Volume 1, Chapter 7: Is Something Different About Blue Lance Today?
At 10:46 a.m., Shuichi woke up for the second time.
The first time had been a little after seven, when the sound of Yusei tearing apart cabinets woke him and he'd gone over for breakfast while he was at it; the second was an entirely normal waking up, because after coming home he'd drawn the curtains and gone straight back to sleep for more than two hours.
The room was still very dark; beside the computer desk, only a few little lights on the router and power strip were lit.
Shuichi fumbled around on the bed for a long while before finally digging his phone out from under the pillow. The moment the screen lit up, a string of push notifications popped up along with it.
【Two calamity beast attacks in Linjiang City on consecutive days.】
【Mysterious female hero "Blue Lance" appears two days running.】
【Blue Lance's latest battle footage, analyzed.】
Shuichi swiped a couple of times, meaning to clear them all, but his thumb lingered on the last one.
He tapped in.
The browser automatically jumped to a website in a pink-and-white color scheme.
At the very top was a line in a rather eye-catching decorative font.
【Girl Hero Observatory】
Below it hung the site's slogan.
【Recording every descent from the sky.】
"..."
Every time Shuichi saw this website, he figured whoever had built it had way too much free time.
But he had to admit the thing was kind of impressive.
The identities of the girl heroes were all hidden, but over all these years, ordinary people's curiosity had never waned because of it.
If anything, because the real people could never be found, a whole crowd of internet sleuths had formed who specialized in tracking their movements, and the biggest of them all was this "Girl Hero Observatory."
The site didn't record real identities.
Because nobody knew them anyway.
It only recorded the heroes' publicly seen battle footage, weapons, apparent abilities, usual areas of activity, estimated number of appearances, and all sorts of strange rankings decided by netizen votes.
Things like—
【Ranking: Heroes We Most Want a Princess Carry From】
【Combat Suit Aesthetics Ranking】
【Best Girlfriend Material Ranking】
【Ranking: Who Looks Like She Has the Worst Temper】
The first time Shuichi saw it, he was silent for a full minute.
Then he closed the site.
Now that he'd clicked back in, a screenshot of a blue-haired girl holding a lance was already up at the very top of the front page.
Page title:
【Linjiang City's New Hero, Provisional Codename: Blue Lance】
There wasn't much data below yet.
【Publicly confirmed appearances: 2】
【Main area of activity: Linjiang City】
【Weapon type: Lance】
【Suspected abilities: energy emission, physical enhancement, possible shield construction】
【Current status: Identity unknown】
【Netizen vote popularity: #37↑】
Only two days.
Thirty-seven.
Shuichi scrolled down.
The comments section was a lot more entertaining than the data.
【The first time I saw her yesterday I said she'd blow up. With that face and those legs, if she doesn't blow up, I'll eat my computer desk.】
【Finally, another lance-type hero!】
【She was obviously not in great shape the second time, right? She went down on one knee after that last strike.】
【Poster above, don't jinx it, I just found a new waifu.】
【Looks 9/10, combat 8/10, outfit 6/10. Designer, come out and take your beating.】
When Shuichi saw the last one, he couldn't help laughing.
"Designer..."
If these people knew that the so-called designer was actually the transformer's own power, he wondered what they'd think.
He kept scrolling.
Someone had already clipped several slow-motion shots of Mio fighting on Changze North Road yesterday, breaking down her grip, footwork, and habits of putting out force, and below that people were solemnly arguing over whether Blue Lance was a power type or a technique type.
Shuichi looked at a few of them.
None of them had hit the mark.
Mio was a technique type.
It was just that she didn't much want to admit her body could no longer keep up with her technique.
But now...
Shuichi thought of Yusei being dominated by his own kitchen cabinet doors.
Hard to say.
His phone suddenly buzzed.
A message from Yusei.
【You up?】
Shuichi replied.
【No.】
The other side was silent for a few seconds.
【Then who's answering me?】
【Sleepwalking.】
【Come downstairs.】
【Why?】
【Groceries.】
Shuichi stared at the screen.
【Not going.】
Yusei's reply came fast.
