Chapter Text
“What is Promised Blood? What do you intend to do in Kamihama?!” Mifuyu cried out across the dilapidated building. Yachiyo stood next to her, poised and ready to strike the moment things turned hostile. The dying sun illuminated the skeletal remains of what was once an office space in a dim orange glow, with the shadows cast by the support pillars almost completely concealing their opponent. It was only the electric yellow of her Soul Gem that cast a faint silhouette on her. The sounds of fighting between the Magia Union and Promised Blood could be heard in the streets below.
“What are we?” The platinum blonde magical girl asked. She lifted a free hand to clutch her temples, seemingly contemplating what to say.
“We’re the survivors. All that was left after the disaster caused by the Magius. We want our pound of flesh,” She explained, her voice dripping with sheer malice as she transformed. The shadows were banished for a brief moment in the magical light of her metamorphosis, revealing a kimono-clad, horned magical girl wielding a great, spiked club.
Mifuyu’s hand shot towards her soul gem. Next to her, Yachiyo did the same. “There must be some misunderstanding!” Yachiyo spoke. “The Wings of the Magius were defeated. There was a tribunal, those responsible faced justice!”
The oni-magical girl’s face twisted, an ugly snarl taking place. “They faced your justice.The witch shortage caused by those you harbor killed dozens of my comrades! While they spoke of liberation for all Magical Girls, of salvation, I had to watch as those precious to me became witches, and it was left to me to put them down. You speak of justice. If you truly believe in this justice, let me enact my own.”
An ice cold chill shot through Mifuyu’s body. Her body almost froze up, before she felt a reaffirming hand on her shoulder from Yachiyo. “Don’t worry. I won’t let her harm you,” Yachiyo smiled as she communicated telepathically. Mifuyu managed to compose herself, and smiled back.
“I know you won’t Yacchan. Let’s do this. Together,” She said as the two transformed. Yachiyo pointed her spear at their foe, and took a deep breath.
“You’ll have to get through me first,” She announced.
“Very well. You shall die first.'' The girl’s voice was once again empty of emotion. Mifuyu was not new to fighting other magical girls. She’d been directly involved in the many conflicts of Kamihama, even long before the Magius were formed. The girl, and her conviction, was something to be feared.
Like a tiger pouncing on its prey, she was upon them. Yachiyo was quick to raise her halberd to a thrusting position, intending to skewer their opponent as she charged, but she wasn’t fast enough. Effortlessly knocking Yachiyo’s polearm aside, their opponent leaped into the air, her fell weapon gleaming with electricity. She swung the weapon downwards towards the off-balance Yachiyo. Mifuyu reacted in an instant, throwing her chakram into the club, sending the attack off course.
The chakram pinged off the surface of the oni’s weapon, falling to the ground, inert. In a graceful, ballet-like motion, Mifuyu threw two more chakrams, and used her magic to create many more illusory copies that concealed the location of the real weapons. The oni moved her weapon to block, making sure her soul gem was protected from the hail of weaponry. A mistake. The first projectile phased through her club and then harmlessly passed through her body. The moment she realized the nature of Mifuyu’s magic, the two real chakrams had already connected, leaving a deep gash in her left thigh and right shoulder. Fresh blood spilled on the floor, and a cry of pain was ripped from her lips.
Clutching the gash on her shoulder with her hand, she breathed heavily. “I see… Illusion magic.”
“Stand down.” Yachiyo exclaimed as she stabbed her spear into the ground, unleashing a tidal wave towards their wounded opponent. The force of the rushing water easily slammed her into the wall, excess water spilling out of the broken windows into the street below. Before the magical girl could do anything else, a carefully thrown spear pierced her hand, pinning her to the wall.
“Ggngh!” The magical girl’s cry of pain more closely resembled an animal's death cry than that of a human. And yet despite her incredible pain, her other hand reached for the spear, gripping onto it and trying to pull it out. She was met with another spear, inches from her Soul Gem, as well as a chakram hovering near her neck.
“Don’t move,” Yachiyo ordered their defeated opponent.
Mifuyu began to speak. “You’re going to answer some questions for us, then call off the rest of the Promised Blood. If you cooperate, we’ll call someone to heal you and let you off with a warning.”
“Go to hell,” she spat a thick glob of blood and mucus at Mifuyu’s feet.
“Watch your tone,” Yachiyo growled, moving her halberd closer to her Soul Gem.
