*
"Jeez! Didn't I tell you it was okay to run away?! This is like... The 3rd time you've done it this month?" (Myuu)
Her pouting face hovered behind my head, a stern but concerned voice echoing into my eardrums as bandages were tied around my injured limbs. Perhaps she was right, that I should stop running my body so haggard. While her advice came from a good place, the nature of her words were slightly different. If I had retreated on the spot, it would have attacked a town nearby. In other words she was telling me, "it's okay to let people die."
It was not exactly a surprising thing to hear among magical girls. The common consensus was that our lives were worth far more than a few civillians. That if push comes to shove, I could sacrifice a few lives to safeguard my own. As most people were quite literally adolescent girls dragged into becoming soldiers, most people don't really have the will to do this. Despite that, most would parrot the same line over and over again. 'it's okay to run away'.
As humans, the super humans they gained the power to defy and kill monsters, I believe we had the responsibility to protect the rest of humanity. It was unfortunate. The strongest enemy of all, are other magical girls.
"Mhmmm... But I can just heal each time I get injured no?"
I guess my wording or the content of my words was a mistake. Myuu held an exasperated expression, as if she was holding back the urge to scream out in frustration. Her complexion gradually became more pink as her anger welled up.
"You!... Don't tell me you forgot something so basic..." (Myuu)
"W... What is it? You're scaring me, am I missing something?"
"Yeah you are! Our method of recovery is the acceleration of our wound's recovery, not the reverse of its cause!
....If you continue hurting yourself, its going to heal wrong and disfigured yo....." (Myuu)
"..? Oh...yeah,I already have a lot of... scars from combat... It's okay, it'll reset when I cancel the transformation. "
An apologetic expression takes over her face, leaving no room for any other emotion. Her eyes lower a bit, struggling to look into my eyes. What would be the right thing to do in this situation? I guess something like this would be my fault. Usually I don't think there would be a right and wrong to these kinds of situations, it was a trivial matter after all. There wasn't much to think about it. But in the end, is it wrong to want Myuu to stop making such a sad face?
"So... How are the others doing? As the emergency responder, you should have at least ran into one of them, right?"
She finally looks back up. While we were both transformed, we were at the same height of 159 cm. Almost all magical girls range from 157 to 162 cm, of course there are outliers whether it's because of a skill or other factors, but the average is about our height.
"They are doing fine, some of them got some scratches like Barius, but nothing as serious as yours." (Myuu)
"... I'm glad. Thanks for picking me up, I wasn't sure if I was going to survive so I was planning to call you anyway, haha."
" WHEN?! When it's already too late!? In cases like this, you should rely on other people more!" (Myuu)
A deep flush covers her face, the pinkness akin to a swelling tomato. Her brows furrowed in a rarely seen anger, her cheeks pushed together and her eye lids raised.
" Just when.... When will this end? It's been a year, do we have to wait a century or 2 for civilisation to rebuild itself?
Will we ever get rid of all the monsters so that we can live in peace?" (Myuu)
Ah... I could feel the colour drain from my face, not knowing what kind of expression I should be making right now, all I musterd was a frown. I don't have the answer, I can't predict the future. I also don't think anyone else could predict the future. If they happened to have such a convenient skill, they would be headhunted by the military and dragged into the conflict. We've maintained a relative amount of peace so far by living our lives idyllically.
It was a fragile serenity, a now common element of society. It was easy to disrupt the peace of many places. Humans were able to quickly recover to build shelters and other tools to gather essential resources, but there were no more firearms or law enforcement. The common people depended on the grace of the magical girls that were forced into important positions. After seeing the power of even a mid ranking magical girl, people came to easily fear them. It was natural that they would fear the people with great power. It fell to magical girls to reliably enforce any laws.
If we were to seek conflict, we would not come out unscathed. No one would, even them. Especially since we survived an attack from the great General Frena. It was a miracle, she had quite a reputation and her sparing us had more of an impact than I thought. We've long lost any leads of our previous enemy, all we knew was that they were part of our governing body. Just as we stopped seeking conflict with them, nothing else has happened so far. Perhaps this peace would continue on for a bit longer, at least I hope it would.
"I can't exactly say that all this chaos would resolve itself, but I could at least assure you that we'll face anything together in the future."
I muster these words from my heart, trying my best smile in an assuring way. My lips ended up curving weird and cheeks tensed up. I could feel cold sweat dripping my temple as Myuu stared at me blankly for what felt like eternity. What? Was there something wrong? I thought I pulled it off perfectly! I'm not that socially inept... Am I?
"Pft!....you suck at consoling!" (Myuu)
I am! Breaking into tears as some spit escaped her mouth, she held a hand in front of her mouth as if to contain her laughter. Her back convulsed as she continued to hold in the rest of her laughter. She looked back up at me with tears in her eyes.
