A Flower on the Cliff
A Flower on the Cliff
At the center of the pink storm, where violet electricity flickered.
An unbearable silence hung there.
"......"
Staring at me with trembling eyes was the Moon Priestess, the villain who had already devastated Seoul with three Magical Power Storms.
Unlike the impregnable storm that no hero seemed able to stop, the girl standing at its very heart looked fragile and young.
"....What in the world are you saying...?"
She asked me in a faintly trembling voice.
The magic circles suspended around her quivered precariously in midair, making it clear that she was deeply flustered.
And now was the perfect moment to press her.
Still grinning, I walked toward her one step at a time and spoke.
"Moon Priestess—no, Baek Eun-wol. I know all about the Moonlight Church. I even know all about your cult leader."
As I said that and advanced, she flinched and edged backward.
I smiled at her and continued.
"Eun-wol, be honest. You're suffering because of the Moonlight Church, are you not? You hate committing these terrorist attacks, do you not? You only do it because the cult leader forces you."
Striding steadily, I soon stood right in front of her.
She had been retreating in tiny steps, but now there was nowhere left to go. She could only tremble before me.
The magic circles that had been floating in the air had long since quivered and vanished.
".....Do you not want to live without being controlled by them anymore?"
I said that to her face.
She merely trembled faintly.
Just as the Original Work had shown, when someone came at her firmly, she could not move.
After all, she had spent her whole life confined, controlled by the cult leader, and forcing insincere smiles for the believers.
This might even have been her first real conversation with another person.
Baek Eun-wol still looked up at me in confusion.
Hmm. I had pushed her hard so far, so should I try something softer now?
Having said that, I immediately knelt on one knee and met her eyes.
She still hadn't pulled herself together, so I smiled.
This time, I spoke quietly and gently, as though coaxing her.
"I will save you."
"Leave the Moonlight Church and join me."
"I'll bring down the cult leader."
"So, will you take my hand and start a new life with me?"
I held out my hand as I finished.
She looked at me, still smiling.
Her body was still trembling slightly, but her eyes were calmer than before.
Then, after gazing at me with her red eyes,
she began to move her lips.
"....First, I don't know how you know so much about me. I don't know, but... still."
After saying that much, she continued in a voice that still trembled.
"....Are you really going to help me?"
"Yes. I'm."
"Why... why? I'm just... I'm just a monster..."
She said that in a voice full of self-reproach.
Right. This was my chance.
When she suddenly tried to shrink into the ground before someone she had only just met, I caught her hand.
She flinched when I grabbed it.
But as though I hadn't noticed her reaction, I shamelessly declared,
"No. You're not a monster."
"Others may not know, but I do. I've seen it. Even while carrying out all these terrorist attacks, you did your best to keep people from getting hurt. I know that."
"Who could call you a monster, knowing that you endured and never surrendered even while the cult leader controlled you?"
"Eun-wol. You're not a monster. Don't blame yourself. So—"
I pulled her to me and held her in my arms.
"Don't cry."
And when she heard me,
she began to cry softly.
***
She had given up on everything.
She had even prepared herself to die there.
She had swallowed all her sorrow and made up her mind.
Yes.
My disappearance alone might not end everything, but still—
leaving here would be the right thing.
What appeared before her just after she had steeled her heart was
a strange masked man.
A strange man who suddenly smiled and greeted her, who somehow knew her identity and even her innermost thoughts.
Then he said he would bring down the cult leader and asked her to join hands with him.
A strange man.
She had no idea how he knew about her and the Moonlight Church, but
that didn't matter to her.
'Will you take my hand and start a new life with me?'
She had already given up on everything.
She had let go of everything, to the point of giving up her life.
And then, suddenly, a rope appeared before her.
Whether it was a lifeline or a rotten rope, she had no way of knowing.
But.
It was the only rope that had come down to her now.
A new chance that had come to her after she had given up everything.
What would change if she kicked it away?
She was destined to be used by the cult leader, destroy Seoul, and then be killed by a hero.
.....So if she was destined to die anyway,
could she not trust this man just once, one last time?
And.
Beyond all that,
he was the first person who had ever spoken to her so warmly.
The cult leader, who always gave her orders in a cold voice.
The believers, who endlessly recited meaningless praise with unfocused eyes.
And the room that was always dark.
To her, who had lived cut off from the world like that,
who had been prepared to face contempt,
he was the first person to smile brightly, say kind things, offer her a new chance for the first time in her life, and promise to break her curse.
He was the first.
