“You wouldn’t be trying to scam us with someone who’s already dead, would you?”
“Of course not.”
What a wonderful reaction. Raban smiled as he continued.
“Have you not already used magic stones to lure out Ochanja?”
“Yeah. Are you going to hold us responsible now for bringing out the power of the old era?”
Raban leisurely shook his head. In a scam like this, what mattered was not the truth itself, but making it ‘look’ true. The most convincing lies were made by hiding them among nine parts truth.
“No. If by some chance you were convinced that Ochanja had disappeared, and brought out the power of the old era to deal with our magical girls, what do you think would have happened?”
He created a hypothetical threat by presenting a plausible situation.
Dine folded her arms with a displeased look. She hated to admit it, but if Ochanja ambushed them, even one of the Four Heavenly Kings would be likely to suffer grave wounds.
And conversely, Ochanja would have absorbed the Four Heavenly Kings and the magic power of the old era, becoming even stronger.
“Salamandine, I informed you of Ochanja’s survival even though you had yet to promise your cooperation, did I not? This is the same principle. We do not wish for the tragedy of the old era to be repeated.”
In truth, Raban did not even know whether this so-called tragedy of the old era had actually existed. He had merely wedged in a phrase that sounded impressive to fit the circumstances.
But it was not as though a mascot was watching this place, so who would know the truth?
“So please accept our deal. For the sake of Hikarius and the magical girls’ dream.”
Dine trembled, then, ever so slightly. With a truly unwilling expression, she gave a tiny nod.
The contract was concluded. An achievement won by exaggerating and advertising a threat that did not even exist.
It was, indeed, an exemplary false-listing fraud.
***
After finishing the long and tedious meeting in the Fairy Kingdom, Papirune sighed and returned to reality.
The agenda of the meeting had been diverse indeed—Is Ochanja really dead, mohu? So where did the super-duper magic power extracted from that super-duper huge demon beast go, mohu? Ah, Salamandine is cute; when is the new warrior joining?—but among them, there was one main topic.
Codename ‘Sawayo.’ An extradimensional being who, through the blessing of the Mother Fairy, had been distorted…, corrupted…, no. Reborn as a magical girl.
How should they deal with that thing, which had suddenly arrived at Lux Tiera High School?
Should they overlook it on the tiny possibility that all their reasoning so far was mistaken and that she might truly be an ordinary student?
Or should they abandon their original principles and take preemptive measures?
But there were too many uneasy points to attempt an immediate attack.
First, ‘Sawayo’ had helped exterminate a demon beast. And the altered form she had taken after receiving the Mother Fairy’s blessing was not something ferocious like a demon beast, but the shape of a magical girl.
The Mother Fairy’s blessing was a barrier that prevented extradimensional beings from harming the existences of Hikarius, but it could not twist even their very nature.
If such a thing were possible, they would have made every being approaching from another dimension submit and used them as a means of protecting Earth. The blessing was, in the end, merely the minimal safety device for protecting magical girls and the lives of Earth.
If Sawayo’s nature had simply been evil, she would have taken on a form similar to a demon beast rather than that of a magical girl. They might end up making a powerful being who could become an ally into an enemy through needless meddling.
After an exhausting debate, the fairies reached the conclusion of, ‘Let’s just watch her school life for now.’ In this industry, it was common knowledge that monsters who infiltrated schools to uncover the identities of magical girls would often be reformed and become new warriors.
Papirune, who had once again mediated the guardian fairies’ reckless meeting through sheer grit and force of will, received a report on the subject of concern’s movements within the school as soon as she returned. First was Inian.
‘The counseling room?’
Raban was in the counseling room. A suspicious outsider who had been under suspicion of being a monster under Salamandine’s command.
However, there had been no further contact with the Four Heavenly Kings over the past few days, and his reputation among the students was good, so people were beginning to say that perhaps he could be removed from the watch list.
The biggest reason was his diet. It was difficult to suspect someone of being a monster after seeing him buy triangle gimbap at the convenience store every day and mutter, ‘Sob, sob, it was delicious again today.’
Unless he was a beggar who had lived a destitute life somewhere in a barren, remote mountain village.
Though, in Korean, monster and beggar did start with the same consonants.
‘Is Raban her objective, mohu? …No, that seems unlikely, mohu.’
Codename Sawayo—the name she had given was Inian—was staying in the same dormitory as Raban. If she were trying to contact Raban, she would meet him at the dormitory; there was no reason to deliberately seek a meeting at school.
Next was Dine Ifrit, a.k.a. Salamandine.
She was in the counseling room.
[…?]
A suspicion that something was rather strange brushed through Papirune’s mind. Raban, of course, would be in the counseling room because that was his workplace.
[Senior, I think the situation has gotten completely screwed up, mohu.]
A junior mascot delivered the news in a trembling voice.
[You must uphold the dignity of a guardian fairy, mohu.]
[Salamandine, Magi Black, Sawayo, and Raban are all in the counseling room together, mohu.]
Papirune hurriedly checked the exclusive chatroom for Lux Tiera High School faculty members (mascots) on her Magical-Phone.
She saw a message urgently posted by a mascot who, not being high enough in rank to participate in the Fairy Kingdom emergency meeting, had been in charge of monitoring the school. The pitiful dying cry of ‘Seniors, please check the messages’ was written there like a last will.
