They had to come up with a way to deal with this.
The Investigation Department's Disadvantage
The Investigation Department was currently in a rather awkward position.
In name, they were an investigative division responsible for matters related to Magical Girls, but in reality, they were essentially a logistics department serving all Magical Girls.
The Investigation Department did have some authority. They could mobilize the military and local police forces, and even had access to modern weaponry.
But there was one thing they could not do.
They could not fight Demons.
First, aside from the toys Song Niandong had demonized, ordinary humans could not see Demons. They had no awareness of their existence.
Second, unless a Nightmare Barrier actively pulled ordinary people into it—such as the Magic Barrier Song Niandong had created—ordinary people had no way of entering a barrier to confront Demons.
They could not see them, could not enter their domain, and therefore could not even speak of fighting them.
What was more, He Xuan had now discovered another "weakness" of the Investigation Department: they had no resistance to magic whatsoever!
Magic, something that had appeared in this world for the first time, was almost overwhelmingly powerful when used against ordinary people.
Just look at the battle between Xiao Bai and the Songstress Witch shown on the Sky Screen.
Their battlefield had practically been bombarded into ruin, and that was only its manifestation in terms of raw destructive force.
In everyday life, Song Niandong—whom the officers had seen yesterday yet somehow ignored—was the best example.
If magic was used to hypnotize humans, they would overlook the fact that they had seen Song Niandong. Even if they remembered afterward, they would not think anything was amiss.
Song Niandong simply did not want anyone to find her and Fang Ming, so she had only used magic to make people overlook them.
But what if new Magical Girls appeared in the future?
Or what if some special Demon appeared—one that was not a Magical Girl, yet could still use magic?
If they used magic on those in power, it would be disastrous for the entire world.
As He Xuan realized this, anxiety inevitably welled up within her.
She had long known how powerful Magical Girls were, yet she had never asked them to cooperate in any related research.
It was not that she did not want to. She simply could not do it.
Not only could she not do it, He Xuan also had to stop those who truly harbored ulterior motives toward Magical Girls from conducting those damned experiments on them.
Since the Investigation Department had been established, He Xuan had received an unknown number of submitted request letters.
Every request contained only one thing.
They requested that the Investigation Department permit research into "magic technology."
He Xuan and her immediate superior, the department minister, had rejected every one of those requests.
Because they had spent a long time within the government, they knew full well what the people behind those letters were like.
In name, it was research into "magic technology." In truth, it should have been research into "Magical Girls."
He Xuan had said that she had always been protecting the Magical Girls, and that was true.
But she had also been protecting these damned humans. That was true as well.
For that reason, He Xuan had never demanded anything from the Magical Girls, only given them all sorts of benefits.
But now... He Xuan was starting to buckle under the pressure.
She had to produce something to shut up those old bastards behind her. Otherwise, the adult world that He Xuan had kept outside would descend upon the Magical Girls.
"Magical Girls..."
He Xuan turned to look at the Sky Screen, a trace of longing flashing through her eyes.
Once upon a time, she had been a little girl too, and she had wanted to become a Magical Girl.
But now, she had already lost the dream she once held.
The scheming and filth of adult society had long since robbed her of any understanding of what "love," "hope," and "dreams" truly meant.
She envied the children who possessed such dreams, yet she also knew that she would never again possess what they had.
But He Xuan had things she could do.
She wanted to protect the children's dreams.
Protect that "love," those "dreams," and that "hope."
Because those were the sources of the Magical Girls' strength. They were also things she had once possessed, only to lose them.
["Whoa! Look, look! I can make this carousel spin!"
Beneath the curtain of rain, Chen Xiaoxia splashed through the puddles and ran over to the stopped carousel.
The magic in her hand flowed into the carousel's machinery. A blue glow flashed across it, and the wooden horses began to spin.
She had a blast riding one of the horses. In the distance, Yu Muqiu's eyes also lit up, and she ran over to the carousel, casually picking one to sit on.
"Xiaoxia, that's amazing!"
"Right? Right?"
Chen Xiaoxia proudly puffed out her chest and raised her chin.
At that crucial moment, the green-themed Magical Girl known as "Mama Xiaochun" spoke helplessly. "...You two, weren't we supposed to be looking for the Demon?"
"Ah..."
"..."
Chen Xiaoxia and Yu Muqiu both froze in awkward embarrassment.
They had been searching for quite a while, but they had not found anything. Because of the low pressure brought by the rain, Nino had hidden inside Chen Xiaoxia's raincoat and refused to come out.
The three truly had no leads, which was why Chen Xiaoxia had gotten distracted and run off to play on the carousel.
And dragged Yu Muqiu along with her, while she was at it.]
(Xiao Bai's side: Fighting feels great! Xiao Qiu's side: This is so fun, that is so fun!)
(I'm dying, no wonder Xiao Bai said they were just kids. She wasn't wrong at all.)
(But they are kids. Isn't playing their nature?)
