*
"Haah~ haah~ haah~" (Kanou)
A dark greyish haired girl was heaving deeply for breathe, struggling for a tiny pint more of oxygen. She felt her throat burning and clogging up at the same time, the only occasion when it didn't felt clog up lasted too short of a while to properly calm her rapidly beating heart. Her skin was drenched under a thick coat of sweat retained under her magical girl combat dress. The skin fitting black top became particularly sticker as it bound to her skin as if glue had been used to attach it, small drips of fluid could be seen rolling down the leather vest over her black top.
Similarly to Kanou, Triney had also been exhausted to the end. Her cyan hair had gone dishevelled and her aura of nobility was practically gone at this point. With her final skill which could attach "divine enhancements" to any material, she was able to repeatedly reproduce one-time shields. With "divine enhancements", which was a ridiculously high level of item enchantment, the shields she made were practically invincible unless another item with the same or higher level of divinity was used.
The key thing was that her shields could withstand the sun's heat very easily and guard against Frey's micro-sun attacks. What was truly frightening and mind bending, was how Frey tore through those shields like paper with her bare hands. At that point Triney was burning through her magical particle supply just to create more shields, rather than blocking attacks they were used more for pushing Frey back and creating distance between them.
A somewhat triangle formation encapsulated the 3, with the base being Kanou and Triney around 70 metres away. Frey was similar in which she was exhausted, though when compared, her stamina was a league above the other 2. Her powers that involved heat as a side effect had evaporated all the sweat that was previously on her, and made her body impervious to heat, so it stopped having the need to sweat either.
Her body had been enchanted by her own skill to immediately take in necessary energy and remove the excess. Since she had been repeatedly using her first skill to throw around miniature suns from extremely close proximity to her body, there was a massive excess of it. It gathered around and coated her skin like armour, the excess was practically akin to her own miniature sun attacks now, melting metal and evaporating liquid with her skin was now possible.
And finally, next to that was Frey's comrade who could rejuvenate her stamina and boost her magical particle recovery rate from an unknown location. Fighting something like that was simply impossible for those 2. That was why it had seemed hopeless, until Frey vanished.
At first, the pair was watching out to see if they had missed out a new skill of Frey's, or try to deduce what it was in case Frey was somehow able to use a 4th skill. It had never been done in history before, but limiting deductions to common sense was fatal in battle. In this case, they were plenty strong enough to prolong the battle despite knowing their enemy's cards. Kanou refrained from using her first skill due to the danger of Frey's heat barrier and simply ran around.
Combining their powers, Triney made a floppy boot armour out of the heat-proof "divine enchantment" material, which was used to repeatedly kick Frey until they simply broke apart. Just by spinning her body around like a top or slapping it, Frey was able to destroy those boots with her sheer durability alone. Enduring the attacks, and even pushing back with her body. A sigh of relief escaped her lips when she got healed by Palmicia from a distance away, but with her around she was practically invincible.
So why? Or how... How did Frey disappear. Even the vague presence of her comrade was gone. Did they escape?
A landscape that spread white as far as the eye could see greeted the pair who were whimsically whisked away. The air never felt so stale before, as if dust had been whipping up and bouncing around for months to fill up the space.
"Oblivion magia?" (Frey)
"... Oblivion... Magia...? What's that?" (Palmicia)
A girl with locks of mint green pouring down her back sat up from her lying position, carefully brushing stray strands covering her face. She donned a large white coat akin to one that's used in laboratories and looked up at a standing black haired girl with a puzzled look. The black haired girl had a hue of hot pink colouring the underside of her hair, which could only be viewed from her front.
Crossing her arms, Frey gave a quick run down on the words she had just uttered. Her expressions shifting and varying to a grim tone as if she was reciting taboo.
"Oblivion magia is a high level magical girl technique. It involves controlling the magical particles both inside and outside your body to create a seperate dimension.
Very few A grade magical girls could do it, S grades would have difficulty but it wouldn't be impossible. Due to the immense mental strain and magical particle cost, it's more commonly used by SS-grades or those close to reaching it. In other words, we've been captured by the Eye God.
Now, there are even 2 more degrees to it. A normal oblivion magia would have both the user and the target caught in its dimension. This abnormal one didn't. What do you think that means? "(Frey)
Colour had drained from Palmicia's face only from hearing the explanation. The implications driven by Frey's hints throughout her explanation continued to dig her suspicions and despair deeper. She understood, but didn't want to acknowledge it. Acknowledging it meant that she was forced to accept it. Breaking down in the process. Most people would say breaking down and letting out your emotions earlier would make the future more productive.
Though, this wasn't a matter of want or don't want. Her body subconsciously knew it, it had been buried deep in the back of her conscious and even more since she was transported into this space of all white.
Frey could only smile wryly as she watched the constant transformation of Palmicia's thought processes.
