Characters / A Certain Magical Index Accelerator

A Certain Magical Index / Scientific Railgun / Scientific Accelerator character index
Main Characters
Touma Kamijou | Accelerator | Railgun's Main Cast (Mikoto Misaka)
Science Side
The Level 5s | The Teachers and Students of Academy City | Academy City Founders, Researchers and Law Enforcement
Academy City's Dark Side | The Sisters | Other Science Side Characters
Magic Side
England and its Allies | The Roman Catholic Church | GREMLIN | True GREMLIN | Other Magic Side Characters
Other Characters
Other Light Novel, Manga, and Anime Characters | Audio Drama, Video Game, and Movie Characters

Accelerator

He Who Wields the Power of God

^{Click here to see Accelerator's old outfit}

Voiced by: Nobuhiko Okamoto (Japanese) and Austin Tindle (English)

The #1 ranked Level 5 Esper in Academy City. Having long forgotten his name, he is only ever referred to by his ability's name: Accelerator.

Accelerator's ability grants him the power to manipulate and control the vectors of anything that his body comes into contact with. His most common use of this power is for defensive purposes, termed "Reflection", in which his entire body is surrounded by a field that will automatically reverse the direction of any harmful vector that comes his way. Accelerator is also more than capable of using his ability in a more active way, known as "Vector Control, with which he can use to achieve a wide range of effects, such as knocking around shipping crates with a light touch, flying with tornado wings, and even reversing a person's blood flow.

He was part of an experiment called "Level 6 Shift", which ostensibly aims to turn him into the first Level 6 Esper by having him kill 20,000 of Mikoto's clone Sisters—only to be stopped dead by Touma. After the experiment was canceled and some soul searching, he pulls off a Heel–Face Turn and starts on his long and hard path to redemption by saving and protecting the very last Sister created, a little girl named "Last Order", at the expense of getting shot in the head and having his power now be reliant on the very same Sisters that he had been killing en masse.

He stars in his own spinoff manga, A Certain Scientific Accelerator, which shows off some of his adventures before his reintegration as a protagonist in the Index novels.

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A-D

• '90s Anti-Hero: Accelerator is an anime version of this type of Anti-Hero, despite being lanky and thin instead of overly muscled. He's snarky, edgy, and very much 'did what I had to do' in attitude. He sees other Villainous characters as pathetic and tries to teach them how a 'Real' villain should act, usually by toying with them and all but torturing them.
• Above Good and Evil: What he ultimately becomes after his Character Development following his rematch with Touma and confronting Misaka Worst. Ironically, this makes him much closer to being like Touma just as he decides it isn't worth trying.
• Achilles' Heel:
  • Due to the nature of his Auto-Reflect ability, expertly timed pulled punches can get attracted to him instead of being reflected.
  • Accelerator can't reflect something if he doesn't know the correct vector equations for it, which will reduce the effectiveness of his barrier anywhere from simply deflecting the attack instead of reflecting it completely (most forms of magical attacks which have different vector equations than a physical attack) to getting bypassed (objects which do not follow normal laws of physics, such as Kakine's Dark Matter, in which case he has to manually 'feel' and find out the correct vector calculations to redirect it). Finally, he can't redirect any attack which has no vector equation in the first place (i.e. scalar quantities), which is why he speculates voodoo doll-like effects might be able to bypass his AIM.
  • Accelerator still requires air to breathe, light to see and sound to hear, so his Reflector ability allows some things to go through. Meaning that someone who can control matter indirectly like Kakine and his Dark Matter can turn interactions Accelerator normally calculates as "safe" harmful.
  • Since his brain injury, he needs an electrode collar to walk and talk, let alone use his powers. Consequently, he can be incapacitated by messing with the electrode or simply making him fight long enough to exhaust the battery.
• Adaptational Badass: In the Sisters Arc, the novel explicitly makes it clear about Accelerator's physical weakness; Touma merely uses basic jabs to fight back, but due to Accelerator's lack of endurance it is equivalent to getting hit by a heavyweight boxer. The anime and manga of both Index and Railgun however show Accelerator tank Touma's right straights and hooks (which require more power than jabs to knock out an opponent) and keep fighting even when logically a single hook would've knocked Accelerator out cold (though it slightly Justified in Railgun's case as the fight is viewed from Mikoto and Accel's POV).
