Watching the anime from Madoka Magica and writing the rules

"The limit is limited to missing two witches without dropping their Seeds of Sorrow. Once the limit is exceeded, the magical girl, while still alive, will be as good as dead. Instead, she might try to snatch other magical girls, adding to their losses."

"After learning about this situation, I finally understand why Asami is an outlier."

"Even though the cost of battle is unpredictable, Mami wasted her magic power to eliminate her familiars, yet she was able to easily rely on the seeds of sorrow dropped by the witches to survive for over a year. In the end, she died not from a lack of magic power, but from battle."

"I made a wish to stay alive, and that's why I attracted so many witches carrying the seeds of sorrow. I risked the lives of ordinary people in order to continue my life as a magical girl."

"While I understand why Mami can act as she pleases, I also know there's probably no safer place out there."

"After all, magical girls with extra energy and good intentions mean there will be more wild witches nearby. And magical girls without the energy to help others will have many more familiar witches they cultivate."

"No matter how you look at it, it's hard to find a suitable city to live in this world."

"More importantly, the Soul Gem's capacity is fixed. Therefore, the source of the magical girl's recovery magic power is obvious."

"The talent has not been fully converted into magic power. Therefore, after consuming magic power again and again and clearing the filthy volume, the magic power can immediately occupy the soul gem."

"In other words, there are still untransformed causes and effects within the magical girl's body. Only when the corresponding causes and effects are present within the body can it attract distortion and then banish the power to correct the wish into another dimension."

"And banishing the alternate dimension, which is how the witch's barrier is formed, is to break the barrier of the soul gem and transform all the remaining talents in the body into witch magic in one breath."

"So, even though the witch is just a young girl, she's able to create a large number of familiars and maintain a barrier, yet each attack can surpass the magical girls' defenses. This allows the magical girls to constantly dodge the heavy attacks and then target the witch's weak points. Even so, it still consumes about one-third of her magic power."

Chapter 96: Despair brought by addition and subtraction

Zhixing blinked and looked at his phone, confirming that it wasn't paused, but that the phone was indeed gone. He couldn't help but wonder:

"That's it?"

The so-called one witch consumes one-third of the magic power, which should be the consumption of eliminating the witch, plus the daily consumption of waiting for the second witch. It is just like charging a mobile phone. Although it consumes a lot of power when playing a game only once, the rest of the time, just turning on the screen can consume more power than playing games.

Zhixing's doubts were easily heard by the magical girls with excellent hearing, and they immediately looked over.

Being stared at by several people, Zhi Xing subconsciously turned around and looked at the girls one by one, then explained awkwardly:

“Maybe it’s in a different form, I need to calculate it, haha.”

Having said that, he turned his head back, opened the notepad and started counting.

"Rose Witch, Snack Witch, TV Princess Witch, Shadow Witch, Mermaid Witch, and then there's Artist Witch, Class Monitor Witch, Birdcage Witch, and finally Witch Night. Abandoning the mermaid means 7-8 witches a month are needed to withstand the mana wasted on cleaning out familiars like Asami did."

"So one witch plus three days of daily expenses would consume one-third of the magic power? No, if you subtract the battle to eliminate the familiar, then it should be six days plus one witch battle."

"In this case, with 4 witches a month, you can continue indefinitely. With 3 witches a month, you can only bear the consequences of two not being able to ship. With 2 witches a month, you can only change your territory or die."

"So, a magical girl needs to defeat two witches a month to get at least one Seed of Sorrow? No, two would be a safer option, since the witches' arrival times are not fixed."

"This is just the consumption during normal combat. If we fight against Witch Night, it should require more than one Seed of Sorrow per person."

"If we follow the plot of the third round, there are only 8 witches including the mermaids. Then, with Homura and Madoka working together, minus the 8 witches consumed this month, 2 Seeds of Sorrow are enough to kill 6 witches. Then, they need to recover against Witch Night, so adding 2 more makes it only 4. If each of them consumes one, there are only 2 left. Of these two, Madoka still has a mermaid's Seed of Sorrow hidden."

"No, before becoming two people, I'm afraid one had already been used up, such as when Mami fought the Rose Witch during the demonstration. The remaining times were barely enough to support the five people until the story with the mermaid."

“2个人，2*（满状态+1悲叹之种）-打魔女之夜=全黑*2+0悲叹之种。”

"So, it takes 4 mana to defeat Witch Night? I think Homura's magic is too targeted, so I expect half of her mana will be left after defeating the witches. So, if two people fight 6 witches, only 2 seeds of sorrow will be consumed."

