Essence leeches out of your body as you spin up a few more spells. Thermoptic Camoflage. A spell to minimize the signature of your mana reactor, another to spoof radar and lidar. One ward against ultrasonic detection... You stifle your breathing, casting another spell to minimize your carbon dioxide output as you lie flat and wait for Steele to finish scanning.

"Are you seriously going through all of this?" You hear Libromancer complain.

"Wow, are you seriously complaining that I'm doing this? I thought you were the paranoid one," Steele ripostes. "I told you I got a weird reading on my sensors when I came in…"

"I conducted my own sweep of the area earlier. Magically speaking, it's inactive. There are only minor monster nests around," Luminous Libromancer huffs.

You hear Steele's suit chime as it finishes scanning the surrounding area.

"Well alright, looks like I get to eat crow. Everything checks out, y'all are good to go."

"I told you so," Luminous Libromancer replies, a particularly smug tone entering her voice.

"Yeah, yeah… Ah shit, Harris is seriously hammering my tits now… Oh, and now he's figured out that I'm using a robot as a stand-in. I've gotta go. You have fun with the kiddos then, Libromancer. Kiddos, don't stay out late and force mama Steele to pick you up. Okay? Okay. Ciao!"

Engines whine, whirring to life. You hear a loud whoosh as Steele takes off, then a thunderous crack as she breaks the sound barrier heading back to the city's center.

You poke your head out from behind your cover, just in time to catch sight of Luminous Libromancer as she slowly facepalms.

"That girl is far too energetic," your love grumbles, then yawns. "Alright. You lot, follow me, and let's just… Go on patrol."

How cute. She's like a grumpy mother duck being followed by some adorable little ducklings.

"You could at least try and sound enthusiastic," you hear Crimson Champion complain as the three rookies fall in line.

"Mmh. Too much energy," Luminous Libromancer nonchalantly replies.

You flit into the air, concealment spells still spun up, and let out a shaky breath.

Phew! That was close. Thank goodness for quick thinking. And for the fact that you've got an entire grimoire's worth of spells at your disposal.

Barring anymore unexpected events? You should be clear to stalk your love as she shepherds these cute baby Magical Girls through… Ugh, patrol. You remember those days well when you were first starting out as a Magical Girl. Patrol days were the absolute worst days.

Well, maybe the fact that it's your love you're following around will take away from the boredom?

--

Nope, nevermind.

You're bored. Bored, bored. Bored. Bored out of your skull. Bored out of your mind.

The fact that it's your love you're following around helps, but you can't exactly fixate on just her.

You watch disinterestedly as an imp jumps out from a dark alleyway. The rotund red-skinned demon chitters as it makes a break for the ocean on short, stubby wings.

It squeals as an arrow of light pierces its brain, flops to the ground where it's then promptly crushed by Crimson Champion's talons. Another easy kill, another low-level scrub-tier monster annihilated with ridiculous ease by this set of Magical Girls.

"How many imps is that now?" You hear Heavenly Testament ask.

"Eh, that was the fourth nest we've taken out?" Crimson Champion shrugs.

"I thought it was five…"

"… Isn't this… A little too easy…?" You hear Primal Huntress ask. As one, the three rookie Magical Girls turn to stare at Luminous Libromancer. Who's actually ignoring them. She's got her nose buried in a tome. If you didn't see the way she occasionally glances up, or feel the buzz of her mana as she maintains a series of detection spells focused squarely on the rookie Magical Girls, you'd have assumed she wasn't paying attention at all. In the slightest.

"Welcome to patrol," Luminous Libromancer says, flipping a page in the book she's reading. "Nine times out of ten it is this boring."

Yeah, you have to agree with that assessment. Patrol really hasn't changed one bit since you were a regular Magical Girl too.

Monster attacks have become an unfortunate reality in the post-awakening world. Kaiju, terrors from the deep, beings from other dimensions, literal demons from hell… All sorts of nasties came crawling out of the woodwork in the bad old days right after the Resource Wars ended. All sorts of nasties started setting up shop in human cities and settlements. Typically around the poorer areas where people were already going missing on a regular basis.

Patrol's a holdover from the days when the first Magical Girls arrived to fight the monsters terrorizing humanity. In the bad old days, Magical Girls needed to be seen fighting evil to get things like funding, support, and ways to increase their mana regeneration. It's common knowledge that strong emotion leads to stronger magic. In the same vein, Magical Girls who established a strong following found that their magic became that much more potent.

