88. Magical Girl Final Chapter
88. Magical Girl Final Chapter
The Puppet Duchess's identity was officially secret, so Pia's participation was also kept confidential.
Just as Nikolai operated as the luchador named Peter, Pia was reborn under the name Ada with my help.
Ada's costume also underwent a drastic overhaul.
The revealing combination of a mini-skirt and crop top was replaced with long pants and a shirt, and the collar was made long enough to cover the neck.
I had initially proposed a full-body latex suit, but the Emperor sent me a demonstration video of an iron maiden with a smile, so I settled on a uniform.
It still felt a little plain, so I added a long coat that billowed like a cape. The result was an unmistakably imposing mastermind.
Pia-Ada was given about a week of intensive cram tutoring and then immediately deployed into filming.
We started filming early in anticipation of frequent retakes, but Pia handled the script surprisingly well.
Now that I thought about it, she was the Puppet Duchess who designed stages on an imperial scale—worrying she might forget her script was groundless anxiety on my part.
Her reactions were somewhat more exaggerated than ordinary acting, but once we made that part of the character, they stopped feeling awkward and became convincing method acting that drew spontaneous applause.
Her acting grew progressively cleaner with each scene, and filming proceeded smoothly.
We were now preparing Magical Mari for its beautiful conclusion.
=============<Magical Mari begins>=============
Time had passed since Mari became a Sun Warrior through Scapul's noble sacrifice.
It was safe to say that, after awakening as the Warrior of the Sun, Mari no longer had any opponent capable of matching her.
Not only Mari, but Isis and Dina also awakened new powers, and the executives of the Twilight Council were no match for them.
Having grown stronger, they proceeded to deal with every councilor, leaving only one remaining.
In that process, they also learned the location of the Council's headquarters.
"This... is a joke, right?"
Mari's hollow murmur echoed within the base.
But the researchers inside the base did not deny Mari's mutter.
Isis, who had also come to know the truth, and Dina as well, simply stared at the screen without a word.
Because the location of the Council's headquarters.
It was Hetairo Island.
*
The girls headed to the Headmistress's office to hear the truth directly.
But they received word that the Headmistress was away on a business trip, and she did not meet with them.
Unable to wait, they cooperated with the Student Council and began investigating the Headmistress and the professors close to her behind the scenes.
After about a week had passed like that, when they were just one step away from the truth, tragedy struck them.
- Mari! I found the evidence!
Mari's manager, who had contacted her just the day before to say she had found decisive evidence, had died.
The diligent girl who had mediated between the Student Council and the magical girls from the very start of Mari's magical girl activities—her name was Ada.
That girl, who had been with her even longer than Isis in a sense, committed suicide in the Student Council room.
After that incident, the Student Council's cooperation grew lax, pushing the truth even farther away.
But despite this, the magical girls did not give up, and they finally reached the truth.
"The dean's position has been vacant for a year."
Dina, the only brains among the magical girls, uncovered the whole truth through her deductions.
The truth was that the Headmistress had already vacated her post from the very day the monsters first appeared.
And it came to light that the person who had been acting as Headmistress before them until now was in fact the mastermind.
No longer giving any thought to procedures, they headed for the Headmistress's office.
They discovered a secret passage inside the office and descended below it, where the conference room of the Twilight Council revealed itself.
And inside that conference room, a woman welcomed them from the seat of the last remaining councilor.
"Do come in. To my council."
Sitting there was someone they knew.
"Ada...?"
The colleague they thought dead welcomed them with a smile spread across her face.
While Mari could not understand why she was in that seat, Ada rose from her chair.
As her tied hair came loose, her clothes began to change.
Her office skirt and shirt were replaced with a uniform.
And her eyes, which had been round like a gentle lamb's, sharpened as her glasses were removed.
Her long coat billowing like a cape, Ada smiled toward Mari.
"Mari. Blind faith is the emotion furthest from understanding."
*
While the girls were bewildered by the transformation of someone they had believed to be a comrade, she expounded upon her convictions just as the other councilors had done.
"I once believed that love for humanity was precisely what could advance this world as well."
As though she had cast aside her polite register along with her glasses, she recounted her past in an utterly arrogant tone.
