0 Lulu
She hadn’t been able to go back. Or rather, there had been no going back. Unlike the other magical girls, Lulu had been the one person operating against the will of the organization. Even though she hadn’t caused it, she’d been without permission in the place where her master had lost her life—at the magical-girl class.
So there was no going back. It was even iffy if there’d been a place for her to begin with. At the very least, she couldn’t bring herself to just sort of go back with a careless smile on her face.
She hadn’t become too good for it. Neither had she become more conscious or aware. She’d just come to feel that doing things like that was embarrassing. Lulu wasn’t going back because she was embarrassed. She convinced herself that was fine.
But the world was not made so that magical girls with no backing could live on without doing anything. Whether they be human or magical girl, in a world where money rules everything, those with no earnings were not qualified to live. She’d considered wandering around to train herself, but that wouldn’t ever work.
“Waaaaaaaaaugh!”
Lulu cried out and leaped. A blade of flame passed by her back that she just barely managed to avoid. She landed and then kicked up dust as she ran along the wasteland. When she glanced at her back to check, it was smoldering with flame, so she hastily beat it out. She hadn’t managed to avoid it entirely.
This time three blades of flame flew at her. Lulu cried out, slid, rolled, ran around, and yet again just barely evaded. There was only so long that she could keep dodging in the middle of a wasteland with no obstacles. Looking at her back, it was smoldering again, so she beat it out.
“Hey! Over here! Over here!”
When she looked toward the voice, there was a hole in the ground. Lulu slid in without so much as a by-your-leave. This time she really did evade the blades of flame by just a hair, and she tumbled down into the ground, landing on her butt, which she rubbed as she proceeded through a tunnel, coming out to a slightly bigger space about the size of a room.
Two magical girls were waiting there. The one in a yamabushi-style costume was jangling a khakkhara. She pounded the ground with it. “Hey, what the heck is the meaning of this?”
Lulu tilted her head with a vague smile. “Uh…I got taken by surprise.”
“Don’t give me that, you dunce!”
“Listen here.” The other magical girl, who looked like a many-tailed fox, fixed Lulu with an icy stare that seemed to be smiling but wasn’t smiling at all. “We hired you because you said you can bring good luck.”
“Well, uh…we managed to avoid the absolute worst luck. Like, normally someone would have died, but we somehow got away.”
“Are you done with your excuse?”
“Hey, hey! Next time! Next time for sure!”
The mercenary business was tough. Next time I’ll have Miss Ril come, too, she thought. Then Lulu’s magic could manifest more wonderful powers.