*
Judging from her reaction... Maybe?... Maybe not?... I saw her talking to a store manager just as that guy had described, though of course it was a different store now. Rather than clothing, it was one selling some fashion accessories. There were 2 simple drawings of a large jewel on the signboard, followed by the store's name in a big yellow font 'Arc's diamonds!'.
Walking closer to her, she visibly shivered before calming herself back down. She had regained her composure almost immediately, which was far different than any other person I saw today. This town was really strange after all... Though I don't know if it's limited to these people or if anyone else from outside Central also worship magical girls to the point of fear. Without delay, I got right down to business. I deployed my aura.
"Are the tax collector for this town?"
" Y... Y... Tes!?!" (Girl)
'Ah. She bit her tongue... '(Kaori and shop manager)
No matter how one would look at it, she was clearly shrinking from my pressure... And her biting her tongue doesn't really inspire us to put any confidence in her... Regardless, appearances can be deceiving. What I can be sure of is that she withstood my aura which normally felt so oppressive. She was likely a weak magical girl, but even then weak magical girls were several times more powerful than even the most trained athletes.
I could let my guard down since she could virtually do no damage to me but... I extended my left hand out into the air. Seeing my raised arm, she gritted her teeth and pushed her head down ready for a slap. It never came. Instead... A slight whistling sound could be heard as a large yellow projectile comes flying from the sky. It was a fiery beam of magical energy, even if they tried to shoot it from the sky, I could still pinpoint their lcoatione easily with my passive.
Were they perhaps inexperienced? They're alone... So they must have thought they could silence their subordinate and run away. As the projectile comes crashing down at high speeds, my outstretched left hand wrapped in a layer of my first skill and a bit of Magia retainment blocked its way. A large burst of smoke dispersed upon its impact, was it meant to be an explosion or a smoke screen?
Regardless, first skill Domain technique - wall of irrefutability. It's irrefutable because it blocks out all sound and prevents any noise from escaping. Unless one tears a whole in space or brute force their way through, the magical girl here shouldn't be able to run. Blowing away the smoke rapidly with my first skill, I had basically used my specialised magic as the most efficient leaf blower. It wasn't the first time it had been used like this, and sadly I don't think it'll be the last either. In any case, smoke doesn't work in me.
The large haze of ash and grey smoke rapidly parts away as a coughing sound could be heard nearby. Her pitch was a little high and cute compared to mine. It revealed to be that tax collector girl. Everyone else in the vicinity also turned out to be safe, so it seems my left hand had absorbed most of the damage.
Combined technique, first skill + first passive, reverse tracking. "Target lock." I stared straight at where the enemy had fired that attack from while brandishing a flowery smile. My passive allows me to read the gradient passives of any substance in the vicinity of a 100 km range, indirectly telling me what substance is there. With humans it would be the largely irregular presence of glucose and iron in their blood that alerts me.
With only my passive, it wouldn't be enough so my first skill was used to predict the flow of magic that flew with that magic attack, by applying the reverse of the original gradient it moves backwards, effectively rewinding time without having to rewind time. Releasing my aura, my excess magical particles leak from my bodily pores, painting the air around me in a faint purple with every breath.
For a moment a world of silence had befallen the street around me as everyone stared in awe. Without a second to rest, I vanished right after their eyes were laid on me. Swinging my kick as hard as I could, I struck and smashed through the flooring that person was standing on. The mysterious sniper magical girl, roughly 3 km away was standing on a roof. Needless to state, the concrete crumbled so much under my attack that it had all been converted into superheated powder, with some of it igniting the air around it.
"?!" (?)
I punched my palm in excitement as my eyes stared her down like a hawk. A brazen smile wrapped around my cheeks as I begin moving my magical particles.
"What are you doing here?" (?)
It wasn't the sniper that spoke, it was a new voice from a different direction. For some reason this voice had an authoritative tone that sent shivers down my spine. My fingers felt cold before I clenched them down once more into my palm. What was this strange feeling? Was it the same with when I first met Paridia? No, this was something far deeper, itwas embedded so far into my muscle memory that it instinctively reacts like this.
I activate the magic tool that everyone has on them, the one that shows the opponent's name and stats.
Title: Barius, star of perfection
Magical girl effectiveness level: A
Perimeters:
- Physical: A
- endurance: B
- speed: A
- will: S
- well: A
It was one of the friends listed in Myuu's note. Well first, she should already be convinced according to her words. She's just wondering why Kaori has come back, so I need to give an excuse.
"Well... Central life just didn't suit me I guess, so I was planning to come back home. Then I noticed magical girls are apparently collecting tax from the common people now. Mind explaining?"
Halfway through, I gradually converted into an assertive tone to block off the unease at the back of my mind. I was attempting to fool a person, naturally I was feeling a little anxious. Especially since her stats are higher than mind, so if she wants to kill me it would be a hard fight like the one with Myuu. Despite saying I knocked Paridia out of consciousness to spare her life in the fight, in truth my strength was just not powerful enough to cave in her skull. I was just weak, not merciful.
