I Became a Demon Queen

I Became a Magical Girl (3)

“Why do you fight? From the start, you magical girls… no, those fairy bastards behind you don’t know anything.”
“???”
“Being new, you must be young matching your appearance. Wake up. The mascots and fairies by your side are absolutely not justice.”
“Ah, I agree with that.”
Absolute justice? Such a thing doesn’t exist to begin with. Whatever suits the narrative. Victory becomes justice.
Feeling Ren kick my ankle, I kicked him away.
“…We’re not justice either. But this time, we’re trying to take one step closer to that opportunity. So magical girl, please withdraw.”
“You’re trying hard.”
He was someone who knew magical girls very well. Protecting civilians is the top priority. So maybe I couldn’t do anything here.
All magical girls probably have that tendency to begin with.
“But I don’t.”
“!”
My shadow exploded outward. He fired his gun, but my shadow covering the hostage was faster. I drew my hand diagonally, sending shadow blades flying to slice off his arm.
“You hesitated. For a whole second at that.”
“What… you don’t care if the hostage dies?!”
“It’s not that I don’t care, I can just see everything clearly, rookie. Seems like you haven’t killed many people either.”
Those who’ve eaten know how to eat better. Those who’ve done know how to do better. Those who’ve killed know how to kill better.
The demon challengers who died by my hands alone number in the thousands. From the start, I can see everyone with true killing intent.
“This can’t be… we had a great cause…”
I split the head of the bastard who kept rambling until the end. I had no intention of listening to third-rate villain’s dog-shit philosophy, and now there were no villains left in this building.
Instead, the police special forces entering the building were growing in number.
“That’s the end, right Ren.”
“Y-yeah. But…”
“Let’s go now.”
I broke the window and threw myself out. At the last moment, my eyes met with the child who had been held hostage, so I just grinned at them.
“Whew, you seem to need some education. No! Put down your fists first!”
“What education. I’m going to be busy from now on.”
Amidst the blaring sirens wailing noisily. I sat perched on the rooftop of the building right next to the incident site, looking down.
“I can see your tendencies veeeery well now. But information about magical girls has already spread in detail in this world. Nobody will like Code Red magical girls, murderers like you!”
“What does that matter?”
“…Setting aside your mentality that will get you treated like a monster, you’ll be kept in check. That’s the biggest problem.”
His voice was unexpectedly serious. Is this really such a big deal? Well, thinking about it, this Earth isn’t the Earth I know.
Though it’s become reality now, isn’t this place still inside someone’s creation? It must be a place where many things are different and many things are twisted.
“Explain everything calmly. I’ll listen.”
“Though I don’t like your attitude, now you’re finally showing a normal reaction.”
I felt I should listen and learn even if I didn’t like it. After all, if I want to enjoy myself here from now on.
“As I said before, it’s been some time since we, that is, magical girls, appeared in this land.”
“How long?”
“20 years.”
20 years, huh. Such an ambiguous timespan. Long enough to get used to, yet somehow not.
“While magical girls have accumulated considerable achievements in this world over 20 years, there has also been backlash. In particular, there are several problematic groups.”
Suddenly becoming enthusiastic, Ren’s eyes shot out a beam creating a screen in mid-air. Looking at it, he continued this presentation.
“First, about 10 years ago… ah, let’s save this history lesson for later. Actually, don’t they teach this in elementary schools these days?”
“Stop the nonsense and tell me the important stuff.”
“The biggest problem is the magical girls who betrayed us.”
Ren nodded with a serious voice. I felt nothing special about it. Looking at what these guys do, it was obvious they’d face backlash.
“But how do they betray? Don’t you say Yggdrasil reclaims all power the moment the contract is broken?”
“Of course, reclaiming the power succeeded… but their memories were the problem. Back then, there were no measures like memory deletion, so.”
“Ah.”
The betraying magical girls provided all information about magical girls to humans. Thanks to that, people now know everything about their ecology and purposes.
“As if we weren’t busy enough, many magical girls were caught up in humans’ religious and political schemes, branded as demons or terrorists, and hunted down… moreover, the biodata extracted from those hunted magical girls spread around creating even bigger ripples.”
“You’ll never admit it’s your fault, will you?”
“H-how is it our fault!”
“Rushing into contracts, no care provided, abandoning responsibility when accidents happen… even with this?”
“We gave power to fight to lowly beings like you!”
Getting provoked by my obvious mockery, Ren showed anger for the first time.
Seeing him fuming, it seems he really thinks what they’re doing is right… it’s kind of cute seeing their chosen people mentality that makes them think they’re right no matter what.
“I-I’m prepared to get hit for saying this. Don’t act so arrogant yourself. Even if you got strong powers by transforming, aren’t you just an inexperienced human girl!”
He pointed his finger at me. I didn’t bother refuting. I couldn’t reveal my identity anyway.
“…Anyway, we continued our mission in this very chaotic world. I won’t talk about justice or dreams to someone like you. But let me warn you one thing, reality is cruel. Don’t act arrogant, there are no easy opponents these days.”
“You’re stating the obvious.”
Time to move. I got up from my spot. I pressed the connector on the ring to undo the transformation. That doesn’t mean I returned to my original form as a tentacle monster – just my outfit changed to ordinary shirt and shorts.
My hair also changed to shoulder length. I preferred shorter hair actually.
“Are you going home?”
“What are you talking about? I don’t have a home.”
Since I couldn’t fly, I opened the door and went down the stairs. A person who looked like a company employee stared at me wide-eyed as I came out through the locked rooftop door.

