"Then let me handle it, cutie. You wouldn't blame your big sister for stealing your prey, would you?"
Ando Meiko shook her head and stuck out her tongue at her. "As if I'd dare. If you hadn't stepped in, I'd probably have been squeezed out by now."
"You really are a funny little newbie. I like you. Don't worry, big sis will look out for you this time."
As they spoke, the Void King Serpent, which had been repelled by the samurai contract beast, raised its head again. Black flames erupted from its body, while its scarlet eyes flickered with fire.
The cooked duck had actually flown away after being ambushed... It was obvious that the Void King Serpent was about to explode with rage.
"As expected, even a Void King Serpent isn't easy to eliminate with an attack of that level."
The purple-haired girl lowered her right hand beneath her skirt and pulled out a purple wand from a girl's absolute territory.
Th-This thing... did she conjure it, or was it stuffed in there?
Watching that absurd scene, Ando Meiko simply couldn't suppress her urge to comment.
She pointed the wand straight ahead at her humanoid figure and muttered an incantation that even Ando Meiko behind her couldn't hear at all. "Anti-Magic Enhancement, Speed Enhancement."
Two beams of light shot from the tip of the wand in succession and entered the samurai's body through its back.
The instant the Void King Serpent attacked, the humanoid abruptly raised its helmet-covered head. The next moment... it vanished from where it stood.
From Ando Meiko's perspective, when the samurai humanoid appeared again, it was already in front of the Void King Serpent's head.
"His sword... was sheathed?"
The samurai gripped the sword that had somehow been returned to its scabbard, then drew it at a speed too fast for the naked eye to follow. The shrieking blade seemed to possess the power to cut through anything that stood in its way.
Afterimages and cold flashes crossed with the Void King Serpent. When the samurai appeared again, it was already behind the Void King Serpent.
It paid no attention to the motionless Void King Serpent. After shaking the black flames from its sword, it slid the blade back into its scabbard with a clang.
The Void King Serpent, whose body seemed frozen solid, finally moved.
The next instant, an enormous amount of Demonic Aether burst from a point three inches below its head like gushing blood. Its head slowly separated from its body before dropping to the ground with a thunderous crash.
Ando Meiko swallowed as she looked at the smooth cut where the two had been connected.
Although the purple-haired girl had given the Void King Serpent two buffs, she had indeed killed the monster that had nearly scared Ando Meiko breathless with just one strike.
That was way too strong, wasn't it?
She couldn't help sighing inwardly.
Could it be that every Magical Girl except me has this kind of strength? Then this newbie life is way too miserable. Forget newbie bonuses—I didn't even get a beginner's tutorial.
"It's fate that we met. How about being friends? What's your name?"
"I'm..." Before Ando Meiko could say her name, Ruby promptly sent her a reminder.
[Master, when a Magical Girl is asked for her name while transformed, don't give her real name. Use a fake name or a codename.]
Magical Girls from different factions were different. Considering that she was a Sunstone-type Magical Girl, Ando Meiko decided to use Ruby as her codename.
Ruby was the foreign name for red gemstone. Maybe Ruby's name had been transliterated from here. If so, then my codename should be Ruby.
"My name is Ruby."
"Ruby, not bad. I'm Xiphias."
[Huh?]
[What is it, Ruby? Is there something strange about her name?]
[Her name means swordfish? A sword? It suits her contract beast pretty well.]
[Tch, that's all? Don't suddenly speak up and scare me for no reason.]
They had exchanged names, so they were friends for the time being, right? But could a lowly Magical Girl like her really hope to befriend such an aloof beauty?
"Alright. Although the Void King Serpent has been defeated, this place has already been contaminated by Demonic Aether. I still need to deal with it. Ruby, you should head back on your own."
"Okay." Ando Meiko answered. Just as she tried to stand, her feet faltered and her entire body lost balance.
Her head seemed to crash into somewhere incredibly soft, soft enough to make her whole body relax.
When Xiphias leaned down toward her, Ando Meiko somehow felt that she could faintly hear rapid breathing coming from her mouth.
"Oh my, cutie. How could you be so careless?"
"Sorry... My body feels a little weak." In front of someone with real strength, she always felt as though she was acting somewhat inferior.
After steadying herself, she hurriedly pulled away from Xiphias's embrace and barely managed to stand.
"It's alright. You should hurry home. With your current strength, staying in Demonic Aether for too long might cause problems." Xiphias smiled and shook her head. With a wave of her wand, she opened a gate for Ando Meiko to return to the Material World.
"Thank you." After solemnly thanking her again, Ando Meiko left through the gate Xiphias had opened.
[What a strange person.]
[Magical Girls are all strange in one way or another, Master. Don't mind it.]
[I guess that's true.]
"Are You Calling Me Strange?!"
"That's not right! Aren't you just calling me strange?"
I was supposed to be a boy, yet I became a girl. That was strange too. So did that mean I was also a strange Magical Girl?
Xiphias had thoughtfully opened the gate in a place without anyone around. Though rather than saying that, everyone in this amusement park had long since fled because of the Ferris wheel incident.
Her transformation ended. Behind a tree serving as cover, her body turned into Aether until she changed from her little-girl form back into Ando Meiko.
"It's time to go back. Nanako and Fuko should be waiting for me."
She did not linger at the amusement park and left. When Fuko and the others saw Ando Meiko emerge from the main entrance, they ran over anxiously.
