Fourteen thousand points. Liara was not the best at Magical Girl economics, barely passing with tutoring help from Talia, but even she knew that was a lot. Yet she had no idea where those points came from, did it have something to do with that error message from earlier? She asked Pellas, but his answer was not very helpful.
“I am just as confused as you are! There is no reason you should have so many points, but it does explain the system's reluctance to grant you a free healing miracle. After all, you can afford that on your own with so many points."
“Are you sure I have that many?” Liara had only known her golem for a short time, but she was already aware that this particular one was eccentric. She had heard that they come with different personalities, ranging from some of them being very serious to others so dramatic they could stage a play on their own.
"Well, I am confident in my abilities, I suppose the only way to know for sure is to buy something from the system."
“Can we buy something to prevent my imminent death?”
"Well, I would not call it imminent, more like inevitable. You have time, but it is limited, and to call it imminent would imply...”
“Mr. Pellas.”
“Right, sorry. As I said, you can afford it. That Mylock broke your ribs and caused internal bleeding. Ironically while that is the condition that is the most dangerous for your long term health, it will be the cheapest to handle. The eye that it stole from you will be significantly more expensive, as well as the hand that you pulverized. Honestly, I knew I picked right. I mean most young women your age would still be either crying or passed out from the pain!”
Liara looked at her hand and immediately wished that she had not. It reminded her of the gore videos that a boy had shown her when she was younger. Those images had given her nightmares for weeks and now the reality was realized in what was left of her hand. She clamped her eyes and almost shouted, "Painkillers. Buy them for me. Please!"
(Greater Pain Blocker) – 30 points
The words burned in her mind, but Liara saw something start to materialize into existence. It was like looking at a drop of water too close on a window, a blurry shape of colorlessness, but in a short span of a few seconds it fully coalesced into one of the needleless syringes that nurses used for the students’ annual vaccinations. She did not need urging from Pellas and snatched the syringe from the ground and aimed it at her lateral leg muscles, releasing the contents into her body.
There was no sting as the syringe pushed its medicine into her flesh with a molecular blast, but the effects were almost immediate. The roaring pain in her head and hand faded like they were strangers walking away and her ribs felt fine. The absence of pain felt so good that she was able to stand up and could have cried with relief.
“Outstanding, though not really that difficult, but good job!” Liara felt too good to glare at Pellas and wobbled over to Talia. Using her remaining hand, she felt a steady pulse on the other girl’s neck.
“Is there anything we can do for her too?”
Pellas half floated, his spider legs dragging on the ground, over Talia and Liara, “I would think that we should take care of you first. You are my priority.”
“And Talia is my priority. Is there anything we can do?”
Somehow a golem that did not need to breathe, sighed at Liara, “Yes, yes. We need to fix you first though if you are to defend us. My close-range sensor is not picking anything up, but who knows when the next Yabanchi is going to come through here.”
Liara looked down the hallway, nothing was coming, but the sounds of that Yanabchi’s claws dragging on the floor echoed in her memory. “Can you buy what I need?”
“Yes and no. I need to be upgraded first.”
“I need to spend points to upgrade you?”
“Of course! The licensing fees are quite steep for the system to pay for after all.”
“I’m paying for licensing fees now too?”
"Between the energy required to make the items, transport them via mana link, and the various patents owned by corporate entities, there are quite many factors that influence the cost of items and upgrades."
“What kind of upgrade would we get you?”
“Basic medical suite, it would allow me to attach a new hand and new eyeball, as well as treat your broken ribs and your friend’s concussion.”
“She has a concussion?”
“I do not know, I am guessing. I would be able to tell you if I had the basic medical suite upgrade,” the golem laughed, like it was telling some great inside joke, but Liara was not laughing with it.
“Do it.”
“Understood, verbal authorization accepted! Processing.”
(Basic Medical Suite Upgrade) – 6000 points
Liara could have fainted again. Nearly half of her points were spent on a single purchase. She should not have been so shocked, it was not like she expected to start her career as a Magical Girl floating in points like she did, but if a basic golem upgrade was so expensive, then how much did the more advanced upgrades cost?
Pellas broke Liara’s train of thought, “Yes, a concussion, but a mild one. She should be fine when she wakes up.” One of its legs trailed over Talia’s face scanning her head. “As for you, I can see it now. The way the mana courses through your body! Oh, it should be so simple to reattach a hand or eye.”
“Can I, can I purchase a new eye and hand?” The idea of it seemed grisly to Liara.
“Of course, though they would not be flesh and blood, but mana constructs created by the system. I promise you; they will feel just like the old ones!”
“Will they be expensive too?”
“Oh my, yes, prohibitively, but the attachment process should only take a few minutes.”
Liara sighed, at least it was honest with her. “Can you help me drag Talia into this classroom? I’d feel better if we did it there.”
