Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku - Volume 15 - Chapter 11

CHAPTER 11

FROM A CRISIS TO A BIGGER CRISIS

  Dreamy Chelsea

Chelsea, Mary, and the old mage were in the middle of an argument when worse came to worst: an ax murderer showed up. It was very sudden, as if this person had appeared out of thin air.

Among the many slightly obnoxious things that Chelsea’s mother had taught her was “In an emergency, follow your instincts.” That meant “Don’t take too long to think if you don’t have the time”—or that she shouldn’t take pains to mull things over because it wouldn’t do her much good. The fact was that things often went better when she left it up to intuition and took action, rather than exercising caution and thinking things through.

Chelsea acted on impulse. Intuition led her to figure out two things: “This is an enemy” and “This is the one who killed Shepherdspie.” She flew right past the process of questioning or checking and went straight to attack. She’d made some stars beforehand by crushing a rock, and now she sent three of them flying from the right, three from the left, and another four skyward while she stepped forward, making peace signs. So cute. So adorably innocent.

Surprisingly, her opponent moved half a beat faster than Chelsea. The goddess did two vertical spins to leap backward faster than Chelsea’s stars could fly before landing on a tree and lunging at her. She moved so quickly, you wouldn’t think she carried axes in both hands. The tree did not break or snap—in fact, it didn’t even drop any branches or leaves, just wavering slightly. You could tell that she wasn’t simply used to using trees as springboards—she’d even mastered some kind of technique for it.

Chelsea was still not thinking. She prioritized action.

Dropping the double peace signs, she made a heart shape with both hands in front of her face. The heart, a symbol of friendship and harmony, was appropriate for a charming and kind magical girl. It gave off an even stronger impression of the magical-girl subculture than the simple, innocent double peace sign. And it was cute, of course.

The goddess swung her axes up. She was still far away; she must have misjudged the distance— No!

Chelsea ran toward the goddess without a thought. She ran like a peppy magical girl in an anime opening—she was thinking of Riccabel in particular. But the enemy wasn’t too far away; she hadn’t made a mistake. Chelsea was the one who had it wrong. The enemy’s axes had a wider attack range than they seemed to. As the enemy swung them, the axes writhed, and their gray, rocklike texture turned into something red and rough like sand, and right as they were about to strike, Chelsea flung herself up like she was doing a high jump over a bar, puffing out her chest and spreading her arms wide as she emphasized her girlish brilliance. The sand axes didn’t hit Chelsea, striking the ground instead and kicking up dust.

The sand axes instantly reverted to metal, and the goddess swung them so quickly that it looked like she was wielding ten or twenty instead of two. Such incredible speed. Using a flowing amalgamation of spin and natural turns as if she was waltzing, Chelsea avoided the string of attacks, and, with a little jump after that, she landed atop her rotating stars and leaped some more.

The axes were just so fast. It was difficult to follow them with her eyes. Chelsea had somehow managed to avoid that attack just now, but if she kept this up, she would make a mistake somewhere down the line. And that one mistake would spell game over.

She made up her mind. She would fight this enemy with speed and add irregularity. Chelsea set her ten stars on seemingly random trajectories and moved in a confusing way herself, posing as she hopped from star to star or switching to the ground in order to toy with the enemy—not avoiding her, but preventing her from keeping aim. Plus, she dazzled the enemy with her poses.

With a double axel and a triple toe loop, Chelsea leaped from star to star, slipping past the axes to get closer to her opponent. She struck the enemy’s forearm with an arm movement chock-full of lyricism only to be sharply repelled. Her hand tingled with numbness. The enemy’s arm was crazy hard, but not as if from a spell; her flesh was just abnormally firm, even by magical-girl standards. It was not cute.

One of Chelsea’s stars, which she’d sent shooting through the area, shattered with a pop, smashed by the goddess’s ax. She destroyed two more stars after that. The axes were speeding up. The blades became fine and sharp. Chelsea could fight back by speeding up her stars, but that would destabilize her coordination. There didn’t seem to be a limit to how fast the enemy could swing those axes, plus it would be disadvantageous to turn this into a competition of speed. Chelsea gracefully evaded the next attack with a jeté en tournant reminiscent of a swan landing on a lake. When the axes came swinging after her, she grabbed them by the handles, spinning herself and the enemy around to swap their positions before leaping. She did all this in a beautiful stance like a rhythmic gymnast while shouting pleasantly like a vocalist; that way, what she was doing didn’t appear violent, like grappling or scuffling. But although she was reluctant to take such measures, this wasn’t an enemy she could immediately beat.

“Mary, run!” Chelsea yelled, and then she imagined Mary running toward Ren-Ren. Suddenly, a crazy thought struck her: She didn’t want her to run away, she wanted Mary by her side. She almost cried out, “Actually, don’t run,” but another part of her restrained herself. She absolutely didn’t want Mary to be in danger. Just thinking of her getting killed like Shepherdspie gave her goose bumps.

“Run! Not toward Ren-Ren!”

That was good enough.

Remembering Shepherdspie made Chelsea’s heart feel like it was going to get caught in her throat, but Mary quickly blotted that out. She was Chelsea’s top priority right now. Everything Chelsea did was for Mary.

The remaining stars raced through the air, or wove through the trees in complex trajectories to gather in one spot. Had an ordinary pro been controlling them, there would have been one or two midair collisions. But this was none other than the master of star shooting, Dreamy Chelsea.

When Chelsea and the goddess got up, Chelsea was holding an ax handle in each hand, crossing the blades so the enemy couldn’t swing them anymore—not forgetting to tilt her head with a smile for added cuteness. Her opponent was smiling, too. The anger hidden behind one smile and the hostility lurking behind the other clashed like locked blades, entwining, enmeshing. She would not avert her eyes.

At just the right moment, seven shooting stars rained down behind the goddess, passing through the trees or under the sun to strike her undefended back. Even if these were just makeshift stars Chelsea had solidified, they would still hurt. No—if she was a normal magical girl, they would do more than just hurt. One star after the other hit the goddess, but she didn’t even twitch; she just let them slam into her back and head. All the while, her smile never faltered.

Chelsea tilted her head to the opposite side. Her opponent didn’t seem to be just putting up a strong front. Chelsea’s observant eyes detected that the enemy had taken only minimal damage. Just how thick-skinned could you get? What did you have to eat to get a body like that?

