Magical Girl Neige

"Hello, Senior Seol!"

Mid-yawn, worn out from exhaustion, Chae Seol turned at the familiar voice. It was Mana, her junior.

"Well, if it isn't my cute junior Mana!"

Mana smiled sheepishly, arm in arm ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠with her friend Chaerin.

"...Hmm? Are you two okay?"

From where Seol stood, the two of them looked remarkably flushed. Mana seemed almost feverish, while Chaerin had the air of someone gazing off at some distant mountain. Both looked tired and a little dopey, yet every so often their bodies would give a sudden jolt. It was enough to make Seol wonder if they were coming down with something.

"Yeees... of course we're fine. What about you, Senior Seol?"

"Me? Ah, you know, I've been run absolutely ragged lately~"

Seol laughed it off with a rakish grin and folded her arms. The reason behind those yawns was pure fatigue, too. It had already been days since she'd met Mana, and the sharp explosion in monster activity had cut her total sleep down to almost nothing.

"You're holding up okay, though, right?"

"Of course~! Whose junior do you think I am? I'm dutifully fulfilling my responsibilities as we speak!"

"Reliable as ever."

"Anyway, I'll get going! Come on, Chaerin!"

"Mmhm...."

Mana tugged Chaerin along by the hand. Days ago they'd looked like perfectly ordinary friends — now they were arm in arm, practically a couple.

'No matter how I look at it, that's a confession, isn't it? Or am I just being old-fashioned? Hmm.... Eh, whatever. If I nitpick every little thing she'll chew me out for not being politically correct.'

Seol stretched until her spine popped, working the kinks out of her stiff body. Her lectures today were morning-only. She could go home now and sink into a long, uninterrupted sleep—

The staff's flat, mechanical voice made Seol's head droop at last.

'Seriously, why are there SO many of them!'

Chae Seol.

Older sister to her twin Chae Hong, she had become a magical girl several years ago upon meeting the staff known as Snow.

There was no lofty reason behind it. Not to protect people, and certainly not for the city's sake. It simply looked like fun — and, as it happened, her twin sister had been in danger at the time.

The freedom of soaring through the sky on mana for the first time, the rush of transforming her staff into a blade and freezing a monster before cleaving it in a single stroke — she'd fallen in love with those feelings, and that was the only reason she kept doing the job.

A fixed routine, the occasional deviation from daily life. To her, being a magical girl was exactly that much and nothing more.

"This is not what I signed up foooor!"

Conjure ice. Trap the enemy. Cut them down in one stroke. Normally she'd have been toying with them, shouting silly battle cries like Manhae! — but their numbers were beyond anything she'd imagined.

It felt like the workload had honestly doubled. Out of options, she pulled out her phone and dialed.

She could picture her sister scowling somewhere far away, but there was no helping it.

"Just this once, pretty please~? I granted your favor last time, didn't I?"

"...Fine. I'm coming, so hold on."

"See? Cold as your words are, you're the only one who actually cares about your big si— hey, did you just hang up on me!? Ugh!?"

She swept her blade through the air in a graceful arc. Ice footholds bloomed across the empty sky, and she raced through enemy territory in every direction at once. Her speed was such that the trail of frost marking her trajectory hardened into a road in the blink ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of an eye.

'I've killed off all the small fry, at least....'

Reverse-perched on one of the ice platforms she'd spun into midair, she eyed the monsters down in the alley.

'...That one I've never seen before is giving me a bad feeling.'

It was a little different ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠from your average monster. Massive, for one — and those enormous arms wrapped in coiling tentacles left quite the impression.

'Something about it feels off. Like I must not let it catch me.'

She lowered her stance, ready to behead it in a single strike. The monster stretched an arm toward Chae Seol — and in that instant, the colony of tentacles wound around it bloomed open like a Venus flytrap, spun, and came hurtling straight at her.

'That's fast!?'

The tentacles chased her down, each at its own speed. Chae Seol sprang hard off her platform and cast her magic, conjuring an ice road no one could predict and sliding along it at full tilt.

Dodging them like a hero mecha weaving through a missile barrage, she sank her stance even lower before the tangled mass of tentacles and poured her mana into the sword.

She closed her eyes.

And opened them.

That alone was enough — countless crossing scars of sword-light blossomed all around her. The tentacles were severed in an instant, and from every cut a pink liquid came gushing out. She froze each wave as it approached, but a tiny amount still splattered onto her. It might have been a flesh-melting acid, so she shook it off quickly.

'...The tentacles are regenerating. No matter how I look at it, this thing is mid-tier or above, with a core. Where did something like this suddenly crawl out from?'

"P...lea...se."

"...!"

"K...ill... me."

The sounds had come from that monster's mouth.

In that moment, Chae Seol felt a boiling rage rise in her chest. Perhaps it came with long years on the job — it seemed even her sense of justice had been dyed a shade darker.

"BENELOV!!"

The beings who had appeared out of nowhere in a world once belonging only to monsters and magical girls. They'd shown up in black combat suits to attack magical girls — and now, it appeared, they were running experiments fusing tentacles with monsters.

