Magical Girls and Chtulutech Ch.6 (Patreon)

Chapter 6: Sewers Spawns

Last Cinder and Frost Mirage were standing over an already open sewer gate. The blue-haired magical girl apparently had more than decent tracking skills and was able to follow the Dark Spawn tracks, which led both magical girls to this particular entrance. As they had guessed, the Dark Spawns had come from underground.

“Here we go then.” Iroha said, more to herself than to her impromptu ally, before jumping down and allowing her magic to carry her down. She heard the flutter of Frost Mirage’s cloak above her as she followed her lead.

They touched down the floor, and it was surprisingly clean and well lit.

“Guess they didn’t skip on at least that much.” The redhead’s voice echoed off the enclosed walls.

“The corpos do send teams here often enough that they prefer to keep it as clean as possible.” Frost Mirage responded. “It gets darker as we go down, though.”

Just as she said, both Luminaries found themselves going down the sewers, and the clean, well built walls and water-cleaning facilities gave way to older tunnels.

“We shouldn’t have to go too far. There are things far scarier than Dark Spawns in the lower levels. There is no way those carrion eaters risked entering the territory of something larger.”

Iroha nodded to Frost Mirage’s words. It made sense. She also lifted a hand and created a ball of fire to illuminate their surroundings.

“I do find your magic curious. I don’t think I have ever seen a Luminary with fire magic.” The archer said.

Last Cinder forced herself to not flinch or show anything on her face.

Iroha  knew fire magic was technically used only by those on the Dark side. However, she couldn’t ignore the magic brought by her transformation. This would be like denying part of herself. But, telling anyone about her vision talk with Ste’ve was suicide. Thankfully, she didn’t have to lie.

“I was a hedge mage before being turned. I only found fire cantrips and creepy rituals that I wasn’t willing to practice. The Luminary transformation allows me to be a bit more freestyle with what I already know along with my natural affinities.”

Frost Mirage hummed, and Iroha prayed that she couldn’t hear her heartbeat picking up.

“Interesting. I haven’t heard of a Luminary with a magical background from before being recruited. This make you quite special. How exotic.”

Iroha felt a chill wind run down her neck and whirled around. Frost Mirage was centimeters away.

The redhead’s brows furrowed.

“Personal space, lady.” She growled.

“Don’t worry, you’ll want me in your personal space soon enough.” The ice user giggled before her face went back to neutral.

The more Iroha interacted with the girl and the more she believed her switch between taciturn and flirty was just a way to mess with people.

“Weirdo.” Iroha settled on saying before turning back to the path forward.

As they descended down the tunnels, Iroha couldn’t help but notice that the cavernous walls started to get larger and larger and they were soon replaced by brickwork, clearly showing that things had been built down there. And that was just on a visual level. Her magical senses were also going off because of the increase of magical energy floating in the air.

It didn’t take long for the Luminaries to start hearing things scuttle in the dark.

“This is it?” Iroha asked, keeping her eyes and ears sharp.

“Indeed.” Frost Mirage answered, hand plucking at the string of her bow.

A movement in the shadow caught Iroha’s peripheral and she turned to intercept the pouncing Dark Spawn.

One hand gripped its throat, preventing it from snapping its jaw around her face, the other grabbed its midsection. She spun with the momentum and slammed the beast down head first.

As if it was a signal, a wave of shadowy beasts rushed the two Luminaries.

Iroha quickly noticed that it was a lot harder to fight them here. Unlike above ground where both the moon, and the lights of the City kept the dark away, here the only source of light was the ball of fire hanging above Iroha’s head. The Dark Spawns had no problem moving around in complete darkness while the Luminaries had to wait for them to get in range of the light.

Back to back with Frost Mirage, Last Cinder only had to focus on what was in front of her, landing hits on any appearing monsters.

She punched one, only to have a set of fangs latch on the gauntlet before she could pull it back. The opened her for a claw strike from another that she barely blocked with her other arm. A third Dark Spawn surged between the first two, a gnarly hand poised for a disemboweling strike.

“Raaaaah!” Iroha screamed and jumped. One leg stomped the beast’s hand, making it screech in pain as it felt its limb break.

Her other leg ended its suffering as she front-kicked it before letting loose a detonation of Fire magic from the sole of her greave.

This also had for effect to make other Dark Spawns back off for a moment.

The redhead Luminary could still hear them prowling around even if she couldn”t see them. It was only a matter of seconds before more would lunge for the two girls.

“Fuck it! We can’t hold back! Spray and pray!” Iroha yelled, hoping frost Mirage would listen to her.

She followed her own advice and brought up as much energy as she could before firing it in a cone in front of her.

She mixed Force and Fire, sending forth a wall of solid fire. For a moment, she could see further ahead, and she heard the yelp and screams of pains from the Dark Spawns as they were being burned alive.

From the other side, Frost Mirage created arrows of supercharged ice magic. Each shoot ended into a blossom of ice spikes on the floor, impaling any Dark Spawns unlucky enough to get too close.

The light of the flames reflected off the ice crystals, illuminating the whole room they were in for an instant.