After landing the first hit, the stars turned around and flew over Chelsea’s head to pelt the enemy’s face. Chelsea made them faster than before and added a spin like they were bullets. She wouldn’t have gone this far with a normal opponent, but she wouldn’t have needed to then. One after another, Chelsea struck this fearsome enemy’s face with the stars, using a destructive force that would send even a tough magical girl flying backward three times. The stars were unable to take the force and shattered, knocking the goddess’s chin upward. She lowered her chin, revealing that same smile, although a little bit of blood oozed from it.

“Is the one you dropped the golden ax?” the goddess asked just like before, her arms slowly coming forward. She was straining harder into her axes. Chelsea’s spine made a cute sound from the strain.

“Or is it the silver ax?”

“Hya!”

With a pretty call that carried the full strength of her body, Chelsea returned to a forward-leaning stance, pushing against the goddess.

Chelsea took a few steps and stopped there. Her toes dug into the ground, her knees shook, and, though she was trying to go forward, her legs just wouldn’t move ahead. In fact, they were going backward. She retreated several steps.

Chelsea looked at the goddess, who was calmly smiling. “Is the one you dropped the golden ax?” the goddess asked again.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me… What is this?”

“Or is it the silver ax?”

“The hell are you?” The words that came out of her mouth felt lacking in cuteness, so she hastily asked, “What the heck are you?”

Chelsea wasn’t as strong as her opponent. She couldn’t fight this. She was built like a child in late elementary school or early middle school, while the goddess had the physique of an adult woman. But a difference in stature is no barrier to a magical girl. Some were strong even if they were small, and even if you were large, those who were weak would still be weak. As Chelsea backed up a couple of times, her lower body struggled to stay balanced. She fired some stars from the cuff of her sleeve.

Sensing that the goddess’s left leg was tensed, Chelsea intuited that her foe was going to spin on that leg to launch a kick with her right leg, which was now in Chelsea’s blind spot, since the goddess had that leg drawn back.

The stars Chelsea had fired went into position. They weren’t ordinary stars; they were pieces of mirror cut into star shapes. By reflecting one mirror star off another, she could see what was going on even behind her head. Chelsea popped out her leg in a cutesy kick.

Huh?

She’d meant to adorably meet the goddess’s boring, run-of-the-mill, ordinary kick with her own leg and knock her down, but she couldn’t envision it succeeding. Chelsea suddenly released the axes and hopped to the opposite side. Chelsea’s jump and the goddess’s kick met in perfect unison, sending Chelsea’s small frame high into the air. The goddess swung her now-free axes.

Chelsea was looking down from twenty feet up in the sky. Pastel Mary was already gone. Incidentally, the old mage was also gone. Relieved that they’d run away, Chelsea changed the angle of the two mirror stars to blind the opponent’s eyes with light. At the same time, she moved a different pair along a star-shaped trajectory to repel the ax handles from below. The attack wouldn’t be able to stop the axes from swinging down, but it would slightly disturb their balance when the goddess tried to lift them overhead. In the meantime, Chelsea pulled out her wand and grabbed the star taped to the tip.

She made the star move downward at an acute angle. It dragged her along with it, zipping to avoid the attack by a hair or two. The magic tape couldn’t take the speed, and some of the pieces peeled off. Acrobatic flight gave her a sick feeling like a direct stroke to her innards, and she didn’t want to feel this repeatedly, but it was far better than taking a direct slice from those axes when she was defenseless in midair.

Chelsea avoided the right slash in midair, then skimmed over the ground to make it through the attack from the left. Passing under the sand as it sprayed up like in episode thirty-six of Help Me! Hiyoko-Chan!—the surfing episode—she did three turns, now twenty-five feet away from the goddess, to land on her right leg. But something was wrong—as she slowly tried to step out on her left leg, spasming pain abruptly stopped her.

Her leg was numb where the goddess had kicked it. She didn’t think she could move it for the moment. She could have sworn she’d leaped the moment it hit to reduce the impact, but she’d still taken quite a lot of damage. It hurt.

Chelsea struck a slightly silly pose, spreading her right hand and lifting her left leg. It wasn’t to her taste, but she had to at least go through with it, for appearance’s sake. Granted, no matter how she posed, the enemy would probably be able to tell she’d taken a hit.

The goddess slid her right leg forward. The movement was smooth, and it didn’t seem like she’d been hurt at all. It was totally unfair that Chelsea had been injured and the enemy totally unwounded when they’d collided. This was less than egalitarian.

The waves of pain came endlessly, practically torturing Chelsea. She was about to lose to a foe who fought with pleasure. Was cuteness going to lose out? This would not do. That wasn’t allowed.

The right ax turned black. The left ax turned red. The goddess came forward, and Chelsea hopped on one leg to back up. Unlike the goddess of the spring who appeared in fairy tales, this goddess only used her axes for violence. While she had such a fantastical and fairy-tale appearance—she was wasting it.

Chelsea’s left leg was complaining harder. She needed a rest, not more fighting. More accurately, she couldn’t fight any longer than this. It was a total pack of lies that a magical girl’s true power came out when she was in dire straits. It wasn’t magical girls who showed strength at times like that. It was those pseudo-magical girls who liked fighting. They were different from Chelsea.

Pastel Mary wasn’t there. In other words, the one Chelsea had to protect was not there. There was no need to push through this. Cuteness would not lose. This was just a temporary retreat.

Chelsea clapped the star on her wand with her open right hand. Another cute sound. “Oh yeah, that’s right. I did drop an ax. I totally saw that, yeah.”

Still smiling, the goddess tilted her head. In this attitude, she did have a mysterious sweetness to her.

“But I don’t think I saw the gold ax. I think it might’ve been an iron ax, yeah,” Chelsea added, smiling brightly. Then she leaped backward, manipulating the star decoration in her palm.

The goddess started running after her with hardly a pause at all. The attempt to talk to her to try to create an opening hadn’t really succeeded.

Chelsea had figured that if she ran into the forest, the trees would get in the enemy’s way and slow her down, but she ran strangely, in a manner both forceful and light that made obstacles like tree roots or indentations in the ground no problem for her.

Okay then, Chelsea thought, and she changed the direction of her star. She shot it up into the sky at a sharp angle, scattering leaves and branches. Chelsea figured that since her enemy was not an angel or a fairy but a goddess of the spring, she shouldn’t be able to fly. But the goddess immediately shot down that thought. There was an ear-bursting explosion, and then Chelsea sensed an object flying at her at the speed of sound—Chelsea changed the course of her flight at a forty-five-degree angle to evade the slice by a hair. The enemy was generating continuous explosions and using the blast of wind to fly. The hair on the back of Chelsea’s head was sliced off, and a lukewarm fluid flowed from her head down her neck. Knowing it wasn’t a magical-girl-like thing to do, she clenched her teeth. The hairdo she’d had all done up prettily was a mess, and this bleeding that wasn’t appropriate for a magical girl was turning her head red. None of this was right for magical girls. It wasn’t right for Dreamy Chelsea. It was not cute at all.

