Healing System

"Forget it, it's not that bad anyway."

Mithril comforted Angell, rubbing the hair of the body he currently inhabited with a small paw.

"Shall we head back, meow?"

"No, I'm going to double-check." Angell said.

"...You actually quite like this movie, don't you, meow?" the Black Cat remarked.

Angell didn't care what the Black Cat said; he summoned the unfortunate servant Tom and had him fetch another movie ticket.

This time, Angell remembered to buy a hot dog and sweet orange juice, and he bought dried fish for Mithril before walking into the cinema once again.

The screen first displayed the logo of Magic Gear.

Golden gears turned with a clatter, shedding sparkling powder, and then the Iron Puppet emblem of Sir Mandela walked clumsily across the screen.

The movie officially began.

The content of the film was roughly the same as the script Allen had provided to Angell.

Cute little Maya was an ordinary twelve-year-old girl whose family ran a tailor shop; she was lively and cheerful, beloved by everyone.

At the start of the story, on her way to school, Maya encountered a strange Maine Coon wearing boots. She followed the cat through an alley full of cats (the Receptionist Cats made a cameo), and finally, in a junkyard at the end of an ordinary alley, she saw a broken full-length mirror. The reflection inside was not her own, but that of a stunningly beautiful woman who called herself "Cecilia."

When Angell saw this part the first time, he didn't think much of it.

It was a very standard opening for a Magical Girl film.

During his second viewing, Angell noticed that certain signs of the later developments had been there all along.

For instance, while the beginning of the film seemed bright and glamorous, this radiance was confined only to little Maya. Her family's tailor shop was gloomy, the street she lived on was gloomy, and while the smiles of her parents and neighbors seemed cheerful, they appeared weary under the unnatural lighting. In contrast to the tailor shop, the shopping mall outside the old street was very bright, but the passersby walking around in fashionable clothes had blurred faces, like puppets; if one looked closely, it was even somewhat creepy.

After Maya entered the cat alley, the atmosphere became fairy-tale-like, but that sequence felt slightly overexposed. It was cute, certainly, but it felt very artificial—especially when Maya passed through the alley and returned to reality, the contrast with the gloomy alley made the previous scene feel like Maya's own dream.

As for the old items from the Magic Era—the old crystal ball, wand, magic sword, and bow and arrow in the junkyard—they were almost a direct metaphor.

"Lady of Charm" Cecilia was also quite interesting.

Cecilia in the mirror was constantly changing her appearance, one moment a pure young girl, the next a glamorous matron. While this might have been an expedient measure by Sir Mandela to accommodate various casting favors, the uncertainty of the peerless beauty's form made it all the more eerie.

At this point, Maya even asked, "Can you defeat the enemy just by relying on beauty?"

"Of course, girl," Cecilia smiled. "Beauty is a woman's greatest weapon."

"To hell with that!" Angell muttered, chewing on Mithril's dried fish.

He remembered this line of dialogue; it had seemed perfectly fine on the script, and he had even thought it would make a decent advertising slogan for merchandise. But in the current eerie environment, it felt deeply unsettling.

However, the plot continued in a standard, formulaic way.

Kind-hearted little Maya couldn't bear to see Cecilia sealed away, so she agreed to accept her legacy to defeat monsters and collect moonlight energy.

Cecilia gifted Maya the "Moonlight Wand."

Maya brought the wand to school, a monster appeared during class, and Maya transformed for the first time to defeat it.

The performance that made Angell realize something was wrong started here.

When reading the script, Allen had explained that this monster was Maya's classmate who had turned into a monster because his family business went bankrupt—Angell thought this was a very generic reason, acceptable enough—and Maya later attended his funeral, where she met her first little friend, Little Red.

It was just that Angell hadn't expected the home of the classmate who turned into a monster to be so close to Maya's house, with such a similar layout, and also being a small workshop. Furthermore, at the funeral, the conversation between Maya's parents and those distorted, eerie passersby was about whether to stop their own business and go to the factories.