And a shocking truth came to light.
She was a former magical girl.
Hundreds of years ago. She was the magical girl who single-handedly succeeded in toppling the First Council.
But despite her sacrifice, humanity, bereft of the Council, marched toward self-destruction through desire.
Seeing that and falling into self-reproach, the magical girl revived the Second Council.
This alone was shocking enough, but the secrets revealed next were no less staggering.
"Did you never find it strange? Why enemies appeared to match your growth?"
All of it had been her design.
She began designing the entire scheme after realizing that the Second Council was not much different from the First.
After agonizing over the cause of why it would not change, she reached a conclusion.
Aha. The Second Council, too, was not made of better humans in the end, and thus could not lead humanity in a better direction.
Then the answer was simple.
Let's replace the Council and create a new Council with new humanity. And let's overturn humanity entirely.
And the ones adopted as that new humanity were these magical girls.
Mari, Isis, and Dina had been raised as comrades to lead the new humanity alongside her.
Having finished all her explanations, she made a declaration to the magical girls.
To follow her.
Naturally, they refused Ada's proposal.
Having awakened their virtues through countless adversities faced until now, they could not agree with Ada's methods.
At their cold rejection, Ada wiped away her tears and drew forth her weapon.
Tap.
As she clicked the heels of her shoes together, her shoes transformed into blood-red high heels.
And the battle began.
Ada's combat power was overwhelming.
A single exchange.
As if the claim that she had single-handedly annihilated the First Council was no exaggeration, each time her shoes moved once, a magical girl fell.
After deciding the match in just three attacks, she told the magical girls to reconsider the proposal and left the spot.
*
Afterwards, Ada procured new monsters from somewhere and tested the magical girls again.
She occasionally showed her face, delivered a new memorable line, and disappeared as a bonus.
- Your tone. Do not raise your tone so high.
- Then allow me to ask. When did you start thinking I wasn't using a Heart Gem?
- It's full of openings. All of them.
Words brimming with bravado poured from her mouth.
If an ordinary villain spoke like that it would seem pathetic, but Ada possessed the ability to prove every one of those words.
Ada exuded a pressure on a different dimension from the other executives.
But the magical girls grew even amidst that adversity and finally stood before Ada once more.
True to their confidence, the magical girls were far stronger than when they first met Ada.
Yet they were pushed back, if only marginally, and they were ultimately defeated by a slight difference.
At the very moment Ada, who had seized victory at the end, was about to declare her win, Mari, who had fallen first, murmured.
"I can do this all day."
Behind Mari, who staggered to her feet and clenched both fists, the other magical girls rose together as well.
And the second round began.
Normally, in their exhausted state, there was no way they could defeat Ada.
But by realizing the essence of the Heart Gem in that brief battle, the girls ascended to a new realm once more.
"The Heart Gem is... the power that turns the heart into magical power!"
The reason the councilors' seats had been divided that way, the reason Ada had been unnaturally strong, and even the very reason they had awakened to the power of magical girls—it was all because of this.
Mari steeled her will.
Isis dreamed of being a hero.
Dina tightened her devotion.
The three girls' hearts resonated and awakened a new power.
That power clashed with Ada's love for humanity, but the twisted love for humanity was no longer a match for the virtues they had awakened.
In stark contrast to her adversaries, Ada's strength gradually waned the more she opposed the magical girls.
And finally, when she realized that her own love for humanity had become distorted, her transformation was undone.
And Ada was no longer a magical girl but a monster.
Toward the twisted monster, the three magical girls launched their finishing move.
"""Infinite Spiral!!"""
Within the torrent of light, Ada recalled the virtue she had forgotten.
"Truly... you cannot be defeated. Bonds are."
Leaving those words behind, the final boss crumbled to dust and vanished.
With everything concluded in that manner, the long narrative of Magical Mari came to an end.
=============<Magical Mari true end>=============
Along with the final episode shot over winter break, the Magical Mari Series came to an end.
Amid applause filled with wistfulness and lingering emotion from the fans, Mari said her goodbyes to everyone.
"Thank you all so much!"
The finale-commemoration fan meeting was held at the Sanctuary of Parma.
