Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku - Volume 16 - Chapter 6

CHAPTER 6

A CHANCE ENCOUNTER

  Sally Raven

It was decided that they would participate in the Founding Festival. That part was fine. The problem came after that. The principal had made a lot of proscriptions for their participation, and though Sally had anticipated this, it was restricting them quite a lot.

They were not to do anything against public order and morals, they were not to cause trouble for Umemizaki Junior High, its students or teachers, not to do anything that would make the school suspect they might be magical girls, they were to deal with matters with solidarity—that much was taken for granted, and Sally had no complaints with that.

Sally personally was very indignant about how they weren’t allowed to use any copyrighted material—“that means no Cutie Healer!” But once she calmed down and mulled things over, she realized that this was the safer option, so she decided to swallow her anger. A few classmates were unhappy about the rule that they couldn’t use their powers as magical girls, but Sally figured that counted as obvious. They were the ones borrowing the building, so they couldn’t be doing whatever they pleased.

The problems came after that.

They were only allowed to go onto the sports field, and they weren’t allowed inside the school building, which made her feel like, “What are we even participating for?” They weren’t supposed to speak with the students and teachers of Umemizaki, either, which made it like, “So if they talk to us, then we should ignore them?” Finally, the statement that they were not even to deal with any food or drink had Princess Lightning smacking her desk with her palm.

Everyone there saw Lightning. But with all their eyes on her, she had a cool look that said, “Why are you looking at me?” as she directed a palm toward Tetty, who was presiding over the meeting, prompting her to move on with the discussion.

Everyone was dissatisfied to a greater or lesser extent. If there was any difference among them, it was just whether they would say it out loud or not. The sisters Arlie and Dory shrieked their anger incessantly, Pshuke’s cursing increased in volume and depth, and those like Adelheid and Miss Ril, who were normally more well-behaved, were unable to pacify those around them—they even had troubled expressions themselves. And Mephis Pheles, who would normally be whining and complaining, remained silent for some reason—but still, she had to have some kind of concerns about this and not think well of the situation.

Of course, they did not reach a conclusion. The class meeting went through first period, then second period, using it up over nothing as Calkoro was still as a scarecrow, and Tetty gave up, thinking there was no longer anything to be done about this. But it wasn’t as if they’d given up participating in the Founding Festival.

They wrote out everything they didn’t like about the principal’s orders, making a written report of it that they decided to submit, which the whole class agreed on. To be more precise, Calkoro panicked and opposed it, but they made her back down, saying they wouldn’t cause her trouble and that they were taking responsibility for submitting it themselves, and once the report was done, it fell on Tetty to take it to the principal.

  Halna Midi Meren

Halna wanted to smack it and say, “Don’t give me this nonsense!” but she resisted the urge. She read over the sheets of paper she’d been handed three times, sighed, and felt dizzy at the greediness of magical girls.

Even just approving their participation in the Founding Festival with conditions had been a shockingly large concession, but now they were kicking up a fuss saying that they didn’t like those conditions. Halna figured they would never be satisfied, no matter what or how she gave them permission. Approval had just gotten them carried away. They continued to demand more, ever more new treats. They were incorrigible.

Summoning Calkoro, she had the teacher explain about how this paper had come to be submitted. She wanted to yell at her, but if she yelled now, then Calkoro would know that she was angry, and if she gave permission down the line, it would seem odd to her why Halna had permitted it when she was angry. So Halna maintained the best expressionless mask she could as she ordered dispassionately to “tell me only the facts.”

Calkoro was still frightened, but since she had never not been frightened to stand before Halna, the principal paid that no mind and had her speak. Halna had her explain who made what statements and how they responded, and then after having listened enough, she had Calkoro leave.

Once everyone else was gone, Halna smacked her desk with a fist.

“They’re all trash!”

Halna wasn’t concluding that all magical girls were trash. Magical girls were necessary to the Magical Kingdom, and some were perfectly capable and worthy of respect. But not every single one of them. In fact, there were more harmful ones than not. If they were just slacking in their training, that was on the better side—there were truly a lot who were pleased to use their magical-girl powers for illegal activity. While conversely, there were also those who didn’t know what to do with their talents and lived in obscurity. That was exactly why an organization for the sake of educating magical girls was needed.

When Halna had still been a newbie, she had been ordered to investigate into the Cranberry incident, and she had witnessed many, many tragedies of the sort that would make you want to cover your eyes. Magical girls like glittering stars who would surely have been great successes, had they survived, had fallen to those who excelled purely in combat ability and cunning.

The more she had investigated, the more depressed the incident had made her. She had seen her time with the investigation team only as a stepping stone to success, but instead it had triggered her to rethink magical girls. The dim-witted scouts had come to do a slightly better job, the number of magical girls increased, and there were more with powerful magic, but their mentalities weren’t keeping up. If a magical girl was strong but had a twisted heart, then it was better not to have her. At this rate, they would never make proper use of them.

Even the Cranberry incident had just been the tip of the iceberg. You couldn’t at all say “It’s been resolved, the case is closed, so it’s over.” They would raise magical girls’ level of education by three levels, reduce the rate of all incidents, both surfaced and not surfaced, to less than 10 percent, and then finally make it zero.

It was with that thought that they’d taken advantage of the Puk Faction’s failed plan, stealing the ruins that they had been maintaining to finally set up this magical-girl school—but then they had stumbled right from the first step. The school had not been the recipient of innocent and ignorant magical girls with hopeful futures, as Halna had envisioned. It had wound up becoming a gathering of good-for-nothing magical girls. The vanguard types sent in as a part of a plot to expand the interests of their factions weren’t even the worst of them—there were scoundrels attending the school; covert operatives or actual terrorists were making like they were magical girls with righteous natures.

The vanguards and the covert operatives and the terrorists—all the students of the magical-girl class would think that they were the chosen ones. That was why they all wanted so badly to make things go as they pleased. And on top of all that, they’re submitting something like this, she thought, hitting the sheets of paper on her desk with her fist.