As time went on and Magical Girls started surviving for longer periods of time and gaining more experience, they started winning a lot more and monsters started being driven out of their long-established dens. At that point, patrol turned into 'pest control.' A way to keep the monster population at a controllable level and prevent outbreaks like what happened at Sydney or Tokyo.

And that's what patrol's like in Terminus City. You suppose you shouldn't be too surprised. After all…

"It doesn't help that Infinity Princess went in and cleaned this place out a while ago," Luminous Libromancer confirms. "Probably last week."

Of course she did, that girl has absolutely no chill.

"… But she was with us last week, when did she have the time-" You hear Crimson Champion protest.

"She literally does not sleep," Luminous Libromancer replies flatly, her lips thinning. "Her ridiculous magical reserves and her overpowered mana reactor lets her stay on patrol every single day without having to do regular things. Like sleeping. Or eating regularly."

"… Wow, that's hardcore."

"It's stupidly self-destructive is what it is. I have no idea how someone as smart as she is can be that dumb. There's a reason why we've been forcing her to take breaks. You'd better not pull something like that when you head off by yourself," Luminous Libromancer sighs. "If you do, I'll curse you with ten years of bad luck. Because you should know better."

"…" Crimson Champion and Heavenly Testament take a quick step back at the implied threat. Primal Huntress raises a tentative hand.

"… You can really do that?" She asks.

Luminous Libromancer smiles now. A serene, utterly malicious smile. "Oh, I can do far worse. Don't you know? I'm Terminus City's genius mage who's memorized entire grimoires' worth of magical spells."

"You also haven't taught us anything," Crimson Champion mumbles underneath her breath.

"What was that?" Luminous Libromancer asks, directing a glare right at the pink-haired punk.

"… Nothing."

You see your love blow out a quick sigh, stare up at the heavens as she tries to find the right words to say.

"Okay. I'm going to be honest. I don't have that much experience teaching Magical Girls, I don't really know any of you, and I don't really want to get to know any of you. All three of you will probably end up moving out of the city anyways, it's what Magical Girls who make a Pact here in Terminus City do. If they do stick around it's because their personalities are warped," Luminous Libromancer informs the group plainly. "It's that or you'll kick the bucket. The mortality rate for newly-pacted Magical Girls might've gone down in recent years but it's still pretty high."

"… How high-"

"Thirty percent," Luminous Libromancer replies. "Depending on where you're stationed. It used to be a lot worse here before Infinity Princess moved in. We haven't had fatalities in years because of her, but we have had a lot of girls move out for greener pastures. Which, again, is why I'm not getting too attached to any of you all."

Well, that's a bit of a buzzkill. You can actually feel the atmosphere beginning to dampen. Luminous Libromancer catches on and sighs.

"With that being said…" She begins, teasing out the words like they physically pain her. "… None of that's your fault, and I should probably teach you all a few tricks of the trade. If only because Steele and Infinity Princess'll yell at me otherwise. You clearly know how to plan patrol routes, I've just watched you clear out a bunch of monster nests… So how about this. We'll have a little competition. To make things less boring."

You find yourself perking up at the sound of her words. A competition, eh?

"You seem like you've got a handle on things, so I'm going to send you off by yourself to finish clearing out the rest of this sector. First one back gets lessons on enchanting with me, as well as a free upgrade to their gear."

Heavenly Testament raises her hand. "Are you going to tell us how to do that portal spell-"

"Yeah, sure, why not. Go on, shoo, shoo. Get to it," Luminous Libromancer waves the rookies off dismissively. "I'll even throw in cash. 500 credits, why the hell not. You've got this."

Well, that definitely gets the rookies' attentions. They're off in the blink of an eye, each sprinting away in bursts of speed. You watch Crimson Champion rush into a nearby alley, Primal Huntress climb up a drainpipe and onto a roof, Heavenly Testament scurry into the street. And… Yep, they're separating. Luminous Libromancer pops open her tome, and gets back to reading.

Well. Well, well, well.

This is presenting you with a bit of an interesting opportunity… If you're daring enough to try to pluck one of these fledglings from right under Luminous Libromancer's nose, that is…

--

(75/100 Essence, 30 regen)