Ch 23: Beach Rematch
Today is Friday, a whole 6 had passed and now Me and Mary are waiting at the bus stop for a specific bus, as one of the last vacation plans we had besides going to this year Comicket was visiting the beach to have a little bit of fun, so that's is the plan on doing today, we decided to go on the bus since the beach was like 2 hours on foot, so we were just waiting in the benches, the problem was that the summer heat had finally made its presence known, I was completely drenched in sweat and fanning my self with a flier someone handed me while coming here, Mary tolerated the heat better than me but she had her fair share of sweat herself.
While we were getting dehydrated in the morning sun, I saw a familiar figure walking along the highway, I squint to see him better, I'ts David carrying some groceries in a plastic bag, since I hadn't seen him in some weeks I decided to greet him.
"Hey David" I waved at him, he looks at the sides of the road trying to figure out who called him.
"Who?" He said while looking up as if he didn't believe someone actually called him.
"It's Amy, you idiot!!" I wave my hand more aggressively, since David is actually pretty cool he just approaches us.
"Hi Amy, didn't expect you to be here" he said while giving a faint smile, Mary look at him and then back at me.
"Who's this dude" she asked the both of us, David got nervous at the question.
"I guess we are friends? I mean we don't talk, like, at all" I said, I forgot to actually come up with an excuse to tell mary.
"Yeah, I kinda owe Amy a favor!!" David scratched his head in embarrassment.
"I see, well Amy does help a lot of people but this is the first she greeted someone" she gave David a judging stare, he froze in panic.
"What you got in there?" I pointed at the grocery bag he had, he opened it.
"I got some groceries, some sewing materials, ice cream, fo-".
"Hand over the Ice cream" I interrupt him, the mere mention of ice cream clouded my mind
"What?" David closed the bag and tried to hide it behind him.
"This is a robbery, also it's pretty hot and you owe me a favor!" I argued, he just look at the sky and thought about my words for several seconds.
"I guess you are kinda right, here" he handed us some ice creams, I get an Ice cream sandwich while Mary gets a popsicle, David looks at me with a defeated look.
[This is awesome! I didn't actually think he was gonna do it].
"You got a slave?" Mary smiled while saying that.
"I prefer the term 'Involuntary unpaid worker' but yeah kind of" I replied, David sighed loudly.
"I'm not your 'unpaid worker' I'm just trying to repay the favor, anyway see you around" David started to walk away from us.
"Are you busy?" I'm actually curious about what this guy does in his free time.
"Well yeah, My ex-boss found some event interesting and is planning on disciplining some people there and for some reason, I have to go there" David explained, he looked quite frightened at the thought of Lark beating people up.
"Makes sense, well then goodbye" I waved David and he continued to his 'home'.
"You have a lot of friends now Amy," Mary said, I thought about those words for a moment.
"Well it's not like I'm actively seeking friendship, it just kinda happened to bump into David and Vera, Vera is fun to hang out with since she likes the city a lot and David for some reason is always asking for help" I explained, it was mostly true, I just bumped into these weirdos constantly, but I took a liking to them over the course of these weeks.
The bus finally showed itself, We got in it and began our journey to the public beach when we arrived we it completely populated by people, so Mary searched for a spot with fewer people since she knew that I hated crowds, at this point, I was getting slightly accustomed to them since being a Magical girl involved being seen on the internet or having people following you, both of us got into a public restroom to get on our swimwear, but while looking for it we encountered someone else.
"Class rep?" I asked, Akari turned around.
"So you did come" Akari said in her usual tone, she had a light-blue swim dress that had a small white ribbon in the chest, the whole set had a floral pattern, she also was wearing a floppy star hat to protect her face from the sun.
"Well yeah that was the plan, but why are you here?" I replied, In our last meeting we did tell her we were going to the beach, but she said that she was busy that day so she couldn't come.
"Because I wanted!" Akari said with confidence.
"She means how can you be here since you were supposed to be busy" Mary was helping me deal with Akari's unawareness.
"I hurried so I could go here" Akari explained.
"Ah... I see, well then we need to get changed so if you excused us" I said while walking the restroom to get changed, my bikini was actually quite cute since I liked the light pink and flower patter it had, once I put it on I realized something.
[Wait a minute, my stomach is completely exposed in this].
I had forgotten something important, because of my overthinking I had bought this a month prior, so before I got slightly buffed, it was noticeable and I had no choice but to go out looking like that, so I gathered my courage and walked out of the restroom, I saw Mary with her usual sporty swimsuit, it was colored dark blue with some light blue vertical lines at the sides, It took every ounce of willpower to not run away from them.
[I really hate this].
"Does it look good?" I shyly asked since I was actually dying from embarrassment, Akari was staring into my chest like the last time and Mary had her eyes glued to my abs.
"Yes" both of them said at the same time, my face was completely red from blushing so hard.
