Grace had been serious about leaving the next day. Before she had gone home for the day, she ordered the girls to finish packing that same night. She intended to head out first thing after breakfast, and once the sun rose she kept them to that schedule.

  After a quick breakfast of eggs, toast, and an assurance that they’d stop somewhere for lunch on the way, the four magical girls crammed into Grace’s old clunker. Despite the fact that the vehicle’s ignition sounded like it was connected to a torture device for mountain lions, Grace promised that it could make the journey.

  They had a four-hour trip ahead of them, and the girls decided this was the perfect opportunity to share and select their weapons. Adah was riding up front with Grace, so she turned and looked over the shoulder of her seat to talk with her teammates. The other three girls squeezed next to each other on the backseat bench with Emi stuck in the middle spot. Everyone except Ami pulled out their phone and brought up the Magiapp to show their options to each other.

  Weapons existed in a sort of middle ground between a magical user’s transformation costume and their spells. Transformations were chosen entirely at the discretion of the magic user. Anything you could imagine and you had the magic essence to support was fair game. You simply provided your mascot with a representation of the design—a drawing, a 3D model, anything like that—and they’d inscribe it in their magic essence for your use. This was the best opportunity to set expectations for your “character” and show off your creativity.

  Spells, on the other hand, were out of the user’s control. That was how Adah wound up with [Nightwind Whip] even before she swapped her identity to Twilight Heartbreak. At the time, Izzy had explained it the same way he explained so many of magic’s intricacies: the will of humanity.

  Theoretically, magic could be used in limitless ways, but the system agreed upon by mascots and humans decades ago essentially set up guardrails for those uses. Adah’s training told her these limits were necessary to properly amplify magic essence, but she also suspected it was a means to control the power of magic users. By limiting the ways someone could use magic according to what the public expected from them, the mascots could ensure no magic user ever wielded their power to the detriment of those who trusted them.

  The end result of this system was similar to interpreting art. A magic user would put their costume and personality out into the world, and fans would interpret what kind of magical girl or boy they were. What sort of spells they ought to have. How they ought to use them. That’s when their character really took shape.

  Weapons functioned a bit differently. Like spells, they were tools that had to conform to the expectations and desires of fans. However, like transformations, they needed to be chosen with the comfort of the user in mind. A weapon that didn’t fit your fighting style, or that contradicted the nature of your spells, would be useless. Someone like Rika, who wanted to shoot magic from a distance, wouldn’t find many opportunities to make use of something like a dagger.

  Thus, weapons were chosen via a compromise. Magic users would be presented with a selection of three options, each generated from the will of humanity much like spells were. The options came from the hearts of fans, but the final decision on which to take was left to the user. It was that set of options the Sunbright girls were debating over now.

  “You already know what you want—right, Emi?”

  The girl who had been dead-set on a halberd since long before the IndieMagie suddenly doubted her decision.

  “It’s harder when they’re all lined up like this,” Emi said.

  Making your desired weapon known to the public beforehand could influence the options you ended up with, and it certainly had in Emi’s case. All three of her choices were variations of a polearm: her once beloved halberd, a sleek partisan, and a fierce-looking trident.

  “The trident makes more sense, doesn’t it?” she asked. She alternated looking at Ami and Rika.

  Ami just laughed. She was in good spirits, despite being the only girl not making a selection today. That optimism might have been her personal magic.

  “We could change our outfits to look like mermaids,” she joked.

  From the driver’s seat, Grace said, “It’s not wrong to consider your theme in your decision, but at the end of the day, it’s your weapon. You’re going to be relying on it to keep you safe, so it should be something you feel confident using.”

  “Maybe the halberd’s still your best choice,” Rika suggested. “Your [Crux Current] is already kind of a spear, isn’t it? This is your chance to mix it up.”

  “How does that work, anyway?” Ami asked. “If Emi took this partisan thing, is her spell just pointless now?”

  Grace rubbed the back of her head. “I don’t know, to be honest. Can you ask Izzy?”

  Adah called her mascot out, who popped into existence above the backseat. The three girls back there instantly burst into complaints about how cramped their space already was and therefore threw Izzy to the front of the car. He settled on Adah’s lap, leaving her looking like a child holding a stuffed animal on a family roadtrip.

  Once settled, he explained, “These weapons are a physical manifestation of magic essence. This essence is unbound to any spell, meaning you can utilize it in any way its physical form would practically allow. The damage your weapons can inflict on a Cruelty will start out slightly weaker than your current spells, but they have other advantages. They are constantly available to you, requiring no casting or charging in the way a spell might. Their reliability and functional flexibility are quite useful.

  “However, to answer your question, it would not make sense to summon a spear with a spell when you already possess a physical one. Therefore, spells that are functionally similar to your weapon will instead augment it, giving it the unique strength and properties of that spell for the spell’s duration. In the example of [Crux Current], most likely you would empower your physical spear with the rushing rapids of the spell. How that may play out in battle, you will have to use it to discover.”

  After explaining what he could, Izzy vanished once more. Even the front seats were a bit too cramped with him around.

