Transformation or Death

Chapter 99

Like Family (10)

A lightning bolt pierced through Virgo. The dial in her hand couldn’t withstand the shock and flew far away.

Behind where Virgo crumpled powerlessly, it created a jagged crack pattern branching out like tree branches.

The dial that had just flown entered that crack, and naturally, the machine was shattered. 

It was a failure. Still, there were no regrets.

“Ugh…kuhuk…!”

Even after taking the direct strike of the lightning that parted the earth like tofu, Virgo was still alive. She spat out thick blood from between her red lips. She seemed to be in quite a bit of pain, but thankfully her life didn’t seem to be in danger.

Her entire body was battered and bruised, her pale skin stained with soot and bloodstains, but she was alive.

If she wasn’t, it would have been troublesome.

“…Why?”

Red Spica mutters with an expression of sincere incomprehension. I smile bitterly and start stepping backwards gradually.

The past was still flowing. The her on the left and right overlapped. It felt like my head would burst.

Belt’s warning that my brain would melt wasn’t an exaggeration. It hurt like my eyes were being shoved into my nose and my brain microwaved. 

On top of that, I was also being consumed by the starlight.

Expelling ragged breaths, I glared at Virgo.

Just like my past self, she was looking at me with an expression of incomprehension.

“…What are you doing?”

I even felt a sense of futility. 

“Are you mocking me? Do you want to insult me? Why won’t you just end it…!”

She tried to somehow move her trembling legs to stand up. Of course, she couldn’t stand up. Even if she was a monster, her physical structure was fundamentally human.

There was no way she could stand up with her muscles stiffened from being struck by lightning.

“Kill me! Kill me! Don’t mock me, just end it!”

Virgo shouted while holding her shaking body steady.

“After you ran away from me… Now you’re pretending to be kind? Don’t make me laugh! You started this first. You know that? Just obediently let me kill you… This pointless mercy…”

Virgo showed a strong attachment to me. 

Whether she saw me as a replacement for lost family, wanted me as an emotional support pet by her side, wanted a friend, wanted a mentor, or even wanted a negative example, I couldn’t tell.

I don’t know her.

Among the people I’ve met, she’s one of the noisiest, yet simultaneously one of the most silent.

I could only glimpse her heart through guesses, as she never directly revealed her true feelings herself.

She was happy keeping things shut. I wasn’t the only one who did that.  

She herself covered her own eyes, plugged her ears, and sealed her lips shut.

That’s why I don’t know her. I don’t know Virgo, Red Spica, this one person’s daughter, this incestuous orphan, this murderer.

But there is one thing I do know.

“Virgo.”

“What!”

That she was kind to me.

“I never ran away from you.”

The fact that she treated me like family. That’s not a guess, but a definite fact.

A huge tremor approaches from far away. Just by walking, it shakes the earth and pushes away the clouds in the sky.

Even to me, still a civilian, the dense starlight is fully palpable. 

It is a calamity that walks on two legs.

The same grim reaper that creates hellish landscapes that I’ve felt before.

“Run away!”

Red Spica hurriedly pushes me back.

What shows on her face is an emotion distinctly different from before.

Fear. The deepest and most powerful emotion since the beginning of the universe. The alarm bell for survival. Virgo’s entire body shakes as she hears that bell ringing loudly.

There is no room for mania or composure. Red Spica is extremely anxious. She rolls her eyes in unease.

“Why is it back again… Why again…!”

She seems to have seen this villain before, and while filled with fear, she also harbors deep resentment. Amidst the unease dominating her body is a thick grudge.

Even then, I guessed. That whatever is emanating that ominous aura from afar is one of the enemies she faced in her magical girl days.  

Not just a simple enemy, but closer to an archenemy.

To exude such an oppressive presence from so far away before even showing its form. Wouldn’t that be too much even for an S-rank villain? The difference from Red Spica is clear. At that level, shouldn’t they create an exceptional SSS-rank instead of S?

A huge flash comes from far away.

That massive light soon approaches this place. Dark matter. In the endless darkness, a single, lovely star falls.

Is that the sight of a meteor falling? An overwhelmingly massive ball of light approaches to vaporize this very land where I stand on two feet.

I too felt fear.

Red Spica smiles wryly as she pushes my shoulder.

“…I already told you before, right? Killing villains is like plucking stars from the sky. It was impossible for you from the start.”

In an instant, I was trapped inside a crimson bubble and pushed back endlessly, as if shoved away in zero gravity.  

“Run away like this. And never come back.”

By the time I was pushed so far away that I couldn’t even go back to Red Spica, the bubble encasing my body burst.

To return would be a death sentence.  

I had no choice but to decide to leave the Dark Matter. 

In the place I had entered to die, I felt a stronger survival instinct than ever before.

And I also steeled my resolve.

That next time, I would never run away again.