• Adaptive Ability: In order to bypass Accelerator's Attack Reflector Kakine deduces that it only works with particles Accelerator can calculate the vectors of, so he uses Dark Matter ability which doesn't follow the world's physics. After getting hit a couple of times, Accelerator simply adds this new ability to his math and renders it ineffective.
• Always Someone Better: Though he will loathe to admit it, Accelerator sees Touma as his personal idol, and as time goes by, he adopts his philosophy, at least until the later stages of New Testament.
• Always Save the Girl: Last Order, Esther, Hasami, Index, Yomikawa, Yoshikawa, Misaka WORST, Fremea, Birdway (almost in New Testament Volume 3), Qliphah Puzzle 545, etc. At this rate, like Touma he will also end up with an Unwanted Harem.
• All Guys Want Sorority Women: Played for Laughs, but seriously, It's a wonder why he puts up with Misaka WORST.
• Alternate Character Reading: His given name is spelled in kanji as "一方通行" (one-way road).
• Antagonist Abilities: He has a passive Attack Reflector so effective that not even Misaka, who's also a Level 5 Esper, can touch him. Should he go on the offensive, he has a Touch of Death that blows up his opponent's heart by reversing their blood flow or their bioelectricity. And that's not even mentioning the myriad applications of his Superpower Lottery... though he eventually becomes a protagonist.
• Anti-Hero: He is a card carrying example of the '90s Anti-Hero. He has a rough but simple name, is ridiculously powerful, doesn't care about hurting people who get in his way, and is a badass with angst and sarcasm to boot.
• Arc Villain: The main antagonist of the Sisters Arc.
• Armored But Frail: Accelerator is physically underdeveloped due to his powers protecting him from things like muscle tearing ultraviolet lights, meaning that he is very easy to take down if he is forced to fight physically. His esper powers makes it so that he is almost never in a situation where someone can actually punch him out.
• Attack Reflector: His Redirection ability automatically reverses any oncoming vector he runs into. As a result, he's nigh-untouchable against the vast majority of attacks in the series. There are only a handful of ways to get around this, including pulling back one's fist as it approaches Accelerator so that it will reverse the vector back into Accelerator's face (which takes ungodly precise timing), using an attack that doesn't follow the normal laws of physics (i.e. magic and Dark Matter), or to negate it all together (the way Touma does).
• The Atoner: To his credit, Accelerator has come to know the error of his ways and is trying to be a better person. Not that he's going to be particularly nice about it, though.
• Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: Briefly at the end of World War III, in which his black distorted wings turn pure white as he ascends to the Aeon of Horus. It happens again near the very end of New Testament when he defeats Coronzon by creating a whole new cosmic tree based on science, unlike the magical Kabbalistic Tree of Life, signified by his white wings briefly turning into platinum, similar to Aiwass.
• Awesomeness by Analysis: Very good at reverse engineering techniques and devices, can learn on the fly how to convert air into plasma, can comprehend the movements of electrons, and able to figure out the correct vector calculations to manipulate Dark Matter.
• Ax-Crazy: Throughout his initial appearances, though it's worth noting that even before his Heel–Face Turn, he never attacked random people; he'd actually prefer to just be left alone. Only if you attacked him first would he retaliate as brutally as possible. He participated in the Level 6 Shift project under the notion that the clones he was killing weren't actual people (helped by their near-inhuman lack of emotion or sense of self-preservation) and expressed reluctance about the possibility of having to kill Touma for seeing the experiment, becoming more giddy about it when Touma insisted on challenging him. In fact, he was even rather friendly and cordial when he met the first Misaka clone, and only became extremely jaded and cynical after discovering what the experiment actually entailed.
  • As of New Testament, after ascending to the Age of Horus, he shows a composed and cool attitude towards his opponents and refrains from killing them, as Umidori can attest.
• Badass Boast: Has many of these moments.
  "I strive for something beyond the strongest, that challenging me would be the most ridiculous thought ever, that fighting me would be an unforgivable sin!"
  
