I, the little cat, am a substitute for others who are starving and thin

Raising her sword to eliminate the familiar blocking her way, the blue-haired girl temporarily put aside all distractions to fight.

"Hey, are you an idiot?"

The annoying voice rang out again, and it was the red-haired man who bullied Yimi. Of course, the orthodox magical girl's tracking of the witch was stronger.

"Watch carefully, the ones you're attacking are familiars, and they're the type that can't even interfere with you."

"so what?"

Sayaka looked at her unkindly when she suddenly appeared.

"Only witches drop seeds of lament. It's best to just leave familiars like these alone. Killing them would be a thankless task for us."

Xingzi sat there, showing no intention of helping.

Sayaka hugged Hitomi with one hand: "Because my friend is here! I don't need things like the Seed of Sorrow."

Xingzi sat on the steps and took a bite of her apple. "My friend... well, that can't be helped. But you're so angry, aren't you starting to regret your wish?"

"I won't regret it."

Xingzi held up her face and said, "Huh... Your wish is to save a boy, right? Then you are that guy's benefactor, right? Why not just tell him directly and let him repay you? Just like the girl you are holding, if you don't tell her, she will probably never remember that you saved her, right?"

"This kind of thing..."

Sayaka couldn't use this to coerce others.

But, what is she expecting if she doesn't say anything? So her real wish isn't to save Kyousuke, but to be rewarded?

Sayaka squatted down and covered her head.

"What? You're preaching nonsense to people without permission."

Sayaka pointed her saber at Kyoko.

She chose to avoid this topic with another one.

Xingzi couldn't help but smack her lips and took out her soul gem: "Because looking at you is like looking at my old self, so stupid."

"If you need to blow off some steam by fighting, I'm always here to help. But do you still have the magic to keep fighting?"

"Don't describe me as a battle maniac... Hey!"

Sayaka yelled and suddenly drew her sword towards Kyoko's side.

The witch's true form finally appeared and launched a sneak attack on Xingzi.

Of course, a sneak attack of this magnitude would not go unnoticed by Anzi, and she, who had mocked Mami before, would certainly not make the same mistake.

But the bad thing was that she didn't expect Sayaka's attack and that unreserved magical slash.

The airflow it created directly killed the witch with one blow, and blew her soul gem away.

After the witch's barrier was broken due to the witch's death, her soul gem fell accurately on a car.

Kyoko: (._.)

23

Chapter 23: The Strong Girl.

"That was a close call. You owe me your life."

"Is this the Seed of Sorrow? It looks kind of evil. Hey, you need this, right?"

Picking up the pitch-black Seed of Sorrow from the ground, Sayaka turned to look at Sakura Anko, but saw that she was distracted for a moment, and then fell straight down as if the string had been broken.

"Hey!"

Sayaka put Hitomi down first and quickly squatted next to Kyoko: "What's wrong with you?"

Because it was her first time defeating a witch, or even her first time seeing a witch, she had no idea of ​​the witch's strength, so she output all the remaining magic power in that instant.

But I vaguely remember that at the moment she struck, Sakura Kyoko seemed to be holding her Soul Gem. Did she accidentally shatter it? Imi seemed to have mentioned that her magic output was greater than that of ordinary magical girls. What would happen if the gem that already contained the soul was shattered?

Although she didn't know if ordinary magical girls had this ability, she remembered that Yimi had said that her soul gem had a life-saving ability, which could transfer souls into it to prevent accidental injuries. It was said that her soul gem was very strong, but she didn't know if ordinary magical girls had this ability, or whether it was strong enough!

She tremblingly sniffed Xingzi's breath.

"died?!"

Did she kill this girl?

Sayaka took a step back in a trance.

Although I really dislike this girl who gave me a bad first impression and kept saying selfish things, I don't hate her to the point of wanting to kill her.

She is a murderer...

Sayaka turned around and nudged Hitomi: "Wake up, Hitomi."

"Sayaka? Why am I here…"

"You're so tired you sleepwalked. Can you go home on your own?"

Sayaka picked up Anzi in a daze.

"Am I sleepwalking?"

Renmei lowered her head in confusion. For her, who had systematically studied etiquette, this was as rude as snoring.

"What is Sayaka going to do?"

Sayaka looked down at Kyoko, whose eyes were wide open, and a tear fell from the corner of her eye. She forced a smile and said, "I'm going to turn myself in..."

……

It is certainly impossible to surrender oneself, at least not before it is certain that no remedial action can be taken.

Magical girls are born from miracles, so perhaps there is some way to remedy this? At this time, the only person she can turn to is the child.

The kitten who had already crawled into the bed was called out again. Wearing little dinosaur pajamas, he squatted down and observed Xingzi seriously.

Although the red man had chased and beaten her before, she had also fed the kitten apples and cookies.

"How about it?"

"Her soul was lost, but it should still be there."