Calkoro said that Snow White had not proactively agreed. That did feel like a bit of a saving grace. If the shining star of the magical-girl class joined in with the rabble and made a scene, that would cause problems.

But still, all these miserable…

Calkoro lifted her fist, took a deep breath, exhaled after a few seconds, and brought her fist down again. The magic desk would not be damaged by a mild impact, but even so, an educator should not be abandoning herself to her emotions and treating it roughly.

Opening her palm, she slowly lowered it, lifted up the papers, and brought them in front of her eyes. With her open left hand, she adjusted the position of her glasses frames, and while knowing the content was utterly foolish, she read over it. No matter how worthless the content of the text was, her magic glasses would show it to her clearly and crisply.

If she was to give them permission, she couldn’t go suddenly approving everything. If a principal who was strict about regulations gave in to the students’ pressure, then it would be unnatural for it to be everything all of a sudden. Someone with an eye for it would have doubts. Already, some would have sniffed out that it was unnatural for Halna to have given permission for the Founding Festival.

Pythie Frederica and the Lapis Lazuline Faction would have noticed this irregularity and taken it as a good opportunity. The homunculus defense system was currently out of commission, and they were defended by security cameras alone. Even if the security cameras did find fault with them, they just had to finish their intrusion before the security team rushed in. And if you added the condition of the Founding Festival, a survey would be easy, and infiltration would be possible.

They would certainly be thinking that the conditions were too good for thieving, so it might be a trap. But still, if they thought that letting this chance go by would make it difficult for them to get the relic out of the underground ruins, then there was a 70 percent—no, an 80 percent chance that they would make their move. If Halna could lure them out by making it look like there was an opening here, then a little bit of irritation was a cheap price to pay.

There were rats aside from Frederica and Lazuline, too. People like Calcton from the Lab, Teetz from the Puk Faction, and Juube from Magical Girl Resources might be aiming for a theft during the confusion or to profit while others were fighting. But they were a low level of threat, harm, and priority compared to the other two, so she would leave them aside for now.

The same went for Kana, who had been sent in from the magical-girl prison. Halna had sensed an incredible presence during her conversation with Kana, so she’d tried to use the power of the Information Bureau to look into her, but no matter where she looked, it stopped at the prison. No criminal history would come up at all. If Frederica had erased her history before sending her in, then she truly was an enemy you couldn’t let your guard down with. But if she put too much into investigating Kana and slacked off elsewhere, then she would lose everything. For that reason, she left her aside for the time being.

Now, there was the Founding Festival. Through Tetty, she would circulate the information that the principal had hesitantly given permission for it. A single negotiation with the students would not be enough for her—rather, they would reach an agreement after repeated concessions on both sides. She would ease the air of suspicion as much as possible.

This was necessary. Getting angry over every little thing would be bad for her health. So she told herself as she took her feather pen in hand, adding her orders in red ink. The magic feather pen ignored Halna’s feelings and moved smoothly along. This would be the final festival for the faction vanguards, the covert operatives, the terrorists, and all such magical girls, so she had to be magnanimous about it when she gave them permission.

After everything had been cleaned up, the magical-girl class would recover both its original ideal and any students who were properly qualified for it.

  Pshuke Prains

Through an exchange over a number of documents and with mutual compromise, they settled on conditions to participate in the Founding Festival. What they settled on made Pshuke feel like, “Well, this is fine.” They were not to use their magical-girl powers; they were to refrain from any excessive contact with the Umemizaki Junior High students; they were to watch out that their program didn’t double up with Umemizaki’s; and copyright was also forbidden.

Kana had been very seriously saying, “I was thinking if necessary I would have to go negotiate with her personally,” but that clearly would have led to more fights—rather, that would have been a fight right there. So Pshuke was thankful to the principal—whose face she didn’t know—for making these concessions.

Pshuke had been grumbling and griping like usual, all while maintaining a grumpy expression, but on the inside, she was giddier than ever. She’d only had a normal school life until the age of ten, when she’d become a magical girl, and ever since she had dropped all that to strive in her magical-girl activities. She had to, or she never would have been able to establish herself as a freelancer. It wasn’t as if she regretted it. But she was drawn to the fun parts of school life, just a bit—like field trips and outings and events like that. Of course, having classmates she was good friends with was also vital.

As for whether Pshuke was good friends with her classmates or not—opinions would be divided. But lately things weren’t as awkward as they were before, and it had been fun when everyone had made their suggestions about participating in the Founding Festival—even with the dicey element of Kana in there. And as for the members of her group—though one of them looked really overbearing, one of them really did what she wanted with no regard for anything else, one was always spinning her wheels, and one would insert anime into the conversation at every opportunity, they weren’t boring people—they actually had a lot that made them interesting.

In making that promise with Sally, at the time, Pshuke had only meant it as a casual promise with an eye to utility as a mercenary—but now, having a secret promise with a classmate was so much like normal school life, she came to think, Maybe that might be fine.

Pshuke’s heart was already settled on joining in the Founding Festival, and as the event took shape, things were gradually going in the right direction. But once they were at the point where they were going to decide what to do, she started getting suspicious. In the class meeting the day after the negotiations finally ended with the principal, the conflict between her classmates came to a head.

Princess Lightning insisted that they absolutely should do something related to food and beverages. “For a school festival, you just have to have a refreshment stand. Could there be anything else? I say no. This is absolute. Since I have no intention of backing down.”

Kumi-Kumi proposed that they all work together to manufacture something. “It’s already been decided…that Umemizaki…is doing…the popular refreshment stands. Rather than…trying to sell…something niche…we should all…work together…on something, like, commemorative…on a piece of art that would move people…”

Other various proposals came and went: “make a map of the city,” “investigate the seven mysteries of the school,” “roller coaster,” “tea cups,” “haunted house,” “instrumental performance,” “a play,” “censor the proper names for a summary of Cutie Healer history,” “cosplay shoot,” “a public reading,” “arm wrestling,” “candy making,” “fortune telling and spells,” “manga café,” “lecture on how to keep pets,” “lecture on how to draw manga,” “cute Lillian knitting lecture,” “martial arts lecture,” “shogi problems,” “sharpening blades,” “a ball pit,” “learning about weapons you can own, as far as you can go legally,” “sandbag café,” “movie watch party,” “merry-go-round,” “scientifically study liquids”—and in the end, two remained: the vague and hazy idea of “producing an art piece” and “a refreshment stand,” the plain expression of Lightning’s desires.

