Chapter 050
Chapter 50. The Black Magical Girl
“Get out of the way!”
Yuck! The disgusting gray was clinging to my body, so I shook my hands to get rid of it.
Was it confirmation that we were beings from the same otherworld? The gray world hesitated for a moment before moving my body to another location.
But that didn’t mean that I had given up on eating. It kept attacking me, but it wasn’t something I had to worry about too much.
After all, just because it’s a being from another world doesn’t mean it’s on my side. It’s only a hostile neutral relationship.
I wouldn’t go so far as to act all fake, but if I showed any weakness, it would probably move to devour me.
“Um… is this really okay? Yumil?”
“It’s okay. Probably.”
Seeing her tugging at my dress in fear made me feel sorry for the sight of the Danger Rifle.
She had lived dozens, no, hundreds of times longer than me, yet she was like this.
She started off strong but fell into this state after showing her power.
Maybe it was fear of my creator, who was more brutal than the others.
I calmly looked around at the gray-covered dying walls.
Thump.
Every step I took made the world regain color for a moment, but soon after, the tentacles devoured the world’s diversity.
“Can diversity be eaten?”
“It can’t… be, right?”
“I wasn’t asking you.”
I asked the memories inside me.
To the foolish man smoking and chuckling away.
Emotion, memory, relationship, past, space…
(Yes, it can all be eaten. Why can’t it?)
A few words flashed through my mind for a brief moment.
And at the same time, disgusting memories surfaced together.
My reflection in the mirror.
The reflection of my allies in the mirror.
Shock. Electricity. Drugs. Corpses. Blood. Modification. Machines.
Does that mean there’s a price to pay for obtaining memories? As I recalled the short past, episodes related to that came rushing back to torment me.
“Ugh.”
A comment I threw at my father, who made it impossible for me to think properly.
“Is it about my sniper rifle…? If it’s cumbersome, I’ll put it away…”
“It’s not that, so just be quiet.”
The comrade called the Danger Rifle was also annoying.
I understood she was a wealthy woman.
After seeing me and hearing what I said, she quickly prepared numerous disguises and safe houses.
It was thanks to this woman that I was out on the battlefield now.
Did she have connections in the army? Sneaking into the supply line and disguising herself as a hero was also a success.
Strangeness aside, she was excessively capable.
I had no memory of such a thing. What on earth did that guy see to pair me with this woman?
Step. Step.
Only the sound of my boots echoed on the silenced walls.
Complete silence. An unchanging world.
If heroes were to fail, this world would transform like this.
Why do I feel no thoughts even knowing such a fact?
Is it because I have nothing?
I didn’t feel like wanting to go back, and as I was just walking on the walls, my companion tugged at my clothes.
“Hey… could it be people?”
We have to help.
We have to help, huh.
I looked around.
Beings integrated with the walls.
Humans who had lost their intelligence and even their emotions.
The voice coming from their mouths was a bizarre sound that held no meaning.
I had become a creature from nothingness, yet you all were becoming nothing from being creatures.
A feeling I couldn’t understand welled up. What emotion was this that I couldn’t find no matter how hard I searched for memories?
Hiding such emotions, I opened my mouth to my only conversation partner.
“How are we going to save them?”
“Maybe we can drag them out of this strange place… or we can leave them near Yumil.”
“The first one is hard. How can we drag this many people out? The second one is even more impossible. Saving you is the best I can do. Two people? Would you rather go out instead?”
The space I could maintain was at most a radius of about 2 meters.
I didn’t want anyone else entering this space.
“So, if you want to save them, pray that the heroes win.”
In this situation, I couldn’t judge well whether the heroes would win or not.
Should I call Linshua?
If the monsters of the resolution gather, maybe we could manage something.
If it’s the will of the resolution, such a method is the worst idea.
The ideologies seeded in me by Linshua, the teachings of the resolution—everything opposes this approach. And so, if this situation continues, it wouldn’t take long to understand that the resolution would step into the battlefield.
Having been rejected by humans, and having been killed by them, my seniors have been watching over the world from behind.
But even that, I still didn’t understand.
Why did they fight?
If monsters born in the human world could understand, no matter how corrupted the otherworld was, Earth was the hometown they were born in.
But what about monsters born in the otherworld? Why did they fight for Earth even until the moment of death?
They say it’s for world conquest, but that’s just nonsense.
Ununderstandable behavior.
The teachings left to me, and my ideologies, both were things that had been drilled into me.
It wasn’t something that arose from the depths of my heart.
Memories were the same.
Everything was just pain.
The memories left to me by my father.
The ideologies handed down from my mother.
The teachings given to me by the group.
They were merely things that made my life painful.
Thanks to the world’s beauty, the pain was somewhat alleviated, but the pain inflicted on me was eternal, while the beauty of the world was fleeting.
Someday, even the brilliance of the sea and the blueness of the sky would become familiar.
The tickling wind as my body moved and the dampness of the earth, all of it.
Then the heavy chains that filled me would once again tighten around my body.
Isn’t it the same even now?
As the gray world killed all senses, the beauty that was transmitted to me vanished, and now, that gloomy weight is crushing me again.
I am merely an existence designed as someone’s proxy.
Even that was a cursed birth.
The tranquil gray world is the perfect environment for me to burrow into such darkness.
As I walked the walls with the Danger Rifle equipped, I felt a reason emerge and stopped my thoughts.
Immense power.
And the loud sound of colliding reasons.
“There appears to still be an active hero.”