It seems like the path I took was in Botis’ territory, as I encountered Botis on this escape route and had a chase.

And another person. 

“Oh, have you lost your way too?”

I met Jason and was able to escape from this long dark matter.

Virgo looked up at me blankly.

“Wh, what?!”

“It seems you’ve forgotten a lot.”

It was pitiful and pathetic that she couldn’t even remember her own deeds.

“How much have you forgotten?”

“Shut up!”

Virgo experiences amnesia. According to her, it’s her madness, and she, being a crazy woman, always forgets and moves on.

Still, she values memories. She treasured the memories of living with her mother, and has an attachment to the life she spent with me. She always forgets, and always remembers again.

Virgo resents the magical girls. More precisely, she hates the role itself. She felt bitter about the duty of protection she had to take on despite not wanting it.

Still, she wants to become a magical girl. The power she gained by becoming a villain is the Four Season Day. The power to make the magic girl’s power her own. She wants the power even after suffering as a magical girl until now.

Virgo calls herself insane. So she thinks she can do anything. Since she doesn’t know what’s wrong, her hesitation disappears from her actions.  

Still, she rationalizes her own misdeeds. Rationalization is a shield to defend one’s sanity. Even if her mind had already collapsed, she desperately muttered that her actions were not wrong to protect it.

It’s ironic.

Virgo is an incoherent villain. Her words and actions differ, and her actions and true intentions differ. She is duplicitous. 

Like the star Spica, like its binary companion.

“Virgo, what is your goal?”

“Of course it’s world destruction….”

“No, it’s not.”

That was a nature closer to a human than a villain.

“If world destruction was your goal, there would be no reason to protect me. Even assuming you gave up because you knew world destruction would come, it’s strange. Then you would have no reason to fear death.”

“Do you think I’m afraid of death or something?! I’ve been telling you to kill me right away…”

“That’s not it either.”

I flatly denied it.

“You’re saying that because you know I can’t kill you. Just like a child throwing a tantrum knowing their parents can’t abandon them. It’s just you committing evil to vent your grievances.”

Around when the lightning flashed until my eyes closed, I undid my transformation.

My left eye was still replaying my past, and the pain eating away at my body remained.

“Were you that bitter about me leaving your side?”  

“…Shut up.”

“You know, I didn’t leave you. You made me leave.”

“…I said shut up!”

A beam of light shot out from Virgo, who apparently still had some strength left. It grazed my cheek and flew off.

I felt a trickle of blood running down my cheek.

“You tried to restrain me but couldn’t kill me, and made me leave but got lonely and tried to make me your companion again. Even as you always experience amnesia, you just couldn’t forget me until the end. While calling for world destruction, you’re creating reasons the world can’t be destroyed.”

Perhaps that was her last bit of strength, as Virgo fell to the ground with a thud. I leaned over her lying form. As if she’d expended all her starlight, I sensed a power from her not even worthy of a low-rank villain.

“Virgo, what is your goal?”

“Sh…ut up…!”

I don’t know Virgo. She only ever spouts nonsense and can’t properly convey her true feelings.  

So this too is just conjecture.

“Virgo, you wanted empathy.”

The Four Season Day.

All of the girl’s time was a deep reddish-purple color.

All her time was like evening.

No matter how many days or years passed, she remained in a single day.

She forgot what happened to herself over and over, but tried to remain in that one day.

Like the young girl waiting for her working mother to come home, she chased nothing but expectations and hopes all her life.

“You wanted someone like family who would accept even your madness, who would tell you that you weren’t bad. That you just had to go mad. That’s what you wanted.”

The exhausted magical girl who ran away from her duties but couldn’t escape to the end, only to collapse from exhaustion in the end.

“…Th, that’s not…”

Flustered, Virgo hung her head. Her face was dirtied by mud and dust looked pitiful.

“That’s not… it…”

Blood spurted from Virgo’s faltering mouth. It splattered on my face and fell to the ground like a wilted flower.

My vision focused on reality suddenly shifted to the past. I couldn’t help but concentrate on that scene.

Within the view of my left eye.

The road is burning. The burning cars and road, the ringing and screams and noise deafening my ears, the smell of flames layered over the scent of blood. My body inside that hell is small.

It’s an attack by a villain. I look around feeling a sense of dissonance. The scent of my parents enveloping my body. A stronger scent of blood than perfume. A colder feeling than warmth.

I realize how I survived. My parents sacrificed themselves to protect me.

Just as I’m shocked by this, an ominous pressure suddenly weighs down on my body and takes my breath away.

It was a villain.

I know that sensation. I felt it on the last day I stayed in the dark matter.

And now, I can feel it too.

The grim reaper depicting hell has arrived.

My parents’ enemy is approaching. Just as nausea rose to my throat.

“Kuhuk…!”

A massive beam of light flying in from afar pierced Virgo’s heart.

And then, an explosion occurred.

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