The Story That Began (2)
Silence.
An eerie hush settled over the surveillance room.
“…How dreadful.”
Not a single person who saw the screen could keep their face from twisting. Some let out gasps of pure horror; others gagged and nearly retched. What Illusion was doing to Ian-na on that feed was so revolting that even Ho-jun’s brow furrowed. By any ordinary human standard, the acts were simply incomprehensible.
“Die!! Die!!! I said die!!!”
She throttled the thrashing Ian-na until the girl was on the verge of blacking out, then drove a merciless fist into her abdomen. Whenever the terror-stricken Ian-na tried to crawl away, Illusion seized her throat again and forced her back into Libra’s waiting arms.
Libra locked her from behind—again and again, without pause. Ian-na, foam flecking her lips from sheer panic, struggled with every scrap of strength she had left, yet Libra held her so tightly that not even a finger could twitch free. Angry red welts already mottled every inch of Ian-na’s skin.
As she whimpered and shook from head to toe, Illusion’s fist slammed into her stomach once more.
“Uweeeek…….”
A torrent of bloody bile erupted from Ian-na’s mouth at the same moment a yellow stream leaked between her legs. Watching her, Illusion’s mouth stretched into a grin so wide it threatened to split her cheeks. Libra, as if the whole spectacle were pure entertainment, kept her smartphone trained on the writhing body, filming every second.
No one inside the surveillance room could speak. No one even tried. They had all understood, in theory, how dangerous magical girls could be—but never like this. And never, in their wildest nightmares, against Ian-na, who had once been one of them. None of them had imagined the two would bare such raw, sadistic violence.
None of them except Ho-jun.
The pair had erased the Adjutant who burst into the room to save Ian-na without leaving so much as a trace.
“…Shall we classify this as treason?”
“Wait.”
Ho-jun’s subordinates assumed the two had killed the Adjutant outright, but Ho-jun knew at once that the man was still alive. The signal from the biochip embedded in the Adjutant’s body had never gone dark. Illusion had simply used her power to relocate him.
“…Why.”
Ian-na, crawling across the floor with her body a ruin of bruises and blood, managed a broken murmur.
“Because it’s fun.”
Illusion’s reply was light, almost playful, and every person in the surveillance room recoiled in shock. Here, laid bare for all to see, was the naked face of the magical girls—the very reason they had to be purged.
The world was finally stabilizing, yet the over-expanded ranks of magical girls were slipping further into madness. The Twelve Seats had grown bloated with arrogance and violence, and the artificial girls drank that poison in deeply. Leave them unchecked and catastrophe was inevitable; their rage would turn on the whole of humanity. Someone had to act. By any means necessary, they had to be removed.
Every agent except Ho-jun believed that was their sacred mission—that the purge of the magical girls was the first step toward a greater ideal.
“Is the recording complete?”
“From the first frame to the last.”
Ho-jun allowed himself a thin, satisfied smile. The footage captured by the micro-cameras would serve at the decisive moment—evidence enough to blind the Committee’s eyes.
“Connect me to Star Cluster.”
Preparations were finished. Ian-na could not be allowed to die; she still had a role to play.
Static crackled.
The screen switched to a “solitary cell” built to magical-girl specifications: a massive bed, wall monitors, a top-of-the-line computer, a spa tub—every luxury imaginable. In the far corner, the Magical Girl of the Star Cluster sat curled into herself, arms locked around her knees.
Ho-jun spoke her title.
“Magical Girl of the Star Cluster.”
“…”
No answer. At his gesture the large monitor inside the cell flared to life, flooding the room with the live feed from Waning Moon’s quarters—Ian-na’s room.
A sickening crunch filled the speakers as Illusion’s boot came down without mercy on the prone girl’s skull.
“…What is this.”
“Real-time. Illusion and Libra are trying to kill the Director—the Magical Girl of the Waning Moon. Stop them. Now.”
“…”
Han Byeol-hwa’s eyes locked on the monitor.
“I’m sorry…….”
The two of them were stomping Ian-na without restraint. Ian-na begged, body convulsing with terror.
…Good.
