The Sand Witch, the target of the mission, made her move.
The writhing dunes began to rise and deform, turning into a gigantic palm that slapped down at Mi Xue and me. It looked imposing enough, but it was far too slow. I had plenty of time to carry Mi Xue out of its range.
Was that thing's true body inside the palm?
"Mom, there's something under the desert!!"
Mi Xue had sharp eyes. She spotted something squirming beneath the sand, like the shadow of a fish lying in wait.
"Leave it to Mom!"
In my self-acceleration state, the Witch swimming beneath the sand might as well have been frozen in place.
Lockon! Attackfire!
Maintaining Time Acceleration, I drove a powerful kick downward.
In the end, I missed the Witch and buried half of myself in the sand instead...
Was that squirming thing just bait?!
Worse still, I couldn't pull myself out.
Even after canceling Time Acceleration, the sand was like a suctioning mouth, constantly swallowing me deeper and deeper...
"Mom!! Mom!!"
Mi Xue ran over while shouting anxiously...
"Don't come over! Stay back! It's quicksand!!"
But she was still too late. The sand pit beneath the little girl's feet began collapsing as well.
"Mom! Hurry, save me!"
Seeing my daughter in danger made me far more anxious than being trapped in the sand myself.
Time-Freeze!
I activated acceleration again, and everything except me came to a standstill.
At maximum acceleration, even shifting sand was nothing more than solid earth. But pulling myself free was incredibly difficult... and my legs were badly injured in the process.
"Hiss—"
More specifically, the rough layers of sand had scraped away a layer of flesh.
Back when I was still a Magical Girl, I had already developed this style of fighting by trading injury