Chapter 1. In a Foul Mood (5)
I wanted to be a magical girl too.
...No, wait. Coming out with it that abruptly does sound strange, I'll admit.
Let me say this up front so there's no misunderstanding: in my past life, back when I was a man, I never once had thoughts like that. Which is only natural, no?
It's only since coming to this side that I have. They were the girls from the webtoon I used to read, after all. And since even the webtoon had established them as beautiful, the magical girls of this world were bound to be beautiful as well.
I'd always figured my own looks weren't far behind, and Blossom—who'd shared a school with me since we were little, close enough that you could honestly call her a childhood friend—was refreshingly sweet company.
So naturally, I'd let myself think I might just slip right in among them.
Besides, I had my own circumstances.
Unlike the magical girls, every one of them born into a comfortably well-off middle-class family or better, the me of this world had no parents.
To put it precisely: this world's me came from a Baby Box.
One of those boxes you sometimes see at churches, opening onto the street, just big enough to hold a single newborn. It exists on the principle that if a mother is going to abandon a child on the pavement, she might as well leave them there instead—and apparently, at some point, I had ended up inside one.
That's not to say the orphanage I live in now is a Christian-run one. The church's own orphanage was already full to bursting, so someone went from orphanage to orphanage asking after openings, and I was finally moved to a place with room to spare.
I have never told anyone this.
Even Blossom, who has known me through all those long years, doesn't know that I grew up in an orphanage without parents. There's a chance she poked around on her own and figured it out, but given that she's never said a word to this day, it must be one of two things: she can't even imagine it, or she knows and pretends she doesn't.
Though she did used to say, right up until about two years ago, that she wanted to come visit my home. Maybe she's given up on that by now.
...Anyway.
The orphanage I attend is a fairly sound operation, all things considered. It receives government subsidies, and a major corporation makes fixed donations. And by "major corporation" I mean an Earth company—not Noir Corporation, which only began sponsoring the place after I started working for them.
But even lumping together the state support and the donations, once you've fed the children, paid the staff their wages, covered taxes and utilities, and put a little into the building, there's almost nothing left over.
Saving is all but impossible, so if something suddenly breaks down, or a piece of equipment ages faster than anyone expected, there's no easy way to fix it.
That's why I took the job.
I don't draw a salary; every won I would earn is donated straight to the orphanage. Thanks to that, the place has an "emergency fund" now, and the children's meals have grown more generous.
And since it's all framed as "corporate sponsorship," there's no chance of anyone discovering it's because of me.
If Blossom—Hayun, I mean—ever heard this story, how would she react?
She'd probably call it corporate tyranny. She is, before anything else, a righteous magical girl.
Then again, it was simply a case of our interests aligning.
"Here—your new equipment."
Said the executive, James.
His name and his face were both intensely Earth-like, but this executive was in fact an alien—and he had called me to his office alone.
The office was quite lavish. The auditorium earlier had been, well, no unusable space either, but this place had the unmistakable atmosphere of a "major corporation executive's" office.
A spacious room, an enormous window, and a desk set against that window.
In front of the desk stood a guest table and sofa, and—how very kind of them (that's sarcasm)—I was seated in the guest's seat.
...Special treatment, huh.
If he hadn't seen potential in me, he wouldn't have bothered bringing me all the way here. After that mortifying presentation earlier, he'd simply have sent me home.
With me settled on the sofa, the executive opened the large case sitting on the table.
When the sturdy, case-like box swung open, equipment lay neatly arranged inside.
At a glance, it looked almost identical to what I'd been using. Except the design had gained a few additions—and above all, it was brand new.
When my face showed a flicker of surprise, the executive apparently took it for a positive reaction.
Wearing a thoroughly smug expression, he began introducing the equipment piece by piece.
"First, the High-Capacity Circuit. Miss Jeong Jieun, I couldn't help noticing, in your last battle, that you regulated your emotions to control your output."