The goddess’s axes increased their size with a pop. White and sharp, they looked just like wings. She flapped once to close the distance between them. With one more flap, she was even closer. They really were wings.

Agh, come on! Anything goes with this lady, huh?! No fair!

Chelsea pulled a sudden dive, and then, right before she collided with the ground, she changed direction to fly at a low altitude, parallel with the ground. The hem of her skirt swiped against the earth and grew dirty, and her injured left leg snapped off tree branches, the pain shooting to the crown of her head and making her cry out, “Yeek!” No matter how bad it got, cries like “ergh” or “gwagh” were out of the question.

There was an intense impact and the boom of an explosion behind her, and Chelsea slowed her star, lifting her legs up high enough to keep from knocking into things as she checked the situation. Clouds of dust were billowing up, and broken trees and branches were raining down along with clods of earth. Then the shape of a person rose, cutting through the dust, and Chelsea clicked her tongue and sped up her star. She didn’t consider escaping high in the sky. The lack of trees as obstacles would just make it more dangerous.

This is not right! It’s messed up, it’s unfair!

The goddess wasn’t just strong. Her reflexes were sharp in subtle ways, and most of all she was abnormally resistant to everything. Even being right beside the center of the explosion she’d created just got her a little dirty, and after falling from the sky that rapidly, she didn’t seem like she was hurt anywhere, running after Chelsea like she was totally fine. When Chelsea looked back, the goddess’s hands on her ax handles had the index and middle fingers sticking up. In other words, she was doing a double peace sign. Chelsea shivered. The enemy was even making to equip herself with both strength and charm.

“Don’t copy me!” Chelsea yelled back at her, but even that was ignored with a smile.

Chelsea was finally out of options. One of her legs wouldn’t move, the enemy wouldn’t go away, even if she did attack her she didn’t feel like she could do damage—there was nothing at all to be done. The only good thing here was that she’d managed to let Mary escape. That was the one area where she had been cute and capable.

When Mary rose in her mind, the next thing that came up was that irritating Ren-Ren. Telling her not to run to Ren-Ren was a good play, if I do say so myself, Chelsea praised herself, and she also thought that maybe Ren-Ren could manage this somehow. She seemed to recall that Ren-Ren had said her magic was to fire a magic arrow to control minds or something like that. Chelsea didn’t want her own mind controlled, and she kind of thought that type of magic was too evil for a magical girl, but maybe mental attacks would be effective on an enemy who was seemingly invincible to physical attacks. Chelsea also seemed to recall her mother maybe saying something about how compatibility was important in fights between magical girls, though she wasn’t sure. She’d ignored that stuff because she didn’t really care about fighting, but she figured it had been something along those lines. Chelsea didn’t think Ren-Ren was even worth paying attention to, but she did have a feeling she would be useful against the goddess. So she should head for the rocky area that Agri and the others were using as a meeting spot. Ren-Ren would probably be there, along with Nephilia or someone, and then Chelsea would work with them to beat the goddess. Then they’d make the goddess apologize and hand her over to the police.

Now it really did seem like a good play to have made Mary run someplace Ren-Ren was not. When a log came flying at Chelsea from behind, she kicked off it with her good leg to speed up the flight of her star.

  7753

With Tepsekemei checking their position, Mana and 7753 were headed for the main building. After coming out of the brush, 7753 saw a shining streak of red on Mana’s cheek and thought regretfully as she made her way along, Ahhh, I should have held those pointy leaves away from her face. Right now, 7753’s head was too full for her to spare any minute considerations toward other people. Now she was regretting that she’d failed to make such considerations and was brooding over it.

They didn’t show caution or exercise wariness as they traveled, emphasizing speed instead. “Let’s hurry,” Mana told 7753 and Tepsekemei before rushing ahead. Mana had to be thinking about Marguerite. 7753 didn’t object to Mana’s decision. They were headed in the opposite direction from where Marguerite and the others had headed. If they ran into the enemy anyway, maybe they should just be coolheaded about it and consider themselves unlucky. They had to be somewhat cold about it, given the situation. 7753 started to remember the events of B City and shook her head to get them out of her mind. She really was brooding. And when she got like that, she remembered the past—painful, difficult things. 7753 of all people had to be clearheaded. She punched herself in the cheek to make it hurt. That seemed to energize her a bit more.

The area around the main building was well maintained, with the trees and grass being pruned and weeded and whatnot, making a bit of a garden. In other words, there was a better view here than inside the forest. When 7753 came out from the forest path, holding her hand up against the light of the sun, she heard a voice.

“Hey, you kids came here, too?”

A broad forehead, square face, and overall rugged and burly man—it was Navi Ru. He waved at them, the sleeve of his robe sliding down to expose the magical figure tattooed on his forearm. A mage’s tattoo obviously had to have a magical meaning. But combined with his appearance, it came off less like something magical and more like the kind of thing you’d see on a member of a criminal organization.

Keeping such rude opinions to herself, 7753 waved back at him.

They’d finally encountered someone who was not an enemy. 7753 was about to rush toward him when someone held out an arm in front of her. She looked over and saw it was Mana’s. Her expression was stiff. She seemed different from when she’d looked about to collapse in the forest. She was also different from when she’d brought up Hana’s name and cheered up.

Holding back 7753, Mana went over to Navi very slowly—7753 was confused, but she followed. Mana stopped ten feet away from Navi, who was standing a slight distance from the entrance to the main building.

Navi didn’t seem particularly suspicious about this, shoulders dropping as he let out a big sigh. “It’s good to see an ally out here in this mess.”

“Where is everyone else?” Mana asked.

“Clarissa is checking around. I told her not to, ’cause it’s dangerous, but magical girls never listen. Yol and Rareko are hiding together in a safe place with the kid. Not like anyplace is safe, mind you. But it’s comparatively safe. So what about you folks?”

“We encountered an enemy.” Mana paused for a beat and continued. “It was a magical girl who carried two axes. Me, 7753, and Tepsekemei were there along with Mr. Shepherdspie and Marguerite, but we got separated from them when the enemy attacked.”

“Was it the one who killed Maiya?”

“That seems highly likely.”

“I see…” A corner of Navi’s lips bent slightly. His expression looked terribly regretful. “I’ll say first off that I don’t blame you guys at all, but I’d like to say something, if ya don’t mind.”

