NOVEL NEXT Chapter 34 – The Line to Protect (4)
“Such cute antics.”
I threw the poor victim I had caught aside. Anyway, I am now a Magical Girl. Since I couldn’t directly lay my hands on her, as long as I restrained her without touch, that was enough.
Grabbing a nearby rebar, I tripped the girl who came at me again, tightly binding her hands and feet with the contorted metal.
However, this girl just kept squirming without even screaming.
A thick aura of darkness was emanating from her entire body. Indeed, the experiments happening in this horrible place were insane from the premise of forcibly injecting negative mana into the girls’ bodies.
“Their presence is already fading. It means they fled without a moment’s hesitation.”
I sensed a group of people moving farther away. They couldn’t be thoughtless fools, and I doubted I could catch them all just by chasing them down in this underground facility.
“Ugh, die, monster!!”
“I’ll take care of the aftermath, I suppose.”
In the end, all I could do was wipe out the remaining remnants here.
I easily split the punk who was shouting while spraying bullets in half and sent my shadow throughout the entire facility.
After all, these were just small fries. For anything alive, I just pierced, slashed, and tore them apart without hesitation.
Being here meant these were the kinds of people I could kill easily without any hesitation.
“Takilas!”
After that, as I clicked my tongue and exited the blood-soaked facility full of corpses, I was met not by those who had fled, but by the arriving police force and Magical Girl Aria.
“Long time no see. But you’re late, way too late.”
“You killed people again?!”
Aria, who wouldn’t let her guard down this time, bit her lip while igniting her red mana.
If it were another time, I would have thoroughly teased her about that, but unfortunately, I wasn’t in the best mood either.
“I did. Was it exactly 73… and in return, I saved 34 girls.”
“What…?”
“If I hadn’t come, what do you think would have happened? As my senior said, 73 people would surely have lived. In exchange, several of those 34 girls might have become victims of illegal biological experiments, just like the 21 children who have already sacrificed themselves. Maybe they would have turned into twisted monsters.”
Was my remark a bit shocking? Aria’s face went pale in real-time. The police behind her looked the same. A commotion spread among them.
“Mamute, don’t just pay attention to that scum. What have you all been doing while the demons gather young girls across the country for experiments using possessed ones?”
“…Don’t speak carelessly. Mamute is an evil entity you can’t handle carelessly. What do you know?”
“Oh really? How about a bet, senior?”
Seeing Aria’s voice grow cold as if her pride was wounded, I couldn’t help but chuckle. Mamute. He certainly was a tough opponent. But that’s about it.
“What if I kill that egg ghost? Will you acknowledge it? How incompetent, weak, and inefficient you all are.”
My eyes met Aria’s crimson ones in the air. At the same time, I sensed hesitation in her gaze. She was genuinely worried I’d really kill Mamute.
Indeed, she was still young.
“Hey! What are you all doing?! That kid is under a capture order! Fire! Who does that little brat think she is to talk back to adults…”
“What a madman…”
But then, a disturbing voice blared through the loudspeakers, interrupting our squabble.
The one who clicked his tongue was a middle-aged police executive, half-bald. Ignoring the shocked plea from Aria, he commanded his subordinates to open fire.
It was such an unexpected move that even I momentarily gazed blankly.
“What are you doing! Stop right now!”
“You be quiet! Who are you to give orders? I am performing my duties according to the law!”
As he bellowed, ignoring Aria’s words, what could I do?
The poor low-ranking officers who had to participate in the actual battle, just because they had a foolish and arrogant superior, pointed their guns at me with confused faces.
I raised my arms to shield my face. Tasers and capture nets flew towards me, trying to constrain my shadow-protected body.
“Ah, let’s retreat for now. You’ve already let the main ones slip away, right?”
Ren shook his head and lightly tapped my ankle.
However, I didn’t want to retreat just because I had transformed after a long time. After all, what kind of sense did it make to take hits after being the one attacked first?
“Uh-oh?”