"No, the witches appear too soon. It's better to assume that two people are fighting eight witches and only consume two. That means we only need one Seed of Sorrow that we replenished before the Witch Night. In this case, we need five tubes of magic power to fight the Witch Night."

Zhixing tried his best to increase the consumption of Witch Night in a way that would make him despair, and then he looked back and thought about what he had done in this round.

"There was one at the school gate, the second at Mami's house, the third on the pedestrian street, two the week after Sayaka became a partner, and the sixth the day Mami disappeared. The seventh was in the barrier arc, and the eighth was in Homura that day, but was harmed by Kyubey... The ninth was in the hearing ability arc, none in the external aid arc, and the tenth was made up in the daily arc. That's not right, because that was the familiar I brought with me, so it doesn't count."

"The top-secret chapter was also wasted. The wishing chapter was only the tenth one, and if it succeeds today, it will be the eleventh one. There are two more chapters to come. If both succeed, that will be a total of thirteen. That's how you look at it."

"Thirteen witches, only four Seeds of Sorrow have been consumed, so there are still nine left. Even if four Seeds of Sorrow are used to recover, everyone can still have one. Four tubes of mana plus one Seed of Sorrow will just be enough to finish the Witch Night with full mana. At worst, if there is one less Seed of Sorrow, we can share it with everyone, and each of us can use a quarter, which is enough to cope with the daily consumption in the future."

"If we lose one more, we'll lose half of our magic power. We can use it to destroy one witch, or maybe three together? Then we can use the Seeds of Sorrow together, which will barely cover our daily expenses."

"And if I fail to attract the witch these last three times..."

Zhixing covered his mouth with his hands, and two terrible endings appeared in his mind.

In the second stage of Witch Night, after being resurrected again, the 4-color team was wiped out or unable to defeat the witch, and could only watch their magic power being exhausted.

"No, no, no, no, no, what am I thinking? Combat can't be quantified into mana consumption. Everyone's magic is different, so the way it's used is also different. Apart from anything else, Homura right now, after defeating Witch Night, can probably still activate Samsara with almost full mana, right? Combat experience and ability will further reduce consumption."

"Maybe it's like the Five Colors Team, where all five of them gather together and each unleash a single ultimate move, eliminating the need for the Seed of Sorrow."

"It's not that my presence attracted witches from further away, and that, combined with the fact that we saved quite a bit of time exploring witches, it was only enough for the four of us to defeat Witch Night. In that world without me, wouldn't Homura be..."

Zhi Xing turned his head slightly stiffly and looked at Xiao Yan, who was not participating in Mami's team but standing alone on the side.

"...You won't try to gather the strength of your partners, will you?"

Recalling that Homura's attitude towards partners was that having them was fine, but without them I wouldn't have to fight on my own, and considering that it was my mistake to let Sayaka make a wish, Homura didn't turn Sayaka into a fighting force, but instead just made her a burden, like consuming more of the Seeds of Sorrow's reserves.

"Witch Night is a familiar, so she doesn't have any real weaknesses. She can be killed instantly with a concentrated burst of power. We can only rely on magic power to continuously consume the witch's body and then kill her with a single blow. So, does Xiao Yan want to use up all five tubes of magic power, or even more magic power, to fight Witch Night?"

"So the battle on Witch Night lasted until Madoka made up her mind, and then, with public transportation paralyzed, she ran to the center of the battlefield and even went upstairs to find Homura."

"It seems that a lot of time has been spent on purifying the magic power of the Seed of Sorrow."

Homura was looking at the paper and occasionally writing something down, but suddenly looked over at this moment, then lowered his head and continued to think. Suddenly, he knew which article he was reading, so he stepped forward decisively and greeted everyone:

"It seems that Conan-kun has encountered a problem in his thinking. Can you give him a hand?"

Homura's words drew the attention of the other three people as well as the paper line.

So Xiaoyan borrowed Zhixing's body to block the sight of other irrelevant people, and then stretched out her left hand, and the soul gem jumped out from the back of her hand, allowing Zhixing to see the bright gem luster up close.

"A few days ago, I used TV Princess's Seeds of Sorrow to recover myself. After all, I only participated in two witches, three assists, and these 27 days of life in Mitakihara. There is a witch you haven't seen before, and now there are no Seeds of Sorrow left."

Homura finished speaking to the paper and gestured to Asami, asking her to speak according to this format.

"Are you comparing contributions? We agreed to split it equally."

Mami said something puzzled, then covered her face with her right hand and explained to the paper line that turned around:

"Because there's a group activity today, I used the last Seed of Sorrow to purify it yesterday. If we count it based on the 27 days that Yanchan mentioned, including the time when Yanchan took care of them, there are probably... one, two, three, four, five."

