To make people actually remember, here's it once for posterity: Minako is nonbinary and uses they/them. This message will be pinned so you people stop getting it wrong and pissing me off. If you get it wrong in the future I'm going to be much less nice, considering you have to scroll past it just to read the quest.
[X] Mention what you think you've been hearing/seeing, and then let Takane choose. It might be Magical Girl related, after all, which would mean she has a more informed opinion than you.
As a pure hypothetical, it would be interesting to see how quickly everything would spiral into chaos if the seniors all vanished and people in the city had to start dealing with outsider invasions. Are the current generation strong enough to hold off all comer and train the next wave, leaving Mitikahara as a permanent beacon of stability, or would the rush of Japans strongest hit the city like another Walpurgisnacht?
So long as Mitakihara magic is post scarcity, they'll be fine. If you disappeared the Walpurgisnut... then we're talking a hypothetical.
50 is way beyond Mitakihara's carrying capacity, things will get very nasty quick if there's no authority around to manage the aftermath. Mitakihara will have some remodeling to do, at the very least.
So long as Mitakihara magic is post scarcity, they'll be fine. If you disappeared the Walpurgisnut... then we're talking a hypothetical.
50 is way beyond Mitakihara's carrying capacity, things will get very nasty quick if there's no authority around to manage aftermath. Mitakihara will have some remodeling to do, at the very least.
[X] Mention what you think you've been hearing/seeing, and then let Takane choose. It might be Magical Girl related, after all, which would mean she has a more informed opinion than you.
It was mentioned that there's something like 50+ meguca in Mitakihara, including members of the generation or so after Sayaka's, so as long as the mega seed doesn't run out and they don't fall apart to infighting? They'd probably do fine.
Yeah but there are thousands of Meguca in Japan, how many organised gangs need to come out of that in order to try and fight in order to cause chaos, increased witches, damage to the city, regular people leaving because they lost their job to a gas leak and so on that puts the city on a vicious cycle?
So long as Mitakihara magic is post scarcity, they'll be fine. If you disappeared the Walpurgisnut... then we're talking a hypothetical.
50 is way beyond Mitakihara's carrying capacity, things will get very nasty quick if there's no authority around to manage the aftermath. Mitakihara will have some remodeling to do, at the very least.
Counter point, if Mitakihara was post scarcity then why would there only be 50 odd magical girls? Given that you know about witches wouldn't you be actively advertising for people to come in order to stop them witching out and then possibly creeping over the border?
They aren't post scarcity, they're just rich enough to pay everyone there currently a high UBI. And the difference is that eventually the Walpurgisnacht grief seed will run out, but keeping it at 50 rather than a thousand means it runs out in a lifetime rather than 5 or 10 years.
Yeah but there are thousands of Meguca in Japan, how many organised gangs need to come out of that in order to try and fight in order to cause chaos, increased witches, damage to the city, regular people leaving because they lost their job to a gas leak and so on that puts the city on a vicious cycle?
Counter point, if Mitakihara was post scarcity then why would there only be 50 odd magical girls? Given that you know about witches wouldn't you be actively advertising for people to come in order to stop them witching out and then possibly creeping over the border?
They aren't post scarcity, they're just rich enough to pay everyone there currently a high UBI. And the difference is that eventually the Walpurgisnacht grief seed will run out, but keeping it at 50 rather than a thousand means it runs out in a lifetime rather than 5 or 10 years.
Although, I will add that the definition (from wikipedia) of post-scarcity: " a theoretical economic situation in which most goods can be produced in great abundance with minimal human labor needed, so that they become available to all very cheaply or even freely." Also has this addendum: " Post-scarcity does not mean that scarcity has been eliminated for all goods and services, but that all people can easily have their basic survival needs met along with some significant proportion of their desires for goods and services."
Basically, your point that they're at a point where they can pay everyone a UBI is definitionally post-scarcity. It's just a post-scarcity with a time-limit; access to a practically un-limited (emphasis on the limited part) means that those girls don't have ration out their resources, because what resources they have are free at point of access.
Potentially, they don't even have to engage with any Meguca related activities besides cleansing their gems. That they'll eventually have to go back to a free-for-all at some point just means their resources themselves are limited, but so long as they're access is relatively costless (the cost being whatever energy it takes to physically get to the Walpurgisnut™) they're still technically post-scarcity.