“I would advise against testing Yacchan’s patience,” Mifuyu suggested. “First, what is your name?”
“Kureha Yuna,” She relented.
“How did you know about the Wings of the Magius?” Yachiyo pressed.
“We grabbed a few of those ‘Black Feathers’ and made them talk,” A small smile formed on Yuna’s face. Mifuyu felt sick.
Yachiyo looked at Mifuyu, concern clear on her face, before turning back to Yuna.
“Where is this ‘Promised Blood’ located in?”
“Futatsugi City.”
“Are you the one in charge? Can you call off this attack?” Mifuyu followed up.
“My Sisters listen to me when I speak.”
“And can you call off the attack?” She repeated herself.
“I could.”
“You could?” Mifuyu asked. “Does that mean you won’t? Why?”
“I have no reason to believe you will keep your end of the deal. Let me go now, and I’ll call off the attack.”
Mifuyu looked at Yachiyo. “She’s in very bad shape. She wasn’t able to hurt us when she was uninjured. I don't think she'll be able to fight back now,” she thought.
Yachiyo nodded. “I agree. Still, let’s not let our guard down.”
Mifuyu turned back to Yuna, and nodded, lowering her chakram. Yachiyo did the same with her halberd. “That is negotiable. Yacchan, call Tamaki-san. Kureha-san, we have someone coming who will heal you. After that, you’re free to go.”
“I don’t need your damn pity,” Yuna winced as she removed the spear from her hand. It fell to the floor with a metallic clank.
“Futatsugi is quite a long way from Kamihama, I assure you that you do , unless you want to cause a scene bleeding all over the train on the way home,” Mifuyu retorted.
Mifuyu realized her mistake a moment too late. Yuna placed the bloody palm of her hand on an old office desk. Her whole demeanor suddenly shifted from relenting and defeated, to downright murderous. “How about I make you bleed?!” She roared, as she slammed her club down onto the table, crushing it into splinters.
Mifuyu initially took this a temper tantrum from a deeply troubled person, until a searing pain shot up her left leg, causing her to fall to her knees with a shrill cry.
“You think you get to act all high and mighty after what you’ve done?! I refuse to be talked down to by the likes of you!” She rushed at Mifuyu, immobilized from her phantom injury, meekly putting up a chakram to defend herself. “Thunderbolt Burial!”
“Mifuyu!” Yachiyo cried out.
There was a flash of light, and a roaring thunderclap, drowning out all other stimuli. And then everything went black.
Mifuyu came to not even 10 seconds later, her ears ringing and her eyes seeing double-no, triple. She sat up, and rubbed her eyes, managing to focus on what had happened in front of her. Yuna was laying face down in a pool of her own blood, with many of Yachiyo’s spears piercing her through the back, head and other extremities. “Yacchan must have saved m-”
Mifuyu turned to her right, and screamed. Yachiyo was laying on her back, with a hairline crack running through her soul gem diagonally. Mifuyu tossed her chakram aside, and scrambled to her side. She leaned over Yachiyo’s body, and ignored the shooting pain in her own. She cradled Yachiyo in her arms, and felt her heart rise into her throat. “No… no, no, no! Yacchan, what did you do?!”
“I… saw she was about to kill you. I jumped in the way and stopped her…” She replied, weakly. “I guess she still grazed my soul gem, though,” Yachiyo coughed.
“Don’t move! Just… try not to use any magic! It’s only a crack, Tamaki-san is on the way, we can still save you! Like me after I fought that U-”
Yachiyo cupped Mifuyu’s cheek in her palm, and shook her head. “No. It’s too late for me.”
Hot tears began to well up in Mifuyu’s eyes as she held Yachiyo’s hand. “Wh-what do you mean? Of course you’ll make it!” Her voice broke.
“She’s not dead,” Yachiyo said. A chill went down Mifuyu’s spine, as she turned her head to look at Yuna, who was twitching, struggling to get off her back.
“A-after all that she’s still alive?” Mifuyu whimpered.
Yachiyo nodded. “ I missed… her Soul Gem…” Yachiyo closed her eyes, a pained expression crossed her face. “I… I think her magic… might be what I used to think mine was.”.
“I don’t care about any of that! I’m getting you out of here, before her friends show up!” Mifuyu's voice was hoarse as she yelled, trying to lift up Yachiyo, only to stop once the pain in her leg flared up once more. “Agh!”