  With this new information, Emi looked through her choices again. The partisan didn’t particularly suit her tastes or her theme, so that was one option down. She tapped the trident option on her screen, which brought up a new window that displayed a detailed view of the weapon and its properties. The main shaft was the same shade of aquatic blue as her transformation, with a translucent violet drapery coiled around its length. At three equidistant points along the shaft were etched a series of runes around its circumference. At its top, of course, jutted out the three-pronged spearhead, made of a dark gray magic alloy.

  This detailed window also displayed any special properties and effects related to the weapon. In the case of the trident, this section contained a note about the potential for midrange attacks—by expending extra magic essence, Emi could create a stream of water toward an enemy along which the trident would travel and strike the target. The effective range was estimated at around fifty feet.

  Emi tapped on the halberd next, which featured a similar design as the trident. The shaft was the same color and was etched with the same sequence of runes, though its length was nearly double that of the trident. Instead of any kind of decorative cloth, the halberd’s shaft was segmented into thirds by two metal handguards that curved up toward the weapon’s blade and point. The halberd’s head was made of a lighter shade of gray than the trident, and shaped into a wide ax with a spear point poking out of the top of it.

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  The note under the halberd explained how the metal of the weapon’s head was in fact fluid, and could assume various forms to best deal with different enemies. The bladed ax-like design featured in the image was one such form, but the metal could also shift into a thick-headed hammer or a tall glaive if the user desired.

  Emi swapped between the views of each weapon several times, staring at each and biting her lip. The other three girls were more intent on watching her face as she contemplated the choice than they were on inspecting the weapons themselves. After a while, she took a deep breath and raised her head.

  “I want a weapon I can stab and swing!” she declared.

  She confirmed her selection for the halberd and her phone emitted a pleasant ding. The girls around her all clapped as a notification appeared in her Magiapp:

  Weapon Selection Locked: Mercury’s Majesty

  “I wish I could summon it now,” Emi said.

  “Please don’t,” said Ami, who happened to be sitting in the treacherous seat to Emi’s right. “You’ll turn me into a kebab.”

  Emi resisted her urge and instead started poking her sister in the ribs, perhaps as a nonlethal way of skewering her. Naturally, Ami had to return the favor. A war of finger pokes soon broke out, which Grace tried to put a stop to by suggesting Rika make her selection next.

  “All right,” Rika said. “When I checked them out last night, there was a clear winner.”

  When she opened her own Magiapp, Adah barely had time to see what the options were before Rika pulled up the view of one in particular. She ignored what looked to be a rifle and revolver and went straight for the middle option on her screen.

  “Huh,” Ami said. “I thought you had your heart set on a gun.”

  “I did,” Rika said, “until I saw this.”

  The weapon she’d highlighted didn’t actually appear to be a weapon at all. It was just a simple pocket-sized lighter with a flip cover.

  “What does it do?” Adah asked.

  Rika grinned ear to ear and said, “Listen to this: ‘Harness destructive light magic via timed ignition of essence-generated accelerants. Attack with portable explosives, flammable trails, and incendiary projectiles.’”

  The image in the enhanced view shifted as Rika read the description aloud. In place of the lighter itself, her phone cycled through the possible “accelerants” the description mentioned, including what appeared to be a stick of dynamite, a self-propelled firework, and a tiny pellet Adah couldn’t identify.

  “From gunslinger to demolition woman,” Adah remarked.

  “Just one time, I want to toss a bomb into a Cruelty’s mouth and watch it blow up from inside,” Rika said.

  “Like a boss battle,” Emi added.

  “We’re turning out to be one badass team,” Ami said.

  Rika seemed to have made up her mind even before this conversation, but after seeing her teammates reactions, she was completely ready to commit to the explosives. After all, she had gunslinging covered with her own two hands. She finalized her decision in the Magiapp without another moment’s hesitation.

  Weapon Selection Locked: Fornax Firestarter

  “And then there was one,” Grace said, watching Adah out of the corner of her eye.

  Adah opened her Magiapp and held out her phone for the three girls in the backseat to see. She’d been thinking through her options ever since she first checked her phone the day before, but even after sleeping on the choice she was no closer to making up her mind.

  The first weapon was the oddest of the bunch, named by the app simply as the “meteor.” Once she saw its image, though, its function was obvious. The image depicted a spiked metal ball attached to a chainlink of smoky magic, much like the chains produced by Ami’s [Frigid Fetter]. If it had come with instructions, they’d only say one thing: fling pointy end at enemy. According to the description, the meteor’s special effect was similar to Emi’s trident option: the chain of magic that leashed the ball could extend a moderate distance from the user, and then automatically retract after striking its target.

  Assuming she could control its trajectory in the same way she could handle her [Nightwind Whip], the meteor could prove exceptionally useful against pesky armored enemies. The concept itself certainly fit within Heartbreak’s theme, as well. That said, her other options had their own appeal.

  Next was a great scythe that any grim reaper would be proud to own. The scythe looked as though it’d been designed to match perfectly with her transformation. The shaft featured the same iridescent coloring as her outfit, shifting between violet and black depending on the lighting and angle, and thin silver chains dangled from just below the head of the weapon. Instead of any kind of metal, the curved blade atop the weapon was made of that familiar smoky magic, flowing out from the shaft almost like a demonic exhalation.

