*
"...?" (Kaori)
She felt like she heard something important, but as soon as she lifted her back off the bed's soft surface, her thoughts became akin to smoke and simply vanished.
Every now and then, there were voices that murmur incomprehensibly in the background. She chalked it up to her enhanced sense of hearing, as a magical girl could eavesdrop at extremely far distances. It could just be a blend of numerous dialogues brewing into an incomprehensible murmur. A consistent but not completely uniform hum of countless voices, no one word or meaning could be deciphered from that monumental mass of noise.
But... Like augmentations to strength, endurance, will and speed... This enhanced sense could be carefully adjusted to stop eavesdropping by simply restraining the flow of magic to her ears... In fact this was in accordance to the endurance stat, increasing the hardness and durability of her body also increases the ability of her senses...
She stood in her bedroom, staring out ofthe small and brief openings of her swaying curtain over her window frame. She can't pinpoint the far away the voices were. This wasn't suppose to be the result of her inquiry... She had used her sense of hearing to watch out for enemies countless times... It was used in tandem with every other sense and magic available, such as her radar... Similar to a few days before, she cannot pinpoint the presence of these garbled murmurs within the nearest 1 000 km...
She learnt her lesson. There was no point in flaunting her powerful aura, only innocents would get caught up in it and die. Fortunately, Himei was there to stop her. She wouldn't oppress an entire region of people for a mere tantrum.
"I see." (Kaori)
An enemy.
Something beyond the tandem framework of normality, existing beyond the usual frames... She could just be schizophrenic, she couldn't trust her own mental stability, perhaps she really was going insane. But it's fine. It's fine if she's insane. As long as she doesn't harm anyone who was innocent, as long as she kept this to herself. The voices return after long intervals of time. Essentially a daily occurrence, but it was during random times. Morning, evening, even during the day, it could interrupt a concurrent conversation...
Accept it with grace. Live with it. Because soon it will see that there's no way some voices will get to her. If it was an opponent, they would have to come out and greet her if they want to bother her to any extent. So she will do as she please as she always has. She walks out of her room, taking in fresh air on the way to the bathroom.
Dipping her feet into the bath, it wasn't a mere metallic basin like the previous bath tubs, but a proper modern ceramic tub. There was also a newly installed heater, she liked her water hot but not too hot so it was perfect. She layed in the water, as if she was letting it consume her, the warm fluid flowed between her limbs and body, wrapping around her skin. It swayed from left to right as her large water displaces it into one direction, but it doesn't spill since the tub wasn't filled to the brim.
"Blblb" (Kaori)
She exhaled into the water, blowing bubbles as a result. The water soothed her skin and mind as she sunk her body weight into the embrace of the tub.
"... I can never get used to how soft and stretchy the skin is..." (Kaori)
It was surreal to have no need to care for skin ever again, as a magical girl, the magical particles dealt with the health of her skin perfectly. Well, it wasn't just the health of her skin that it took care off... Muscles and organs are also maintained at the height of their condition. But more importantly, the moment she augmented her body with more magic, it gets even harder. Like tough rigid steel, they resist any attack as long as there's more magic in it.
She stopped playing with her skin a long while ago, it was a little uncomfortable stretching the ends like jelly. But it shouldn't be underestimated, through countless training, there was only dense and chiseled muscles to be found under the unblemished supple skin. Rather, she was surprised that she wasn't just a mass of muscles but still had enough fat to make her body squishy in certain areas.
Alright, that's enough. After a quick change, she arrived back at her room to dry off her hair. [Hollow calamity] really helped to speed it up by essentially acting as a hair dryer, blowing warm air through the fluttering strands. Even so, it still took some time to dry her hair. It was an egregious facet of life as a magical girl that she wished she could do without.
She picked herself up after sitting in her bed to dry her hair. Today, they would finally be putting their board games to good use. Just for today, they thought it would be good to invite some friends over to their home. Mid game snacks and drinks have already prepared. As for the friends they invited...
Surprisingly, Kenzi turned them down. She had something more important to tend to, but in turn she brought in Garion who was unexpectedly receptive enough to join in the festivities of a board game. Fiel was also able to join in while Izumi and Vibell were on a mission outside the labyrinth.
In total, there would be 5 players including Kaori, Myuu and her mother. The 2 arrived a couple minutes earlier and had already settled down as if it was their own home. Garion layed on the living room couch while Fiel was helping to set up the game with Myuu. Well, Kaori wasn't helping much either... She chattered away with the 2 who were helping out without moving her hands.
"...!! If you're gonna come bother us, at least help out a little! Why are there so many rules?!" (Myuu)
"ehehe..." (Kaori)
Myuu could feel a vein popping over her temples, she would have given Kaori a little bonk on the head had it not been for the board game pieces lying around. If she used too much strength, the pieces would fly away from the shock waves. But if she used too little, Kaori wouldn't even feel it...
For now, Kaori was fortunate that they were already done with the set up. Each player had a plastic counter similar to the password on luggage or safes, where a numeral password could be fixed into the lock. Though, this was just a plastic counter, meant to count the number of dice each player had.