"Heh, intensified social contradictions—the favorite topic of film critics." Angell took a fierce bite of his hot dog.

"It's quite realistic, too, meow." Mithril reached for the dried fish.

"The last thing I need is reality!" Angell complained.

That was why the transformation and battle scenes in the storyboard he had done were very unrealistic.

Angell had aimed for a commercial route, and with his experience as a planner from his previous life, he had researched how to attract players to spend money through cool transformations and battle scenes; the storyboards reflected this.

As for whether these storyboards matched the plot... who cared about that?!

As long as the merchandise could be sold, wasn't that enough?!

Angell had been most invested in the transformation scenes, so he had stayed on set to watch them film those parts.

Director Peter was also a very obedient director; he had filmed exactly according to Angell's requirements, without cutting a single corner.

What he hadn't expected was that Allen could actually reconcile this as well.

He had adjusted the placement of these battle sequences, putting them in the most contrasting positions. Consequently, after the magnificent battles, the gloomy reality followed, making the battle segments seem even more unreal, like a little girl's fantasy.

This sense of unreality naturally eroded the protagonist as well.

The subsequent battles were standard processes of defeating enemies and meeting new friends, but as the enemies' backstories became increasingly tragic, Maya's innocence and cuteness seemed more and more hollow. Her battles, while seemingly defeating enemies, actually felt like a process of being consumed by Cecilia.

Especially toward the end of the story, after Maya finished a flashy battle, the blood-red moonlight cast her shadow on the ground, as unstable as Cecilia in the mirror.

Even the romantic subplot didn't save this shift in atmosphere.

If anything, the presence of the School Prince, whom Maya had a crush on, repeatedly triggered Maya's corruption.

The most terrifying part was that after the "monsters" were eliminated, passersby who looked similar to the "monster prototypes" would still appear. They had blurred faces, similar builds, clothing, and speaking tones to the "monsters," and even the newspapers were filled with hints of various heinous crimes. This implied that these internally corrupted beings hadn't truly been turned into monsters and destroyed by the Magical Girl, but remained among the people.

(Damn it! When Angell saw them reusing supporting characters and costumes, he had thought they were helping him save on the budget!)

It seemed the Magical Girls' eradication of Monsters was merely a delusion of their own.

They were descending into madness day by day under the dominion of the Black Witch Cecilia.

Angell bit into a hot dog and remarked, "This segment is a classic depiction of a Witch's descent into insanity; even the shifting of the moon corresponds to the protagonist's mental collapse."

This was precisely why Angell hadn't suspected the director at all, but was instead gritting his teeth, eager to settle the score with Allen.

Perhaps no one could feel the impact of the moon-induced Mana tides on the psyche more keenly than Allen.

Angell didn't notice that when he mentioned the "moon" and the "Witch," the audience member in the adjacent seat cast a deep look at him. The person managed to refrain from debating Angell on the spot, but noted down the two terms, determined to look them up later.

Perhaps this metaphor required some thought for the audience of this era, but as far as Angell was concerned, the plot had reached a point where he could practically draft a literary comprehension test:

--This film satirizes the cannibalistic nature of XX-ism. Under the oppression of XXX, the lower classes fall into becoming Monsters without hope of salvation. The heroine is no exception; she wishes to save her friends and family, but it is all a hallucination. She can save no one and is ultimately assimilated as a part of the Witch, which illustrates--

It illustrates that the screenwriter has a death wish!

Following the collection of lunar energy in the latter half, Maya's Magic Wands became increasingly numerous—this should have been a point to excite the audience—yet the rift between the Magical Girls stemmed from an unconscious comparison of their beauty! Coupled with their jealousy over Maya's Magic Wands, it carried a subtle critique of consumerism.

Angell: ...Damn you, I still have to sell merchandise!