"Meizi, are you alright?"
"I'm fine."
Behind her, the mother and child she had saved also came over to thank her.
"Big sister! Thank you!"
"It's alright. As long as you're okay."
Without saying anything more, the frightened mother and child left shortly after waiting for their savior to emerge and thanking her.
Watching their departing backs, Ando Meiko revealed a smile she did not even notice herself.
Wasn't this her original intention? She simply wanted to save people for the sake of saving them, regardless of her identity or beliefs.
But what did it feel like to be thanked by someone she had saved?
Only now did she understand that perhaps it was not vanity at all. Rather, such gratitude was enough to awaken the most original and purest conscience in someone's heart.
Perhaps from now on, she would have to reconsider her decision not to fight.
Even so, she still did not want to get herself involved in battle... After all, she felt that her own life was just as precious as anyone else's.
But before that...
[Alright, alright, don't be angry, Ruby.]
That idiot Ruby had been angry ever since Ando Meiko returned from the void. Every now and then, she would inexplicably snort in her mind just to make her presence known.
Still, Ando Meiko couldn't blame her. She had promised to let Ruby come out and play for a while, and Ruby had kept her end of the agreement by staying quietly inside all morning.
This sudden incident had completely ruined their plans, so it was only natural for Ruby to be unhappy.
[Actually, I was planning to give you a present as compensation.]
[Huh?]
[That plushie. Why do you think I shot down three of them? One was for you.]
[Huh! Huh!!! R-Really?]
[Of course it's true. Why would I lie to you about something like this?]
[Mmm, Master is so nice. Hehe, thank you, Master. What the heck, Master really does care about me.]
Her change of expression was far too fast to praise. Of course, Ando Meiko had only shot down three plushies because she had three bullets left.
Besides, she had not originally intended to give the third plushie to anyone. Still, peacefully resolving things with Ruby was great.
She would treat this as a secret to take to the grave.
"At an amusement park where no accidents had ever occurred, a Ferris wheel destruction incident suddenly took place. Video footage shows that the Ferris wheel's load-bearing shaft suddenly snapped, and the excessive force crushed the metal structure into a twisted shape."
Less than two hours after returning home, the television station was already reporting on the Ferris wheel incident that had just occurred.
The incident seemed to have been handled as an accident. Fortunately, no one had died, and most of the injured people had merely suffered scrapes from falling while running away.
The entire process from the Ferris wheel's load-bearing shaft snapping had been recorded by a phone camera from far away, but it had not captured Ando Meiko's heroic deeds.
That was good for her too. She had not saved people to become famous. If she had been recorded and people discovered her existence... she did not want her daily life to become even more chaotic.
Ando Meiko stood and walked toward the entryway, where she happened to run into Fuko returning to the living room from the bathroom.
"What's wrong? Are you going out?"
"Yeah, I'm going for a walk. I'll be back before dinner. Please watch the house, Fuko."
"Okay. Be careful." She said she was going for a walk, but in truth, she had nowhere to go.
Perhaps she had walked this road so often that it had become muscle memory. She had only intended to take a stroll, yet before she knew it, she had arrived at her school.
Why were there so many people here?
Not only was it a holiday, but it was also nearly dinner time. Yet the entire school was filled with students' laughter and chatter. The situation itself was strange.
Could there be some special event today? Or had I remembered the holiday schedule wrong?
With that curiosity in mind, Ando Meiko headed toward the school gate.
"Excuse me, are you here to see someone?" When an unfamiliar girl attempted to enter the school, the guard promptly appeared and stopped her outside.
"Ah, um, I'm a student here. I was passing by and saw so many people, so I wanted to go inside and take a look."
She looked down at herself and only then realized why the guard had refused to let her in.
She was not wearing her school uniform...
"Sorry, but without proof, even if you attend this school, you can't go in."
"I see. Alright, then." She did not insist. It did not matter to her whether she entered or not, since she had only wanted to take a look because she happened to pass by.
"Wait." Just as she was about to leave, a familiar voice made her turn around instinctively.
"Rei... Rei?" The person who had called out to her was Nakajima Rei.
"Will this proof work?" Rei showed the guard the card in her hand. After taking it and glancing at it, the guard stepped aside from the entrance.
"Of course. Please come in, miss."
Ando Meiko did not know why Rei had appeared before her at such a convenient moment, nor did she know why Rei was taking her inside.
"Alright, now the guard won't stop you. Come in."
"Oh... okay. Th-Thank you."
But as she followed behind Nakajima Rei, Ando Meiko did not dare ask anything.
"What I showed the guard was a certificate our homeroom teacher wrote for me. I finally found you, Ando Meiko."
"Huh... me? Do we know each other?" The moment Rei called her by name, she was startled. She wanted to remain calm, but could not calm down at all.
Putting aside the fact that Ando Koichi had been rejected three times after confessing, Ando Meiko had never had any contact with Nakajima Rei since entering the school.
How... did she know me?
"Of course we don't know each other. You're my partner, right? So I asked your homeroom teacher. She described your appearance to me in detail, so when I happened to see you here, I knew it was you."
"Huh? That's really impressive."
There had to be at least two thousand people in this school. To identify someone just from a homeroom teacher's description was far too impressive.
It would be a real waste not to become a detective with that kind of talent.
"Practice for the Mobilization Assembly"
Before you continue