There was a pile of dice in a box next to the board, players traverse the board with their player pieces, which had no restrictions for places they wanted to go on the board. From caves, the ruins, to forests, it was pretty much an rpg on the board. Random set events would occur and depending on what they got, players could attain multiple difference dice such as attack die or defence die. Each player started with a single attack die and defence die, every die was 20 sided.
Other than these, they were more off the board customisations such as traditional fantasy classes like spearman, trebuchet, axeman, mage, etc each class has a unique skill that grants them an advantage and could only be used once every few turns.
"57!? No fair! You get extra die when you cast magic!" (Kaori)
"Heehee! How did you like that? Now you know not to just mess with me!" (Fiel)
"Uweeeeehhh.... I thought it would be funny..." (Kaori)
A ruckus ensued as joyful screams and wails escaped the living room.
"Uwaaaahhh!!!!! What the hell?!" (Fiel)
"Let's go!!!! I leave it all to fate and let it decide!!! Now to consolidate my gains and exercise prudence!" (Kaori)
"Hah! I use my extra action die now! I'll also use this spell I have saved up to disable 20% of your action dies, then scoop up everything you gained while you're vulnerable!" (Garion)
"Nooooo!!!! I'm getting third partied!!" (Kaori)
The highs and lows were filled with laughter, from an impulsive player like Kaori to methodical ones like Fiel and Myuu, as well as opportunistic players like Garion. Myuu's mum relaxed in the middle of the chaos that was this conflict, in the end she won as the other 4 players wiped each other out.
"Gugh! Why'd I have to lose first... Dammit... Let's go for another around!" (Kaori)
She really was a sore loser..., Myuu thought agasped. Well, it's what makes this game so fun. The liberating yet whimsical nature of their fate relying one dies. It was quite thrilling to see Kaori bulldoze through everyone's resources, she only lost because she was ganged up on by everyone, but simultaneously she had also weakened everyone's characters to the point that they were like frail twigs flailing in the wind.
"Speaking of which, is everyone planning to attend the life festival? Himei sent a message saying it'd be great if we showed up.
Even if circumstances have gotten relatively much better, the people still look towards hope in the form of magical girls jsut showing up would be a service... Was what she said. " (Kaori)
" Ah! I placed a trip mine there, using this trip mine card.
About the festival... Even so, you still want to go don't you? If that's so then it's simple. Just go all in, don't worry about your Selfishness, I'm sure the citizens would be happy to see you too. " (Myuu)
" What's the point of being wishy-washy? It's fine if your ulterior motive is to be the people's hope, you know? Perhaps a little self gratifying, but you beat Hikari did you not? I think there's some credibility there, though you shouldn't become too cocky as a result!" (Garion)
" hmmhmm! Yeah, I did! Then there should be no problem!
... Fighting supernatural beings for the past year and a half has served to neuter my social skills, I'm afraid when the kids will ask me to do something cool with magic and I fumble u-up! " (Kaori)
'... At least she's aware that she's weird... I was wondering how I would have to break it to her one day... ' (Myuu)
'Are her mood swings getting worse? I thought guys would have a low propensity to such things...
Or was what I saw when we were kidnapped by Illnoia a mistake...' (Garion)
'When will the second round start... I can't end on a loss! ' (Fiel)
'How lively!' (Mother)
For a few moments, everyone was too busy reacting to Kaori in their minds that they forgot to talk. Even if they didn't forget it, they assumed someone else would fill the silence... As a result... Sheer silence filled the air when Kaori admitted she couldn't interact with strangers properly...
'Why is everyone so silent?! Are they disappointed in me? They're disappointed aren't they?!' (Kaori)
"Now, now... Shouldn't we continue the game? We still have a long afternoon!" (Mother)
By the way, a game took around an hour. It's impressive that Myuu's mum could still last for a few more rounds. She wasn't the type to exercise, she read books and cleaned the housed. Though the chores had been split into 3, so Kaori and Myuu were contributing as well as doing the cooking. In other words, where was she getting all her energy from?
Kaori glanced behind the table with her radar, directly watching the back of Myuu who sat next to her mother and Kaori. Garion and Fiel sat on the other side.
"..." (Kaori)
Myuu's supple and sharp fingers were hovering behind her mother's back, a dim and subtle green light emanated from it. [Extreme body governing]... She was making sure she doesn't collapse...
Myuu turned to Kaori next to her with a subtle smile.
"Did you see...?" (Myuu)
"H-hmm? See what?" (Kaori)
Kaori returned the smile, cold sweat slipped down her temples and back. Myuu turned back to the board, thankfully she left it at that. They played a few more rounds, the events gave the flow of the game a heaping of twists and turns. Nonetheless, it certainly served to brighten up their days before the Life festival.
***
2 days before the Life festival.
'Are you willing to give it all up? There's only so much that can be done, what difference would it make?' (?)
Another unidentified voice from an unidentified location. She theorised that it came from a place beyond the range of her radar. It was magic that directly teleported messages into her mind, akin to telepathy but it has no need to built a network into the target's mind through magical particles, since it could teleport messages in. From a far away distance, from a far away dimension.
She had no idea where the voices are coming from, but the more they speak to her, the more they are exposing themselves. She used divine mode to increase the range of her radar to wrap the entire earth. She wasn't hopeful enough to find it, but it was a good enough confirmation for one of her suspicions.
If not on earth? Then where?