After all, compared to Gray Shadow the owl's nimble, ever-changing, unpredictable attacks, Marugang's swordsmanship was far more direct and undisguised.
Just like sensing the flow of magic during Synchronization, she relaxed her body, focused her attention, immersed herself in her senses, and felt the flow of the stream.
Ando Meiko had not noticed the brief burst of magic just now, nor did she know that Rei and Kajieliena were confronting each other over her.
At that moment, she had devoted all her attention to her sense of touch.
Just moments ago, she had struck no fewer than nine times in succession. Though every attempt had ended in failure, she had vaguely touched upon that fantastical sensation.
The flowing water slowly decelerated in her perception, slower and slower, until it became motionless, as though time itself had stopped.
The fish at her target location lightly swayed its tail, and the ripples it stirred spread outward, passing through the water to gently brush against Ando Meiko's legs.
As everyone knew, because of the refraction of light, the position of a fish seen by the naked eye differed somewhat from its actual position in the water.
All useless information was stripped away in the process of analysis. In Ando Meiko's three-dimensional mental image, only herself and the target fish remained.
"Now!" she shouted inwardly, suddenly opening her eyes.
Her waist twisted slightly, gathering all the strength in her body around her waist and concentrating it in her right hand. The branch clenched tightly in her hand left a series of afterimages as it shot into the water.
Then, under Yuna's somewhat disbelieving gaze, she raised the branch again.
The sharpened tip of the branch had pierced through a silver fish that thrashed and struggled constantly.
"God, Meizi, y-you're amazing!"
[Master succeeded in such a short time. As expected, Master really is an exceptionally talented magical girl.]
This was the one thing she absolutely did not want to admit.
The Disappearing Everyday Life: Let Me Do It Instead
Hui, who had been sent to call Ando Meiko and the others back, stood by the riverbank and looked at the few fish still puckering their mouths atop a flat stone slab. Her voice trembled slightly.
"You guys... actually caught some?"
She had thought Rei had given them the branches merely to pass the time. She had never expected them to actually spear fish using such a clumsy method.
After the three returned with their spoils, aside from Yuna, whose gaze was still somewhat vacant, and Hui, whose face was full of disbelief, Kajieliena and Rei were also surprised, though they had expected this outcome to some extent.
They both knew Ando Meiko was a magical girl, so naturally they could not rule out the possibility that she possessed such ability.
"Ling Ye, look, look." As though showing off, Ando Meiko waved the branch with the skewered fish toward Ling Ye beside her. "This biggest fish will be the first one I share with you later. How about it?"
Seeing that Ling Ye still gave no response, Ando Meiko did not get upset. Smiling, she placed the fish on the leaf-lined ground before turning to the others.
"Alright, now that we have the ingredients, let's start cooking."
The moment Ando Meiko said that, everyone present fell as silent as the dead. Ling Ye and Kajieliena aside, Rei, Yuna, and Hui even avoided Ando Meiko's gaze.
After a moment of confusion, Ando Meiko's eyes swept across the five of them, and she suddenly understood. "Don't tell me none of you five can cook?"
This time, all five girls, including Ling Ye, nodded at her together.
"How about using this..." Rei's eyes struggled for a moment before she pulled out the corner of a packet from her backpack.
"Instant... no, that won't do! It'll be trouble if it gets counted as cheating." The instant she saw it, Ando Meiko pushed it back in.
"Forget it, I'll do it." Left with no other choice, Ando Meiko volunteered herself.
Somewhere in the Void World
A sword-wielding magical girl swung her blade aside, knocking away three sharp black feathers. As she landed, she forcefully kicked off the ground.
Her sudden burst of speed made the combat uniform tightly fitted to her body rustle, producing sharp sounds of air being torn apart.
Seeing a sharp black glint rushing straight toward her, she immediately stopped in place. Borrowing the inertia of her forward momentum, she stepped forward, and the tachi angled toward the ground suddenly swept upward.
This seemingly ordinary move not only halted her charge in an instant, but also significantly increased the power of her strike.
With a crisp metallic clang, the black glint was knocked into the air, while the sword-wielding magical girl remained standing motionlessly where she was.
Before she could clearly see what the black glint was during that brief pause, it adjusted its flight once more and transformed into a bolt of lightning as it dived toward her.
She turned the blade forward, gripped the long hilt of the tachi with both hands, and swung heavily. A strike woven from strength and speed crossed the black glint at the instant they met.
