Adah didn’t have much time to wonder about why Apex Vox had shown up at some low-ranking mission in a region that wasn’t theirs. The target Cruelty for today’s mission soon materialized atop a hill a short distance away from Adah and her teammates. This was among the simplest variants among the C-Ranks: a gray rabbit the size of an RV, with two tall eyestalks where a normal rabbit’s ears would be.

  Ranking Cruelty variants was far from an exact science. The Magedars could measure the volume of essence that was gathering in a particular area, and enough distinguishing features of that power to identify the monster if it was of a known variant, but a Cruelty’s strength was somewhat subjective. Depending on a team’s spells and natural aptitudes, they could find one C-Rank variant much easier to deal with than another.

  The rankings themselves were partly a means to divide missions into bounty tiers, which meant they could represent a fairly wide spectrum of Cruelty strength. In general, certain Cruelties were recognized to sit at the top end of power that could still classify as C-Rank, such as the lynx Emi had recently fought. Others, like the rabbit their team was taking on today, fell toward the weaker end of the C-Rank spectrum. It was these weaker—or easier to deal with—variants that Secretary Thibault planned to have the lower leveled teams in Region 4 take off DreamRise and the Last Light’s plate eventually.

  The rabbit’s only real threat was its hop. It could jump as high as a skyscraper, and it could get up there even faster than the twins could fly there. Then, it seemed able to either control its fall or effect gravity in some way, since it plummeted back to the ground faster than an anvil in an old cartoon. This hop, which was more like an ultrafast elevator, was the rabbit’s main means of avoiding the attacks of magic users and delivering its own. In a pinch, it would kick or bite, but both of those were simple enough to dodge or defend against.

  Offensively, the monster was no trouble at all. The eyestalks sprouting from the top of its head could make the fight a bit more interesting, though.

  These eyestalks were a common theme among Cruelties—they must have been a favored attribute they had picked up while harvesting essence in another world. The eyes seemed to afford a few potential effects, such as sight-based teleportation like with the whale Cruelty or target acquisition and communication like with the K-Rank Cruelties. The rabbit, weak as it was, had none of that. Its eyes were simply for sight, with their only unique feature being that the monster could process the images from each simultaneously. They ended up serving the same function as a normal rabbit’s ears, only better: watching out for predators.

  Or, in this case, magical girls.

  The girls of the Sisterhood of the Last Light had an abundance of options at their disposal to take out this gray furball. If they locked down its movement or baited it into landing in a certain spot, Adah could destroy it with her whip, or Rika with her railgun. Loading up Ami’s shield for the same effect would work, or even unleashing more of the scythe’s energy to end the battle in an instant. Given the point of going out on this mission as four was to show themselves off as a unit, the girls decided to wear the rabbit down through a series of individual attacks.

  The fight would end quick no matter what, so this approach would make sure they each had a chance to get involved, even if their attacks were simply formalities.

  “Emi and me in the air, you two on the ground?” Ami suggested.

  “Works for me,” Rika said.

  “Whoever kills it buys dessert for tonight,” Emi said.

  “Isn’t that backward?” Adah said. “We should be incentivized to kill it.”

  Rika shook her head and said, “You’re slow on the uptake today. We’re saving the core for you, so that means—”

  “Thanks for the éclairs!” Ami shouted before rushing off toward the rabbit.

  “And the ice cream!” Emi added before doing the same.

  Flying away wouldn’t get them out of earshot—didn’t they remember they could always talk through magic channels?

  “I’m only buying one thing!” Adah called after them.

  “Does that mean I’m not getting pumpkin pie?” Rika asked in far too saccharine a tone for the occasion.

  “I still owe Izzy tiramisu,” Adah muttered, mostly just to preempt the pig joining in on this list of demands.

  In any case, dessert would have to wait until they finished up this job. So would dinner, for that matter.

  “Let’s make this quick,” Adah said to her team. “All this talk made me realize I haven’t eaten since breakfast.”

  Rika must have taken Adah’s words to heart, for she immediately began charging her [Renova Railgun]. The spell’s red aura glowed around her body, and only a moment after the light reached its peak, she let loose the bullet. This was her quickfire she had practiced on that N-Rank job with Adah a little while back, and today’s mission was an ideal opportunity to continue testing it out.

