Chapter 101 : Magical Girl HAZARD

June 6, 2012

On a slightly hot early summer day.

The Shibuya Scramble Crossing in Tokyo was filled with girls with solemn expressions.

The fateful day.

Numerous magical girls gathered there.

[Activating the Threads of Fate Protocol!]

“Activating the Threads of Fate Protocol!”

Huge lines spread like spider webs across the blue sky.

Threads of hope connected to the surface of the stars where humanity has lived and which seek to eliminate humanity.

The massive threads created by the three apostles connected with magical girls around the world, becoming both a shelter and a passage.

Numerous footsteps going back and forth at the scene.

Radio communications of administrative magical girls.

Sounds of magical girls doing final checks on their abilities.

“Connection with the Council confirmed.”

“We can go to the domain anytime.”

“Please report connection status from other regions as well.”

[Supernatural Ability Countermeasures Team connection confirmed!]

[Bright Moon connection confirmed.]

[European Union connection confirmed.]

[Free Magical Girl Federation connection confirmed!]

[Russian Relief Union connection confirmed.]

[Southeast Asian Dispatch Team connection confirmed.]

[Middle East Dispatch Team connection confirmed.]

After that, endless connection confirmation reports continued, along with voice messages being transmitted from silver ships floating in the skies around the world to the Elysion observatory.

[Sirius standing by!]

[Pollux standing by.]

[Vega… standing by.]

[Castor standby complete!]

[Altair standing by.]

Numerous silver transport ships carrying combat magical girls were circling in the skies above Shinjuku.

The magical girls waiting inside the transport ships, fully prepared to be deployed at any moment, were listening intently to the radio.

“Do it properly like we trained. Don’t be nervous.”

“Company commander, you seem the most nervous of all.”

“…If you use your body recklessly thinking you’ll come back to life even if you die, I’ll kill you myself.”

“What if civilians are in danger?”

“Then you have to throw your body in.”

Relay ships acting as intermediate base stations that can connect to the Threads of Fate and transport magical girls at any time.

“The distance between Bright Moon and the Southeast Asian team is too far. Please move as far south as possible from Bright Moon’s side.”

[If we disperse personnel any further, it will be impossible to maintain even the minimum combat units.]

“Then please hold out on Bright Moon’s side while being aware of the range of the Threads of Fate activation.”

[Understood. We’ll fight while maintaining distance adjustment as much as possible.]

“We’ll make sure to receive real-time activation range updates.”

Just one day.

There was a girl who had saved and guided magical girls for just one properly prepared day of battle.

“Captain Himari! The combat unit is ready!”

“How is the security team doing?”

“Tsugumi said she’d go around taking care of people who couldn’t evacuate in time.”

A day that once came without any warning.

A day they couldn’t properly face due to the curses of the three goddesses and human greed.

“Boss, we can go anytime.”

“We’ll follow you. Miss.”

“We’ll go join up in Shinjuku now.”

The day all tragedies began.

Perhaps the day humanity’s fate was decided.

“Captain! Just leave the rear to us!”

“You just hide behind me. Kyoko.”

A battlefield barely created through numerous miracles and deceptions.

“Daphne! Sylph! Echo! We’re going to save people who couldn’t escape in time!”

“Okay! Hana! Leave it to us! I’ll blow them all away with sound waves!”

“Ugh, I’m scared.”

“Stupid Sylph.”

Girls who had gathered after finally unraveling numerous threads of fate.

“Hikari.”

“Yuki.”

“Let’s definitely win.”

“Okay.”

Two girls who had run from the past and future to see only this moment.

Where one girl had stood blankly in a shabby appearance drenched by rain.

Where one girl had lost everything due to a foolish runaway.

All our stories began there.

The true beginning of <Magical Girl HAZARD>.

A special scenery different from usual.

12 o’clock noon.

The sky turned red.

* * *

I waited for this day.

I hoped this day would never come.

Contradictory emotions.

3 years ago, I woke up here as a weak girl who could only rely on others.

1 year ago, I watched here as the weakest apostle who had not yet realized her power.

And today.

To face the magical girl of [War], the strongest apostle.

To see the second red broadcast that is the beginning of destruction.

For this world that I came to love.

To return to my mother.

