Time Is Money
Pumpkin-headed monsters, diced so finely they could pass for pie filling.
And I was the one who'd made that scene happen.
Time Stop really is perfect for getting the timing right.
Just as the novel's plot demanded, Halloween rolled around and the pumpkin monsters appeared. Comet showed up and made short work of them—or so everyone thought. The pumpkin monster's gimmick was "immortality through fear." As long as even one person was afraid of it, it absolutely could not die. A completely broken ability.
This is the problem with this novel. The enemies don't scale up steadily as the story progresses—the power inflation just lurches all over the place.
Imagine a level 1 protagonist who should be facing level 3, 4, 5, and instead gets hit with a 20, then a 10, then a 40, then a 35. No wonder she could never actually get stronger.
And the biggest problem of all: Comet's ultimate technique was a self-destruct move. Unlike the other magical girls who blossomed later in the story, Comet's finisher was Turning Radiance—a suicidal explosion.
Thank goodness I've already stepped outside the blast radius of suicide attacks.
I'd hammered it into her head that I was an opponent her self-destruct couldn't handle, so she wouldn't use it on me—but the other monsters were a different story.
Huh? That brat looks suspicious? Cue Magical Blast. Huh? It's YOU? Cue Turning Radiance.
Once she gained teammates later on, they'd at least talk her down from the sidelines. But Comet in her current state was nothing more than a deranged martyr machine.
Then again, the one silver lining was that she was the protagonist—apparently that entitled her to survive her own sacrifice techniques multiple times.
This event is mine to run now.
Immortality through fear? A pumpkin swinging a scythe is fake madness. A guy who nearly starved to death while armed with Time Stop—that's real madness.
She couldn't grow anyway, not without a pile of lasting trauma. So I'd take over the event myself and let her level up without a single scar.
"C-Cloak...?"
"At your service."
I swept my cloak and turned toward Comet. And as always, her eyes were trembling with fear.
Because to her, the object of terror was no longer that shattered pumpkin.
"Cloak...?"
"Th-the clock monster?!"
"He wiped out the pumpkin monster in one go..."
"I-I can't even close my eyes tonight... I'm going to die..."
The citizens, of course, felt exactly the same. Conditional immortality was no match for Time Stop.
"H-HIIIIK...!"
"Oh? You're getting back up again?"
Perhaps because the fear had thinned out, only one of them had managed to revive.
"WHO, WHO ARE YOU!!"
The pumpkin monster's face twisted with rage. But compared to what my face was doing right now, it was nothing more than a jack-o'-lantern decoration for a Halloween event.
"It seems you don't quite know your place. In that case..."
I seized the flow of time, strolled over at my leisure, and brought my palm-blades down across both of the creature's arms.
-Shhk.
Cut through, smooth as silk, without a hitch. I nodded in satisfaction and released the flow of time.
"GEHAAAACK! H-How...?!"
The pumpkin monster reacted far more violently than it had when its whole body had been diced into pieces. Ignoring its screaming, I turned back to face Comet and the citizens.
"It appears there are still some people here who are afraid of that pumpkin."
I clenched my fist—hands that might as well have been weapons.
"I can't very well turn that pumpkin into pie like this. I suppose I'll have to eliminate the root cause."
"HIIK...!"
"Wh-who is that...?"
"I-I'm not scared of that pumpkin anymore!"
"Me neither...!"
The citizens scrambled over one another to insist that they, personally, were not afraid. I turned back to the pumpkin monster.
"GEEHIK?! Wh-why is it regenerating...?!"
"Hm. Now we have a satisfying result."
The fear of that pumpkin was gone. And the fear of the people was now directed at none other than me.
-KRAK!
"GEHIIK...!"
The moment I confirmed it wasn't regenerating, I grabbed the creature by the throat and hoisted it into the air.
"GEHI! Sp-spare—"
"No mercy."
-KRAK!
My other hand drove straight into the pumpkin monster's face. The pumpkin head burst apart completely, and the headless body swayed limply like a strand of seaweed.
"Hmm. Consider this one a gift."
-Whoosh.
"KYAAAH?!"
I hurled the body—nothing left of it worth looking at—straight at Comet, and got an excellent reaction.
"Wh-what do you think you're doing?!"
"Oh dear. It was a gift, you see... I take it you didn't like it?"
"L-like THIS?!"
"Hm. I suppose I simply don't understand women's hearts very well..."
