Bayloupe

Bayloupe (ベイロープ) is a character introduced in Toaru Majutsu no Index. She is the leader of New Light. Originally a supporter of Carissa's usurping of power in the United Kingdom, her group would later go on to aid the resistance forces in stopping Carissa's self-destructive actions.

Appearance
Bayloupe is the eldest of the group, has silvery hair and wears the same outfit as Lessar, but without the jacket. She has a long-sleeved sports shirt on, with the collar undone revealing some cleavage slightly visible. The portion of her legs sticking out of the miniskirt had blue leggings on them down to the ankles.

She has hearing aid-like devices behind her ears that looks like two vacuum tube-like objects sticking from each one called the horn of wisdom, the Gjallarhorn.

Personality
As the oldest of the group, she acts like a big sister of the four younger girls. She doesn't suffer Lessar's antics lightly, and easily gets mad at her, specifically just before a mission is about to start.

Like the rest of her group, she is patriotic to her country, only wishing the best for it, enough for her to make an enemy out of it and harm people if it is necessary, though she is willing to let them go if they are willing to stand down or if they are not a threat, as shown when she defeated Itsuwa.

Background
They are commissioned by Princess Carissa to excavate the thought to be long lost Curtana Original for her plans in changing the United Kingdom prior to the start of July. With their base in Edinburgh, Scotland, they are able to excavate the magic artifact in a place where there once a fortress using a spiritual item, which would allow them to do other work instead of focusing on the excavation alone. Due to their group being styled similarly to a Cabal Reserve Army, they are able to avoid attention being drawn towards them.

British Royal Family Arc
New Light is first noted after finally excavating the Curtana Original from Edinburgh, Scotland. As they travel to London, England via a highway using a car, they are notified, likely Knight Leader as he is the only likely person with Laura Stuart during the terrorist incident with Sky Bus 365, that Necessarius will be sealing off highways in Scotland in order to facilitate their plan in forcing the plane to make an emergency landing. They later use their magic to remove the illusion cast by Necessarius on the plane, stopping the pilot from making an emergency landing.

When New Light are driving down a country road towards London, Bayloupe is in the back of the car and annoyed by Lessar's bottom and tail waving in front of her eyes. Bayloupe threatens to tear the tail off if Lessar doesn't withdraw it and Lessar complies but shoves her bottom into Bayloupe's face, causing her to get even more angry and grab it painfully. Lessar struggles against Bayloupe, at one point trying to subdue her via her calves as Floris said but to no effect. They later make their final preparations for their delivery using the Skíðblaðnir, as well as the adjustments on their "dragon parts". At 11 PM the girls are only 30 kilometers away from London, and later arrive shortly.

After arriving at London, Bayloupe communicates with the rest of New Light near some stairs leading into an underground station. Here, each of New Light has their own Skíðblaðnir and their own instructions on what to do with them, with Lancis holding the Curtana Original within her Skíðblaðnir, while the others do a supportive role as relay points. In which as relay points, they need only to adjust their locations to match up with the location of the Travelling Fortress where the Knight Leader, owner of the 5th case would be on, and if any one of them acts as relay point then they will succeed. As Lessar is getting something to eat, Bayloupe tells her that is fine but to not forget her role and mess up. When Lessar asks whether they should be using communication magic, Bayloupe mentions that it should be okay since they are under their noses, adding how she doesn't want to rely on her for this. Thinking about how Lessar of all people is the strongest New Light member in terms of battle ability, Bayloupe starts to get hungry due to Lessar sending the smell of her fried fish through the communication. On being informed that she's unwittingly broadcasting her thoughts, Bayloupe cuts off the communication.

On learning about the commotion that Lessar caused after getting her case mixed up with another, Bayloupe starts foaming at the mouth and nearly passes out. With the attention of the police and Necessarius drawn as a result, Bayloupe partially thinks about finishing off Lessar herself. She then notices she's been surrounded by the Amakusa and is approached by an armed Itsuwa. Refusing to be apprehended, Bayloupe attaches her horn and flips her case up. Itsuwa attempts to thrust her spear into Bayloupe's arm, but Bayloupe's tool bursts out from her bag and strikes the spear, knocking them both back. As the Amakusa draw their weapons, Bayloupe destroys the wall she was leaning on and flees into the station.