A fair amount of time and enthusiasm had been consumed by this point. Pshuke was totally feeling like, “Who cares anymore, just decide on something already,” but now was when things really got started. For the Lightning plan and the Kumi-Kumi plan to remain meant, in other words, that it had wound up a showdown between Groups Two and Three. In times like this, Group Two thought of it as an embarrassment to back down, while the Group Three leader had declared from the start that she wasn’t going to yield, and Pshuke couldn’t see a future where either gave in.

Even if she had been more subdued lately, Mephis was Mephis. She looked like a bookworm, but she had the personality of a delinquent and was always up for a fight. And Lightning was Lightning to the bitter end. Her freedom would not recognize any obstructions.

Since they were out of time, homeroom ended for the day, and they decided that if they couldn’t settle it over a discussion at a later date, then they would have a vote. By this decision, Groups Two and Three both came to set their sights on Group One. If they got the votes of Group One, then they would win.

There was some maneuvering in order to secure a majority of the class. By the diversion of school lunch desserts, changing of cleaning duty, and those sorts of furnishing of profit, they made appeals for cooperation on the day of the deciding vote. Since putting it into words would make it illegal, all such bribes were ultimately carried out under pretense of pure kindness, which only seemed to confuse the members of Group One. And Pshuke found it all wearying.

After school, she met up with Sally in the cafeteria as usual, and she voiced complaints of the sort that she couldn’t say out loud in the magical-girl class.

“Right when the vibe in the class was getting good! If we’re clashing again, or going in that direction, I’m really sick of it. Either side should just give in, but neither side will. The group leaders are crazy, and it’s stressing out everyone else.”

Listening to Pshuke’s grumbling, Sally laughed. “Oh, I don’t think that’s quite what’s going on, yeahhh.”

“Huh? What do you mean?” Feeling sullen about getting laughed at, her words came out harsh.

But Sally tightened up her expression and waved her right hand. “Come on. Compared to how it was before, I think it’s like fooling around.”

“You think? I dunno.”

“They kinda seem like they’re enjoying themselves, yeahhh. You should enjoy yourself along with them.”

“Enjoy myself, huh…”

From the looks of Sally’s human form, she was fulfilled in her real life and high up in the school caste. And she didn’t just have looks—she actually had strong communication skills. She was able to have very normal conversations with the eccentrics of Group Three and laugh with them and chide them. She had been managing in the PR department, which was a gathering of formidable communicators, so well, she had to be used to things.

Pshuke thought that if Sally said it was all right, then it had to be all right. While she didn’t quite like it, she was won over. At the class meeting the next day, the decision was made easily without having to go to a vote. It was the plan that Tetty proposed, to make a “refreshment booth decorated with a piece of artwork.”

After the school meeting was over, Pshuke continued to complain along the lines of, “If it was going to be like this, then we shouldn’t have wasted our time bickering.”

  Diko Narakunoin

Working up to the Founding Festival, the magical-girl class was bubbling with excitement. If Diko had been just another student, she would have been excited along with them, though rather more tacit. But with her original role as a covert operative taken into consideration, she couldn’t let herself be sincerely excited—since the final decision that they would definitely be participating in the Founding Festival was synonymous with the countdown to the start of D-Day.

But Princess Lightning, who should obviously have been burdened with the same role as Diko, was clearly excited. She wasn’t the very expressive type, but she didn’t particularly try to hide what she was thinking, either. It was as if she felt that hiding her thoughts was a restriction of her freedom.

Lightning fought with everything she had to make their feature for the Founding Festival as she wanted it, and when her plan was combined with Group Two’s through Tetty’s mediation, she was entirely pleased. Her shaking hands with Mephis didn’t seem at all like just a formality, and when she said, “Let’s work together and do our best,” it didn’t ring false.

Unbelievably enough, she was serious. After school, when the Ranyi, Diko, and Lightning trio got a karaoke box for their regular meetings—for things like reports and comparing and adjusting their plans—she said something outrageous.

She said that she’d run into Adelheid yet again at school at night, and she had warned her not to try anything during the Founding Festival. Additionally, she’d even proposed that they share information and work together to have the Founding Festival go off without a hitch.

What Lightning was just boldly telling them was something that would make you suspect she was a double agent. While Diko was privately confused, she listened to the end. Looking at Ranyi, she seemed rattled, but ultimately nodded and said, “I see, yeah, that’s an option.”

It was obviously not an option.

There were three of them—Ranyi, Diko, and Lightning. Diko had thought that fundamentally, if someone were to be the leader, it would be Lightning, since she’d been trusted to operate on her own. Diko and Ranyi were both Lazuline candidates, and ostensibly of the same rank, so if Diko became the leader, then Ranyi would feel bad, and if Ranyi were the leader, Diko doubted that she would be able to handle things well.

But Lightning had not been chosen as their leader, and the role was foisted on Diko. This clearly bothered Ranyi, and Diko had wondered if this was a failure in personnel selection, but the more she associated with the magical girl called Princess Lightning, the stronger her feeling became that they really couldn’t let her be the leader.

At a glance, she seemed competent. Her exceptionally beautiful looks gave her a strength of presence, and her bold personality would allow no faltering or weakness—she appeared to be someone incredible. Diko figured that every single one of their classmates in the magical-girl class had to be thinking that Princess Lightning was no ordinary person.

But she had no aptitude as a leader or a covert operative. She had taken a total turn on her plan to sow discord in the class, and now she was completely earnest about making the Founding Festival a success. And then she’d made contact with Adelheid. Even if she had attacked her, didn’t warning her to avoid the Founding Festival entirely benefit the enemy?

