The Rising Of The Anomaly - Chapter 148

Damn it, what the hell’s going on here!? I don’t understand this, seriously, what went wrong this time!? It’s definitely not the Crocsnek, I didn’t feel any rumbling, not to mention that the blackout didn’t happen this time.

What’s more…the spread of damage to this building was starting to slow down and settle a bit, which means that what caused the explosion must have been some kind of bomb.

The X-Warrior Zone does manufacture bombs, but they aren’t sold to the public, or even accessible to X-Warriors. It’s hard to believe that someone involved in the manufacture of the bombs would do this, in fact, that’s pretty much impossible. Director Silva assigned only her most trusted subordinates to that task, and I’m fairly confident in her judge of character.

I suppose there’s a possibility that she misjudged one of them, but I highly doubt that…in which case, maybe this was a different explosive, a homemade bomb, perhaps?

There are two factors that I need to find out…first, what kind of explosive was used, and second, who triggered the explosion? But before that, I need to make sure that I can afford to take my time with this…

“<Activate Anomaly, Tier Two: Pause>.”

I then headed over to Training Hall 04, where the final session for my Level Q class was supposed to take place. I pushed the door open and peeked in, letting out a sigh of relief…good, all my classmates are in here.

And more importantly, they’re all alive. Some of them had sustained a bit of damage though, looks like the ceiling had broken down a bit. Zoya had a badly broken shoulder, which she was putting pressure onto with a pained expression.

Makoto was passed out, his right leg absolutely crushed, shards of bone poking out of his excessive flesh, while Instructor Satou was bandaging the stump where his leg used to be, with a nauseous expression on his face.

The others all looked pretty shaken up too, and some of them had a few bruises, bumps and scratches, but nothing broken, not visibly, anyway.

Alright, since they’re all alive, I can afford to investigate before going back and trying to undo this. Yeah, there’s bound to be a bunch of others that are dead, but I can’t afford to concern myself with every single person…if that sounds cruel, I say it’s better than concerning myself with absolutely no one.

Now, then…what should I do? I’ve only got about four minutes worth of frozen time with my remaining XFE level, so I don’t have enough time to go investigate the area where the explosion went off. I’m better off heading back to Director Silva and accessing security cam footage around the Academy building to see if we can find any footage of anyone planting a bomb or something.

Somehow, though…I doubt it’s going to be anywhere near that easy. I then walked away and peered into the other nearby training halls, before finding one that was empty and heading inside towards the teleportation platform at the back of the space.

“<Activate Anomaly, Tier Two: Play>.”

The moment I resumed the flow of time, I immediately contacted Director Silva, giving her a call…after a few rings, she picked up, much to my relief.

“No time to explain, I’m on the teleportation platform in Training Hall 07, I need you to teleport me over there right now!” I urged her.

She didn’t say a word in reply, and a second later, I was in her office, on the teleportation platform. Sofia was here too…I see, they must have scheduled a meeting for this time beforehand, she was here during the Ace Mutant’s attack too, which happened around this time.

“That explosion, do you know anything about it?” Inquired Director Silva immediately.

“No, I don’t, that’s why I’m here, to find out. I thought maybe if we go through security cam footage-,” I began to suggest.

“Not an option, unfortunately…the moment I received word of the explosion, that was the first thing I was going to check, but…for the last twelve hours or so, all the security cameras in and around the Academy have been inactive. I then decided to check the cameras around one of the areas in the underground facility, specifically the area where we’ve been manufacturing and storing bombs…and those cameras had been deactivated too, along with the entrance logs on the security system connected to the metal sliding doors leading into that area,” Explained Director Silva with a frown.

“So the thief wanted to remain anonymous, huh?” Remarked Sofia with a frown.

No offense, but that’s kinda stating the obvious…pretty sure all thieves want to keep their identities hidden. Well, except for the crazy ones that seek infamy, I suppose.

“How many people have the authority to access that area?” I inquired, turning to Director Silva.

“Less than twenty, but I highly doubt that it was any of them…still, one of their I-Watches was definitely used to gain access, because hacking the security system is virtually impossible,” She replied with a shake of her head, “And I don’t have any proof of this, but I’m quite sure that the deactivation of these cameras and the looped footage in the cameras we were concerned with earlier today are both unrelated.”

“Yeah, I think I agree with that. The methods used to sabotage the cameras were very different, and the timings are different too…you said that the looped footage had been going on for a while, but this deactivation thing was all twelve hours ago. Hey, by the way, how would someone unauthorized be able to enter the underground facility anyway?” I asked her.

“That shouldn’t be possible, the security system is pretty complex,” Spoke up Sofia.