Another strange, crisp metallic impact rang out. The sharp black glint, swift as lightning, folded into an acute angle immediately after colliding with her body and the tachi in her hands, preparing to attack her back again.
No matter how fast the black glint was, how powerful it was, or how tricky its attacks became.
The sword-wielding magical girl, whose eyes remained closed throughout, seemed to possess foresight. She could always swing her sword at the exact instant its attacks arrived, canceling them out.
The faster the black glint attacked, the faster the sword-wielding magical girl swung her blade. Their speeds rose continuously, as though they were competing against each other.
Once their speed reached its peak, their indistinct afterimages instead became hazy, making the sword-wielding magical girl appear as though she were wrapped in a thin silver-white membrane.
An impenetrable defense was perhaps the best way to describe this sword-wielding magical girl at that moment. No matter how the black glint attacked, it could never penetrate that silver-white membrane even half a step.
To the naked eye, it seemed like her blade merely drifted slowly into contact with the black glint, but in reality, each exchange had already compressed the collisions of seven or even ten strikes.
Clang, clang, clang, clang...
Every collision between the tachi and the black glint produced a spark visible to the naked eye. For a time, thunderous sounds of metal striking metal rang ceaselessly across the area.
After gradually figuring out the black glint's nature, the sword-wielding magical girl instantly changed tactics. She delivered a heavy strike that temporarily forced it back, then leaped backward herself and opened some distance between them.
Holding the tachi pointed ahead in a tight grip, magic surged from her body before pouring entirely into the blade.
The repelled black glint naturally would not wait for the sword-wielding magical girl to finish. It paused in midair for only an instant before transforming once more into a bone-clinging parasite that latched onto her.
"It's over." The girl's voice was crisp and ethereal, like an angel descending into the mortal world.
After being infused with a massive amount of magic, the tachi in her hand radiated brilliant silver light. Vaguely visible transparent crystals had even formed along its blade.
Step forward, slash!
Though she still held something back, this strike was undoubtedly the sword-wielding magical girl's full-power attack.
The tachi tore through the air, its trajectory seeming to transform into a crescent moon radiating silver light.
The crescent collided once more with the fearless black glint. Unable to withstand the crescent's erosion, the black glint lasted less than a breath before being sent flying.
There was no suspense in this clash of strength against strength.
Yet as the black glint flew away, it borrowed the force to retreat at full speed. In the end, moving no slower than it had when attacking, it vanished directly beyond the distant horizon.
After a while, once the retreating magical presence had completely disappeared from her senses, the sword-wielding magical girl finally let out a slow breath.
Without pursuing it, she put away her tachi and softly said, "Dragon Vein, Void Beasts, witches... I never expected everything that was supposed to emerge in this city had already emerged."
After a pause, the girl turned to look in another direction. At the point where her gaze fell stood the high school where Ando Meiko was.
She opened her eyes, revealing hollow, lifeless pupils devoid of even a trace of light, and sighed softly. "This school is as plagued by disaster as ever."
"I've been away on business for a while and had enough fun. It's time to go back and take a look."
The Disappearing Everyday Life: The Topic of Romance
Ando Meiko's parents were both busy people. They regularly attended meetings of all sizes at their company and worked overtime.
So, not wanting to starve, Ando Meiko could only learn cooking from her mother whenever she had time. Her cooking was not particularly impressive, but it was still far better than those who had never cooked before.
After lunch, since they did not need to attend class and had no other task besides living there for five days, the six of them fell into a state of having nothing to do.
The three tents were assigned by drawing lots. In the end, Ando Meiko and Baigui Lingye were paired together, Asakusa Megumi and Kajieliena were paired together, and Chihaya Yuna and Nakajima Rei were paired together.
After Ando Meiko announced that cheating was forbidden, both Kajieliena and Rei, who had long been itching to make a move, restrained themselves and did not alter the results of the draw.
All that could be said was that it was fortunate the two whose relationship felt somewhat off had not been forced into the same group.
After finally enduring the boring afternoon, the five girls ate the leftover wild vegetables from lunch and headed straight to the mountain school for a comfortable hot bath.
Ling Ye, however, did not accept Ando Meiko's invitation to go together. She merely stayed silently in the tent alone, planning to go last.
The three tents were arranged with their entrances facing one another. At night, without drawing the curtains, the girls gathered together and chatted about this and that.