There was nearly no way to win that fight to begin with, it was a miracle I was able to reach Amony and kill her. Well, maybe they let me through by going too soft on me, or that Amony was...
".... Uhh..." (Barius)
Putting up a big show of blushing, her fair pink cheeks were tapped by her right index finger as her legs fidgeted.
"We got into a little problem, while our front line with the joint Illnoia-Grundo alliance was going relatively well, it turns out they infiltrated a bombed a large chunk of the labyrinth..." (Barius)
I stared wide eyed at her words as I took them in. It's.....it's gone? The only trace left of my past life? Myuu and the others don't have any other record of me from before that, where I was living before The Great Disaster and where I was living right after. Speaking of which... I haven't untransformed once. The thing was that the information erasure, while not an active magic had already deleted 4 of my sensory methods. I was afraid something worse would happen if I untransformed. Myuu and the others advised against it as well, so I'll keep it like this in the meanwhile.
"And then...." (Barius)
And then...?! There's more to it?!?
"We decided to collect money from the citizens to rebuild it. Fortunately we had kept casualties to a minimum in that bombing and only lost less than 10% in the war. The war is now on hold since the bombing erased a large portion of the land, making the environment hard to fight in. To them, they've already won since all our amenities and facilities have been crippled along with any research endeavour... " (Barius)
" I don't even know where to start.... No, to begin with I left in the middle of a war. "
By extension, it would be my fault for leaving them. Even a B grade was a rarity good enough to be a highly positioned magical girl that commanded others. Maybe if I had stayed here, life would be far more peaceful than trying to fight the Progenitor. I mean what a joke right? We were planning to assault a living legend despite not even being an S grade magical girl...
" No need to take any responsibility. We did a good job after all, if I do say so myself. After we drove off their commanders, we switched from a 10 B grade magical girl team to a much larger 100 man team. The sheer chaos was enough to keep everyone alive while driving them back, as entire platoons combined their power and techniques to fulfill specialised roles. It'll be a long while if I spoke about everything, so let's just take a rest. "(Barius)
She took pity seeing the conflict in my eyes. My thoughts were read aloud but she attempted to console me all the same. Maybe she was a nice person, but why did I feel so much fear at the start. Was it her power? No... Myuu and the others had 2 S graded stats while Barius only has 1,by that metric they would have been stronger. Or maybe I was the normal one, I was just hanging around monsters with my average stats.
".... Barius, I can't overlook it when I saw the fear in the eyes of the citizens. They fear magical girls, if it's not the tax... What have you done? "
In any case, I made up my mind. I want to ease their fear. I want to grant them the solace that I can not receive. I will be a magical girl of the common people.
"....??? Is someone trying to sabotage us...?! Our supplies were gradually depleting but I thought the builders were just being liberal with their resources.... Jirey, please make contact with the reconstruction team and ask them about their resource management. Ask them about the deviation from the amount they planned to used and the actual amount used so far. Also contact the logistics department to keep a tighter track on things. "(Barius)
" Yes Ma'am. "(Jirey)
The sniper magical girl spoke. From a superficial guess, Jirey was her secretary and a good sniper at the same time. Maybe I wasn't normal, as any C graded magical girl would at least suffer a concussion from such an attack. Despite being so far ranged, its magical potency was still extremely high. It burned minimal magical particles to fuel its acceleration and trajectory, and most of it was efficiently converted into an attack magic. She was really capable to say the least.
"...? You think the enemy camp is doing this? Have you seen how the citizens react...?"
'Fuuuh~' I swerved my left leg to the side while keeping my right leg in the front, both slightly bent to lower my centre of gravity. I locked my elbows near my torso and fastened my fingers into my palms. My fist gripped tight enough that the knuckles go white over the pinkish hue of my blood filled skin.
".... Kaori, don't be reckless. We'll do a thorough check on our personnel." (Barius)
I flared up my aura, it trembles vigorously under the surrounding air painting an uncharacteristic purple onto everything it covers.
"I don't trust you. Remove the entire tax requirement and debt, these people should already be paying the government. Why make them pay more? "
Endless darkness engulfs the landscape, a world of nothing but black appears to swallow me whole. Was I in this place the whole time? It was so dark when I was running away, I must have ran into this unknowingly. I see. I'm beginning to see some more. What was there since the very start. And finally, I know what to do.
Condensing my aura back into my body, I jumped forward with all my strength. There must be an edge somewhere, some way to break out of this artificial space. I'm able to sense a boundary of magical particles, but the distance between me and that boundary seemed to be constant. Had I been tricked all along? I can't tell what was happening, but clarity began setting into my mind. Whoever did this, they were now an enemy.