【No lunch for you.】
Shuichi threw off the blanket.
***
Twenty minutes later, the three of them were walking along the shopping street outside the residential complex.
Shuichi had assumed it would be just him and Yusei, but when he got downstairs he found Asakawa Mio was there too.
She was dressed simply today, in a black T-shirt with light-colored jeans, her shoulder-length black hair tied back in a ponytail, and a small medical dressing still stuck on her left wrist. Since yesterday's injury had largely healed, her complexion was noticeably better than it had been the last couple of days, and her walk had recovered its usual brisk, decisive rhythm.
When Shuichi saw her, his first reaction was to turn around.
Mio asked.
"Where are you going?"
"Back."
"Why?"
"Two people are enough for groceries."
Yusei grabbed his shirt from behind.
"You're mainly in charge of carrying."
Shuichi glanced down at the hand clutching the back of his collar.
"Let go."
"No."
"I'm calling the police."
"Call them."
Mio watched for a while.
"Are you two like this every day?"
"Pretty much."
"No."
The two of them answered at the same time.
Mio was already getting used to it.
She didn't comment further.
The shopping street was crowded on a Sunday morning. Roadside restaurants were getting ready for the lunch rush one after another, a row of discount bottled water was lined up outside the supermarket, and a few kids ran around a street corner chasing a balloon the wind had carried off.
Traces of yesterday afternoon's calamity beast attack hadn't been fully cleaned up yet; not far away, a shop's rolling shutter was still dented in a big hollow, but most people passing by didn't have the slightest interest in taking a second look.
Life had to go on.
Yusei was discussing the test after breakfast with Mio.
"So the connection really can't be broken?"
"It's not that it can't be broken."
Mio corrected him.
"It's that we don't know the right way yet."
"There's a difference?"
"Of course there is."
"Isn't the result the same?"
"Completely different."
Mio turned her head to look at him.
"One is not knowing how to open a door; the other is a door that doesn't have a handle at all."
Yusei thought about it.
"Sounds like you still can't get out either way."
A vein twitched faintly at Mio's temple.
Shuichi, walking behind the two of them, found it a little funny.
Then he stopped.
Just for a moment.
Yusei and Mio up ahead didn't notice.
Shuichi raised his head.
The traffic light at the end of the shopping street was working normally.
Nothing seemed out of the ordinary in the crowd either.
But the feel of the air had changed.
Very subtly.
Ordinary people couldn't possibly notice.
Even an ordinary transformer might not sense it right away.
Shuichi stood still for two seconds.
Only one thought in his head.
No way.
The next second.
The city alarm went off.
A piercing wail exploded along the entire shopping street at once.
Almost everyone's phones buzzed at the same time.
【Disaster alert.】
【High-intensity calamity beast reading detected.】
【Area: west of Xincheng Station.】
Mio's expression changed instantly.
Xincheng Station.
Less than a kilometer from here.
Yusei already had his phone out.
"This close?"
Shuichi didn't say anything.
Because he'd already heard it.
BOOM—!
A muffled roar came from the distance.
Right after, the ground of the shopping street visibly shook, and the signboards outside several shops swayed at once.
The crowd broke into brief chaos.
Mio didn't hesitate.
"I'm going."
Yusei grabbed her wrist.
"Wait."
Mio looked back.
"What?"
"I'm coming too."
"No."
There wasn't the slightest hesitation in the answer.
"Why not?"
"You can't control your power yet."
"Then I won't fight."
"A calamity beast isn't going to walk around you just because you say you won't fight."
"But your power's connected to me now."
That made Mio stop.
Yusei went on. "Yesterday, even when you were a little farther from me, I could still sense you. If that's the case, maybe distance affects the empowerment too. I should at least go and see."
"It's too dangerous."
"So you want me to stay behind here alone, with no idea whether the connection on your end is going to suddenly go wrong?"
Mio frowned.
He had a point.
That was the most annoying part.
Shuichi looked at the two of them.
"Are you two done talking?"
They both turned around.
Shuichi pointed at their surroundings.
"Everybody's almost run off."