Kitty, who has studied Kyubey's magical girl technology and has the ability to materialize souls, certainly knows a lot about souls. Although his understanding is not deep, he can still figure out what it means when a person loses their soul.

Yimi transformed back into her cat form and put her pajamas into storage. She sniffed at Xingzi, turned around, and ran in a certain direction.

Sayaka hurried to follow.

"What the hell is going on? Is the Soul Gem so fragile?"

"Ordinary gemstones are very fragile."

It is so fragile that it can be shattered by a single bullet, but compared to an ordinary human body, it is definitely quite strong.

It was only at this moment that we could see how fast Yimi could run. Sayaka originally thought that she would go to the crime scene to look for fragments of the Soul Gem or something like that, but the kitten actually took her all the way to the suburbs twenty kilometers away.

Finally, he jumped off the top of an unloaded truck with the Soul Gem in his mouth.

"Is this okay?"

Sayaka's uneasy heart relaxed a little, but her expression was still a little stiff when she looked at Yimi.

This kid, did he just come down with this thing in his mouth?

"call!"

With the Soul Stone returned, Xingzi Chang breathed a sigh of relief and sat up: "What's going on?"

"Very good……"

Sayaka slumped down in a duck-like sitting position, her voice much softer than before. She looked at Anzi and complained, "Hey, please don't throw your soul away for no reason, okay?"

"Littering? What are you talking about?"

Xingzi looked down at the gem in her hand and seemed to feel something vaguely.

"Kyubi, are you nearby? Stop playing dead!"

Kyubey really jumped out: "It is meaningless for us to pretend to be dead."

"You beast!"

Xingzi roughly grabbed its ears and lifted it up, "Are you hiding something?"

Kyubey, who was lifted into the air, showed no sign of pain. "It seems you already know. Really, losing yourself is a rare act among magical girls in the world."

"Myself? What are you talking about?"

"The Soul Gem, as the name suggests, is the gem that houses your soul. From the moment you sign the magical girl contract, your true self becomes this gem, while your physical body becomes nothing more than an empty shell that can be manipulated for combat. Once your body is freed from the Soul Gem, its effective range is 100 meters."

Kyubey spoke this message honestly.

In the past, it had never concealed the truth after being exposed, but perhaps because information did not spread so quickly in this era, or perhaps because knowing its true nature would accelerate the girls' despair and transformation into witches, such things had never been spread.

"What did you say?"

"You humans are always like this. It's obviously a very convenient thing. No matter where the body is damaged, as long as the Soul Gem is still there, it can be repaired in time. This is the most suitable state for fighting."

"Are you kidding me? Isn't this just like a zombie?"

Kyoko grabbed Kyubey by the back of his head and pressed his face against the mound of dirt.

"it turns out……"

Sayaka was stunned.

Is it true that a normal magical girl's soul is forced to be stored in the Soul Gem? With such a body, I'm afraid she can't even be considered human, right?

But no wonder...

No wonder it has to be hidden there, after all, it is a place that is extremely vulnerable to harm.

Before she could show sympathy or guilt for almost hurting the other person, Kyoko abandoned Kyubey and ran away.

"Hey!"

Sayaka hurriedly chased after him.

Although she didn't know why she wanted to chase him, it was probably out of guilt.

She didn't chase her far, or perhaps Anzi intended to let her catch up, because Sayaka grabbed her wrist on some inexplicably designed three-dimensional curved road.

"Why?"

Xingzi glanced back at her impatiently.

"I always feel like you're about to do something stupid..."

Xingzi gently pulled her hand away: "What about you? You still looked indifferent after hearing that."

"I...maybe I'm different."

Sayaka didn't elaborate, saying that letting people place their hopes on Yimi without permission was not a good behavior for the child.

Xingzi laughed and said, "Do you think I can't accept this kind of thing? You're wrong. This kind of thing doesn't matter to me at all!"

"..."

The red-haired girl stood at the edge of the curved road and looked down. "Actually, I didn't come to you just now simply to track down the witch. At first, I thought it would be that guy Tomoe Mami who was clearing out the familiars there."

Because of what Mami said to her last time, she was thinking about getting back at her, but later she found out it was this blue-haired guy.

"When I saw your expression, I knew you were regretting the wish you made for someone else. You're such an idiot, just like me."

It’s like seeing my past self, and I feel like I can’t just leave it there, I want to do something.

He said so much to Sayaka because it was like he saw someone of the same kind. If it was Mami who was there, she would have choked him no matter how gently he spoke.

"Why do you think I regret it?"

Sayaka, who just wanted to comfort the other person, suddenly felt bad.

"Sakura Kyoko, what a magical girl."

Kyubey said this from a distance.

Maybe because she felt that she had nothing left, she thought that she should only consider herself in the future. Anyway, she has always only thought about herself, and she doesn't care what others think of her body... Maybe.

The fact that she was a magical girl had an impact on Anzi, but it wasn't to the point where she was directly contaminated.