The culprit behind all this had returned to the scene of the crime, claimed the sofa, and greeted the victim as if nothing had happened. “Arrogant” didn’t even begin to cover it.
The worst thing Jiecheng Yuan could imagine was a college student changing back into their high school uniform, running to the entrance of the college entrance exam, and shouting that today’s test was really easy. Compared to what the silver-haired girl had just done, that idea was nothing.
If she could still come up with jokes like that, then falling to darkness probably hadn’t affected her much.
Falling to darkness might not have had much of an effect, but the silver-haired girl’s impact on her was very real.
“You?!” In the space of a moment, Jiecheng Yuan went from astonishment to fury. She stomped across the floor and stormed toward the sofa.
Jiecheng Yuan’s furious approach made the silver-haired girl look up from her phone again. Their gazes met through the gap between them. The girl’s lazy, unconcerned expression vanished at once, replaced by unmistakable shock and panic.
Then the girl hurriedly clutched her phone, rolled off the other side of the sofa, landed on all fours, quickly righted herself, and dashed for the window.
“Wait, this isn’t right! This isn’t how it was supposed to go!”
The silver-haired girl’s voice cracked with tears. Without a moment’s hesitation, she grabbed the enormous living-room window with both hands. As Jiecheng Yuan watched in disbelief, the girl sprang barefoot over the window frame and leaped outside.
They were a full seven stories up. Had the other girl really panicked so badly that she’d lost all sense?
A flash of black light outside the window made Jiecheng Yuan realize how naive she’d been. Common sense from the real world made her forget that she was already in a world where magic and miracles existed.
In the light, the silver-haired girl changed in the blink of an eye into an outfit that had nothing to do with a Magical Girl.
A red-and-black, high-collared military coat, completely unsuited to the blazing summer heat, replaced the girl’s hoodie. Beneath the coat, which barely reached her knees, there were no matching military trousers—just the girl’s muscular legs and the tall military boots on her feet. And… something that seemed to be black.
Jiecheng Yuan knew that outfit was one of the symbols of a Magical Girl: her magical attire. But in her memories of the game, there was no Magical Girl who looked like this.
The silver-haired girl had transformed without hesitation and chosen to run. It was better to chase her down and demand answers than to stand around wondering who she was. Jiecheng Yuan still didn’t know why the girl was running, but if she let her get away, this clue—handed to her on a silver platter—would be gone. Finding Li would become a fantasy, never mind her plan to clear her name.
An ordinary person could never catch a Magical Girl. If the other girl could transform and run, then Jiecheng Yuan, who was also a Magical Girl, had no reason not to transform and chase her.
Finding a way to transform was much easier than Jiecheng Yuan had expected. The moment she wanted to do it, the method came to her like muscle memory.
“Transform!”
Jiecheng Yuan didn’t have a flashy belt, and she didn’t need to say those two words out loud. But her chuunibyou streak got the better of her, and she struck a heroic pose as she transformed.
The entire transformation was over almost instantly, yet Jiecheng Yuan could feel every tiny change in her body as it happened.
First, the Black Magic Mark lit up. A hard-to-describe heat rose from her abdomen, and strands of pink-and-black light stretched out from the mark. They wove together like silk, forming a cocoon of light that completely enclosed Jiecheng Yuan at its center.
The girl curled up, hugging her knees. Her clothes slowly melted away in the light, replaced by a sinister shimmer that completely covered her body.
As the girl gradually stretched out, the wispy glimmers grew solid, transforming into a flowing yet streamlined magical outfit that covered her body.
It was flowing because the pink miniskirt beneath her was almost unchanged from the original, aside from being a whole lot shorter. It was still soft and puffy, with a dreamy feel to it.
As for streamlined, the close-fitting black gloves and stockings really did seem practical for moving around. But the outfit used a ton of fabric to cover places that didn’t need covering, while leaving everything above her collarbones rather bare. It wouldn’t even give her sleeves, and the extra frilled collar around her neck was a design Jiecheng Yuan couldn’t make heads or tails of.
It was clearly a dress, but the front had an enormous opening from her chest down to her abdomen, covered only by a sheer, translucent black material. It somehow made her belly feel chilly.
This magical outfit really did fit the image of a fallen Magical Girl. But on someone like her, who had never even worn a skirt before, it felt indescribably strange.
Jiecheng Yuan didn’t have time to feel embarrassed. Being raped after missing her chance was far more terrifying than wearing this weird outfit. Before the fleeing figure disappeared from sight, Jiecheng Yuan completed her first transformation and leaped out the window, copying the other girl.
In the game, Magical Girls flying around in the sky was commonplace. Jiecheng Yuan had assumed flying was an innate ability of Magical Girls, just like transforming.
But she realized she was wrong again. She leaped out the window and hung in the air in a running pose for less than half a second before she began to plummet.
This was the seventh floor! The seventh floor! If she really fell, she’d definitely die, wouldn’t she?
She didn’t even have time to think that through before Jiecheng Yuan hit the ground hard. Her petite body slammed into the middle of the asphalt road, leaving cracks radiating out around her. The pedestrians nearby screamed and instinctively scattered.
“That hurts!!”
Jiecheng Yuan cried out in pain and climbed to her feet. She wasn’t a mangled heap, and she hadn’t even broken a bone. Aside from aching all over from the impact, she was practically unharmed. The people who had just gathered around her let out a chorus of gasps.
After transforming, her physical abilities had improved dramatically. Her magical outfit, made of magic power, had also absorbed most of the impact and damage for her.
Jiecheng Yuan rubbed her head and searched for the silver-haired girl. At the edge of her vision, the girl was already getting away, racing along the walls on all fours in a pose even less like that of a Magical Girl.
The girl maintained a delicate balance as she moved. Her hands and feet found the tiny bumps and hollows in the walls with pinpoint accuracy, giving her extra support as she darted through the jungle of steel and concrete like a hunting dog.
So the other girl couldn’t fly either… Wait, why was she relieved? If she didn’t hurry up and catch her, the girl would vanish without a trace!
Jiecheng Yuan didn’t hesitate for even a moment after hitting the ground. She pushed through the crowd and chased after the silver-haired girl, determination burning inside her.
Fortunately, the silver-haired girl’s way of moving was easy enough to predict. With her transformed body, Jiecheng Yuan could keep up by running along the road.
But a new problem came up. After transforming, Jiecheng Yuan was wearing a short magical dress. Its loose skirt created a strange resistance every time she took a stride. The two soft mounds bouncing around on her chest were just as unfamiliar, and they made running awkward too.
On top of that, the air stirred up by her running swept beneath her skirt, bringing a chilly sensation against her inner thighs and belly. It felt weird, and she had to watch how far she stretched her legs so she wouldn’t expose what was under her skirt.
Even though Jiecheng Yuan was careful to avoid flashing anyone, that mischievous-looking magical outfit still drew plenty of attention and impressed murmurs.
Basking in everyone else’s blazing stares, Jiecheng Yuan had a brief moment when she seemed to understand why Magical Girls lost their sense of shame after falling to darkness.
A girl with any sense of shame couldn’t run around the streets dressed like this, could she?!