“What is it?”

“Was that magical girl so strong that even three magical girls couldn’t fight her?”

“…If you’re asking me based on what I saw myself, then the honest truth is that I couldn’t even tell what she did. Marguerite and a part of Tepsekemei drew the enemy away, but Tepsekemei said that part has already been destroyed—”

“Mei died,” Tepsekemei offered.

“…So she says.”

“Man, well…this isn’t good.” Both corners of Navi’s lips bent, and his expression clearly darkened. That look made 7753 feel like her own uselessness was being shoved in her face. It was embarrassing to just stand there, but she couldn’t go and hide.

“Do you think you could beat her if you had five or six magical girls?” Navi asked.

“I couldn’t say.”

Navi’s gaze shifted from Mana to 7753, who realized that he was wondering if she had managed to measure the enemy’s strength. She hastily shook her head. If only she’d had her goggles, 7753 could have measured the enemy’s strength precisely, but she didn’t have them now.

Navi’s gaze left 7753, and he glanced slightly upward at Tepsekemei.

“If there were lots, maybe we could win. Maybe we would lose,” she said heavily.

“Well, of course.”

“If Archfiend Pam was here, we could win.”

“Stands to reason.” Navi let out a deep breath and gave them a look featuring a slight wry smile. 7753 was grateful that Navi was easygoing enough that he gave Tepsekemei’s answer no more than a slightly uncomfortable smile.

“Figures,” said Navi. “If the situation could be judged easily, nobody would have run away, huh? Anyway, I get that she’s a real strong opponent. Though that wasn’t what I wanted to hear. Anyway, I guess we should gather everyone together. Let’s meet up with Clarissa, for starters. She just said she’d come if she could, but she’s the type to wind up showing up when you get together.”

Navi took a step toward them, trying to come closer, and Mana held up a hand. Navi stopped. 7753 wondered what Mana was doing. Then she figured out that the hand sign meant not to come close, and she bit her lip. She almost said, “What are you doing?” out loud but managed to hold her tongue.

Navi didn’t get angry—he actually seemed curious, tilting his head. “What’s up?”

“We also ran into Dreamy Chelsea…,” said Mana, “but it seemed like she was being controlled by someone.”

“What the heck?”

“We somehow managed to make it through that situation, but she was being openly hostile. Oh, yes, and we haven’t confirmed what sort of magic the enemy uses.”

“Well, if you waited around until they used it, then you’d be in danger. Makes sense.”

“It may be a magic that can twist minds or control people.”

“I haven’t seen it, so I don’t know… Wait, are you saying I’m being controlled?”

“That is a possibility. After all, Dreamy Chelsea was indeed being controlled.”

Navi scratched his head, at a loss. Since 7753 had been among those attacked, she’d seen the enemy. She’d seen the axes changing color, too. And she knew that after that, they’d exploded, and half of Tepsekemei had been shaved away. So then, wouldn’t it be typical to assume that had been the enemy’s magic? It didn’t seem quite right to leap over such explanations and claim they hadn’t seen the enemy’s magic. It was true Chelsea had been acting strangely, but 7753 felt that was a different issue.

7753 wondered if she should say something, but after getting a peek at Mana’s expression, she changed her mind. Mana looked just like an inspector as she stared at Navi: sharp and without weakness. Therefore 7753 shouldn’t butt in.

“If you’re sayin’ someone’s controlling me…,” Navi said, “you got me there. But if you could check with the goggles…”

“The goggles aren’t here now,” Mana told him. “Chelsea probably stole them.”

“That’s not good.”

“I’m fine just doing a basic check to ensure you have no hidden weapons.”

“Now that sounds like a hassle. From where I stand, I don’t know if you guys are being controlled, either.”

“If we were being controlled…” Mana looked to 7753 and then Tepsekemei before returning her gaze to Navi. “Then we would have killed you or captured you.”

Navi’s eyes widened slightly, then immediately narrowed with a small smile. “Well, I guess you’re right. There’s no way I could fight two magical girls.”

“Call it the nature of Inspection to be suspicious,” Mana said, her tone the epitome of superficial and insincere politeness.

But Navi wasn’t offended, raising both hands. “I can’t fight a cop.”

7753 approached Navi’s side, more or less cautiously, and Mana inspected his person more painstakingly than she’d said she would, confirming that he was not carrying any weapons.

Mana took her hat in her hands, placed it in front of her chest, and bowed. “No issues. Please forgive my rudeness.”

“Oh, it’s fine. More importantly, you came here for the same reason as me, right?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, didn’t you come here thinking there might be something useful here to get outta this situation? I was lookin’ for just that kind of great magic item.”

Mana nodded and glanced at the main building. “That’s the plan.”

“Then you’re outta luck.” Navi approached the building and knocked on the wall, then gave it a slap with his palm. He seemed far more disgruntled now compared to when Mana had demanded to inspect his person. “I tried investigatin’ the storehouse, too. There was nothing worthwhile. There were a few antiques that would fetch a good price if you took ’em to the right places, but there’s no use for something like that now.”

“Then I will look as well.”

“Uh, I said I just looked.”

“Our specialties are different. There might be something that only I would notice.” Mana went straight inside.

Navi shrugged with a “What do you do?” look on his face. 7753 bowed apologetically. “I’m sorry. We’re all on edge.”

“No surprise there. I’m sure nobody thought things would wind up like this.” He was always so easygoing.

7753 ordered Tepsekemei to keep watch at the entrance, then went after Mana. They walked briskly along, turning many corners, then went up a flight of stairs to arrive at a large door at the end. The door wasn’t as heavy as it looked, and Mana opened it casually with one hand and went inside. 7753 followed her. The room was nine feet by eighteen feet at most, with shelves built in on all four sides. It looked like a storage room. There were a lot of things in here, and none of it was organized. Moving papers and piling books to the side, Mana dragged out an armful-sized box and slid the top open.

“Is there something here that could help us?” asked 7753.

“You wait there. An amateur shouldn’t go touching these things.” That meant 7753 couldn’t do anything.

Then Mana turned back, having remembered something. She thrust a finger at 7753’s chest. “Also—you can’t trust Navi. He said there was nothing here, but don’t just take that at face value.”

“Huh? We really can’t trust him?”

Mana faced the box again and pointed at the bottom. “Doesn’t it look like something was here?”

7753 leaned over Mana’s back and looked down to see a space roughly four inches square.

“I’d assume it was like that to begin with,” said 7753.

“Look around it. There’s dust in the box. But there’s no dust in just that one spot.”