Diko put effort into her clothing and hairstyle because she knew a lot of people valued appearances. If she could make people think that she was “no ordinary person,” that alone could help things move along smoothly.

Aside from the fact that she was using what she was born with, Lightning did essentially the same thing. That was why it didn’t fool Diko. She observed her coolly and assessed her behavior.

Some people were deceived by appearances. Ranyi was one of them. She was easily taken in by beautiful looks and confident behavior. But Diko couldn’t point out that she was being deceived. Ranyi couldn’t be described as mentally strong, and she was always worrying about things. If you pointed out she was mistaken in some area and told her, “You’re wrong, so fix that,” it would make her anxious, and she might not be able to do the job that was expected of her.

Ranyi’s personal magic was incredibly convenient, and she was a capable magical girl who did well in battle. But she yearned to be a leader in the field like Lazuline, though Diko doubted she had the aptitude for it. The way she wanted to be Lazuline so badly that she even imitated her vocal cadence went past silly into sad.

But even understanding all this, Diko couldn’t point it out—since protecting Ranyi’s emotional state was also part of her job. She also had to keep a handle on Princess Lightning so that Ranyi could do her work.

Diko felt like she understood her own abilities. She could fight. It was difficult to say that she was skilled at anything else. It was rather too much to entrust her with coordinating relationships, too.

When it had been revealed that Lightning worked for Lazuline, Diko had told her master that this job was too tough for her. But her master had rejected that statement, saying, “You think too little of yourself.”

In a sonorous, beautiful voice, Lightning said, “When the homunculi went out of control, you know, I had fun. Working together with Adelheid and the other members of Group Two and such to fight the enemies, I thought, oh, this is so much fun. I’m sure it would also be fun to work together toward a single goal for the Founding Festival. Of course, I don’t mean for that to be all. After we’ve gone through everything we have to and the time comes, I’m sure it’ll be even more fun to defeat everyone. So we’re biding our time right now. Look, Adelheid beat me once, right? I’ve frankly never really cared at all about who was strongest, but once I actually lost to her, it was surprisingly vexing. It kind of feels unacceptable to end it there. So I certainly will settle that, relax. I’m just saying we need the Founding Festival to make us more motivated and give us some closure. Plus, having more opportunities for interaction will help me read her movements and find her weaknesses and such when we fight—although I can’t say whether that would actually work.”

Her rattling off all of that slowed down the workings of Ranyi’s brain. Now she would be even more confused by her appearance, attitude, and rank, and lose her capacity for judgment.

Watching Ranyi out of the corner of her eye as she nodded like a dippy bird, Diko thought, I really can’t let things go like this.

After leaving the karaoke box, she invited Ranyi to do reconnaissance of the school. When Ranyi asked, “You’re not inviting Lightning?” Diko clearly shook her head no. Originally speaking, the nighttime reconnaissance mission had been Diko and Ranyi’s. This had nothing to do with Lightning. Lots had been going on lately, so they hadn’t done it as often, but it wasn’t a bad idea to do it that day.

“I want the two of us to go alone.”

It was rare for Diko to speak out loud. Those who knew that would value what she said a little more. Though Ranyi grumbled about why she would say such a thing, she answered Diko’s invitation, and the two of them ran to school that night.

It was already getting dark when they left the karaoke box, but by the time they arrived at the school, the sun had set. There were no students endeavoring in their club activities or preparing for the Founding Festival. And on the side of the school building where the magical-girl class was, there was no sign of people or anything living at all.

It looked like neither Lightning nor Adelheid were there that day. Had they just not come yet, or were they taking the day off? Regardless, it was easier if they weren’t there.

Diko gave instructions with hand signs, and Ranyi used the same hand signs to give her the green light. Her expression was more serious than when they had been in the karaoke box, with a faint air of tension. It seemed that Diko’s idea to invite just her on a mission to get her to shape up had not been a bad one.

They approached the entrance of the school building. Of course, they didn’t go inside. Staying outside the range of the security cameras, they split up, with Ranyi going right and Diko going left, racing out alongside the building.

With the running speed of a magical girl, they covered half the circumference of the old school building in seconds. Of course, you wouldn’t be able to tell if anything was off just from looking, so Diko ran through the area, meaning to meet up with Ranyi again immediately. But unintentionally, her feet came to an immediate stop. There was clearly something wrong.

There was a sudden hole on the usual outer wall of the school, which had walls and windows at regular intervals. The hole was big enough that an adult man could pass through easily without bending over. It wasn’t the type of hole made from being broken or rotted away. It was a genuine hole, cleanly bored out.

Diko immediately used her magic right there on the spot. She used it reflexively, out of surprise and fear. She passed through nowhere to move a short distance instantaneously. She leaped behind a tree that was stunted from being in shade, hiding there as she quietly peeked into the hole.

She could have sworn there was no such hole during the day. And the hole fit too well with its surroundings for it to have been hollowed out by someone doing building work that day after school. The hole looked as if it had been there the whole time, since before the old school building had been designated as “old.”

The wind blew through. The clouds must have moved. Sunlight shone into the dim hole.

The sun…?

The sun had set. But Diko had naturally felt that sunlight had shone through it. That was contradictory.

She could see green on the other side. There were tree branches swaying in the wind. It was a fine garden tree, beautifully trimmed. The pale green of the lawn was gentle on the eyes.

The courtyard.

They had deemed the courtyard the most suspicious, a likely entrance to the ruins. One of the missions Diko had been assigned was to pinpoint its location and secure a way in.

The wind blew again. The clouds shaded the sun, and the courtyard went out of view. Still holding her breath, Diko took one silent step after another toward the hole. And then in front of the hole, when she was just within arm’s reach, she stopped. Her body was still moving forward, but she halted her feet with strong willpower.

Everything about this was abnormal. It was strange that there was a hole here, it was strange that there was sun shining through only in the courtyard when it was after sunset, and the way she was moving like an insect approaching a light trap was illogical, too. It was highly likely that this was some kind of trap—and not just any trap, but a powerful magic trap.

