I Became a Demon Queen

I Became a Notable Magical Girl (3)

A magical girl’s power is expressed through color, originating from their potential and emotions. This black wave shot at me now contained all the pain and resentment of a girl.
“Disgusting.”
I deflected it with one hand wrapped in magic power. The wave that bounced off my hand flew to the roof, exploding and blowing off the lid.
“Yeah! Eliminate them all and pile up achievements!”
“Shut up!”
After forcefully kicking away Ren who suddenly became confident, I moved my magic power and shot spikes from the shadows.
All the guys who were resisting by shooting bullets were instantly skewered alive as the needles burst through, destroying the ground, walls, and ceiling.
“Kyaaak!”
The pitiful test subject belatedly moved and charged at me, swinging claws from her transformed hands. Her hand stabbed into my exposed midriff. The claws broke and fingers snapped.
I frowned. Though it didn’t hurt, this sticky dark power felt unpleasant.
The darkness I possess, my magic power, is not such a miserable and sorrowful power but the proud power of demons.
“Kii…”
“Now rest in peace.”
I swung my shadow-wrapped hand and cleanly took off her head.
“Nng, there are still guys left!”
“Those guys can be caught later.”
“But…”
“Those damn achievements will pile up on their own. So. Keep your mouth shut.”
I glared at the whining Ren showing his teeth. He immediately shriveled up, seemingly scared. Leaving the few survivors who escaped, I crossed through the ruined ship.
I kept sensing faint magic power stimulating me.
Deep inside the ship. Here, likely meant to be a panic room, was a thick iron door that looked like it wouldn’t open even with bombs.
“Why did you come here?”
“Here, they have more test subjects.”
I shot shadows toward that thick iron door. An unnecessarily thick door that even my power couldn’t break in one go.
But it just takes a bit more time. Soon the flowing shadows broke the locks and flung open the door.
“Hmm.”
“Ha.”
Both I and even Ren sighed at the sight before us. This wasn’t just a simple laboratory.
If this was just one of their ordinary laboratories, who knows how messed up this world must be.
“What do you think about this?”
“Evil worthy of an A-rank achievement… Ah, no, how tragic. How tragic!”
I grabbed Ren’s ears and stretched them. While listening to his screams, I slowly looked around.
This was a laboratory. And one of enormous scale.
A scene you’d only see in movies, one I hadn’t seen even in the demon realm. People inside tubes alive. Young girls from various nationalities, all appearing to be in their early to mid-teens.
There were also an extremely small number of boys. All of them were naked in tubes filled with unknown liquid, wearing respirators.
“These children…”
“Half are dead, half are alive. But of the survivors, can half really live normally?”
“How did you…”
Muttering blankly, I stood in front of one test tube.
The girl inside looked around my current age and was Asian. Half her upper body, with tubes stuck all over, was already grotesquely writhing with swollen tumors.
The reason I could tell their condition was simple. All the children here had faint magic power.
As the pinnacle of demons, I couldn’t fail to notice.
“Creating magical girls without Yggdrasil is impossible. I don’t know the principle, but in the end they’re just breeding mutants rather than magical girls.”
“…That’s right.”
“When these kids wake up, they’ll become enemies. Your enemies, I mean. Or should I call them achievements?”
I couldn’t help but laugh bitterly. Perhaps burned by my personality repeatedly, Ren couldn’t say anything.
“I can’t watch that happen.”
I moved my power again. Peaceful rest to the suffering children. At least, hoping these children could live new lives in another world like me.
“Stop!”
But at that very moment as I was about to bring down my raised hand, someone crashed through the ceiling with a bang and landed behind me.
“Well who do we have here.”
I smirked looking at my opponent. A frilly cute pink one-piece dress, dainty decorations.
A cute little miss who obviously screamed ‘I’m a magical girl’ was holding a large staff. And on her shoulder rode a black ferret.
“Hmm?! Retina!”
Ren recognized the ferret. Natural for those in the same industry?
“It’s been a while, Ren. Weren’t you stripped of your position after messing up caring for Delight?”
“Sh-shut up about that!”
Ren jumped in surprise then looked at me anxiously and bounced around. Speaking of being stripped of position…
“A-anyway, we got here first. You back off!”