"Thank you! Does that mean you'll be staying with me forever? Eh?" (Myuu)
Her eyelids relaxed as a smirk reaches her face. I could feel my own heart beating slightly faster as my cheeks grew hotter. Of course, my first thought was that it was uncomfortable so I wanted to cool down as fast as possible. In order to do that, I'll need to stop feeling so embarrassed. Ahhhhhh, why did she have to be so bold now of all times? I wasn't prepared!
"Ah! Uhhh, by that I meant....!"
"Hehe, I know. I could tell just from your face. I don't know why, but you always wore your thoughts on your face." (Myuu)
Yeah. It was disappointing, but I've already abandoned the notion of having a family. I don't want to lose anymore.
On that day in my second year of middle school, I didn't stab the bully who tormented me for a few years. That was merely a part of my past that I changed in that test. It was my worst memory and I changed it into something better. What originally happened was far worst. I was thankful for a slight moment, you know? That he had to take a train to go back home. And you know how crowded trains could get. No one knew it was me, but apparently a classmate had saw me. No one dared to bring their what they witnessed to court, did they think they would be next?
It was euphoric, the way Amanogawa's face had contorted as he was pushed face first into the train tracks. The clarity of the juicy and squishy sounds his corpse produced all over the tracks. The way his eyes popped out before he was run over by the train, since he was first hit by its front then dropped onto the tracks to paint it red. There was more you know? His lackeys, I memorised their routes back home and when they would walk their pets. It wasn't easy, and I couldn't bring myself to directly kill their pets. Train tracks it was then! I had already experienced throwing life under that heavy mass of steel, in preparation to push the great man himself, Amanogawa. I wonder what face I was making then?
In any case, everyone began to distance themselves from me. It was visible, like opening up a path for me. Most people were oblivious, but the few people who knew who I was stayed away out of fear. It was limited to the classmates in my class and a few on top of that, but it was clear my presence was not welcomed. I didn't intend to stress people out and impede their learning. Moreover, I could not forget the joy I felt from pushing Amanogawa. Yes, that was my worst memory. It was the guilt that I felt for feeling joy, and feeling joy from taking the life of a single boy.
Needless to say, my mind was a mess in a gutter. I could not tell how I should feel, and kept to myself within my room for a year. If I didn't, I'd have the urge to push someone else. It was an overbearing pressure, a great burden on my mind. The burden of fear. I had luckily managed to escape justice once and removed a person's entire future with a single push. So I feared, perhaps I stopped thinking like a human, and if people would do the same to me. I felt anxious everyday, struggling to muster an appetite or sleep at a proper time. I kept staying up, pondering over these things.
Eventually, I felt that if I holed up in my room for a year, maybe things would become better for me and for other people. Above everything else, I needed time to myself. Did I perhaps think that everyone would forget about what happened and that I could go back to society just fine? Sometimes I thought that maybe a therapist could solve the problem faster, but if I could think that rationally maybe my mental state was not so bad. In the end, I held this vicious cycle of hope.
Hope is like a little poison, it pushes you forward regardless of what happens. It isn't like in stories where hope only brings a good ending. Bad ones definitely exist. It was a cycle, I would gain a little hope for my own condition, then I would think about what I did and how my actions resulted in the loss of a life and lose that small sliver of hope.
Rinse and repeat, it lasted for an entire year. I was practically left as an empty husk. The only thing that pushed me out of that room, was a small notion that perhaps high-school was like restarting from a blank slate. I immediately moved out to a new place near a highschool that I managed to get into.
That blank slate included the abandonment of my family. I threw everything away that could remind me of that time, I didn't want to think about it anymore. Surprisingly people were more accepting in highschool, perhaps everyone had matured beyond picking on people for being different. I blended into the background to be as inconspicuous as possible. I felt better, much better about myself. I even made a few friends who I could comfortably converse with in my class.
I realised that staying alone like this was very comforting. I was free to do anything anything I wanted at home, dressed however I wanted, in exchange for responsibilities like cleaning, cooking, washing, and paying rent. For me, it was a fair exchange that I wished to continue for the rest of my life. My rent and food was mostly paid for by my family, but occasionally I would work part time to buy something expensive that I wanted. I built a bookshelf and a collection of novels and books in the blink of an eye.
That was when I understood. My fear was not about my own actions at all. I simply feared being branded a criminal, and I was terrified of having my relationships destroyed because of that. I became a neet as a result, not wanting to make any human contact at all. At the end of it all, I subconsciously pulled away from any notions of familial love, whether it was romantic or not. I ran and ran, not wanting to build any relationships for fear of destroying them with my own hands.
It was not that I didn't want to settle down and have a family someday. I was just too scared to do it. And the Great Disaster only served to make the world more dangerous for anyone trying to settle down. Birthing them into this horrible world sounded just like that, horrible.
"I can't tell what you're thinking about, but just as you told me. I'll also be by your side, so again, rely on me more okay?" (Myuu)
I realised, I was making a grim expression this whole time. Honestly, how can I be a magical girl that saves everyone when I can't even save myself?