Diko pulled out her magical phone. She had to send a message to the First. Then she would immediately get out of here and meet up with Ranyi—thinking that far, she suddenly realized something. Why was she stopped here? She could send a message while moving, so she should get out of here quickly. For some reason, Diko’s body was still trying to stay here.

I have to move, she thought, but right before she got going, someone grabbed her arm. A hand thrust out of the hole to grip Diko’s arm with terrible force. Its fingers were slim, long, and transparently white. The purple fake nails bit deep into her skin, making a drop of blood streak down. The graceful, willowy hand was wounding the arm of a magical girl—in other words, it indicated that the owner of this arm was a magical girl herself.

The hand was trying to drag in Diko with terrifyingly superhuman strength. Lazuline candidates were all powerful fighters, but none of them were this strong. Intuiting that she wouldn’t be able to resist, Diko used her magic practically on reflex, moving through a nowhere space to travel, and landed on the grass.

In the spot she’d moved to, Diko was confused. She had thought she’d made her goal a place that was just away from the hole, but she was standing somewhere unfamiliar. Garden trees, a brick pathway, a gazebo. This was…the courtyard? Her magic wasn’t working normally. Diko had thought she’d moved to get away. She had not been trying to get into the courtyard.

“This is a place for magical girls to study.”

The voice came to her from behind. It was a voice she had never heard before—sweet but carrying well. It was the voice of a magical girl.

“Those such as you with no intention of learning…”

Diko tried to use her magic. But she didn’t go anywhere. She couldn’t even turn around and look at the other’s face. A hand was placed on her shoulder. She couldn’t move. She was at their mercy.

“…shouldn’t be here.”

A flock of crows flew off with a loud flutter of wings. Diko did not stop her feet, glancing up into the eastern sky where the crows had flown as she ran. They were just crows. There wasn’t anything going on here. She reached the back of the school building without any other particularly strange occurrences. Ranyi was leaning against the wall with her hands behind her neck as she looked over at Diko with a scowl.

“You took so long. What the heck were you doing? Was there anything unusual?”

Thinking back, there had been nothing else aside from the crows. Ranyi couldn’t have been waiting more than half a second, but she was being so dramatic. Exasperated, Diko put on a crooked smile.

“So what are we doing now?”

Diko indicated the school building with her chin. She meant, “Let’s leave.”

“We’re leaving? So then what’d we come here for?”

Diko looked back the way she’d come. It wasn’t like anything had happened. And she didn’t believe that crows were unlucky. If she believed in that sort of superstition, she would have had a hard time getting along with Sally Raven.

There had been nothing. But she just kind of had a bad feeling. And any magical girl, especially a Lazuline candidate, knew that magical girl intuition was not something to make light of.

Prompting the grumbling Ranyi along, Diko swiftly left.

  Snow White

The class 2-F feature in the Umemizaki Founding Festival wound up being, on Adelheid’s suggestion, a ramen shop. It was decided easily without any quarreling. It was a universal menu with firmly rooted popularity, and it also differed from all the Umemizaki main school’s menu items. The biggest reason they picked it was that they were able to get some brand-name instant ramen sold to them on the cheap from Adelheid’s senior—it was a recent product of hers. They would serve it at a stall decorated with various art pieces.

What with Princess Lightning’s naked greed toward food, Snow White had worried she would feel it wasn’t worth making and it wouldn’t be satisfying—but such worries turned out to be unfounded. The other classmates, who had known her a few months longer than Snow White, knew well that Princess Lightning wouldn’t fuss over how things were made. She was ultimately a gourmand who loved to eat. After hearing as much from the members of Group One, like Tetty and Rappy, she nodded. “I see.”

If Lightning wasn’t going to complain about it, then instant ramen would be a good choice. Constructing the art pieces would certainly be time-consuming, so making the cooking part easier would decrease the burden by just that much.

Besides, even if it was instant, it was nothing to shake a stick at. Made without magic, the flavor of the Twin Dragons–brand ramen won the stamp of approval from everyone who participated in taste testing—including Lightning, who had doubtfully said, “Will it truly be delicious?” In the end, she’d said, “This is plenty good enough.”

“Good texture.”

“Seconds.”

“Hya-ha! This is so good! This is great, for real!”

“Three types of broth? Huh, tonkotsu, miso, shoyu, hmm? Perhaps I’ll have the miso next.”

“This is the first I’ve had of this ‘ramen’ dish—the flavor has quite the depth. It is a fitting meal for the wolves.”

“Look, you need to stop inserting manga lines assuming everyone understands your references.”

“I’d like a little more toppings in them, yeahhh.”

“If we…go too far…the price…will go up.”

“I heard she’s offering them to us at one-tenth of the list price—is she gonna be okay?”

“Ah dunno if it’s ’cause she’s tryin’ to be legit or what, but they were too expensive ta begin with. Ten percent is just about right.”

“Them being so expensive just makes me feel even more badly about it.”

“She’s givin’ us a deal ’cause we’re doin’ advertisin’ and testin’ for ’er—that’s win-win. Then there’s like her pride or instinct as a senior, not wantin’ to look bad to her junior.”

“It kind of…feels like…we’re abusing your senior’s kindness…”

“Ah’m normally always bowin’ mah head to her, so she’d better be nice to me sometimes.”

“All seniors are like that…really…just remembering makes me angry.”

“Hey, she ain’t that bad a senior, y’know?”

“I think this is bound to be a success,” Tetty muttered with earnest emotion, as if digesting things, and her classmates, who had all been talking on their own, quieted for a while. Surely, they all had their own thoughts about the matter.

Snow White was thinking, I have to do my own job.

The courtyard was still a blank space to her. Snow White’s magic didn’t reach there. Never mind getting a full portrait, she couldn’t even grasp a clue.

And speaking of the courtyard, she also wasn’t making any progress investigating Satou. Since the voice of Tetty’s heart told her just about nothing related to Satou, she didn’t even really know who this person was. And Tetty felt wary of Snow White’s questioning her about Satou, so it would be dangerous to probe any further.