There, Celestia demonstrated her fanservice spirit without reservation.
- You'll come back someday, won't you?
- If all of you remember me, I'll come back someday!
Seeing her dish out lip service she normally never bothered with, she must have been really happy to be throwing off the magical girl costume.
Not to be outdone by Ceres, Kylie also exchanged greetings with the Order of Isis.
And there was an event where Diane praised the Dina Knight Order for their hard work so far.
- Heuheuheh. Our baby! You've grown up so splendidly!
- Mother. Please get up. This isn't the last time we're meeting, you know.
I could see a lady who was close with the Dina Knight Order gushing embarrassingly, but I consistently played dumb.
She seemed like a capable lady who was a former Tower Master, had two sons, and had the Guardian Duke for a husband, but I decided to stay silent for the sake of her honor.
It was absolutely not because I was embarrassed by half the blood flowing through my body.
During the process, the title Diane used to address that lady also bothered me for some reason, but I didn't want to pretend I knew her, so I let it go.
While the magical girls were reminiscing with the fans, the named villains also spent time with their respective fanbases.
Naturally, Riv—that is, I—was among them.
For the fans who kept wanting to shake hands with the prosthetic arm, I had to strap on that unbearably uncomfortable Death Knight arm even though I wasn't acting.
Still, if it was for the fans, this much was nothing I couldn't handle.
While I was carrying out the fan meeting inside the swelteringly hot Riv costume like that, a short break came up.
I was in the break room, untying my bound arm and stretching, when Nikolai approached me.
"Boss. But do you really not have to tell them that?"
"Tell them what?"
"Celestia and Kylie are that happy. Keeping it a secret like this feels a little... cruel."
"Leave them be. They deserve to be happy for a little while too."
"... Be honest. You just think it'll be funny, don't you?"
At Nikolai's last question, I rinsed my mouth with bottled water and chose my words.
And in case anyone might overhear, I answered using only words Nikolai would understand.
"The Flying Dutchman always needs its captain."
"... Boss, you are actual garbage."
=========== <Magical Girl... ???> ===========
The main Magical Mari series concluded, and the Civil War Episode was released as a feature film.
And the feature film attempted something groundbreaking, the likes of which had never been seen in this world.
- Those who purchase the Collector's Edition will receive both the Sage Cut and the Theatrical Cut!
It wasn't canon, but people couldn't help being interested since it was a video containing the intent of Sage Cervantes.
Especially at a time when Riv's Hellfire Ending had the academic world in an uproar, it was only natural for people to buy the Sage Edition.
- Kyaaak! Sage Cervantes! Priest Price! Do you fiends truly have no human hearts?!
Though there were people writhing over the Hellfire Ending despite ample warning that it was absolutely not canon, the Civil War Episode itself wasn't very different from the main series.
The scale of the action scenes was far grander and much more visually dazzling, but the story itself wasn't very different.
And just like the main series, the episode concluded with the magical girls' reconciliation.
People hadn't come to this movie expecting anything but a rehash to celebrate the finale anyway, so they weren't particularly disappointed.
Just as people were preparing to get up from their seats with an appropriate sense of lingering afterglow, they noticed something strange.
"There are five minutes of footage left?"
And to answer the audience's question, the footage continues.
Inside a gloomy room completely unsuited to a magical girl story, a man was sitting at a desk, smoking a cigar.
In the man's hand was a report containing information on the magical girls.
While he was reading through the information on the magical girls, a newspaper lay on his desk.
The newspaper's headline bore the large title "Scoop" along with the following content.
- Scoop! New lifeforms discovered in the Forest of Spirits! Beings calling themselves Mascots declare the establishment of a Knight Order for world peace.
- These Mascots have been revealed to have seized an island off the Empire's eastern coast and are constructing a building of unknown purpose...
The man who had been examining all of this information took a long drag on his cigar and tapped the ash into the ashtray.
Then the camera turned to show the man's nameplate.
- Chief, Imperial Counterintelligence Department
He repeatedly took long drags on his cigar, and only after he had burned through an entire one did he open his mouth.
"So. What was this proposal of yours?"