Itsuwa catches up with Bayloupe as she is climbing down from an empty platform. She throws a sign held by her Steel Glove at Itsuwa but it is sliced apart by her seven wires. As Itsuwa recognizes the symbol as being related to Thor, Bayloupe mentions how Thor used other tools besides his famous hammer Mjölnir, such as the steel glove - a more convenient weapon for girls like New Light. Adding that there are other aspects of Thor besides that of the lightning god, she swings her weapon, sending fragments of the floor at Itsuwa who dodges and then charges at her. In response, she swings it again, grabbing concrete dust in the air and flinging it at Itsuwa with explosive force, blowing her to the side. Bayloupe then jumps, grabs again and brings down the glove towards Itsuwa with an explosive impact. As Itsuwa dodges, she swings again to the side, knocking Itsuwa down with a direct hit. Thinking the fight is over, Bayloupe says she will use Gjallarhorn next if Itsuwa wants to continue, threatening to turn her to ashes with lightning if she moves. Grabbing the case and telling Itsuwa to enjoy the changes they bring about, she rides her glove into the tunnel at high speed.

Believing she has escaped, Bayloupe relaxes and starts to thinking about how the others are getting on. Adjusting her gloves to match the track, she heads for another station or a worker exit but then realizes that there shouldn't be a curve in the tunnel. She then hears Itsuwa's voice over the speaker, mentioning about the training facilities that were used to test new Necessarius personnel and how she should be able to guess where the track that was magically switched over was heading to. As Bayloupe realizes she's caught in the spell, Itsuwa tells her to try not to die as the facility was off-limits now as it's difficulty wasn't properly regulated and people kept dying in there. She later succumbs to the traps in the training facility while protecting the case. Despite the damage done to her and the case as the result of the labyrinth, the relay of the Curtana Original between the cases is successful and is sent to the fifth case carried by the Knight Leader.

British Halloween
After being defeated, Bayloupe was taken to a cathedral for healing and confinement, but was put inside a hidden room when the coup d'état occurred. When Elizard uses Union Jack to distribute the power of the Curtana Original to the British people and calls on them to use their power how they see fit, Bayloupe uses a pen to draw a magic circle and contacts the other New Light members. When asked by Lessar what they should do, Bayloupe isn't sure, saying it didn't seem right as they helped bring about the coup but they do what is best for the United Kingdom so they had little choice but to act regardless of shame or honor.

Toaru Kagaku no Railgun SS2: Shopping Mall Demonstration
When Misaka Mikoto returns to Nihon Daruma, after looking into a lead from Lessar which turned out to be a dead end, Bayloupe is in the middle of spanking her for giving a normal person unnecessary information. She briefly stops when Mikoto comes in but soon resumes it after what she says. After releasing Lessar, she tells Lessar to give Mikoto the proper explanation she wants, seeing as things have got this complicated because of her.

Not long afterwards, Bayloupe is dusting a magazine rack when she sees construction equipment coming straight at the store. She shouts a warning and dives for cover as it comes crashing through the front. After escaping via a different route from Mikoto and Lessar, she meets them again at Nihon Daruma's North Gate store, giving a half-hearted welcome as they come in.

Lessar later contacts Bayloupe when she locates a magic-based bomb in the shopping mall during the riots. After threatening to spank Lessar when she jokingly asks if it was their doing, she agrees that another cabal is likely involved. Bayloupe tells Lessar that there aren't enough merits to justify the risks for getting unnecessarily involved, saying that they need to retreat since it wouldn't help with their goal and that even if they saved the people in the city it wouldn't benefit them in any way. After confirming this, Lessar then challenges her to a fight afterwards, hanging up before she can respond.

Bayloupe and Lancis later report to Lessar that the riots have lulled slightly but are still a problem. Lessar later contacts them for assistance during her confrontation with Caliche I. Niknosh and her allies. Bayloupe then proceeds to bombard the area with green lightning using countless runes. After several heavy bombardments, she, Floris and Lancis assist Lessar with a spell to destroy the giant wheel snake unleashed by Caliche's group.

