Kari buried her fist into another head hound, crushing its skull into the throat. It lumbered back, sputtered a fountain of black blood, then fell limp to the ground. She leaned against a nearby tree to catch her breath, a short reprieve to rub out an itch on her back that had been bothering her.

Sweat dripped down her forehead and stung her eyes. The pain in her chest hurt more than the aching knuckles. She lost track of how long she had been running through the city killing strays.

"How many does that make?" Kari asked Rocky.

Her anthem pulled out a notepad and donned a pair of glasses. He licked his finger and thumbed through the pages until he reached what he was looking for.

"Seeing as you earned 15,000 points, that makes fifteen hounds. We sure did a lot of work today, despite uh… that thing…" he hesitated to say.

Finding Makina in that state left a bitter taste in Kari's mouth.

It had looked like Tetsuo and those guys did something to her, but she wouldn't say what. Makina always told her everything, even the smallest of things. Why not this time? Just what the hell did they do to her?

The more she thought about it, the angrier she became again. There was one answer she could think of, but pushed it to the back of her mind so as to not go insane.

"Find me another," Kari said through gritted teeth.

"But I'm not sensing—"

"Find me something else to hit!" She snarled.

"R-Right away! Engaging long-ranged detector now!" Rocky fell into a trance-like state. His eyes went wide, beaming with light as he spun around in place like a rotating lighthouse— then stopped. "Found one!

The anthem pointed northeast. They came to a remote part of the city, far away from any residential or commercial districts. A large field overgrown with tall weeds hid an even larger tract of land flattened for eventual construction stuck in bureaucratic limbo. Yellow construction vehicles and stacks of cement cylinders were left idle to collect dust.

"I don't see anything?" Kari kept her eyes peeled, but it was dead quiet.

"I'm sure something's here…" Rocky produced binoculars from himself to help in the search.

It wasn't until Kari checked the riverbank that cut across the field did she find it. The head hound was hidden behind an iron sewage gate, staring forward with its mouth open and giggling quietly.

"These things really can end up anywhere, huh?" She returned its deadpan stare with a glare. After killing so many head hounds, they had become about as scary as an ant.

A dark thought flitted through her head. She tried shaking it away to no success.

Keeping something like this around…

"You're not going to kill it? A thousand points is a thousand points!" Rocky flew too close to the gate, and the head hound tried to bite at him.

"I think I've worked out my frustration for now. Besides, it doesn't look like it can break out of that," she said.

The anthem tried to protest. "But—"

"Let's go! I got school tomorrow!"

Breakfast this morning tasted bland. Or maybe Kari was finally getting tired of her mom's cooking. It never did taste that good anyway.

Dad entered the kitchen to grab a cup of coffee. He didn't so much as acknowledge either of them and quickly returned to the living room. If the news was on the television nothing else existed for him, not even his family.

Not that it mattered to Kari. As long as they left her alone, it was a good day, morning, and night.

"In other news, the fourth magical girl strikes again!" the news anchor began enthusiastically. "Fifteen more head hounds have been found dead across Minato City this morning. Could Tokyo have its very own guardian angel?"

"All I know is I'm feeling a lot safer already. Whoever she is, she must be shy to do all this away from the public eye," a fellow anchor remarked as the camera panned over to her.

Guardian angel of Tokyo. A title that made, any other day that might have made Kari jittery with joy. Her parents watched the television, unbeknownst to them it was their daughter the news was talking about. What kind of face would they make if she transformed right now?

"Great. Now all I'm going to hear at work is more talk about magical girls." Dad stood up to stretch, grabbed his briefcase, and made for the door. He hadn't even taken a sip of coffee Mom so kindly brewed from scratch for him.

Kari watched from the kitchen as Mom intercepted him before he could exit the house.

"What do you think about vacation when Kari's on summer break? Okinawa is great this time of the year. Just one week— a single weekend?" she asked from the hallway.