For a moment, she considered blocking out the pain so she could carry Yachiyo to safety, but almost as if her mind was read, Yachiyo laid her other hand over Mifuyu’s soul gem. “Don’t hurt yourself like that!” She exclaimed, quite animated for the state she was in.
“Please! Let me save you! Stop acting like this is the end of the line! Right when we finally got back together… you.. you can’t just die! Don’t be so selfish! I don’t want to live without you! You make me strong! I need you!” Mifuyu pleaded.
Behind her, Yuna propped herself up on her club, and limped towards Mifuyu.
“Don’t say those things… Mifuyu. You’re… the reason that I’m so strong… in the first place. It will be hard… but you’ll manage. You always do,” Yachiyo smiled weakly. “I’m really happy we met… I’ve always loved you. It’s... funny.” She coughed. “I was always thinking you’d end up dying to save me…. Glad I was wrong.”
“Please! Don’t go! I love you!” Mifuyu wailed, uncaring of Yuna, who was standing right behind her, still stuck with Yachiyo’s halberds and drenched in blood.
“One last thing before I go… let’s Connect one last time.” Yachiyo breathed, gently pulling in Mifuyu’s face, wet with tears, and kissing her on the lips. A rainbow colored sigil appeared next to them, and Mifuyu felt a surge of familiar magic course through her body. Yachiyo’s.
A flood of memories washed over her, happy and sad. Their first meeting at 12 years old. A hanami they went to that ended up being unintentionally quite romantic. Birthdays. Kanae’s death, Mel becoming a witch. Their yearly letters they would exchange. Yachiyo tirelessly combing through the Rumor File looking for leads on Mifuyu’s whereabouts. The Seance Shrine, their eventual reunion. Yachiyo crying over her unconscious body. Everything that Yachiyo had experienced up until now.
She tried to make this kiss last as long as she could, she wanted to be frozen in that moment in time forever, everything else be damned. Eventually, Yachiyo pulled away, and the light began to fade from her eyes. “Live…” She whispered.
The sound of glass breaking echoed throughout the building, and her soul gem shattered with it, into a few shards of deep blue sapphire, dusted in a similarly colored powder. In a final flash of light, Yachiyo reverted from her magical girl form. As Mifuyu sobbed over her dead body, burying her face in Yachiyo’s chest, Yuna had finally summoned the strength to raise her club. “Don’t worry. I’ll send you to the same place she’s going.” She brought down her club towards Mifuyu’s back, and Mifuyu braced herself for impact.
Except she didn’t feel a thing. Yuna stumbled back, apparently surprised by Mifuyu’s sudden durability. Mifuyu reached for her back and ran her hand down it, and then pulled away to check her hand. Not a single drop of blood, or any other signs of a wound. It was as if her skin had suddenly turned into steel.
“Live…” Yachiyo’s last words echoed in Mifuyu’s mind as her soul gem rapidly grew corrupted. Mifuyu clutched the gemstone as her breathing grew ragged and heavy. “This can’t be real. This can’t be real. This is all a bad dream…” She repeated to herself like a mantra. “Yacchan is the one that survives. Not me.” She tried to rationalize to herself.
“Would you quit your whining and die already?!” Yuna roared, bringing her weapon down once more. Another glancing blow. “What the hell is this? I can’t even break skin!”
Mifuyu stood up, and clenched her fists. “Be quiet,” She commanded, voice dripping with venom. “Let me mourn in peace,” She turned around and made direct eye contact with Yuna. For a moment, Mifuyu could have sworn she saw fear in Yuna’s eyes. “What’s the matter, are you scared?” She breathed. A pale white, featureless mask manifested in front of her face.
“Helvelius, was it?” She asked aloud as her voice distorted and broke. “Destroy her. Make her suffer.”
“It’s unlike you to fully hand over the reins to me,” Her Doppel responded in her own voice. “If you’re that intent on killing her, I will assent. Be warned, though. There will be a price to pay.”
“I don’t care anymore. Do your worst.”
The mask’s lips curled into a thin smile. “As you wish,” For a moment, there was silence. Then, a rippling shockwave radiated out from Mifuyu’s soul gem. Black lightning arced off her body, before the impurities in her soul gem began to overflow and spill out as a thick, dreamlike haze.