When Yuna suggested telling ghost stories, the more timid Hui immediately shrank her neck. "N-no ghost stories. How about... how about we talk about romance instead?"
"Eh! That sounds pretty interesting. What does Ling Ye think?"
Though Ling Ye remained as unresponsive as ever, Yuna, upon hearing that, revealed a sly smile. "Since Meizi is so interested, why don't you go first, Meizi? Is there anyone you like?"
Nice, Yuna. I also want to hear which boy would be lucky enough to win Meizi's favor. Rei silently gave Yuna a big thumbs-up, then unceremoniously picked up the topic.
"No." Ando Meiko answered without the slightest hesitation.
Although she had maintained the body of a girl for some time now and had completely adapted to everything about being a girl and being Ando Meiko, deep down, she was still a hot-blooded young man.
Her soul had not been corrupted by the change in her body. Asking her to like men was nothing but a dream.
"That doesn't sound fake." Yuna froze for a moment, then continued asking, "Then what type of boy do you like, Meizi?"
"Th-the one from Class Five... the handsome one. What about him?" Hui timely interjected.
"Hui means the captain of the basketball club, right? He is indeed handsome, but compared to Meizi, I think he suits you better."
"S-s-s-suits me? N-not at all! I was just saying." Having been hit where it hurt, Hui hurriedly flung the blanket over herself, covering her slightly reddened cheeks.
"Not really. Compared to boys, I think I prefer girls. Who wouldn't like soft, sweet, adorable girls?"
"Uh... I never expected Meizi to..."
"Indeed, I also like soft, sweet girls like Meizi." Rei coquettishly took over from Yuna.
"Oh! Confessing on the spot without any shame? You really are a bad one."
Yuna did not think there was anything wrong with Rei's words. She simply assumed Rei was using the topic to make a joke.
"Indeed, I also quite like her body."
Kajieliena's unexpected remark caught everyone off guard. Their mouths opened, closed, then opened again, and the atmosphere sank into an entire minute of awkwardness.
"Th-this is even more intense." Even cheerful Yuna no longer knew what to say. "I-I didn't expect Meizi to be so popular."
"Yuna! Don't copy the way I talk!"
"I'm not. I was just... just shocked."
Yuna was rather speechless. It would have been one thing if Rei had been joking, but hearing such a serious statement from Kajieliena, who was usually so sparing with words, gave everyone no choice but to think deeply about it.
"Th-they're just joking. How could they possibly be interested in me?" Ando Meiko gave an embarrassed laugh and could only brush it off.
At the school festival, Rei had once proactively done that kind of thing to her. As for Kajieliena, there was even less need to mention her—she had coveted Ando Meiko's body from the beginning, wanting to study it under all kinds of pretexts.
Forget whether they were joking or not; what those two said could very well be entirely true.
Then doesn't that mean Rei and I like each other?
That thought suddenly flashed through her mind, and a faint blush spread across her cute face. Fortunately, the night concealed it, preventing anyone else from noticing.
Ando Meiko turned to look at Ling Ye, only to discover that she seemed to move her head as though trying to avoid her gaze.
Ando Meiko was briefly stunned, but she only thought she had seen wrong and did not dwell on it.
"What about Ling Ye? Does Ling Ye have anyone she likes?"
"That's no fun. Forget it, forget it. Let's stop talking and go to sleep early."
Yuna spread her hands and looked up at the sky before closing the tent flap.
Though the lonely night sky was not veiled by clouds, it also lacked any stars to adorn it at that moment. It looked ordinary, plain, and without the slightest ripple.
Only a bright moon hung alone in the sky, pure and alluring.
"I heard that in the mountains, without all the lively city lights, we can see a beautiful night sky covered in stars."
"Since when did you become so sentimental?" Rei smiled and shook her head.
"It's not as exaggerated as you make it sound. I was just wondering whether we might get a chance to see such a beautiful sky during these five days."
"Perhaps." To Rei, it was not something important.
"What a pity for that bright moon. Though it is pure, noble, and untouched by dust, without stars to set it off, it is so... lonely." Ando Meiko murmured softly, so quietly that only she could hear herself.
"Ling Ye, even though today is the first day we've truly gotten to know each other, I really want to be friends with you." The thought came from a feeling that this girl should not be so lonely.
"Sleep, sleep. Good night." Without hearing Ando Meiko's muttering, everyone drew their tent flaps and prepared to enter the realm of dreams.
Before you continue