A Scientific Urban Detective

"……No, I'm not going back yet," the girl in the denim jacket shook her head, the Aquarius-shaped earrings swaying. "Let me play with them a little longer..."

Her eyes locked onto a figure active on the street, she snorted coldly, and stood up to leave.

The empty orange soda can was left on the table.

As she walked out of the store, she saw the balloons used for decoration at the entrance and casually took one.

Although the clerk at the door noticed, they didn't stop her since she was a customer.

"Something seems to be happening on the street," a colleague who was working with her said. "The thunder just now was so scary, I almost spilled a customer's drink..."

"Be careful, or you'll get scolded by the customer and the manager." As she spoke, the clerk deftly cleared the empty can from the table by the window.

"Bang!"

The girl in the denim jacket imitated the sound of an explosion, but the balloon in her hand remained intact.

However, a little girl in front of her was startled and squatted down to protect her head.

"Haha, don't be afraid, I'm just teasing you." The girl smiled and gave the balloon in her hand to the little girl. "Here, this is for you."

"Thank you~" The girl reached out to take it, and then said in surprise, "This balloon is so heavy!"

"That's because it's filled with heavy gas instead of hydrogen. It's a rare find!"

"Oh, thank you, big sister!" The little girl thanked her again, still a little confused.

"Okay, go play." The girl waved her hand, bidding her farewell. "Also, good children should be considerate and not litter. Even if you don't want this balloon anymore, you can't throw it away."

"What should I do then?"

"You can give it to someone else," the girl said with a smile. "Like the discipline committee big brother. The busybody discipline committee member will definitely not refuse."

Watching the little girl walk away along the sidewalk, the girl put away the kind smile on her face, a sneer on her lips: "Lin Wuming, Kiyama Harumi..."

Among the group of five, only these two were level 3—relatively the lowest level, making them the perfect targets.

And Lin Wuming, who had repeatedly discovered key clues and solved cases, was an even more essential target to eliminate first.

—Otherwise, with his investigative and reasoning abilities, he might soon find the "underground arena" that's truly suitable for you, right? You should thank me, Madarame Komugi!

Just as she expected, after holding the heavy gas balloon for a while, the little girl quickly grew tired of it—not only could this balloon not float, but it was also heavy and cumbersome to hold.

But there were no trash cans nearby, and the big sister who gave her the balloon said she couldn't just throw it away, she had to give it to someone else.

Just ahead, she saw a discipline committee member wearing an armband patrolling.

The little girl ran over...

"We found something," Kiyama Harumi looked up at the others. "Headquarters has the latest information. There seems to be a discovery about the 'Explosion Maniac's' identity."

"—Metokago Kama, female, 15 years old, ability is level 4 'High-Pressure Vessel,'" Kiyama Harumi read out the email from headquarters. "Former second-year student at Kirigaoka Girls' Academy Junior High School, dropped out a year ago for personal reasons, currently missing."

"Missing? That sounds super suspicious!" Ruiko Saten said.

"Level 4 esper, 'High-Pressure Vessel'?" Lin Wuming thought. "That perfectly fits the circumstances of this case."

According to the photo in the file, Metokago Kama was a tall girl with light brown curly hair, her eyes half-hidden by her bangs, giving off an overall gloomy feeling.

"What does 'missing' mean?" Mikoto Misaka asked.

"It means exactly what it says. Her classmates, teachers, and friends have no idea where she is," Kiyama Harumi explained. "We can't find her through any channels."

What she didn't say was that, generally speaking, "missing" could often be equated with "accidental death." For various reasons, similar situations were not uncommon in Academy City.

And people often didn't delve too deeply.

In addition, Lin Wuming also knew that "missing" could also mean being involved in a secret experiment, or joining a secret organization like an dark side organization, thereby concealing their whereabouts in the surface world...

Now it seemed that if the "Explosion Maniac" was really this Metokago Kama, she undoubtedly belonged to the fourth situation—missing, faking death to escape, and becoming a criminal.

"Can her ability create explosions of this power?" Lin Wuming asked, pointing to the sky.

"Yes," Kiyama Harumi gave a definite answer. "The highest record for 'High-Pressure Vessel' is the ability to create a super-high-pressure environment of a million atmospheres, its performance exceeding the load limits of most high-pressure containers in the world."

The power of such high-pressure gas bursting would be no less than that of a high explosive.

The discipline committee's reaction speed was already very fast. After determining that the explosion was formed by high-pressure gas rather than explosives, it took them less than an hour to identify the suspect.

—Half of that time was spent running procedures and applying for library access.

"In any case, let's first try to find this Metokago Kama," Lin Wuming said.

"Headquarters is taking action," Kiyama Harumi said. "In a few more minutes, our support will arrive, and we won't have to be so tense..."

As she was speaking, she suddenly saw a little girl running towards them, holding a balloon in her arms.

Since the nearby pedestrians had been evacuated by them, the sudden appearance of the girl seemed very abrupt at this moment.

"Wuming!" Influenced by the little boys from before, Kiyama Harumi's nerves tensed up subconsciously.

Although she wasn't kicking a can, this girl was holding a bigger balloon!

"Balloon, very similar!" Kiyama Harumi said quickly—she saw through her "clairvoyance ability" that the inside of the balloon was very similar to the previous soda can!

Lin Wuming immediately took action, using his telekinetic ability to directly take the balloon from the girl's hand, repeating his old trick of throwing it into the sky.

But this time, the "bomb's" reaction speed was even faster, and it had already begun to expand as soon as it left the girl's arms...

Lin Wuming's expression changed drastically. His telekinetic ability was limited and couldn't withstand the close-range explosion of the "High-Pressure Vessel"!

Unfortunately, Ruiko Saten was far away, and her strong defense couldn't be used at this time.

—Continue to lift the balloon bomb, or focus his telekinetic ability to protect the little girl? But if he protected her, he wouldn't be able to protect himself..."

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