Colloquially speaking however, you're absolutely right. When we say post-scarcity it's usually something more ambitious than a very slowly drying watering hole.
As to why there are only 50. Has Moid said that 50 is all that can be fit? Has Moid ever explicitly said that there weren't other girls in the city that Sayaka might not keep tabs on? Girls with powers that make them impossible to track? Girls who had a different incubator and are out the telepathy network?
These are all questions that are up to Moid to settle, so maybe we're already looking at an incomplete dataset. The answer to why are there only 50 might be that there are already more than 50.
Given that you know about witches wouldn't you be actively advertising for people to come in order to stop them witching out and then possibly creeping over the border?
Mega-seed or not, the only girls who are going to be able to make regular use of the seed are the ones who already live close enough to hear about the seed and get to it, or those that don't have any roots where they already are, have heard about the seed, and have the resources to make the trip and sustain themselves potentially miles and miles from where they've set themselves up.
Edit: Also, some girls just might not be having enough problems to care about the seed. Fighting witches is scary stuff, but seeing as both Sayaka and Kyouko still do it when they don't really have to... maybe once a Meguca has buffed out their skillset to a certain point, traveling miles for a cleanse is too much of a bother when you can down a witch just fine by yourself, or already have your stockpile.
The Tokyo Girls had at least over two dozen, IIRC, they were living well enough. (When they weren't being suicidal)
...with a name like 'Easy to Find' I fully expect that the Wallypotamus-Seed will be jacked at some point. I mean, it's pretty easy to find, for good or ill.
It would be a hell of a plot hook, certainly. It's the linchpin of the city right now. If it vanished today, there'd be a hell of a power struggle over who got to stick around, so long as no-one could track that seed down.
And, oh, there's a daughter who'd love to make a wish to save her family...
That's some mighty fine plot rails you got there. I don't see an easy to way to head that off at the pass, either, because MAGIC.
Or this won't be the plot, and I'm just overthinking. Or I just gave you some delicious ideas. At least I had fun theory-crafting.
Although, I will add that the definition (from wikipedia) of post-scarcity: " a theoretical economic situation in which most goods can be produced in great abundance with minimal human labor needed, so that they become available to all very cheaply or even freely." Also has this addendum: " Post-scarcity does not mean that scarcity has been eliminated for all goods and services, but that all people can easily have their basic survival needs met along with some significant proportion of their desires for goods and services."
Basically, your point that they're at a point where they can pay everyone a UBI is definitionally post-scarcity. It's just a post-scarcity with a time-limit; access to a practically un-limited (emphasis on the limited part) means that those girls don't have ration out their resources, because what resources they have are free at point of access.
Potentially, they don't even have to engage with any Meguca related activities besides cleansing their gems. That they'll eventually have to go back to a free-for-all at some point just means their resources themselves are limited, but so long as they're access is relatively costless (the cost being whatever energy it takes to physically get to the Walpurgisnut™) they're still technically post-scarcity.
Colloquially speaking however, you're absolutely right. When we say post-scarcity it's usually something more ambitious than a very slowly drying watering hole.
As to why there are only 50. Has Moid said that 50 is all that can be fit? Has Moid ever explicitly said that there weren't other girls in the city that Sayaka might not keep tabs on? Girls with powers that make them impossible to track? Girls who had a different incubator and are out the telepathy network?
These are all questions that are up to Moid to settle, so maybe we're already looking at an incomplete dataset. The answer to why are there only 50 might be that there are already more than 50.
Mega-seed or not, the only girls who are going to be able to make regular use of the seed are the ones who already live close enough to hear about the seed and get to it, or those that don't have any roots where they already are, have heard about the seed, and have the resources to make the trip and sustain themselves potentially miles and miles from where they've set themselves up.
Edit: Also, some girls just might not be having enough problems to care about the seed. Fighting witches is scary stuff, but seeing as both Sayaka and Kyouko still do it when they don't really have to... maybe once a Meguca has buffed out their skillset to a certain point, traveling miles for a cleanse is too much of a bother when you can down a witch just fine by yourself, or already have your stockpile.
