The Association's Investigation

Seven o'clock the next morning, in the old industrial district on the west side of the city.

Yellow police tape sealed off the entire abandoned factory. Outside it, a few early risers craned their necks to look in, only to be politely ushered away by field staff.

Inside the tape, everything was deathly still.

Old Wei of the Magical Girl Association's Local City Branch, Field Operations Department, stood before the factory gates. He had forgotten to light the cigarette between his lips and had been holding it there for a full ten minutes.

Behind him, the clipboard in the hands of the new recruit, Lin Guo, fell to the ground with a clatter.

Neither of them moved to pick it up.

Because right in front of them—

Half the factory building had collapsed.

And not from age or neglect.

The corrugated iron roof, rusted for over a decade, the concrete pillars, the load-bearing walls—everything looked as though an invisible giant hand had plowed straight through the middle. The breaks were unnervingly clean, and rubble lay scattered across the ground in a radial pattern.

The open ground outside the building was even more astonishing.

A deep trench began at the break in the building and fanned outward, tearing through the weed-choked concrete yard for seventy or eighty meters. At its deepest, it could have swallowed a person halfway up.

It was as if something had swung once here, and the earth had split open.

"W-Wei, brother..." Lin Guo's voice wavered. "Did a Fallen Beast do this?"

"No."

Old Wei finally took the unlit cigarette from his mouth.

"Can't you smell it?"

"Smell... what?"

"Light."

Old Wei crouched and pinched up some dirt from the edge of the trench.

A faint, almost invisible glow lingered along its broken surface, tinged pinkish white beneath the morning sun.

"Fallen Beasts leave behind a rotten, bloody stink. The kind that makes your skin crawl. This is different. What's left here is as clean as snow."

He stood and brushed the dirt from his hands.

"It's magical residue. A magical girl killed a Fallen Beast here."

"Oh..." Lin Guo breathed a sigh of relief and picked up her clipboard. "Isn't that good news? We can have the publicity department put out a commendation..."

"Good news?"

Old Wei looked at her as though she were a child who had yet to be weaned.

"Lin, do you know what rank our city's resident magical girl, Knight, is?"

"Sure. Firefly Rank." Lin Guo nodded. "Knight went to the neighboring province on an exchange last week. Everyone in the department heard about it."

"Right. Firefly Rank." Old Wei pointed at the collapsed half of the building. "Do you think Knight could do that with one strike at full power?"

Lin Guo gave it serious thought.

"She could... knock down a wall?"

"More than a wall. With enough effort, she could demolish the building," Old Wei said. "But this—"

He gestured toward the trench stretching seventy or eighty meters.

"Judging by the magical residue, the aftershock of that strike alone carved out this trench. The aftershock, understand? The real force went straight into the Fallen Beast. What spilled over—the scraps—plowed up the earth on the side."

Lin Guo swallowed.

"Then... what rank would this magical girl have to be?"

"What's the rush?" Old Wei clasped his hands behind his back and slowly walked along the trench. "Here, I'll give you a lesson. Do you know how magical girls are ranked?"

"Uh, I heard the ranks are based on images of light..."

"Right. Six ranks, all tied to light." Old Wei raised one finger. "At the bottom is Glow Rank. A newly awakened magical girl has only just kindled that spark inside her. She can barely sense Fallen Beasts, and fighting even a first-rank one is a life-or-death struggle. Most recruits the Association registers each year are at this rank, and more than half retire before a year is up."

A second finger.

"Next is Firefly Rank. Their light and power output have stabilized, and they can handle things on their own. Most cities have a resident magical girl at this rank—Knight, for instance. It may only be the second rank, but it's more than enough to keep a city safe."

A third finger.

"Above that is Lamp-Lighting Rank. That's the first real hurdle. At this rank, a magical girl gains an 'exclusive ability' of her own. She and her light truly begin to become one. There are fewer than a hundred registered Lamp-Burning Realm magical girls in the whole country. Every one of them is treasured by her provincial branch."

Old Wei paused.

A fourth finger rose.

"Then comes Dawn Rank."

His tone changed.

"The first three ranks are still, when you get down to it, 'lights in the night.' But Dawn means daybreak. It's a transformation. A magical girl at this rank is an army unto herself. She can face a large Fallen Beast head-on without flinching. You can count the registered Dawn Rank magical girls in the country on one hand. Headquarters displays every one of their names on the wall."

Lin Guo nearly stopped breathing.

"Wei, are you saying..."

"I'm only saying it's possible. Possible." Old Wei waved a hand, but his expression was grave. "Anyone who could do this is, at the very least, a monster among Lamp-Lighting Rank magical girls. And if the numbers we calculated are right—"

He looked at the trench and spoke one word at a time.

"Dawn Rank."

"A Dawn Rank magical girl appeared without a sound in our little city, where even Knight has enough free time to visit the neighboring province. No registration, no notice, and the Association knows nothing about her."

Lin Guo stood stunned for a long moment. Then something occurred to her.

"What about... the two ranks above that? Sunlit and Eternal Day?"

"There hasn't been a Sunlit Rank magical girl in five years. Each one is a national treasure who belongs in the history books, the kind stationed in the capital." Old Wei put the cigarette back between his lips, still without lighting it. "As for Eternal Day Rank—that's legend. Myth. You might as well pretend it doesn't exist."

He pulled out his radio and pressed the talk button.

"Old Wei here. I've reached a preliminary conclusion at the west-side site."

"Confirmed magical girl activity. Unregistered individual. Estimated rank—Lamp-Lighting at minimum, possibly Dawn. Also, two witnesses survived last night, a middle-aged couple. I've found their address."

The other end of the radio fell silent for several seconds. Then came the sound of a chair toppling over.

"Say that again? Possibly what?!"

"Dawn." Old Wei gazed at the rubble strewn across the ground. "I'm requesting immediate authorization to investigate and make contact with this magical girl. We need to move fast, be courteous, and approach her with humility."

"Someone of this caliber chose to step in and save lives. That's a blessing for our city."

"If another branch makes contact first... the branch director will swallow our entire Field Operations Department whole."

"There's one more thing we need to watch out for."

As he spoke, Old Wei's expression turned deadly serious.

"If this Dawn Rank magical girl has only just awakened... we have to report it immediately!"

Lin Guo looked even more confused.

One look at Lin Guo's face told Old Wei what she wanted to ask.

"Not every magical girl awakens at the first rank. If her wish is strong enough, she can awaken directly at a higher rank... An unidentified Dawn Rank magical girl no one has ever heard of could very well be newly awakened."

"Awakening at Glow or Firefly is still normal... but if it's Lamp-Lighting or Dawn..."

"All I can say is, at that point, what drives her is less a wish than an obsession... A magical girl's strength is generally tied to the strength of her conviction. And to have conviction that powerful from the moment she awakens..."

Old Wei said no more.

At the same time, on the other side of the city.

A boy with dark circles under both eyes trudged to school, yawning nonstop.

"Achoo—!"

Yang Chen rubbed his nose and muttered,

"Who's talking about me this early in the morning...?"