Sensing the probe, I answered,
"...Courage is born in the process of overcoming fear."
That we draw our energy from despair is a secret to the outside world.
So is the fact that we're attempting "eco-friendly power generation" with that energy.
Put plainly, the idea goes like this: provide humanity an adequate standard of food, clothing, and shelter, keep them alive at exactly the level where they can't quite die, and generate staggering amounts of energy from the despair they feel while working.
To put it even more simply and honestly, the logic is:
"Everyone's going to feel far more despair anyway, so why not put it to use?"
Naturally, if this ever reached the general public, the backlash would be enormous—hence the secrecy.
And for the record, Noir Corporation even has plans to siphon that energy off for its own use.
Hence, an "evil organization."
Conversely, the Galaxy Federation's Hope Circuit was built for much the same reasons.
The sacrifice of the few for the many—or the fair sacrifice of the many for the whole.
Setting aside the imagery that hope and despair carry, which side is more rational?—that, supposedly, was the author's intent, or so the author explained in person. Honestly, though, I think it's a setting that simply accumulated as they wrote, and the author bolted a theme onto it afterward.
"Excellent."
James, who had been watching me with eyes that seemed to be sounding me out, nodded and slid the case toward me.
"Have a look."
As if I were the one who wanted the equipment.
Had he failed entirely to read my expression back in the auditorium?
No, probably not—he simply doesn't care one bit about other people's feelings. Or perhaps that appearance of his isn't merely human-like, but a mask concealing his true form.
If it isn't his own face, then his unfamiliarity with my expressions makes perfect sense too.
Still, I couldn't very well respond with you really didn't have to show me..., so I moved sluggishly and picked up the circuit.
Heavy.
That was my first impression.
The circuit, which had looked like an oversized wristwatch, seemed on second glance even bigger than the ones the magical girls wore. "High-capacity," huh—apparently it wasn't just talk.
"We've also added a charging function."
That did surprise me a little.
"...That's possible?"
Emotions are volatile. However intense a feeling may be, it's summoned and set alight moment by moment; no one in this galaxy, I'd wager, can sustain one for years on end.
That's why it's "despair" and "hope." Those two are less single emotions than "concepts" formed from whole clusters of feeling gathered in a particular direction.
"Of course, we aren't storing 'courage.' Emotion can only be stored here—"
As he spoke, James pointed a hand at his own head.
"—and here."
The place he indicated next was just beside the heart.
"It stores converted energy. It banks a large capacity in an instant, and when you spend it, you spend it all at once."
I see.
Metering it out in portions would mean nothing against a magical girl.
"Try pressing the crown."
Following his instruction, I pressed the protruding button that would be the crown on a watch.
Click.
The circuit—shaped like a compass with only half a needle—clacked open upward.
Inside sat a single battery shaped like a 9V rectangular cell.
Of course, it wasn't actually such a battery. It was probably high-tech gear that would leave an MIT professor drooling.
"After use, simply pull it out, discard it, and slot in a fresh one."
I'd noticed a jacket-like flap on the neatly angled top of the case—apparently that was what it was for.
"..."
By this point, I was growing a little suspicious.
Because, after all, I'm just a combatant.
It's true that I'm a somewhat unusual Earthling, scouted by a recruiter affiliated with Noir Corporation. But that is exactly as far as it goes.
If I had anything resembling a magical girl's aptitude, the Galaxy Federation would have approached me long ago.
Two possibilities came to mind at once.
One: raise me with care and forge me into Noir Corporation's own answer to the magical girls.
Or two: a sacrificial lamb.
Both were enormously awkward prospects for me.
Just as my friends don't know I live at the orphanage, they don't know I work as a combatant for this company, either.
I have no intention of devoting my life to a company like this. Why would I stay until the end at a company that collapses in the story's final act? I plan to work only until I've graduated from the orphanage, landed a proper job, and can make steady donations on my own.