The Tokyo Girls had at least over two dozen, IIRC, they were living well enough. (When they weren't being suicidal)
Yes, I suppose I consider sustainability to be an inherent part of post-scarcity. If its not part of the definition then I'll correct my language however the point that its not something that can be done indefinitely remains.
And yes those are questions for Moid, however in the absence of definitive answers we're free to reason and speculate if that's something we find interesting.
I mean whats the worst that can happen? We raise a good point that Moid hadn't considered and a nasty random event gets thrown our way for forcing some notes to be rewritten? What are the chances of that.
I have not said that 50 is an ideal number or that 50 is a sustainable number or that 50 is in any way the maximum. What I said was that 50 is such a low number that I suspect that it shows that Sayaka and co have not been actively advertising Mitikahara as a city where you get free grief seeds. And then I went on to suggest that the reason that they weren't is because they know that they are using limited resources.
The resources needed to make the trip are "not so deep in despair that you will witch out before the train journey ends" its not a high requirement at all and its very possibly a matter of life of death so there ought to be a lot of girls who'd willingly move. And I think that the fact that there is active gang warfare in nearby cities means that we can reasonably assume that there are some people who would willing migrate and that resources are limited enough that Meguca need to actively fight over them.
Theres a lot that can be speculated on there although I think 'girls who can not be tracked' is your worst suggestion by a significant margin because Qby wants conflict between girls to help accelerate them falling into grief (or whatever the correct terms are) so such powers would be rare, additionally they won't kick anyone out who wanders in as long as the new girl plays by their rules so why hide? A better one that you didn't touch on is "Maybe they aren't actively recruiting because they've got busy lives." and "Very few people actively chose go to Mitikarahara because just about the only thing people know about it are urban legends about what killed the Tokyo Six".
Hell we can even turn the question around entirely, if Sayaka and the old guard are trying to keep Qby out of the city how have they got as many as 50 magical girls? Are these people who contracted within the city that they couldn't or didn't stop (over twenty years thats about 2/3 a year, if each magical girl lives two years on average would that be a normal stable replacement rate for any other town of this size? If so have they hindered Qby at all?) are they people from outside who moved in?
...with a name like 'Easy to Find' I fully expect that the Wallypotamus-Seed will be jacked at some point. I mean, it's pretty easy to find, for good or ill.
It would be a hell of a plot hook, certainly. It's the linchpin of the city right now. If it vanished today, there'd be a hell of a power struggle over who got to stick around, so long as no-one could track that seed down.
And, oh, there's a daughter who'd love to make a wish to save her family...
That's some mighty fine plot rails you got there. I don't see an easy to way to head that off at the pass, either, because MAGIC.
Or this won't be the plot, and I'm just overthinking. Or I just gave you some delicious ideas. At least I had fun theory-crafting.
At the very least, the thing is so large that the city was unable to remove it and instead accepted it as weird abstract art, so I'd trust that only a magical girl with a powerset specifically designed for the task would be able to manage it.
And all that is setting aside the fact that, at least at the time of SayakaQuest the first, the average lifespan of a magical girl is or was two years from time of forming their contract, per word of Kyubey. Like, the existence of the Walpurgis seed probably skews the numbers a good bit, but the fact that some of Sayaka's newer students have made it into their 20s is probably impressive stuff compared to the standing average elsewhere, nevermind the ages of the older central group. Mitikihara is probably something of a statistical anomaly, in that regard.
So extrapolating from that and presuming the information from SayakaQuest 1 to remain valid elsewhere, for any given magical girl in Japan, from the moment they contract they have on average two years to learn of the seed's existence, scrounge up the resources to move or somehow convince their families to move, assuming they have family ties, and carry out the move. The first bit might be easy enough, depending on how often the Walpurgis seed appears on, say, the news outside Mitikihara. The second part? Magical girls are typically teenagers, and most families wouldn't be overly inclined to move cities on the whim of a teenage daughter. Orphan magical girls wouldn't require that, but they also lack even the bare-bones support structure of People Who Care But Don't Know the Secret (henceforth abbreviated PWCBDKS), would have to travel by whatever means they can scrounge up, and run the risk of trespassing on territory of a separate, hostile magical girl. It'd be dangerous, is my point.