As I took a step forward, a startled Ren fell to the ground. Ignoring him, I raised my killing intent.
And naturally, the gunfire began to decrease.
“What are you doing?”
“Move aside, senior. It seems like you all are misunderstanding something.”
Aria blocked the pathetic officers who were being suppressed by my killing intent. However, I ignored her and proclaimed.
“Go ahead and shoot, confidently. You’re certain that there’s no risk of your heads getting smashed by a Magical Girl, right?”
“Back off! Touching the police is really crossing the line!”
“With how things are these days, people ought to realize they can actually get their heads smashed for being cocky. What do you have to believe in to be so brazen?”
“Back off right now!”
Aria shouted, intercepting me as I advanced.
But her eyes were trembling. How about the pathetic idiot hiding behind her?
“I warned you… Aah!”
I engulfed Aria with my shadow and flung her away. Someone of her strength should at least buy me 10 seconds. And that would be enough.
In that fleeting moment, I caught one of the fleeing officers by the neck with a shadow tentacle and slammed him face-first into the ground.
“C-cough…”
“Hey. Talk. You pathetic trash in the police. Who exactly can protect you?”
I stomped on the groaning officer’s chest.
The very fact that I could lay hands on him proved how rotten he was. The young male officer beside him, though weak, was clean; I wouldn’t have been able to touch him.
“I am from the Republic of Korea Police Headquarters…”
“Even prosecutors and members of parliament got killed by my hands. You fool.”
“GAAAH!”
As I slightly exerted strength into my legs, I heard the crunching sound of the ribs I stomped on.
The officer clinging to my calf trembled, blood spewing from his mouth.
Just a little more, just a little more pressure and this trash would die.
“Stop it!”
At that moment, Aria charged in and knocked into me. In a tangle, we broke through the cabin’s outer wall and fell inside.
Before the dust even settled, she quickly pinned me down, grabbing my neck tightly.
“Surprised that your neck isn’t choked?”
“Guh…”
Using my thumb and index fingers, I pried her hand apart. The muscles of her arm trembled, but unfortunately, I was much stronger.
Shadows rose and, like a baseball pitch, slammed her body down.
“Then let’s actually make a bet, senior.”
“A bet?”
As she struggled to rise from a massive TV I had smashed, I presented her with a tempting proposal.
“There’s an illegal lab here, and the organization that conducts biological experiments using Mamute’s demons. I couldn’t kill their main force. Because their experiments succeeded, and as a Magical Girl, I couldn’t act against innocent girls being treated as weapons.”
“Y-you can’t…”
“Whether you cooperate with the police or not, you’ll take down that organization. I’ll take care of Mamute. The first one to catch their target wins.”
My proposal seemed to strike a chord with her; her gaze changed. The reason I made such a proposal, I didn’t even know myself. I just felt slightly different.
“If I win, I won’t hold back anymore. After all, you’ll have no justification to stop me due to your incompetence.”
“Then… if I win…”
Gasping for breath, she hurriedly spoke.
“You must stop killing.”
And she placed her condition. I accepted that condition. After all, she wouldn’t have a chance to win anyway.
“Then give it your all.”
Shaking off the dust from my clothes, I left her behind and exited the cabin.
The police, who had been watching their chief get beaten pitifully, now looked at me with intense fear, unable to even meet my eyes.
I liked that gaze. It felt just right. If you’re weak, know your place, and when mercy is given, crawl humbly to the ground.
“I hope today taught you something. In a world where a weakling can have their head smashed any day for not knowing their place.”
I retrieved Ren and soared into the sky. Then I climbed a certain height and concealed myself.
Considering how things would likely have turned upside down at school by now.
The place I aimed for after hiding was none other than the underground lab I had just escaped from.
“You’re not—are you…?”
“I thought it would be better to be kidnapped than to have to endure relentless questioning and excuse-making right now.”
With a breathing mask on, I submerged myself in an empty test tube and let out a faint laugh.