So she had no choice but to be swayed.
And to her, who always blamed herself and thought of herself as a monster, came the words—
'You're not a monster.'
Before she knew it, tears began to fall.
'Yes... After all, I have nothing left to lose.'
'Just once. Just one last time... should I trust this man?'
***
Good.
It looked as though I had managed to win her over with the suspension bridge effect, just as planned.
....Actually, I had prepared far more to say, but the Moon Priestess came around more easily than expected. She must have been under a great deal of stress to begin with. In the Original Work, she had been a poor soul who asked Stardus to kill her, so I supposed that explained it.
I thought that as I stroked her, still held tightly in my arms.
...It felt a little as though I had gained a high-maintenance younger sister.
In any case, that was not the important part.
I gently pulled the still-sniffling girl away from me and spoke.
"So you've truly decided to join us, right?"
"Y-yes... But because of my curse, the cult leader... I mean, the cult leader can keep watching me... I... even now I..."
She looked up at me anxiously as she said it.
It seemed she could still hear that bastard cult leader's voice.
"Yes. Of course I'll break it for you. But before that—just a moment."
Having said that, I teleported away.
Where to? Straight to where our Ego Battleship was.
"Ugh."
"Big bro!"
As soon as I arrived on the ship, Ha-yul came running over.
"Big bro, what happened? Helicopters are swarming and everything is going crazy right now..."
"Ah. I'm going live soon anyway, so all the attention will shift to me. Don't worry."
I said that while inspecting her outfit.
She was wearing a neat white robe and radiating a mysterious aura. Good. It was her debut, so she should look pretty.
"All right, let's go right away. You can use your healing ability now, right?"
"Yes."
"Good. Let's go."
I grabbed Ha-yul's hand and teleported back to the eye of the storm.
And as soon as we arrived, a chilling voice echoed.
Child! What are you doing?! Answer me at once!
"Eek..."
An old man's voice rang through the storm, and the Moon Priestess trembled as she heard it.
Damn, had that bastard cult leader already caught on?
There was no time.
"Ha-yul, hurry!"
"Right!"
Ha-yul dashed over and embraced the crouching, trembling Moon Priestess, Baek Eun-wol.
At the same time, white light burst from the two of them.
Child. Answer me. Child! An-swer. Me. Child. ___
And then—
the chilling voice that had been echoing through the storm gradually faded and finally vanished.
Silence returned.
"Haa... haa..."
Only the Moon Priestess, Baek Eun-wol, gasped for breath. Realizing the voice had disappeared, she examined her hands and murmured blankly.
"...I can't... hear it?"
"Yes. Eun-wol. Congratulations. The curse the cult leader placed on you has been lifted. You're free."
The easiest way to break a curse:
just call a healer and heal it all at once. Done!
At my words,
Baek Eun-wol, still looking dazed, spoke in a choked voice as though she couldn't believe it.
"....Thank you. Thank you. Th-thank you...."
Then she kept thanking Ha-yul and me in turn.
In the Original Work, the curse had always been described as feeling as though one's mind were being gnawed at while someone watched. Now that it was gone, she must have felt the difference immediately.
"All right, all right. You can thank us later. First, calm down. There, there."
"Yes. Don't cry."
As Ha-yul and I comforted her, her sniffling gradually subsided.
...Meanwhile, Ha-yul was stroking Baek Eun-wol with the benevolent smile of a nun, just as I'd instructed. Or perhaps the kid was simply genuinely kind.
In any case, once she had calmed down,
she looked at me with far more trust in her eyes, so I spoke.
"Good. Eun-wol, with that bastard cult leader's surveillance gone, you're now a member of Ego Stream."
"Yes. Ah, yes!"
"Then, to celebrate, how about we do a broadcast together?"
"....What?"
We needed to go live.
***
News that Ego Stream's ship had appeared where the Moonlight Priestess was carrying out a terrorist attack spread nationwide in an instant.
Speculation ignited: Egostic must have come himself. He would stop the attack. No, if Stardus and Shadow Walker couldn't break through, what could Egostic do? He would never even reach the center. No, if it was our Mango, perhaps he could...
People were running their hope circuits to the absolute limit when—
Flash—
a violet beam suddenly shot from the pink storm straight into the sky.
Everyone's attention locked onto the sudden change.
At the same time, the storm shifted violently.
Just as people were at their most tense—
[Holy shit lol Egostic stream ON lmaoooo]
Egostic's broadcast went live.
*
"Hello, everyone! This is Egostic!"