As for groups of magical girls, while numbers may well provide safety, odds are that most of those have some sort of system in place or have settled into their area, such that they wouldn't necessarily feel a compelling need to put in the effort to move. In sum, then, bar active canvassing or something, Mitikihara probably isn't exactly magical girl Mecca.
That being said, the Kasamino situation could well be a gang looking to make a power play in this direction. It's a valid possibility; we know so little that we can't discount much. And going off the Akane discussion it sounds like there've been outside gangs broken up by them before, though we can't currently know if that was just the Mitikihara group stepping out under their own initiative or the outside groups made moves towards Mitikihara first. So I'm not saying we're safe or anything; this is more an exploration as to why Mitikihara hasn't been entirely flooded by magical girls.
Worth noting: without the megaseed Mitakihara's Meguca population didn't even break into double digits (or the high single digits, for that matter), and just six meguca was enough to dominate somewhere the size of Tokyo to the point that the Tokyo Six were effectively unchallenged. I don't think Meguca are anywhere near as common or have populations in numbers approaching anything close to what DaS is suggesting.
Also, remember that the megaseed does have a limited lifespan. It's good for an arbitrarily large number of cleanses, not infinite; that alone is enough reason not to build up too large of a Meguca population that depend on it.
And all that is setting aside the fact that, at least at the time of SayakaQuest the first, the average lifespan of a magical girl is or was two years from time of forming their contract, per word of Kyubey. Like, the existence of the Walpurgis seed probably skews the numbers a good bit, but the fact that some of Sayaka's newer students have made it into their 20s is probably impressive stuff compared to the standing average elsewhere, nevermind the ages of the older central group. Mitikihara is probably something of a statistical anomaly, in that regard.
So extrapolating from that and presuming the information from SayakaQuest 1 to remain valid elsewhere, for any given magical girl in Japan, from the moment they contract they have on average two years to learn of the seed's existence, scrounge up the resources to move or somehow convince their families to move, assuming they have family ties, and carry out the move. The first bit might be easy enough, depending on how often the Walpurgis seed appears on, say, the news outside Mitikihara. The second part? Magical girls are typically teenagers, and most families wouldn't be overly inclined to move cities on the whim of a teenage daughter. Orphan magical girls wouldn't require that, but they also lack even the bare-bones support structure of People Who Care But Don't Know the Secret (henceforth abbreviated PWCBDKS), would have to travel by whatever means they can scrounge up, and run the risk of trespassing on territory of a separate, hostile magical girl. It'd be dangerous, is my point.
As for groups of magical girls, while numbers may well provide safety, odds are that most of those have some sort of system in place or have settled into their area, such that they wouldn't necessarily feel a compelling need to put in the effort to move. In sum, then, bar active canvassing or something, Mitikihara probably isn't exactly magical girl Mecca.
That being said, the Kasamino situation could well be a gang looking to make a power play in this direction. It's a valid possibility; we know so little that we can't discount much. And going off the Akane discussion it sounds like there've been outside gangs broken up by them before, though we can't currently know if that was just the Mitikihara group stepping out under their own initiative or the outside groups made moves towards Mitikihara first. So I'm not saying we're safe or anything; this is more an exploration as to why Mitikihara hasn't been entirely flooded by magical girls.
Perhaps I'm at a disadvantage because I've only gotten to thread 4 of the original so far, but of the magical girls
Mami lives alone, her family died in a car crash? Orphan
Homura, we never see any family of hers and she lives alone. Perhaps not orphan but she's clearly trusted to live alone at least.
Kyouko, definetly orphan,
Akane, never see family, she was willing to move cities so either her family did go along with it, she's trusted to live alone or she's an orphan.
Sayaka, not orphan.
Takane, moved for unknown reasons, has mentioned this is a common occurrence, either following parents job or probably constantly flees cities.
Honourable mention for Madoka, not orphan.
At the most optimistic reading we have 2/7 being orphans with probably another 1 or 2 being so estranged from their family that they may as well be. This is way the hell above a normal rate. And a pessimistic reading is that 1/6 Meguca don't come from dead or broken households.
I'd offer a conjecture that being an orphan leads to the sort of increased misery and emotions that Qby looks for to determine power level and this leads to them being massively over represented in the demographics.