Things were not going well, but she decided to leave that aside for now and try an approach from another angle. If the magical-girl class was aiming for the Founding Festival, then she could aim for that, too.

The ramen shop would have just ramen. They would make an art piece to decorate the inside of the shop. Kumi-Kumi’s idea of producing an art piece had been fuzzy and pure concept, but giving it a ramen shop as a shell suddenly made the idea more concrete. They filled up ten sheets of draft paper sketching out and conceptualizing ideas, though they were probably a little too big—things like making the dragon that decorated ramen bowls and having it go around the whole classroom interior.

You could tell how exhausted everyone was from the dark circles under their dead eyes—in other words, they were not transforming into magical girls to work. They were doing this in human form. Nobody was mocking or calling Kumi-Kumi stupid for keeping so honestly to the rule that they were not to use magical-girl powers—in fact, that heightened the morale in the class.

The rules from the principal meant Kumi-Kumi could not use her magic. But having a creation-style personal magic like Kumi-Kumi’s often meant aptitude in that direction to begin with. From her plans, you could sense not only her passion and pride but also her clear technique. It was a grand plan: They would gather empty cans, iron pipes, bicycles, tables, a CRT TV, and various other scrap material, clean and disinfect everything, and put it all together to build, color, and finish the dragon.

This art piece was far beyond what you’d expect from a middle school class, but the elite of the magical-girl class excelled, even without transforming. But first, they had to get materials for it. So everyone went around to various places to gather scrap material. In this case, Sally Raven gathering disused items from the PR Department didn’t count as using her magical-girl powers. If that counted as having used her powers, then they wouldn’t have been able to accept that senior’s help in opening a ramen shop in the first place.

During homeroom, recreation time, and after school, the magical girls worked vigorously—washing, disassembling, carving, assembling, painting, and gathering things as the preliminary step. As the other magical girls were heading to their hometowns or the departments they were affiliated with, Snow White waited for a moment when no one would criticize her for it and addressed Miss Ril by the gate.

“Do you have a minute? There’s something I’d like to talk about.”

“Sure. What is it?” She looked just a little skeptical, probably because Snow White had spoken to her in a place where there was no one else around.

“You were recommended from the Magical Girl Management Department, weren’t you?”

“Yes, apparently so. Though I don’t know very much about that… I’ve never met the person who recommended me.”

Talking with her made Snow White, Koyuki Himekawa, strongly aware of her own exhaustion. Even just hearing the concern in Miss Ril’s voice made her feel ready to collapse. But Snow White had to lie to her and use her.

“I’ve met the chief of the Magical Girl Management Department before,” said Snow White.

“Oh, is that right?”

“I did something quite rude to him and made him angry.”

“Oh, that’s…”

“I’ve been wanting to apologize, but I haven’t been able to get an audience with him. So, um, I have a request. We’ve received some garbage from the places that Sally and Dory recommended, right?”

Sally had carried in a large volume of cardboard boxes from the PR Department. There were just so many, she couldn’t carry them all, so she had gotten Pshuke, Ranyi, and Diko to help her. Apparently, Lightning had also tried to help but had been politely refused. It wasn’t like Snow White couldn’t understand the desire to not bring Princess Lightning into the PR Department.

Dory had carried in some incomprehensible objects from the Lab. These incomprehensible objects could only be described as incomprehensible—some were warm like human skin and slimy with mucus. Saying that she would feel bad to throw it all away, Tetty was with her to sort them all out.

Miss Ril gently tilted her head. Snow White revealing her old failure now explained why she’d waited for a moment when nobody else was around. Miss Ril’s suspicion seemed to ease, but now she appeared confused.

“I would like to help…but as I’ve said before, it’s simply that I was recommended, and I don’t know who recommended me and for what reasons. So I don’t know their contact information, either.”

“That’s no problem,” said Snow White. “It’s a public institution, so you can find out their contact information easily if you look it up.”

“Is that right? Then you don’t need me, do you?”

“If I say that Snow White is trying to contact them, they’re not going to listen to me, and if I made a sudden visit, I’d get shown away at the door… This is because of what I did in the past—but then I can’t apologize for it, and things have always stayed like this…so please! If I have you accompanying me, then we can go together.”

Miss Ril still seemed to be at a loss, but Snow White knew that she was weak to requests and also that she couldn’t abandon people in trouble. While Snow White felt guilty to take advantage of a good person’s weakness, she bowed her head even deeper, putting her hands together.

  Ragi Zwe Nento

It wasn’t that Ragi had any special attachment to the magical-girl class. He just knew the history behind its establishment. He figured this wasn’t going to go according to their ideals. Even if this class was being touted as education for magical girls, those putting in recommendations weren’t going to readily accept that. They were obviously going to send in magical girls under their patronage in order to expand the interests of their factions. Once that happened, the magical-girl class would simply be an extension of their scheming, and there would be no education, development, or anything at all of that nature.

Ragi hadn’t been expecting anything of it from the start, thinking of it as an enterprise with fine ideals and nothing else, but even so, he didn’t think to carelessly expend the single recommendation slot he had been allotted. Ostensibly speaking, he’d had this recommendation slot for a magical-girl class foisted on him since he was a specialist in magical girls, so he had to fulfill his responsibility.

To begin with, in the Magical Girl Management Department, there were no magical girls “under his patronage.” Ragi selected a magical girl purely with a neutral position and eye. He completely ignored those who tried to flatter him and say, “What about this one or that one.”

Ragi examined the matter from various angles and selected one person who seemed like it: financially needy, excellent intellect, strong capacity for learning, insatiable ambition, kindness, the communication skills to build smooth relationships, having no ties of obligation to any organization, passion, tenacity, toughness, manners, age, family relatives, reward and punishment, qualifications. And that was the magical girl Miss Ril.

Being full of those sent in from each faction, the magical-girl class would be a hotbed of demons. Living there while remaining a good magical girl would come with struggle. There would be a need to keep an eye on her to ensure that so-called bad adults could not interfere with her.

