My Magical Girl System-Chapter 28: Sein Alpis

Andrey’s fist connected with the hound’s snout and it was like punching a brick wall wrapped in hot asphalt. His knuckles split, blood smearing across the creature’s molten hide, but the beast didn’t even flinch. It snarled, jaws snapping toward his throat.

"Damn—my attacks aren’t doing anything!" Andrey twisted aside, barely avoiding the teeth, but another hound was already lunging from his blind spot. Claws raked toward his back—

A gust of green wind slammed into the creature mid-leap, sending it tumbling across the plaza. Gale Ward. Lisa’s wand was raised, her face set with fierce concentration.

"Behind you!" she shouted, already pivoting. Her wand blazed. "Starlight Burst!"

Green stars streaked from her wand, each one finding its mark—the first hound, then a second, then a third, the projectiles chaining between them with sharp cracks. Where Andrey’s fists had failed, Lisa’s magic bit deep. The hounds yelped, their molten hides cracking, dark ichor spraying as they reeled back.

Andrey didn’t waste the opening. He sprinted toward the café entrance where the mother and child were pressed against the glass, the mother’s face pale with terror, the child crying silently. He reached the barrier just as Lisa reinforced it, his palms pressing against the mint-green shimmer.

"Stay inside! Don’t come out until we tell you!" He didn’t wait for an answer. His eyes had already caught movement to the left—an elderly man, the same one who’d fallen earlier, was still on the ground, trying to crawl toward a bench. A hound was circling toward him, its burning eyes fixed on easy prey.

Andrey ran.

His legs burned, his lungs heaved, but he closed the distance before the hound could strike. He threw himself between the old man and the beast, arms wide, taking the full force of the creature’s lunge across his back. The hound’s claws ripped through his shirt, tearing into flesh—but the pain was muted, absorbed, stored. Damage Absorb flared, a deep red glow building in his chest as he shoved the old man toward the barrier.

"Go! Now!"

The man scrambled, half-crawling, half-running, and Lisa’s barrier rippled to let him through. Andrey straightened, gasping, the stored energy making his bones ache. But when he looked at the hound that had struck him, it was already turning away—dismissing him, its burning gaze fixed on easier prey.

His jaw tightened. ’These monsters are B-rank. My fists can’t even slow them down.’

He watched Lisa’s next Starlight Burst chain across three hounds at once, each impact sending shockwaves through their bodies. Her attacks worked. His didn’t. The math was simple.

’I need to group them. Give her clear shots.’

He started running toward the rift. A hound snapped at his heels; he twisted, let it clip his shoulder, absorbed the hit, kept moving. Another lunged; he ducked, felt the wind of its passage, and redirected it with a shove into a third. The creatures snarled, turning, their focus shifting from scattered civilians to the lone man sprinting across the plaza.

"Lisa!" he shouted, skidding to a halt in the center of the open space. Three hounds were circling him now, then five. Their burning eyes tracked his every move, their molten hides hissing where rainwater from the shattered fountain touched them. "Concentrate your fire—right here!"

Lisa’s eyes widened. She understood instantly. Her wand came up, green light building brighter than before, the air around her shimmering with stored mana.

Andrey ducked, weaved, absorbed another hit—his chest blazed with stored energy, dangerously close to its limit and then he saw it: all five hounds, clustered together, jaws snapping at him from every angle.

"NOW!"

"Starlight BURST—MAX OUTPUT!"

The world turned green.

A cascading wave of star-shaped projectiles erupted from Lisa’s wand, each one finding a hound, then chaining to the next, then the next, until the entire cluster was caught in a net of pure light. The beasts howled—a chorus of agony that shook the plaza windows—and one by one, they dissolved into mana particles, their molten forms collapsing into ash.

Andrey stood in the center of the circle, chest heaving, shirt in tatters, blood dripping from his knuckles and the gashes on his back. The stored energy in his chest was so bright it was visible through his skin.

Lisa ran to him, her transformation flickering, her face pale. "Andrey! Are you—" 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝒆𝙬𝙚𝒃𝙣𝙤𝒗𝓮𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

The rift pulsed.