The shopping street that had been bustling a moment ago was rapidly evacuating; shop clerks were pulling people inside, cars were jammed at the intersection honking like mad, and a column of dust could already be seen rising from between the buildings in the distance.
Yusei asked.
"What about you?"
"Going home."
"Alone?"
"Mm."
Yusei looked at him.
Shuichi looked back at Yusei.
Two seconds.
"..."
"Fine."
Shuichi sighed.
"I'll go to a shelter."
Only then did Yusei nod.
"Don't wander off."
Shuichi waved a hand.
"I know."
Mio had already turned and dashed off.
Yusei followed right behind her.
Shuichi stood where he was, watching them run off.
Five seconds later.
He started walking in the same direction.
Of course.
It wasn't because he was worried.
The underground passage next to Xincheng Station was the nearest shelter area anyway.
That was how he planned to explain it.
***
The calamity beast that had appeared this time was bigger than any of the earlier ones.
When Shuichi reached the area near Xincheng Station, he saw it right away.
A giant four-legged creature nearly seven meters tall was sprawled in the middle of the intersection. It looked as if a beetle and a lizard had been forcibly stitched together, its whole body covered in a thick layer of gray-black armor, with six bony plates of varying sizes rising from its back.
It had no obvious eyes.
At the front of its head were only two enormous pincer-like mouthparts that closed inward.
With every breath, a dark red glow lit up in the seams of its carapace.
The area around it was a wreck.
Two cars lay on their sides.
A bus shelter had half collapsed.
A streetlight lay toppled across the sidewalk.
Worse, a minibus had been rammed over a median by the calamity beast and flipped, its body wedged between a roadside flower bed and a guardrail, and there were still people inside.
The police had already started evacuating people.
But the bus door was deformed.
There was no getting it open.
Shuichi stopped at the edge of the crowd.
First look: the calamity beast.
Second look: find Yusei.
He found him fast.
The guy hadn't gone toward the calamity beast.
He was by the minibus.
"Honestly..."
Shuichi had known it.
Yusei was trying to pull open the warped door along with several police officers.
"Get back!"
An officer shouted at him.
"It's dangerous here!"
"There are kids inside!"
"We know!"
"The door's stuck!"
"The fire department's almost—"
Yusei didn't hear the rest.
Because crying had suddenly broken out inside the bus.
A warped metal bracket was pinning down the space right beside a little girl.
The calamity beast let out another roar.
The ground shook.
The overturned minibus rocked along with it.
Yusei crouched down.
He gripped the edge of the warped door with both hands.
The officer next to him stared.
"What are you doing?"
"Giving it a try."
"That's not something human strength can—"
CREAK.
The metal let out a grating, twisting shriek.
Everyone went quiet.
Yusei went quiet for a moment too.
"..."
He looked down at his hands.
Then he kept pulling.
CRACK—!
The bus door, which had been rammed completely out of shape, was actually wrenched outward by brute force, opening a gap nearly half a meter wide.
The people around him all stared, dumbfounded.
"Holy shit..."
Someone said it.
Yusei hadn't expected it either.
Yesterday it had only been a cabinet door.
Today it was a bus door.
The changes were still going.
But there was no time to think about that now.
He climbed straight in.
"Hand me the kids first!"
The adults inside came to their senses and hurriedly passed over the little girl closest to the door.
One.
Two.
A third.
Shuichi stood in the crowd, watching.
He could barely keep the corners of his mouth down.
"Demolition crew."
Getting more professional by the day.
Blue light suddenly burst in the distance.
Shuichi looked up.
Asakawa Mio had already transformed.
And this time.
It wasn't the old battle attire from the website's footage.
When the blue light scattered, long pale-blue hair streamed out behind her and the silver lance dropped into her hand. The heavy armor that used to cover her shoulders and arms had vanished entirely, replaced by lighter blue-and-white battle attire that hugged her body.
On the outside of her left leg, that pale-gold King's Mark shone especially bright.
The crowd at the scene went noticeably quiet.
Then almost every phone went up at once.
"Blue Lance!"