  Its effect wasn’t as straightforward. Adah had needed Izzy to confirm she was understanding it correctly. The Magiapp described the scythe’s blade as a “magic siphon” capable of storing within the weapon the energy of those it slays. Of course, she’d only be slaying Cruelties, but she wondered if this effect meant she could call upon the scythe’s energy reserves to surpass her own magical limits. Izzy confirmed that such a thing was possible, as well as the ability to resupply her own magic essence as it dwindled. In effect, the scythe was a sort of battery she could charge up by killing Cruelties.

  Her final option was the simplest of the bunch, but also closest in style to what she had originally imagined herself wielding when she first became a magical girl. This third weapon was an elegant rapier, with looping and intersecting guards splaying out like the legs of a spider around the blade’s grip. Each piece of the intricately connected guard was made of the same kind of silver chains that hung from the scythe, though they appeared taut enough to still deflect an opponent’s blade—not that she planned on swordfighting any Cruelties.

  The weapon’s design itself didn’t feature any of the smoky magic that marked the meteor or scythe, but such magic did play a vital role in the weapon’s effect. Once the rapier’s tip pierced a Cruelty, a trace of magic would slip into the target and damage it from within, almost like a venom. Whether or not such a snakebite attack could effectively annihilate a Cruelty’s core was something Adah would have to test in practice.

  “Hmm,” Ami hummed as she looked over Adah’s options. “It’s gotta be the scythe, right? With all that extra energy, you could bust out a super attack that’d give Iris a run for her money.”

  “The meteor’s the only one with any real range,” Rika said. “That’s pretty hard to pass up.”

  “A rapier for a princess,” Emi said, a tiny twinkle in her eye.

  Each of her teammates providing an argument for a different weapon certainly didn’t help Adah make up her mind. A couple of months ago, the choice would have been easy. However, she also wouldn’t have been offered these kinds of choices back then.

  The magical girl known as Sparkling Starbloom had nearly faded from even Adah’s own memory, and Twilight Heartbreak had completely assumed her place. This went beyond a public persona—Adah felt closer to her Heartbreak identity than she ever had to Starbloom. Maybe that was because Heartbreak had granted her so much more success, or maybe it was because she was meant to be Heartbreak all along. Either way, something like a simple rapier no longer fit who she appeared to be outside or who she felt like inside.

  “You guys are going to hate me,” Adah said to her teammates, “but I don’t think I can pick right now.”

  She felt a collective groan welling up inside the other girls, but it never came to fruition. Instead, the three of them bit their lips and shared a glance.

  “The anticipation hurts,” Rika said, “but we couldn’t pressure a fellow magical girl into rushing a decision like this.”

  The twins nodded in agreement, although Ami quickly added, “But I’m forcing you to pick before we head home!”

  Adah laughed—that was more than fair. There was no benefit to overthinking something like this, after all. If her teammates did pressure her into picking, surely her heart would reveal what it wanted.

  “Maybe our hermit mentor can help me decide,” Adah joked.

  “Just don’t call her a hermit,” Grace warned. “If she gets sick of you, she won’t hesitate to kick you out. And I don’t plan on coming back here early.”

  “That reminds me,” Ami said. “Am I supposed to know what this ‘Untethered’ stuff means? You said this hermit was one.”

  If Grace wasn’t driving, she surely would have resorted to sliding off her glasses and rubbing her eyes as she so often did.

  “Seriously,” she said, “don’t call her a hermit when we get there. And shouldn’t you have covered this during your training?”

  Ami shrugged. “I dunno. I don’t remember any of that stuff. I can pass tests, but I forget everything as soon as they’re over.”

  Grace stared at Ami’s reflection in the rear view mirror so hard Adah thought it might shatter. Ami, for her part, was none the wiser.

  “Being Untethered works kind of like our weapons,” Adah said before Ami could get herself in any kind of trouble. “Or like flying or our defensive barriers. When you’re Untethered, you gain total control of all your magic. You can use magic without being bound by spells, even without having to transform. ”

  “Are you serious?” Ami said, grabbing hold of Grace’s headrest to pull herself closer to the front seats. “How do I become Untethered?”

  “That I don’t know,” Adah said.

  Grace smacked Ami’s hands off her headrest before she explained, “It’s an agreement between the magic user, their mascot, and whichever region issued their license. It’s not even possible until you hit some unreal FP levels—you need enough support from the public that the majority of people are okay with ‘taking your reins off.’ Then, if the government determines there’s suitable reasons for allowing it, they’ll approve it. Even after that, the final say goes to your mascot. It takes your connection to another level to allow magic to flow that freely between you, so they need to be on board with it.”

  “So this mentor lady got be to Untethered because she’s protecting the woods all alone?” Rika asked.

  “Uh, kind of.”

  “Kind of?” Emi said.

  “You’ll see when we get there,” Grace said as she glanced at the rear view mirror again. “It’s more like she’s a force to be reckoned with.”