7753 looked more closely. Now that Mana pointed it out, she did notice. It was true, it was as she’d said.

“It’s already suspicious that he would choose to split up with his magical girl to come to the main building, given the situation. It’s too reckless for an employee of the Lab—he should be used to danger.”

7753 had sensed the air about Mana change when she’d seen Navi standing in front of the main building. Maybe this was what Mana was like when she was working. She wasn’t simply steeling herself, she was working as an employee of the Inspection Department.

“At the very least, we should suspect him of being a looter,” Mana continued.

7753 followed what Mana was saying and went back to consider everything in order. She scowled. “You mean you think maybe Navi took advantage of the commotion to steal some of the inheritance? And that’s why you inspected his person? But he wasn’t carrying anything, right?”

“He wasn’t carrying anything that looked like the inheritance.”

“So then, it’s also possible that someone other than Navi went in during the confusion to steal it, right? Or wait, maybe it wasn’t even stolen, but that, um—Sataborn, was it?—maybe he needed something, so he took it out.”

“No.” Mana cut 7753 off. “Navi is the most suspicious.”

“How can you say that for sure? You inspected him.”

“He just had a few grayfruit and one staff. He didn’t have a magic bag, either.”

“So then, he didn’t steal it, right?”

“He was missing something he should have had before.”

“Missing what?”

“He was using a magic carpet before. That’s gone.”

7753 recalled when Navi had showed up. That had left an impact. True, he’d had a carpet. Or rather, he’d been riding one.

“He could have given it to Clarissa,” 7753 suggested.

“In this situation, I doubt he would give a magical girl who isn’t with him a tool he could use for escape or retreat.”

“That’s true…but what about not having it makes him untrustworthy?”

Mana looked up, and 7753 followed her gaze. There was nothing particularly strange about the cream-colored stone ceiling. If anything, it was just a little dusty.

“How far up do you think the barrier goes on this island?” Mana asked.

“Who can say…? I don’t really know.”

“You don’t think that if he put the item he wants atop the carpet and sent it up above the clouds, it wouldn’t be found?”

7753 clapped her hands with an “Ahh.” Then he would just have to retrieve it after everything was over. Since there had been no kind of catalog to begin with, nobody would even notice it had been stolen.

“I heard a story about how a long time ago, a robber stole jewels via a similar method,” Mana explained. She pulled a pale-pink ceramic container from the box, then placed it down on the shelf more slowly than she’d picked it up. There was a chip in the neck. “It seems like…a lot of these things are broken.”

“Did someone break them?” 7753 asked.

“No, it’s probably simply due to age. These are the sort of antiques you’d find in a museum. Some people find historical meaning in even a single chip. You shouldn’t repair them if you don’t know how.”

“So this means there are a lot of old things in here.”

“I’d have been glad to find things that made use of new techniques, though…” Mana pulled a number of items from the box and carefully lined them up. There was energy even in those little gestures. She didn’t look like a victim who had been caught up in an incident, but like an inspector who had found someone suspicious. This was unquestionably Mana.

  Rareko

Touta seemed worried about something—he was groaning to himself. He wasn’t trying to hide that he was troubled, worried, and at a loss.

“If you can’t hold it, I dug a hole in the back…,” said Yol.

“No, that’s not what it is. It’s something else, Yol. I’ve been thinking about things a bit.”

It seemed it wasn’t that he wanted to tell them something. If complaints and whining had followed, then Rareko could say “I see”—for her, that would be straightforward and easy to understand. She wanted to keep on whining and complaining, too. The world was filled with misery—this island in particular.

Yol let out a sigh and looked down, seemingly lost in thought. Maiya’s death had left her heavily disheartened. Her reliable bodyguard was gone, and she had been abandoned on an island surrounded by outlaws. She couldn’t remain a mere carefree and pampered young lady.

Rareko adjusted her glasses with the tip of her index finger. Her setting them at this angle would make it difficult to read her eyes from Touta’s position, due to the reflection of the light. As she spent some time observing Touta, he flicked repeated glances outside. It seemed he hadn’t given up on his idea to leave the cave. That basically had to mean he was thinking about how to leave, how to change Rareko and Yol’s opposition into agreement. Rareko doubted that he’d come up with an answer immediately, given his child’s brains.

Rareko looked away from Touta.

Maiya had been killed. To Rareko, this was a bigger blow than simply losing her master. As a magical girl who had served for many years, Maiya had had a unique position in the house. She’d been given a position of responsibility in working for both the past generation and the current one, and she likely would have been responsible for the future generation—Yol—as well. Maiya had touched many secrets that couldn’t be allowed out, and she had been able to make statements a mere servant could not. Rareko had only been employed because she was Maiya’s apprentice. With Maiya gone, Rareko’s presence in the household was at a terrible risk. Her position was going to get worse, even if this wasn’t her fault.

Rareko twisted the hem of her apron in her fingers. Getting back safely was her absolute condition, and she had to think about after she got back, too. There was a single dripping sound in the back of the cave. The sound rang out, but she didn’t look back toward it. She was so on edge, she’d been looking back there with every drop of water, but she’d gotten sick of that. Only magical girls like Maiya could accomplish the feat of always being alert to their surroundings. Even if Rareko couldn’t do it, that didn’t mean she was at fault.

Navi was trying to get into Yol’s favor. Maiya had hated that. Navi failed to measure up to Maiya’s standards in character, career history, skills, and appearance. With Maiya there, it had been difficult for Navi to even approach Yol.

With Maiya’s guard so incredibly firm, Navi must have seen her as a tough nut, as before long he’d sought cooperation from Rareko. It wasn’t dramatic enough to call betrayal—she was just sort of leaking information to him.

Rareko needed to have more than just one person she could rely on when something happened. She didn’t view this as not trusting in others, rather managing to get by in the world—but she knew full well that wouldn’t fly, socially speaking. If the information Rareko had leaked had caused Maiya’s death, then Rareko would have no place to run. Even if she insisted, “It’s not my fault! I didn’t do anything,” nobody would listen. Even if she wasn’t really at fault, even if it wasn’t because of her, that wouldn’t matter.

Yes, perhaps Navi had been involved with Maiya’s death here. Navi had said a few times that he wanted to convince Maiya somehow, but if this was the kind of convincing he’d meant, that would be disastrous. That would inevitably make Rareko an accomplice. Since coming to this island, she had been sending Navi information via notes—they were about comparatively trivial things like what Yol and Maiya talked about and the things they did. When Clarissa had brought her mouth to Touta’s sleeve, Rareko had let that go, and when Clarissa had come over while being chased by Clantail, Rareko had run to help, even though that meant leaving Yol behind. Rareko had undeniably cooperated in everything. If Rareko’s cooperation had led to Maiya’s death, that would make it Rareko’s responsibility.