"Well, I think I've fought 5 witches, 3 helping hands, and 68 familiars. I've already used up all the 6 seeds of sorrow I got during this period."

Zhixing looked at Mami's soul gem, which was also full of color, and his brain seemed to have crashed. He didn't respond at all, and stared blankly at Sayaka who spoke next to Mami.

"Wow, as expected of Asami-senpai! Really strong! Compared to Asami-senpai, my record is a bit disappointing."

"It's okay. Everyone has a novice period. Besides, you've only been a magical girl for a short time, so there's still a lot of room for improvement."

"Yeah, I'll do my best! Um, what's the format? I haven't been the main force in defeating witches yet. I've basically been assisting. I think I have about 6 assists. But when it comes to defeating familiars, I'm still very confident. I defeated 17 familiars~"

"Although I've only been a magical girl for 18 days, the Seeds of Sorrow I defeated with Mami have been consumed, and I gave Mami-senpai half of the Seeds of Sorrow. I don't have any left either."

Sayaka's strong performance scared Mami, making her chuckle and encourage Sayaka, but Zhixing didn't pay attention. Instead, she turned her head woodenly and looked at Anzi.

"Tsk, if this is really a comparison of contributions, it's so unfair to me, an outsider who's only been here for ten days. Besides, this is for Edogawa to hear, so it should be used to seduce this guy's despair, right?"

"If that's the premise, doesn't it mean that this guy has gradually realized that he's useless? Maybe he's just realizing his own incompetence and feeling desperate. How boring."

"But if it really does attract a witch, it's still acceptable. I'll tell you what I mean."

Xingzi came over and placed the gem in her palm without any concealment, then held it in front of Zhixing and said:

"In the past ten days in Mitakihara, I defeated three witches. It should have been my turn to assist, but you had a problem that day. You were just a familiar that couldn't drop the Seed of Sorrow."

After saying that, Kyoko glanced at Homura, paused for a moment, and then spoke:

"Due to a deal I made with Homura Akemi, I purified it after defeating the witch a few days ago, so I only have one Seed of Sorrow left. But don't think of asking me to use it on you."

Zhi Xing took a look at it, which was glowing red, but at the bottom he could see some black and filthy soul gems, and his brows frowned even more.

"Oh, I forgot. Do you still want to see the Soul Stone?"

When Sayaka saw what Anzi did, she suddenly realized that she had missed a step. Then she slowly turned her back to the irrelevant people in the tram, summoned the gem, hid it, and handed it to Zhixing to take a look.

A soul gem that was mostly contaminated by black filth, avoided the sight of others and appeared in front of Zhixing, instantly breaking down Zhixing's psychological defenses.

"Why is this happening? It shouldn't be happening this fast."

Zhixing lowered his head, took out the memo on his phone again, and started thinking again.

Sayaka looked at Kazuyo's reaction and couldn't help but glare at Homura, muttering to herself:

"She's definitely doing this on purpose. She's just trying to expose the extent of my Soul Gem consumption by saying she's giving Conan a helping hand. After all, I just purified it in front of Mami on the 6th, and it's only been five days. This level of consumption shouldn't be happening. She'll definitely get involved and tell everyone about how she discovered two Kyousuke-kuns back then."

"Although I'm not sure what she's going to do, it's obviously inconsistent with the purpose of fighting against Witch Night. Maybe some of the things I saw through the witch were actually fake, or maybe Homura Akemi has other motives. We must be vigilant. Now that I know Homura Akemi's true identity, I'm the only one who can protect Senior Mami."

Compared to Sayaka, who was focusing on Homura and didn't notice the situation of Kazuhiko, Kyoko, who was more interested in witches, noticed that Kazuhiko was still busy but had the Witch's Kiss on his neck.

"As expected, it came out. That's why they say amateurs are amateurs. They think the battle is too simple. It's just a Witch Night that can be handled by two people. Even if it's just Asami and I, we probably don't need to stock up on Seeds of Sorrow, not to mention there are a total of four magical girls here. Well, the more Seeds of Sorrow, the better. It's not a big deal to have a few more. Life must go on after Witch Night."

Mami, who also noticed the Witch's Kiss appearing on Shimizu, had a different opinion. After all, she had been in contact with Shimizu for the longest time among the other three. After observing Shimizu's performance and Homura's behavior, she thought for a moment and said uncertainly:

"Could it be that, according to future battle reports, simply being at full health isn't enough to defeat Witch Night, and we'll need to prepare Seeds of Sorrow? Hmm~ Witch Night doesn't drop Seeds of Sorrow, so if that's the case, we really do need to be prepared."

At this time, the paper industry finally noticed the loophole that had not been discovered before.