[I'm gonna perish].
"Akari you can stop staring" I said to Akari, she didn't react at all.
"Well then, let's beach day begin!!" I say and immediately jump into the water since I wanted to hide m body as soon as possible, Mary frowned upon no longer seeing my stomach, I stuck my tongue out at her and she splashed me with water.
"Shouldn't you apply the sun cream to not be burned by it" Akari pointed out.
"Oh.. yeah we forgot that" I got out of the water, Akari planted an Umbrella in the sand and I got some towels on the sand so we didn't so we don't get ourselves covered in sand while applying the cream, I saw Akari get an idea while rubbing the cream in her body, she hurried to spread it and then immediately turned to me.
"Amy help me get the cream on my back!" Akari said enthusiastically, I sighed and did so reluctantly, I knew that someone had to do it and since she asked me specifically I didn't have a reason to turn her down, Akari smiled as soon as my hand touched her back, her skin was pale, so I was extra careful to not leave any spot without cream, Akari was happy once I had done it, I still had some cream in my hands so I turned to Mary.
"Do you want me to help you with your back"
"YES" Mary said without hesitation, but immediately blushed after, it seems she did not think how her words would come across, I just did the exact same thing, Mary skin was highly tanned, so she had some tanlines but you needed to be right beside her to notice it, I still took great care to not leave any spots without cream, I noticed that her skin differed from Akari's skin, Akari has a soft and tender skin that made my finger sunk into it, while Mary's skin was firm and smooth, once I terminated Mary turned to me.
"Well then let me do your back" Mary said with a cheeky smile, I let her spread the cream all over my back, Akari was watching us closely, she finished and I was going to stand up but Akari approached me.
"I'll help you with the front" I felt Akari's gaze into my boobs as she said that.
"No I'm fine" I said while giving her a fake smile, Akari simply pouted and nodded.
[I really need to teach her the word shame].
And so we started doing some random things since we really didn't have anything planned, I tried to make some plans but Mary insisted on 'winging everything' because that made our time more 'genuine' which I didn't understand since everything I did with Mary was genuine but I just attributed to her clumsiness.
After a bit of time I sensed that something was wrong, I got confirmation once Sauriel hopped on my shoulder, I got worried for a second but remembered that he only was visible to me.
"So what's happening?" I asked while trying to refine details in the sandcastle I was making.
"It appears we have some aether signatures of people you know" sauriel explained, he inspected my sandcastle in detail.
"So who exactly are they?" I asked Sauriel, I got to think on a plausible excuse to fight the enemies, I had assumed that they were devils.
"It appears that it is Magda and Hui which are causing a ruckus close to here" I dropped my shovel, I was a bit excited about the prospect of finally fighting Magda again.
"I see, then let's get going!!" I turned to Mary who was just laying in the sun with some sunglasses.
"Hey Mary, I'll get us something to drink, do you want anything" Mary raised her sunglasses.
"Anything Watermelon flavored please!!" She said, she then continued relaxing on the beach, Akari heard me and walked up to me, she was wearing floaters in her arms since she wasn't confident in her swimming abilities.
"Can I accompany you?" Akari asked.
"Yes" Akari got surprised at my answer, she didn't expect me to agree with it, while walking away I got close to her whispered.
"Actually some Magical shenanigans are happening, I hope you helped me with this" Akari nodded in agreement, she was also a bit happy since she was still slightly depressed at her becoming a hostage in her last fight.
We finally got to a secluded place and transformed, I was a bit unsure since swimsuits had less fabric but it seems that didn't matter to the transformation, and so we made our way to the beach, some people were running away while others were getting crowded on one side of the beach.
[I guess it's there].
Akari used her Telekinesis to get us over the people and see the situation, Hui was playing with a sandcastle while Magda was splashing around in the water.
"Umm, what?".
The situation didn't seem dire and so I looked at Akari, she was staring in the other direction and saw what was causing the commotion, a humanoid figure covered in algae and other plants was slowly walking along in the beach, it didn't seem to be attacking anything but it was just strolling along, I took a good look at it before they noticed us.
"YOU ARE STILL ALIVE?!!" Magda screamed at me, I just kept staring at the algae humanoid.
"It's that a devil Sauriel?" I asked while pointing at the algae monster.
"It isn't human, but it seems to be rather intelligent" Sauriel explained.
"I see that all angels do have good intuition" Hui remarked, Sauriel was surprised about someone actually hearing him.
"You seem to be in better condition, why don't you maintain us entertained in the meantime" Magda mock us, she did a hand signal and the devil that I decided to call 'Chlorophyte' started slowly walking towards us, it started to look at us, it seems it did have a head and from it, 2 light blue orbs could be seen, I assumed those were its eyes.