One of the Magical Girls heads to the Mage Tower, seeking greater power, only to fall into darkness and transform into a Witch.

From that point on, none of the people Maya wanted to save were rescued, and even her companions had betrayed her.

The atmosphere reached its peak of depression. When Cecilia smiled and asked Maya, "Do you truly wish to save her?", the vibe practically implied that Maya had reached the limit of her sanity and was preparing to sacrifice herself.

Angell suspected that was exactly what Allen had in mind.

According to the original script, Angell remembered that Maya had agreed to Cecilia's request without hesitation, saving her companion.

To a child, it looked like a victory—that was what Angell had thought when he first read the script.

But based on the atmospheric buildup, it actually implied that not only had Maya committed suicide, but her soul had also been devoured by Cecilia, as had the others long before.

The script didn't explicitly state it, but Cecilia's beauty, which could bewitch anyone, was derived from the "devotion" of these young girls.

Whether it was the Monsters or the girls who struck them down, all had become a part of Cecilia.

A part of the past, abandoned and forgotten by the world.

However, as the plot reached this point, Allen seemed to have had a change of heart at the last moment. He added a scene where Maya strengthens her resolve and, relying on her own power, ignites the strength of her Magic Wand. The atmosphere of the final battle shifted accordingly, turning into a scene where Maya ultimately saves her friends through her own strength.

It was this performance that pulled the tone of the entire story back to "a grand battle between justice and evil," rather than "a little girl's insane delusions" or "magic is all a fraud."

--And in doing so, Allen saved himself.

Honestly, after watching it for the second time, Angell felt a bit suspicious: if it had followed Allen's original script, would it have enraged Mayor Owen and Branch President Hume?

But Branch President Hume had watched the film from start to finish; if that were the case, it wouldn't have been screened, right?

Thinking of this, Angell felt much more at ease.

"I told you, things wouldn't be that bad," Angell muttered.

He acted as if he had forgotten who it was that had rushed to Xiesse in a fit of rage after seeing the newspaper.

"Finally at ease? Shall we head back, meow?" Mithril asked for the second time.

It had watched the film twice alongside Angell and felt quite exhausted.

Angell also felt that a film filled with such heavy subtext was draining to watch. He sighed, "No rush. Before we head back, let's go see a place that truly heals the heart."

"Heals the heart?"

Angell left the Cinema with Mithril and stepped out onto the street.

Xiesse was truly one of the largest commercial hubs in the world; its prosperity didn't even lose out to the first-tier cities of the Blue Star where Angell had lived in his past life. Take the commercial street outside the Cinema, for instance—it looked almost identical to those on Blue Star. One could find all sorts of shops on this street, some of which were already selling mature lines of film merchandise.

Angell naturally had no interest in those shops.

He walked straight toward the store with the most children gathered at the entrance.

Only after Mithril followed him closer did it understand why Angell had come to this shop.

Inside, children were bustling in and out, clutching merchandise from Magical Girl, including but not limited to setting books, character cards, chibi figures of Maya, plushies of the Maine Coon, and various styles of Magical Girl backpacks and accessories.

It wasn't just children; even adults who had just finished the movie couldn't help but step inside to buy something as they passed by.

Selling merchandise in the vicinity of the Cinema the moment Magical Girl premiered was a strategy Angell and Mandela had agreed upon early on.

"How about it? Healing to the heart, isn't it?" Angell said, intoxicated.

"What exactly is your definition of healing the heart? Is it just cold, hard cash?" Mithril retorted.

Seeing the hot sales of these products, it felt a sense of relief.

The magic cat had truly had enough of backlogged inventory.

But speaking of backlogged inventory, Mithril felt something was missing—

"Strange, meow. How come I don't see any kids buying Magic Wands?" Mithril thought for a moment, then bristled in shock, "Don't tell me even those aren't selling, meow?!"

"That's not it, because..."