  "The strongest in Academy City? Level 6? Your pathetic titles don't do me justice. Nothing in existence can stop The Accelerator!"
• Belligerent Sexual Tension: With Musujime Awaki (they even mockingly call one another husband and wife), and later on, Misaka WORST.
• Berserk Button: After his Heel–Face Turn, dehumanizing the Sisters (and especially Last Order) provokes Accelerator into going on a warpath. This is why he goes after Awaki and destroys the Tree Diagram Remnant; he will not have a potential repeat of the Level 6 Shift.
• Big Brother Instinct: He sees Last Order like a little sister and so he spends time with her and looks out for her.
• Big Damn Heroes: Much like Touma, he's begun to develop a habit of doing this, which generally translates as "You're all screwed" for the opposing party.
• Black-and-White Insanity: Suffers from this for quite a while, until Touma tells him it's a load of crap.
• Blessed with Suck: His powers make him the strongest Esper in Academy City and currently the only one who can reach Level 6 without losing his mind, but they also make everyone else intensely interested in him. Said interest got to the point where he was causing destruction at an incredibly young age (not helped by the fact by then he was barely able to control his powers). He also has to consciously let light enter his eyes and gravity affect his body.
• Blood Knight: While he does enjoy his fights, he would really like to avoid getting into them in the first place. In fact, that's the reason why he sought more power in the first place.
• Blow You Away: One of his most common uses of his power as the series goes on. One time, he even boasts that the entire atmosphere is his weapon.
• Boring, but Practical: Compared to the myriad of applications that Accelerator can (and has) use with his ability as well as his wings, his most famous usage of it, Reflection, ultimately comes down to simply reversing the vector of anything harmful coming towards him (in maths terms, he simply multiplies any incoming vector by "-1"). Because of this, he is invincible to to a good majority of attacks and powers in the series, and he is The Dreaded as a result.
• Breakout Character: Was so popular with the fans that he was redeemed and made the Deuteragonist. He also got his own manga spinoff in late 2013.
• Broken Bird: For a good part of the series, to the point of calling himself a villain beyond all redemption, but since his rematch with Touma, he has stopped caring about good and evil, realizing it only weighs him down from his new sworn duty to protect his friends.
• Broken Ace: He is pretty much good at everything he does. He even displayed a perfect control at a subatomic level and considering his tormented childhood, he's this, at least until Volume 22, where he turns over a new leaf.
• Brought Down to Normal: Played with. After Volume 5, he can only use his powers when his brain is connected to the MISAKA Network, thus making him somewhat of a normal. But then he "awakens" his true nature of Esper powers and can now regain his full power plus some by summoning black, angelic wings at the cost of losing all control. Then he ascends into the Aeon of Horus, gaining white wings and capable of retaining his mind.
• Brought Down to Badass: On two separate occasions (the fight against the Hound Dogs in the warehouse during the September 30 incident, and during the Skill-Out uprising shortly afterward) he has found himself facing a large number of armed Level 0s with only a handgun to defend himself. He still manages to take down all his foes and accomplish his objectives.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Even post-Heel–Face Turn, he'd still consider himself already way beyond redemption. Touma and Last Order would beg to digress, and as of New Testament he's finally succeeding in leading a new life.
• Catch and Return: While he typically just reflects attacks by flipping the directional value, he can also catch an attack and amplify it before throwing it by simply increasing the magnitude as well. Leads to moments where he teams up with Hyouka Kazakiri and Shizuri Mugino, catches their blasts and makes them more powerful before throwing them at the enemy.
• Character Development: He's introduced as an Ax-Crazy antagonist in Volume 3 with a Dark and Troubled Past. After a humbling defeat by Touma and gaining a sense of purpose in protecting Last Order, this trope is in full force. Being Brought Down to Normal is his Laser-Guided Karma devastating enough to make him reconsider his actions and, in a twist of Irony, defend one of the last surviving Sisters as part of his long hard path to redemption.
• The Comically Serious: Watching him fight with Last Order or get caught up in any sort of comedy scene is hilarious because of how he acts most of the time.
• Death Glare: His default expression, though it is noted he has developed a softer expression and voice around small girls, like Last Order and Birdway, which the latter lampshades.
• Death Seeker: He's trying to redeem himself for all his sins, so he tries to protect the remaining Sisters and the people he cares for even if at the cost of his life. In New Testament Vol 6, Shizuri Mugino (who is also trying to redeem herself) calls him out on how stupid this is, saying it's better to struggle to live, so that they can continue to protect their loved ones.
• Defeat Means Friendship: Sort of. While they never become actual friends, he develops a profound respect for Touma after his first defeat. Following his second defeat at Touma's hands, and snapping him out of his Heroic BSoD, he ends up practically worshipping him as an idol.
• Deuteragonist: He essentially becomes the second protagonist after Touma since his defeat.
• Drama-Preserving Handicap: Due to his brain damage, he can only use his powers while being connected to the MISAKA Network using his battery-powered choker, which works for 15 minutes at a time. He is later given a new one from GROUP technicians with double the operating time. Still, because the Sisters can't match him in sheer processing power, even then his calculation ability is weaker than before. His connection to the Network can also be disrupted by electromagnetic forces or somewhere deep underground.
  • Also, his employers put a kill switch in his new choker to disable it when he goes against what they want. Accelerator later recovers his choker's blueprint from Heaven Canceller to attempt to build a new one, only to see that it is nearly impossible. He instead uses his custom cane in Volume 19 to discover what frequency is used to mess with his choker, and blocks it out using a sort of jammer installed in his cane.
  • Whenever he "awakens" his black wings, all of the above-mentioned handicaps no longer apply, as his wings give him more than enough computational ability to match and even surpass him when his brain was intact. He does have a new handicap though, since he cannot control himself whenever the black wings manifest. After he ascends to the Aeon of Horus and gains white wings, even that no longer applies to him.
• The Dreaded: Everyone in Academy City fears him, with the exception of Touma, Shiage, Last Order, his legal guardians, and some bullies who are Too Dumb to Live. This is invoked by him, in which he maintains this fearsome image so others won't mess with him, not that stops some of them though.
• Dude Looks Like a Lady: When they first meet, Last Order asks him if he is a guy or a girl because she can't really tell. Accelerator explains that repelling sunlight made his gender hormones underdeveloped.