I returned to this place.

“Come.”

I am here.

In the center of the vast city where numerous citizens should be passing by, only magical girls who had come out to face the trial were standing on the streets.

The sky that should be no different from usual.

The blue sky that should have shone with the hot early summer sunlight had turned red due to the will of the stars seeking to destroy humans and the curses of the three goddesses combined to plunge humanity into the brink of destruction.

Black energy was gathering and swirling in the red sky.

The malice of goddesses and stars towards humans was gathering and wriggling to create a form.

[…]

Silence

The goddess’s announcement that should have started as soon as the sky turned red was not heard, and only a chilling silence continued.

[…You deceived us.]

[…You tricked us.]

[…You fooled us.]

The three goddesses no longer spoke in mocking voices.

What could be felt was anger.

[The daughter of the world deceived us.]

[The first daughter tricked us all.]

[She fooled the fate of humanity.]

The deception prepared by the goddess of [Beginning] was supposed to be smaller, but it became a massive rebellion shot towards the goddesses by one human.

Even so.

I declared in the name of the goddess.

Because I wanted to give the leading role of the miracle to the first magical girl.

“That’s right. You were deceived by the first goddess. This was a ritual for humanity to survive while keeping their dreams.”

In response to my answer, I felt enormous presences from beyond the sky gazing at me through the faintly opened dimensional gap.

Even though it was clearly just a passage that couldn’t properly take shape, the weight of the curse flowing from there was heavy.

Huge beings who couldn’t understand humans that were too small and weak when alone, and only recognized them as the sum total of humanity.

Beings who had not paid attention to anything except the will of the stars now felt hostility towards me.

Due to my existence, the will of humanity fully faced the trials and the beings that were once goddesses.

And we finally recognized each other.

[…]

[…]

[…]

An enormous presence that made my limbs go numb and felt like it was pressing down on my shoulders.

An enormous presence that made it feel like a small human would be blown away like a piece of paper.

“Kugh?!”

Even Yuki standing next to me staggered as her legs gave out for a moment, and the ground began to crack under the gaze with such an enormous presence.

Rumble―

The earth I was standing on cracked due to the curse.

I ignored the pouring malice and curses and stepped forward one step at a time.

Passing by numerous magical girls, to the very front.

So that no one would be hurt by the goddesses’ curses.

“Kyaa?!”

“Ugh… I don’t feel good.”

“Earthquake…? The ground is shaking.”

Although they were not as forgotten as the goddess of [Beginning] who had been exiled for tens of thousands of years, the malice and curses poured out by these beings who had been forgotten for thousands of years were enough to wound this fleeting world.

But there’s no need to be afraid.

If the will of humanity wants to break free from the gods of the past, they cannot appear here directly.

Like weak humans, they can only sit in their seats and curse their opponents.

I have no intention of calling them gods and fearing beings who are neither omnipotent nor omniscient.

They, like me, are just using their own cowardly tricks from outside the laws of the world.

They and I are the same.

[We curse the ritual of trials.]

[We curse the remnants left by the first daughter.]

[You will disappear by the will of the stars.]

―!

The world responded to the curses of the three goddesses and let out a massive resonance.

A huge reverberation that all of humanity living all over the world must have felt.

The demons and trials that the will of the stars was trying to pour down answered that reverberation and shouted loudly from beyond the door.

――!

The will to completely remove humanity.

Hostility that had continued from the distant past.

Unreasonable anger caused by transcendents and the will of the stars.

I felt the hundreds of magical girls gathered for the first battle wavering and despairing.

“Do, do we have to fight such beings?”

“Huge doors are appearing in the sky one after another.”

“Are, are we really going to be destroyed?”

No.

That is just the struggling of transcendents who are afraid of humans, spreading their spines like hedgehogs.

Deceivers who only deceive people with petty tricks like me.

Their struggles have already become unable to interfere due to my promise with [War].

The truly great things already existed in the hearts of magical girls.

“Don’t be afraid.”

“Ugh… but, but!”

“Those are just illusions that are only big in size. They can’t directly interfere with this world.”

“But they have such an enormous presence?!”

“If they were truly omnipotent beings, they could erase us with just a finger.”

“But, but still!”

“If we submit to them out of vain fear, we won’t be able to protect the things precious to us.”