  Though her charging period only lasted a couple of seconds, that was enough time for the rabbit to spot the impending danger. The monster hopped into the air just as the railgun fired, leaving Rika’s bullet to strike the top of the hill and send a small explosion of grass and dirt flying in all directions.

  In its rush to get out of the bullet’s path, the rabbit had jumped straight up, where Ami was already waiting with the rivulets of her Poseidon’s Pugni coursing around her balled up fists. The beast’s eyestalks noticed the magical girl as the rabbit floated upward, but was too slow to reverse its gravity and plunge down out of the sky. Ami had already cranked back a punch, and thrust her fist forward once the Cruelty reached her height.

  The momentum of her punch was carried forward by a jet of water shot out by the weapon wrapped around her fist. The burst of water struck the rabbit’s belly like a runaway truck and sent it hurtling through the air. After putting her weapon’s controlling capabilities to good use at the shopping center, Ami must have been eager to have fun with its offensive power as well.

  The rabbit tumbled through the air in an arc, completely unable to influence its trajectory after such a powerful strike. At the end of that arc, Emi was waiting with Mercury’s Majesty readied in its halberd form.

  Except Emi’s location wasn’t the end of the arc. The rabbit flew far over her head, still carried by the force of Ami’s strike. As Emi noticed her target was going to pass her by, she began to fly backward in an attempt to meet the rabbit where it was headed.

  “Too much!” she yelled to her sister. “Way too much!”

  “Sorry,” Ami said with a laugh. “I told you to go long!”

  Emi said nothing in return. She flew silently after the rabbit, and the other girls followed to meet her there.

  As they flew, Rika said to Adah privately, “Don’t they seem out of sync today?”

  While it was true the twins could usually read each other’s intentions without so much as a word, that didn’t mean they never stepped on each other’s toes. Adah was willing to chalk up today’s small lack of coordination as one such fluke.

  “Everyone’s just excited,” she said to Rika. “It’s been a while since we fought as a team, and now we’re doing it in new transformations.”

  Besides, Emi had managed to hunt down the rabbit before it fell to the ground, and had sliced it apart with her halberd. She had managed to adapt to Ami’s overshot and bring this mission to what was effectively its end.

  The rabbit lay mangled in one of the valleys between the hills, ready for Adah to consume its core.

  Adah summoned Beleth’s Bloodletter as she had during the lynx mission, its materialization hidden with the smoky winds of her [Nightwind Whip]. She swung her scythe’s blade into the rabbit’s core, claiming the monster’s essence for her own.

  “You’d all better finish your dinners before skipping ahead to dessert,” she said to her teammates.

  She could only assume the stern look she gave them had no effect at all.

  ☆☆☆

  After the mission came to a close, the girls flew over to where the crowd of spectators had gathered. The local news had some questions about their new transformations and names, which the girls did their best to answer in-character. It would take some experience before they could do so like it was second nature. The Rally Force members also begged to take photos with the girls in their new outfits—particularly with the Raindrop Reaper. The girls were happy to oblige, especially given the photos would make for free publicity online.

  Throughout all these interactions, however, Adah’s attention was fixed on the Apex Vox trio. Why had they come here, and why had they brought their manager with them?

  The animal-eared magical girls watched from afar as the girls of the Last Light interacted with the news and their fans. They weren’t interested in any of that attention themselves, so the fact they were sticking around could only mean they wanted to talk to Adah’s team.

  The news crews had departed a while ago now, probably hoping to clock out before the day turned fully to night. Once all of the Rally Force members had gotten the photos they wanted, Seb shooed them off, too. They left as one big group, heading down the hill to a nearby parking lot where they had originally met up.

  That left only the two teams of magical girls.

  Sheffa Surefoot approached first, walking toward Adah with a wide smile across her face. She had the same sand-colored hair as Iris, and had tied some of into a particularly messy top knot bun. She stood a couple of inches shorter than the twins, but even through her jeans, Adah could tell she had more defined muscles than either Ami or Emi. If Adah had to summarize the girl’s look: she was a sunflower.

