Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku - Volume 16 - Chapter Ep

EPILOGUE

  Mana

Quite a while back, there had been a meeting about an inheritance, so Mana had taken two of her friends to head out to an island. But a great tragedy had occurred there, with multiple people turning up dead. It hadn’t felt like a vacation at all. Even after being freed from the island, she’d been busying herself with the investigation, never with a moment to settle down. She was still giving up her holidays to work.

Now that she thought of it, ever since that inheritance meeting, it had been nothing but bad things happening. She’d been told she was certain to be promoted, but that had fallen flat for some reason; she’d slipped and fallen by the gym entrance; the content of the highly recommended A set at the cafeteria had changed for some reason—there were lots of things, big and small.

And that wasn’t her lucky day, either. She was being forced to accompany a strange magical girl.

“Look, Uluru doesn’t want any more tea, so could you bring me juice next?”

“This isn’t a café or a restaurant. Who died and made you queen? Is that who you think you are?”

This was no diner. It was the interrogation room of the Inspection Department. Aside from the questioning of suspects, this room was also used to gain useful information from informants. Since it was fully equipped to prevent spying, this place was thought to be the best place to use for this. It was ironic that a room with nothing but a desk, chairs, memo paper, and writing tools—not even a window—would actually put Mana at ease.

But any member of the Inspection Department would wonder if they should bother using the room for this guest.

“But Uluru is a guest.”

“No, you’re not!”

Uluru, a silly-looking magical girl with a coat and a toy gun, occasionally visited the Inspection Department to see Snow White. She appeared to be some kind of assistant to Snow White who passed information to her before promptly going back home. Mana figured that Snow White was like an Edo-period patroller, and Uluru was one of her henchmen. The historical novels that Hana Gekokujou had once brought into the Inspection Department had been mildly popular among the investigation teams for a while, so a lot of the other investigators must have interpreted it that way, too, and Uluru’s presence wasn’t generally considered to be a nuisance.

“Generally” was the operative word in this case. When Uluru came while Snow White wasn’t there, that was excepted from “general.” Uluru was long-winded and not good at talking, but let your guard down, and you’d be caught by her magic. And with her temper and how quick to fight she was, nothing good ever came of talking to her.

It seemed that Uluru also figured that she shouldn’t bring up her important information with anyone aside from Snow White, and so they spent the whole time on a meaningless parlor debate. In the end, Uluru left without Mana ever knowing what she wanted to say.

Uluru had apparently worked closely with Snow White before the latter had infiltrated the magical-girl class, but post-infiltration, they were working separately, and Uluru was supposed to report if something happened.

Her presence made those inspectors who scowled at Snow White’s freedom from authority scowl even harder, and nobody wanted to deal with her. And then at some point they made an unspoken priority ranking for who would deal with her when Snow White was absent. No, maybe it hadn’t been made, but it definitely existed.

Mana was top priority. Though she would only say so very reluctantly, Mana was young and an underling, and so unpleasant roles were often foisted on her. Not only that, she had, albeit temporarily, worked together with Uluru during the incident when Puk Puck had occupied the ruins. So it wound up like, “You’re close with her, right, then you deal with her, please.”

While she wondered why the heck she had to be the one to deal with her, here she was dealing with her again. Leaving Uluru unattended would be a dangerous thing in its own right, so someone had to handle her.

“Where are the snacks? You need snacks, right?”

“If you commit a crime, I’ll give you a katsudon.”

“If Uluru ate a katsudon for a snack, Uluru wouldn’t be able to have my dinner. You need to consider things better.”

Mana clenched her teeth. “…By the way, just what is your business today?”

“Is Snow White not here? Uluru has business with Snow White.”

“I just told you she’s not in! …Sheesh, if this business is something you can tell only her, then just go home. She won’t be back anytime soon.”

“But wouldn’t it be a waste to go home without doing anything? And when will I get my snacks? You can’t not offer a guest any snacks.”

Mana’s teeth made a nasty sound. She wanted to believe they hadn’t cracked yet.

“I’ve really had enough of you…”

Her magical phone vibrated. Mana stood up, turned away from Uluru, and turned her phone on to check the messages. A number of people at Umemizaki Junior High had been attacked. It seemed they were using a barrier.

“Umemizaki Junior High is where Snow White and Arlie go to school!”

Mana panicked and turned around. Uluru had been peeking at Mana’s phone over her shoulder.

“You can’t just snoop on case information—”

“We’ve got to go save her, like before! Follow Uluru!”