"You have an answer don't you. It's not that hard to deduce. After all we're speaking right now." (Frey)
"Yeah. If you had a way to escape, we would have done so by now and held this conversation elsewhere. We're stuck here aren't we. Kugh!" (Palmicia)
Answering while trying not to stutter with all her might, her knuckles impacted the floor with her pain and frustration. Her teeth gripped tightly close together as if her anger had welled up in her jaw with nowhere to go. Due to her immense endurance stat, even her own physical strength could not overcome and harm her knuckles.
"Yeah, looks like we've been left here to starve. With our powers, we'd be able to last for years physically. But I wouldn't be so sure about our minds. It'd be better to break out now when we have more magical particles." (Frey)
"Break out? How? We're stuck in another dimension, even if you use your final skill, I doubt you'd be able to break through these barriers seperated in space time. It's simply out of the scope of your skillfunctions." (Palmicia)
With a skeptical look, a little hope had been rekindled in her heart as she forcibly put down that hope with her own hands. Of course, she expected it to be refuted, that by some miracle that they would have a way out of starving to death in this desolate white space. Her heart gained tranquility when she saw how Frey was completely unperturbed by her statement, fully intending to get them back home at that moment, an expression of resolution was worn beautifully on her face.
They've been friends for long enough. This wasn't the kind of deceit that friends could conjure after telling a lie, this was the type of expression that fully contained her thoughts and feelings. So she could tell, Palmicia understood well that there was still something driving Frey.
".... Listen well, Eye God. I've made it this far and I'm not stopping now. I know you've still got methods to kill me without needing to wait for my magic to run out. But that's exactly why I've gathered subordinates like Palmicia here.
Palmicia, guard me thoroughly if you want to leave this place alive. Well, it's not like a small threat or 2 could harm you. The Eye god has finally run out of all her cards, except for herself.... -Oblivion Magia-"(Frey)
"... I see, no wonder you knew so much about it. Someone like you who could easily defeat The S-grade arc maidens, is easily entering the territory of the god magical girls.
Both figuratively and literally. Take your time, I won't let a speck of dust past this line. [Grim drop dew] second technique, cursed territory of iron. "(Palmicia)
Spilling a drop of her blood onto the snowy white ground, a tiny puddle of crimson spreads forth from the point of impact with the ground. Usually blood would have a much darker tone, however this piddly was packed to the brim with magical particles that it had begun to glow. It spread forth as lines, drawing up a large circle surrounding Frey and Palmicia. Protruding blade like red structures sprung forth from the ground as Frey's Oblivion Magia begins to take shape with silhouettes of numerous petals and stalks.
Bright yellow and Vermillion flowers bloom in the air as a black slithering background spreads forth from Frey's feet as the starting point. It extended further as time progressed, as if it was a living thing that couldn't stop growing, the colours writhed and slid around to darken the white realm. At the same time, black silhouettes of magical girls begin to surface from the pitch-black ground. The silhouettes had their own magical auras of grey grow larger before vanishing on the spot.
"I see, so these are the enemies you're trying to face huh... No wonder your training was so tough." (Palmicia)
Concentrating on her mental strength, the magical particles in her blood and flesh circulated and flowed faster till her skin began to glow. At a certain point, even the magical girl themselves cannot contain their own power resulting from the activation of their magical particles, the energy first makes an appearance in the form of light before spilling over onto the outside when the cap bursts. The cap, or body magical particle retention limit isn't a physical structure but a mental one. It was common for magical girls to breach that cap, after all the excess energy spilled outside of their body is what creates their magical combat dresses.
"Hmpf, So I've been preparing for this day. Form change, final form -Bloody fortress-." (Palmicia)
Her mint green hair kept its lustre while growing rougher in nature like a reptile's scales, her large white jacket had shifted to a black hue with red highlights lining the bottom and painting a sun on the back. Her sleeves folded to her elbows, baring her thin arms that held unusual strength. Black fitting gloves fit her slender fingers as they bunched up into fists. Under that surprisingly flashy black jacket was a mundane dark grey T-shirt top, a white belt and grey mini skirt. Two straps of cloth extend from the inside of her skirt to the ground, lined with odd-looking black-matt rifles with foreign designs.
It was by going into her final form that those 2 straps of cloth and weaponry materialised, it was considered as a passive skill that regenerated ammo and rifles as long as she had magical particles to spare. Picking up the rifles, she unloaded a whole magazine into one of the black silhouettes to test its reaction. Though a bit distracted by the rapid firing gun shots, Frey continued to give her best in conquering the white territory.
As the bullets were formed from magic, they were naturally more destructive as they contained vastly more energy than natural ammunition. Each bullet broke the sound barrier and punctured a portion of the black silhouette's body, a crystal clear and audible scream of bullet collision and flesh caving in repeatedly echoed in that white space. Each impact thoroughly shook its body left and right until 90% of its torso was gone. An enormous visible hole revealed that it was a completely black construct. Smoke was wafting off of the sides of that hole, from the other side they could spot Palmicia's elegant expression.
This time, she sprayed with both guns. Each bullet was packed with magic and contained a magic circle that activated her second skill. Her second skill also aided her in annihilating all the silhouettes that came close. It seemed like some sort of explosive skill, each bullet enchanted with it sent the enemy's body material flying into every direction like stalagmites.