E-M

• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Back when he was a villain, he couldn't fathom why Mikoto and Touma were trying to stop him from killing the Sisters. He concluded that Mikoto's reason was that she was embarrassed that people with her face were being slaughtered so easily. This was a result of him rationalizing his actions by telling himself the sisters weren't really humans.
• Even Evil Has Standards: This is lampshaded by him several times:
  • He says it to a maintenance crew member.
    "They may all look the same to you, but there are different kinds and different levels of evil. A first-class villain doesn't target honest lives."
  • He says this almost word for ward during his fight with Kakine. in volume 15.
    "Fine, now is a good time to teach you something; even villains have standards!"
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": Not even Accelerator remembers his original name, thus he considers "Accelerator" his name, so it could technically be a case of His Name Really Is "Barkeep".
• Evil Laugh: Does this a lot, and it's pretty spectacular in the anime.
  "KHKHKHKHKHKHKHKHKUKUKUKHIKAKAKAKAKAKAKA!!!!"
• Facepalm Of Doom: Gives one to Amata Kihara just before killing him.
• Failed a Spot Check: Back before his brain damage, he often uses his powers to filter out unwanted background noises, so he would sometimes fail to notice events happening around him.
• Fight Off the Kryptonite: When fighting Amata for the last time. Not only can the latter nullify Accelerator's powers, but can hit him. Accelerator keeps attacking until his collar battery runs out, removing his powers and mental ability completely. Despite being in a state where he shouldn't be able to think, let alone stand, Accelerator gets back up and keeps fighting, doing more damage than he did with his powers, largely because his "strategy" caught Amata off-guard. Accelerator keeps this up for a while until he awakens for the first time, where it elevates to a Curb-Stomp Battle.
• Fights Like a Normal: With his handicap Accelerator uses guns and weapons while dping missions with GROUP. He drops this after ascending and gaining more power.
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: The Mage to Touma's Fighter and Shiage's Thief.
• Finger Poke of Doom: With a single touch, he can pulverize objects or reverse the blood flow in people.
• Fingore: Touma broke his left index finger in the Railgun version of their fight in the Sisters arc.
• Flight: From manipulating air into mini-tornadoes behind his back.
• Gender Flip: Yes, Accelerator has one called Yuriko Suzushina! What started as a joke on Accelerator's gender by the novel artist, Yuriko became a hit with the fans.
• Godhood Seeker: His goal early on was to become so powerful that it “would be a sin” to fight him.
• Good Costume Switch: Following his Heel–Face Turn, Accelerator starts to wear white color outfits.
• Good with Numbers: His calculation skills are phenomenal, so much so that it takes the remaining 9,969 Sisters to replicate these skills after he loses them to brain damage.
• Good Is Not Nice: Accelerator doesn't hold back his harsh attitude even to those he is sworn to protect.
• Good Is Not Soft: Following his Heel–Face Turn, the most you could probably say about how much the way he deals with problems has changed is that a) they probably aren't all dead and b) he's become more concerned about dragging innocent people into the crossfire. It seems he still can't really wrap his head around the concept of "property damage" yet, though.
• Gravity Master: Gravity is nothing but another vector. He even has to consciously allow it to affect him.
• Green-Eyed Monster: He idolizes and at the same time is jealous of Touma for his ability to save people without using lethal force.
• The Gunslinger: After Volume 13 he almost always carries a pistol in case he can't find a good time to use Redirect. If he doesn't, he'll usually strip a hapless mook off. And while not quite as good as Shiage, he is still very deadly with one.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: It's not hard to get Accelerator into a bad mood, courtesy of a childhood of dealing with violence.
• Handicapped Badass: Even after getting shot in the head and needing a cane to walk most of the time, he's still the #1 Esper.
• Heel–Face Turn: A good deal of his character arc is spent Deconstructing how phenomenally difficult it is for someone who's spent most of his life as a Heel and killed thousands of people to reform, and equally important, to consider himself a Face.
• Heel Realization: In Railgun, we see the fight with Touma from his perspective. Touma's words coupled with the actions of the Sisters has it finally sink in that the Sisters are alive. He keeps fighting, but he doesn't keep fighting competently because he just doesn't want to win anymore. Further, part of Nunotaba's plan was the hope that if he saw the Sisters actually hesitating or afraid to go through with the experiment he might have a crisis of conscience and refuse to continue but Last Order herself blocked that plan.
• Heroic BSoD: A few times. His worst is in Volume 20, when he was forced to fight Misaka WORST, resulting in him losing all faith in the world and lashing out against in with Black Wings mode. It took a visit from Touma to snap him out of it. He also suffers another major one in New Testament volume 6 when he faces the resurrected Kakine, who recreates the Misaka Sisters to remind him of his traumas.
• Heroic Neutral: Long before he joined the Level 6 Esper project, Accelerator was a frequent target of assassinations and unscrupulous researchers because of his tremendous powers, and was forced to kill to protect himself. This simple desire to be left the hell alone eventually led him to join the Level 6 experiment, under the reasoning that since his powers won't go away the only way the get people to leave him be is to become so powerful that the idea of fighting him is an absurdity. After Touma beats the snot out of him, he becomes a slightly more traditional example, being mainly concerned with Last Order and a small group of his closest associates.
• Heroic RRoD: During the WWIII arc he has to cast a spell to save Last Order. It works, but he damn near explodes in the process.
• Heroic Sacrifice: He doesn’t die, but saving Last Order from Amai’s virus required him to shut off his Attack Reflector in order to focus all his calculating power on ensuring he doesn't make a mistake and end up irreparably damaging Last Order's mind, leaving him vulnerable to a gunshot that causes irreparable brain damage.
• Heroic Wannabe: Since his Heel–Face Turn he wants to be a hero like Touma, to the point he imitates him by using only his right hand. In Volume 20, he comments that using the right hand doesn't suit him.
• Heroic Willpower: In Volume 15, after losing his mind against Kakine, he goes on a rampage, causing massive destruction. Even then there’s only one thing he doesn't do: kill.
• Hero-Worshipper: He becomes something of a Touma fan after his defeat. It seems to be subverted by New Testament 6, though.
• He Who Fights Monsters: He's from the Dark Side of Academy City.
• Hey, You!: He hardly ever addresses Touma by name. He instead refers to him as "Hero". He also tends to address Last Order as "brat".
