Yekase and Ivaris boarded a flight bound for Second New Tokyo, the silver fuselage cutting the clouds like a knife through fleece.

Both were Flash Energy Ascenders, sleepless by nature, yet Yekase felt travel begged for a nap, like drifting on a slow river.

Midway, a pressure like a bursting dam woke her—the call of a full bladder, sharp as winter wind.

She opened her eyes to Ivaris asleep beside her, breath steady as a metronome, face calm as still water.

To sell Yekase’s lady-of-the-house act, Ivaris had gone to a tailor in the City of Ivalice and ordered a luxe black-and-white maid dress, embroidery gleaming like frost, sleeves and hem thick and long like winter drapes—only an Ascender could wear that in this heat.

Yekase raked her hair like combing reeds in wind, got up, and walked toward the business-class restroom at the tail, footsteps soft as moth wings.

A porthole window waited beside the restroom, cold as a watchful eye.

Beyond it, the ocean breathed like a sleeping beast, and far off lay Huaxia, a familiar coastline like an old scar returned.

…Nothing seemed different, like a mountain unmoved by storm.

Mountains stayed mountains; cities stayed cities; even though C‑rank and below Sinister Organizations were disbanded, the sky still bloomed with hologram ads, bright and relentless as summer cicadas.

Yekase wore her [Akano Yuko] alias—beige turtleneck over a white shirt, silver hair swaying like moonlit streamers.

A nearby flight attendant, standing by like a heron, saw her pressed to the glass and spoke in a friendly lilt: “We’ve left Huaxia airspace and are over the Sea of Japan. Little traveler, you haven’t been to Huaxia, right? There was unrest six months ago, then Shadow Curtain International’s Huaxia Branch tightened management. It’s now among the safest countries, like a city with lanterns lit.”

“How did she do it?” Yekase’s tone was cool as shade.

The attendant didn’t notice Yekase had said she, not they—she simply continued like a tour guide following a script.

“They established an Official Hero system. Anyone can register as a hero by ability—the European way would call them government-backed mercenaries, neat as a uniform.”

“Backed by the government, or backed by the Organization?” Yekase’s words fell like pebbles into a deep well.

“Aren’t those the same?” The attendant smiled, light as foam.

Yekase went silent, a hush like snow.

She nodded thanks, slipped into the restroom, and sat on the throne like a queen in exile.

What now? Hero has mutated into a bad joke, a banner tattered by wind; maybe we should call each other comrades instead. The Sinister Organization will always stick labels on you to stir PvP, like hornets shaken from a nest—so be it.

This trip was for fun, which meant running from reality like a deer from hounds. The endgame could wait like wine sealed in clay—she told herself that, pulled out her phone, and scrolled a saved novel, pages flowing like rain for twenty minutes.

Outside, came a rustle, thin as mice in the walls.

“…?”

Yekase finished up, quick and clean as a blade, cracked the door like a sliver of moon.

At the center of business class stood a figure with a pumpkin-styled helmet, orange and grinning like a harvest mask.

She wore a dark-green tracksuit and cradled an assault rifle, black as a crow’s wing.

“Hello, everyone. I am the Singing Wrecking Lady,” she said, voice sweet as poisoned honey.

…?

Yekase’s brow tightened like a drawn bow; she pulled back into the restroom’s shadow.

The attendant who’d chatted with her knelt in the aisle with hands on her head, small as a curled fern. Another green-suited fighter aimed a rifle at her temple, cold as iron in winter. More of them dotted the cabin like thorns.

Mechbreaker continued, “But today’s objective isn’t purging. It’s to use your lives as chips to requisition military funds from Shadow Curtain International,” her words flat as a ledger.

Where was Ivaris? Yekase’s gaze curved back to their seats—and found Ivaris still fast asleep, breathing like a cat in a sunbeam.

Unbelievable. Touring with that attitude… oh right, Yekase had told her to sleep. A lady must commit to the bit, even when hijacked, like a porcelain doll during an earthquake.

But switching identities on a plane was messy as wet ink, and a sealed cabin made vanishing after cleanup tricky; before the guns barked for real, she needed a thread to pull—

“Unforgivable!”

A familiar silhouette rose from a corner Yekase had overlooked, rising like a spark catching tinder.

She pulled off a black military cap, and auburn hair fanned out like a burst of pomegranate seeds, puffing with a soft thrum.

“I will never allow you to threaten their lives!” Her voice rang like a bell over ice.

Wait—could she be—

“I also won’t allow you to use her name!” The declaration fell like a gavel.

Mechbreaker snapped her rifle up, sight sharp as a falcon’s eye. “Who are you?!”

The girl raised something in answer.

A cube, plain as a brick, heavy with promise.

Bang!

Mechbreaker, tense as a bowstring, pulled the trigger. In Yekase’s ninja-grade dynamic vision, the bullet cut the air like a wasp, set to hit the girl’s chest in a blink—

The girl moved faster—like fire leaping a gap.

The cube burst crimson light, and in 0.01 seconds, her transformation bloomed like a sunrise.

The instant the bullet entered the space around her, a sudden sheet of flame devoured it, melting it to iron slurry that splashed her scarlet ball gown, lifting only a puff of steam like breath on glass.

The tips of her long hair burned like candle wicks, and in her hands formed a greatsword cast from molten iron, with a hollowed spine where bright metal flowed like a lava stream.

“My name is Magical Girl Phoenix—I will burn away your sins!” Her words flared like banners in a storm.

“Damn it, a hero slipped in?” Mechbreaker’s voice scraped like a file.

