NOVEL NEXT 35 – The past!
“For the two of us, it started when Trish and Sally – that is, the first Pretty Flame and first Pretty Spark – invited us to hang out at some secret hideout they made… or so they claimed,” Annette, the first Pretty Frost began.
“Ahaha! Yeah, and what a hideout it was! An entire new dimension!” the other woman – Michelle, the first Pretty Bloom – laughed.
“Dimension…? It was the demon realm, wasn’t it?” Iris asked.
“That’s right.” Annette nodded. “A whole new world. We were completely stunned when they first showed us the portal, then stunned again when Trish grabbed us and pulled us through.” A nostalgic smile appeared on her face. “Colorful greenery as far as the eye could see, strange but friendly animals all around us… It was a literal fantasy land. A paradise, almost.”
Iris frowned at that. There was something wrong with that description. She had been to the demon realm, and it looked like the exact opposite of a paradise… It must have been a wildly different part of that world.
“About a month before that day, Trish disappeared for a few days. We were worried, didn’t know what was going on… And then one day she suddenly reappeared and acted as if nothing happened. She kept saying that she was just out of town for a few days. We weren’t buying it.”
“Ah, that damn girl. She was always terrible at acting.” Michelle chuckled. “Well, as you might have figured out, that disappearance? Someone accidentally summoned her to another world, became friends with her, and then spent a few days figuring out how to get her back to Earth.”
Both Iris and Max nodded. They could see where this was going, from their previous talk.
“That someone was Baugh. A native of that world,” Annette smoothly continued. “Curiously enough, there was no language barrier; we all spoke the same language. Still not quite sure why that is, to be honest.”
Now that was curious. No matter what countless fictional stories say, having two completely different worlds develop the exact same language was just improbable.
“Baugh was the quiet researcher type. You know the one. He lived in a stone hut far from civilization and performed experiments with magic.” Michelle smirked. “So, of course, when someone as loud and energetic as Trish suddenly came into this life, he searched for a way to return her as fast as he could. Funnily enough, that’s how the two became friends. Trish started helping him with his experiments, learned some magical theory of her own, and kept helping him.”
“Wait…” Max – their son who had awkwardly walked in on their conversation – spoke up. “I thought Baugh was… the demon lord?”
“Oh, don’t worry, we’ll get to that. He is the demon lord now, but back then? He was just a lonely nerd.”
Max frowned, clearly having difficulty combining those two images together. “Okay…”
“Right, so… Even after Trish returned to Earth, she kept visiting Baugh to help him with his research. She later roped in Sally… and eventually, the two of us as well,” Michelle explained. “They told us about their crazy scientist experiments, how we should keep everything secret, yada yada, you can probably guess the details.”
“They needed more people from Earth for one of their experiments, and Sally and the two of us were the ones Trish trusted the most, that’s why they invited us there.” Annette paused before fixing her eyes on Iris. “That experiment? Creating tools that utilized the demon realm’s materials and the Earth’s unique energies in unison as their power source. They already had prototypes for a sword, as well as the blueprints for a staff, a bow, and a shield.”
“Our weapons,” Iris breathed out as her eyes widened.
“Got it in one!” Michelle grinned. “Our dear friend Trish was already the magical girl of summer when she invited us. Apparently, both the weapon and its user had to be attuned to the right energies to function. Even if someone stole the sword, it would just be a sword for them. Nothing magical.”
Iris nodded, absorbing the new information. Of course, she had already known a bit about the whole attunement thing but had no idea the weapons were made from the demon realm’s materials.
“So the Earth’s energies… are seasons?” Max asked. “Pretty Bloom is spring, Pretty Flame is summer, Pretty Spark is…. autumn, I guess, and Pretty Frost is winter?” He briefly glanced at Iris as he said the last one.
“Exactly! I knew you were a smart kid, Max!” Michelle ruffled her son’s hair as she said that. “Although… we didn’t actually know it was the seasons at the time. So I guess you’re smarter than we were!”
Max seemed to wilt under the praise and look to the side, his cheeks coloring red.
“We helped in the creation of the four weapons, and each of us attuned ourselves to one of them. We didn’t quite understand everything back then, but we loved being able to use magic.” Annette smiled. “As any kid our age would be.”
“Yeah, fun fact. Baugh could use magic innately since he was a demon, but us puny humans had to get attuned first to do party tricks,” Michelle clarified.
Or get possessed by a demon, Iris finished in her head.
“But then! I had a great idea.” Michelle grinned. “Magic was cool, but why didn’t we use it for good? To help others? To be heroes? Or better yet, magical girls!”
“We became the first generation of the magical girls. Catching criminals, stopping fires, rescuing people from a collapsing building… Just helping anywhere and everywhere we could. Baugh never joined us, though. He preferred to stay in the demon realm and do his research,” Annette continued.
“I guess he didn’t feel like being a magical girl…?” Iris asked, inserting a smidge of mirth into her voice. “And all four weapons were already in use as well.”
“Maybe.” Annette smiled. “Although, don’t get me wrong. The four weapons weren’t our only creations. We also made plenty of counterparts for them. Made with Earth materials, but attuned to the energies of the demon realm. Those were much easier to make. And even easier were the pure demon realm ones. Made with materials and energies both from the demon realm. We could make thousands of these without an issue.” She shrugged. “Baugh didn’t even need any of those anyway. As we said, he could use magic innately. He could have joined us at any point, but didn’t.”
Iris could feel the story would soon take a turn. What could have possibly happened to turn the timid researcher into the demon lord?
“At some point though, he discovered that a fifth weapon is theoretically possible. We still didn’t know it was the seasons, mind you. So we didn’t question it and tried making it and…”
“And it didn’t go well,” Iris finished for her.
“Nope, it was a disaster.” Michelle shook her head. “We made prototypes first again, but each and every one of them imploded when we tried to attune them. We planned on finding another trustworthy person to be its wielder, but… yeah.”
“We eventually managed to create a prototype that didn’t cause untold destruction just by being powered on,” Annette continued. “I’m not sure about the details, but Trish said it was a fraction of a fraction of what the real deal would be. And… Like I mentioned before, it was still extremely dangerous and unstable. It sucked out all ambient magic from the environment when turned on. Like a black hole.” She shook her head. “Obviously, we never tried to find a wielder for it in the end. We labeled it a failed experiment, thinking we would never use it for anything.”
Both women then grimaced. Iris and Max could tell, this would be the turning point in their story.
“Then, one day, we realized… Trish was losing her power. Her attunement was slowly but surely fading and we had no idea why. That’s what started it all.”