Though 7753’s goggles had denied his direct involvement, it wouldn’t be a surprise for Navi to be up to something. Rareko saw him as a man who would do anything for his own benefit, and that worked out for him. He had a new face for every occasion and said whatever people wanted him to say. He would sometimes play a cheerful clown and other times a scary-looking but kind man, and he could also be an outlaw who made a reliable ally.

I’m going to get him on my side somehow, after all.

Even if Navi hadn’t been the one to cause this situation, he would still try to use it. So the best thing would be for Rareko to actively cooperate with him. This was how you made it in the world. This was for her own survival.

Rareko had heard so many sad stories about what happened to magical girls when they lost their jobs, she couldn’t count them all on the fingers of both hands. She didn’t want to be a part of that statistic. She didn’t want someone else stomping on her. She also didn’t want to meet some miserable fate for unfair reasons. She was timid and no good at speaking her mind, and nobody saw her as important. That had never changed. Only Maiya had paid attention to Rareko. The words that Maiya had taught her—“Always think about the future”—lived on inside her. Times like these were when you most had to think about what might come next. She would live for the future. She would insist, “It’s not my fault.”

The problem was how to get in contact with Navi or Clarissa. She couldn’t spew everything in front of Yol. She wanted an opportunity to speak in private. Touta aside, Rareko couldn’t abandon Yol for a long time, and she just couldn’t think of any good way.

“Hey, I was just thinking…”

That was Touta. Rareko looked up, and her glasses slid down.

Some people would use the preface “I was just thinking” or “I just had an idea” even when it was something they already knew or had noticed. If he was digging up what they’d already talked to death, it would end with “Drop it already,” but if he made it so that he’d come up with a nice idea just now, then people would actually listen to him. He’d used a pretty cunning technique there, for a kid.

Expression a little brighter, Yol looked at Touta. Rareko kept her expression decently hard. She was showing her tension and caution at one quarter of actuality.

“So Clarissa…she was chased right up to us, right?” Touta said. “Then that means that the one chasing her, Clantail, would know that you’re here, right? And Yol, who’s with you.”

Yol’s lips opened slightly in an “Ah.” About a second later, Rareko’s mouth opened wide in an “Ahhh!”

That damn brat is too perceptive, Rareko thought, but she didn’t let her true feelings show. Rareko had been doubting herself that Clantail’s attack on Clarissa had been one sided, but she hadn’t voiced her suspicions. If Clarissa had tried to bite Clantail’s clothing to use her magic, but she had then been caught and made her mad… Well, that was a bit of a casual assumption, but maybe something like that had happened.

“I think it’s a bad idea to be here after all, but what do you think?” Touta asked.

“Yes, you’re right. I think it’s not good for someone, um…violent who would go around chasing people to know where we are… Let’s find a new shelter.” Yol nodded, took her staff, and stood.

Rareko closed her mouth, opened it about half as wide as before, then closed it again and stood. Touta poked his head out the entrance, checked how things were outside, and then called back “Looks okay!” to the two inside.

Touta checked left, right, ahead, behind, up, and down, and when he looked up into the sky, he froze. Pointing above, he muttered, “There.” Rareko came out from behind Yol and looked up in the same direction. She couldn’t hear any sounds—but there were explosions. Was there a spell erasing the sound? But that wasn’t all. Magical girls were chasing each other through the sky. One of them was a magical girl with a strange ax in each hand. The other was Dreamy Chelsea.

“Are those…explosions? It looks like someone is flying…,” said Touta.

“They’re zooming around…but the smoke from the explosions is getting in the way, and I can’t see through,” Yol said.

The two of them couldn’t tell who the magical girls were—not because of the speed, but because of the smoke getting in the way. It was no surprise that they could only see hazily, with the eyes of a human and a mage.

“What’s going on?” Yol folded her arms and tilted her head, making her curls sway.

Rareko stuck up the index finger of her right hand to adjust the position of her glasses, but when she glanced from side to side, they fell down again. “Magical girls…I think they’re magical girls.”

Rareko tried to make some kind of shape with both her hands, then dropped her hands like she’d given up. With a groan of “Hnn,” she looked up, then moaned, “Ahh” and dropped her chin. She made it look as if she was so confused, it was even a little much. Pretending to be weak made it easy to gain sympathy. This was already deeply ingrained in Rareko—it was the way she lived.

“I think one of them was Dreamy Chelsea,” Rareko said. “I don’t know the other one. It looked as if she was carrying axes. I think it was some magical girl we don’t know. The two of them were fighting.”

“A magical girl we don’t know…,” Yol murmured. “So then, that means, in other words, the one who Maiya…”

“Yes…I think most likely…”

Yol’s expression stiffened. “I’ll go, too.”

“You can’t.”

“It’s too dangerous.”

Touta and Rareko both spoke at the same time, and then they shared a look, and Rareko waved her right hand in front of her face as Touta aggressively shook his head.

Whether Yol was listening to them or not, her eyes remained pointed, unmoving, in the direction in which the enemy had vanished—she didn’t even blink. “But we have to go help her.”

“I said, it’s too dangerous,” Rareko repeated.

“Even if we did go, we’d just drag her down,” Touta pointed out.

“Rareko is very strong,” Yol offered. “She’s Maiya’s number one student.”

Rareko couldn’t say, “Miss, this is the very person who just killed Maiya.”

“But look, if she were to be protecting you while fighting, then she wouldn’t be able to put everything in the fight, right?” Touta helped out, and Rareko emphatically agreed with him.

Yol hung her head, twisted up her cheeks, and clenched her teeth. She slowly, slowly brought up her staff, and once it was over her head, it hit a tree branch, making Yol twitch and look up at it. She lowered her staff weakly with a little sigh. “But, but…we can’t just let Chelsea die.”

In a very timid manner, Rareko intervened. “Shall I go out alone to help her?”

Touta found himself yelping, “Huh?”

Yol also seemed surprised, as she covered her mouth, and the covering hand trembled slightly. “You mean that without a burden holding you back, then you can fight with all your strength…is that it?”

“Yes, precisely,” Rareko replied. “Ordinarily speaking, I would be unable to leave your side. But, perhaps fortunately, we’ve learned the villain’s position, so I believe my leaving this area would not pose much problem. Then, as for where we would meet after—”

Navi wouldn’t want Yol to be hurt. Even after they’d gone into a state of emergency, he was still coming around persistently to check up with her. In other words, what Navi wanted from Rareko was for her to protect Yol—but if she was doing that, she couldn’t make contact with Navi. So she would use going off on her own to get in contact with Navi or Clarissa. There had to be orders they wanted to give her directly, too.

