67715


In the Railgun anime's third season in episode 6 at 19:36, Baba orders a type-
Mantis robot to seize Misaka, but as the mantis claw (pretty sure real
mantises don't have claws like that- but I digress) closes in, the screen
blinks white just for an instant (as if to say that moment is too cool or
happens to fast for the viewer to see), and Misaka somehow severs the claw and
some of the arm it is attached to, launching it into the sky. One sees as the
claw arm flies up and when it lands that the separation point looks like a
clean cut, and is red-hot. The screen then shows the mantis looking at what's
left of the arm it tried to grab her with- also showing what looks like a red-
hot, clean cut, where the red-hot quality extends what looks like at least one
hand-breadth into the length of the arm where the separation happened.

[![enter image description
here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/1S44Gs.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/1S44Gs.png)
[![enter image description
here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/LCVqMs.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/LCVqMs.png)
[![enter image description
here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/A9Rwgs.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/A9Rwgs.png)

[![enter image description
here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/KftOxm.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/KftOxm.png)
[![enter image description
here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/BZHGXm.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/BZHGXm.png)

Again, the screen didn't show how it happened. It showed the instants before
and after it happened. Misaka herself is shown standing completely stationary
right up until the moment of "impact" where the screen momentarily whites out,
and again when she is back in the shot (perhaps to call to mind something like
[quick-draw sword combat](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iaijutsu)).

This puzzled me. How did she do it? Which of [her
abilities](https://toarumajutsunoindex.fandom.com/wiki/Misaka_Mikoto/Abilities)
did she use to do it?

She's not shown holding any weapon, and she's wearing gym clothes for the
Daihaseisai festival- I don't see how she could conceal one on her body
capable of doing that.

To my memory, having watched the three seasons of the anime before, and now
being in the process of watching them again, she is never shown doing
something similar or creating a similar effect/outcome (red-hot, clean cut of
metal), so as someone who hasn't read the light novels or their manga
adaptation, I also wonder if this is something that only happens in the anime,
or if it also happens in the light novels and their manga adaptation, and if
so- whether there's any more information there or in any other moments that
explains how she did this. My memory isn't perfect, so maybe I've just
overlooked or forgotten some other similar, clearer moment.

I know she can make a sword out of ironsand (season 1 ep4 at 18:12), but
there's no trace of her using ironsand in this scene, and I'm also a little
doubtful that her ironsand sword would cause more than one hand-breadth of red
heat to linger in the severed arm. Giving a closer look at the scene, 19:16
does seem to show some specks of ironsand materializing out of seemingly
nowhere / her hand, but that does seem awfully subtle.

As part of my research, I also tried to think of other scenarios in the anime
where the opportunity was there to show her using a similar ability. In season
one, there are two scenes against Therestina where Therestina has Misaka in
the clutches of her robotic suit (ep23 at 16:04, and ep24 at 16:18), but in
both those scenes, Misaka is mostly incapacitated by Capacity Down. In season
two, there's the scene where she launches some steel beams at Accelerator and
he reflects them back to her (ep6 at 3:54), but I don't see how such an
ability to cut through metal would save her there, unless cutting the beams
could divert the split sides away from impact with her body (which I find
physically hard to imagine at the speeds they were travelling at), and there's
a short kerfuffle with a powered suit (ep20 at 11:27), but in that fight
scene, Misaka either dodged the suit's physical attacks with its blunt weapon,
or blocked them using a moving stream of ironsand as a shield.


CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-01-23T09:13:37.757
67710
2023-01-31T11:13:48.787
2023-01-24T19:50:32.723
70615
70615
question
a-certain-scientific-railgun
How did Misaka sever this type-Mantis robot's arm? With her bare hands?


Is likely her signature iron sand.

In chapter 52 of the Railgun manga, which is anime is adapted from, for the
most part, we see her gathering what looks to be iron sand (second panel).

[![Iron sand is
charggging](https://i.stack.imgur.com/OcjR0m.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/OcjR0.jpg).

On the next page we see a stoke of black, reminiscent of a veil of black iron
sand.

[![next
pg](https://i.stack.imgur.com/VESK2m.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/VESK2.jpg)

The second attack is clearly a lighting spear strike and more of a severing
attack than a slicing one.

[![spear
atk](https://i.stack.imgur.com/3Pj6nm.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/3Pj6n.jpg)


CC BY-SA 4.0
2023-01-24T11:19:23.913
67715
2023-01-31T11:13:48.787
2023-01-31T11:13:48.787
70615
63
67710
answer