The Butterfly Effect of Idle Words (1)
“Ahh, run away!”
The blood vessel human’s body was slowly disintegrating. It was like watching a knitted scarf made of red thread being unraveled.
[You can't understand...]
The blood vessels writhed like worms, heading toward the darkness. Even Dunamis, one of the Four Heavenly Kings, froze for a moment at the grotesque sight.
Magi Black had charged ahead first.
“Think you can escape?!”
A spiral of magical energy burst from her tightly clenched fist, but it fell short of obliterating every scattering blood vessel.
A voice echoed from the shadows—the shadow mage’s.
[You, guardians of Hikarius City. Ponder once more why you ally with those who defy the natural order. I have come to guide this twisted providence back to its rightful place...]
“Shut up! Twisted? Since time immemorial, only the mascot imperialists have dared doubt Lord Ebon...”
‘What the...?’
Dunamis himself was startled by the reflexive slogan he’d shouted—a natural put-down aimed at those who doubted the great pioneer, Lord Ebon. A hunch flashed through his mind: hidden within those words was a truth hinting at the shadow mage’s identity.
“That obsession with purification and the natural order! You’re one of the Ochan Clan, aren’t you! Weren’t they all wiped out by the mascots?!”
‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’
Raban wanted to tell him not to spout insider lore only he understood and to explain it properly. But the key to seeming profound was momentum and...
[Ask that one cowering behind the Magical Girl. The one who hides the truth knows it best—both truth and lies.]
...deflecting.
The moment Dunamis’s gaze locked onto the mascot Papirun, Raban dismantled the spell forming the blood vessel human. Now reduced to mere clumps of blood vessels, the mass-produced right hands from the factory lay dormant across the city in the form of red threads, ready to be deployed as needed.
“Phew.”
Lounging on the bed in his assigned staff dorm, Raban controlled his familiars without lifting a finger. The grunt work was finally done. He glanced at the clock. The chicken he’d ordered should arrive any minute.
The smell of motorcycle exhaust mingled with the approaching aroma of fried chicken. A normal human couldn’t sniff out chicken from an unparked delivery box yet, but Raban was a black mage. More precisely, a dirt-poor one. He’d had to substitute his own body parts for most sacrifices. That environment had forced him to master flesh manipulation—regeneration, proliferation, the works. Among those half-forced skills was sensory amplification, especially enhanced smell, perfect for detecting approaching predators early.
Savoring the chicken’s ecstatic fragrance, Raban recalled the chickens from his home dimension.
‘Those freaks had five eyeballs and blasted petrification beams at anything that moved in front of them—total psycho roosters.’
How great was domestication! Failed sensory tweaks sometimes flooded his nostrils with sweat and body odor, but for the sake of that chicken bliss, it was worth it—
‘Hold up.’
Body odor. Human scent.
‘Isn’t this a way to track Magical Girls?’
Raban had inferred with high certainty that the two girls who transformed into Magical Girls attended Lux Tierra High School. If he were a mascot, he’d place his most convenient firepower in an easy observation spot. The counseling room saw plenty of student traffic, too.
‘Tch. Should’ve focused on sniffing them out more.’
It wasn’t just smell. Clues for identifying people abounded. Gait was one. Everyone’s walk differed based on skeleton and build. Detect the pressure variations on each body part at footfall, and you had a reliable ID method. Spread thin without clumping, blood vessels could act like pressure sensors.
‘Next time I bait them, I’ll observe the Magical Girls from every angle!’
Sorting the intel:
One, Ebon’s Ivory Tower held excessive faith in Ebon.
‘If things go really south, cosplaying as Ebon might work?’
Raban had mimicked plenty of others—not true Homo sapiens, but close enough for convenience—to deceive enemies. He could fully morph his body, including skeleton. If he learned Ebon’s appearance, impersonating him to infiltrate the Tower was viable. Specifically, as a backup if the Magical Girls uncovered his identity and put him on death’s door.
‘Nah, cosplaying Ebon might backfire from both sides. Better mimic a Heavenly King?’
Pondering Plan B for looming crises, Raban shifted topics.
Mascots, guardian fairies. Papirun packed serious mana, but it wasn’t entirely hers.
‘Connected to something, drawing power from it.’
He’d sensed an invisible ethereal line. Papirun distributed the supplied mana, naturally activating and maintaining a barrier. Terrifyingly intricate spellwork. How immense must the “Mother Fairy” creating and rationing it be?
‘Observe her a few more times, trace the line, infiltrate the Mother Fairy’s fortress...’
Difficulty was the issue. Even a dispatched fairy got such cunning safeguards—what defenses guarded the source? But if the raid succeeded, if he could hijack the Mother Fairy’s infinite mana hoard, he could complete his dimension-hop spell in one shot...
‘Hah! What am I thinking?!’
Chasing get-rich-quick schemes was madness. Black mages survived by eternal caution, always picking the safest path.
‘Anyway, not priority now. No seed mana to invest in Mother Fairy stock.’
Tonight had been satisfying enough. He’d bought time from the Ivory Tower, and Chicken Wing Heavenly King’s amusing reaction at the end let him smokescreen his identity.
Feeling lighter, Raban tore into a drumstick.
‘Figure out the Ochan Clan next time—improvise!’
Ideally, tension would brew between the Magical Girls and mascot, but that was too convenient. His vague toss lacked clues. At best: ‘This is that evil mage’s plot to make us doubt each other! Remember our bond!’ and done.
An ominous silence hung over the clearing where the shadow mage had vanished.
Dunamis’s “Ochan Clan” remark. The shadow mage’s “ask the guardian fairy.” All eyes turned to Papirun.
Magi Black tried cracking a joke to lighten the mood.
“Ochan? Sounds tasty. Folks who ate a good lunch?”
“No, Magi Black. Those who devour filth (). That is the Ochan Clan.”
Dunamis fixed Papirun with a cold glare. The guardians had purged them long ago. Survivors?
“If that shadow mage is Ochan, it makes sense they’re rampaging to ‘purify’ us. That’s what they were made for. Isn’t it, Papirun?”
[......]
Papirun fell silent. No cute “mohu,” no back-guarding cheer. Uncharacteristic.
“Papirun, what are the Ochan?”
[Fallen... like guardian fairies, mohu.]
A kind tone, but vague. Magi White sensed Papirun’s reluctance on this topic.
“Fallen?”
Hmph. Dunamis scoffed in contempt.
“Yes. Why they fell, who purged them, why your almighty Mother Fairy hides in the world’s shadows. You always conceal it!”
The Heavenly King beat his massive wings and took flight. Even amid the whirlwind, his gnashing words rang clear:
“Magical Girls, if you don’t want their fate, stay vigilant.”
The two Magical Girls couldn’t move easily from the now-empty clearing. If an ally they’d trusted fully hid “secrets”...
If they couldn’t even grasp the intent behind the silence...
‘What... should we do?’