(You make a good point, but Xiao Bai is getting beaten up right now lol.)
(By the way, is time different inside and outside this Nightmare Barrier? It feels like Xiao Qiu's side has been going on for ages, while only a little time has passed on Xiao Bai's side?)
Now that was getting to the heart of the matter.
The flow of time inside and outside the barrier created by the Songstress Witch was indeed a little different.
Generally speaking, time inside moved slightly slower.
But Fang Ming had not known that at the time. He would only realize it after leaving the barrier and noticing the changes in the outside time.
"Is it common for time to differ inside and outside a Nightmare Barrier?"
When he did not understand something, he asked. Fang Ming happened to have Youyou, an outstanding student from the Magic Academy, beside him, so she was the perfect person to ask about Nightmare Barriers.
Youyou did not immediately answer Fang Ming's question. Instead, she asked him one of her own.
"What do you think a Nightmare Barrier is?"
"Hmm... a projection... of the real world?"
Based on what Magic Barriers could achieve, it was probably like throwing a group of people into a projected world similar to reality. No matter how much they fought or destroyed there, it would not affect reality.
To put it more plainly, it was a convenient setting the production team had invented so they would not have to create more scenes of streets being destroyed.
Just like how Ultraman always fought in a studio.
But in reality, Nightmare Barriers and Magic Barriers truly existed. Sometimes, a setting casually dreamed up on the spot could become far more terrifying in reality than anyone imagined.
And far more ridiculous, too.
Like Tsuburaya assigning numbers with their feet...
"More or less, but... it's more like a projection within a 'dream.'"
Youyou explained, "The word 'Nightmare' already explains what the barrier represents, and time within a 'dream' was never synchronized with reality.
"Often, a long time passed in reality while only an instant passed in a dream. Or an instant passed in reality while countless years passed in a dream. Such things were very common.
"The Songstress Witch was already a Mid-Tier Demon, so the barrier she created naturally possessed that sort of property. But because she was only a Mid-Tier Demon, she could not control the barrier she created.
"Otherwise, her magic would not have penetrated the barrier and affected reality, nor would she have been unable to control the difference in time between inside and outside the dream."
The Nightmare Barriers of Lesser Demons had identical time flow inside and out, and they possessed no control whatsoever over anything within their barriers.
Mid-Tier Demons were a little stronger than them, but not by much.
Not good enough to compare with those above, but more than enough compared with those below. That was about it.
Then that meant... Demons capable of perfectly controlling their barriers would definitely appear in the future.
After all, every Demon they had faced so far had only been Lower Rank or Middle Rank.
The legendary High Demons and Overlord Demons had not appeared yet.
...Wait, wouldn't the power scaling in this show eventually break through the heavens?
Thinking of the stacking power scales unique to certain anime, Fang Ming felt a faint sense of crisis for the first time.
He could not delay improving his magic any longer.
He should first think about what to learn.
Who Would Have Thought It Was in the Sky?!
[The three Magical Girls wandered in circles through the amusement park, while the rain in the sky grew heavier and heavier under the influence of magic.
After searching for so long without finding anything, Chen Xiaoxia finally exploded.
"Where the hell is this Demon?! The rain is already this heavy, yet we still can't even find a trace of him. Does that make any sense?! Could we be getting played?!"
Chen Xiaoxia wore sandals, but even so, her feet had already soaked until they were wrinkled.
The other two were the same.
Coupled with the low-pressure environment brought by the rain, their moods worsened by the moment. Their initial smiles had vanished, leaving behind only anxiety and impatience.
Yu Muqiu patted her cheeks, forcing herself to perk up, then said:
"Since the source of the magic is in this amusement park, the Demon must be here. And didn't Xiao Chun sense Xiao Bai's magic?... Xiao Chun?"
Yu Muqiu mentioned Xiao Chun, only to find that Xiao Chun, holding an umbrella, had somehow fallen into deep thought.
Hearing Yu Muqiu's question, Xiao Chun finally raised her head and looked toward the sky.
"This dark cloud was created by that unknown Demon, right?"
"Isn't that obvious?! Otherwise, why did we come here?!"
"Then... why don't we try looking in the sky?"
"?"
Xiao Chun's words instantly reminded the other two and Nino.
Nino poked her head out of the cat carrier, pulled aside Chen Xiaoxia's raincoat, and looked up at the sky. Then she suddenly shouted:
"Up there!!! It's there!!! Look!!!!"
The three followed the direction Nino pointed and looked upward.
Amid the torrential rain, beneath the dark clouds, a transparent rift flickered in and out of sight.
That was the entrance to the Nightmare Barrier!
It had been above their heads all along!]
(CT players never look up.)
(No, who would have thought it would be up there? It's raining this hard, everyone walks with their heads down. Who would look up at the sky?!)
(But there was actually foreshadowing. It was mentioned before that the dark clouds had gathered because of the Demon's magic, so the Nightmare Barrier should be closer to the sky.)
(Hindsight much?)
Before you continue