“And someone clearly found a loophole,” I countered objectively, “There’s no question that they were able to access a restricted area, so if it really is someone who usually wouldn’t be able to access the underground facility, they must have had an I-Watch belonging to one of those that are authorized with access to it.”

“Hm, the cameras were deactivated a couple of hours after midnight, and knowing those that are assigned to this project, all of them would have been asleep at that time, no doubt about it. They all have teleportation platforms in their homes that can link up with the underground facility, though I suppose it’s not impossible to teleport down there from a different teleportation platform, it’s extremely unlikely though. All of them are currently in the restricted area, working normally, and none of them have reported a missing I-Watch…and even if they hadn’t, I’d have known immediately since they wouldn’t have been able to enter,” Director Silva pointed out, her forehead creasing as she tried to figure this out.

“And you’re absolutely sure it wasn’t one of them?” I pressed her with a raised eyebrow.

“Yeah, I am. It’s not like with the security guards, I trust this team, I wouldn’t have selected them otherwise,” She responded with a confident shake of her head.

“Alright, in that case…do any of them have children, or maybe siblings, somewhere around my age or a bit older?” I inquired, as a thought crossed my mind.

“Well, uh, yes, I guess some of them do…what are you thinking?” She asked curiously.

“Do you think someone related to one of the team members did this?” Added Sofia.

“Not quite sure just yet, I’m still figuring it out…,” I replied, before closing my eyes and focusing, thinking over all the facts.

Damaging the Academy itself probably wasn’t the primary goal of the bomber…if that’s what they’d been after, they’d have chosen a different area to blow up, like a spot near a pillar or wall that was integral to the building structure, or alternatively, used multiple explosions.

Was their target casualties? No, if that had been their goal, they’d have probably blown up the cafeteria during the lunch break instead. At any time during the day, the most crowded spot in the Academy is undoubtedly the cafeteria during lunch break.

So it’s unlikely that all they wanted was to kill a bunch of people…in which case, maybe…

“Hey, where exactly did the explosion happen? I know it was on the first floor where the classrooms are, but do you know which specific classroom it was in?” I inquired, as I felt myself getting close to a realization.

“No, but I will shortly, I sent a team of X-Warriors to investigate the moment I found out about the explosion, they should be arriving any minute,” Director Silva replied, before asking curiously, “Have you figured out what happened? Or at least a hunch?”

“Yeah, I think so…here’s my working theory, one of the bomb manufacturing team member’s child or younger sibling is a student at the Academy, and has a bad relationship with their classmates, maybe they’re getting bullied or something…and having had enough, they stole their parent or siblings’ I-Watch, then used their teleportation platform to get to the underground facility. Normally, an I-Watch shuts off if someone who isn’t the registered user wears it…but that doesn’t apply if they wear something like rubber gloves, does it?” I surmised my theory.

“…that’s right, I-Watches only shut off if an unidentified user touches them with direct skin contact…if they wear gloves or something, it won’t shut off. We’ve been trying to fix that issue, but it’s been a low priority since no one’s really figured out that loophole…well, except you now, I guess,” She sighed with a wry smile, before adding with a serious look on her face, “If you’re right, then whoever this is, must have already known about the manufacture of the bombs, they clearly planned it out carefully.”

“That part’s simple…assuming they’re related to someone on the bomb manufacturing team, they could easily access their laptops and find out,” I pointed out.

“Yeah…yeah, that’s true, and quite likely, actually. Taking notes and typing on a laptop are much easier than doing so on an I-Watch, even though the latter is dozens of times more secure…guess I need to enact some stricter policies,” Sighed Director Silva, before adding, “Well, I think you’ve all but figured it out, all that’s left now is to create and then narrow down the suspect list.”

She then began typing on her laptop furiously, and as I glanced at the screen, saw that she was looking up citizen profiles, specifically those with close ties to her team, and compiling a list of those that could viably have pulled this off.

She was done in a matter of minutes, with a list of seven suspects, three of them were current students at the Academy, two were recent failures of the entrance exam, and one had flunked out of the Academy and the last one had graduated, and was currently a Q-Ranked X-Warrior.

“I think we can narrow these down to just the ones that are current students,” I suggested, after scanning the list closely.

“Are you sure we can eliminate the rest just like that?” She responded doubtfully.

“Yeah, I am,” I replied confidently, before pointing out, “The ones that failed or flunked out, if they had a grudge against the Academy, they’d have bombed a spot that would either have done more structural damage or one that would have resulted in more casualties. Instead, they targeted a classroom, possibly specifically.”

Before she could reply, she suddenly received a notification, her eyes widening as she read the message, before turning to me and stating…

“Looks like we can narrow down the suspects further…the class that the bomb was triggered in was the Level J classroom.”

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