I'll Make You a Magical Girl
"I'll make you a magical girl." ……………
"I know this is selfish. But I still want to get closer to Gyu-rin sunbae. I really like her."
Han Min-seo muttered while staring at the floor, his back to the monitor's glow.
"But she doesn't see me as a guy, I guess. At best, I'm just a cute little sister to her. A sister, not even a brother. That's two mountains I have to climb."
Crunch. He crunched another potato chip. Salty.
"So I'm trying to get closer, but—what if I push too hard and ruin what we have now?"
These little troublemakers know their snacks. But shh. This is getting good.
"They say girls can spot a guy's crush from a mile away... If Gyu-rin sunbae figures out how I feel, she'll probably keep her distance, right? It'd be uncomfortable for her if a guy she's not into starts liking her."
Silence stretched after that—until Han Min-seo suddenly snickered.
"What am I even saying to something that can't understand me? Sorry for the weird rambling."
No, I get it just fine. And the story's pretty entertaining. Good job. Not quite thumbs-up worthy, though.
So, to sum it up: He wants to get close, but he's scared touching it might break it. Too afraid to do more than hover at a lukewarm distance with a lukewarm attitude.
This snack provider's surprisingly timid in the weirdest places. He feeds me—an outer god—chips and lets me pet him, but he can't confess to Yi Gyu-rin of his own species.
Humans are such unbalanced creatures. I wanna tell him: Just confess boldly! Like Tera Chad did.
But I can't speak directly, so I need another way—
Then I spotted Han Min-seo's smartphone on the desk.
Yes, that's it. Words. I can write words.
Swoosh.
"Ack—!?"
Before he could react, I snatched the phone. He reached out in panic, but I twisted away easily.
"C-Could you give it back? Please."
I could taste his anxiety without even trying. He's worried I'll break it. Silly snack provider. I used to be human once—think I'd wreck this?
I fiddled with the screen, hunting for a place to type. Yellow icon—bam, white paper-like screen. "Memo" at the top. Perfect.
Time to write: Confess boldly.
But how exactly? What to say?
The little troublemakers chattered wildly in my mental world.
Hm, but we already do snacks and comics—the three of us. Not bold at all.
The glasses-wearing one cleared his throat and butted in.
Oho. That's bolder than I imagined. Might actually work. Success odds?
The doctor-coated one whipped out a chalkboard and chalk like he'd been waiting.
Scribble scribble. Chalk flew across the board with equations.
Yi Gyu-rin's baseline favorability toward Han Min-seo. Her ideal type data. Han Min-seo's current looks score cross-analyzed with her tastes. Ring price feasible on his salary. Masculinity correction factor.
= Confession success rate: 2.69%
Whoa, that's low.
Glasses gasped, clutching his head. Doctor-coat smugly set down the chalk, puffing his chest.
Hm. Answer's clear, then. Prep the ground first. Build favorability.
I jabbed the keyboard.
Just as "Favor" started forming on the screen—
It warped. Instead of "Ho," the whole keyboard shuddered, and a geometric pattern bloomed in the center. Straight lines curved, curves spiraled, spirals twisted into devouring shapes.
Not Hangul, not English, not numbers. Something outside human script, invading the screen.
I'd only tapped 'ㅎ,' but my full intent flooded in: [Raise favorability]—translated into non-human form, injected into the phone's processor.
Tick, tick, tick. The circuit board heated up. APU spinning toward ignition.
Sizzle— Screen blazed blindingly bright. Battery surged; back glass scorched.
Pop.
The phone exploded. Innards puffed out like baking muffins.
Oh no. Why?
Glasses explained.
Got it. So this is my fault. I eyed the exploded phone. From Twitter to memos moments ago—now a charred lump in under ten minutes. Smoking scrap.
Han Min-seo clutched his head, howling at the sight.
"Nooo!! My phone!! I still had 43 months on the contract!!"
He lunged for the wreckage in my hand, but I pulled back.
Sorry. Mistake.
【Sorry. Mistake.】
Keeps coming out like what Mom said—eating and spitting me. Did it to Yeom Hana, now him. Genetic?
Anyway, to apologize: Magical girl time, pronto.
Magical girls in Yi Gyu-rin's comics used brooches to transform. Like Yeom Hana's choker, make him a similar accessory.
And this phone... since it's busted, repurpose as material.
I shoved the smoking remnants into my internal subspace.
"Ah, no...."
Han Min-seo slumped, defeated.
Pat, pat. I sidled up, tapping his back lightly. His shoulders tasted like lukewarm Pyongyang naengmyeon—with a fresh bitter drop.
Don't be so sad. Magical girl = all better.
Pat, pat.
……………
American continent, Washington D.C. The name lingers. Just the contents changed.
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Once the White House site—no foundations left. No lawn, no fences, no Oval Office windows.
Now: A vertical fortress of black glass and carbon-reinforced concrete—Microgenics headquarters. 120 floors above, undisclosed below. No logo, no name. In a city wholly theirs, that's just waste.
CEO's office. A gaunt man in a buttoned-up suit sat at the oak desk, eyes on a holographic presentation.
Next.
Next.
Loss lists, burned agents, unrecoverable gear—scanned and memorized in seconds.
Next. Failure analysis.
A slow-mo aerial spinning kick capture hovered over the hologram. Yeom Hana, female Awakener, equipped with unidentified exotic material dubbed Neutronium.
Slide advanced.
Hologram shifted. Last frame from Jang Bung-ik's iris cam: Purple-haired girl staring straight at it, waving lazily.
Hi, mister.
The girl on-screen locked eyes with Will Bates. As if she knew the observer beyond Jang's pupil. Greeting across thousands of kilometers and days of lag.
Illusion, of course. But Will Bates doesn't do illusions.
"The entity Korea's Threat Management Agency calls Alpha Outer God."
His secretary spoke. Neat gray suit, tablet in hand, beside the hologram.
"Emerged in Seoul Gangnam ~8 months ago. Estimated threat grade: 40 Tera+. Data highly restricted."
Bates's chin pointed at the frozen girl.
"Detected via iris cam. More data?"
"None. Connection severed post-detection. No significant intel from other channels."
"None."
Bates's eyes stayed glued to her.
"Korea is our primary testbed for the endgame. And it had a fatal bug."
3 seconds. Bates's brain overclocked impossibly, computations firing.