Inside the gymnasium many of The Scouring were battling each other under the effects of Strife’s ‘cursed’ confusion eye, but some were still focused on those of us fighting as well as chasing the Humuruns remaining in the room.
The sounds of combat had not gone unheard even after normal school hours. There were a few people in the halls in the distance, and one man much closer. He had absolutely perfect hair and skin, and I imagined the sort of people into that would be all over him. Though part of that observation was due to the squad of girls behind him, as I wasn’t normally attuned to such insights.
He looked straight at me. “... Magical Man?”
“No,” I said. “I categorically refuse to go by that name.” I looked at the various Humuruns who had not yet gotten far. “Someone take care of these civilians, please.”
A single silvery fish form Humurun swam up to the man, presumably revealing itself to him. “Hmm. You’ll do. Do you desire to fight the forces of evil?”
“... Yes?” the man said hesitantly.
“Good enough.”
The fish dove directly into the man’s chest, disappearing in silver ripples that propagated across the man’s chest and then down his extremities. When the transformation was complete, he stood fully garbed in silver with a tailed jacket and tophat in the same color. Everything he wore was very… glittery. That included what I assumed was supposed to be a wand in his hand.
“Uh… what do I…?” he looked around.
“I’ll handle this,” the fish commented, suddenly appearing. Multiple times.
One of them dove into me, pulling out of me what was presumably supposed to be a decoy copy, except it shared the same silver sequin-and-glitter aesthetic as the guy.
“You’re Magical Man now,” I said, pointing to him. “I’m Turlough.” This was an entirely different world and it was easier to just not use my moniker.
Magical Man seemed to accept the name for the moment, watching additional fish fly into the spear-lady as well as Strife and then random Humuruns. Each of them got their own very unconvincing copy- or so I would say, except The Scouring seemed to take them for real. The true Strife quickly disengaged as she found a moment to spare, while the other one seemed to be throwing quills and just missing the enemy. Meanwhile, the second me was throwing out magic that I absolutely couldn’t do, like fireballs.
“For the moment,” our fishy friend explained, “These will not be combat capable clones. But eventually you will be able to be more effective.”
“Right,” Magical Man nodded. He glanced towards the crowd. “Should I be concerned about them or…?”
“Only in the manner that you should help escort them away,” the Humurun said. “Those who are watching will likely undergo mysterious amnesia about your involvement in this incident.”
How convenient. And potentially not random.
“Oh. That’s… good?” Magical Man frowned. “Umm, everyone! Please come with me! It’s dangerous to stay!”
As he began to speak, he turned into multiple copies of him, leading various groups towards different exits. I could see him curiously looking down at the various versions of him, and I wondered how much conscious control he had over things. How fun.
Now then, how best to hold back the rest of this swarm?
“Hey, you-” I gestured to the teacher turned magical girl. “Uh… Matador.” She got her powers from a bull, right? And she kind of looked like one. Everything checked out. “Come help us hold this door!”
A few Humuruns were still scrambling for the exit. Midnight- the real one, not the copy one- used Chain Lightning to clear out the mess of enemies around a particular bison and sloth. They trotted out the door just in time to avoid a new wave of enemies coming from a portal just inside the room- up in the air where it was dropping monstrosities.
I was glad that my staff was made out of Yggdrasil wood- artificial or not, it was quite sturdy. It packed a punch, but was still light enough to not tire me out too quickly.
Haste had faded a few moments before, which meant little more than a minute had passed in all the chaos. I wasn’t sure how long it would take for backup to arrive, but holding the line would be difficult for however long that took, especially with more enemies pouring through.
I stood to the side, reaching out for the newest portal that appeared. I began to twist and squash it with Alter Portal, heedless of how much mana it took me. I really didn’t know how much mana it took me, but by the time it shrunk to a single point and expired I was unsteady on my feet. The rush of mana I expected was filling me, but I likely wouldn’t have enough for another portal for a few minutes.
Still, if I could try another portal from a distance, if I collapsed it would be outside where I should be relatively safe. Though I was going to do my best to not hit that limit.
I might end up simply shrinking a portal, but if that could stem the flow of enemies it would be worthwhile. I saw one particular candidate that had a massive horned head in front of it, ready to push through.
Since I was already screwing around, I might as well try something interesting. It should be cheaper to distort less of the portal, shouldn’t it? So if I squeezed from the top and bottom…
I focused everything on my control of mana and remaining conscious. Even if I could be rescued if I passed out, I really didn’t want to burden the few fighters we had with something like that. Or Midnight. The real one, who was only slightly less silver than the other with his battle suit active and visible. He was low on mana and focused on using his built-in weaponry.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
My mana was… not important at the moment. As long as I remained conscious. The previously round portal I was focused on had now become something like an oval. I continued to pull together parts of it, not quite collapsing it. If the two sides touched, I might have to bear the burden of splitting it into two portals or otherwise completely closing it.
I staggered backwards, using my staff as a crutch to hold myself up. I was so dizzy. What was this, less than a point of mana remaining? That had been close.
Huge pools of monster blood were filling the doorway as Strife and Matador stabbed the enemy with quills and a bident. Some of it was fading away into magical substance as the creatures perished, but it left a pretty unpleasant area at the doorway.