Gangs provide systems for those who are a part of them, lets remember that as far as Akane was involved the Tokyo Six's system was starve non members of grief seeds by their monopolisation of the witches and when Akane stole from them to survive they killed her friends and told her to replace what she stole twice over within a month or whatever.
Worth noting: without the megaseed Mitakihara's Meguca population didn't even break into double digits (or the high single digits, for that matter), and just six meguca was enough to dominate somewhere the size of Tokyo to the point that the Tokyo Six were effectively unchallenged. I don't think Meguca are anywhere near as common or have populations in numbers approaching anything close to what DaS is suggesting.
Also, remember that the megaseed does have a limited lifespan. It's good for an arbitrarily large number of cleanses, not infinite; that alone is enough reason not to build up too large of a Meguca population that depend on it.
I assumed that the Tokyo Six were exceptional in their own right, given that Akane was apparently part of her own gang with her friends so it wasn't simply a matter of them being the most numerous gang in the city.
I assumed that the Tokyo Six were exceptional in their own right, given that Akane was apparently part of her own gang with her friends so it wasn't simply a matter of them being the most numerous gang in the city.
They were pretty powerful, two of them horrifically so, but not to the point of being able to stand against the whole rest of Tokyo's population at once if Meguca are as common as you seem to be suggesting; after all, if Mitakihara's capable of supporting even a dozen or so Meguca normally, Tokyo would probably support a hundred-plus Meguca that the Six would have to constantly oppress. And yet Sayaka (who had relatively average potential) managed to pretty much solo one of them with less than a month's training, and Akane literally destroyed another after a similarly brief training montage.
Even accounting for luck, near-suicidalism, etc, in that fight, the Tokyo Six just didn't show themselves to have the power to deal with dozens of Meguca at once without losing members (or losing outright)- and if they lost even one member, things would just get worse for them from there. And considering what the Six were doing, the rest of Tokyo would have allied against them if they thought there was a snowball's chance in hell of it working.
Perhaps I'm at a disadvantage because I've only gotten to thread 4 of the original so far, but of the magical girls
Mami lives alone, her family died in a car crash? Orphan
Homura, we never see any family of hers and she lives alone. Perhaps not orphan but she's clearly trusted to live alone at least.
Kyouko, definetly orphan,
Akane, never see family, she was willing to move cities so either her family did go along with it, she's trusted to live alone or she's an orphan.
Sayaka, not orphan.
Takane, moved for unknown reasons, has mentioned this is a common occurrence, either following parents job or probably constantly flees cities.
Honourable mention for Madoka, not orphan.
At the most optimistic reading we have 2/7 being orphans with probably another 1 or 2 being so estranged from their family that they may as well be. This is way the hell above a normal rate. And a pessimistic reading is that 1/6 Meguca don't come from dead or broken households.
I'd offer a conjecture that being an orphan leads to the sort of increased misery and emotions that Qby looks for to determine power level and this leads to them being massively over represented in the demographics.
Gangs provide systems for those who are a part of them, lets remember that as far as Akane was involved the Tokyo Six's system was starve non members of grief seeds by their monopolisation of the witches and when Akane stole from them to survive they killed her friends and told her to replace what she stole twice over within a month or whatever.
Leaving aside that we're attempting to extrapolate conclusions for a population of unknown size based on a sample size of six (to seven, I believe, counting later arrivals like Tomo at least one to two of which who do have families in evidence if memory serves), it is true that there is very likely correlation between strained, broken, or absent familial ties and willingness to contract, though such a thing would not be a hard rule taking Sayaka and especially Madoka('s ability to contract) as examples.
Strained ties would, of course, still be ties; just because a magical girl has a difficult relationship with her family doesn't necessarily mean she's going to up and leave. And in that situation or the situation of a good relationship with family, the magical girl's movements are going to be tied to the family's movements. And as I said, families are probably going to predicate if and where they're moving off things like job opportunities or nearby relatives or what-have-you far more than the daughter going "can we move to Mitikihara?" The caveat would be magical girls with mind control powers or equivalent, perhaps, depending on the power's specifics and the individual girl's scruples. But I digress.
