BXBX NOVEL Chapter 15 part1
Welcome to Underground
I decided to search for a healing ESP\'er in order to provide support for the increase in fierce battles that the secret organization Amaterasu will have as it fights the world\'s darkness. However, as we usually do, Kaburagi-san and I narrowed it down to two candidates. After the transplanted Nenrikin has mutated, if you haven\'t trained it at all, then there is only momentary pain, as if you had hit your pinky toe against the corner of the dresser, even if the whole thing is torn off. Therefore, as the other Amaterasu members had also agreed that they would like to gather members from around the world, I searched for a healing ESP\'er by performing superpower transplants throughout the world.
As a result, there were suddenly many incidents around the world of people getting attacked by a momentary pain – as if they had hit their pinky toe on the corner of a dresser. The sudden pain was easily misunderstood as a physical illness, though because I only did it on a couple hundred people, the point of origin was scattered. It didn\'t even become a rumor on SNS, but I was aware that it was an annoyance to some people. I do feel somewhat apologetic about it, but I don\'t regret doing it.
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Healing ESP\'ers belong to a relatively rare category in terms of statistics. Most awaken powers based on natural phenomena, such as fire, ice, lightning, wind, etc1. About 90% of the whole are like this, with Touka-chan and Shouta-kun fitting into that as well. The remaining 10% are "other". This includes things like healing, time-stop, atomization, body strengthening, clairvoyance, teleportation, invisibility, and etc. Psychokinesis is probably "other" as well, but so far I haven\'t found anyone who has it except me. Is it really that rare? There were a limited amount of healing ESP\'ers within that 10%; of the approximately 150 thousand subjects, including monkey experiments, there were only four cases of healing powers being awakened.
From those four, Kaburagi-san and I (as we always do) each chose one to be our candidate for the next member of Amaterasu. Surprisingly, somehow we both ended up choosing nine-year-old girls. Kaburagi-san\'s candidate lives in England, and my candidate lives in Brazil.
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Her Excellency, the Duchess Kaburagi, recently has decided to withdraw from work related to electronic money and conventional stock trading. This is due to the fact that the electric power company and Kaneyama Tech\'s earnings came in and there\'s an expected increase in sales/stability in the future. It seems that she will keep some stocks, but she said she would quit buying and selling any additional ones.
Because Kaburagi-san is being kept busy dealing with that, I went over to her house at around noon for the decisive battle for selecting the final candidate. I was let in by the maid, deposited my coat, walked across a corridor laid with red carpet, then knocked on Kaburagi-san\'s door.
"Come in."
When I opened the door upon receiving permission from her usual beautiful but false voice, within was Kaburagi-san, facing the mirror dressed in a lovely ensemble.
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I was speechless.
Right now, I don\'t even care if she only faces the mirror in that ensemble. Her outfit is dangerous. It\'s a tight-fitting dress in pink and white with large openings in the back and chest and a miniskirt that generously and unhesitatingly exposes her upper thigh. She\'s also wearing knee socks with a star pattern on them, and shoes with small wings attached to them. In her hand is a small wand with a large gem on top of it.
There\'s no mistake; that\'s magical girl cosplay. She\'s a 23 year-old adult woman! Cosplaying as a magical girl! Not at a cosplay venue, but in an ordinary setting! Is this normal? Here?
What are you doing, Duchess?! Don\'t just say "Come in"! I shouldn\'t be coming in at all in this situation! Why are you so calm after having been seen in such a get-up?! Then again, you always were like that, weren\'t you!
Still, becoming a magical girl at 23 is difficult…
⋯⋯⋯.
…I don\'t mean that Kaburagi-san is difficult.
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"Welcome! You came for the final candidate selection, yes?"
"Oh, yes…?"
Kaburagi-san proceeds to start talking without bringing up her magical girl cosplay at all, as if such a thing is natural. I wonder how – even though she should be too old for such an outfit by at least 10 years – it looks so good on her. Just how? It doesn\'t feel like she\'s overdoing it, nor does it have that out-of-place cosplay feel to it. She\'s naturally wearing such exceedingly stylish clothes; it makes you think that a sparkling magical world actually exists, you know? If I look closely, she even looks a little different, it\'s like she\'s a bit younger somehow. She probably used makeup to achieve this look. She\'s even changed the design of the room to make it fancy in order to match the clothes.
