Chapter 5: 5 – Sunflower cannon!

Jessica hadn’t expected her first mission to turn out this way, but she wasn’t complaining. Sure, being an enemy of humanity and whatnot was still a bit of a downer, but for the time being that’s the role she was playing. A true actress always stayed faithful to her role, after all.

Another blast came her way and she countered it with one of her own. The magical girl in front of her wasn’t happy about it.

Jessica, on the other hand, was very excited that she was able to take her head-on, even though Pretty Bloom wasn’t exactly the heavy-hitter of the group.

Another flurry of blasts showered Jessica. This time, she only countered some of them whilst dodging the rest. She wasn’t skilled enough to rapid-fire magic like that yet.

“Sunflower cannon!” Pretty Bloom shouted as she pointed her wand at Jessica. It lit up, the petal ornaments on it opened, and a greenish-yellow ball of magic began forming in the middle.

Jessica immediately tried to jump away only to find out that her legs had been caught.

“?!”

Vines were holding her boots down. She had been led into a trap.

With no time to get out of the vines and dodge the attack, Jessica once again prepared to take it head-on. She only barely constructed the spell she wanted to before a huge blast – that smelled like sunflowers for some reason – enveloped her.

Pretty Bloom watched the explosion of dust centered around the unusually tricky minion. She was certain she got her this time but prior experience and also her gut told her not to let her guard down until she was certain.

And sure enough, once the dust settled, although tattered, the minion still stood there.

“No way!” Bloom widened her eyes. “Why are you so resilient?!”

It had been a spur-of-the-moment idea. Jessica didn’t actually know any defensive spells, but she did know a lot about sealing magic by now. And most sealing magic was designed to keep things in and out. It wasn’t perfect, but dammit, it had worked.

“Jessica… I think you should teleport out already,” her overseer suggested.

Just as she was about to reply, something hit her from the side, sending her flying… and screaming. She couldn’t even register what it was until she found herself bouncing off the walls of some attraction and splatting on the ground.

Like a proper minion…

“Bloom! You alright?! I heard you use your Sunflower cannon!” a blurry yellow image called out to the magical girl Jessica had been fighting.

Somehow, Jessica had forgotten that there were two magical girls cleaning up the minions. She could somehow defend against one, but not two. Especially not against someone like her.

“I’m fine, Spark… This one was a lot tougher than usual for some reason.”

Pretty spark. A glowing golden dress, the hems of the skirt and the sleeves ending in a zigzag pattern. A ribbon in the middle of her chest with the lightning symbol etched on top of it. She had glowing golden eyes, and golden hair tied into a side ponytail. Her hands clutched her signature Thunderclap bow.

“What? Her?” Spark looked in Jessica’s direction.

Her rattled brain nearly made Jessica press the emergency teleport-out button as the stern eyes focused on her. Instead, she opted to raise her arm – through the pain – and wave at her adversaries while still lying down.

“...” 

The two magical girls had no words for that. Instead, they both clutched their weapons and carefully walked in her direction.

“Uh… What are you doing? Why aren’t you teleporting out?” The spirit was starting to get nervous.

Was she screwing around a bit too much? Probably. It was just too fun to mess with her idols. It reminded her of messing around with Erika. Like good old friends… even though they were supposed to be enemies.

“You… You’re not vanishing. You’re still fine, aren’t you?” Spark said, already raising her bow.

Jessica answered with a thumbs up, still lying on the ground. In reality, although a demon’s body was a lot tougher, getting tossed around like that definitely meant she wasn’t getting up any time soon. She had just wanted to be cheeky.

“Jessica, you really need to get out now!” the little shit began yelling in her head.

“What are you scheming…?” Spark demanded.

Jessica lay still for a second, pretending to think about it.

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“Jessica…!”

Then, she merely shrugged and pressed the emergency teleport-out. From one moment to another, she was lying in a hospital bed rather than on the cold hard ground.

She hadn’t gotten to see their expressions, but she could imagine the utter confusion she had left behind.

Jessica sighed to herself. Maybe she shouldn’t have done that. Would the leader or the general be pissed at her for this performance? She was supposed to be just another minion, after all.

“Dammit, Jessica! What were you thinking? You should have gotten out sooner! What was all of that nonsense for?” her overseer berated her.

Jessica thought for a second before replying, “Stalling.” through telepathy.

“Stall–... Huh.”

“Since they were too busy with me, they couldn’t go help out with our general,” Jessica lied, trying to pretend it wasn’t just for the heck of it.

“That… was surprisingly smart. You sure are ballzy, you know that?”

Jessica smirked. What a gullible demonic spirit.

“Oh hey! You’re finally here!” a voice came from the bed right next to her.

Jessica turned her head to see… another minion. Although he seemed kind of familiar. Oh, wait… wasn’t he the one who got himself tied up with vines? She had completely forgotten about him. Oops.

“Hey, what’s up?” Jessica replied, still lying down. She was recovering, thanks to the enchanted beds here, but it was still too hard to properly move her body.

“You kicked ass out there! I thought you were new! How come you can even use telepathy?” the guy said with glee.

Well, that confirmed that he couldn’t use it.

“Eh, it’s not a big deal.” She waved her hand in the air. “I still couldn’t even counter-attack and got wrecked by Spark in the end anyway.” She didn’t say that she had decided not to counterattack.

“That’s still a huge win! I wish I was half as awesome as you! You’ll probably get promoted or something now.” Jessica could feel the grin behind his mask.

She couldn’t quite tell if he was being genuine or just trying to win some brownie points with her. Well, either way, this was a good opportunity. If she were to do this infiltration thing properly, she needed to win over some allies on the inside as well.

“Hmm? Wouldn’t that mean I would be your superior then?” She quirked an eyebrow at him. A gesture lost on him because of her mask.

“Haha! Yeah, I guess so!” He laughed out loud, making the other nearby minions look at him in annoyance. Shouting in a hospital sure was rude.

Something seemed off about him though. Just what reason would such a happy-go-lucky guy like him have for ever even thinking of joining the demon army? Was he just acting? Pretending like her? Either way, it was a good chance for Jessica.

“Well, how about this future superior of yours gives you some special magic training then?” She grinned behind her mask.

“Seriously?! Hell yeah!” He pumped his fist, excitement pouring from him as if he was a child in an amusement park. Even his demon tail was wagging behind him like a dog’s.

Jessica finally recovered enough to sit up. She glanced around and noticed that their conversation had attracted a bit of attention from the other recovering minions.

She thought about it for a second… and decided to take the risk here.

“Well? Anyone else want to join? I can teach you the basics of magic.” She grinned. “And I’ll only demand your soul in return! No credit card required! Order now and you’ll get half a soul off!”

A round of chuckles later, a few others decided to take her up on the offer.

Well, even if the general was planning on yelling at her, getting some apprentices had been totally worth the show today.

Now she just had to convert them.