Accepting, even then, that a disproportionate percentage of the magical girl population wouldn't be troubled by family ties, there still remains the risks involved in a teenaged (or younger, in some cases) girl traveling, on her own, with whatever resources she can scrounge, steal, or otherwise procure, through unfamiliar territory with any number of witches and other magical girls who are possibly-to-probably hostile. An uncertain, risky, and even frightening proposition.
I am aware of what the Tokyo Six were like, yes. Their method is not the guaranteed only method in evidence; even if one chooses to believe all gangs of magical girls choose to or must inflict cruelty on other non-member magical girls to survive even outside acts of self-defense - far from an unfair assumption, all told - there are likely as not a wide variety of forms for that cruelty to take. Moreover, I would consider it quite likely that for some Tokyo Six equivalent that existed in the world at the same time as the Walpurgis seed, there is a good chance that they would choose to maintain their own systems and not bother with Mitikihara so long as events in Mitikihara did not affect them. Why bother fighting over the seed when they already have their own established systems and methods of procuring all the seeds they need?
Moreover, I'm not exactly sure what the point of your bringing up the horrifying methods of the Tokyo Six is, here? Like, yes, they were absolutely horrifying and despicable, morally speaking. But morality doesn't inherently directly effect logistics and risk? Like, where are you taking this train of thought, exactly?
They were pretty powerful, two of them horrifically so, but not to the point of being able to stand against the whole rest of Tokyo's population at once if Meguca are as common as you seem to be suggesting; after all, if Mitakihara's capable of supporting even a dozen or so Meguca normally, Tokyo would probably support a hundred-plus Meguca that the Six would have to constantly oppress. And yet Sayaka (who had relatively average potential) managed to pretty much solo one of them with less than a month's training, and Akane literally destroyed another after a similarly brief training montage.
Even accounting for luck, near-suicidalism, etc, in that fight, the Tokyo Six just didn't show themselves to have the power to deal with dozens of Meguca at once without losing members (or losing outright)- and if they lost even one member, things would just get worse for them from there. And considering what the Six were doing, the rest of Tokyo would have allied against them if there was a snowball's chance in hell of it working.
I pretty much agree with points made here, except for one
Tokyo Six were pretty formidable, so much in fact I can easily see them oppress a population of a hundred disorganized teenage girls... for a year or two or three.
Two reasons: coordination and their leader.
If Seykuu and Co fought them together, they would have smeared our protag all over Mitakihara.
And their leader basically decided to get suicided by Highlander at that point, so I'm not even sure Seykuu would have won if the Airguca had fought to win.
I pretty much agree with points made here, except for one
Tokyo Six were pretty formidable, so much in fact I can easily see them oppress a population of a hundred disorganized teenage girls... for a year or two or three.
Two reasons: coordination and their leader.
If Seykuu and Co fought them together, they would have smeared our protag all over Mitakihara.
And their leader basically decided to get suicided by Highlander at that point, so I'm not even sure Seykuu would have won if the Airguca had fought to win.
If Airguca had fought to win Sayaka would have gotten splattered, no question, but the rest of the Six weren't anywhere near her level. They were certainly powerful, like I said, but not to the point where I could see them handling populations on the scale I get the impression DaS is suggesting exist.
If Airguca had fought to win Sayaka would have gotten splattered, no question, but the rest of the Six weren't anywhere near her level. They were certainly powerful, like I said, but not to the point where I could see them handling populations on the scale I get the impression DaS is suggesting exist.