The golem did most of the pulling, Liara almost tripped from lightheadedness when she exerted herself too much. Of course, the golem happily told her that it was due to blood loss, but that information did not help her feel any better. Once they were in the class, Pellas locked the door and shoved a desk against it. Liara was not confident at all that it would keep a Yabanchi out, but it was better than standing in the middle of the hallway.
“Alright, let’s do it.” Liara said to Pellas, “Do what you need to do.”
"Excellent, lay down please." Liara complied and allowed the golem to hover over her, three legs on both sides of her body supporting it and two hovering up and down the length of her torso, scanning as it did with Talia.
The purchases started totaling up in her mind.
(Greater restoration) – 40 points
(Mana sight/Discount) – 4000 points
(Reinforced mana hand) – 4000 points
Even shutting her eyes did not block out the text popping up in her head, so Liara tried to distract herself from the expensive purchases by watching what Pellas was doing. The items materialized in three separate containers, each unmarked, but the golem instinctually knew which was what and popped open one of them to pull out a syringe that looked the same as the pain blocker from earlier. Pellas pressed it into Liara's shoulder, but unlike the pain blocker, she could not tell if it was working. She said so to Pellas and the golem replied, "Oh yes, it's repairing blood vessels and organs as we speak. Hyper vitalizing cell production and appropriate platelet response as well as neutralizing any potential bacterial infections."
“They did not have anything like this where I grew up.” The golem looked at Liara for the first time that she could have sworn was sympathy.
“I know, remember that I read your file. Do not be afraid, I will serve you as best I can for as long as we both live." Liara was a little taken aback by the golem's sudden seriousness, so it was jarring when it snatched another of the containers, pulled out her new hand, and made an entirely inappropriate pun about it. When Liara told it so, the golem apologized and got to work on attaching it to her.
She felt torn about watching the procedure. On the one hand, she had to look at the remaining stump of her wrist, but on the other, she had never seen mana lines manipulated before, so she chose to watch with her one eye half open. The ends of Pellas' limbs split apart into various blades and lasers. Parts of her ruined hand were cut away, along with bone, this was the part that she refused to look at, but when it had finished with that preparation, the golem's miniature lasers started firing back and forth between the new mana hand and her cleansed stump. It was faint at first, but as the minutes passed lines started to shimmer in the space between the spots, mana lines being created and connected. When the lines looked almost like they could be solid, Pellas slid the new hand, like inserting a piece into a machine and finished with a laser cauterizing the flesh between the pieces.
Liara held up her new hand to her face and flexed her fingers. Not only did it feel like she was flexing her original hand, but the skin tone and look of it was just like the original too, down to the small freckle between her thumb and forefinger.
“Did you clone my hand?”
“Of course not, it is an artificial mana construct. It looks so similar because of the medical scans periodically taken of your body.”
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“I haven’t seen a doctor in four years though.”
The golem stared at Liara, silent, and changed the subject, “How about we get that new eye in?”
“Will it hurt?”
“If you had no painkillers running through your system, then you would probably have a myocardial infarction from the pain! Thankfully that is not the case.” A small smiley face appeared in Pellas’ central eye, like the kind Liara used when texting friends.
Liara laid down again, grabbing her hands together and twisting them to distract herself with the feeling of her new right hand. Though it looked the same, it felt different to the touch, harder and less malleable. She supposed that was why it was called ‘reinforced’, but she did not have time to ask Pellas as it opened the last container and pulled out her new eye.
This time she really did not look and only laid down, staring straight up at the ceiling until Pellas' appeared above her, something grasped at the end of its limb.
“Ready?”
Liara closed her eyes and nodded. The seconds that passed by felt like hours and she stifled a scream when two of Pellas' other hands steadied her head between them. There was a sensation of something touching her face, along with her right eyelid, and she wanted to lash out with her new hand, to drive a flame palm into Pellas' dull grey body, but she resisted, teeth clenched, and prayed the old prayer her mother had taught her as a child. She must have rapidly whispered it half a dozen times until she saw the light. Not because she had opened her left eye, but because she was seeing again with her right. The first thing she saw was Pellas' claw recoiling away from her face and the second was its name floating over its head.
“I can see your name?”
“A wonderful feature is it not? I took the liberty of adding myself to your favorites list.”
Liara looked over at Talia, but her name did not appear over her like Pellas. Looking back at the golem, she saw how seeing its name just hovering in the air could be annoying. “Is there a way to turn that off?”
Pellas slumped and replied, “Yes. You need to just concentrate on making it go away and your neural web should do the rest.”
Liara did as Pellas said and was pleased to see its name disappear from her vision. “Can I do the same with those notifications?”