"It's Blue Lance!"
"Wait, did her outfit change?"
"Holy shit."
"That's not the one from yesterday, is it?"
"Definitely not!"
Even the police officers keeping order couldn't help glancing over.
Shuichi looked down at his own phone.
Someone had already started a livestream.
The title had even just been updated.
【Blue Lance's New Form, LIVE From the Scene!!!】
"That was fast."
Shuichi muttered.
Meanwhile, in the middle of the street, Mio had no time at all to worry about how people saw her.
The calamity beast had already turned its head toward her.
The next instant, its huge body suddenly accelerated.
When a seven-meter monster charged, even the ground shook along with it.
Mio didn't back off.
She moved forward instead.
Left foot down.
Lance low.
In the instant before they collided, she suddenly realized something.
Her power was flowing too smoothly.
Not like yesterday's temporary surge that had spun out of control; from the moment her transformation finished, her body had naturally held at a level she could barely have imagined before.
She could even sense Yusei in the distance.
The connection stayed stable across hundreds of meters.
The calamity beast's forepaw slammed down.
Mio sidestepped.
So fast she left only a blue afterimage where she'd been.
BOOM!
The claw smashed the ground.
Mio had already swept along the monster's right side, close to its body.
The lance tip, carrying gold-and-blue light, stabbed into a seam in its carapace.
CLANG!
It didn't go in.
A huge recoil ran back up the shaft.
Mio's eyes changed.
So hard.
The calamity beast's tail suddenly swept sideways.
She immediately braced the lance to block.
BANG—!
She was flung straight off her feet.
Gasps rose from the crowd.
Mio flipped in midair, her long boots skidding down the outer wall of a building, cracking a tile, before she sprang back down to the ground.
She wasn't hurt.
But Shuichi had already figured it out.
This thing wasn't something for the current Mio to practice on.
Its carapace could actively disperse energy impacts.
Simply raising her output wouldn't necessarily help.
Yusei had obviously seen it too.
The last injured person had just been brought out of the bus when he looked up.
"Asakawa..."
His voice wasn't loud.
But Mio heard it.
Not with her ears.
Through that connection.
The next second, the state of Mio's body surfaced in Yusei's perception again.
Her power was plentiful.
Her body was fine.
But her output was being canceled out by the other side's carapace.
And then.
A very natural thought appeared.
If her output wasn't enough—
Then open it further.
Even Yusei was taken aback.
He could feel it.
Mio's power was divided into something like several tiers, and he was holding part of the valves.
Yesterday it had only been on or off.
Now there were starting to be finer gradations.
He looked up.
And looked across the street at Mio.
"Asakawa!"
Mio drove the calamity beast back with one strike.
"What?"
"I think I can give you more."
"How much?"
"I don't know!"
A vein twitched at Mio's temple.
"Then what are you shouting for?"
Yusei felt it out.
"Right now it's about..."
He paused.
"Seventy percent?"
Mio's movements visibly halted.
"Seventy percent of what?"
"Of what you can use right now!"
"And the other thirty?"
"I think I'm holding it back."
"..."
Mio suddenly really wanted to ask him what gave him the right.
But the calamity beast was already lunging again.
There was no time.
She simply shouted.
"Let it go!"
The valve in Yusei's heart moved at her word.
"Got it!"
The next instant.
The golden King's Mark on the outside of Mio's left leg flared bright.
BOOM—!
A ring of golden light spread out from beneath her feet.
The crowd burst into another wave of gasps.
The gold lines that had only been trickling faintly along the edges of her battle attire all lit up at once, and the surface of her lance was coated outright in a layer of gold-and-blue energy.
Even Mio was stunned for half a second.
Full.
She looked up.
The calamity beast was charging.
This time, she didn't stab at its carapace.
She vanished instead.
At least that was how it looked to ordinary people.
A blue afterimage looped around behind the calamity beast in an instant, almost brushing against its body.
First strike.
Into the joint of a hind leg.
Second strike.
The lance's butt smashed into the base of a bony plate.
By her third move, she was already standing on the calamity beast's back.
Her long hair was blown out behind her by the wind.