Hmm
Maybe Airguca had done it a couple of times before? Like, she's noticeably older than other girls, so maybe Tokyo Gucas rose up in revolution and murdered the previous overlords of the Tokyo metropolis, but couldn't really put the Air Guca down
So she used the new Tokyo Six to quickly murderize all the groups against her and disorganize the rest
Agree that's pretty unlikely
Orrrr
I always wondered why they were so willing to move out of their power base for any reason
So maybe the things were already going to shit and the Guca sent after Akane was scouting new stomping grounds
Not knowing Mitakihara is Walpurgisnacht's target lol
Just hypotheticals for some mental exercise, mind you
In another long-running Quest ( PMAS ) Tokyo has 128 Magical Girls, but they are ruled by something like a shogunate, not a totalitarian dictatorship, so eh
Hmm
Maybe Airguca had done it a couple of times before? Like, she's noticeably older than other girls, so maybe Tokyo Gucas rose up in revolution and murdered the previous overlords of the Tokyo metropolis, but couldn't really put the Air Guca down
So she used the new Tokyo Six to quickly murderize all the groups against her and disorganize the rest
Agree that's pretty unlikely
Orrrr
I always wondered why they were so willing to move out of their power base for any reason
So maybe the things were already going to shit and the Guca sent after Akane was scouting new stomping grounds
Not knowing Mitakihara is Walpurgisnacht's target lol
Just hypotheticals for some mental exercise, mind you
In another long-running Quest ( PMAS ) Tokyo has 128 Magical Girls, but they are ruled by something like a shogunate, not a totalitarian dictatorship, so eh
They were the original Six; there's a snippet somewhere that showed their start of darkness (their original seventh member witching out, IIRC), and it features the Six encountered in-quest. The reason Airguca was so powerful compared to the rest was a result of her having absolute bullshit potential (I'm pretty sure Moid confirmed her as being the sort of person who'd have wound up in history books if she hadn't contracted) and her getting a really good powerset to use it with.
[X] Mention what you think you've been hearing/seeing, and then let Takane choose. It might be Magical Girl related, after all, which would mean she has a more informed opinion than you.
You move in closer to her. "So, uh," you lean in. "I've been hearing something nearby."
She blinks, then narrows her eyes. "Like a cat?"
"Like...I guess?" You turn back to the rooftop. "I just heard it shuffling around."
She pushes you slightly. "Let's talk downstairs." She looks towards the stairs. "It'll keep following you. Don't trust anything it says."
"I...o-okay?" Takane doesn't give you time to process your confusion as she brings you down the steps and the door swings shut. For a split second, just before the lock comes down, you see a pair of pink eyes.
You move downstairs with her, her arm around your shoulders. She keeps glancing back up the stairs, but she doesn't leave your side for even a second. You both reach the floor, before she moves in front of you.
"What's that thing?" You ask. "I-I don't get it. What is it?"
"It's..." she sorts through her words in her head. She tries to go for an explanation that is probably less crazy than 'I'm a magical girl', and you see the gears turning in her head. She coughs. "You know how magical girls have mascots?"
"It's, wait, huh?" You blink. "What?"
"That's what it is, but only on the surface." She glances back. "What it wants are more warriors."
"F-for what?"
"To fight an eternal war." She turns back to you. "Okay, what it does is that it grants you a wish." She crouches just enough to match your height. "It entices you with something that you think you want. It tells you what you want to hear, and it tells you that you can get it with just a single wish."
You blink a few times. For a second you wonder if that wish is worth it. "Anything?"
"Yes, anything." She frowns. "It's a trap. The bargain it makes is not worth the price of entry. It's also a vicious opportunist. It preys on you at your most vulnerable, when you're at your lowest. And nine times out of ten, it will find your weakness. Usually it's successful."
You shudder, and look her up and down. Takane's smarter than you. She's wiser than you. Unlike you she kind of has some idea of what she's doing. If she contracted... "Right."
She rubs the top of your head and slowly pats your hair.
"Myueeweeehhhh."
"Heh, you are cute." She looks up. "Just be careful, okay? I trust you."
You wish you could say the same. "Date on Saturday?"
"Date on Saturday, yes." She gives you a tight hug. You give it right back. "Later, Mina."
"Same." You smile dumbly as you watch her walk back to the classroom. Of course, you have to follow her just a few minutes later.
[=]
You walk home alone, separated from your friends. The streets look even more empty than usual right now, the dust spiraling across the pavement and a few pieces of trash scattering at your feet. You don't know why it looks so awful today. The streets aren't even unusually dirty, but you just feel unsettled.
You scrape your shoes across the filthy concrete sidewalk, and the chill makes you zip up your hoodie. You instinctively shudder as the wind picks up trash and leaves and winds them through the streets.
You hear the soft patter of feet again, this time to your right. Your head darts to the side, just in time to hear a loud, thunderous CRASH.
The alleyway to your right flashes with pink light as dust and dirt is thrown your way. You instinctively cover your head; it won't hurt you, but you never know.
As the dust settles, you stare down an open alleyway and past an overflowing dumpster that's been knocked backwards by the force of whatever blast sent it sideways.