“Now that is something I can do! Do you want me to just hold on to the notifications and release them when it is convenient or I can just verbally inform you when asked?”
“Maybe a combination of both?” Liara was not sure what the best option would be, she did not want to miss any important information, but she also did not want words constantly ringing through her head like she was experiencing delusions. “Are we done now?”
“Yes! I estimate you are at 80% health normalcy.” Pellas scuttled away and bounced on its legs.
Does your upgrade tell you that or are you just guessing again?”
“Guessing! A true scan of your health readiness would require the advanced medical upgrade of course.”
"Of course," Liara stood up and did not feel any sense of vertigo or lightheadedness threatening to bring her back down. Looking at her uniform, she was surprised to see that aside from the right sleeve of her blouse being ruined, there was very little blood on her. She noted this to Pellas who quipped back, "It must have been that flame mana you were using. Cauterized your hand and the Yabanchi's wound. Now your face though, it is absolutely covered in blood!”
Liara did not want to wake Talia up looking like she had just crawled off the set of a horror movie, so she ripped off the left sleeve of her blouse and concentrated on it, eyes closed.
The air grew a little warmer around her, but the torn sleeve started to darken with water accumulating on it. When she was satisfied that it was drenched enough she scrubbed her face, paying special attention to the right side and her matted hair.
“Would you like a mirror?” Pellas hovered its eye next to her face.
Scooting away a bit, Liara asked, “How many points would it cost?”
"None!" Pellas' eye stopped glowing and took on a metallic sheen that swirled until it made a perfect mirror for Liara to look at herself with. She screamed when she saw it.
“What happened to my eye?!”
“The Mylock tore it out,” Pellas sounded confused and the mirror disappeared.
“I mean, why is it red?”
"Oh! Well, they come in stock as red. I was able to get a discount on it, otherwise, we could not have afforded it."
Liara rubbed her eye, not able to see the crimson staring back, but she knew it was there now.
“Now they’ll really be calling me ghoul girl,” Liara muttered to herself, but Pellas responded anyway.
“No, they will not. You are a Magical Girl now," the golem did not chirp or sound like it was joking, "Honestly, humans, they would be stupid to do so."
“Thanks,” Liara replied, the golem’s straightforward answer brought her out of herself. “You can call me Liara by the way.”
“Liara, my Magical Girl! I’m so excited for our future together.” The way Pellas bounced back and forth between emotions was a little unsettling. Liara asked it how it could be so happy.
“Because you need me to be. We are in the middle of a catastrophic Yabanchi invasion, you and your friend almost died, and you have been suddenly thrust with all the responsibility of a Magical Girl without much warning.” Pellas glanced at Liara’s face, “You know, if you want, you have enough points to change your natural eye’s color to red.”
“I don’t want to do that?! Why would that be cheaper?”
"Modifying your body is less mana intensive than modifying a construct and I think it would look good if they matched. Besides, there is a famous Magical Girl who has similar heterochromia. If we make them both red then we can avoid that confusion."
“I think I’d prefer to keep my left eye as it is.” Liara rubbed at her left eye, “Thank you for asking and not just doing it though.”
“Of course,” he replied, “Now, let’s see to our friend here and get out of here before more monsters arrive.”
That was a suggestion that Liara was all too happy to agree with. She shook Talia's shoulder, but her friend just grumbled. Pellas nudged her with one of his legs, “Go on, she’s fine. She just needs a wake-up call.”
Emboldened by her golem, Liara started forming a small amount of water over her friend's face and released it all at once. Talia woke up immediately, sputtering with surprise and anger.
“Liara? What are you doing?” She rubbed her head and looked around, “Are we in the safe zone? Where’s that monster?”
Pellas leaned in front of Talia's face and spoke, “Liara killed the monster. She is a Magical Girl. No, you are not safe. I am her sentry golem. My name is Pellas, nice to meet you!" The small robot made the smile emoticon on its face again as if that would soften the news.
Talia looked at Liara, her eyes seeking confirmation, and Liara gave it with a nod.
“Well ok then, I guess I missed a lot after that thing knocked me out.”
"You're really taking this in stride human, Liara was much less cool-headed than you."
“More like I’m not really processing it right now,” Talia shrugged. “I’m sure the implications will come crashing down all at once later.” Looking again at Liara, she asked, “Did you really have to dump water on my face?”
Liara blushed and looked away, “It seemed like the quickest way to wake you up. I was worried.”
That answer made whatever twinge of anger slip off Talia’s face, "Well, I guess you have to practice dumping water on people."
“Oh trust me, I’ve wanted to do it many times before.”
Liara’s bad joke broke the tension that was hanging in the air and pressing on their chests, and Talia hugged her friend, laughing and releasing all at once, a small celebration of the fact that they were still alive despite what they’d been through.