Granted, I hardly need to worry about the first possibility. That borders on an overinflated sense of self.
The one that matters is the latter.
The company knows Iris has marked me. They've reviewed every second of the helmet footage.
In that case, wouldn't it be more profitable to simply throw me at Iris as I am, and let me be gravely injured or killed?
A company whose image is terrible but which is, for now, legal—and gray-zone alien invaders straddling the ambiguous line of legality.
The surest way to tip those scales is for the other side's image to shatter.
...And I happen to be pitiful in exactly the right way, with a serviceable justification to boot.
So that's it—they intend to "breathe courage" into me.
"...It's splendid."
Not that I'm stupid enough to let those thoughts show in front of this man.
But the executive's expression was dissatisfied.
Hm.
"I-It's amazing! Really amazing."
When I forced a smile and exclaimed, James finally nodded, looking satisfied.
God, what a hassle.
"Oh, friend!"
When I emerged from the building feeling oddly wrung out, the Earth-boo kid waved at me with tremendous vigor.
The ground floor was a shopping mall anyway, so he can't have been particularly cold. And the talk I'd sat through hadn't been all that long, either.
"So? What did they say to you?"
"Get lost, traitor."
When I grumbled and pushed him away, the Earth-boo put on a genuinely wounded expression.
Well, I'd have stopped him too, if he'd tried to follow me into the venue.
Haa. I let out a long breath.
"I got promoted."
"I heard that already."
"...I got new equipment, too."
"Oh?"
The Earth-boo slapped me hard on the back. Ow.
"That's incredible! So your pay went up too, right?"
"Well, a little."
Every won of which goes straight to the orphanage.
I turned my head to find the Earth-boo grinning slyly at me.
What.
"Days like this call for a celebration! It's on me!"
"...You have money?"
"Uh, well..."
He rummaged through his pockets.
What came out was a single ten-thousand-won bill, crumpled into a wad.
"There it is!"
"...Let's go Dutch."
I said it with a small sigh.
"I believe in the potential of humanity."
I've lost count of how many times I've heard that one.
Did you know?
Humans don't get drunk on caffeine. In truth, caffeine is a poison to a great many animals. Humans are just about the only ones who gulp the stuff down as a so-called stimulant.
And much the same holds on other planets.
To be precise about what I mean: this Earth-boo's body cannot fully metabolize caffeine.
That's one of the little joys of traveling to Earth.
Caffeine that minors can't touch on their home planet flows freely here on Earth.
Though I do wonder whether a minor ought to be living alone in a foreign country in the first place.
"Do you know how thrilled the Galaxy Federation was when they first found Voyager?"
"I'm fairly sure that's the seventh time I've heard that story."
I heaved a deep sigh.
"People from a planet that can't use magic at all flung something beyond their skies without a scrap of magic! And by an astoundingly crude method, no less!"
That's the kind of remark that would bring the people at NASA to blood and tears. For you aliens, getting off the ground is simply magic; for humans, launching even a single rocket demands staggering technology. It isn't brute force—you design the optimal trajectory first, factor in the positions of the planets, and hurl the thing as far as possible, even borrowing the planets' own gravity to carry it farther.
And apparently, to aliens, that very fact comes across like a Rube Goldberg contraption. For them, you just warp, and that's that.
"And that Golden Record riding aboard it! Onto an object that no one knew when, or by whom, or how might ever be found, the people of Earth packed their greetings and their songs! Purely out of curiosity over whether something might be out there in all that universe—driven by nothing but passion, countless people banded together!"
"...Could you keep your voice down a little?"
I let out a long sigh.
Yes.
This is how "Earth-boos" are born.
Don't we have our own prejudices? The kind that decide what a given nation's people are like. A country with that many people is bound to hold both the timid and the bold, yet somehow the stereotype never peels away.
