Chapter XLI

Carrot felt like... she wasn’t sure, but it wasn’t very good.

The best analogy for how she felt was a not-so-fond memory of the one time where she drank three milkshakes in a row. She wasn’t lactose intolerant. Three milkshakes was a lot of milk to shake in her tummy, though, and she ended up feeling bloated, cramped, and full in an unpleasant way for an entire evening.

At the time, she had still thought that it was worth it, and to be honest, she felt that way now as well.

She kept the fact that her insides were churning to herself, it wouldn’t do to bother Silas with it. 

They had to leap across to a second rooftop before they found a roof-access that wasn’t locked from the outside. In all of her magical girl shows, with all of the roof-hopping they did, it had never really occurred to her how the magical girls got down from the tops of tall buildings. 

They took the stairs.

Once on the street, then made sure not to gawk at the three police cars that had pulled up to the office they had raided. “Is that going to be trouble?” Carrot asked. She picked a bit of what looked like drywall from the floof of her dress and flicked it into a garbage bin. 

“Probably,” Silas said. “They’re going to find the dog in there. Fortunately, most animal controls across the country have some association with magical society.”

“They do?”

“Oh, yes. A lot of non-magical people assume that any daemon they encounter are just rabid animals. To be fair, they have no reason to think that that’s wrong. So one of the ordos listens in on reports that are made about that. Sometimes weaker daemons are outright captured by normal animal control too.”

“I guess that’s possible,” Carrot said. She rubbed at her tummy, then let her arm fall when she caught Silas looking at her.

Was she being a bad friend by pretending? She... maybe? She didn’t feel so good about it. Actually, she didn’t feel so good, period. 

Inside of her was a roiling storm of magic, stolen from the dog by her Rite of Dark Purification. It was a lot. More than she had ever had to deal with before. Worse, it was darker, dirtier magic than she was used to. 

It wasn’t coming clean as quickly as she would have liked, and she was feeling it slipping through her grasp whenever she didn’t focus. Some of that was just escaping out of the air around her, and she probably smelled funny to anyone with the senses to notice, but some of it... she was worried that it was being absorbed by her.

There was no time to worry too much about it. Corruption was a danger, but it was something she would have to deal with as well. 

Slowly and surely, she was expunging the yuck and mixing the cleaner magic back into the dirty. It would take a long time, but she was going to dilute that pool of magic back to being pure, even if it might take her the rest of the day.

They made a beeline for the garage, walking at a rather brisk pace through the city. It wasn’t too long before they saw the garage up ahead, and Iris, walking out of it while looking... “Heya!” Carrot called out. “Are you okay? You look scruffy.”

“S-scruffy?” Iris asked. 

“In a good way?” Carrot added. She winced a little. That hadn’t been the most tactful way of putting it, but it was a bit true? Iris’ clothes were covered in dust and a bit of grime, and she looked like she had been tossed around a few times. Plus her hair was all crazy and could use a good combing.

Iris glared, then sighed and adjusted her blouse. “I suppose you’re not even wrong, which is the most insulting part. I take it from the fact that you’re alive that your part of this went well?”

“It did!” Carrot said. “How about you?”

“As well as can be expected,” she replied courtly. “The vulture had... a bit more fight in him than expected, but his skills left much to be desired. I managed to put him in his place and ground him. They were defeated.” Iris reached into her purse and removed a small object.

Carrot felt her magic, or at least the magic she was holding onto, shift towards it. 

She pulled it back, but there was so much that it took a fair bit of effort, and left her brow covered in a fresh sheen of sweat.

“Carrot?” Iris said as she took a step back. “What is that?”

“Ah, I think the magic I grabbed from that dog wants... whatever that is,” Carrot said.

Iris frowned, then placed the item back into her purse. Not seeing it helped, a little. 

“What is that?” Silas asked.

“It’s a rather makeshift device. I robbed the daemon of its magic, much like how Carrot does it, and fitted it into that item. It’ll last a while, and could be used to empower a few things. I thought that... maybe Carrot here could use it?”

Carrot grinned. “Aw! You’re thinking of me?”

“Only in negative terms,” Iris grumped.

Carrot wanted to leap over and hug her so bad she was shivering, but she also didn’t want to push Iris boundaries (much) and was a little afraid of getting too close to that stick. The magic she was still trying to assimilate wasn’t reacting well to it. 

“I take it from the fact that you’re both alive that you succeeded?” Iris asked.

“We did,” Silas said, then he winced and rubbed at his side. “Not without a few bruises, but we made it out. The locals called the police, however, so we decided to leave.”

“Discretion is the better part of valour. Or something like that,” Iris replied. She rubbed at her face, then grimaced. “Well, this was... a learning experience. Did you discover anything?”

“Maybe,” Silas said. He raised the bag he’d been carrying this whole time. “A laptop. I... am not an expert with these, but I’ll try to see if I can’t open it up anyway? If you two want, my place isn’t too far from here.”

“Inviting two young women to your place so casually?” Iris asked.

“I’ve been to Mister Silas’ place before,” Carrot said.

“Your innocence and naivety isn’t helping anything,” Iris replied. “But... fine. I could use a moment to sit down and relax. But I can’t spend all evening with you. I need to replenish my supplies. I burned through week’s worth of materials in a single fight.”

“Ouch,” Carrot said.

“It’s the price we pay for our magic,” Iris said. “A well-prepared Ulvent can take on even the most powerful of wizards. It just takes an inordinate amount of time to prepare.”

“I get that,” Carrot replied. “And sure! I wouldn’t mind spending a bit more time with friends, only.” She pressed a hand over her tummy and then fought off a slight wave of dizzying nausea. “I need to sit down for a while, maybe? I think I should meditate, or something like that.”

“Sure,” Silas replied. “I think that’s a good idea. I’ll order some food as well. My reserves are nearly tapped out.”

“Hmpf,” was Iris’ reply, but that sounded like a ‘sure’ to Carrot, so the three of them took off. 

The walk was... nice. Silas and Iris started to talk about small, inconsequential things, and while Carrot would have normally joined in, she was happy to pay attention with half an ear while splitting most of her focus off to purify the magic she had gathered.

She was trying two things. The first, a sort of... wave through the gathered magic, pushing the ‘detritus’ to one side to expel it. That was sort of working, but it was slow, cumbersome, and only picked out a small amount of junk. The second technique was a bit like plugging a hose to a big tank and letting some of the magic out from that while pressing it through a much finer filter at the end. 

That worked better as far as cleaning the magic went, but it was far, far slower.

She was almost surprised when her friends stopped, only to realize that they had made it.

“I... I think I’m going to go in the backyard, and just sit for a while. Is that okay?”

“That’s fine,” Silas said while looking at her carefully. “I’ll warm something up for you?”

“Thanks! That’s nice of you!”

“Least I can do,” he replied. 

Carrot still felt queasy, but her smile didn’t leave. She had made friends! Good ones, that helped her and went through tough times with her! That was something she’d always wanted to havel good friends. A bit of suffering was worth that much, right?

She sure hoped so, because this tummy ache was really annoying!

***