84. Mari Episode
84. Mari Episode
Exam season began.
Once again, Bon Voyage Studio formed a study group from the film crew to prepare for the year-end exams.
One difference from the semester-one finals, however, was that this study group was a little noisier.
"Diane! Diane!! Tap! Tap!!!"
Inside the Sanctuary, which had been transformed from a set into a sparring ring, Diane was applying a triangle choke to Ceres.
Ceres hurriedly tapped Diane's arm and signaled her surrender.
"That makes it twenty-nine to one."
Acting as referee, I announced the score between them.
The two returned to the bench and reviewed the sparring session they'd just had.
"Ceres, your straight punch is too careless. A straight punch hits hard, but it's vulnerable to counters."
"I thought I was going to land it."
"But you didn't."
"Hmph..."
Diane pointed out Ceres's issues one by one.
All of this was, of all things, prep for the year-end exams.
The finals only covered a half-year of study, so when I'd seen they only tested theory I'd grumbled, but the year-end exams provided a full year, which meant it was time to seriously verify practical skill.
That didn't mean the theory portion had vanished—we still had to do it alongside sparring.
And at that moment, Diane was helping Ceres prepare for her sparring exam.
Diane was using the sparring session to work through Ceres's weakness against joint locks.
After a short break, the two resumed their sparring.
Ceres took the previous bout as a lesson and refrained from throwing a rushed straight, probing with jabs instead.
Ceres took the opening and executed a shoulder throw.
"Thirty to one!"
The moment Ceres's back hit the ground and she gasped out a breath, I declared Diane's victory.
Diane, who had been about to transition into a hold-down, stopped her attack at the declaration and returned to her spot.
Diane had racked up thirty wins over Ceres and still looked to have energy to spare.
It was easy to forget, but Diane was a year ahead of her and the daughter of the Calamity Duke.
When she was acting as Dina, she was on the same level as Mari, and in the real world Ceres was not her match at all.
Diane wiped the sweat from her forehead and again pinpointed Ceres's problem areas.
"This time you only probed, so you posed no threat whatsoever. To the point where I could walk right in."
At Diane's blunt assessment, Ceres puffed out her cheeks and protested.
"That's just you being weird, Diane! None of my classmates would take a hit like that just to apply a joint lock!"
"What about him?"
Diane pointed at me.
"He's an exception!"
But Ceres's heartfelt appeal didn't land with Diane.
A genius could never truly understand a regular person, so to Diane, Ceres's protest was mere whining.
"Fine, I get it. Get back into stance."
"No!"
For the first time, Ceres openly defied Diane.
She could feel that training with Diane was gradually overcoming her weaknesses, bit by bit.
But even for Ceres, having her weak points relentlessly exploited thirty times in a row meant she couldn't help growing fed up with Diane's joint-lock curriculum.
"It's just too hard doing nothing but joint locks! You can also strengthen someone's strong points instead of just fixing their weak ones... you know."
Ceres managed to speak her mind while still gauging Diane's mood.
Then, worried that she might have actually offended Diane, she belatedly tacked on polite speech.
But Diane, expressionless as ever, simply nodded.
"Fine. Then I'll teach you some striking techniques too."
"Really?"
"Yeah."
"Nice! Thanks, Diane!"
I watched the two fondly, moved by the growth of the elf who was at last beginning to learn how to read the room.
*
A few minutes later.
"Aagh! Diane! You said you'd teach me striking!"
The two beauties were entangled and rolling around on the dirt, yet Diane's anaconda choke was so close to art that it drew not lustful thoughts but pure admiration.
As Allen applauded the artistic joint lock from afar, Diane whispered a lesson into Ceres's ear.
"Bear this in mind. Striking is nothing but flashy bluster for the weak. The true technique of a hegemon is the John-style joint lock."
*
The eventful year-end exams came to an end.
Ceres, having received joint-lock training from Diane, took second place in the Combat Department.
Pia took top spot using kicks alone.
Me?
I screwed up the common Literary Arts subject and came in sixth.
This time, they'd twisted the Literary Arts questions into knots as if they'd done it on purpose.
To give you an idea of how badly, not just the top student in the Hero Department but even the top of the Faculty of Foresight was shaking their head in disbelief.
In my case, though, I figured this kind of balance patch was only to be expected and didn't pay it much mind.
Besides, I'd also taken a little revenge for their nerve in making the problems so filthy.
'How dare they set questions like that while the original creator is standing right here with both eyes open?'