“Then let’s go that way! Let’s combine our powers!”
Have they lost their senses to fear?
Did I forget what kind of existence I am?
“What will happen if a monster appears before a hero?”
“I know not all monsters are bad! My driver is a monster too…”
The driver? What the heck is that?
I’m really losing my mind due to lack of information.
“My memories don’t say that. Let’s go to another place.”
Step.
I turned my feet to move to another spot.
Why is this happening?
Why am I here?
At some point, I stood in this place.
The best spot to see the collision of the hammer and the gray crustacean.
“What is that red pillar—could it be the cause of this situation, Yumil?”
“Couldn’t it be the culprit of this situation?”
The power of the otherworld was also immense.
The tremendous power of the otherworld. Not as strong as Linshua, but a being capable of destroying the world.
According to the memories remaining, fights with beings of that level had existed more than ten times.
And all those battles had won at the cost of a certain level of sacrifice.
Could this time be different? I thought simply and read the information about the red giant.
At the same time, my confidence shattered into pieces.
What is that?
Regardless of the size of the power, just existing there felt like overwhelming pressure and fear.
No, the moment I realized it was a terrifying being in terms of power size, it pressed down on me.
Uwooooh.
What was inside me came spewing out.
Pasta I ate from a restaurant inside the barrier.
Uncooked noodles burst out from my mouth and shattered into pieces.
“Yumil!? Are you okay?!”
An anxious Danger Rifle asked about my abrupt change, but its words didn’t reach my ears.
Meaningless noise.
How can I stand against something like that?
Why does my father stand there, carrying all unwanted emotions?
I was merely reading the memories within me, mistaking them for my experiences.
The memories were simply recorded plainly, leading to my mistaken beliefs.
If they weren’t recorded this way, if I didn’t remember them this way, they would have been atrocities too unbearable to endure.
The heroes of the old times fought those things to protect the world.
Wooooo.
While I turned my gaze away in disgust, had the situation changed rapidly?
The sense of immense power and eerie sounds prompted me to lift my head.
A red beam and a golden hammer collided. In a world filled entirely with gray, the hammers of beings with colors were swung.
Continuously.
Again and again.
“Why?”
I cannot comprehend.
Why are they blocking that?
My memories, the duplicated combat abilities, speak to me.
That’s an attack to be avoided.
There’s no need to block it.
So why?
“That hero is amazing! They’re blocking that! We might win—”
No, that isn’t blocking.
They’re pushing their body to the limit, preventing something from advancing.
As I realized that, I had the space to look around.
If they evade, where would the beam fall, what would happen?
The answer was simple.
If they evade, the beam would fall onto the walls, and countless lives would be lost.
That man is standing there to prevent that.
Sacrificing his own body, he stands for the justice he believes in.
Even if that’s warped, broken, and considered disgusting value, it’s his sense of justice.
I can understand.
His distorted values.
His contradictory, erroneous sense of justice.
The madness of a human being.
Yet within that, there was something he believed in.
There was something he was protecting.
His sense of justice also didn’t spare himself. If he deviated from that sense of justice, he would be someone to punish.
He is standing there right now.
Was it because of that realization?
Many memories began to surge in chains.
The emotions I couldn’t comprehend started to become clear. The moment I understood everything, his final words surfaced.
May you protect the peace made from the blood of heroes, and continue to challenge this unjust world.
May you not hold your life sacred.
May you not demand rewards for your actions.
May you embrace the beliefs of others within your heart.
May you not show mercy to cruel enemies.
May you not be stained by the burning desire within your heart.
May you hold unyielding values in your heart.
May you take up arms for the weak.
May you spend time with your lonely daughter.
May you not know the wretched pain we possess.
Even if that being is a monster, may it be just.
Twelve contracts.
Wishes lacking compulsion.
In glancing briefly at his life, I realized that.
Those contracts were wishes that never reached him.
None of those words from that lengthy message made it to this man.
Wishes laden with him hoping I’d be happy.
Only then did I realize.
I was born out of his need, but I was not cursed.
I understood why Linshua smiled at me.
I was born blessed from the very beginning.
The moment I realized that, I saw a red dot from afar.
A rapidly growing sphere.
Enormous powers of the otherworld contained within it.
And the figure of my father desperately rushing to block it.
Miserably crying out, extending his hand desperately.
Even as he stretches his hand that can’t reach, he’s exhausting himself to defend others.
How trivial.
That is the last act of a hero who has piled up all wishes onto others, giving everything up.
Only the belief remains, a hollow shell unaware of its own ruin.
That’s why it makes those around them unhappy.
But is it not beautiful?
Even if it’s a monster like that, it can protect the world.
I recalled the image of the hero I hold within my heart—
A small being wielding a golden hammer.
A brazen face.
A twisted expression and lifeless visage unlike that of a girl.
Blue gloves and black boots.
A green coat.
A red layered skirt.
A white long dress.
White stockings.
(Is that the image you wanted?)
The figure in my heart chuckled and posed the question.
The cigarette had transformed into a white metal rod without me noticing.
Yeah.
At the same time, I kicked off the wall and soared up.
The black dress transformed.
The color remained black, but it turned into the attire of a magical girl that resembled someone.
The hammer I held started to twist.
Clang. Clank. Clank. Clank.
The sound of iron twisting. The sound of machinery clicking.
I felt the weight in my hand.
It was a dark red hammer identical to the one held by someone.
Only now did I feel it. My emotions.
I swung the hammer towards the red sphere before me.