"You know I don't have time for that. If you two want to go, then go. The company is going through a merger between August and September, and they're laying off poor performers during the process. I have to be at my best unless I want to be let go," Dad replied half-heartedly. The door creaked open. He stepped outside and lowered his voice, thinking it was quiet enough that Kari couldn't hear. "I'm busting my ass providing for you, our parents, and in case Kari becomes a NEET here. Talk to her."

The door closed shut.

Mom reentered the kitchen with a scowl. "Your father doesn't know how to be a part of the family unless it was his job."

It wasn't as though her parents were particularly antagonistic to each other. In fact, both of them were, by social standards' sake, good-looking for their age and had married out of love. Work just absorbed everything out of Dad, and Mom wanted more out of life than being a senior care provider.

Kari pretended to watch the television, waiting for her mother's inevitable talking-to like Dad wanted. Nothing of the like came.

Instead…

"What do you say, Kari? Just the two of us, mom and daughter bonding time?" she asked, staring at a calendar on the fridge. "I could take a few days off here…"

"Makina and I made plans." Kari answered instantly. It was true, just not the entire truth. She promised to attend the music arts festival Makina was set to perform at, and was sure they would make more plans in the coming days.

"Figures. Just put the dishes in the sink. I'll wash them later." Mom sighed and exited the kitchen a second time, presumably heading to her room upstairs.

"I think your mom really wanted to spend time with you," Rocky said, picking up a piece of salmon from Kari's plate to nibble on. She'd forgotten he was here this whole time. Since he was going to be living with her, the rascal had technically become part of the family. A member that only interacted with her.

"You my family therapist now?" She left the plates on the table and grabbed her school bag. Before exiting the living room, she chugged down her dad's coffee and realized why he might not have drank it— Mom had put in too much sugar.

Makina was waiting in front of the school gate with her head down and nails digging into her bag handle. Kari half-expected to find Tetsuo buzzing around, but he was nowhere to be seen. He better count his lucky stars that she found Makina first.

"You sure you don't want to talk about it?" Kari asked as she caught up to her friend.

"Really, it's fine. Let's pretend that day never happened. Promise me, please?" If Makina pleaded that desperately, she couldn't possibly refuse.

Curiosity was killing her. If she wanted to get an answer, she might have to coax it out of Tetsuo. But was she ready to hear the truth, confirming her terrible suspicion? Could she even take it without going nuts?

As soon as they got into class, all eyes were on Makina. Students parted ways for them to pass and whispered derisively.

"What's everyone gawking at?" Kari asked out loud, but saw first why they were at the center of attention. She thought to stop Makina and block her from seeing what she had seen.

Too late.

"Who… why?" Makina gasped. Blood drained from her face. She was on the verge of tears.

Written on her desk, scrawled in large black letters were hateful words: whore, slut, trash, easy— just to name a few. Dead roaches spilled out of her desk and emitted a foul stench.

She stood there, unmoving and staring with a blank expression.

"I'm going to be sick…" Her voice quivered. She covered her mouth and looked close to vomiting, then ran out of the room.

"Wait!" Kari was about to go after her when students in the class began to whisper amongst themselves again. Her anger got the better of her and lashed out at them accusingly. "Which one of you did it?"

None of them answered. They turned away and pretended not to be involved. As far as Kari was concerned, they were all at fault. Some of them had to have seen who did it. Even the class rep turned a blind eye, and returned to her routine chore of replacing the water in the vases for Gouda and Chie.

Kari snatched the vase from Gouda's desk and tossed the flower aside, and the class rep finally found her voice again.

"Hey! That's disrespectful to the deceased. Give that back!" she cried.

"And this isn't disrespectful to someone who's alive?" Kari asked, pointing to Makina's desk. She poured water over it, trying to scrub off the obscenities with a handkerchief to no success. It had been written with a permanent marker.

Was it just her imagination, or did the whispers grow louder?

Just a week ago these students raised their voices a pitch higher to ask Makina if she was okay and gave effortless words of comfort, then at a flip of a coin they turned on her.