Rareko tried to pull out a grayfruit, but she fumbled and dropped it. The grayfruit rolled over the fallen leaves, and Touta and Yol’s eyes went toward it. She had her chance. Rareko reached out to Touta’s robe and ripped off the fabric of his cuff and took it. If she took Clarissa’s bite mark and went off somewhere, the odds were high that Clarissa would come to her.

Rareko bowed her head as she accepted the grayfruit from Touta. The situation was very unfortunate. But Rareko knew she’d been unfortunate since she was born, and she was used to it. She would contact Navi or Clarissa, avoid encountering the ax-wielding magical girl, and pray that Yol would remain safe.

Her course basically decided at last, she firmly reminded herself that this wasn’t her fault.

  Love Me Ren-Ren

She felt like her head was going to spin, but she encouraged herself and returned to the rocky area at full speed. Agri and Nephilia were having some kind of intense discussion, and they only glanced at Ren-Ren.

Ren-Ren made sure that nobody but Agri and Nephilia were in sight before calling out, “Agri!”

The pair turned around, both apparently tense. Nephilia had never had an air of seriousness, often either looking dazed or smirking. But right now, her expression was unusually serious. Agri, on the other hand, seemed serious as she listened. There was nothing joking about the look she gave Ren-Ren.

“Did something happen?” Agri asked.

“It’s strange—there’s something strange going on,” Ren-Ren told her.

“Nephilia said something similar.” Agri let out a little sigh.

Ren-Ren looked at Nephilia, and Nephilia looked at Ren-Ren; they nodded at one another, and Ren-Ren drew her chin back slightly to prompt her to speak. Nephilia gave in her muttering way the explanation that she had probably also just given Agri. She said she’d extracted a large sum of money from Clantail and that she had also caught sight of battles that properly speaking shouldn’t be happening anymore. Following Nephilia, Ren-Ren told them about how she’d also seen signs of battle. There was a fight going on that shouldn’t be happening if Navi was controlling the situation—at least if he was managing to control his magical-girl ally.

This didn’t seem to make sense to Agri. She was repeatedly tilting her head. “Is this really something that Mr. Navi’s ally is doing?”

“There isn’t anyone else it could be,” said Ren-Ren.

“You did make the contract with him properly, right, Nephilia? You made no mistakes?”

“No…mis…”

“Yeah, of course. Then, assuming he’s failed to control her, the initial contract aside, there’s no reason for him not to be honest about that in our second discussion… If he spewed some nonsense and then it became a problem down the line, his whole fortune would go pop. It reeeally seems like there’s something else going on here.”

“Maybe…that…time…”

“Ah yeah, I guess you could say that maybe he’d been able to control her then. True.”

“Now…also…”

“Mm-hmm, it also seems plausible that he thought he had control over her, but she’s been consistently getting out of control since the beginning.”

Agri closed her eyes and walked around the area in a ten-foot-wide circle, muttering under her breath. At the end, she grumbled to herself, “Well, not bad, I guess,” and nodded. “Change of plans.”

“Yes?” said Ren-Ren.

“Let’s be more proactive about sharing the grayfruit with the others. We sell them off at a cheap price. Instead of direct help, we offer them support so they can fight that person who’s on the loose. But we should stay in hiding, someplace as safe as possible. We won’t be actively attacking Mr. Navi and his happy friends, but we will just in case be assuming this is an emergency situation and making our personal safety the number one priority.”

“I think that’s a good idea. It’s important to stay alive.”

“Uh… It…”

“Mm-hmm.”

Agri beckoned to Ren-Ren, and then she beckoned to Nephilia. The two magical girls sidled up to Agri, who slung her arms around their shoulders to bring them close. She’d done this a number of times since they’d first met. It was like a ceremony. Whenever they were going to try something and whenever something happened, Agri would embrace the other two.

“We’ve nabbed that surprisingly big payout from Clantail, plus if things go well, the contract breach fee from Mr. Navi, so I think that should be enough funds to live on. I’m fine with that this time around.”

The sweet smell of the grayfruit lingered on Agri’s breath. Looking up at her, Ren-Ren felt very troubled, and she was relieved to see Agri’s eyes were fixed forward more firmly than she’d thought. Ren-Ren felt so happy, she buried her face in Agri’s chest. The desperate daughter of a mistress who’d been willing to throw away her life for a money grab was now trying to get through this more safely. Maybe that was because she was dealing with not only her own life but Ren-Ren’s and Nephilia’s as well.

Ren-Ren looked at Nephilia to see her forcefully thrusting her cheek into Agri’s chest, seemingly enjoying the sensation. She was, to put it mildly, smirking with smug self-satisfaction. That reminded Ren-Ren how she’d pulled something like sexual harassment when they’d been in human form, too. Ren-Ren did find this regrettable, thinking it would be nice if she could enjoy this embrace with more pure feelings, but then she had a sudden realization that sent a shock racing through her like lightning.

Agri wanted to feel at ease. Nephilia enjoyed the sensation. Even though their behavior was the same, each party had different goals. Ren-Ren was feeling serenity from being embraced by Agri. She had felt this serenity somewhere before, but she’d been unable to put it into words. Now she understood it. It was the same as being embraced by her mother. Agri let Ren-Ren treat her like her mother, and that was why Ren-Ren wanted Agri to be happy.

“Mom,” slipped from Ren-Ren’s lips, and then her face jerked up.

Agri looked back at her with a curious expression. “‘Mom’?”

“No, um, that’s not what I mean, sorry.”

Agri laughed happily, shoulders shaking. “When I was in school, there was a kid who called a young teacher Mom and got laughed at until graduation… Ah, that really takes me back.”

“Sorry…”

“Mom, huh? She caused me hardship, and I always resented her…but now, it’s not so bad.”

Ren-Ren felt her expression softening. The smile spread around her face. Agri hadn’t rejected her for muttering, “Mom.” When Ren-Ren had tried to somehow cover up that slip of the tongue, Agri had smiled at her—with that smile just like her mother’s—and put a hand on Ren-Ren’s head, mussing her hair and tangling it around her horns.

“Um, family…,” Ren-Ren muttered.

“That’s right, family. We’re a family. Let’s all find happiness together. I’d like to be happy.”

“…Yes!”