"Don't think you can cause problems without repercussions!!!" Akari exclaimed, she knew that we needed to keep the civilians calm while fighting, She lifted all of the shells and small rocks out of the grounds, they started to circle around her.
"Aquinas Faith".
Half of the rocks starter to shoot at high speed toward Chlorophyte, it takes it but doesn't receive any damage as if algae are extremely tough, it bends backward and then lunges 2 strips kelp all the way to us, we dodge it barely since their speed was ridiculous, the algae impacted the ground with enough force to make sand rise up.
"Its algae are pretty tough, but we are tougher" I say.
[Gotta work on my one-liners, kinda not good].
Akari fires the rest of the rocks at Magda who just got out of the water, she dodges them perfectly and begins pulling dynamite from her waist bag, I decide to start and impale Chlorophyte, it doesn't work because it bent its body to dodge it.
[He's pretty nimble, and not at all stupid like the other Devils].
Hui has been just taking notes about everything that is happening, taking extra attention to see all the behavior of Chlorophyte, cataloging its movement and decision making on the go while also trying to dodge anything that came her way, Magda had already lit her dynamite up.
"Akari, The twin-tailed girl can pause and interact with explosions, so be careful extra careful with her!!" I warned Akari about her since information is important in these types of battles.
"haha even knowing that can you really stop me" Magda threw the dynamite on her feet and started running.
"ROCKET JUMP".
The explosion propelled her directly into Akari, I quickly make a wall of rocks, Magda reacts by kicking it, stopping her movement, I had to quickly move the ground below me to dodge another of the Kelp attacks.
[Okay don't lose focus now!].
I make a spike pop up from the ground and punch it straight into Chlorophyte to pierce it, the distance gives it enough time to dodge it, I get annoyed and make two walls beside the Chlorophyte and crush him between them, it doesn't work since he doesn't have an actual body, so the algae and kelp slither out of the walls.
Magda started rushing towards Akari, since she didn't have more rocks to pick up she retreats by pushing herself with Telekinesis, She also started lifting sand to cover Magda's vision, but she disperses the sand with explosions, Hui is still observing, I try to approach Chlorophyte but it started retreating and lunges more Kelp at me, it hard to block since they feel tough as rocks, punching it also doesn't affect them.
[Goddamiit can I really not do anything on long-range targets, and the kelp can only be cut].
I take a look at Akari, She started compressing sand to make rudimentary rocks to throw at Magda, she has to block Akari's bullets since they are numerous, and then I realized something, Akari was using sand to make rocks, and I could control rocks so...
[I really am dumb!!].
"Sand Bayonet".
I punch the sand and make a sand blade go along the beach sand at high speeds, Magda jumps out of the way but I graze her arm slightly, I also had parted the sand where the blade cut, Akari looked at me since the sand blade was gigantic, she was surprised but continued her attack on Magda.
"Now we're cooking with gas" I was now confident because of an obvious fact, Chlorophyte shoot another Kelp at me, I kick vertically and create a smaller sand blade, it slices through the kelp tendril and the devil is forced to dodge to the side, I punched in its direction and hit it with a sand projectile.
[New plan, this thing is way too annoying to deal with].
I started a barrage of sand bullets directed at Chlorophyte, it tried to dodge them but get's hit by most of them since they come out of random directions, a particularly dense sand bullet makes it fall into the ground, I immediately make the ground below Chlorophyte shake upwards sending a considerable amount of sand in the air.
"Desert prison".
I make all the sand come down onto Chlorophyte to hold it down, It tries to slither Away but I crush him completely under the weight of sand, I start pouring a lot of aether into the Idea of 'compressing sand' to make him a rock prison, the 'sand ball' that is enveloping the devil slowly decreases in size, HUi tries to run to free it but I make a spike hit Hui, she doesn't have the reflexes to dodge it and get's pushed back.
"Akari, switch" I say, Akari who was maintaining Magda occupied changes into focussing on Chlorophyte and Hui, She holds the prison down compressing even further and makes more rock bullets to use in case Hui tries anything, I make the ground move to start approaching Magda.
"You got guts to face me after your defeat!!!" She exclaimed, she had an arrogant smirk on her face, I don't say anything and just make a fighting pose, she lits another dynamite, I start running towards her.
"Well, then it's your loss" She throws her dynamite at me while pulling another one, I don't stop and instead use sand to turn off the dynamic wick, Magda expected the explosion and was starting to run at me.
"It won't work!!" I say as I make the ground below Magda slide towards me, she gets surprised at her sudden acceleration and barely blocks my kick, I use the sand my kick raised to make a sand blade, it hits Magda directly and she backs off.
[Nice].
She grabs two stopped explosions the size of tennis balls out of her pockets and throw them at me, I make a sand pillar around them and drag them underground, the explosions make a lot of sand jump into the air, I clear the sand out of my field of view and start compressing it into rocks.
"ROCKEY JUMP".