As soon as I finished speaking, I felt an enormous wave of curses crashing down, enough to make even my hair sway.

A wave of direct and childish malice and curses, like an immature adult trying to instill fear by grabbing a child’s shoulders and pressing down.

A vision of death suddenly approaching and everyone becoming rotten corpses.

A vision of dividing and fighting to gain enormous power and resources.

A vision of eyes and nose rotting and tearing pain throughout the body.

Humanity’s fundamental fears.

Childish fears that can only be shown because they have failed to understand humans for so long.

“…What kind of visual terrorism is this.”

So I felt more and more refreshed.

Because it’s a sight they can show precisely because they are not truly divine beings.

Although I felt a bit sick from tens of thousands of curses overlapping, each capable of extinguishing life alone, I overcame it with endless starlight and moved forward.

Due to the endless healing, my body sparkled endlessly with colorful starlight.

“What kind of god appears directly to threaten people with childish illusions and curses?”

“Hikari…!”

“Hikari-chan!”

“Leader…!”

“Leader!!”

“…Your Majesty.”

I shouted so that all the magical girls around could hear.

We did not come here to be destroyed by such petty transcendents.

“Those are neither gods nor demons.”

“They’re just beings who luckily got great power!”

“Don’t be scared!”

“We can all overcome this!”

“Because we’re magical girls who gained power to protect people!”

With each step I took forward, I felt the magical girls regaining their senses and burning with fighting spirit.

“My true alias is [Deception]!!”

The magical girls followed behind me, taking one step forward at a time.

Towards the sky where the transcendents’ presence and demons were approaching. And towards the strongest apostle who had come according to our promise.

“A magical girl who deceives beings calling themselves goddesses and twists the fate of humans!”

A massive crack several kilometers long occurred in that sky.

Beyond it was darkness.

In the endlessly churning darkness, eyes shining like lotus seeds were embedded, sending chilling gazes at us.

Black lions dripping black liquid fell from between the slowly opening cracks.

They looked like black rain falling from the red sky, making it seem utterly unreal.

A repulsive appearance made of pure malice pouring from the wounds of stars.

The sound of howling while spewing sticky oil.

“■■■■■!!!”

Guuuung―

Five massive pillars descended from beyond the red sky and fell towards the empty city.

Enormous masses, each hundreds of meters in size.

Their twisted surfaces like wedges were densely engraved with records of all the fights and wars humans had waged, in the most primitive script.

The massive pillars fell onto the city in an instant, causing huge explosions as they were driven into the ground.

Boooooom!!!

The ground flipped over, buildings collapsed, and enormous dust clouds rose.

Tens of thousands of black lions pouring down from the sky like rain.

Massive wedges recording the history of war.

[War] Magical Girl’s Unique Skill

World of Struggle

Above that sky, the magical girl of [War] was floating with a huge sky palace behind her.

Reddish-brown hair fluttering in the wind.

Reddish-brown pupils opened with the excitement of war.

Fluttering reddish-brown cape.

Simple black outfit.

A huge blazing blade.

Her appearance looked like a modern female officer, a medieval knight, and an ancient empress all at once.

“…”

“…”

This is a play between me and [War].

Her test as the one overseeing the first trial receiving the will of the stars.

Animus took out her reddish-brown Glass Star and shattered it.

“I… the apostle of [War], renounce all rights as an apostle.”

“…”

“I will become humanity’s first trial and test humanity to destroy it.”

“…”

“If you cannot surpass me… you will live in struggle until the moment only a handful of humanity remains.”

“We will surpass you.”

“Humanity, struggle, I will surely evolve you at the moment of the final trial where the remains of the goddesses remain. I will surely preserve you.”

“We don’t need that.”

“Then fight me and win.”

“That’s what I intend to do.”

Animus and I looked at each other.

Animus had a cold expressionless face, but.

Somehow she seemed to be smiling a little.

―!

The will of the stars granted the magical girl of [War], who was performing a sincere play to destroy humanity, the qualification for the trial.

The first trial we must overcome is not mindless demons, but the apostle who once thought of extreme methods to preserve humanity.

The twisted beginning of the original work.

Four starlights rose behind Animus, shining like a halo.

And the battle began.