And thanks to the aliens who, running wide-area scans before ever making contact with humanity, happened upon Voyager by chance, the image of "Earthlings" across the entire universe became "those who yielded to no obstacle and at last pressed on into space"—in a manner of speaking, "the Odysseus of space."
These days, the magical girl footage the Galaxy Federation spreads far and wide for publicity has only deepened that impression further.
Beings who never lose hope, anytime, anywhere, and advance only ever forward.
Grand, isn't it.
"Long live Earthlings! A toast to that potential!"
Watching the Earth-boo hoist his steaming mug high as he shouted, I buried my face in my hand.
"Heh heh heh. Caffeine really is best taken as coffee..."
"..."
I hadn't known a single cup could do this to him.
Come to think of it, even at the same size, extra shots mean that much more caffeine. Did he add some while I wasn't looking?
The snow had stopped, but as expected, a fairly thick layer had settled over the ground, slippery underfoot.
He was a guy with his share of faults, but that doesn't mean it was fine to leave him sprawled in snow trampled black by a thousand passing feet.
If I just left him there, I'd look like an awful person. Right?
Fine—instead, I'd dump him somewhere in the company dorm and go. There were plenty of empty rooms anyway. It counted as a company benefit, so they didn't even charge for it. Big corporations really are something else.
With the Earth-boo's arm slung over my shoulder, I staggered along, barely watching the road ahead. Not that it mattered much—the area was familiar—
"...Jieun?"
Huh.
At the sudden sound of that familiar voice, I raised my head.
When I look at Hayun, the first thing that catches my eye is, inevitably, that flamboyant hair color.
And the next thing to catch my eye is eyes of much the same color.
They're beautiful eyes—but those eyes needlessly remind me that this world was never the one I came from.
"Jieun."
I froze stiff.
The weather was cold, sure, but not so cold as to be unbearable.
That was purely in my head. Hayun isn't the type to think strangely of me over a little shivering.
But what about the friends around Hayun?
"Hayun, who's...?"
Hayun is my childhood friend.
But being childhood friends doesn't mean we live in the same world. We simply happened to end up in the same class at the same school.
It truly was coincidence, but the neighborhood I live in is split down the middle by a single road: on one side lies a relatively poor district, and on the other, a wealthy one, facing each other across the asphalt.
Naturally, unless you go out of your way for a private school, students from both sides can end up mixed together in the same school.
Ordinarily, there's no need to cross paths at school. Groups sort themselves out on their own.
But every so often, kids who sit a little apart from their groups—like Hayun and me—end up becoming friends.
And because of that, for each of us, the only friend we have in common is the other.
"Hm? Oh, this girl is..."
No—wait, you're in my class.
Before I knew it, I found myself glaring at the girl asking Hayun to introduce me.
That was deliberate.
Hayun's face is already known on a galactic scale.
She must not like that someone as unremarkable as me is friends with a girl like her.
Though why she'd stick her nose in at all, I have no idea.
"...My childhood friend, Jieun."
Hayun introduced me on reflex, but she seemed to catch on to the girl's intent partway through, and her face went a little pale.
"Oh, really? So you're Jiyun? Nice to meet you."
She'd probably gotten the name wrong on purpose, too.
"We're in the same class."
I said it, deliberately staring the girl dead in the eye.
"Your memory must not be very good. Or maybe you've got face blindness."
Oops.
Feeling the already-chilly atmosphere freeze over even harder, I screamed that inwardly.
Normally I'm one of the quiet ones in class. Naturally, she hadn't expected me to fire back with that kind of aggression.
No—more than that, she probably hadn't imagined I'd even catch the mockery.
But right now I was in a spectacularly foul mood, and as for her luck... I couldn't exactly call it bad.
If anything, you could say her luck had been good just now.
"Ah..."
Still, Hayun—who knows my temperament at least somewhat—groaned, looking pained.
"You talk to your own classmate like that?"
The girl's eyes narrowed slightly.
It almost looked like a smile.
With a troubled Hayun caught between us, we glared at each other.