Snow White
Arlie’s, Dory’s, Calkoro’s, and Miss Ril’s inner voices grew distant. Dory had used her magic to drill a hole in the classroom, and the hard magical girls like Arlie and Miss Ril guarded them from the attacks of their pursuers as the rest of them kept moving. But Snow White didn’t know how long that would continue.
The school broadcast had been saying to gather in the courtyard—looking at that on its own, it was extremely suspicious. Snow White’s magic was not working well around the courtyard, an indicator that something shady was at work there. In the end, she couldn’t even get started at getting out of this situation without going to the courtyard.
Snow White clenched her weapon—an instinctual, unconscious move.
Frederica had entered the school. Snow White had been unable to hear her right away, perhaps since the courtyard had been between them, but she would never mistake that voice.
She could not allow Frederica to touch the ruins.
Without the time to wipe away the spiderwebs stuck in her hair, Snow White moved down the hallway. It was not just this old school building—the majority of buildings were not directly in contact with the ground, so there was a space between the floor and the ground. The space underneath the floor of the old school building was about twenty inches high, and you could move through it.
Right now, the floor was destroyed and there were holes everywhere, so it was difficult to sneak around. But on the other hand, that meant you could get in and out of it.
It was a space that normally nobody would go into. It was packed with dust and trash. Now she would make use of that. She threw up dust to block their vision, changing her position dizzyingly to confuse the Lightnings that pursued her. Listening to their mental voices, she thrust her weapon up from under the floor, aiming for the Lightnings’ feet, and with her third thrust, she came up out of the floor. She drove off the Lightnings who had been rushing Rappy, who was defending herself with her magic wrap.
They weren’t as capable as the Lightning Snow White knew. They were also lacking in combat experience. So many inner voices were flitting through Snow White’s mind unceasingly that she had trouble focusing on only a single one, but she could still tell who was coming at her.
And yet, there were so many. A beat later, lightning was fired in from all four directions, which she avoided by going inside the wrap with Rappy, and her storming blade swept from right to left, mowing down Lightnings.
The voices came closer. Snow White kept going.
She broke the window of the classroom and leaped out, and when lightning followed her, Rappy blocked it, smacking some wrap on the broken window. Tepsekemei wove through the Lightnings’ legs, and when the enemy’s eyes were drawn to her, Snow White punched and kicked them, and those who ignored Tepsekemei to go for Snow White had their feet swept up in a whirlwind and were made to fall as she cut across the hallway.
A lightning strike that the wrap hadn’t been able to block hit Snow White’s back, and she clenched her teeth to keep from getting knocked out. Her legs seemed like they would falter at any moment, but she moved them mechanically forward, catching the thoughts that she had heard from the end of the hall.
A group of Lightnings was looking for enemies as it made its way along. It was a group led by the club face cards, and it was far stronger than the Lightnings that they were fighting now.
“To the left.”
She changed direction to avoid the group. The enemies were strong, and there were many of them, but she had the advantage of knowing the location. This could still work—just barely.
She kicked out a floor-level window with a baseball slide that stirred up dust, entering a vacant classroom and pulling Rappy’s hand. To stop the enemies who were following her, Snow White put the wrap over the window—but her pursuers tore down the wall almost immediately. Without a moment to catch their breath, she and Rappy ran off.
They couldn’t face those Lightnings in a straight fight. Right now, they had no choice but to just keep running.
There were so many Lightnings it was hard to pick up their individual voices, but she somehow heard one as she made her way along, while correcting her way to the courtyard. Arlie and the others’ voices grew distant, but Snow White was too busy to focus on them. She could only pray that they were safe.
She heard someone’s inner voice—one she’d never paid attention to before. It hadn’t appeared suddenly. During the battle, it was so peaceful she could just about miss it. This person was suppressing their own mind’s voice. Never before had a magical girl done such a thing.
Snow White was surprised as well as confused at the quality of the voice and what it was thinking. But she kept her guard up, raised her weapon, and faced the voice.
“You’re putting up quite a nice fight.”
The group of Lightnings broke open. A hand gesturing to her approached her gradually. Snow White thrust her hand out in front of Rappy, restraining her. Rappy was at a loss, just like Snow White. She couldn’t understand what was happening.
In a sense, Snow White was even more confused than Rappy. The things she was hearing from this voice and its vocal quality—it had a warmth that made her want to lean into it.
“You and I could join forces. Don’t you agree?”
She heard another inner voice. This girl was working with Ripple.
Snow White gripped her weapon.
Ripple… Ripple… Ripple!
The Lightnings were pointing their swords at her. Old Blue stood among them, her gaze on Snow White. The blue magical girl looked like she was enjoying herself.