• Hidden Heart of Gold: Tried to keep Elizalinians safe by getting away from their country to keep them from getting involved in his battles... only to be discovered by Misaka WORST, to his great embarrassment.
• Hot-Blooded: He gets easily riled up even without his powers!
• Idol Singer: No, seriously. He gets his own comedic idol spinoff, A Certain Idol Accelerator-sama, and still has the same personality he has here.
• Ignore the Fanservice: When he enters the shower only to find Yoshikawa, Yomikawa, and Last Order naked inside, he just gets pissed that they didn't lock the door.
• I Just Want to Have Friends: Moments before Touma lands the final blow during their battle, Accelerator remembers the true reason he participated in the Level 6 experiment. By acquiring a power that cannot be contested by anyone, Accelerator hopes that he will no be challenged by anyone else and maybe one day, he will have friends of his own.
• I'm a Humanitarian: He gives a few comments on the taste of human finger and cheek meat. The former is too chewy that it must be spat out, while the latter just tastes like normal meat. The people he killed and ate are Misaka 10031 and a Hound Dog operator.
• I'm Not a Hero, I'm...: He refuses to be called a hero, because a hero would be able to save the day without killing anybody. He refers to himself as a villain or "evil" instead.
• Improvised Weapon: Technically, he fights by making an Improvised Weapon of everything around him.
• Incoming Ham: All the damn time, but especially around Amata Kihara.
  "KIIIIIHAAAAARAAAAAAAAAAAA!!"
• Irony: The use of his powers after he took a bullet to the head depends on the very girls he butchered in his quest for godhood not too long before.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Shows spades of this post-Heel–Face Turn.
• The Juggernaut: If his powers are active, the only ones who can stop him are Touma and divine beings.
• Knight of Cerebus: The stories centered around him carry lots of blood curdling, unwholesome cynicism and brutality which the yarns centered around Touma lack.
• Knight Templar Big Brother: For the sake of the people he cares about like Last Order, Yomikawa, Yoshikawa, etc.
• Lack of Empathy: At least until Last Order came into his life and showed him that even he had hope of connecting with the rest of humanity as a human rather than a murdering monster.
• Lame Pun Reaction: When Accelerator tells Worst to be careful with Last Order, she responds with, "well, shucks! This is what Misaka is worst at!" Accelerator isn't amused, telling her she's lucky she's useful to him because she still has "a chance to not be killed after a terrible joke like this."
• The Law of Diminishing Defensive Effort: He eventually learns not to rely on his powers so much to avoid hits.
• Lean and Mean: He is often noted to have a fairly scrawny build, likely because his powers relieve him of the need for physical exertion.
• Level Grinding: The whole point of the Level 6 Project. He also becomes increasingly more skilled with his powers with every fight he is in.
• Light Is Not Good: Accelerator dresses in light colors, has white hair, is gorgeous, and even can sport an almost angelic appearance. He's also enormously insane and is easily angered. This is inverted later by his Heel–Face Turn, where he doesn't become a straight-up example of Light Is Good, but is probably getting there.
• Logical Weakness: He's Story-Breaker Power incarnate, but like all humans, he still needs to breathe. Should the available oxygen around him somehow be taken away (like say, an explosion consuming it all, or a vacuum suddenly being forced into existence around him), his vectors won't make air where there's none and he'll suffocate, at least when he is not in an "awakened" state.
  • His Reflection works by reversing the direction of incoming vectors to repel any attack, so if an opponent manages to reverse said vectors themself right before Acccelerator's Reflection does, they'll be able to bypass it. Kihara Amata exploited this, who pulled back his punches and kicks to overwhelm the level 5 esper.
• Lonely at the Top: As a kid, which was what convinced him to accept the experiment at first. He thought if he could achieve ultimate power no one would try to fight him and he would be accepted.
• Made of Iron: Despite his frail appearance and overreliance on his powers, he possibly takes more blows from Touma than anyone else in their first fight, and he only gets tougher afterwards; later he takes massive beatdowns from Kihara Amata and he can still give the guy a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown.
• Magical Sensory Effect: After he manifests his wings for the first time, Accelerator is able to sense magic and magicians (notably Etzali), his fingers trembling and a pressure in his chest. Before he learns what magic is, he doesn't understand what's happening, only that he can sense supernatural powers not originating from Academy City. Interestingly, these are the exact same symptoms as Sasha Kreutzev's after she was possessed by the Archangel Gabriel, hinting at a connection between the wings and angelic power, corroborating Index's words that they are "something like" Telesma.
• Manly Tears: Mixed with Tears of Blood.
• Martial Pacifist: Despite being a power-hungry Godhood Seeker with little regard for human life, Accelerator doesn't actively seek people for fight, most of his fights are done in self-defence, and his passive ability deals with threats for him. He's only killing the Sisters because Level 6 Project treats them as Expendable Clones, and he mainly joined so people would be too afraid to try attacking him. Last Order also speculates that his pre-fight taunts are a way of checking if a Sister would rather avoid fighting.
• Mind over Matter: His power, Vector Redirection, though it is noted to be distinct from actual Telekinesis Espers.
• Misplaced Retribution: When Last Order becomes seriously ill and he has no idea how to help her when he runs into Touma, he angrily attacks him, blaming him for being a hero, yet not doing anything to help her. Touma defeats him and points out he can't be everywhere at once.
• Mook Horror Show: Heaven helps you if you have to fight him. Even after he's given a massive Drama-Preserving Handicap and without using his powers, he still handily takes out a group of assassins to rescue Misuzu Misaka.
• Morality Pet: The most important people in his life are Last Order and their guardians, Yomikawa and Kikyou.
• Mundane Utility: Among other things, he can redirect annoying background noise away from him so it doesn't bother him.
• My God, What Have I Done?: The Railgun manga shows much of his fight with Touma from his perspective. As the battle wears him down, horror slowly crept into his Internal Monologue, when he realized that the Sisters are actually human and that he only wanted to be strong so no one would dare to challenge him again, then he wouldn't have to kill or cripple anyone else and he would finally have friends of his own. The implication: he lost because his will to fight was being sapped.
• Mystical White Hair: His hair is white because he naturally reflects all unwanted radiation that could allow him to develop any kind of normal pigmentation.