Or so he had thought, but Ragi hadn’t had a handle on how things had gone since choosing her. A short while ago, he had been in such dire straits that he had forgotten his concern for Miss Ril. What was supposed to have been just an inheritance meeting had become a great tragedy that had resulted in multiple deaths. Sometime after that terrible kerfuffle was over, he received contact from Miss Ril, who said she wanted to get together with him.

She wanted to meet him in person to thank him for his recommendation, and also to ask if he had any trash, that she hoped he would share it. Apparently, they were going to use it for some classroom presentation called the Founding Festival.

Thinking about the magical-girl class for the first time in a long while, Ragi folded his arms and looked up at the ceiling. Even calling it the ceiling, the Management Department office had no boundaries. The ceiling was blackness that went on forever.

It seemed that she was diligently living her school life. If she was participating in some event and proactively working with others, then did that mean she’d made friends? He would hope that it wouldn’t be bad magical girls pretending to be friends, but had she really made the distinction? There were many concerns. Partly out of guilt about forgetting, Ragi responded to the call from Miss Ril immediately.

Ragi had been depressed for a while. There had been nothing to enjoy. Unpleasantness just summoned more unpleasantness. Before, Ragi would have drowned all that out with anger, but he couldn’t do that anymore. He had come to speak less, only doing the minimum necessary and living quietly.

Right after replying to Miss Ril, Ragi made a golem to do some work for him and had it gather the waste materials. That still didn’t seem like enough, so he went elsewhere to gather more. Then he lowered the security of the management office to make it so you could enter the room smoothly.

He was just like a foolish old grandpa working for the sake of his grandchild, he thought, and snorted. If grandfathers and grandchildren out there all had relationships like this, then it had been the right choice after all not to have made a family, he figured, convincing himself.

After that, he made all the various preparations, and by the time he was finally relaxed, there was a knock on the door to the Management Department office. Ragi cleared his throat twice to ready it and prompted them to come in.

Though it was the first time he had met her, it wasn’t as if he’d never seen what she looked like. Obviously—the documentation had included that. From midair, he nodded heavily at the metallic magical girl greeting him, and then his eyes happened to stop behind her. Miss Ril was not alone.

There was a wavering of white flower decorations, and in a twinkle, Ragi’s expression turned harsh. Though Miss Ril remained expressionless, she seemed surprised, but seemed too overwhelmed to be concerned about the magical girl behind her.

“It’s been a long time, Management Department Chief. I’m Snow White.”

He didn’t respond to her greeting out loud. He just replied with a glare.

  0 Lulu

Cindy Neckchopper was a mercenary magical girl with a gigantic magic razor that only touched living organisms and passed through everything else. Attacking with her razor of over a yard long, she would scoff at enemy abilities that tried to block it with weapons and armor, wounding only their bodies. Her main business was bodyguarding of aristocrats, though all the rumors said she was a sadist who would wield her razor even outside of work. But now, focused attacks from kunai and shuriken had turned her into a porcupine, lying there. Her razor, being unable to touch inanimate objects, had failed to shield her from them.

Cottie Riel was a mercenary magical girl whose magic would change the strength and properties of tissue paper that she touched. She had hidden bags hanging all over and was equipped with tissue boxes. While her magic seemed rather humorous, contrary to appearances, the woman herself was all logic. Those who took her lightly were sliced up by tissues or beaten up. Unlike Cindy, she had managed the storm of kunai and shuriken with hardened tissues, only to be cut down by Ripple when she had leaped out of the thicket from the opposite direction.

Tateru Amamiya had a carpenter motif and magic carpenter tools. They said she could build a whole house at three thousand times the regular speed. She could have made her living with carpentry work, but she couldn’t help her battle-loving disposition and had become a mercenary. She made use of dangerous magic carpenter tools like nails, hammers, planes, saws, chisels, and ink lines to polish off her enemies. She had failed to catch Ripple’s slice when she’d come in from a blind angle, using Cottie Riel’s body as she fell as cover.

Then there was the Black Knight Guinevere. All the items she carried, from her jet-black helmet and armor to her giant sword, were part of her costume and had magic cast on them. Her personal magic was a comparatively plain one—she had a magic horse. But her skills with a blade were top class among Archfiend Cram School graduates. She had a particular fixation on one-on-one battles, and she was good enough to persist in that fixation, which to Lulu’s mind was completely pointless. Having defeated Cindy Neckchopper, Cottie Riel, and Tateru Amamiya one after another, Ripple stopped before Guinevere, faced her directly, and bowed her head. All of this had been by Lulu’s instruction.

“I’d like to ask for a one-on-one match,” said Ripple.

Under her helmet, Guinevere chuckled. “You want a one-on-one after taking us by surprise?”

“If you don’t want to…then back out now.”

There was no ring of challenge in Ripple’s voice. It was entirely dispassionate. But that tone, as if to say that she was just telling the facts as they were, sounded to Lulu more challenging than anything.

But Guinevere was not angry or irritated—rather, that improved her mood.

“Oh, I don’t mind. Cindy and the others being beaten was a lack of training on their part.”

Just ten seconds earlier, kunai and shuriken had been raining down over the area like hail. But none of them had hit Guinevere—they hadn’t even nicked her armor. She’d swung around her great sword to knock down all the shuriken and kunai, and had even protected her dear horse. Even from Lulu’s eye as a Lazuline candidate, the feat had been so swift, she’d just barely caught it in her vision.

With shuriken and kunai sticking up all over the whole campground, Guinevere nimbly threw a leg over her horse and thrust her sword out at Ripple. “My name is the Black Knight Guinevere!” Her face was hidden by her helmet, and all that showed out of it was the long silver hair that slipped out from the cracks. But her voice contained unconcealed glee.

“Ripple.” That came from a voice as subdued as a bottomless mire. But she moved fast.

Shuriken and kunai flew through the air. Her ninja sword whizzed, and the giant horse neighed. The battle had begun, and it would be difficult to interfere now. Lulu had never planned to do that; it was important that she couldn’t interfere. The two magical girls fought while moving, going from the campground deeper into the forest. Trees and dirt flew, emphasizing their presence awfully even after they went out of view.