Andrey’s head snapped toward it. The purple tear in reality was shrinking—but slowly, reluctantly, as if something inside didn’t want to let go. And through the narrowing gap, a single shape was forcing its way through. Larger than the hounds.

A clawed hand gripped the edge of the rift, black and jagged, and pulled.

The system’s voice cut through the chaos, losing its usual playful lilt.

System: Second wave initiating. Brace for impact.

"Lisa! How much mana do you have left?" Andrey’s voice was sharp, cutting through the panic building in his chest.

Lisa’s wand flickered in her grip, the green light dimmer than before. She was pale, sweat beading on her forehead, her transformation starting to shimmer at the edges. "I have two more attacks left—maybe three if I push it. But I can’t drop the barrier on the civilians. If I do, and something gets through..."

Andrey’s jaw tightened. He could see the calculation running behind her eyes—the same one running behind his. Two attacks. Maybe three. And whatever was coming through that rift looked like it would take more than that to put down.

He made the decision before he could second-guess it.

"Keep the barrier up. I’ll draw its attention. You hit it when I give the signal."

Lisa grabbed his arm. "Andrey, you can’t—"

"I’ll be fine. Just make it count."

He pulled free and ran.

The creature was halfway through the rift now—a massive, hunched thing with too many limbs, its body a nightmare of jagged edges and pulsing dark veins. Its head was low to the ground, almost bestial, and when it saw Andrey sprinting toward it, a sound like grinding stone rumbled from its throat.

Andrey grabbed a broken bench leg from the debris, hefting its weight.

He closed the distance, swinging.

The wood splintered against the creature’s hide, doing nothing. The beast didn’t even seem to notice. One massive claw swept out, and Andrey threw himself sideways, feeling the wind of its passage tear at his ruined shirt. He rolled, came up, grabbed a chunk of shattered stone from the fountain, and hurled it at the creature’s head.

It bounced off. The creature’s burning eyes tracked him now, its focus shifting from the barrier to the small, insignificant thing that kept hitting it.

’Good. That was the plan.’

He ran again, leading it away from Lisa, away from the café, away from anything that couldn’t move. His lungs burned. His back screamed with every step. But the creature followed, each of its massive strides eating up the distance he’d worked so hard to create.

"Lisa!" he shouted, glancing back to gauge the distance. "Now!"

But as he turned, he saw them—more shapes forcing their way through the rift behind the massive creature. Hounds. Three of them. Five. Their burning eyes fixed on him, their jaws already open.

He was surrounded.

Andrey skidded to a stop, his back to a shattered planter, the massive creature closing from one side, the hounds fanning out on the other. There was nowhere to run.

He raised his fists anyway.

’Lisa can take maybe three of them with her remaining mana,’ he thought. ’But the big one... the big one she’ll need everything for. Which means I need to hold these hounds myself. Just for a minute. Just long enough.’

His knuckles were bleeding. His back was on fire. He had nothing but his own body and a skill that could only take so much.

He stepped forward anyway.

The first hound lunged. He caught it with his shoulder, absorbing the impact, letting the energy build in his chest. The second came from the side—he twisted, took that hit too, the red glow inside him flaring brighter. His vision blurred at the edges. He was close to his limit. One more hit and he’d overload.

The third hound leaped, jaws aiming for his throat—

And a fist caught it mid-air.

The creature’s head snapped sideways with a sound like a cracking rock, and it hit the ground hard, dissolving before it even stopped rolling. The other hounds pulled back, snarling, their burning eyes fixed on the new threat.

The woman who had thrown the punch stood where the hound had been, her fist still extended, her orange hair escaping from a ruined ponytail. Her clothes were torn, her face bruised, her gauntlets cracked and sparking with erratic energy.

She lowered her arm slowly, staring at her own hand like it had betrayed her.

"Damn it..." Her voice was rough, scraped raw. "My power... it’s dropped this much?"

Andrey stared at her, recognition hitting like a physical blow. He’d seen her face on the news. Sein Alpis. S-rank of Vixion Guild. One of the heroes who had gone into the C-rank gate that had become a slaughterhouse.