Uluru opened the door and burst outside, running down the hallway while Mana rushed after her.

  Mariko Fukuroi

“Young people these days really are no good, honestly,” the woman bemoaned as she slammed down her beer stein. She wore a leather overalls motorcycle riding suit stripped off halfway, her shaggy brown hair tied at her waist. The fried sparrow on skewers that she had lined up on the plate in front of her rattled as if in protest.

“Complaining about young people these days? That’s proof you’re old.” A woman clapped her hands and laughed. She was blatantly a woman of lower class, with a bright pink tracksuit, sandals on bare feet, and hair of a somewhat paler pink than her clothing tied into two pigtails as she brought a cigarette and alcohol alternately to her mouth.

The brown-haired woman lifted the stein she’d just slammed down, audibly swallowing the remaining half before smacking it on the table again. The sparrows rattled even more than before.

Mariko looked around the area. The izakaya was about 70 percent full with a decent amount of people. However, the combination of a rider’s outfit, a punk in a track suit, and a white lab coat was certainly unusual, and some customers were whispering to each other and giving them glances.

“Come on, stop being so loud.”

Ignoring Mariko’s warning, the woman with brown hair brought up her theories on modern youth. “Have you heard? These days when young people get together for something, they go for Magical Teatime.”

“Huh? That’s a café. They don’t go to bars?”

“That’s right. They don’t serve beer there. It’s like, why do I have to talk with those morons sober? Poking at your cake or mille-feuille or whatever while drinking chamomile or Darjeeling or whatnot, is that the way a magical girl is supposed to be?”

Mariko figured that was far more magical girl than being alone at a bar grumbling with a beer mug in one hand, but since if she said that, it would just be dissing herself, she said nothing and took a drink. The junmai sake “magical boy” had a gentle feel on the tongue, as usual, and felt comforting. “Aren’t they just happy to eat and drink at that shop while transformed?”

“I don’t know what’s so fun about going to eat and drink while transformed.”

“You don’t have to worry about the calories.”

“Have you ever worried about calories?”

“There’s no way. She’s got a nice figure, even if she eats.”

Pink hair wriggled around at the hips, pushing out her chest in a sexy pose, and when brown hair saw it, she let out a vulgar snicker in a voice raspy from drinking.

“Gonna go freshen up,” said Mariko.

“Be quick about it.”

“No running away.”

Mariko stood up, and while heading to the bathroom, she looked at her two friends. Printed in Ming typeface on the back of the brown-haired girl’s T-shirt was: “I’m a magical girl, but I’m off duty right now, so I won’t transform.” Mariko just about spewed out the soy-simmered sand lance that was still in her mouth but restrained it with her right hand.

It had been a long time since she’d last come to the bar with her friends to drink. They were really loud and bad-mouthed, and with their aggressive fashion sense, they stood out way too much. There were a lot of bad things to say about them, but despite it all, they made her laugh when they drank together, and she made them laugh.

No, that’s not quite it.

It was less that their aggressive fashion was bad and more that they were just bad. They didn’t try to conform to society, other people, or to the occasion—they just came as they were always, so with all three of their quirks combined, they stood out like sore thumbs.

Finishing her business, Mariko returned to her seat and poured beer into her mug. “But I think I’m not as bad.”

“Huh? What’re you talking about?”

“I just came in my lab coat by mistake. It’s not like I’m doing it deliberately.”

“I don’t get what you mean.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but isn’t doing it by accident a bad thing? I seem to remember someone important saying something like, ‘Aging’s already started in your twenties.’”

“You seem to remember? Do you remember, or don’t you?”

All three of them laughed.

If these guys were getting treated to eat and drink until they were satisfied, they wouldn’t even give a damn if Archfiend Pam was the one footing the bill. Mariko was going to be paying quite a lot for this, but well, whatever.

After the girls cheerily were like, “Okay then, what do we do next?” Mariko got a taxi for the two of them and moved the motorcycle to nearby metered parking. Mariko got into the taxi late, and within three hours, they arrived at a deserted beach.

It was originally a remote fishing village with not much in the way of houses, and since it was early morning, there was nobody passing by.

Her two friends, walking ahead of her, must have sobered up a bit as they sat down on some driftwood, talking to each other about something while they patiently waited. As soon as they sent the taxi back, the pair began talking. They hadn’t completely shaken off the alcohol yet. They were loud.

“What the heck, making us wait?”

“What’d you do with my baby?”

“I put your bike in coin parking,” said Mariko. “I have the money for that, so you don’t need to worry.”