The silver lance reversed.
The tip lined up with the joining seam at the very center of the six back plates, only a few centimeters wide.
"Found it."
She drove it down.
No tremendous boom.
The tip sank in with precision.
Then Mio gripped the shaft with both hands.
All the gold-and-blue light compressed toward the lance tip in an extremely short time.
Shuichi narrowed his eyes slightly.
That was right this time.
"Burst—"
Mio said it low.
"Open!"
BOOM!!!
A glaring blue light suddenly flared inside the calamity beast's body.
Light shone out of every seam in its carapace at once.
The next second.
The huge monster was run completely through from the inside.
It didn't break into pieces across the ground.
Nor did it get any chance to split.
Its internal tissue was burned straight to ash by the energy, and the heavy carapace, with nothing left to hold it up, crashed onto the street and kicked up a great cloud of dust.
The whole intersection was silent for a full three seconds.
And then—
The cheering exploded.
"Blue Lance!"
"That was way too cool!"
"What was that golden light just now?!"
"A new form! It's definitely a new form!"
"Did you get it?"
"Got all of it!"
Mio stood on the calamity beast's remains, breathing a little fast.
Her power was still there.
She could even keep going.
She looked instinctively toward where Yusei was.
Hundreds of meters away.
Yusei was looking at her too.
The connection had become even clearer than before.
Mio suddenly had a very strange feeling.
That burst of power just now hadn't belonged only to her.
Yet there hadn't been the slightest foreign awkwardness in it either.
As if Yusei had simply opened a door that had always been inside her body.
And on the other side.
Yusei had just been about to go over.
When a piercing screech of snapping metal came from overhead.
The bus-stop ad frame that had taken a hit earlier was toppling down.
Two people underneath hadn't gotten out of the way in time.
"Hey!"
Yusei acted almost without thinking.
He took one step forward.
So fast he hadn't even registered it himself.
BANG!
The heavy metal frame came crashing down.
But it didn't hit the ground.
Yusei held it up with both hands.
His whole body sank less than half a step.
The surroundings went quiet again.
A phone camera that had been filming Blue Lance slowly swung around.
Yusei: "..."
Uh-oh.
Only now did he notice.
A lot of people seemed to be watching.
Shuichi stood at the back of the crowd.
He raised a hand and covered his face.
"Idiot."
***
Forty minutes later.
The three of them had already left the scene.
Mio had released her transformation and was back in her own clothes, while Yusei kept his head down scrolling on his phone the whole way, his expression getting more and more complicated.
Shuichi walked off to one side.
He was in a pretty good mood.
At least the monster was dead.
Nobody had been hurt.
And lunch would probably still happen as usual.
Yusei suddenly stopped.
"It's over."
Shuichi asked.
"What?"
Yusei held his phone out.
The screen showed the Girl Hero Observatory.
The Blue Lance page had already been updated.
Absurdly fast.
The page that had only had two blurry battle images now had a brand-new high-definition screenshot.
Pale-blue hair flying.
Evolved blue-and-white battle attire hugging her body.
Golden light wreathing the silver lance.
The headline had changed too.
【Blue Lance Suspected of Completing Second-Stage Empowerment, New Battle Attire Confirmed for the First Time!】
The data below was refreshing like crazy.
【Publicly confirmed appearances: 3】
【Suspected new ability: golden energy amplification】
【Weapon change: Confirmed】
【Battle attire change: Confirmed】
【Power rating: Significantly raised】
【Current popularity: #11↑】
When Mio saw the number eleven, she fell silent.
"Wasn't it thirty-seven yesterday?"
Yusei nodded.
"Eleven now."
Shuichi leaned over.
"That climbed fast."
Mio stared at the page.
Someone had already opened a dedicated discussion thread below.