“No way. And I didn’t come to steal achievements. What are you doing, Ren? Can you even call yourself a mascot? When a kid goes astray, you should advise and discipline them.”
The ferret openly mocked Ren. By all appearances, it was just another arrogant, elitist mascot.
“…Hello?”
Instead of the little ones, I spoke first to that child in the same situation as me. Friendly, with a smile.
“A rookie… speaking informally?!”
However, the cute girl frowned looking at me as if in disbelief.
“Hey, how old are you? Aren’t you a rookie?!”
“…?”
“Don’t you know me? I’m Keny!”
She opened her eyes wide and pointed at herself. Meanwhile, I was buffering at the strange way of speaking coming from the cute girl’s mouth.
“I’m 17 you know? And I’m your senior so watch how you talk?”
“Ah.”
Now I understood. Since transformed appearance is fixed, no matter how old they get, they return to that appearance when transforming.
“…What’s with that expression?”
Reading my grotesquely twisted expression, her face turned hostile.
Of course it would twist. The fact that someone old enough was going around looking like that.
Well, I suppose it’s not strange when a tentacle monster is going around wearing a girl’s shell.
“Then our great senior. Why are you here? As you can see, this is an illegal facility where horrible experiments are being conducted.”
“Kuh… I didn’t come to steal your achievements. Don’t worry.”
She frowned and stepped back. But personally, I wasn’t very pleased with her continuing to harp on about achievements even after seeing this scene.
“Anyway, stop it.”
“Stop what?”
“Trying to kill those children!”
“Oh senior. If you have experience, you probably know? These children have no hope. Even if we leave them like this, unless we bring an angel’s blessing, they’ll be overtaken by corrupted magic power and undergo mutations incomparable to cancer cells.”
I snorted. Well, at 17, it’s an age to be steeped in flowery sentiments about everyone being able to be happy.
But one needs to know that sometimes in this world, you have to let go.
“What stupid nonsense are you saying?”
However, it was me who still hadn’t adapted to this world.
“If we leave those kids alone, tons of new achievements will just keep appearing.”
“…”
“Don’t you know the basics? Didn’t your mascot teach you that?”
“Hiek.”
Ren bowed on his own, seemingly feeling called out. Now understanding the situation, I smirked.
“What? Why are you laughing?”
She clicked her tongue and glared at me. For a moment, I thought it might be fine to pluck out those eyes.
“Can’t you think about making it a little easier for them?”
“What are you saying… Ah~ right, you’re a rookie. I was like you once. But it’s stupid. Achievements are meant to be created and accumulated.”
Though I tried to reason with her, she just cackled as if it was nothing. At this point I gave up on communication.
Well, what communication in the first place? I came here to have fun, not to work and get stressed. I just flicked my hand.
“Wah!”
“Kuk, what are you doing!”
The rippling shadows all burst out in the form of needles, breaking all the test tubes and instantly taking the lives of the test subjects inside.
That wasn’t the end. As the shadows writhed, they gradually lifted my body into the air with my uniform jacket fluttering on my shoulders.
“Such stupidity! A mere magical girl dares…”
The rushing shadow tentacles struck the noisy ferret and sent it flying far away. Seems it tried to resist, but from my perspective, I just had to press down firmly.
Now the shadows were creeping over and covering this entire ship.
“Uh, uah..?”
“I hear competition between magical girls is free and natural. So it would be fine if I killed you here, right?”
I moved my floating body closer to her. I could see her frightened face right in front of me.
I placed my hand on her frozen neck.
“What should I do? Should I break this thin neck right now? Achievements? Are you just a mere merchant? If you’re a warrior fighting a war, know honor like a warrior. This is a basic principle even kept in the demon realm.”
My eyes flashing with red killing intent reflected in her eyes.
Meanwhile, there was a dripping sound. Unable to bear my killing intent, she had finally wet herself.
“That’s quite something to do at 17.”
When I smirked mockingly, her face turned bright red and she finally burst into tears. At that point I released her neck.
I’d lost interest. I’m not a mass murderer.
“Th-this time…”
“I clearly acted according to the regulations you taught me, Ren.”
I retrieved Ren and flew my body into the air.