Just as Angell was about to explain, he heard an excited voice from the counter:

"Honored guest, you have discovered the hidden clue left by Lady Cecilia. Tell me, do you wish to receive her inheritance?"

Such a conversation naturally drew everyone's attention, including Angell and his cat.

They looked over curiously and saw the shop attendant guiding a little girl toward a cloth curtain. After pulling it aside, a full-length mirror was revealed, identical to the one in the movie.

And just like in the movie, the mirror showed no reflection; it was as if everyone in the shop didn't exist at all.

The little girl wasn't afraid; she only widened her eyes in excitement.

The attendant smiled and said to the little girl, "Little one, you know how Maya transforms, right?"

"I know," the little girl said in a milky voice.

The attendant encouraged her, "Then why don't you give it a try?"

The little girl was a bit flustered at first. She turned to look at her parents, and seeing everyone watching her with smiles, she clumsily performed the transformation gesture:

"Moon Mana, transform—"

The shop clerks and others nearby joined in, calling out along with her.

Only Angell took a step back.

Even though he was the one who came up with this, watching it in person was so cringeworthy he wanted to dig a hole and hide.

Fortunately, others didn't feel the same way.

Accompanied by the little girl's shout, the center of the mirror rippled like water. When the surface calmed, the little girl's figure was reflected in the mirror, only now the girl in the glass was wearing a Magical Girl outfit identical to Maya's.

"Maya! Lily has turned into Maya!"

The little girl exclaimed incoherently, reaching out to touch the mirror surface. The girl in the mirror smiled, handed several cards to her counterpart outside, and then vanished.

Seeing the cards in the girl's hand, the attendant immediately announced loudly:

"Congratulations! You have won a 'Cecilia Invitation Ticket'!"

"Cecilia Invitation Ticket?" The girl's mother hugged the little girl, who was still staring blankly at the mirror, and took the card from her daughter's hand to examine it.

It was a black invitation letter, and the Magic Gear on it was spinning incessantly. It read: [You are cordially invited to attend the Holy Spirit Carnival in Cecilia].

The attendant explained, "This is an invitation ticket from Cecilia. As long as you travel to the Magic City of Cecilia, you can attend the carnival there, join the Magic Gear's millennial annual meeting, and have a chance to obtain a real Moonlight Wand."

"But, this requires us to go to Cecilia City ourselves, right?" The girl's father frowned.

The attendant didn't force the issue. She smiled and said, "If you feel the journey is too far or inconvenient, you can also use this invitation to exchange for any item in the shop... However, I regret to say that the Moonlight Wand is only available in Cecilia; we cannot sell it here."

The little girl was quite clever.

Although she only half-understood the attendant's words, she grasped the main point: "Wand! I want the wand!"

She shouted at her father.

The attendant added at this moment, "The Magic Gear's annual meeting only happens once a year! If you go at any other time, you'll miss it."

At that, a look of hesitation appeared on the father's face.

"It says Holy Spirit Carnival here, so that would be around the Holy Spirit Festival, right?" The girl's mother confirmed carefully. After receiving the attendant's affirmation, she made the final decision, "We were going on vacation at the end of the year anyway, so let's just go to Cecilia!"

The girl's father finally agreed.

They bought a Maine Coon plushie in the shop before leaving happily.

Mithril stared at all this in a daze, pushing at Angell's face with a paw: "What kind of game are you playing now!"

"Don't push! My head will fall off," Angell said, holding his head. "This is a measure of last resort."

"Last resort?"

"Yeah, you haven't forgotten, have you! When my game table was first made, even Enlise couldn't control it! And no matter how lacking in functionality the pseudo-wand is, it still requires a certain amount of mana; it's harder to use than the game table. How could I sell it directly here in Xiesse?! People in this place haven't even played with a game table yet!"

"So you're tricking them into going to Cecilia?"

"Right, after a series of carnival activities, they should be able to raise their mana enough to use the wand!" Angell said.