Lessar later contacts Lessar and Mikoto from a hotel roof to let them know that a portion of the airport has opened up, likely a launch facility for a rocket. As Mikoto and Lessar discuss what good escaping into space would do seeing as they couldn't resupply, could be tracked to landing and be shot down, Bayloupe suggests that it wouldn't matter if it didn't need supplies. They agree that the perpetrator is likely planning to launch Code EIC, which they want to make seem like the culprit rather than take the blame themselves, into space so it couldn't be investigated.

After the incident ends, New Light prepare to leave by charter plane. While waiting for take-off, Bayloupe discusses with the others about what happened in the end with the UAV and how the Academy City higher ups might have let the situation develop in order to drew out dangerous elements within the cooperative institutions. As they think about how they might have been eliminating enemies on their own side before a possible future war between magic and science, Bayloupe supposes that they were lucky that no British cooperative institutions were shut down as a result of the incident. Just before they receive clearance for take-off, they receive a signal from one of their spiritual items, indicating that it has located the Curtana Original.

Abilities
As a member of New Light, Bayloupe is proficient in the use of Norse Mythology-based magic. Like the other members of her team, she carries with her the Steel Glove spiritual item, a pole arm with the blades looking like the four digit hand. The Steel Glove incorporates three legendary items that is associated with the god Thor. This increases her arm strength, gives her tremendous destructive force, and the ability to "grab" apparently anything anything.

Unique to her is the Gjallarhorn (知の角杯 (ギャッラルホルン) ), a spiritual item based on the horn associated with the go and the wise being. It appears as a headphone and hearing-aid like devices behind her ears with two vacuum tube-like objects sticking from each one. The spiritual item allows Bayloupe to incorporate wisdom to her Steel Glove allowing for her to partially use the thunder attribute, though unlike Thor as she does it in a different way than using Mjölnir. Bayloupe warned Itsuwa that she can turn her into ashes using the thunder attribute, implying that she can use electricity-based attacks.

Despite not being the strongest in the New Light Group, she is capable of defeating Itsuwa without going all out, and surviving in the training ground of Necessarius, maybe for a significant amount of time if she wasn't protecting Skíðblaðnir from the traps.

Other abilities and equipment

 * Seiðr: It is a type of magic that is used primarily used by female Norse magicians. This is the magic that allowed New Light to disable the illusion cast on Sky Bus 365 by Necessarius. New Light uses this type of magic to create a certain type of song to cause on to see an illusion while it is used, but also has a spell that can be used to remove its ‘intoxication’. This spell works with both illusions that trick the brain and illusions that directly cause an image to appear. It is unknown which member uses this magic though it can be assumed that each of them has some knowledge of it.
 * Skíðblaðnir: She has her own Skíðblaðnir, though it was primarily used as a relay point to allow Lancis to deliver the contents of her Skíðblaðnir to the Knight Leader's.
 * Runes: Bayloupe is also able to use Runes allowing her to create green lightning.
 * Communication spell: Using a simple marker to draw a magic circle, Bayloupe can create a communication spell. She uses this to talk to the other members of New Light in the twilight of the British Halloween.

Design evolution
Bayloupes' overall design remains fairly static throughout the series. Along with all the other members of New Light, Haimura was tasked on designing them not to look like magicians, but that of lacrosse players, and used their suits as a common symbol between all four of them.

Trivia

 * When Bayloupe was "restraining" Lessar, Lessar was forced to ask for help, then Floris pointed out that Bayloupe's weak point was her calves.... However how true this is can be questioned; as unfortunately for Lessar it ended up that her repeated attacks on Bayloupe's calves proved of no use. So either the tip was wrong or Lessar's attacking methods were unsuited for it.

Quotes

 * (To Itsuwa, from Index Volume 17) “With this, we will change the history of the United Kingdom. We will change the royal family, the knights, the church, England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. But it isn’t all bad. Make sure you enjoy the change we will be bringing about”