N-W

• Name Amnesia: Accelerator mentioned that he once had a "normal name", but he forgot it. Volume 05 states his last name consists of two kanji and his first name three, yet his name had no real meaning in it.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Though there are people who still think he can be defeated.
• Necessarily Evil: As he explains to a little kid that wants to help him, only Accelerator himself should have to bear the burden of being the villain who kills the bad guys to protect people. A hero would save the bad guy too.
• Never Hurt an Innocent: During his fight against Kakine, Kakine was stunned when he noticed Accelerator was restraining himself the whole time to protect the people around them.
• Noble Demon: While working with GROUP, whenever anyone asks him what he is he always claims to be a villain despite always saving innocent lives, minimizing damages, and putting his own life on the end. To Accelerator, you cannot claim to be a hero while knowingly trying to kill your opponent. Only someone like Touma who saves even his enemy can be considered a hero.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: He briefly engages in this with Kihara Amata shortly before "awakening" his black wings. Notable because at the time he was essentially brain dead and managed to do more harm to Kihara than with his powers.
• No One Could Survive That!: While trying to save Last Order and the Sisters he's so busy with his power that he can't even spare the energy to block a simple bullet. We see it start tunneling through his skull... but his power block it before it can do too much brain damage. It does leave him partially crippled, however.
• "Not So Different" Remark: Heaven Canceller compares his ideals with Touma's who both want to save those they care about, except he's willing to kill if needed, while Touma wants to do this without many casualties — a philosophy he always wanted to emulate.
• Obliviously Evil: According to the Railgun manga, Accelerator was honestly convinced that the clones were not really people or alive. To make sure of this, he would always talk to them beforehand to see if they didn't want to fight and when they did he would then proceed with the experiment. When he realizes mid-fight that they were people all along, he stops trying to really win. Even accounting for this, however, his regard for life is pretty low: He attempts to kill Touma and Mikoto for getting in the way.
• Odd Friendship: Him and Birdway in New Testament Volume 3.
• One-Man Army: Even without his powers, he can use his marksmanship to take out an entire group of assassins. With his powers, he is practically untouchable.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: He used to have a real, normal name. He even tells how many characters were in it but doesn't remember what it was. He's only called Accelerator now.
• Person of Mass Destruction: He's the strongest of the seven Level 5s and capable of slowing down the Earth's rotation for 5 minutes. It's also not just that he's able to, he casually manages that to use the absorbed force, which mind you can easily split a continent in half, to launch an attack at Aleister Crowley's Windowless Building, although to no effect. That being said, Aleister does barely feel the attack.
• Perspective Flip: His rematch against Touma was shown entirely from Accelerator's perspective.
• Photographic Memory: After looking at a massive page of computer code, he comments that memorizing it is easy. It may only be for what he sees. He's forgotten his real name and he needed help to remember the lyrics of Index's healing song.
• Physical God: Especially when he sprouts forth his wings. By the time he "awakens" his white wings and ascends to the Aeon of Horus, his powers are approaching those of Archangel Gabriel. Then, he gains platinum wings similar to the ones Aiwass has. Combined with his feat of creating an entirely new cosmic tree upon reality, it makes him quite possibly the strongest character in the series to date.
• Powerful and Helpless: He experiences this when he realizes that for all his world-shaking power, he can't do anything to help Last Order when she becomes seriously ill during World War III.
• Power Gives You Wings: Grows black, supernatural energy wings whenever he "awakens" the true nature of Esper powers. In fact, as Accelerator gains progressively stronger forms, his wings change color to suit. He gains white wings after ascending to the Aeon of Horus at the end of WWIII. Much later near the end of New Testament, his wings turn platinum in order to defeat Coronzon.
• Powers Do the Fighting: Accelerator's power is passively on reflect, causing enemies to defeat themselves even when Accelerator is unconscious of the attack.
• Pragmatic Villainy: Even when he considered himself a villain, he buys his groceries and meals instead of taking them by force. When questioned about this by Last Order, he explains that although he's powerful enough to just take anything he wants, it's too much hassle to have to deal with the authorities and others futilely trying to fight him off. Buying stuff without making a fuss means he gets it quickly and without any problems.
• Punny Name: Accelerator's name in kanji means "one-way street", referring to his personality.
  "I'm sorry, from here on the path is only a "one-way street"! You can't advance, just hide your tail and cry your way to home!"
• Put the "Laughter" in "Slaughter": He has a disturbing, squeaky laugh whenever he's about to or is already doing something brutal and he enjoys it very much. His laughter can go on quite a bit too.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner
  "Now then. I'll teach you one thing about the aesthetics you lack... This is what a truly first-class villain is, fool."
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: The blue to Misaka WORST and Touma's red.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: He has them naturally thanks to his albinism, but when he goes full-on berserk from seeing Kakine stab Yomikawa, his entire eye turns red as he goes on a rampage.
• Redemption Demotion: In process of trying to turn his life around by saving Last Order, he has to turn off his Attack Reflector to focus on her brain, leaving himself vulnerable to a headshot that would have otherwise been no issue. He survives but now relies on an electrode to walk and talk, let alone use his powers. The electrode has a battery that dies faster while using its powers, and it's susceptible to jamming. He admits to Awaki that he's not even half as powerful as before... but he's still Academy City's #1 esper.
