Aria always preferred the magical girl shows that displayed the power of love and justice. She loved the heroines who fought monsters to save the day.
"Mommy, I want to be a magical girl in the future!" Aria enthusiastically exclaimed.
She was nestled in her mother's lap. They had just finished an episode of her favorite show, and the credits were still rolling.
"Are you sure? What kind of power would you want?"
Aria did not even have to think. Her reply was already set.
"Yes! I want the power to heal."
She idolized the healers most of all. To her, they were the true beacons of hope. They were the ones who allowed everyone else to go all out without fear, knowing they would always be mended.
"Really? Why?"
"Because I want to save my friends and family when they get hurt." With a look of shyness, she added, "And I want to heal myself, too, so I can keep helping them."
"It's a beautiful dream, Aria." With a warm smile, her mother pulled her into a tight hug and kissed her forehead.
"But why didn't you save me, Aria?"
Her mother's warmth vanished, replaced by an overwhelming sense of dread. The cozy living room dissolved into darkness.
From that darkness, shadowy figures with the faces of the people from the camp appeared around the two. All of whom wore looks of deep resentment.
Aria looked down to find her mother's legs, and her own, crumbling into grey dust. The floor vanished beneath them. Aria began to plummet into an endless abyss, still locked in her mother's embrace.
The shadowy figures of the dead merged into her mother's form, tightening the hug. Aria couldn't move or breathe. All she could do was gasp helplessly from the pain of her body being crushed slowly.
"Why. Didn't. You. Save. Us. Aria?"
The voices of her mother as well as many others she failed to save in the camp repeatedly resounded in Aria's mind.
The guilt of her inability to save them became the physical force that empowered the hug. Making it harder for her to stay conscious.
Then, she saw a rod with a coiling snake imprinting itself on the wall. A door opened where the mark stood, spilling a brilliant light upon Aria and the ghost of her mother.
With it came an unknown force that pulled Aria toward the door and away from the crushing weight of the dead.
After being pulled through the door, Mending Rosemary found herself standing within the hallowed halls of a grand cathedral.
She was no longer Aria but Mending Rosemary. She could finally see her magical girl outfit that she wore to fight against those giants in its full glory. It was a nun's habit but a bit different from the traditional nun outfit.
Deep black was the base color. However, the parts that were usually white from the traditional outfit had been replaced by a rich purple color and adorned with intricate embroidery of rosemary flowers. The veil she wore also possessed the same black-purple color palette.
It was a bit strange for a magical girl outfit to take this kind of form, but she guessed every magical girl outfit was unique.
After all, the only one she had seen so far was big sis Lily, and her magical girl outfit made her look like a villainess. In Mending Rosemary's case, she just looked like an eccentric nun.
Mending Rosemary felt the door behind her open. She turned around and saw the light so bright that it woke her up.
***
Ludwig saw the eyes of the little nun flutter open.
"Where am I?" the magical girl asked, confusion in her voice.
"Inside the camp. How are you feeling?" Ludwig asked.
After she heard the unfamiliar voice, she shifted her head to look at the older boy she didn't recognize.
"Who are you?"
"Equinox Spider Lily's friend. We were told that this place would take us in, but it seems like that is no longer the case," Ludwig said, gesturing toward Liara, who had returned to her civilian form before the girl woke up.
"Oh, so you're the important people that big sis Lily talks about?" The girl answered.
Ludwig's brows furrowed at the way she said "big sis Lily."
'Is she a friend of Aria?' he wondered. There was only one person who called his magical girl form that, but this girl clearly wasn't Aria. He couldn't ask the magical girl if she was a friend of Aria either, because Ludwig shouldn't know about the girl's existence.
'I might need to go out and find her later,' he noted in his mind.
While Ludwig was deep in thought, Liara looked at her brother with narrowed eyes, whispering under her breath, "Important people?" The girlfriend theory in her head was becoming more concrete.
"Yeah, I'm Ludwig, and this is my sister, Liara," he said, shaking off his confusion to introduce them properly.
"Hi." Liara waved to the girl.
"What's your name?" Ludwig asked.
"I'm Mending Rosemary." The girl didn't dare say her real name.
She knew from her favorite shows that a magical girl must keep her identity secret at all costs.
"So, Mending Rosemary, did you kill those monsters outside?"
"I did," she replied. The memory of the night returned to her alongside the warning of her god. She couldn't turn back until she could find a healer to heal her original body.
"How did you do it?" Liara asked. She was curious about the girl's power.
They only heard from the man that she had the power to heal, so when they saw those monsters with their innards flying out, it was quite unexpected.
"With this." In the hand of Mending Rosemary, an ornate mace with purple rosemary engraving appeared. Earning the look of surprise from the siblings.
'A mace? Is she some kind of priestess-paladin hybrid?' Having seen many types of fiction, he wasn't unfamiliar with the tropes.
"Ooh, it's beautiful." Liara was enamored by the beauty of the mace.
She thought about her own magic wand, which was just a needle with threads tied to it. Quite a bit lackluster compared to the magic wand of this magical girl.