Karma. Payment for driving her precious comrade to the edge of death. Oksana had lost her life; it was only right that Waning Moon lose hers as well. The two who had nearly died under Waning Moon’s orders had every right to take their revenge.
And yet something in her chest twisted. The longer she watched Waning Moon being crushed beneath those boots, the more the sight curdled inside her. When the girl was driven to the brink of death, Byeol-hwa found her own hands and feet trembling without permission.
It doesn’t have to be this cruel…….
Even she, who carried Remegeton—the weapon that could drown a human in agony and terror until nothing but a broken shell remained—saw no reason for an execution this savage. Still, that was not reason enough to save Ian-na.
Ugly, filthy vermin. She did not want to save them. She wanted to kill them. For now—still, for now—she was only enduring.
“…I refuse.”
“The Director will die.”
“Then let her die. It’s karma. You’re the ones who pushed them into the trap in the first place. Next it will be you, Han Ho-jun.”
“Han Byeol-hwa.”
He switched the solitary-cell monitor to a live view of the surveillance room itself.
“Listen carefully. If Ian-na dies at their hands, I press this button.”
“Do you really think I’ll just sit here and watch, Father?”
“…Struggle all you like—if you can handle the hundreds of magical girls who will pour into this place.”
The red button in Ho-jun’s hand was a signal device that would declare “treason” to every general apparatus at once. Officially it belonged to each bureau’s director; in practice the Management Bureau’s director was Ho-jun, so the button was his.
The instant Byeol-hwa saw it, her body flinched of its own accord.
…Not yet.
She could not face them. Hundreds were out of the question; even dozens would be a miracle. Had they been Twelve Seat girls with actual selves that could be reasoned with, perhaps—but the artificial girls carried command chips in their brains. They would throw themselves at her even if it meant dying.
Magical girls reduced to puppets by those disgusting creatures, marching into slaughter without ever knowing why. She had no desire to fight them.
“Think of it not as saving the Director, but as saving Illusion and Libra. Time is short.”
“…Fine.”
Byeol-hwa forced the thought into her own skull like a brand: she was not saving Waning Moon; she was saving the other two. Even if Waning Moon survived, a normal life was impossible. She would end up a half-wreck the way she had right after the rescue, or worse—she would simply go mad. Byeol-hwa was only saving the pair. Just like last time.
“Wh-what do I do, what should I do… Th-this wasn’t… what I meant to……”
“Regret is already too late.”
Illusion’s face had gone deathly pale; she fretted and stammered while Byeol-hwa scooped up Ian-na’s rapidly cooling body and ran. The gamma ether stored inside Illusion had thinned to almost nothing. Shifting objects or people was impossible for the rest of the day. They had no choice but to run on their own two feet.
“Byeol-hwa…”
“Don’t speak. I already understand everything.”
Libra’s soft whisper brushed her ear; Byeol-hwa answered only enough to steady them both.
…But.
Ian-na’s internal injuries were catastrophic. She kept vomiting blood, sometimes laced with a cold blue fluid. No heartbeat could be heard from her chest. She was still breathing, so she was not yet dead—but that was all.
Was the rumor true?
Every record of the rescue after Ian-na’s kidnapping had been destroyed. What little remained was locked under the highest classification. Wild stories had circulated that the torture had been so thorough her insides were “completely emptied out.” Half a year later she had reappeared missing both legs, skin corpse-pale, hair bleached white, eyes milky and half-blind—yet otherwise looking almost whole. The rumors had quietly died.
At least it had not looked as though her body were hollow.
…
Most likely her torso was packed with artificial organs—the kind only synthetic girls used. Organs whose durability could never be guaranteed. Illusion and Libra could not have known. If they had known, they would never have done this.
…Wait.
Surely not. It could not be. It must not be. Only a guess—nothing more than Star Cluster’s private hypothesis. Ian-na might be……
“I-I restored her… I did… restore her… So why, whyyy……”
“…Stop whining. We’re here.”
The medical-bay doors hissed open. Every doctor and nurse in the Management Bureau stood ready, surgical trays already laid out.
“Hand her to me.”
Ho-jun stepped forward and took Ian-na into his arms.