The Abandoned Vehicle Attack

Although they were twins, Huo Lin was very different from her.

Hayate knew that very well.

For instance, Huo Lin could eat hijiki without being picky at all, and never turned down green peppers or carrots. Hayate simply couldn't do that.

When they had learned of their parents' deaths, Hayate doubted she could ever have emerged from that darkness without Huo Lin.

For years, Huo Lin had been taking care of her, becoming her source of both emotional and material support.

She was family no one could ever replace.

So never mind the Book of the Night Sky, which had been out of control to begin with and which she couldn't use herself. Even if it were something more important, Hayate would willingly hand it over as long as Huo Lin could use it.

Nothing mattered more to her than Huo Lin.

Soon, the server brought out both their orders.

Just as Huo Lin had said, the food here really was delicious, as long as she ignored how out of place they felt amid their surroundings.

All around them were men drinking together after work. Rather than going straight home, many office workers habitually went out for one round of drinks, or even two or three.

The clinking glasses and drunken chatter made Hayate feel that, despite their window seats, the two of them stood out as though the entire restaurant had isolated them.

If... if Huo Lin hadn't become a Magical Girl, would she have become one of these people a few years from now?

"You worry too much about other people."

"What?"

"For example, when you see the people drinking around us and feel uncomfortable, isn't it because you're worried they might suddenly get drunk and violent, then hurt you?"

Hayate thought about it. That did seem to be the case.

When she saw someone drinking, she worried they might lose all reason and threaten everyone around them indiscriminately. They might even single her out for harassment because she was a girl.

That feeling of being "out of place" was actually her putting herself on alert against dangers she had imagined.

"But if you're not afraid, they're actually the ones who should be worried."

"Huh?"

"Look, you're an elementary school girl. If some drunk comes over to harass you, all you have to do is shout and someone will call the police. Then that person's social life is over."

Hayate hadn't thought of that, but it was true.

Being both an elementary school student and a girl carried serious weight. Forget drunken harassment-even casually taking a sneaky photo could land someone in a police station once it was confirmed.

In this society, social death was no less terrifying than being put down.

Looking at the office workers competing to outdrink one another at the next table, they clearly seemed somewhat wary of the girls, too.

"Besides, we're Magical Girls."

"Huh?"

Huo Lin's "we" clearly included Hayate. Hayate didn't really feel that it applied to her. She didn't know any magic, and using the Device Huo Lin had given her didn't count.

But Huo Lin merely tapped the table with a finger.

The next instant, the noisy restaurant fell utterly silent. Everyone had disappeared.

The office workers drinking at the next table, the female high school students sharing a meal at the table behind them-the entire restaurant and the street outside were deserted.

They were inside a Barrier.

"See? No one can hurt us." That was all Huo Lin wanted to show her. "Barrier magic is a little complicated. I'll need to study it for a while longer before I can make a Device with a similar effect."

Huo Lin did want to make a Device like that for Hayate. She had Absolute Defense herself, which rendered her immune to damage from any attack, but Hayate didn't.

Although a Barrier couldn't compare to Absolute Defense and offered no protection against magical threats, it was a world unto itself when it came to anything nonmagical. Whether it was robbers, assassins, or natural disasters, taking shelter inside a Barrier offered complete protection.

And Earth was essentially a place with no connection to magic. There were magic users, but very few. In the six months or so since awakening her magic, Huo Lin had only encountered three or four.

A Barrier would all but guarantee Hayate's safety.

"Thank you, Huo Lin."

Hayate's feelings were complicated. Huo Lin always kept her in mind, which naturally made her happy, but she couldn't do anything for Huo Lin in return.

Huo Lin said she was a Magical Girl too, but Hayate really couldn't learn that kind of magic. She had also read the magic books Huo Lin studied, but they were far too difficult for an actual elementary school student like her. She couldn't understand them at all.

If I became a Magical Girl too, would I be able to help Huo Lin?

Huo Lin raised her hand, then suddenly gave a soft "Huh?"

"What's wrong?"

"I already dispelled my Barrier."

Yet their surroundings were still inside a Barrier.

"Did something go wrong with the magic?"

Huo Lin tested it, then shook her head.

"Nothing went wrong. Someone else must have put up a Barrier here too."

So even after she dispelled hers, the area remained enclosed within another Barrier.

Is someone targeting me?

That seemed unlikely. Huo Lin didn't remember offending anyone, especially anyone involved with magic. She only knew Sakura and Eriol, with Phantom Thief Jeanne barely counting as another acquaintance. There shouldn't have been any reason for anyone to target her.

And that did indeed prove to be the case. The unidentified Barrier was soon dispelled as well, and nothing happened.

Huo Lin hadn't even sensed any significant fluctuations in magic power, which meant there probably hadn't been any fighting within the Barrier just now.

Meanwhile, personnel at the Time-Space Administration Bureau had also detected the incident.

"Another junkyard was attacked?"

Randy, the monitoring officer, was the first to notice the anomaly and asked his colleague Alec beside him.

"Yes. A large number of abandoned vehicles disappeared. The local authorities' surveillance cameras at the scene didn't capture anything. Judging by the traces left behind, someone used a Barrier to block the surveillance."

Unadministered World 97 was still a nonmagical world. Its government authorities couldn't investigate magical matters, so if someone used a Barrier to commit a crime with magic, the police were helpless.

"Should we report this to the Admiral?"

"Enforcer Chrono has already taken a team to investigate this case. I'll notify him."

Ten minutes later, Chrono had arrived at the scene with his team. He had originally planned to contact the great Mage from the age of the gods who was temporarily staying in Tokyo that day, but another attack had occurred instead.

This time, the incident had taken place in Shinjuku.

Since the Island Nation's economic bubble officially burst in the early 1990s, the depression had continued for over a decade. The junkyards held no shortage of once-luxurious cars, but their owners had long since vanished.

Yet this time, the missing vehicles weren't luxury cars, but large vehicles that had been scrapped.

"This is already the second incident. The first was in Edogawa Ward, and this one is in Shinjuku. The missing vehicles are all box trucks and construction vehicles parked along the roadside. Even a baling press the junkyard used to process scrap cars was stolen," a Mage from the field team reported to Chrono.

"Judging by the residual magic power at the scene, the culprits are definitely magic users. A spatial fluctuation was recorded in Earth's orbit the day before yesterday, but it was too small to trigger an alert. Now it looks like that was an intruder arriving from another dimension."

"But what use would they have for these stolen construction vehicles?"

Chrono didn't understand. These vehicles had no magical power whatsoever.

Could some special magic require metal? But even then, there's no reason to target construction vehicles specifically.