"If we say that every witch in Mitaki who can drop a Seed of Sorrow was attracted by Mami's wish to survive, then it means that Mami will only be able to use up 7-8 Seeds of Sorrow after killing witches and familiars for a month."

"My arrival only attracted two more witches. The others were all witches that would have been defeated by Mami anyway."

"Two mere Seeds of Sorrow, how can they be enough for the three extra Magical Girls? Even if there were three more, it wouldn't be enough. In other words, five! From the very beginning, the plan was limited by Kyubey's magic limit. I haven't created any valuable plan at all. I'm simply using Homura to pass on some world settings to kill time."

"In this case, even if we choose the next game, with Homura's intelligence, there will always be a time when she will find herself useless. Now I have no new plans that can attract Homura, so what about the future after losing my memories?"

“There’s no way for me to go on!”

Chapter 97: It's time to start the next round

Standing on the crane arm of the construction site, Kyubey looked outside the city, where a witch was speeding towards Mitakihara.

"All the witches nearby have been eliminated, but I didn't expect that such a long distance could still attract witches. The same despair that was emitted five days ago didn't attract witches. What's the difference between them..."

Kyubey turned his head and looked at the moving train at a distance that even magical girls needed to use enhanced telescopes, and looked at Paper Line, who was in a state of despair and thus attracted the Witch's Kiss.

"Edogawa Conan, 28 years old. Blood analysis shows he was raised in the environment of a nearby continent, but no genetically similar bloodline has been found. This means he is not a native of this Earth, but a visitor from another world."

"Unlike the Akemi Homura who occupied Homura, there are no corresponding coordinates here. However, if we regard it as a random teleportation, it is obvious that there is information here. Moreover, with such a useless performance now, I really don't see the value of spending so much effort to teleport to a parallel universe."

Following the action template, Kyubey stretched like a cat, then stood up and leaped towards the crane arm behind him.

"With Witch Night approaching, even if there are three more witches, it won't be of much use. At least this time, they won't pose any threat. We just need to keep an eye on them."

"Why me?"

With the whisper, a new witch's kiss appeared on Zhixing's neck.

This time, Xiaoyan didn't need to do anything because the gem had just been revealed, so Xingzi, who was very close to Zhixing, tried to move the gem close to Zhixing's neck herself, and then added magical stimulation so that the magic in the gem could be transferred to Zhixing's neck.

"Hmm... I don't feel anything. Seriously, I thought I could detect the witch's location by direct contact. Hey, wake up!"

Although Kyoko didn't get the result she expected, she still maintained the magic of the gem and tried to wake Kabuki just like Homura did before.

"That's enough, you can put the gem away now, Kyoko."

Homura observed the state of the paper line and immediately determined that the effects of the Witch's Kiss were gone.

Xingzi took back the gem and waited for a few seconds. Seeing that Zhixing still didn't move, she frowned and said:

"This guy isn't moving at all. Has he really been freed from control?"

"The Witch's Kiss only deepens and maintains the state of despair, but this does not mean that Conan can escape despair without the deepening of the Witch's Kiss. ​​For him, the real despair is the confirmed and inescapable reality, especially when there is no solution in the future."

"So what should we do? Should we just leave Conan alone? I remember that if Conan doesn't actively follow the witch, the witch will be attracted to him and move over."

Mami turned her head and saw the lifeless expression in Zhixing's eyes, and couldn't help but frown.

"Conan can handle it on his own, it just takes time. As for the witch coming, it's actually a good thing."

"A good thing? Because of a witch? Haven't you seen the crowds of people accidentally caught in the witch's barrier?"

Sayaka expressed her dissatisfaction with this.

"You've only been a magical girl for a short time now, so you don't know enough about the Seeds of Sorrow. But I can tell you clearly that we have wiped out all the witches near Mitakihara. Unless a familiar eats enough people to become a witch, don't even think about obtaining the Seeds of Sorrow during this period."

"Indeed, the number of witches this month has increased a bit compared to before. There shouldn't be any witches nearby who can make it here."

Mami counted the witches this month and even thought that there were so many witches because there was going to be a Witch Night.

"Let me tell you something common sense. The speed at which witches move isn't actually very fast. It's about the same speed as a bicycle that's not in a hurry. At this speed, even without stopping for a moment, it would take a day or two to reach other cities."

"But the problem is, how could witches move to such an uninhabited area with such determination? They prefer to settle in places with few people. So, there are actually very few witches who can wander close to the city. Most of them stay quietly in the wild."

Sayaka became serious and asked:

"So, can we eliminate witches in the wild and prevent them from entering the city?"

"As expected of Mami's disciple, your ideas are very similar, but this is impossible."