She grabbed a nearby passenger by the neck, gun jammed to his temple like a nail to wood. “Don’t move! One twitch, and he blooms red,” she hissed.

“Come for me if you dare…!” Phoenix’s stance bristled like a hedgehog.

Clearly, she couldn’t melt rifles from range, and another goon had a gun on the attendant like a hawk’s talon.

Focused on melee, Phoenix had stumbled into the stale trap of hostages. Facing her shielded posture, Mechbreaker’s eyes narrowed like shutters—what would she demand…?

Confirming Phoenix wouldn’t move, she signaled her crew with a glance, sharp as a whip crack, to sweep wallets and watches. With a hero present, nerves were taut as strings; forget ransom—grab and run.

Their landing pod hugged the cabin roof like a limpet. After retreat, the cut hatch would wreck pressure balance—enough to make that nosy hero choke on thin air.

Ka-dak, ka-dak.

The motions stalled, like gears catching sand.

Ka-dak, ka-dak.

Every gaze swung to the rear—toward the restroom that should’ve been empty, like a well with no echo—

Out wobbled a figure with an iron ball for a head and a white robe wrapped tight, shambling like a ghost in bandages.

“…?”

Yekase had torn out the metal toilet, poured Flash Energy through it and stretched it like dough, flipped inside to outside, pressed the grimy face outward into a sphere, and poked two eyeholes—instant helmet. The white robe was just the restroom’s privacy curtain, trailing like fog.

“What are you?!” A dozen barrels stared, dark as wolf eyes.

She spread her arms wide, voice ringing bright as a trumpet: “I am Mafty Aileen. To those ruining my vacation, accept a sincere F‑you!”

Ratatatatat—!!

As the bullets poured like hail, she whipped out a curved thing from behind her and raised it like a shield.

The bathroom sink.

With Flash Energy reinforcement, it had become a medium round shield, hard as a millstone, batting bullets aside like pebbles off a pan.

When the volley eased, Yekase hurled the pitted sink at Mechbreaker, a spinning moon of porcelain and steel.

“Phoenix, now!”

She sprinted forward, a streak like a fox across snow, brushing past the second gunman and—almost idly—tapped his barrel.

“D-Damn it! Then I’ll—” Panic broke his reason like ice; his finger yanked the trigger.

But in that sliver of time, his rifle had betrayed him like a dog that bites.

The choked barrel couldn’t vent the shot; the powder blew inside the structure, launching the magazine and bolt backward. They clanged off his helmet like thrown pans, and the blast swallowed his left hand in fire, red as poppies.

Seeing it, Mechbreaker knew the bluff was over. Their charge was betting she wouldn’t dare kill hostages; if these two got close, she’d be torn like paper.

She abandoned her remaining crew without a glance, retreating while hosing the cabin with wild fire, bullets stitching the air like angry bees. She aimed to climb alone into the landing pod and cut loose.

A rifle’s sustained fire is noise on a battlefield, dust in the wind during an organizational spat—but in a narrow cabin, it’s a storm of iron.

Cups shattered like shells; screens burst like bubbles; passengers screamed, high as gulls; a child cried, thin as a reed; bullets thudded into flesh with dull, wet knocks—business class turned hellish, a garden torched black.

Inside her iron-ball helm, Yekase peeked at Ivaris. Finally awake, she still sat with head bowed, like a monk mid-prayer, comic bubbles almost popping by her ear—good dream smashed, spirit elsewhere.

“Go to hell! Thank these two heroes. Wait for them to save you!” Mechbreaker spat, words sharp as knives.

She backed to the join between business class and cockpit, climbed a soft ladder into the pod, ready to uncouple and flee like a rat through a crack.

Yekase had caught a storm of bullets for the rows around her; chasing now would be late as dusk. Phoenix stepped onto a headrest like a hawk taking wing, a bling-bling pair of wings lighting her back, greatsword raised high as a banner, charging after Mechbreaker—

“…What are you doing?” Ivaris asked, voice hoarse as smoke, eyes opening with the ache of sand.

She lifted her left index finger, casual as drawing in dust.

She traced a line in the air, light and clean as a cherry petal.

A blossom-thin, cherry-pink beam spun forward, fast as a spindle, and sliced the dangling landing pod in two like a peach—and with it, the roof of business class.

“What are you doing?!” Yekase shouted, her voice a lightning crack.

By common sense—ah, nine long years locked up on the horizon, watching TV like tides; common sense had worn away like shore rocks.

Cold air at ten thousand meters roared in through the gaping wound, like a glacier spilling into a valley; oxygen and heat fled into the blue wild; tiny things and glass shards spun up in a silver cyclone, all rushing for the sky.

A gap that size—Flash Energy couldn’t seal it fast. Forcing a patch might leave breathing seams, and who’d trust the strength after?

“Dammit, fine—Celestial Speech, Parallel, Continuous, Passion, Oz Floating Disc!”

A chain of transparent circles popped into being, one breath from disaster, and jammed into the ceiling like crystal plugs, halting the bleed of air.

“Discs…” Phoenix lowered her greatsword, eyes wide as moons.

“Help me! Clear the leftovers—”

To fill every seam between discs, Yekase birthed nearly a hundred smaller Oz Floating Discs, their clear rims catching sunlight with ghostly halos, layering into a topological lace like frost on glass.

The instant math hit like a drum in her skull, pain flared bright as magnesium.

This scene—she’d seen it somewhere, in smoke or memory. She grit her teeth and shouted a name like striking flint:

“I’m counting on you, Akano!”