“Is the information compilation complete?”
“Yes, Director.”
“Let’s start quickly. The President might call us.”
The senior officials who rushed in took their seats in the conference room. The woman who prepared this presentation took a deep breath as if nervous, then started her presentation calmly.
“The name is, still unknown.”
She brought up a large screen. What appeared on screen was a single photograph.
A girl with dark black hair flowing and red eyes. Murmuring broke out among those present.
“Code is, Red. Assuming she’s new, her transformation age should be close to her current age, considering that…”
And the murmuring grew louder.
“Within less than 30 seconds of appearing, she killed 6 people and executed one mutant. Afterward, she entered the building and killed 12 more perpetrators. Finally, the mastermind Kim Jun-hyeok, who was holding out with a hostage, also died by her hands.”
“…Though I’ve been Director for less than a year.”
The Director fixed his glasses with a slightly trembling hand. Not just his hand, but his voice was trembling slightly too.
“Comparing with all records we’ve examined, this seems like an unprecedented bomb.”
“That’s correct.”
The woman nodding at the Director’s words moved to the next photo.
“Symbolic color is… unprecedented black. Ability used is freely controlled shadows, but what’s peculiar is that she didn’t even use her armament.”
The murmuring died down and now it was quiet as a mouse. It was because everyone understood the gravity of the situation.
“Estimated rank is.”
“Minimum S, but we’re looking at possibly higher.”
Once again, shock swept through those present. The strongest magical girl currently existing in Korea is SS rank. Considering that subject is a first-generation Earth magical girl and 20-year veteran, the current situation was unprecedented for them and everyone else.
“Would cooperation be possible?”
“B-but Director. A Red-ranked magical girl…”
“I know it’s dangerous too. But are we just going to do nothing? We should at least try dialogue.”
The Director let out a bitter laugh like a sigh, knowing his words spoken in confusion sounded strange.
Dialogue with magical girls is actually meaningless. Even if they become cooperative, they’ll attack without mercy if they judge you as an enemy.
And that judgment is essentially made not by the magical girls themselves but by those behind them – people who already knew this were anticipating how unstable cooperating with magical girls would be.
Because they didn’t know how their power might turn back on them through some loophole.
“We should at least confirm.”
“The Director is right.”
Getting agreement from those around, the Director quickly set the policy. First, they planned to explain the state-led cooperation system and seek her cooperation.
“Then indeed the only way is to have another magical girl step forward.”
“Then that person…”
“No, that woman would get angry just for calling her for something like this. I know there’s one combat-type magical girl who recently received S-rank classification. One who cooperates closely with our agency.”
The Director suggested, remembering the data he’d seen. And everyone around agreed with his opinion. Not simply because he was their superior, but because it was truly a good suggestion.
“Then, we’ll contact the one who goes by Aria. Ask her to find this new magical girl and arrange a meeting with our Management Bureau.”
She swallowed dryly as if slightly nervous and nodded her head.