"What?"
Tatsumaki's voice was filled with surprise once again.
She could feel it, her superpower was somehow being neutralized, disappearing at an astonishing rate.
The green light covering the enormous chunks of buildings vanished along with it. Once Tatsumaki's psychic power stopped holding them up, gravity took over, and the debris came crashing down piece after piece, hitting the ground with heavy thuds and kicking up thick clouds of dust.
"This…" Fubuki's eyes widened slightly at the sight.
'Ching…'
The Prana surging through Sylvia's body gradually settled down, and her purple eyes slowly opened as she looked toward Tatsumaki.
Tatsumaki immediately understood that the reason her superpower had suddenly stopped working had something to do with Sylvia. It was just like when she had used her psychic power to restrain Fubuki earlier, only for that restraint to suddenly shatter.
"You…" Tatsumaki frowned, glaring at Sylvia. "What did you do?"
Sylvia smiled faintly. "I merely interfered with your mind a little."
In fact, Sylvia had already started considering this strategy after Fang Li told her about Tatsumaki and objectively explained just how powerful she was. At the time, Sylvia didn't know exactly how strong Tatsumaki was. But since Fang Li had said that Sylvia would probably have a hard time defeating her without a means of countering superpowers, she had no reason to doubt him.
After that, Sylvia had also consulted Fubuki, a Level 5 esper, about the subject.
"So, what exactly are superpowers in this world?"
Starting with that question, Sylvia had learned a great deal about superpowers from Fubuki.
As mentioned before, superpowers in this world were essentially psychokinesis. Fang Li had told Sylvia the same thing.
"There may also be other types of powers in this world, such as precognition."
But when people generally talked about superpowers, they were still referring to psychokinesis.
According to Fubuki, psychokinesis was essentially manifested mental power. It was closely connected to a person's mind and brain. If someone's mental power was sufficiently strong, in other words, if their willpower was exceptionally strong, they could even develop resistance to superpowers and avoid being controlled by them.
For example, Tatsumaki had used her psychic power to restrain Fubuki earlier. If Tatsumaki wanted to, she could even twist someone trapped by her psychic power into a mess of flesh like a piece of rope. But if that person's mental power and will were strong enough, they could resist the force to a certain extent and prevent themselves from being completely affected.
Therefore, superpowers were directly tied to mental power and willpower. If a Level 5 esper suffered an injury to the brain, they might even become unable to use their superpower. And even if they could still use it, its strength would be greatly reduced. This clearly showed that the strength of a superpower was directly proportional to the user's mental power.
After learning this, Sylvia had begun to think: 'If I can weaken a Level 5 esper's mental state and affect their mind, wouldn't I be able to neutralize their superpower?'
Sylvia was no stranger to such methods. Back when she was in War-Academy City, she had been subjected to Valda's spiritual attacks. Determined not to let something like that happen again, she had begun researching ways to defend against spiritual attacks.
Later, after arriving in Academy City, Sylvia obtained the Original Grimoire known as 'The Gospel', a grimoire rumored to contain techniques and spells capable of bringing happiness to people. The spells recorded within it were primarily concerned with manipulating people's minds and mental states.
After years of research, Sylvia had long since developed an ability related to the mind. Now, she had made some subtle adjustments to that ability so that it could specifically target the mental power of Level 5 espers.
Tatsumaki was indeed incredibly powerful. But her overwhelming strength was built almost entirely upon her extraordinary superpower. In other words, once her superpower was neutralized, anyone could defeat her.
And now, Sylvia had neutralized Tatsumaki's superpower.
"A Level 5 esper's power is heavily influenced by their state of mind. That's true even for ordinary Level 5 espers, so for someone as powerful as you, Tatsumaki, it's even more unavoidable, isn't it?" Sylvia calmly explained. "The more powerful the psychic power you use, the more stable your mental state has to remain. So as long as I can shake your mental state even slightly, your superpower will lose control and disappear."
That was the effect of Sylvia's song.
Of course, Tatsumaki had no idea how it worked. Just like everyone else, she simply regarded Sylvia as a Level 5 esper. So when she heard that Sylvia could use her superpower to interfere with another person's mental state, Tatsumaki was genuinely shocked. She had never heard of using a superpower that way.
But her surprise lasted for only a split second.
"Don't think you can beat me with little tricks like that!" Tatsumaki shouted. "When it comes to superpowers, you're still far too inexperienced to compete with me!"
As soon as she finished speaking, the green light around Tatsumaki's body surged again.
'BOOM…!'
With an explosive roar, the air surrounding Tatsumaki seemed to be stirred by an invisible giant hand. In an instant, it transformed into an astonishing tornado. Centered around Tatsumaki, it shot straight into the sky, reaching all the way into the clouds.
The tornado's power was terrifying. It swept up the enormous chunks of building debris that had just fallen to the ground, ripping apart the earth and sending fragments of asphalt flying into the air. In the blink of an eye, the tornado grew to a colossal scale, large enough for the residents of A-City to clearly see it from afar.
The berserk winds then spread outward from the tornado, sweeping through the entire area.
"Ugh…!" Green light flickered around Fubuki's body as she desperately resisted the raging winds, raising an arm to shield her face.
'Th-This is too powerful…!'
It was stronger than any superpower Fubuki had ever seen Tatsumaki use in her memory.
'S-So this is Elder Sister's full power…!'
Fubuki's heart began trembling as well.
Even Sylvia's expression grew solemn, and she couldn't help but smile bitterly to herself.
'She's even stronger than I imagined…'
Could her song really neutralize such overwhelming power? For the first time, Sylvia began to wonder.
But the doubt lasted only a split second. Because even so…
"I don't want to give up that easily either…"
Prana rose from Sylvia's body like a blinding radiance. As though challenging the enormous tornado head-on, it transformed into a pillar of light and shot straight into the sky.
An astonishing battle was about to begin.
(End Of This Chapter)
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