Despite the Oracle’s advice, Hanako decides to spend the following days in peace, despite Shinju’s worry about the remaining members of Rui’s clique, who seem to have vanished off the face of the planet. Eventually, one victim does resurface — a girl by the name of Mei Tsukuda. Finding Mei on the brink of turning into a Witch, Yui decides to take the girl under her wing. In the meantime, Koharu becomes convinced of the fact that the Sixth Bureau covered up her mother’s disappearance upon hearing the truth about the disaster that struck Mitakihara four years ago. When her friends bring the subject up in a conversation with Koharu’s sister Midori, Midori mentions their mother had a case she obsessed over as well — an investigation into a group referred to only as “the Conductors”. Enigmatically, that same name reaches their ears again a few days later, when Niko Segawa resurfaces after vanishing following Rui’s murder, claiming to have received some help from a man calling himself a “Conductor”. However, when Koharu probes her about this mysterious man and the help he provided, Niko answers she will only share that information if Koharu helps her fabricate an alibi to explain her disappearance to her parents and the school.

Meanwhile, Aoi Hikarizaka is revealed to have been wandering the city, offering her services to desperate Puella Magi in need of having their Soul Gems cleansed, or even civilians who need relief from the anguish or distress plaguing their souls — such as Yui’s best friend and confidante Alice Rinju¹. When Yui gets suspicious about the “theory” this newcomer is offering, Aoi uses her power on Yui as well as a sign of goodwill. A few days later, however, Aoi uses the grief she absorbed from Yui in this way to materialize the Witch that would be born if Yui ever gave in to despair and lures Yui into its domain. Teaming up with Yasu to take the creature down, Yui entrusts Yasu with the Grief Seed it dropped upon its death, realizing this attack served as a warning from Aoi. With Yui in control of the body they share, Cecilia retreats to the plane of existence where her soul wandered before Yui absorbed it into herself. It is revealed that this plane — enigmatically referred to as “the Dreamscape” — was created when the Conductors sealed Kae within one of their Artefacts and now serves as a “safe haven” for souls — living or dead — who have been allowed entrance and as a result, eternal life. Believing the lantern she and Yui are looking for to be located in this Dreamscape, Cecilia beings her search.

As the members of the newspaper club — including a newly recruited Yasu — work to help Niko return to her normal life, Niko herself is instructed by her mysterious benefactor to set up shop in a luxurious penthouse apartment in the centre of town. Eventually, she reveals the enigmatic man’s identity as one Nebbia Piccolo, a member of the Conductors who serves as warden of the Dreamscape. Having been drawn to the ruined opera house that used to serve as the Conductors’ base of operations, she explains how she discovered Nebbia’s comatose body and was subsequently sucked into the Dreamscape, a sanctuary for wayward and damaged souls — such as her own. She also clarifies that Nebbia can absorb souls into the Dreamscape at will: souls who have a body to return to can visit the Dreamscape as they please, while souls of the dead wander it eternally. With Nebbia’s comatose body unable to wake up, he has apparently recruited Niko to become his apprentice and act on his behalf, in exchange for healing her broken soul.

With Mei having given her the names of all the girls Rui Tomatsu forced into becoming Puellae Magi, Yui continues to work with Alice on a plan to take down Kae before she can exact her revenge on everyone who made her the way she is. Realizing that her family will be next on Kae’s hit list, Yui ponders whether she could defeat Kae by separating her Witch half from her human half. When Cecilia returns from her venture into the Dreamscape empty-handed, Yui decides to dive in herself. In the Dreamscape, she meets the wandering soul of Velare Ambrosi, the man responsible both for the Conductors’ many sins and for Yui’s own troubled past. Velare tells Yui that if Nebbia — once the husband of the woman who became Kae — ever awakens from his slumber underneath the ruined opera house, Kae will have a way out of her prison — as her prison is the very Dreamscape itself. As Velare fades back into the Dreamscape, two others appear — René Colère, the third of the Conductors and warden of the magical lantern that Yui and Cecilia have been looking for, and Yui’s father, Kaito Arashi, desperate to claim the Artefact for himself. With René’s help, Yui manages to fight her father off and claim the lantern as her own. Before she wakes up, however, she catches a glimpse of her mother’s long-lost soul in the Dreamscape. Saddened that her daughter has come to carry out the will of their sworn enemies, Yui’s mother begs her daughter to use the lantern to resurrect her instead, but Yui tearfully refuses, taking the Artefact back with her to the waking world.

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1. Do you remember that when Koharu, Shinju and Hanako were first introduced to Yui by Koharu’s sister in Chapter 3, Yui had a friend with her? Alice is that friend. ↩︎