Chapter 3: Library Charms

Mao Mao drew his sword as he eyed the ghosts floating around and surrounding the group.

"Malevolent spirits," he roared gutturally, "FALL BY MY BLADE!" He zoomed into the air and slammed back down with his blade bisecting one of the ghosts, but that ghost immediately reformed as soon as it was cut, its vaporous composition unchanged. Mao Mao was momentarily speechless, but he resumed his attacks, not only attempting to slice the ghost again, but also several more around him he could find. Around him, Badgerclops and Adorabat were doing their best to help out. Badgerclops tried shooting at the ghosts using his energy-based arm cannon while Adorabat flew into each ghost and tried to destroy them by either a headbutt or a massive bite. However, just like Mao Mao, they failed to neutralize the ghosts. It was like they weren't doing anything to them at all. Mao Mao just felt himself get even angrier as he continued to slice at the ghosts with no results. He may as well not have attacked them at all.

Momo peeked at the battle taking place from under the table where she, moments ago, was reading her now-stolen book on. It was one thing for ghosts to come in and steal things, but the book that the big mean ghost stole from her was special. It contained page-after-page of powerful and dangerous magic spells which could prove terrifyingly harmful in the wrong hands. Momo knew she had to get that book back. But she remembered she was still only a learner. She wasn't incredibly experienced in combat magic and she was only a first-year. She looked at the sheriff Mao Mao and his deputies trying to fight the ghosts but were unable to dispel them. Ghosts were magic creatures and could only be hurt by magic; the Sheriff Department's attacks on the ghosts were not magic.

There was only one thing she could do. Reaching into the sleeve of her robe, Momo pulled out a wand and raced over to where Mao Mao was. As soon as the sheriff landed, she got right next to him, holding her wand at the ready.

"Huh? Momo?" Mao Mao exclaimed when he looked behind to see her. "What are you doing? Get to safety!"

But Momo wasn't listening. She kept her eyes concentrated on a ghost that was flying straight for her. She raised her wand. "Focus," she thought to herself, "remember the basics – a swish and flick." She readied her wand and with rapid waves, rapidly waved her wand in movements resembling the stroke of a brush or pen. Starry magical sparkles flew from the trails left by her wand in different colors of the rainbow and the magical energy was then shot at the ghosts.

Mao Mao looked to see that the multicolored magical streams were actually hitting the ghosts and, judging by the pained looks on their faces, hurting them too. Momo continued to wave her wand and shoot magic at the ghosts until they vanished. Mao Mao's eyes widened at what he saw – the young girl student he only just met and known for a few minutes was using magic to destroy the ghosts; she was using perhaps the cheapest weapon imaginable and known to heroes! He gritted his teeth and tried to attack the ghosts again with his sword, but it still bore him the same fruitless results.

On the other hand, Momo was swishing her wand to several different sorts of shapes as she continued to take down the ghosts. Different shapes of different colors formed as she waved her wand accordingly. Once the library appeared to look almost ghost-free, a larger ghost wearing librarian's glasses approached her. Momo threw a few magic shots at the ghost, but saw that the ghost didn't go down immediately like it was with the previous ones. "Must be a tougher one," Momo thought as she readied herself. Waving her wand again, she opted to unleash a longer and more diverse pattern of forms, alternating among a whole set of different-colored shapes. She was briefly nervous when she ended up having to repeat her lengthy spellcasting a couple more times, but the ghost was finally defeated, its glasses and then the rest of its body shattering before puffing away in a cloud of white vapor.

Momo lowered her wand once she felt everything had calmed down, with the library being completely cleared of the ghosts. She turned to see Mao Mao and the others looking at her wide-eyed. While Adorabat and Badgerclops looked at her with amazement and Camille and Honey seemed impressed, Mao Mao looked like he saw a bug. "What's wrong?" Momo asked when she began feeling uncomfortable with the unpleasant look she got from the other black cat.

Mao Mao took a second to process her question. Shaking his head, he then moved to address her. "Well, uh, it's that…you beat all those ghosts so easily, using…" he hesitated, falling quieter on the last word, "…magic."

"Mao, don't say that like it's a bad thing," Badgerclops muttered to him from behind, sweeping an open book off his shoulder while Adorabat threw another down an empty aisle.

Momo tilted her head at the way the sheriff said that. "Yeah," she awkwardly affirmed, "Of course I did. The ghosts are magic, so that's how it works."

"That was super!" Adorabat called out happily. "I wanna do that too!" It earned a chuckle from Momo.

"Are you telling me that the whole time, I couldn't do anything to those ghosts because I have no magic?" Mao Mao sounded incredulous. No one said anything, but instead either shrugged their shoulders or rolled their eyes.

"Well, some problems can only be solved with it," Momo said, unsure what to tell Mao Mao. She turned her head to hear the voices of other ghosts in other parts of the school. "It's not over yet. Nice to meet you, Mr. Mao Mao and deputies, but I need to take care of this." She then turned to run out of the library.

"Hey! Wait a minute!" Mao Mao called after her but Momo had already vanished behind the library's main door. He looked at his sword that he held limply at his side, looking and feeling a little sullen.

"Hey Mao Mao. You know, if we can't really take the ghosts down since we don't have magic, maybe we can just go on home," Badgerclops suggested.

"Out of the question, Badgerclops!" Mao Mao immediately screeched with a shake of both his fists. "It's the Sheriff Department's duty to deal with all threats that emerge, not leave them for someone else to do the dirty work!" He rapidly turned to approach Camille and Honey. "Is there anything magic we can use?" he asked demandingly.

Camille thought for a bit. "Hm, well we do keep an inventory of extra wands somewhere. Maybe we can see which one uses cat hairs like yours…"

"Yay! Magic wand!" Adorabat exclaimed, waving her wings excitedly. "Mao Mao! Let's go get some!"

"Ah-babababababa!" Mao Mao interrupted her, "If a wand needs to have my cat hairs for me to use it, it'll take too long!" He then turned back to Camille and Honey. "Is there something else we can use? Didn't you make magic tech back at the palace? Did you make any here when you were students?"

"Ha!" Camille laughed. "As if we built anything in this school that was made just for ghosts!" She was interrupted by Honey going up to her and opening a little notepad she pulled from her robe sleeve. Camille briefly looked at the page Honey was showing. "Huh? That's still in the school? I thought the headmaster got that dismantled…"

"What? What?" came the desperate cries of Mao Mao and even the enthusiastic curiosity of Badgerclops and Adorabat as all three members of the Sheriff's Department crowded around the two.

"Well, Honey tells me there's an old blaster model stored in the magitech archive down in the school's workshops," Camille clarified. "It doesn't say it's geared for ghosts but can take down anything close enough."

"Well then," Mao Mao concluded in his standard fierce baritone, narrowing his eyes in determination, "we'd better get down there and grab that gear. TO THE WORKSHOPS!" He held his sword at the ready and raced out the library's main door, with Badgerclops and Adorabat following after him yelling excited things about trying out a new magical machine, even if it was an old invention.

Camille would have simply watched them take off on their quest had it not been for Honey tapping her on the shoulder. Camille looked at Honey to see her pointing in the opposite direction of where the Sheriff's Department took off in. "Uh, the workshops are that way!" she called out, pointing in the same direction as Honey.

"Of course they are," Mao Mao mumbled as the Sheriff's Department zipped by Camille a second after she said that.