Yuna took a step back, in shock at what was occurring before her. “This must be one of those ‘Doppels’ I heard about…” she muttered. The fog began to solidify and take form, revealing a large, hunched over figure draped in a multitude of colorful and textured fabrics. What were once the sleeves of Mifuyu’s outfit fell at either side of her, tied where the elbow would rest in a neat bow, parting almost like curtains. Where Mifuyu’s head was, there was now a bird cage gilded like a faberge egg, with two long streams of cloth bursting out of it on either side, and ending in bony four-pronged appendages. Mifuyu was still visible from about just above her waist down, although her legs didn’t appear to be doing much walking, instead hanging limp and loose and dragging their feet on the ground beneath her.
The awful thing hulked towards Yuna, flexing its skeletal fingers. Yuna took another step back, raising her club to defend herself. Her reflexes were fast for someone who had been stabbed through the back several times. But not fast enough. In a fraction of a second, illusory cranes began to burst out of the ground, flocking around Yuna and beating their wings. Their sharp beaks pecked away at her body, before the birds began to glow brightly and explode into more of that fog that Helvelius initially appeared to be composed of.
Then, Yuna made a critical error. She gasped for breath, and inhaled the fog. Suddenly, her movements grew sluggish, her thoughts slowed down, and her body felt heavy. “I’m not finished with you yet,” Helvelius thought, as its hands raised high above its head, gathering magic and kneading it into an incandescent white disk with a razor sharp edge. The Doppel of livelihood launched the projectile at Yuna. As it whistled through the air, it cleaved through a supporting beam of the building like it was nothing. Yuna tried to move, but her injuries had finally caught up to her. She closed her eyes, and waited for a death that didn’t come.
“Yuna-san!” An unfamiliar voice cried out. Moments before the disk was to hit Yuna, a magical girl who resembled a tin-soldier leapt in the way of the projectile, saber drawn. The edge of her sword met the edge of the disk, and with great effort, she managed to deflect it to the side, sending it straight through an adjacent wall.
Two other, red-clad magical girls landed on either side of Yuna, and each took one of Yuna’s arms, slinging them over their shoulder. “Hikaru… I thought you were fighting below. Why did you come?” Yuna asked, weakly.
“I’ll explain later, you look awful! We’re getting you out of here!” Hikaru exclaimed, using her magic to summon a horde of miniature tin soldiers to rush Helvelius. “That should keep that thing busy, let’s go!” She urged. The two magical girls in red nodded, and began to run, leaping out the window with their leader in tow.
Helvelius wasn’t about to let them escape so easily. Another volley of cranes emerged from the air to meet Hikaru’s tin soldiers, while a second disk was launched at the object of her ire, only for it to meet Hikaru’s saber, and be deflected once again. Her power waning, the march of the tin soldiers began to overwhelm the rate at which Helvelius could replenish her cranes. Soon enough, they were upon her, just as the doppel began to dissipate and Mifuyu fell to her knees, exhausted. She fell to the ground, and blacked out.
The first thing she felt when she came to a terrible, pounding headache. The first thing she smelled was pork stock. “T-Tsuruno-san?” Mifuyu asked weakly. She rubbed her eyes and blinked a few times until her blurry vision came back into focus. She was still in that awful building, with Her body laying in the corner of her vision. Iroha knelt over it, applying every ounce of healing magic she had, before shaking her head. Ui sat by her side, tightly squeezing the body’s cold hands. Sana began to quietly tear up and Felicia sat in the corner, knees tucked to her chest and arms wrapped around her legs as she wept loudly.
“Mifuyu! Thank goodness you’re okay!” Tsuruno cried, “I was so worried, we came here and saw you surrounded by those little soldiers, and you were unconscious, and, and…” Their lips moved, but what came from them was unintelligible, sounding like garbled static from an old radio. “...was… her soul gem was…” Tsuruno pulled Mifuyu into a deep hug, and sobbed. Tsuruno said something again that sounded like more static. “... is dead, Mifuyu…”
“Slow down, Tsuruno-san, I don’t understand what you’re saying…” Mifuyu breathed, as she felt another wave of her throbbing migraine pass over her. None of this felt real.
“She’s in shock,” Iroha assessed. “We can’t stay here, not with…” More static. “... and certainly not when Mifuyu-san is in this state.”
Tsuruno wiped the tears from their eyes, and nodded. “R-right. Let’s go. Mifuyu, can you walk?”
Meekly, she shook her head. “I don’t think I could stand up. My body feels like it’s made of lead.”