This was also a process of filtering out the wealthy.

In this era, due to industrial development, several of the most advanced metropolises inevitably became "fog cities." Coupled with the damp cold of winter, it became trendy for the slightly wealthier people to travel to other regions for vacation during the Holy Spirit Festival, or at the very least, buy a villa in the countryside where the air was fresher.

The Magic Gear's wands were "luxury goods" and were never meant for the average citizen to purchase.

Therefore, Angell was targeting the children of these middle-class families who had the spare money to go on vacation.

However, to be precise, this was a "trick as many as you can" kind of desperate measure.

Reality was like the world map at the Teleportation Outpost; for Angell right now, both the Royal Capital and Xiesse were gray areas. If he didn't raise people's mana levels, he had no way to make money with magic items.

While things like movies were an outpost, the response here wasn't Angell's primary concern. Even if the movie box office exploded, he could only sell some ordinary merchandise.

Currently, only Cecilia City was Angell's home turf.

Angell and Mithril stood in the merchandise shop observing for quite a while. Afterward, sure enough, several others who were purchasing items luckily drew (X) found the clues left behind by Lady Cecilia.

Among them, there were guests who drew invitation tickets but didn't want to go to Cecilia City, so they exchanged the tickets for other items.

Of course, the lucky prizes weren't limited to invitation tickets.

The most common ones were actually small decorations for the Magical Girl outfits, such as ribbons, crowns, or bows. The little girls who could immediately get these decorations were also very happy... no, it wasn't limited to little girls.

Mithril saw with his own eyes a father who, after winning a prize, didn't give the "transformation" opportunity to his daughter, but instead ran happily in front of the mirror to transform himself, making his daughter so angry she kept tugging at his arm.

"Is it just my imagination? Why does it feel like everyone prefers that Magic Mirror?"

Angell observed for a long time, puzzled.

"Perhaps they prefer the version of themselves inside the mirror?" Mithril said.

It did not deny Angell's observation.

Just a moment ago, a woman—not even a girl, but a fully grown adult—had purchased hundreds of items in one go, cleared out all the "clues" inside, and then spent her time twisting and turning in front of the mirror, striking various poses.

Mithril felt that these humans were truly insane.

"Fair point, it's a dress-up game, after all!" Angell muttered.

With that, Angell finally felt relieved, no longer obsessing over the cinema.

Just then, someone tapped him on the shoulder.

"Dr. Marin, why are you at the cinema so early?!"

The person's approach was so unexpected and the strike so heavy that Angell's head fell right off—

No, it was no longer Angell.

The moment the head tumbled from the shoulders, a figure holding a cat fell to the ground along with the head, then vanished as quickly as vapor in a desert, leaving only the headless body standing there in a daze.

Yet, neither the newcomer nor the passersby hurrying through the area spared a single glance at the fallen head, as if a person's head dropping to the ground were no more surprising than a hat falling off.

Even the owner of the head felt the same.

He slowly bent down, picked up the cranium, and placed it back onto his shoulders.

Only then did he slowly look around: "Where is this..."

Where?

The man known as Dr. Marin wondered strangely. He found his memory growing increasingly poor, as if his head and body possessed two separate consciousnesses, constantly doing things he could not comprehend.

But no one noticed anything amiss with him.

The man opposite him grabbed his arm and laughed heartily: "I knew it! You must have seen the report in the Newspaper and came to see if that Magical Girl is really as good as they say, right?"

"...Yes?" That's right, I came to watch the movie.

But why do I keep remembering as if I have already watched it twice?

Dr. Marin wondered, perplexed.

His companion, however, paid no mind to his thoughts, hooking his arm familiarly and pulling him toward the Cinema: "Speaking of which, since the change in ownership, the Magic Gear products have all been top-tier! But at least there's finally a lead on the Game Table! I found two high-level Rune Masters in the Royal Capital; they will definitely be able to crack the secret of the core—"