Mai, Sunao and I had decided it would be best to stay the night at Saki's, despite the grumblings of our guardians when we informed them. The next morning was a weekday, so we rose early in the morning and set off to the station together.
"Think we're gonna be okay today?"
"There's no way those two would attack us in public. So long as we stick to the plan, we'll be fine."
Saki's response helped ease my nerves somewhat, but I was still on edge. It took a while for it to truly sink in that we were now enemies of the super powered individuals that even science had failed to explain. Even if I now had the same power as them, we were outnumbered and outgunned. Our safety was far from assured.
As we waited at the station for our train to arrive, I suddenly recalled a question I had intended to ask the day before, though I had forgotten on account of the head trauma.
"Hey, girls. When I fought against Yokoshima and Shiko yesterday, my clothes transformed temporarily, right?" I recalled noticing myself inexplicably dressed in black, and I had also realised that those same black clothes had disappeared just as suddenly. I had also not gotten a chance to get a good look at them, hence I asked, "what did they look like?"
The three looked between each other, all hesitating to answer the question. Damn, it was that bad?
"Well, you were dressed in this full black outfit with a skirt and tights and stuff, and…" Mai trailed off, as if unsure what to say next.
"Hmm? And what?"
"...and you also had a black veil covering your face."
"...what? Like a widow?"
"...yeah."
I… guess that explains the black fabric I saw in front of my face.
"I mean, did it at least look cool?"
"I mean, I definitely think you pulled it off. Right girls?" Saki and Sunao both nodded along with Mai, but I wasn't sure if they were being genuine or just trying to preserve my feelings.
"Well, so long as the outfit isn't terrible. And black is definitely my colour, so I guess it's cool." Still, the more I learned about this magical girl stuff, the more it defied any scientific explanation. A drug that instantaneously increased your physical proficiency in every attribute was absurd, but I could at least suspend my disbelief on something like that. But magical abilities and clothes that change when you summon them? This was far and away out of the bounds of common sense.
As I was still pondering the absurdity of the situation, our train arrived and we all boarded together, making sure to find four empty seats in the same area so we could sit as a group. We had agreed that strength in numbers was the optimal way for us to stay safe, so we were taking every measure we could to keep close and not let ourselves get picked off one-by-one.
When we were about halfway to school, Mai asked a question that I had been trying to avoid thinking about since yesterday.
"Hey, those Toukyouto girls that went missing… whaddyou think happened to them?" Between our attempted kidnapping and the Toukyouto uniforms we had spotted in the hideout, all logic would suggest that the magical girls themselves were behind the disappearances of the Toukyouto high girls.
"Who knows? A superpowered person that's completely obedient to your every word? A lot of less-than-reputable people could put them to some less-than-ethical ethical uses. Whatever it is, it's something we have to put a stop to." While Saki's words were mostly of reason, her tone carried a lot of anger at the idea of what those innocent girls had likely been forced to do. After a moment of thinking, Amai began to speak again.
"Hey, you guys don't think that the c-"
Before she was able to finish speaking, the sound of glass smashing rang through the carriage. Before I even had a chance to look at the source, I was forced to dodge at lightning speed as something flew past my head and embedded into the headrest of my seat.
Shurikens. More specifically, shurikens thrown with a force only possible with magical power. We were under attack.
Without a moment's hesitation, I got up from my chair and looked to the source of the noise. There in front of me stood a tall figure wearing a long white hood and an iron mask. The signature look of the elusive cult that magical girls often engaged in battle.
Looking around, I confirmed that there was no one in the carriage except myself, my friends, and the figure in front of me. The black veil fell in front of my face once more, and I engaged the assailant head on.
As I dashed forward, he threw two more shurikens at my head, both of which missed me by a hair's breadth, before drawing a sword dangling from his belt. Judging by the size and the way it was worn, it was most likely a tachi. Heavy and unwieldy, but strong and sharp enough to cut through a man like paper. One clean slash and he'd render me completely immobile, if not dead instantaneously.
I moved forward with my centre of mass low to the ground, closing the distance between us as quickly as I possibly could. He sliced at me horizontally, but I predicted the movement and ducked my body even lower, the blade missing the top of my head by mere centimetres. In a single move, I had nullified his range advantage and forced him to drop his guard, allowing me to land a powerful knee strike to his lower right abdomen. The advantage mine, I threw a lead hand uppercut into his gut, followed by a rear hook into his head as he reeled from the pain. I intended to throw the finishing blow with my rear leg, but he threw out a desperate push kick to put distance between us, followed by an upward slice with his tachi that nicked my shoulder, drawing blood and leaving a shallow but painful cut.
Despite having taken three powerful strikes to critical points, the cultist had regained the momentum in the fight and desperately pressed the attack, swinging the great sword more deftly than should ever be possible. It was clear he wasn't an expert in any particular sword art, but when wielding a sword of that weight as if it were weightless, there was no need to be.
I continued dodging backwards, narrowly evading every slash that came my way, but I was quickly approaching the seats where the girls were still hiding. I couldn't risk harm to them, so I had to think fast. But what could I do? Invisibility wouldn't be particularly useful when he can cover so much area in such a small space, and he wasn't leaving any openings for me to get in.