I whacked a few more things as I stumbled back. When was help going to arrive? I needed to stem the tide even further. What could I do with part of a point of mana? I gave myself a few seconds to steady my head. Maybe I could turn a portal into a ring? If there was a non-portal part in the very middle, it would make larger things get stuck while manipulating the minimum total surface area.
That made sense to me in my current state, even if later I would realize that it was probably a much more difficult task. I stopped further down the hallway, at an angle where I could just make out one of the portals. It was a bit far, but what could I do about that? I certainly wasn’t going to use the last of my mana inside that hellscape.
Could I even gather mana without passing out? I was going to have to toss it at my goal in a single burst. I envisioned strongly what I wanted, then I threw mana at the problem. My vision blurred as I saw a tiny bit of the back of the gym instead of a terrible portal. But the flow of mana continued as I pushed it wider, until the central ring was nearly half the radius of the larger portal.
Some part of me understood that wasn’t what could be accomplished with just a point or two of mana. Most of me was focused on stumbling into the wall and sliding down it so I wouldn’t hit my head when I passed out. Which should happen… well, probably ten seconds earlier.
I saw someone run past me. By the time she transformed, the figure was almost the same height as I was- sitting. Okay, that wasn’t even true with the power of exaggeration, but I did vaguely comprehend Flaming Shrimp coming to the rescue.
I sat against the wall in a daze, wondering why I was still conscious. It had to be connected to why I felt sick and why my head hurt. My head hurt the most, and my everything else just ached.
Midnight’s head pushed into my hand. “Hey, buddy,” I said.
He didn’t ask me if I was alright, because it was pointless. “What happened? I only felt some of that.”
“Dunno. Hard to think,” I said. I watched the pretty colors of fire and wondered if Flaming Shrimp was burning down the gym. Actually, part of the hallway was on fire- but the flames leapt off of the walls into the gymnasium. “Hey, are the portals almost done?”
“Looks like it,” Midnight said. “Otherwise I would be forcing you to try to stand.”
“I could crawl,” I said. “Like that sloth.”
-----
I was conscious the whole time the magical girls- and one dazed magical guy- were cleaning up the damage to the gymnasium. I had nearly forgotten that all of them came with reality distorting repair powers, but it helped explain why this world and especially this version of Japan still functioned.
A vague pink figure eventually appeared in front of me. “Where are you hurt?”
Ah, it was Pink Wand. “My soul, probably. I think my body is fine.”
“He’s got a gash on his back,” Midnight said.
Hmm. I hadn’t even felt that until he mentioned it. I turned away from the wall. “Yeah, just that. It’s probably fine.”
“It’s bleeding a lot,” Pink Wand said as she began using her particular form of magic to stitch me up. It was probably the fastest healing magic I’d ever felt, if not necessarily the most powerful.
“Is it a lot?” I asked Midnight. My consciousness was more stable, now- but my mana was pretty empty. After half an hour, I would have expected to be… less wobbly.
“Not by your standards,” Midnight commented. “Francois’ work held together.”
“Good. Force Armor seems a bit… lacking these days.”
“Especially against so many enemies,” Midnight agreed.
After my flesh was stitched back together, my clothes were as well. “Hmm. Does that fix supernatural gear properly?”
“Obviously,” Pink Wand said. “How else would we repair our transformation outfits?”
Weren’t their clothes magical constructs? Two of them had been spontaneously recruited, and they had full outfits. Did that mean the Humuruns spontaneously created permanent, real equipment?
The powers here sounded pretty unfair.
A familiar eye appeared in front of me as Strife crouched down. “Are you able to stand?”
“I can now, yeah,” I said. “No injuries and…” my consciousness wasn’t great, but part of that was because I had a million thoughts trying to find their way to the surface. Hopefully, they would be valuable insights into magic itself and not too many memories of Humuruns getting eaten. I was pretty sure that The Scouring got a few of them. Which probably meant they had been waiting. And taken advantage of me weakening planar boundaries, maybe.
Hopefully it was just the first thing, but them being ready to spring into the world at an unplanned moment was still discomforting.
With Midnight on my shoulder, my balance felt more steady. It might not actually have been, but we walked out of the school to head to a safehouse. Along the way people discussed possibilities, and I mentioned my own theories.
“Clearly, they were able to sense the gathering of Humuruns… or the open Gate. They might have taken advantage of it.”
Lady Eglantine pondered from atop Strife’s head. It looked like it would have been uncomfortable, but Strife showed no sign of carrying any particular weight. Unmanifested Humuruns might just be like that, or something. “They are indeed able to sense us. We should have anticipated this danger. Our previous test case was inside a warded safehouse and we may have miscalculated. They’re not meant primarily as a shelter from the people of Earth, you know. Our eagerness to bring more of our fellows here backfired.”
I could see some of the others talking to the new members off to the side. They were clearly a bit shocked at being so abruptly recruited into the magical community. From what I understood, normally Humuruns went through a much longer process for their choosing.
Once inside the safehouse proper, which must have had wards that extended far beyond it so that people didn’t notice odd individuals such as ourselves coming and going, there were various discussions to be had. It was generally agreed that some combination of factors had been at fault, but no blame was laid at any particular feet. Any future attempts would be much more well defended, however- though the Humuruns had brought through more of their people than they expected to arrive on Earth in a year.
It was nice to not have people angry- just concerned. But even if people had been yelling at me, I would have barely noticed.