The very last question on the subject happened to be about Magical Mari.
The prompt was to state your own opinion on whether Riv's death in the Dina episode should be viewed as a happy ending or a sad ending—and naturally, the "correct" answer was whatever the professor said it was.
Seeing as there were hundreds of students and the professor apparently hadn't even checked that I was in the class before setting such a question, I tossed them some kindling.
- In truth, Riv was going to walk into hellfire.
They asked if it was a happy or sad ending, so I just released the director's cut out of spite.
Now all that remained was for Riv's hellfire ending to turn the art world into a blazing sea of hellfire.
'Let's see you try to grade this one.'
I felt sorry for that professor's poor graduate assistants, but for a while, their office was going to be ablaze over that topic.
There'd been that slight commotion, but in any case the year-end exams wrapped up and winter break began.
We assembled in front of the studio just as we had during the previous summer break.
But instead of gathering to disband and head home, we were there to discuss plans for winter break.
"We'll start filming the final arc in two weeks, so anyone who wants to visit their family should go in the meantime."
With the Mari episode finished and Magical Girl Magical Mari's final arc finally approaching, we'd decided to keep filming throughout winter break.
There was no coercion.
It had been a unanimous decision by the crew, who wanted to give a beautiful ending to the work they'd shed blood and sweat over for the past year.
The most enthusiastic person in this process was Celestia.
"Huh? It's finally ending?"
"Yeah. They say you should leave while the applause is still ringing. So I'm starting to wrap things up."
"Okay! Then of course I'm staying!"
I'd thought she'd grown used to the character of Mari over the past year, but seeing her like that made me think she'd simply resigned herself.
Of course, that didn't mean she lacked affection for her own work.
If this had been a forced attempt to end the series prematurely, she would have fiercely opposed it.
But since this was a beautiful ending decided through reasonable discussion, she had no reason to object.
Alongside Ceres, Kylie was also so enthusiastic upon hearing that Magical Mari was finally coming to a close that she declared she'd spend the new year at Hetairo Academy as well.
Kylie's passion was burning so fiercely that I worried about her background and couldn't help asking whether she was really all right with this.
"As I recall, aren't you from the Eastern Kingdoms?"
"Yep. That's right."
"I heard the Eastern Kingdoms even have a mandatory holiday where you absolutely have to spend the new year with family. You okay with that?"
"You even know that?"
"Understanding the circumstances of Heroes is a virtue of a Priest."
"Well, to put your mind at ease, I'm fine. The rules aren't as strict as you're imagining. My family will understand if I say I can't come because of filming."
"If you say so..."
Amid the magical girls' ardent support, the final arc was decided to be filmed during winter break.
Once all matters were settled and we promised to reconvene in two weeks, before everyone dispersed, I had one last thing to do.
"Who here would like to come with me to see the Magical Mari knockoff?"
Yes.
While I'd been preparing for exams, some nerve-swollen bastard had made a movie, and I needed to go see its ugly face.
*
I'd learned of this fellow's existence the day before exams.
- Hey. After exams are over, want to go see this movie?
- No way. It's a Magical Mari knockoff, and I heard it's incredibly boring too.
- Oh, really? The critics' ratings in the paper looked decent.
- They probably just got bribed.
I'd overheard students chatting as I passed through the hallway, and that's when I learned the bastard existed.
- Hold on. Could you tell me a little more about that?
In a world without the internet, there was no way to find reviews except through newspapers.
The problem was, critics weren't exactly kind enough to directly say this was plagiarism or whatever.
And so, after asking around, I had no choice but to personally meet someone who'd actually seen the movie and confirm whether it truly was a ripoff.
And after compiling multiple samples, the conclusion I reached was that the film was indeed a knockoff.
It blatantly copied a magical girl and blatantly set the protagonist as an elf; anyone could see it was plagiarism.
Yet there was one reason the film hadn't stirred up more controversy.
- Wow, the Priest in charge is Senator Kaitor, and the lead is his own daughter.
Dirty power.
What made it even more absurd was that this senator was the same one who'd sent our club that odd letter.
From the looks of it, having failed to make his daughter a magical girl, he'd apparently resorted to this kind of approach.
Now, this might raise a question.
While this person was pulling this kind of garbage, what was the leadership doing?
On that point, the leadership had something to say.
A senator was not exactly a low-ranking position.
To draw up a plan to bury him would still take a few weeks; he was a fairly big fish.
By now, the Hyphen Kingdom's leadership was probably working behind the scenes on a plan to take Kaitor down, but his trolling had far outpaced their scheming and created this situation.