When the Chief spoke toward the darkness, a reply came from the darkness where no one had seemed to be.
"The Magical Girl Management Bureau. That is what this world needs."
A one-eyed penguin with a toothpick in its mouth walked out from the darkness, and the movie ended.
=========== <Magical Girl... The End?> ===========
After the Magical Mari feature film ended, Nikolai and I held an emergency press conference.
The gist was that we would be renting out the Magical Girl IP rights at a very low price so that all studios could use them.
As long as they did not damage the established setting or insult the original Magical Girl, they were free to create their own magical-girl worlds.
At our unprecedented declaration, a barrage of questions poured in from the reporters.
To avoid any accidental slip of the tongue, Nikolai answered most of the questions.
- Why are you renting out the rights instead of making them yourselves?
: We're starting to want to make other movies too.
- What's the reason for renting them out at such a cheap price?
: Rather than monopolizing magical girls, we want to share the setting with many creators and see a variety of works. Before we are artists, we are members of the audience.
- Then will Mari be making a reappearance?
: She might show her face occasionally as a cameo or a supporting role.
The results of Nikolai's interview caused a huge sensation around the world.
Before we knew it, we were being praised as admirable artists who cared more about the development of art than money.
Well, it wasn't entirely wrong, so I didn't bother to correct it.
The ones cheering particularly loudly were the film production clubs.
It's easy to forget, but our studio wasn't the only film club at Hetairo Academy.
It was just that our studio's presence was so overwhelming that they were intimidated and unable to make films.
And in that situation, we were selling them a proven secret sauce—Magical Girl—on the cheap?
There wasn't a single reason for them to dislike it.
After the press conference ended, on the way back to the club room, Nikolai asked about something he had been curious about all along.
"Boss. So is this a multiverse?"
"No, an omnibus. A multiverse is easier to manage, but it's too irresponsible."
"That's true."
With a multiverse, management is easy because if you go overboard with absurd settings and the reception is bad, you can just erase that timeline.
But rather than irresponsibly throwing out settings and disappointing the fans, I preferred a method of thoroughly vetting everything from the start and developing it omniverse-style.
Following that logic, although the IP rights would be rented out to other studios, there would be thorough vetting.
I added that we had even prepared ruinous contractual penalties in case anyone tried to slip strange ideology into a production.
Nikolai was satisfied with my answer and didn't raise any more questions.
When the two of us opened the door to the club room like that, as expected, Ceres greeted me enthusiastically.
She charged at me without warning, grabbed me by the collar, and shook me violently.
"Hey. I'm asking just in case, but I don't need to appear in the other Magical Girl Series, right? Right?"
At her desperate voice, I answered with a more energetic voice than usual.
"Come on, don't say that. Shouldn't a veteran magical girl show her face from time to time for her juniors?"
Of course, she wouldn't appear on screen as often as when she was still the active star, but she would have to show up just when they were about to forget her.
At least once near the beginning, once in the middle, and once in a special episode of each magical-girl series?
Come to think of it, if I rented the rights out to multiple studios, she'd have to appear in that many series simultaneously, so in the end, the frequency of her screen exposure might not actually be that different.
To help our lead actress shake off her worries, I told her the one thing that was at least somewhat comforting.
"Still, don't worry. I'm going to vet and reject every scene that could insult Mari~"
"That's not the problem, you piece of garbage! This isn't what we talked about!"
"What's different?"
"You said it was the final episode of Magical Mari!"
"It did conclude. 'Magical Mari' is over. Besides, did you forget what I said when we aired the first episode?"
"Don't tell me..."
"'At least' 100 episodes. I told you if we expanded the world, it would go past 300."
For reference, this buildup had been designed from the very first episode.
Magical Mari would end within a year, but I planned to turn magical girls themselves into an ongoing franchise.
I didn't tell Ceres she wouldn't need to worry about roles until graduation for nothing.
Ceres, having learned a fact more shocking than Ada having been the final boss, trembled with her hands.
"You... you... I'll kill you!"
"Whoa, whoa. Don't use such strong words. It makes you look weak."
"Die!!!"
"Hahaha! The Flying Dutchman must always have a captain!"
<Magical Girl Magical Mari. The Real End>