They were a family. They were a family. Ren-Ren felt like tears would spill from her eyes, but she held them back. She shouldn’t cry yet. She could do that lots after she was happy. A family would live together. It would be good to have a bigger apartment. Mom had come back. And Dad was here, too. Because they were a family, she would be happy. Her mother was alive. Ren-Ren hadn’t killed her. There was no way she could kill her.

“So…then…,” Nephilia said, and Agri relaxed the embrace, while Ren-Ren brought her face away as well. She was reluctant to let go, but they couldn’t be hugging all day. This was in order to become happy. It was in order to make her family happy.

“I’d like to hear about Mr. Navi,” said Agri.

“He’s dangerous,” Ren-Ren said.

“Why not have Chelsea go? She’s strong, and worst case, it’s fine if they get her.”

“…So…then…”

“Mm-hmm, that’s right. I think it would also be a good idea to send Mary’s sheep as messengers. Goats are the ones who eat letters, so getting the sheep to do it is safe, and kinda chic—”

Ren-Ren nocked an arrow to her bowstring. Nephilia raised her scythe blade at a diagonal. The two magical girls stood in front of Agri, who belatedly noticed—“What’s that sound?” It wasn’t footsteps. It was the sound of hoofs. A herd of creatures were stepping on the earth, bounding off rocks, and cracking branches underfoot on their way to the rocky area. Ren-Ren lifted up Agri by sandwiching her waist between her thighs, and, with her bow still up, she flew about six feet. Agri cried out, “Ohhh!” in surprise, twisting around like she was ticklish.

“It’s dangerous. Please stay still,” Ren-Ren told her.

“What is it, what happened?”

The answer came quickly. Sheep were racing along, some covered in vivid green leaves and some dirtied by mud, while others had thick tree branches still caught in their wool. They came out of the forest one after another—seemingly endless—to come to a stop in the rocky area, then huddled in a group in the center of it. Ren-Ren and Nephilia went to the side to avoid the herd of sheep, watching them closely from behind the rocks.

The line of sheep continued on and on, in fact they increased in number and force, filling the area with the smell of sheep and pathetic bleats. Nephilia said something, but the cries of the sheep were so loud that they drowned her out. The mistress of these sheep appeared moments later. Riding astride a particularly large sheep with fine wool, a magical girl was furiously scrawling with her pastels. She tore one sheet, then another, off her sketch pad, the sheets billowing up to become sheep that were added to the herd. Basically, she was fleeing while dropping sheep, embiggening the herd.

“Mary! Stop!”

Mary wouldn’t miss the sound of Ren-Ren’s voice, and she would listen to Ren-Ren. Mary’s chin jerked up, transmitting a tremble through her lips, shoulders, and legs to make her whole body shake, and she smacked the butt of her sheep to make it run toward Ren-Ren. She raced toward her so hard, she built up too much momentum, and when the sheep came to a sudden stop, she fell off the sheep onto her head to finally come to a halt. There was a little crack in the rock.

Mary bounced up like a doll on a spring and cried, “It’s awful!”

Agri tilted her head in the same way Ren-Ren had seen before. “What is?”

“We were attacked! A magical girl carrying axes showed up! And Chelsea was fighting!”

Ren-Ren flying in the sky, Agri who was held in her legs, and Nephilia standing on the ground all shared looks, and then, after a pause of half a breath, Ren-Ren opened her mouth. If Agri asked the question, Mary might not listen. If it was the one she loved, Ren-Ren, that was something else. “You mean it was a magical girl you don’t know?”

“It was someone I’ve never seen before. And Mr. Shepherdspie… It was awful…”

“You mean he was killed?”

“Yes.”

Nephilia huffed through her nose; she found this sincerely loathsome. Ren-Ren bit her lower lip. Something bad was happening—bad and unexpected.

“…And then?” Ren-Ren urged.

“Chelsea said to run, so I took the old man and ran, telling him we’ve got to get out of here… Ren-Ren, let’s get out of here.”

“The old man? Do you mean Ragi? Where is he?”

“Huh? Wait…” Mary looked right and left and then around the herd of sheep before face-palming. “Ah! I dropped him somewhere! It’s always like this! Nothing but memory lapses and slips of the mind and stupid mistakes! Always! Always!”

Ren-Ren wasn’t able to say anything to console her. Something rocketed in from the forest and snatched Mary away, and by the time Ren-Ren confirmed that it was Dreamy Chelsea, the next visitor had appeared. With a dirty red ax in her right hand and a black ax in her left, she was muddied, clad in a toga that had probably been white to begin with, and not even trying to sweep the dead leaves from her slightly wavy golden hair. Standing there was the goddess of spring from the fable.

“Is the one you dropped the golden ax?”

The sheep all stirred. Nephilia raised one heel. Ren-Ren was bewildered. How had they let the goddess get so close? It was obvious at a glance that she hadn’t been creeping toward them silently, but they hadn’t heard her coming at all.

“Or is it the silver ax?”

Ren-Ren decided to fly, and she ordered her muscles to move her wings. But before she could actually move, there was a streak of light. She had no clue what had happened. Before she knew it, she was blown away like dandelion fluff caught up in a typhoon. A comical number of sheep danced in the air. Dirt and dust flew in the air along with trees and even boulders that had been smashed to bits. It happened in slow motion, like a movie. Her ears hurt. Even sound seemed to come slowly. The sheep were bleating. Was Nephilia safe? Where had the goddess gone? Ren-Ren was alive. She could see and hear. She had her bow and arrow. She had both arms. Her legs kept a firm grip on Agri, and her wings could move. She regained her balance with a large flap of her wings, then recalled that Chelsea had grabbed Mary and run off. Sparing not a single thought, she undid the magic she’d cast on the two of them. If Ren-Ren shot the goddess with her arrow without undoing the spell, then the goddess would fall in love with Chelsea. Ren-Ren didn’t think making the goddess fall in love with someone who wasn’t present would stop her from attacking Ren-Ren. Losing track of Chelsea was hard, not to mention losing track of Mary, but dealing with the imminent threat was more important than such regrets.

Below, the sheep that had escaped the danger were running and trying to get away. Nephilia and the goddess were nowhere to be seen. Everything that had been blasted into the air aside from Ren-Ren was falling.

“Are you all right, Agri?” she asked.

She suddenly noticed something—Agri, in her grasp, felt weirdly light. Ren-Ren looked down at her. The lower half of Agri’s cream-colored robe had turned dark red. Her eyes were pointed downward, looking nowhere. Blood was dripping from her mouth. Everything below her waist was gone, blood and innards spilling out of what remained of her body.