"Excuse me, ladies, I do mean to interrupt, but I believe that our best course of action is to continue to the checkpoint and catch up with one another later."
Knowing that they needed to be prepared if they were going to go back into the hallways, Liara her right hand at Talia and explained the purchases that the golem made in order to replace her lost body parts.
Talia looked like she was going to cry when Liara explained her new eye, but she compartmentalized the emotions and asked, “Your new hand? What does ‘reinforced’ mean?”
“It means that her right hand is much more difficult to break, harm, or destroy now. If she were to attempt to replicate what she did to the Mylock in the hallway, then not only would her hand be virtually unharmed, but her mana would flow much more efficiently in the strikes.”
Talia grabbed Liara’s hand and started poking and rubbing it, exclaiming, “Oh, it does feel a lot different!” Liara pulled it away and felt self-conscious, but Talia continued, “Try doing a flame strike on the desk, but a chopping motion, not a slap.”
“But that will break my hand!”
Talia looked at Pellas and arched an eye, taking the cue he replied, “No, it is more likely that the table will break. Yet again, I must urge that we leave soon.”
“We heard you the first-time, lightbulb, but Liara needs to practice before we come up against another big ugly again.”
While Pellas was somehow sputtering with his glowing eye, Liara walked over to one of the desks and raised her right hand over her head. She remembered what happened to her hand only a short while ago, the consequences of using a flame strike the wrong way. But both of her friends, if she could call Pellas that, were confident in her, even if she was not confident in herself. Yet she was a Magical Girl now, wasn't she?
The fire mana she felt flowing in her right hand bespoke to that, the heat was familiar but felt stronger, more concentrated, it was not like she was holding her entire palm to a bonfire, but the fire was coalescing along the dorsal side, hungering for release. Liara brought this energy down in a single strike on a desk and jumped back in surprise at the results. Her right hand cut through the desk with so little resistance that the rest of the desk followed in a violent cracking in two. Where she had struck there were only burn marks in the shape of her hand.
Looking at her hand, she was expecting to see split skin, splinters, or another broken mess, yet it looked exactly as it did before and did not even throb with mild pain. Reinforced indeed.
Seeing Talia and Pellas staring at her, Liara hid her hand behind her back and blushed, "I think," she held the hand out toward Talia, still sitting on the floor, "I think, we're going to be okay."
----------------------------------------
Peeking her head outside the doorway, Liara looked both ways down the hallway and up at the ceiling like Pellas had suggested to her. Other than the body of the Mylock, there was not a Yabanchi in sight. Liara looked back at Pellas and Talia, who was now back in her wheelchair and gave the thumbs up. Talia returned the thumbs up and Pellas retracted his legs back into his body, going back into his orb form so he could float past the girls and into the hallway. Liara got behind the wheelchair and started pushing Talia, their journey to the safe zone resumed.
When they passed the dead Mylock, Talia cringed in disgust and horror, whispering at Pellas, “What is that thing?”
Pellas hovered by Talia's head while they moved and replied, "A Mylock, an infiltrator-type Yabanchi. They’re one of the more physically weaker types that the enemy employs in early invasions.”
And that thing almost killed them, Liara thought. She suppressed a shiver that jolted through her body and kept pushing Talia, asking, “Do they copy people’s voices? It was calling for help like a little girl.”
“No, Mylocks don’t have a natural mimicry ability like their more advanced cousins, fortunately. They can only steal aspects of a human's appearance."
This time, remembering seeing her eyeball in the monster's face, Liara could not suppress the shiver.
They reached the final intersection before they reached the safe zone and they stopped just before passing through it. Liara managed to convince Pellas that she should be the one to look around the corner, given that the eye was not a large glowing orb and the golem relented. The acrid smell of something terrible should have warned her, but since the invasion started smells were drifting in from outside, making the musk of death not so unusual. As a result, Liara was shocked to see three dead Yabanchi lying in pools of their own dark blood. Two of them were Mylocks, but one was hard to even figure out what it was supposed to look like, since it was more of a large, deflated balloon than a corpse. There was nothing else of note down the other direction, so Liara grabbed the others and they followed the purple mana lights, past the bodies of the Yabanchi and up to a hastily erected barricade of desks and chairs. The safe zone.
Liara spoke, raising her voice to be heard over the pile of desks, “Hello, is anyone there?”
They heard voices on the other side of the barricade, one an angry and deep man’s voice, and a girl’s that was quicker and high pitched. The argument ended with the man shouting and a familiar blonde head popped over the barricade, grinning down at them.
“Hey girls, long time no see!”
Liara’s Stats
Strength 9 Constitution 9 Reaction 10 Authority 11 Mana 315/330 Augmentations Reinforced mana hand, mana eye Golem Upgrades Basic Medical Suite Special Abilities Minor Vitality Regeneration