At the very end of the alleyway, you see a vaguely human-sized shape just lying on the ground. It's moving; clearly alive, if just barely. You see the smoke rise from it, and an aborted attempt to breathe, every few seconds. Just above it, another humanoid figure presses its heel into the victim's left hand.
You find yourself stepping backwards in shock. Sudden cruelty for no goddamn reason. You glance between the corpse and the person above it. Interrupting them would be fucking stupid. There is nothing you'd gain from doing that.
So that's exactly what you do.
"H-hey-" You start running towards them. You grab your bag. "HEY!"
The attacker suddenly sees you. They take a bewildered step backwards, look you up and down, then just simply...run. They run down the alleyway, far from their victim and across the rooftops.
You skid to a halt and look towards where the thing escaped. You're hyperventilating; it's only now that you realize you were scared shitless and you ran towards what was probably a fully-armed and extremely lethal magical girl. You take a few deep breaths to calm yourself down as the adrenaline drops and fear really starts to set in.
"Sh-shit that was fucking stupid that was fucking stupid." You pant and stare at the ground.
And it's here that you notice that it's coated in splattered blood and bone matter. You see bits of ribcage just lying across the floor, some of it charred, most of it shattered. Your eyes trace up the trail towards the other body in the alleyway.
Now that you're close enough, you can hear the body gasping for breath, and you can get a good look at her.
You immediately regret it.
The chest has been blasted open and her ribcage is splayed out. Her right arm is grasping at a ruined lung and the other grips a pink gem like her life depends on it, which it very well might. Her bright pink uniform is out of place among the charred flesh and smoke, and you desperately try not to smell it.
She coughs and blood sprays from her mouth as she gives you a look. She's alive; her heart (and you fucking hate that you can see it) isn't beating, but her eyes are still staring at you in shock.
"O-oh my god oh my god oh my fuck oh my god." You have to fight the urge to vomit.
She grabs at nothing. "Heal...heal me...help..." She sputters. You look further down the alleyway. At the end there's what looks like a cannon on a stick, freshly fired. Further down, there's shattered concrete, and even further down, there are scorch marks.
It's pretty clear she was fighting that other person; you just don't know why or what it was about.
[] Call someone, anyone. (Write-in who and give your reasoning)
[] Just go home and ignore it. (Difficulty 3)
Adhoc vote count started by TheOneMoiderah on May 16, 2019 at 11:08 AM, finished with 34 posts and 15 votes.
[X] Call someone, anyone.
-[X] Takane
--[X] This is obviously magical, she's magical, she'll know who to contact
[X] Call someone, anyone.
-[X] This is magical girl stuff right? Takane should know what to do.
-[X] But forget all the magical girl cliches, you need to let your mom know about this!
-[X] Call Takane, and your mom Sayaka.
[X] Call someone, anyone.
-[X] This is magical girl stuff right? Takane should know what to do.
-[X] But forget all the magical girl cliches, you need to let your mom know about this!
-[X] Call Takane, and your mom Sayaka.
[X] Call someone, anyone.
-[X] Takane
--[X] This is obviously magical, she's magical, she'll know who to contact
--[X] Call 119, there's someone bleeding out who needs medical support ASAP.
[X] Call someone, anyone.
-[X] This is magical girl stuff right? Takane should know what to do.
-[X] But forget all the magical girl cliches, you need to let your mom know about this!
-[X] Call Takane, and your mom Sayaka.
[X] Call someone, anyone.
-[X] Takane
--[X] This is obviously magical, she's magical, she'll know who to contact
--[X] Call 119, there's someone bleeding out who needs medical support ASAP.
The image doesn't load for me, when I try to view it separately I get this error message
Edit: huh, seems to work now.
<Error>
<Code>AccessDenied</Code>
<Message>Access denied.</Message>
<Details>
Anonymous caller does not have storage.objects.get access to discord/attachments/200091010552823808/578465166220328960/Mina_Finds_A_Dead_Body.png.
</Details>
</Error>
[X] Call someone, anyone.
-[X] Takane
--[X] This is obviously magical, she's magical, she'll know who to contact
The attacker suddenly sees you. They take a bewildered step backwards, look you up and down, then just simply...run. They run down the alleyway, far from their victim and across the rooftops