Lulu slowly stood up, making the thicket sway as she showed herself. The sound of leaves rustling gave away her presence. But Ripple and Guinevere paid her no mind at all and continued to fight. What Lulu was concerned about were the remaining magical girls.

There had been a total of six magical girls gathered here in the unused campground deep in the mountains. They were mercenaries hired by the Caspar Faction and awaiting orders. Three had been defeated by Ripple’s surprise attack: Cindy, Cottie, and Tateru. The magical girl fighting one-on-one with Ripple was Guinevere. The remaining two, Shocksinger, who was good at support with magic song, and Silent Wave, who prided herself on the various functions equipped in her mechanical right arm, were looking at Lulu dangerously.

Singer gingerly moved one arm, reaching out to the lute on her back.

“Forget it,” said Lulu.

Singer stopped. She was looking at Lulu with doubtful eyes.

“Why would I? Just ’cause you don’t want to fight two-on-one?”

“Because it would benefit both of us.”

“Both of us?”

“You should decide what to do after you see how things turn out with those two. We’re not evil or bloodthirsty. If you surrender without opposing us, you’ll get treated differently.”

“What? You think that Guinevere is gonna lose?”

“My partner is just as strong. In Musician of the Forest, Cranberry’s, final exam, she survived the intense fight where even Cranberry lost her life,” Lulu said while casting her magic on a purple stone, an amethyst that was tucked in her pocket that was third from the top and second from the right. It emphasized sincerity while also making you want tranquility of the mind.

She had not, in fact, lied. If Ripple won and came back, them having not fought with Lulu would mean better treatment for their confinement. Conversely, even if Ripple lost, there was no reason that Lulu had to rush to fight them. If Guinevere remained fine and chipper, then it wouldn’t just be two-on-one—it would be three-on-one.

The irritation vanished from one of the girls’ expressions. She was thinking, Now that you point that out, that’s reasonable. She was unsure about what to do and wasn’t attacking. That was basically a mild way of accepting Lulu’s cease-fire deal. She didn’t really want to fight, and Lulu was giving her an out, prompting her to make the rational decision. Lulu was controlling this situation—but the problem started here.

They were just barely handling it all this time. There were a lot of enemies. Ripple’s initial attack had silenced a number of them rapidly, following which she got their biggest foe, Guinevere, into a one-on-one. Lulu was to handle the enemies Ripple had failed to get while making sure to stay out of their one-on-one fight and also keeping their enemies from informing their employer about the attack.

Things had gone miraculously well thus far. But would things continue to go well? It was a pretty reckless strategy, but it wasn’t like they’d had a choice. Frederica must have come up with some countermeasures, as the amount of information they’d been sent had continuously shrunk until right when they had been thinking they should abort the mission, when they’d gotten their first job in a long while. Caught between Snow White and Frederica, Ripple had wanted so desperately to do something that she’d leaped at the opportunity.

Lulu had confidence in her legs. She should run before the other two came back. So Lulu’s calculating side had argued, but her honorable side kept her where she was. She racked her brains and came up with a strategy. Even she thought the strategy was reckless, but despite that, Ripple had not made a single complaint. She’d just said in her brusque manner, “Let’s do it.” Lulu thought that meant she believed in her.

After both of their feelings had exploded, they talked about everything they could talk about and listened to everything they could hear from each other, talking for a whole day. Lulu didn’t understand how Ripple felt. She couldn’t tell at all from her attitude if she saw Lulu as someone she could use for now or a partner worthy of trusting her back to. But whatever the form it took, she still trusted Lulu, even after hating her that much. So then Lulu had to trust Ripple right back. This ad hoc team required both of them, or they would go down. Lulu wasn’t going to let things end just yet.

Frankly speaking, she felt that she had talked too much. There had been no need to talk about her mother and father as well. She had even wound up talking about how she’d been in the habit of searching for change in vending machines for a time, how she had a complex about children who went to school, how she couldn’t quite make friends with the other Lazuline candidates, and how she felt like she subconsciously looked for flaws in other people.

She had definitely let herself get carried away, but that wasn’t all. She had also wanted to listen to what Ripple had to say. Though their association had been brief, she’d still come to understand that Ripple was fair in a way. Lulu had figured that if she talked, then Ripple would talk, too.

And then she was able to hear her story. She heard the infamous story of Cranberry’s exam, about enemies like Calamity Mary and Pythie Frederica, about Top Speed and Snow White, about her mother—hearing about how her absolutely gross stepfather had put his hands on her, Lulu had punched the bed, saying, “Men, right?!”

From the important things to the trivial, surely there was meaning in having talked about it. Right now, as Ripple fought, she trusted Lulu a little.

A minute later, after a final shrill metallic sound, the forest became quiet. The battle must have ended.

Lulu was supposed to have been acting cool, but now she audibly swallowed her spit.

A single magical girl appeared from beyond the grove, dragging her leg. Her hair was loose and disheveled, and her shuriken hair decoration was missing. Blood dripped down her face, and there were slices of varying sizes all over her body. Her face was transformed by her broken cheekbone. You could even tell from the outside that she had broken bones here and there, at her rib and left shoulder.

“She’s lying…over there.” Ripple indicated with her jaw. She had to mean Guinevere.

Ripple glared at the remaining two. Lulu was about to stop her but then retreated half a step back without a word. At some point, Ripple had put a kunai in her mouth. Her feet inched forward.

Ripple hadn’t lost any of her will to fight. She was facing them with the intent to kill. But in that state, she had to be beyond somehow getting through on guts alone. Frankly speaking, she was too wounded to count as a fighting force. But despite that, all the magical girls who presently remained had their eyes fixed on every single move she made.

Ripple crouched. There was no more time for hesitating. Right on the verge, at the moment when Lulu had to stop her there or she would die, Shocksinger raised her hands.

“I surrender.”

Ripple relaxed her stance and spat out her kunai. Lulu restrained the urge to cry as she rushed over to Ripple.