【Blue Lance's new outfit today, who gets it?!】
Reply #1:
【I declare the designer finally woke up today.】
Reply #2:
【THE WAIST!!!】
Reply #3:
【THE LEGS!!!】
Reply #4:
【Is the golden thigh ring the new form's mark?】
Reply #5:
【Yesterday's blue-and-white outfit was only passable, today's finally hits the spot.】
Reply #6:
【I'm a girl and I still have to say it's really gorgeous, don't ask.】
Reply #7:
【Did anyone notice her shoulders and collarbone? This set is way lighter than yesterday's, but she took the calamity beast's hits head-on and was totally fine.】
Reply #8:
【Means her defense method changed.】
Reply #9:
【You're all looking at the outfit. Am I the only one who wants to know what that golden light that suddenly showed up actually was?】
Mio's expression grew subtler by the second.
Yusei was reading with great relish.
"Pretty high ratings."
Mio turned her head.
"You're happy?"
"Why wouldn't I be?"
"Because..."
She'd been about to say that this outfit very likely had something to do with his power.
In the end, she didn't say it.
Shuichi scrolled down once.
Then stopped.
A new thread had appeared.
【Hold on, wasn't there also a guy at the Blue Lance scene who's kind of sus?】
The smile vanished from Yusei's face.
He tapped in.
First image.
Him prying open the bus door with both hands.
Second image.
Him holding up the falling ad frame.
Because it was shot from fairly far away, his face wasn't very clear.
The comments below:
【What's this guy's deal?】
【Staff?】
【Staff who can pry open a bus door bare-handed?】
【Gym bro, probably.】
【Your gym trains that?】
【Could he be a hero too?】
【A male hero? Don't be ridiculous, every one that's ever appeared has been a woman.】
【Maybe he's just naturally strong.】
By the time Yusei got that far, his face had gone a little stiff.
"This isn't going to cause trouble, is it?"
Mio frowned too.
"You can't make out your face for now."
Shuichi, for his part, didn't think it was a big deal.
"Just stay out from in front of cameras from now on."
Yusei looked at him.
"Easy for you to say."
"Then don't charge in next time."
"There were people inside."
"So you'll still charge in."
"..."
Yusei had nothing to say.
Shuichi lowered his head and kept scrolling.
The discussion in the thread quickly veered off in another direction.
【I care more about how tall Blue Lance actually is.】
【At a glance, at least 170 after transforming.】
【Legs take up 110.】
【Your math teacher is crying.】
【Anyone have an HD image of the new battle attire?】
【Someone already restored one on the front page.】
【Watermark-free, please.】
Mio held out her hand.
"Give me your phone."
Yusei immediately turned the screen off.
"What for?"
"Give it."
"Didn't you say you don't care?"
"When did I say I don't care?"
"..."
Shuichi looked at the two of them.
He suddenly thought that the existence of a website like this wasn't entirely a bad thing.
At least it had some entertainment value.
In the end, Mio managed to snatch the phone.
She looked down at it for less than a minute.
The tips of her ears were already starting to turn red.
"These people..."
Yusei asked.
"What?"
"Why do they have to zoom in here?"
Yusei leaned over.
"Where?"
"Don't look!"
"That's my phone!"
The two of them started fighting over it.
Shuichi walked beside them and couldn't be bothered to join in.
He looked up at the sky.
The weather was nice.
Sunlight fell through the leaves and swayed across the sidewalk.
The sounds of disaster-response vehicles could still be heard in the distance.
Everything was no different than usual.
There was just one thing that had already become very obvious.
Yusei's ability was getting stronger.
And it was growing far faster than that "King" in the records had.
It had been barely a day since the first link.
Physical enhancement.
Output control.
Long-range synchronization.
It had even started affecting his contractee's battle attire.
What would it turn into after this?
Shuichi didn't know.
And he didn't particularly want to know.
Yusei suddenly looked back from up ahead.
"Shuichi!"
"Hm?"
"Are you eating lunch or not?"
Shuichi answered without the slightest hesitation.
"I'm eating."
"Pay up."
"No money."
"Then don't eat."
"Yesterday you said it'd be your treat today."
"When did I say that?"
"I forget."
"You're starting again, huh?"
Shuichi looked at him.
And couldn't help smiling a little.
Oh well.
At least for now.
This guy was still just an idiot who'd argue with him forever over two pieces of beef.
That was enough.