Once could have waxed poetics about the art of the architecture, and the archeological value of those underground ruins, however Iroha was more focused on the big, moving shape that was revealed.

It was a Dark Spawn. A huge, oversized Dark Spawn. Whereas the regular ones took the shape of regular animals and stayed around man-sized, this one was the size of an elephant and was bipedal.

In fact, it looked like a giant werewolf made of shadows with the only other distinctive colors being its gleaming fangs, claws and its red eyes.

At being see, it howled and charged.

“Shit!” Iroha barely had the time to curse before a giant paw swept her right off her feet and slammed her against a wall.

Her vision swam for a moment before she struck back. She slammed an elbow on the limb holding her, making the giant Dark Spawn let her go.

“I’ll let you  have the big one. I’ll take care of the chaff!” frost Mirage’s voice echoed, but Iroha didn’t have the time to look at her.

She jumped above another sweep and had to blast herself away from a following one. With explosions and trails of fire following her, Iroha flew in erratic patterns to dodge around the oversized shadowy monster.

Meanwhile, Frost Mirage made true on her promise. Using the remnant of Iroha’s flames, she caught sight of the remaining Dark Spawns. With a surge of magic, she jumped high into the air.

She drew a single arrow, and both it and her bow started to glow an icy blue. She breathed out, a line of cold air leaving her lips before she let go of the string with a single incantation.

“Winter Bow: Hail.”

The  moment the single arrow was shot out, it split. Before the Dark Spawns could even think of dodging, there was nowhere to hide as a rain of arrows pinned them all down.

The Luminary known as Frost Mirage landed on the top of an arch and sat down to enjoy the spectacle of Iroha dealing with the mutant Dark Spawn.

Iroha cursed as she kept evading. She had managed to deal with the lesser Dark Spawns easily enough. She was used to fighting things around her size, and even if they were inhuman, the shadowy beasts had kept aiming for her face and bust, which she was used to guarding.

The giant Dark Spawn, on the other hand, was not something she was used to. Its reach was insane and its hands were the size of her body, so the only thing he aimed at was her general direction. She could read it, and know where it was going to swing, but the sheer size of it left her confused as to how to fight.

“You’re stronger than that mutt! Stop fighting like a human, and fight like a Luminary!” Frost Mirage’s yell reached Iroha’s ears.

“Uh.” Iroha blinked. For a moment, she stopped moving.

The Dark Spawn finally caught her and started squeezing, planning to crush the gnat between its hands.

Yet, it didn’t hear the crack of broken bones, instead…

“Ha! Hahahaha!” Last Cinder laughed.

With a flash of purple aura, her War Song came to life. With a flex of her muscles, she pried open the hand of the beast and jumped out of its grasp.

She kept laughing as she fell to the ground.

The Dark Spawn was confused, but it lashed out, bringing its arm down to crush Iroha.

The moment Iroha’s feet touched the ground, she disappeared from the Dark Spawn’s gaze. The next instant, its jaw was slammed shut and its head rolled up, courtesy of Iroha’s uppercut.

Iroha landed on a platform of Force magic. She was silent now. She looked at herself, fighting a giant werewolf inside underground ruins while floating in the air and throwing out fireblasts. 

She gazed at her body that was barely scratched from being ragdolled by an oversized monster.

She looked at her fists, raised in a guard. Martial arts were made to fight humans, not monsters.

Iroha dropped her guard. She crouched slightly, ready to bolt in any direction. Her fingers flexed, magic coiling around her hands.

The Dark Spawn finally gained back its sense from the unsuspected blow. It charged back into the fray.

Iroha decided to test out Frost Mirage’s words. She reinforced the platform beneath her feet, and when the Dark Spawn swung at her, she launched a haymaker of her own.

Her small fist impacted the tree-sized limb. The monster was the one blown back from the exchange.

Iroha’s face morphed into a grin. It was full of teeth.

She blasted forward. The giant Dark Spawn threw a defensive strike.

A blast of fire sent Iroha flipping over the swipe. She corkscrewed through the air until she was parallel to the ground. Still spinning, she used Force magic to accelerate her body.

Her fist slammed down on the creature’s snout, sending it to the ground.

She landed on it and started raining down explosive blows after explosive blows upon it.

After a few dozen blows, the giant skull beneath her gave up. Her fist struck the ground, and she stopped.

A haze over her eyes she hadn’t been aware of lifted. She blinked.

“What a rush.” She laughed to herself.

She laughed as the beast’s body dissolved back into shadows. She laughed as she heard footsteps approaching.

She let another ball of fire float over to see Frost Mirage approach with a tiny smile of her own.

“Good to see you had fun.” The blue-haired archer congratulated.

“You like the show?” Iroha asked back.

“It was quite entertaining, yes. So, what do you think about your first mission as a Luminary? Exciting, wasn’t it? The thrill of it? The battle against inhuman monsters you don’t have to feel any guilt over slaying? All the others in the Luminous Knights feel the same way.”

Iroha  knew it was basically a recruitment speech, but she couldn’t lie. It felt great.

Before she could answer, the ground beneath her gave way.

Frost Mirage looked at the hole in the ground, where Iroha was standing a second ago.

“Not good.”