Tsuruno gave her a weak smile. “That’s okay,” they sighed, picking Mifuyu up in a bridal carry. “Get some rest. I’ll carry you home.”
Before Mifuyu could object, the dull pain in her head dragged her back to sleep.
Mifuyu opened her eyes to a blood-red sunset on a dried up riverbank. She was on her knees, hunched over a blonde corpse with pierced ears.
Involuntarily, her shaking hands moved to raise a grief seed to her shattered soul gem. She was stopped by the uncaring voice of Kyubey, who had perched himself atop the scaffolding of an unfinished bridge. The sun against his back cast a long, imposing shadow on the ground, and his beady red eyes shone in the dim light.
“Once that happens, restoration is impossible. There’s nothing we can do for Kanae.”
That’s right, this was the moment Kanae had died. Mifuyu had re-lived this same memory dozens of times before in the Magius’ Memory Museum whilst revealing the truth of magical girls to prospective Black Feathers. Mifuyu’s nightmare continued.
“That can’t be true…” She said, in a voice that wasn’t her own. It was unsure of itself and at the point of breaking down crying. “...Hey, Kanae…”
A pang of unfamiliarity arose inside of her. This wasn’t right. It didn’t happen like this. The one who tried to cleanse her soul gem, the one who said all these things, it wasn’t her, it was-
“Yacchan,” Said her own voice. “What a lovely name. It rolls off your tongue so easily.”
Mifuyu reflexively turned her head to face the voice that just spoke. What met her gaze was… herself. Her body gently clutched Kanae’s lifeless hands, and smiled. “Confused?” She asked, in a cloyingly sweet voice. “Look down. That will clear things up.”
Mifuyu anxiously turned her gaze downward, and gasped. She was wearing the Kamihama University Affiliated School’s uniform, not the purple of the Mizuna Girls’ School that she would have been wearing at the time of Kanae’s death. Additionally, the soul gem on her ring finger was blue, not purple, and the marking on the finger was a crescent moon shape. When she looked back up, attached to her body’s face was the unsettling white mask of a Doppel.
“You!” Mifuyu hissed. “Why are you here?”
Helvelius’ laughed, and the distorted timbre of her voice rattled around painfully in Mifuyu’s head. “Weren’t you paying attention, you idiot? I said there would be a price to pay for willingly giving control over to me! And you said, ‘Do your worst!’ You’d think that being a magical girl would teach you to be careful what you wish for, but apparently you still need a lesson in pain.”
Mifuyu grit her teeth. “ She’s dead. What else could you do to me? I have nothing left to lose!”
More booming laughter from the Doppel. “Do you now? Let me ask you something. Your partner, the one who just died. What’s her name?”
“Her name?!” Mifuyu looked at her Doppel with sheer incredulity. “I don’t know what you are trying to achieve here, but whatever it is won’t work. I know her name. I could never forget it.”
“Then say it.”
Mifuyu scowled. “Fine. Her name is-” Mifuyu paused.
A flock of cranes takes flight in the distance.
Mifuyu looked down at the ground, horrified. Even though Her face was staring right back at her in a nearby puddle, she couldn’t for the life of her remember Her name.
“Something the matter? What’s wrong? This one should be easy for you! You’ve only known each other for your entire teenage years. Hell, I even said your pet name for her just a few moments ago!” Helvelius taunted. “Didn’t you say you’d never forget it? It couldn’t possibly have slipped your mind, now could it?”
“Why… why are you doing this to me?” Mifuyu asked, clawing at the dirt.
“Because you wished to be free. You can’t be free while you’re beholden to the memories of your dearly departed. I’m doing you a favor, anyhow. Soon enough all the pain you feel will go away.”
“Give me back Her name, you bitch! If your ticket to freedom is amnesia, I’d rather stay in the cage my whole life!” Mifuyu exploded in a fit of rage. She summoned a halberd in her hand, and threw it in Helvelius’ direction. In an instant, the space her Doppel occupied was now empty. The scenery twisted and warped, not unlike a witch’s labyrinth, before Mifuyu was once again in her own body, with Kanae now taking the appearance of the beloved corpse.
“It’s too late. You made your deal, you stepped out of your cage. You can’t take that back. But don’t worry, you won’t have to deal with this on your own. After all, we’ll be seeing more of each other very soon.” Helvelius said, as both her voice and Mifuyu’s consciousness began to fade back into oblivion.