Magda and turned around, she was flying at my direction with the intention to pass over me and reach Akari, I gritted my teeth at the thought that she was escaping after mocking me, I make a pillar of rock in my feet to quickly ascend, Magda was above me, I reached my right arm behind me and grabbed Magda's left leg, she stops moving forward
"Wha-".
Before letting her finish I start falling to the ground with Magda tightly grabbed in my hands, I make a bump made of rocks in front of me, I then swing Magda's entire body to slam it into the ground.
"FLESH HAMMER".
Magda impacts the ground making a loud sound, her head slams into the rock bump I made earlier, because of this most of the force was concentrated in a single point, multiplying so much that she passed out on the spot, after a few seconds I looked at Magda unmoving body.
"Yeah, you're out now!" I say she was knocked out and wasn't gonna get up anytime now, Akari had dealt with Chlorophyte by burying him in the ground and Hui couldn't get close to help either of her comrades because she would get blasted with stone bullets.
"Give up now and we will treat you fairly".
"Shut up I still got ti-".
Hui was interrupted by a dark portal appearing in front of her, from there the military girl showed up, Akari immediately froze up from seeing her again, she hadn't forgotten their last exchange, I put up my guard and slowly started to slide Akari and Me away from them, the military girl examined the situation, she saw Magda dropped on the ground and Chlorophyte completely buried in the sand, she took a look at Hui who was covered in sand, she stroke her chin and looked at me.
"You're quite the interesting individual" she said while looking at me, Hui quickly got in front of her and pointed at us.
"Your luck has run out now! you cannot defeat her anyway so just gi-"
"TEST FIRE".
A portal with a bright yellow handgun appeared behind Hui and shot a bright green bullet directly in her neck, she dropped unconscious on the floor, the military girl had just shot her own teammate.
"What do you think you're doing!!" I said to her, I was mad at the fact that she didn't even let her finish, she just looked at me and smirked.
"I don't like to pass up opportunities, and you should too, so I'll be going" She made a circular motion with her fingers and made a portal appear beside her, she then swiped with her hand and the portal swept and made Magda's body entered the porta, interestingly the sand didn't enter the portal, then she picked up Hui and started walking towards the portal, she tilted her head to dodge a stone bullet that Akari shot at her.
"Do you really think we are gonna let you go so easily?" Akari shouted at her angrily, she was infuriated at the military girl's behavior, she turned around and looked at us, her gaze was completely imposing but we were ready for a fight.
"You should let me go easily" she replied in a commanding tone at Akari who was starting to tremble in fear.
"And why would we do that" I argued.
The military girl just snapped her fingers, and a huge curved and rectangular portal appeared behind her, from the portal hundreds of different guns could be seen, shotguns, miniguns, rocket launchers, rifles, even slingshots could be seen pointing at us, the portal was the size of a 2 story building and hovered above her, all the guns were colored in a bright color resembling a rainbow.
"That's reason one" she pointed at the huge portal above her, "reason number two would be because it will help you, it is not common for someone to actually knock out Magda" she explained.
[I don't f*cking know what's going on anymore, I guess we should let her go since the wall of guns all pointing at us is quite intimidating, but maybe I should squeeze a bit more information out of her].
"How can we trust you when we don't even know your name?" I replied I try to not sound terrified but it was hard with multiple rocket launchers pointing directly at you.
"If that's your reason then I'll give you my name" she took o her hat, from there her silver hair flowed into her back but was obscured by her oversized coat, "My name is Ophelia- The Awarded Colonel" she walked into the dark portal that knows seemed a bit small compared with the one that threatens us, both of them disappeared once she entered the portal.
Akari immediately called to her knees from how nervous she was, I decided to keep my cool since there were some people watching us, they got scared at the sight of the portal but our stance did slow the spread of the panic, I assured everyone that the situation was solved, and then helped Akari get untransformed in a secluded place.
"Here Mary" I handed Mary a vanilla ice cream, her favorite, I looked around and saw something interesting, there were a lot of people crowded in one place.
"What took you so long?" Mary asked, Akari got frightened by remembering her encounter with Ophelia.
"Ice cream line too long, almost died of boredom, what is happening here?" I made an excused and changed the topic at the same time, But I was truly curious as to why they were so many people near Mary.
"Some dudes noticed that I made a big hole and started helping me, and for some reason that attracted more people" Maru explained.
[What a dumbass reason to crowd].
I looked in the middle, it was a hole in the beach, it was unusually big but not so much as to deserve the amount of attention, Akari jumped into the hole and immediately started digging to make the hole bigger.
"I see, how idiotic" I say.
"Wanna keep watching?" Mary asked me with a testing smile.
"Yeah" the hole was quite dumb, so I kept watching to see what happened while eating my ice cream.
And so, our beach day ended with us seeing a hole until we were yelled at by some bystanders for 'destroying the beach'.