If you think about it, while a 23 year-old may seem to be an \'obasan\' to a middle school student, to a 30 or 40 year-old, they probably look like a kid that\'s still going through puberty. It\'s not too late for her to become a magical girl… is it? Ugh, I\'m so confused.
While I stand there bewildered, Kaburagi-san clicks her heels together, winks, then throws a [Magical☆Kiss] attack. It pierced through my continuously-deployed psychokinetic defense for a direct hit, causing me to almost have a heart attack.
That\'s cheating! You\'re being too coy, Kaburagi-san! You\'re 23, right? Just how are you this charming, it\'s weird!
Kaburagi-san is incredible, you know? It\'s amazing how she has zero shame, isn\'t it? She completely believes in her own cuteness. And she really is cute. She became a cute magical girl at 23 years-old. I could fall in love with her all over again.
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I\'m barely able to recover my sanity by pinching myself with Nenrikin. I take a deep breath and try to restore the original flow of the conversation. Unfortunately, I didn\'t come here today to gaze in awe at the beautiful figure of the magical girl Duchess Kaburagi.
"My candidate is this girl."
"I chose this one."
I used my psychokinesis to take the paper out of my pocket, fold it into a bird, make it flap its wings to fly, land on the table, then return it to an ordinary piece of paper. Kaburagi-san snaps her fingers and retrieves her paper from the void. Hmm, good, it\'s a simple, yet excellent production. Let\'s do this. As I thought, that kind of small trick is a good fit for time-stop. I asked Kaburagi-san,
"How should we decide?"
"How about darts?"
"OK, I accept your challenge. This time, let\'s see, let\'s go for 2 rounds."
We lined up side-by-side a fixed distance away from the dartboard on the wall of Kaburagi-san\'s room. Four darts were prepared. Kaburagi-san had two darts with red feathers, while I had two darts with blue feathers. The rules are simple. Each of us throws our arrows and tries to hit the center of the target. After four throws, the one who is judged to have hit closest to the center wins.
Due to the "ladies\' first" rule, I let Kaburagi-san have the first turn. She fiddled with the dart in her hand, as if she remembered something, then shamelessly said,
"This time, let\'s prohibit the use of superpowers."
"Alright."
"But, it\'s possible that some unknown circumstances may occur where we use our superpowers without it seeming like we used them."
"…I understand."
In other words, you can cheat, but if you\'re caught, you lose. I have no objections. This ojisan won\'t get angry if the cheating is based on mutual agreement.
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As Kaburagi-san readies her aim and is about to throw, I call out to her.
"Kaburagi-san,"
"What is it?"
"You\'re the cutest girl in the world."
"*Ufufu
*, is that right?"Nope, no good. Psychological warfare failed. I was hoping she would get a little embarrassed and it would throw off her aim. Kaburagi-san laughed happily but wasn\'t upset, and threw her first dart elegantly… as I was assessing her, her first dart hit the middle of the board.
Hey, wait a minute, I couldn\'t see the dart\'s flight path. It just suddenly hit it.
"Oi, you stopped time just now and went to stab it in the board directly by hand, didn\'t you? I call foul, you cheater!"
"I did no such thing. Is there any proof that I did?"
When she was cross-examined, the "magical girl Duchess" feigned ignorance.
*Ho* ‒ ? I see, I see, in the end, you\'re that sort of person, aren\'t you? Alright then. In that case, I also have an idea.
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"I\'ll be recording this from the next turn. It\'s simple; if the video pauses unnaturally or if things randomly disappear in it, we\'ll regard that as evidence of cheating."
"I guess that\'s OK."
I put my smartphone in video mode and leaned it against a vase on the table, making sure it had a clear view of the dartboard.
I prepare for my first throw. Truth is, I have no idea how to throw darts. I\'ve never played such a \'fashionable\' game before. However, that won\'t result in a handicap.
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Footnotes:
1: Fire, ice, and lightning are a standard trio of elemental attacks ⇒
Not sure where the wind fits in. Usually the four elements would be water, earth, fire, and air, but here there\'s no earth element.