I was losing ground quickly, and couldn't find any options. But thankfully, the option came straight to me instead.
Once again, my body disappeared from sight, but along with my invisibility came a new power. A replica of myself leapt forward from where I was standing, right into the cutting range of the sword. As the cultist heaved a mighty slash through the clone's body, it disappeared into thin air, leaving him momentarily defenceless.
In that moment, I felt like I suddenly understood exactly what my power truly was. Not just invisibility. Illusion. Or rather, 「The Illusionist」.
Not willing to let such a perfect opportunity pass me by, I took a quick step in and delivered a left straight to the cultists jaw, knocking him completely off balance and causing him to drop the sword. I continued my assault without reprieve, chaining strike into strike without wasting a single movement. I launched a low kick into his right thigh that left him stumbling backwards, before planting my foot hard and finishing the job with a bicycle kick to the chin.
Assuming he was out for the count, I approached him to remove his mask and reveal his identity. However, before I could manage my vision was filled with white smoke, making me cough and splutter as I hurriedly retreated. I heard another window shatter, and by the time the smoke had cleared the cultist was already gone.
Bollocks. Thought I had him.
Cutting my losses, I turned away from where my adversary once was and bitterly walked back towards my seat. On the way, I noticed the sword that my adversary had previously dropped up. Picking it up, I realised that I was also able to move it with relative ease. It was too large to easily conceal, but I also couldn't exactly just leave it here on the train. That was when I first wondered if it was only myself I could make invisible. Focusing with everything I had, I tried to use my power consciously for the first time, and to my surprise, it worked. The great sword seemed to disappear entirely. Though, strangely, I still felt like I could 'see' it. Physically, it was completely invisible, but somehow I was aware of every centimetre of it, as if it had never left my view at all.
Thinking about where I was gonna hide it, I returned to my seat to let the girls know the coast was clear.
"You guys okay? The guy who attacked us is gone so we should be safe now." All three of my friends were huddled together in a corner at the seats, and they all breathed a collective sigh of relief when I delivered the news.
Taking the throwing stars out of my headrest and putting them in my bag, I sat back in my seat while the girls all returned to theirs.
"Us getting personally targeted by a cult member the day after being attacked by Flame of Time… that can't be a coincidence, right?" Mai was the first one to voice the question on all of our minds.
"It certainly seems far too convenient. But I was under the impression the cult and the magical girls hated each other. Could it be that they've been in league with one another this whole time?" Saki's conclusion seemed like the obvious one to draw at first glance, but there were things about it that just didn't make sense.
"I don't think that could be the case. Bear in mind that a few of those cultists got arrested and have been in police custody for months. Would they really enter a deal with the magical girls that could potentially get them locked up?" I said, doubtfully.
"S-so then, maybe it's Sora? T-They might have a way to find magical girls, l-like a sort of tracker?" Sunao raised a good point. Perhaps my existence acted like a beacon? But then…
"No, I don't think that's the case either. If it was, the cult would find the magical girl hideout in no time flat. I think…" Mai paused, as if what she was trying to say was almost painful. "…I think becoming 'cult members' is most likely what happens to people like the missing Toukyouto girls."
That… is a possibility I hadn't even considered.
"What makes you say that, Mai?" Asked Saki
"Well, think about it. No one ever sees the faces or hears the voices of the cultists. Even the ones in jail are apparently locked in some sort of stasis, so we've never seen them with their masks removed. What if the reason their identities are so fiercely protected is so that they're not identified as the missing people? They seem to act with no will of their own, too. They just show up, fight, lose and disappear. They never do anything except make the Magical Girls look better."
"So it's for fame?" I asked, trying to follow her line of thought.
"Fame, influence, the trust of the public. There's lots of reasons they might want to stage things like this. Hell, it worked on us. We wandered into the secret hideout of a group of strangers without a second thought."
No, you wandered into the hideout without a second thought. But I couldn't deny what she was saying. The influence of the magical girls had already spread far and wide across the city, and had even found attention across the rest of the country. Not to mention that they were now gathering an international following online too.
Supporting that theory further was the fact that the cultists and magical girls shared a lot of their powers. They had magical clothes that couldn't be removed, they had hugely enhanced physical capabilities, and some of the 'cult members' even had magical abilities similar to my own illusions and the signature time dilation of Flame Of Time. If they had been injected with the formula that gives magical girl powers but strips someone of their free will, those similarities would make a lot more sense…
"If that is the case, we have a lead on where to start with putting an end to their plans, right?" Said Saki, pulling me out of my internal monologue. "If Nao can figure out what drug is being used to control those girls, we might be able to find a way to neutralise it. If so, we can start saving the Toukyouto girls!"
Certainly, that seemed like the logical next step. Neutralising the mind control on the 'cult members' would not only free them from servitude, it would also throw a wrench in the plans of the magical girls. After all, they can't conduct their big public shows if they don't have puppets to fight. The only question left was…
"Nao, is it possible?" She hesitated upon hearing my question, but after a moment of thought…
"I-I can certainly try. Meet me in the lab after school. I'll need you all to help."
Our plans for that evening were suddenly set.