"This is for you, Malice!" Mars strummed a golden pick across the strings. Her foot pressed onto the pedal, amplifying the sound of her electric guitar. Fingers danced to an invisible song. She had to trust that her skill was doing its job; she couldn't hear her guitar, not while she was wearing her headphones.

[Rock The House][16 FAI][Sustained] - Unleash a wave of sonic energy capable of leveling a dungeon structure. This skill works best when you can listen to your voice, but who am I? Just some boring old system. Clearly, I know nothing.

So long as she held down the notes and kept plucking, she could level this place long before her teammates came to pick through the rubble. It couldn't destroy the dungeon core outright, but dealing with it wouldn't be any trouble based on what she'd seen from the rookie. Even if it was buried under layers of concrete, Gaia could scoop it out with her magic.

This attack would have shattered the [Mirrorhives] that had taken out her drones. She made sure to tune her volume loud enough that it would resonate with the mirrored glass they were made of, shattering the wasp in front of her into pieces and doing doubtless more damage to the structure behind it. She'd like to evaluate the destruction, but lacking Honeybees meant she'd have to confirm the damage personally.

Mars felt it was better to wait for her teammates before surveying the core directly.

"Yeah, bet you like that!" Mars called out to a shattered façade. "Let's go for an encore, okay?" Mars lifted her pick high into the sky, ready to swipe down and set the rest of the house ablaze. It never fell.

Finger wrapped around her [Roman Sound Engineer] and pulled, plucking them off her head. Mars' ears were filled with a relaxing static; the source was close, right behind her. The cicadas of summer continued to chirp away, and Mars felt a chill run up her spine as someone behind her let out a breath.

"Let's not!" A quiet and harmonious voice uttered from within the static, crystalline, and filled with reflections of itself. Mars froze. That voice was impossible. It was synthetic in a way humans could never produce. But more importantly, it was feminine and inches from her ears. Her legs trembled. That voice was perfect.

"I think your concert has gone on long enough, Nebulossom Mars." That voice echoed, each reflection of the sound landing differently. Her voice was an instrument of destruction that left Mars flushed and needy.

Black claws slipped around her face, obscuring her vision. The sound of static intensified. "Can't we just talk? Why do we need to fight?" The static was interrupted by the crystalline chimes of the Malice behind her; Divines, she let the Malice get behind her. She could feel the Malice pressing against her body, claws wrapped around her eyes as a threat. The implication was clear:

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Move, and I strike where you are most vulnerable.

Her helmet, the artifact that brought all her powers to another level, had an evident weakness. The visor was thin. An accurate strike could break through the barrier between her eyes and those slender, black claws. The Malice could deal grievous damage. Mars knew her body was vulnerable, tapped dry of Faith as she was. A mistake at this juncture could be lethal.

Mars could feel her cheeks were warm and flushed a shade of blue. (Vulnerable.) Mars was helpless; she could be killed at any moment, and the creature that held her life in its claws wanted to talk. This was never advised, but Mars couldn't deny the request of a pretty woman. She tried to speak to the source of the melodic voice that made her legs quiver and her body tremble, but words escaped her throat. Mars could feel her legs melting, and an eternity passed before she spoke.

"Talk? You want to talk, that's it?" Mars had to swallow her saliva. (Divines, crush me right now. I'm about to do something not okay.)

"Yes. I want to speak with you. Is that okay, Nebulossom Mars?" The Malice continued to speak in her in such soft and delicate tones. Her gloves cradled the back of her head, caressing the sides of her helmet. Mars couldn't stand it any longer—

"More, please..." Mars moaned, biting her tongue much too late to stop herself. Her eyes widened, and the Malice holding Mars stiffened up in response.

There was a sharp pop in the static backdrop, followed by a low crackle. "I didn't mean to talk like that!"

Both Mars and the Malice were at a loss for words. The Malice certainly hadn't expected to make the warrior feel that way, and the magical girl didn't anticipate the direction the conversation was heading either. Mars could barely believe herself.

"More? I mean, yes! I." Mars felt her face heat up to a brighter hue of blue. "You have a nice voice, so I got carried away... sorry." Mars tried to cover her face to hide the cringe from the world, only to have her fingers meet with the claws of the Malice embracing her helmet.

"Holding my hands now...? Wait, that's crossing a line!?" The crystalline voice squeaked and tried to pull back from Mars. The Malice let go of her victim, tripping over her high heels and falling backward. Her Reflecthives caught her, struggling and buzzing their wings to hold her up in the air.

Mars covered her face in shame, her skin only deepening its bluish hue. "I didn't mean to, I! Forget it! Ugh!" Mars spun around towards the Malice with the beautiful voice, reaching out for her collar. A hand wrapped around the yoke of the purple suit and pulled the monster close, one finger pointed accusingly at her wax-stained throat. A screen flashed an error message atop that neck, a yellow caution symbol wiggling in surprise. "Don't tell the other magical warriors!"

"This doesn't leave this fight, okay?! You didn't hear a thing. Right?" Mars didn't want to admit anything, but the cringe damage had exceeded a threshold. Magical Warriors had a natural bubble of psychic defense that would be worn away by physical and emotional damage, and she'd blinkered it away with her dumb words. Mars would have to bluff to keep this Malice from killing her. If there was one thing she could bluff, it was anger; she was filled with it.

"Stop shaking me!" The Malice squeaked as she was shaken, unsure how to follow this change of events. "I'll think about it!"

"I need an answer!" While shaking the purple-suited Malice, Mars was reminded of the property of physics known as 'inertia.' On the upswing, Amanda's screen planted into her face. Mars felt her lips press against the surface. "Mph!?"

The whole screen went haywire, flashing Mars with a confusion of color before settling on the visage of a bashful girl. "You just stole my first kiss…."

—that was the nail in the coffin. Mars let go of the Malice and ran away in tears.