• Reformed, but Not Tamed: It takes him quite some time before he even starts to get the hang of helping people without causing mass destruction.
• Reluctant Warrior: The driving force behind his quest for godhood. Accelerator's power has made him a target for assassinations and unscrupulous researchers throughout his life. Since his powers won't go away, the only way to make people stop picking fights with him is to become so powerful that the idea of fighting him is an absurdity.
• Retired Monster: Originally he began as this post-Sisters arc: not really openly repentant for who he was or what he had done aside from a (denied and ignored) sense of guilt, but not doing anything villainous. The Radio Noise Project was over and that was that, so he went back to his normal daily yet empty routine (just with more punks coming down on him thinking they could take him out). He gets better when he's gained a great sense of remorse for who he was, to the point he breaks down when faced by Misaka WORST.
• The Rival: Holds a bitter one with the #2 Level 5, Kakine Teitoku, AKA "Dark Matter." While it's clear Accelerator wants to have as little to do with Kakine as he can, the latter has made it clear his hate and desire to kill him so that he can usurp his place as the #1. From Accelerator obliterating Kakine's original body to Kakine nearly breaking Accelerator's mind each of their confrontations have ended with each of them nearly killing the other.
• Sadist: Accelerator understands the kind of pain and agony he can inflict on someone and will occasionally relish in his ability to easily torture someone with just a touch, though he usually limits this to the people who attack him (despite knowing who he is) or those he cares about (at which point it doesn't matter if they know their relationship to him or not). The Necromancer Arc in particular stands out, where he not only gleefully electrocutes two people by turning their own bio-electricity against them until they fainted from the experience but also tried to squash the leader of Scavenger by dropping a mecha on top of her, while he stood laughing maniacally.
• Sarcastic Clapping: When Awaki Musujime figures out he no longer has his famous "Auto Reflect" always active, he answers with this trope plus a little speech.
  "... Ah, but just because I've become weaker doesn't necessarily make you stronger, does it?"
• Screaming Warrior: Especially noticeable when he's up against Amata Kihara.
• Seeking Ultimate Strength: Accelerator is considered the 1st ranked Level 5 Esper, and he participates in the Level 6 Shift project in order to become the first Level 6 Esper, a state theorized to transcend humanity and be closer to God. The reason Accelerator participates in the project is that due to his ranking and his Attack Reflector ability, he is constantly being challenged by other Espers seeking to be the first one to defeat him or take his place as most strongest Esper in Academy City. As a result, he seeks to be a Level 6 so that everyone else would be too scared to fight him, meaning he would no longer need to fight anymore. After Touma defeats him to stop him from killing the Misaka Sisters for training, he has lost this ambition.
• Self-Restraint: As part of his plan to eliminate the dark side and reform Academy City, he accepts to be sent to prison for killing the clones, despite the fact that he could easily escape. It's to the point that he refuses to break out to rescue Last Order from a threat to her, arguing that it would defeat the point if he just got out whenever he wanted to solve problems, and instead choosing to believe in the goodness of the city's residents (such as Kamijou Touma) being able to save her without his intervention.
• Shout-Out: His flashback to his first Esper power awakening strongly resembles several scenes with Testuo in the film version of AKIRA.
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: This boy's normal everyday vocabulary would make Samuel L. Jackson blush in embarrassment. He very rarely even calls Last Order by name, preferring "kusogaki" (lit. "shitty brat") instead.
• Sincerest Form of Flattery: For quite a while he tries to copy Touma, such as using only his right hand to fight, or finishing up by punching the enemy in the face. However, he quickly realizes just how difficult this is, causing his inferiority complex to grow even larger.
• Slasher Smile: He never smiles normally, only viciously grinning in anticipation of bloodshed.
• Sociopathic Hero: He has violent and sadistic tendencies but it's reserved for curb-stomping bad guys.
• Sour Outside, Sad Inside: He's extremely bitter and has a jaded view of the world and himself, but he secretly wished to have friends of his own, as his Tragic Backstory reveals that he couldn't fit in with other children because of his dangerous powers that harmed anyone who tried to get close to him.
• Spanner in the Works: The Magic Side doesn't really have a clue who he is. In Volume 22, he manages to reflect a massive wave of Telesma (the much more powerful Angel version of Mana) that was about to crash onto the Earth, foiling Fiamma of the Right's final vengeance and shocking the hell out of him.
• The Spock: Between Touma's McCoy and Shiage's Kirk, although he has some McCoy traits of his own.
• Squishy Wizard:
  • His automatic and near-perfect defense means that has Nigh-Invulnerability. Still, if it's turned off for whatever reason, or otherwise negated, he's physically weak with almost zero defense and endurance.
  • Perfectly illustrated in his first fight with Touma. As it drags on, it starts to devolve into a fist fight and Accelerator ends up getting his ass handed to him, despite Touma still suffering from the effects of being blasted by Mikoto's lightning attacks not minutes prior. Touma is only throwing quick, light jabs so he can retract his arm before Accelerator grabs it, but even that is overwhelming for someone who hadn't experienced the slightest ounce of pain in years.
• Stock Light-Novel Hero: In a way, he fits this to a T. If it only weren't for the fact that he used to kill 10,032 people to become a Level 6, so...
• Story-Breaker Power: He's immune to any attack based on normal physics and highly resistant to almost all magic, even the divine magic used by angels. Further, his power lets him fly, use superspeed and superstrength as well as basically anything else he can think of like control the wind. He's even a genius, so few people can even match him intellectually. Even with a Drama-Preserving Handicap of only being able to use his powers for fifteen minutes (later upgraded to thirty) a day, there is still almost nothing that can provide a meaningful challenge to him that isn't as broken as him or designed specifically to counter his powers, even more so when he "awakens" his supernatural black wings, which bypasses his handicap and grants him even more power at the cost of his consciousness (a deficiency that he overcomes later after he awakens his white wings). As a result, he gets fewer and fewer fights over time, and whenever he does, he is usually pitted against entities much stronger than him.
