The Ooze Fiends didn't stand a chance.

  I’d spent twenty years in the field, and I knew a natural-born brawler when I saw one. Akane didn't move like a magical girl; she moved like a hurricane with a grudge. She lunged at the nearest cluster of sludge, her spiked gauntlets roaring with a high-voltage whine.

  *CRACK-BOOM.*

  The first punch didn't just hit the monster; it detonated it. A surge of blue-white electricity arced through the creature’s amorphous body, turning the neon-green goo into harmless, scorched steam in a fraction of a second.

  My fists were still clenched at my sides -useless- as she pivoted on her heel. Her movements were fluid, instinctive, and terrifyingly fast. I was good at CQC-mercenary work demanded it-but Akane was on another level. She wasn't thinking about her strikes; she was the strike.

  More importantly, her attacks were pure, raw electricity. There was no mana-signature for the ooze to feed on, no catalytic reaction to trigger. The sludge sparkled and hissed as the current tore through it, but it didn't explode. In less than thirty seconds, the bathhouse was clear. The only thing left of the monsters was a faint smell of ozone and burnt sugar.

  Akane stood in the center of the wreckage, her chest heaving. The black and red armor was still crackling, tiny arcs of lightning dancing between the spikes on her gauntlets. Her amber eyes were wide, fixed on her own hands as if they belonged to a stranger.

  "What... what did I..." she whispered, her voice trembling.

  "You saved your family, Akane," I said, stepping toward her. My guns stayed low, not wanting to spook her. "But we need to move. Now."

  Outside, the sound of heavy boots and shouting was getting closer. The police were done waiting. I could hear the rhythmic *thud* of a battering ram hitting the side door.

  "Misaki, the perimeter is collapsing," Kibi said, landing on my shoulder. He looked at Akane with a disturbing amount of pride. "The Vanguard has awakened. Her resonance was triggered by the protective instinct-the 'Shield of the Hearth.' The ooze was just the catalyst."

  "Save the lore for later, Kibi." My hand was already in the belt pouch, fingers closing around a smoke grenade. "We have company."

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  "I can't... I can't go out like this," Akane said, her voice rising in panic. She looked down at her glowing bodysuit. "My parents... the neighbors... they'll see me!"

  "They won't see anything," I promised.

  The pin came out. Thick, grey-white smoke billowed from the canister, filling the cedar-lined room in seconds. Akane's armored hand was hot to the touch, vibrating with a low-frequency hum, as I pulled her toward the skylight.

  "Up. Now!"

  We vaulted through the opening just as the front doors burst open. A glimpse of the cop from the cordon-service pistol drawn, jaw set in a grim line-was all I caught before the smoke swallowed everything. He wouldn't find any monsters, and he wouldn't find any magical girls. Just the scorched remains of a nightmare.

  ***

  The walk back to my apartment was a blur of shadows and back alleys. Akane was still in her "Vanguard" form, which made stealth difficult. She was literally a walking neon sign.

  "Can you turn it off?" I asked as we slipped through the service entrance of my building.

  "I don't know how!" she hissed, her hair still sparking. "It feels like... like I’m plugged into a wall socket. I can't stop the buzzing!"

  "Deep breaths," I said, punching the code for the elevator. "Focus on the silence. The armor is a manifestation of your will. If you don't want to fight, it doesn't want to exist."

  By the time we reached the top floor, the armor had finally faded, leaving Akane in her torn bathhouse yukata, shivering despite the humidity.

  The door to my apartment swung open and I stepped aside. Akane walked in, her eyes widening as she took in the floor-to-ceiling windows, the sleek Italian leather furniture, and the high-end kitchen.

  "Whoa," she breathed, momentarily forgetting she’d just punched a hole through reality. "I thought you were... I don't know, a student? Or a freelancer? This place is like a movie set."

  "I've had a long career," I said, heading for the cabinet to find some brandy. A drink for me, a sedative for her. "Sit down. Kibi, explain."

  Kibi hopped onto the marble countertop, looking entirely too smug. "It’s simple, really. The Abyss isn't just attacking. They’re testing. They targeted the Tsubasa-yu because it’s a high-density emotional anchor. They wanted to see if they could force a resonance."

  The bottle of brandy stopped halfway to a glass. "They wanted this to happen? They wanted another one of us?"

  "They wanted to see what would happen when the Abyss met a compatible soul," Kibi said. "They’re not just monsters, Misaki. They’re scientists. And we just gave them exactly what they were looking for."

  Akane looked from me to the fox, her face pale. "I just wanted to save the bathhouse." Her voice cracked, and for a moment the fighter was gone-replaced by a nineteen-year-old staring at the ruin of three generations of her family's work. "The cedar panels... Grandpa hand-carved those when he came back from the war. And now they're..."

  She swallowed the rest of the sentence. Her fists clenched in her lap.

  "I need to go back. My parents... they must be terrified."

  "You can't go back yet," I said, finally pouring the drink. "Not until we figure out if you're still a target. And Akane? The posters, the pins, the fans, the magic-it's all window dressing. Welcome to the war."