What changed?

Several students peeking in from the door quickly ducked away as Kari raised her head. She barely caught sight of some girls from other classes.

"Geez. What kind of people say 'fuck off' instead of sorry when bumping into someone?" Minato came in glancing over his shoulders with a scowl. He was horrified to see the sorry state the desk was in. "Kari? The hell happened to Makina's desk?"

"Those girls you saw just now. Did you recognize them?" Kari asked.

"Ena's groupies? What about them?"

Luckily for them, Minato had a bleach pen on him due to his finicky tendencies. He was able to remove most of it by rubbing the tip on the marker stains.

Kari's nails bit into the palm of her hands. "I think they're the ones who did this to Makina…"

When homeroom began, Makina never did come back to class. By lunch, Kari and Minato were getting worried.

"I'm going to check on her," Kari said.

"I'll come with—"

"I don't know why they're bullying Makina. Let's not give them any reason to target you either." She pushed him by the shoulder back into his seat.

"Guess I'll keep an eye on her desk so no one screws with it. Try not to forget you guys can depend on me, too." He grinned.

"Even though you're so flakey about hanging out?" she teased.

The infirmary was on the first floor at the very back of the school building. Few frequented this hall unless they were the nurse or faculty. However, it seemed a couple of students had the same idea as Kari, but for a much different reason.

"You wrote on Makina's desk, didn't you?" Kari called out to the group of girls, stopping them at the door to the infirmary. Looking at them closely now, she recognized one of the girls with blonde hair and a pink headband on her head from the mixer group.

Third year Ena Mizushima, a caked up hype-girl who took her voice several pitches higher than it normally was to act cutesy.

"I thought I saw you yesterday," Ena said, taking her hand off the door handle now that she had found new prey.

Kari was surrounded by the group of five. Ena stepped into her personal space and pushed a foot between her legs.

Their show of force was laughable, if only this was a laughing situation. They really thought they could take her. None of them had any idea what she really was.

Monsters died in one or two hits. All it took was a flick of her finger to kill someone like Ena. She could do it. She felt her hand clenching into a fist and muscles tensing.

"I was having a real nice time with the captain of the basketball team yesterday, but Makina had to butt in looking all pretty. You two stay away from Daisuke if you know what's good for you. Or you can just stay mute. Whatever." She scoffed and stormed past with her groupies following close behind.

The taste of iron filled her tongue. She didn't realize she had been biting her lower lip to keep from blowing a lid. When she spun around hoping to get a word in, Rocky was there to block and hold her back.

"You have to control yourself! Your powers will go out of control at this rate. Look!" He poofed a hand mirror to show that she was in the process of transforming into the magical girl outfit. She dove behind the corner before anyone could see.

"Change me back!" Kari demanded.

"For some reason I can't! It might be because your mind is in battle mode. Take deep breaths, and think about happy thoughts?" Rocky took deep, rhythmic breaths in an effort to get her to mimic him.

Kari took his advice. The first thought that came to mind was Makina, but the image of her warped into the scene at the karaoke place. That seeded hate in her chest cracked and ignited.

"I said 'happy thoughts!' What on earth are you thinking about?!" Rocky yelled, snapping her back to her senses. Electricity sparked at her feet and ran up the walls. A hallway light above shattered and rained glass shards around them.

Her body was on fire. A power she never felt before coursed through her veins and set her nerves alight.

[Apocalypse System activated…

System message incoming…

…

…

…

System message received. Displaying message now…

Interesting… You have more potential than We thought.

Embrace it. Let Us give you a little taste…

We'll call it a loan.

…

…

…

Ne# p#ssi#e s#ill gai##d…

Enrage: When your health is reduced to 20%, your base physical strength is doubled. The effect is lost when healed above 20% or health reaches 0%.]

"What… How did I…?" Kari couldn't finish her sentence before she fainted.

Rocky's panicked cries were all she heard as she lost consciousness.