• Superpower Lottery: His Redirection powers is one of the first among many, many examples this series has.
• Superpower Meltdown: Happens at least twice. He goes into Unstoppable Rage mode when Kakine stabs Yomikawa in front of him, and when Misaka WORST manages to Break Him By Talking.
• Tears of Blood: The first time he cries.
• Terror Hero: A large part of what distinguishes Accelerator from the other two protagonists after his Heel–Face Turn, as his reputation alone can intimidate people into surrendering. Otherwise, he is more than happy to demonstrate his power by effortlessly mopping the floor with lesser mooks. He rarely fights without cackling like a madman and occasionally takes the time to describe exactly what he's going to do when he has someone at his mercy.
• 'Tis Only a Bullet in the Brain: Even though he lost his abilities and some motor skills due to damage to the frontal lobe, it could have been much worse as the bullet used was custom-made for countering powerful Espers like him.
• Theme Music Power-Up: "Ippou Tsuukou (One-Way Road)", which serves as his Leitmotif for the first season. For the second season, it is remixed as "Saikyou no Nanori (Introducing The Strongest)" as his Heel–Face Turn is reaping its rewards.
  • Railgun S gives us a new theme, "Ketsui to Kakugo" (Decision and Resolution), as a well as a scarier remix of Ippou Tsuukou titled "Accelerator".
• The Unchosen One: According to Gensei Kihara in Railgun, Accelerator is the only known esper at that moment that can reach a "stable" Level 6; in other words, he won't turn into an Almighty Idiot and will keep his mind and self upon ascending to true Physical God level (unlike Mikoto, whose human mind and identity will likely be overwritten by the time she's little over half-way there). Judging from what little has ever been shown of his origins, Accelerator was just a normal, random kid who happened to develop the Story-Breaker Power necessary to reach this point by happenstance.
• Unexpected Successor: In the aftermath of the conflict against the demon Coronzon, the dying Aleister makes him the new Board Chairman of Academy City.
• Unskilled, but Strong: In his first fight with Touma, Accelerator finds himself at a bit of a loss when he can't just curbstomp Touma like his previous enemies. Touma himself notes that once you get past his "unbeatable" defense, Accelerator's really just a skinny guy who's never been in a real physical tussle in his life, with no real skill in his strikes despite the raw power behind them.
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid: Before he was Accelerator, he was just a relatively-normal kid with above-average power. Then he got attacked by some bullies and accidentally broke their bones... and then he accidentally broke the bones of the teacher who tried to stop it... and then other adults... and then Judgement and Anti-Skills came to the scene... and by the end of it he was surrounded by unmanned attack helicopters and Anti-Skill robots like some sort of Kaiju monster and scared out of his 10-year-old mind.
• Villainous Breakdown: During the Sister's arc, he finds that Touma is the first opponent to not show any signs of backing down or regret like so many others who tried to take him out before. Touma also managing to land punches on him also causes him to start freaking out forcing him to develop a new attack in order to take him out.
• Vocal Evolution: Nobuhiko Okamoto provided a lighter tone in Season 1 compared to the lower, perpetual snarl in later seasons.
• Weirdness Censor: Until New Testament where it is properly explained to him, he mistook any magic he witnessed for esper powers.
• When He Smiles: After saving Last Order during World War III, he actually gives the young clone a tender, gentle and almost paternal smile as he fully ascends and decides to directly help stop said conflict. Considering how he tends to smile, said utterly gentle smile pretty much symbolizes him fully devoting himself to his Heel–Face Turn and changing his role from guilt ridden avenger to a true force of good and firmly a protector.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Thanks to his Training from Hell by Amata Kihara.
• With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility: Since he decided to start anew in New Testament, his responsibilities have increased a lot, and he barely manages to handle them.
• With Great Power Comes Great Opposition: Among the most powerful Espers in the verse and yet, people try to hunt him anyways because for the sake of a challenge or wanting a bounty on his head. His attempts to become even more powerful are so that people will stop bothering him.
• White Hair, Black Heart: He has white hair (due to reflecting sunlight) and starts off as a megalomaniac Esper who joyfully killed 10000 Misaka clones as part of his training, and isn't above killing anyone else who threatens him. Even after Heel–Face Turn, he's not without sociopathic tendencies.
• The Worf Effect: A bunch of low level thugs come after him after word about his loss to Touma gets out. Without even bothering to do anything his power automatically leaves their limbs twisted wrecks. So, not so much.
  • He gets a much more serious one when facing Aiwass just before he participates in World War III. Aiwass didn't even try when its platinum wings bypass through his vector redirection as if it wasn't even there, he could barely comprehend what happened when the wings came into contact. When he manifests his black wings, it is still obliterated by Aiwass. Even after Accelerator tries to destroy Aiwass through its Weaksauce Weakness of requiring heavily saturated AIM fields to manifest, he still fails to defeat it. This is when Accelerator truly realizes his need to grow stronger.
• World's Strongest Man: He is the Number 1 Level 5 Esper in Academy City, the most powerful of them all by a wide margin. His reputation takes a hit when he loses to the first person able to damage him, however, and during World War III he learns even if he's the strongest esper he's not necessarily the strongest person with superhuman powers.

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