"Nobody accepts this! Man or woman! NOBODY!"
All pretense of resolve and fear gone, Comet was now screeching at me with her face dyed scarlet. About two minutes later, she finally pulled her expression back together.
"...So. What is your objective?"
"My objective, you say?"
"Yes. I don't believe for a second that a monster like you took down that pumpkin monster out of the goodness of your heart. You clearly have some goal of your own, don't you?"
"An objective... an objective, hm..."
The answer was already decided, of course, but I deliberately stalled, pretending to mull it over. The moment her patience hit its limit, I snapped my fingers—perfectly timed.
-Snap.
"I buy time."
"Wh... what?"
"Magical Comet. You may not know this, but I've been watching you for a very long time."
"!!"
"I'm well aware that your power—the magical girl's power—is capable of growth."
"What are you..."
"But the monsters have no intention of waiting around until you've grown strong enough."
Since I was already stuck with a shady, untrustworthy image, I decided to lean all the way into it.
"What I do is buy you the time you need to grow into your full potential."
"M-my growth...?"
"Yes."
"...Why would a monster do that?"
"Why? Isn't it obvious?"
Time to deploy the Monster Moment.
"Time is precious. The more of it you have, the better—and time that has passed never comes back."
"!!"
"Yet the monsters kill people, cutting those people's time short. And the one who protects them from that... is you, Magical Comet."
"So in the end, you're also driven by some incomprehensible desire—"
"Isn't that exactly what a monster is? Besides, I've hardly done anyone any harm. I trust you'll come to understand."
Faced with the answer I'd spent three days and nights agonizing over, Comet's expression turned deeply serious.
"...He's not as bad a monster as I thought...?"
Huh?
Wait. Is the misunderstanding actually clearing up right now?
"So, I beg of you—please don't spend your precious time sacrificing yourself for the sake of others."
And with that final piece of heartfelt advice, her face went blank.
Could this actually be it? Maybe we'd just become friends and start working together, and—
I was right in the middle of running my hope circuit when—
"TURNING RADIA—"
"?!?! No, you absolute—"
Magical Comet had suddenly decided to use her self-destruct technique again, and I desperately seized the flow of time. Within the frozen world, I slowly walked toward her.
"What did I do wrong."
Obviously there was no answer, but this was less a question than a grievance. I was sure I'd delivered at least one line flawlessly. So where had it all gone sideways?
"Well. Looks like I've got my work cut out for me again..."
I wasn't some Do-Gooder Squad or anything, so why did I keep getting this ending?
"...It disappeared again."
Of course. The clock head—no wonder its power was all about time.
Comet bit down on her lower lip.
I almost got swept away by a pointless fantasy.
After hearing Cloak's stated objective, Comet had realized it overlapped, more or less, with her own purpose as a magical girl.
Saving people bought time, and defeating monsters meant no one's time would be cut short. Looked at that way, it seemed like even a monster might be able to join hands with a magical girl like her...
But you mustn't trust what monsters say.
She'd already been burned badly by monsters before. She had no intention of falling for their sugar-coated whispers.
That monster's final words.
"So, I beg of you—please don't spend your precious time sacrificing yourself for the sake of others."
Telling her not to waste her time on sacrifice. At those words, Comet's reason had slipped for just an instant.
Sacrifice. To Comet, sacrifice was something that could never be separated from who she was.
Her ultimate technique was Turning Radiance—what amounted to a self-destruct move. And that was bound, deeply, to the shape of her heart.
Before she became a magical girl, not long after she'd started middle school—
"Mommy... M-Moooom..."
There had been a terrible fire in the apartment building where she and her family lived. And of all the cruel twists of fate, she was the only one home at that hour.
Her parents both worked, so they were away at their jobs when the fire broke out while she was home alone. Too young to evacuate in time, all she could do was stand in the smoke-choked stairwell, sobbing by herself.
And then—
"Ariya!"
A voice she knew called out to her. It belonged to the older boy from the apartment—the one she sometimes ran into in the elevator.
He rushed over to her, swept her up into his arms, and hurried down the stairs as fast as he could go.
"We'll... we'll make it in time, right? I don't think there's enough time..."
He kept muttering anxiously to himself as he descended, flight after flight. And then, for some reason, her memory simply cut off.
When she opened her eyes again, she was already in an ambulance on the way to the hospital.
After her treatment, when she finally saw the news—
That was how she learned that he had died—sacrificed himself—for Ari's sake.