Well, the truth the world over is that shitting always happens faster than cleaning it up, so I let that one slide with understanding.
Moreover, since it was a settled matter that Kaitor was going to be sunk, the more nonsense he pulled before being dealt with, the greater the compensation we'd receive later, so I deliberately refrained from moving directly this time.
Then why was I personally going to see this knockoff? Because I needed to know what the damn thing was even about in order to curse it properly.
When I suggested going to see what kind of face the shameless knockoff had, only Pia, Ceres, and Nikolai among the crew agreed to come.
Leon, as a prince, had to return directly to the capital; Kylie and Diane said their mental fortitude wasn't strong enough and they couldn't bear to watch it with open eyes.
As for those who agreed, I knew Nikolai's and Pia's personalities, so that made sense, but I suddenly wondered why Ceres had chosen to join.
"Do you really need to watch this?"
"Because it's an evil deed committed by fellow elves. I intend to use it as a cautionary lesson."
Wow.
This kid keeps growing day by day.
Celebrating Ceres's growth, I headed with the group toward the movie theater.
- NO!! Stay!!!
- Don't go, you idiot!!
Ignoring the voices—my own voices—somehow swirling in my head, I purchased the movie tickets.
===========================
The name of the knockoff was <Fairy Warrior>.
Nikolai felt the breath catch in his throat the moment he saw the title.
It was the first time a title alone had overwhelmed him like that.
Next, he focused on the premise.
A beautiful elf forest ranger named Jasmine found a shining stone in the woods, gained the power to transform, and defeated villains.
The problem was that her transformed form was unmistakably a magical girl, and the shining stone was unmistakably a Heart Gem.
Aghast at the blatant plagiarism, he turned his attention to the other elements.
Sure enough, the other elements were just as disastrous and fully lived down to his expectations.
Perhaps because the movie had been rushed, the story was a mess.
It was a plot devoid of both entertainment and emotion: Imperial troops disguised as mercenaries committed war crimes against civilians near the Hyphen Kingdom border, and the magical girl Jasmine stopped them.
That wasn't the only problem.
The villains had zero appeal. The fight scenes were abysmal. Jasmine herself had no charm.
The villains were greedy Imperial soldiers who were incompetent, had no convictions, and cared only about money.
Every single fight scene was resolved with energy beams.
Jasmine was simply guarding the elven border because she was an elf; she had no motivation.
Considering all of this, there was no discernible reason why Jasmine should even be considered a magical girl.
And all of those problems came together in the final battle.
The last opponent Jasmine faced in this film was a magical girl named Mary.
It went without saying who had inspired the pink-haired magical girl who acted as an elf-born Imperial army stooge and specialized in hand-to-hand combat.
Mary served the Imperial army for the absurdly lightweight reason that she simply liked money, and with that the fight began.
At first, Mary held the upper hand against Jasmine.
With the downright racist logic that she could not attack a fellow elf, Jasmine was overwhelmed by Mari.
In a fight scene so awkward it seemed they'd had no one to supervise the combat choreography, Mary laid Jasmine out on the ground and said:
"You're just a weak girl who can't even defeat me without your abilities. In the end, you've only proven you're nothing without those powers."
The moment she heard those words, Jasmine suddenly awakened and blasted Mary away with a rainbow-colored beam.
Then, staring down at Mary as a grand song swelled, she said:
"What is there that I could possibly need to prove to you?"
After that, the film wrapped up with Jasmine's multicolored beam parade.
*
"...."
The moment the film ended, Nikolai found himself speechless.
It was so horrendous a movie that even a stray dog would chew it up and spit it back out.
He wasn't the only one with that sentiment.
Cracks were showing in the poker face of Pia, who always wore a bright, cheerful smile, and Ceres was taking deep breaths while repeating the word "relax."
The other audience members sitting near Nikolai also didn't seem inclined to evaluate the film positively.
As he took all this in, Nikolai suddenly remembered Allen's presence.
There was no way he could be this quiet—it was so quiet it was unsettling.
Recalling the saying that a person becomes eerily calm when their rage surpasses a critical threshold, he anxiously looked toward Allen.
And there was Allen, foaming at the mouth—no, foaming blood—while in the grip of a seizure.
In the middle of his convulsions, Allen barely managed to spit out his dying words.
"One-one-nine...!"
"A medic—no, a relief priest!!!!"
Nikolai's urgent cry rang out through the theater.