To think the Fairy Kingdom’s internal policy of turning off all electronic devices during meetings for the sake of efficiency would backfire like this…!
For a moment, Papirune nearly lost her grip on sanity, but she held on with the sense of responsibility befitting the senior of all fairies. Then she deduced how the situation had possibly ended up like this….
‘I have no idea what’s going on.’
Naturally, she could not figure out the reason.
If interpreted maliciously, the situation was that one of the Four Heavenly Kings, taking advantage of a gap in the mascots’ surveillance network, was secretly colluding with outside forces while plotting subversion within the school.
If viewed differently…. Uh….
[Did Sawayo also go to look because she was curious about Raban’s looks, mohu?]
[That seems unlikely, mohu. Perhaps Magi Black sensed some ominous atmosphere and sat in on the meeting, mohu?]
The suggestion was that Na Ihyeon, having spotted Sawayo and Dine together, had stationed herself in the counseling room in order to monitor them. Papirune shook her head.
There was a reason she could be certain.
[Magi Black’s perceptiveness is equal to or lower than Salamandine’s, mohu….]
Ihyeon did not have the perceptiveness to suspect Inian of being the same person as Sawayo Girl merely because they had the same hair color, the same eye color, and an identical manner of speech. Syune, perhaps, but not her.
Syune had likely guessed that Sawayo Girl was Inian, but she would not go out of her way to share her reasoning with Ihyeon. Not because she thought little of Na Ihyeon.
It was because Na Ihyeon was truly, truly terrible at lying.
She was already sneaking around and avoiding Dine because she was not confident she could hide the fact that she knew Dine’s identity. If she needlessly made Ihyeon conscious of Inian being Sawayo Girl, the chance that even her own identity would be exposed would only increase exponentially.
[This is serious, mohu. At this rate, everyone in the counseling room might find out about Magi Black’s existence, mohu…!]
[Shall we send the others in right away and pull Dine out, mohu?]
[…No, mohu. If we overreact for no reason, they may use that as an excuse to trace Magi Black’s identity, mohu. At a time like this, using a more indirect method would be more natural, mohu.]
If the mascots moved directly and applied pressure, they would sense something off about the measures being different from before. They might be able to deceive Inian, who had only just started attending school, but Dine, who had been attending school all this time, would notice.
Papirune wriggled her cotton-candy-like hands and wrote a message to send to Na Ihyeon.
‘Syune, it’s me, Papirune. Please call Ihyeon out of the counseling room….’
***
Inian, who had been observing Na Ihyeon with interest, suddenly recalled Raban’s warning.
‘Do you think a mere magic battery can enjoy the shining youth that even I never got to experience? Absolutely! Not!’
There was considerable distortion mixed into Raban’s cry inside Inian’s head, but to the Grand Duke of the Demon Realm, such details were unimportant.
What truly mattered was confirming the feasibility of Raban’s negative thought-energy mining plan.
There were humans like that from time to time. People who harbored enormous negative thought-energy, but whose mental strength was so great that they did not spill it outward.
Negative thought-energy was extremely difficult to harvest while it remained inside an intelligent being. Whether through words of resentment or tears of blood, it had to be expressed outwardly before it could be processed into the form of magic power.
There was a reason demons tempted people by saying, ‘Be honest with your desires.’ In that sense, Inian felt the need to test Na Ihyeon’s mental strength—or, to put it more vulgarly, the sturdiness of her mentality.
‘If that black-magic freak is doing some hopelessly pointless shovel-digging, I’ll have to tell him to cut his losses fast….’
First, she decided to approach Na Ihyeon’s negative thought-energy in the simplest way.
“I heard there was an accident where your house burned down. Are you all right?”
It was a question she could ask because she was a transfer student. The victims directly or indirectly connected to Naju Pharmaceuticals would be feeling a grim pleasure inside if told that the Black Forest had burned, so saying this directly to Na Ihyeon would be no different from picking a fight.
But if an outsider who knew nothing mentioned that subtle symbol of contempt. And if the pretext was concern, no less?
Ordinary humans would feel ambivalent emotions mixed with a little gratitude for the concern and a great deal of bitterness at having their shame exposed.
If they were weaker, on top of that bitterness, resentment would well up over why they had to be scorned for something they had not even done.
If they were stronger, they would skillfully swallow down the bitterness and show only gratitude.
“Ah, that.”
Na Ihyeon answered cheerfully in a bright voice.
“It was old anyway, so I’d been wanting to blow it up.”
Inian felt as though she had hit a wall.
If that exaggerated humor had been a defense mechanism to get her own emotions under control, Inian could have felt relieved. But the emotion carried in Na Ihyeon’s voice was far removed from self-protection.
“It worked out, really. It was a villa we weren’t using anyway, so I figured I’d take this chance to remodel it.”
A joke meant as consideration, out of concern that if her answer was too heavy, the questioner’s heart would grow heavy as well. It far exceeded the thoughtfulness of an ordinary human.
‘We’re fucked.’
That mentality was tougher than it had any right to be.
‘It’s a false listing, Raban, you lunatic…!’
What did it matter if the actual payout from the negative thought-energy lottery hit not the hundreds of millions, but the trillions?
The numbers that had to be matched were not six, but about ten thousand.