Chapter 193: The Plan to Save the Misaka Sisters

The next day, George woke up and resumed his invisible surveillance of Misaka.

Since it was summer vacation, there were no classes, and Misaka had nothing much to do. She spent the day wandering aimlessly around Academy City.

At one point, she encountered a group of elementary school students just beginning to develop their abilities. She played soccer with them for a while before being drawn to a small frog badge on a little girl's backpack. This led her to spend the entire day battling a capsule machine to collect badges.

'Kids will be kids,' George thought.

After following Misaka for the entire day and finding no useful information, George began considering abandoning his surveillance of her to explore on his own.

However, things took a turn in the evening. Misaka encountered Clone No. 9982, the one created after him.

Misaka seemed to care deeply about the fact that she had been cloned and wanted to find the laboratory responsible through the clones. She even seemed to view the clones as her younger sisters.

This gave George an idea.

Initially, he hadn’t been particularly concerned about the more than 10,000 clones still alive and had no plans to save them. However, since Misaka, the original, cared so much, he wondered if he could use her influence to help the clones integrate into Academy City and live openly.

If successful, George himself, as a clone, could also live openly here, making it easier to develop his abilities and search for traces of magic.

On paper, his identity was simple: Misaka Clone No. 9981, albeit one that had undergone a slight mutation, resulting in significantly enhanced abilities.

On a pedestrian bridge, Clone No. 9982 spoke to Misaka:
"Misaka is heading to an experiment and won’t be returning to the lab. Sister, you’re free to follow Misaka, but you won’t find the people who created her."

Misaka's plan fell through, and after a childish scuffle, she reluctantly parted ways with Clone No. 9982.

“These clones don’t seem completely devoid of emotion. That’s good—it means I won’t stand out as much,” George thought as he hovered invisibly in the air, observing.

He had initially believed that the clones, lacking emotional programming, were no different from robots. However, today’s observations suggested otherwise. The clones were like blank slates, force-fed knowledge but without normal development, which gave them a robotic demeanor.

With normal growth, they might not be so different from ordinary people.

Clone No. 9982, for instance, had clearly begun to regard Misaka as her elder sister during their hours together, even displaying a sense of dependency. She had also taken the frog badge Misaka had spent the entire day obtaining as a gift.

“Do you want to know the truth?”

Under the pedestrian bridge, George deactivated his invisibility as Misaka descended.

Seeing another clone identical to herself, Misaka's eyes widened in shock. “Who are you?”

“I’m Misaka Clone No. 9981. The one you just met is No. 9982. The lab has created a total of 20,000 Misaka clones,” George said calmly.

Misaka grabbed George’s arm tightly. “What’s going on?”

“Have you heard of the Level 6 Shift Experiment?”

Unbothered by her grip, which was weak to him, George slowly explained the details of the Level 6 Shift Experiment to Misaka.

“Before me, 9,980 clones had already been killed. Last night, I was also supposed to die at Accelerator’s hands. But at the brink of death, something awakened within me—a survival instinct, a sense of self-awareness—and I managed to escape.

The so-called ‘experiment’ that No. 9982 mentioned earlier is essentially her going off to die.”

George told her about the process in brief.

“This is beyond absurd! Killing me 128 times, using clones to replace me—this is madness!”

Misaka trembled, her face a mix of fury and disbelief. She had always known Academy City harbored its share of darkness, but she couldn’t fathom such inhumanity.

“If you don’t believe me, we can follow No. 9982 right now. You’ll see for yourself,” George said, turning toward the pedestrian bridge.

“The experiments always start at 9 PM. This is still ten minutes left,” he added.

Misaka hesitated, recalling the files she had seen about the “Mass-Produced Ability User Project.” She had already begun to believe most of what George said.

She turned and followed him. She couldn’t let another clone like No. 9982 die.

Due to their shared brainwave connection, George and Misaka quickly caught up with Clone No. 9982. However, George stopped Misaka from approaching.

“She likely has monitoring devices on her. Let’s stay back and follow her.”

“What’s your plan?” Misaka asked as she watched No. 9982 enter a deserted alleyway, retrieve a pre-prepared submachine gun, and wait silently.

The calm and mature demeanor of Clone No. 9981 suggested he already had a plan in mind.

George nodded.

“There are two ways to stop the Level 6 Shift Experiment.

First, we convince Accelerator to abandon the experiment. Without a test subject, there’s no need for clones to die. The challenge, however, is that if Accelerator refuses, we might not be strong enough to stop him.

Second, we find the research labs behind the experiment and destroy all their facilities and data. Without their infrastructure, the experiment can’t continue.

The issue is that there are over twenty labs spread across Academy City. Unless we destroy them all simultaneously while catching them off guard, they could relocate and resume the experiment later.”

“Then let’s go with the first option. Accelerator will appear in a few minutes. I’ll convince him to withdraw from this experiment!”

Electric currents surged across Misaka's body.

Destroying over twenty research labs simultaneously seemed impossible. The only option was to make Accelerator abandon the plan—persuasion if possible, force if necessary.

Although Accelerator outranked her, Misaka was confident in her own abilities.

“Very well. Let me tell you everything I know about Accelerator,” George said.

He quickly relayed all the information stored in his mind about Accelerator.

The Misaka clones had battled Accelerator 9,980 times. The experience from those fights was transmitted through the Misaka Network to every subsequent clone, and George had access to this data as well.