Before the staff could say another word, Chae Seol hurled her sword-shaped staff with every ounce of strength she had. By the time it left her hand it had already buried itself in the monster — the kind of causality-defying magic only a magical girl could pull off.

Tentacles came flying at her. No weapon left, so surely she had no way to fight back? Sneering at that presumption, Chae Seol clenched her fist.

"Bind!"

The staff glimmered for the briefest instant, then froze solid with a crackling shriek. Absolute zero. The incoming tentacles froze solid mid-flight, just short of brushing her forehead. She caught one, squeezed — crunch — and crushed it to shards.

Chae Seol channeled mana into both hands. Geometric blue magic circles inscribed in a multitude of languages unfurled outward, layer upon layer.

"Let's see you take this one too!"

The finished magic circle hovered before her. Chae Seol drove her power into her fist and —

"Injeolmi—!"

— struck its center. A straight lance of mana blasted out toward the tentacled monster.

"Patbingsu!!"

The frozen magic circle shattered. Her long-suppressed Power of the Heart detonated through the formation, unleashing an enormous, overwhelming radiance of freezing cold.

"Turn to stardust and vanish from the univeeeerse!!"

Pouring everything she had into it, she kicked off the ground once more. Soon the light swelled into something out of Dragon Ball, swallowing the whole stretch of land in an instant — and when the output finally died down, nothing remained anywhere it had touched.

Everything in the vicinity had frozen over; it was as if an ice age had descended on the spot.

"...Uh. Was that too much? The Manager's going to have words with me about this."

Chae Seol scratched the back of her head. When she spread her palm open, the staff-sword that had pinned the monster came whizzing back and landed neatly in her hand.

"Well, that's a problem for later. Now then...."

She looked back over her shoulder. Monsters — and mixed in among them, more of those tentacle horrors, just like ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the last one. There were clearly a great many. Unless she used her finisher again, there was no handling them easily.

And yet Chae Seol smiled.

"Guess it's time to get serious, then?"

In that instant, a rain of flaming arrows came plunging down from the sky and skewered the monsters. Chae Seol knew exactly who they belonged to.

"Sis, I told you to change the name when you use your finisher."

Her twin younger sister Chae Hong — the magical girl Rouge.

"That one's garbage. What kind of magical girl shouts whatever she's craving while firing off a finisher?"

"Aha, sorry, sorry. All that matters is the firepower, no?"

"I'd appreciate it if you had a little consideration for me."

"Eh, we'll sort that out later — for now let's just sweep them all away!"

"Haah...."

Sighing all the while, Chae Hong loaded her bow and pressed her back against Seol's.

"When us twins combine our strength, we're invincible. Right?"

"Well... that much is true."

"Let's go!"

"Take your time. I'm sleepy."

And so the two of them flew at the monsters — like a pair of problem children, and like the strongest there ever were.

"Honestly, calling me out for something this easy?"

"Sorry, sorry. I'll buy you something later, how about it?"

"Patbingsu."

"Fine, fine — your big sister's treating, so put your worries away~"

The two of them, transformations released, walked home together. Chae Seol poked and prodded at her sister, sneaking a sly little smile her way.

Chae Hong looked back at her, furrowed her brows sharply, and delivered a flick to her forehead.

"Ow!"

"If you ever fire a beam while shouting 'Injeolmi Patbingsu' again, I won't go easy on you."

"Got it. I got it, okay?"

"I'm going to bed. Yaaawn...."

"Yes, yes. Sleep well!"

Chae Seol darted into her own room and tossed her clothes aside.

'Ha, I'm wiped out. Where on earth did my free day go...'

It was already past ten — she slumped in defeat and turned on the shower. The moment the water ran over her body, she noticed something was wrong.

'...Why is my body so hot?'

Her lower abdomen felt strange — feverish, wrong. The more the water touched her, the more it tingled. She tilted her head, wondering vaguely if that was just what magical girl work did to you.

'Was it that stuff that got on me when I cut the tentacles? I should be more careful next time.'

And then, quite suddenly, it came to her.

'...That was a scent I'd smelled somewhere before. Eh, whatever. Sleep first. Think about it after.'

Several days had passed since then.

"I know it's urgent! Okay, okay, give me a second — I'm on my way!"

As time went on, the monsters only multiplied — and the tentacle monsters multiplied faster still. Their density had grown to the point where she now had to request backup from the magical girls nearby, and the number of missing-person reports had climbed sharply as well.

'...At this rate, I really will have to ask my juniors for help, won't I? If we just leave things like this, the higher-ups are going to come down on us demanding to know what we've been doing. Maybe I should run some night reconnaissance too.'

Having made up her mind, Chae Seol waited at the university the next day to meet Mana — and before long, she spotted her junior approaching from far off, waving her hand.

"Hi, Senior Seooool!"

"Yes, yes, Mana! I've been swamped, but how have you been?"

The air around Mana had changed — something about it had turned unmistakably... lewd.

"Yeees...♡"