Pink hair grinned. “Nice. I don’t really get why, but you’re generous.”

Brown hair nodded with a “Yeah” as if she’d only just noticed. “Oh yeah, oh yeah, now that you mention it, she really is. Well, I guess that means it’s worth it for her. She’s only ever come to us with fun stuff to do, though.”

“Your fun stuff is always a fun time.”

The two of them looked at each other and smiled.

“Well, we wouldn’t let you bring us anything boring. We rejected Pythie Frederica’s invitation to come here, so this is bound to be more fun than what she’s got.”

“I don’t really know what’s up, but it was fighting with some students or something like that, right? That doesn’t seem very fun. It’s like, lately they haven’t really been cutting loose, y’know. The resistance wasn’t as great as I thought it’d be, either.”

“Students are all shit, they’re shit. Kids these days really are.”

“You’re back on that again?”

The two of them laughed, but Mariko didn’t laugh. “It won’t be a hassle, and it’ll definitely be fun. I’m gonna have you two fight me right here.”

The laughing stopped. They slowly looked toward Mariko—pink hair suspiciously, and brown hair with irritation, as they asked, “What do you mean?”

“The hell do you wanna do?”

“Like I said, fight. If you don’t wanna do it ’cause you’re scared, you can run. What’ll you do?” she said, aware that the statement was equivalent to a declaration of war. They all transformed: pink hair into a magical girl growing nine thick and fine tails like a fox, brown hair into a yamabushi-style magical girl with a khakkara, and then Mariko into a magical girl with a giant rugosa rose blooming on top of her head.

“Ha-ha! Then let’s have some fun!”

“Fucking Marika! You tricked us!”

“If you guys beat me, then I’ll do whatever you want,” said Mariko. “If I beat you guys, then do what I say.”

“What? What are you gonna make us do?”

“Cut ties with Frederica.”

After a moment of blank space between them, Monako spun around her khakkara and placed the butt end of it in the sand. With the sand scattering around them, she cried, “Die, you florist bitch!”

“Come at me, idiots! Ha-ha!”

“Agh, you really are a piece of shit! Damn it!”

The three magical girls all leaped at the same time.

  Kashiki-akarukushi-hime

Kashiki-akarukushi-hime, the Caspar Faction’s new incarnation, was sitting on a stool in the room in the deepest part of the new headquarters they’d moved to. There was no one else around.

The story going forward would be that the old incarnation, Ratsumukana-honome-no-kami, had retired after taking responsibility for the attack on the base, and the soul within her was placed into a new incarnation for a fresh start. But the truth was different. Kashiki-akarukushi-hime’s calm, archaic smile never faltered as she reflected on her happiness.

Pythie Frederica used to think that she wanted to be with magical girls always. Seeing magical girls grow made her so happy, and she dreamed about the birth of her ideal magical girl. For that sake, she wanted to be a great enemy to oppose them. But unfortunately, Pythie Frederica had a limited life span. She couldn’t be with magical girls forever. Being locked up in prison had made her acutely aware of her own mortality. She’d felt keenly that if she died, it was all over, and she wouldn’t be able to see the future of magical girls.

So long as you only lasted one lifetime, it was difficult to escape death. But there were some who escaped death. Those were the Three Sages. By using the system of incarnations, they changed bodies, continuously avoiding the destruction that originally would have visited them.

That was Frederica’s goal. She didn’t want the Magical Kingdom to fall or to be destroyed by someone like Lazuline the First, and for magical girls to go away. If she were one of the Sages, then she would attain the position to guide the Magical Kingdom away from ruin, and she could continue to watch over magical girls, becoming their wall. There were so many possible benefits.

Sneaking into the weakened Caspar Faction, she controlled the spirit of their original incarnation, Ratsumukana-honome-no-kami, and then after tossing her in prison and erasing her memories, she had enrolled her in a magical-girl school. Making her existence unclear or even questionable made it easier to take her place.

Targeting the ruins under the school building had caused the attack by Lazuline the First—Frederica had chosen this moment to transfer her own soul while she put the soul of an incarnation candidate into her original body, brainwashed her with Pukin’s sword, and made her believe that she was the real Frederica. Whether she would live or die after this would be up to her own efforts as the new Frederica.

Kashiki-akarukushi-hime sat on the stool and closed her eyes, posing with her left hand on her waist, her right hand behind her, and her legs together. She imagined a scene with magical girls all lined up, with the attention of all present as she made her debut—and a smile spread over her whole face.