  Sheffa stopped a few feet away from Adah. She thrust her arm forward and gave them a thumbs-up.

  “Looking cool!” she said. Her voice sounded… genuine?

  “Thanks,” Adah said cautiously as she looked over Sheffa’s two teammates.

  Canto Quickclaw was much closer to Adah’s size, with the same black hair. Hers was styled in a wavy bob that draped her face in a remarkably cute way. In contrast to Sheffa’s bright smile, Canto’s face was relaxed. The sharp corners of her eyes and the unflinching stare they gave made her appear decidedly catlike.

  Inarkaki… Inarinkar… Ina—

  Mari was buried beneath a hoodie three sizes too large for her, such that only the ends of her capri-clad legs and her head poked out from under the pink sweater. She had her reddish bangs pushed back by a fluffy headband that looked like it was meant for keeping her hair out of the way while she washed her face rather than wearing out and about. It was in keeping with the rest of her loungewear outfit.

  “Now these are designs with enough hoopla to match your team!” Sheffa continued.

  Hoopla? She definitely hadn’t used that word right.

  “T-Thanks,” Adah said again.

  Sheffa immediately collapsed forward and bent over with her hands on her knees.

  “Don’t give us the cold shoulder,” she said, sounding seriously sad this time. “We waited so long to talk to you!”

  “Maybe they hate us,” Canto said.

  “If they hate us,” Mari joined in, “then that would mean they like DreamRise!”

  All the while, the woman who must have been their manager stood there with her arms behind her back and a pleasant smile on her face. She certainly had a different management style than Grace.

  “We don’t hate you,” Adah said. “And we definitely don’t like DreamRise. I guess I’m just confused why you’re here?”

  “We wanted to say hi,” Sheffa answered without pause.

  “Just ‘hi?’” Rika asked.

  Sheffa put her hands on her head and said, “Well, I was hoping we could chat a little after, but if you’re going to be this difficult to talk to then I don’t know!”

  Mari stepped forward to add, “You don’t need to worry—Canto only bites as a sign of affection.”

  “I don’t bite at all!”

  “You don’t love anyone?!” Mari yelled as if she’d planned out this whole back-and-forth.

  Before they could go off on any more tangents, Adah waved her hand in front of her face.

  “Sorry,” she said. “It’s just… we’ve never really chatted with another team before. Not in a good way, at least.”

  Outside of individual magical girls like Ketzia and Seliah, any team the Last Light girls had come in contact with had been confrontational at worst and dismissive at best. The possibility that some of their peers might be friendly to them hadn’t crossed their minds.

  “Ah,” Mari said, “you don’t have any friends.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  Sheffa chuckled and said, “Not to worry—you’ve got friends now. Looks like my instincts were right, huh, Nora? The creme doesn’t always rise to the top.”

  “You say that as though I’ve ever doubted you,” the Apex Vox manager said. “Or do you just like when I remind you that you were my first choice for this unit?”

  “Maybe I do!” Sheffa declared, smiling at just the corners of her mouth.

  Their manager—Nora, as Sheffa had said—had been standing off to the side as the two teams talked, but now she approached Adah. She reached into her pants pocket and produced a stack of business cards. With that same warm smile, she handed one to each of the four Last Light girls and gave one extra to Adah. Nora’s contact info and the address of the Apex Vox office were printed across the card.

  “For your agency,” Nora said. “We’re interested in a collaboration—when the time is right.”

  Adah inspected the cards in her hand, then looked over the faces of the three magical girls and their manager. With the exception of Canto, they were all smiling. Their expressions still looked sincere, but Adah couldn’t shake her suspicions. You needed to stay on edge around other magical girls.

  “Hey,” Sheffa spoke up, nearly spooking Adah out of her thoughts. “There’s a reason we wanted to talk to you and not DreamRise. I don’t decide my friends based on how they placed in some competition. I want to work with people I can trust, of which there are few in this industry. Based on your face, I’m guessing you feel the same way.”

  Adah turned to look at her teammates. Their faces all showed the same optimistic caution as she suspected was displayed on her own.

  “Besides,” Sheffa added, “if I was placing a bet on a team to climb the ranks—it’d be yours.”