Like a Comet Into Your Heart (7)
Like a Comet Into Your Heart (7)
The reason the girl named Baek A-hee fell so deeply into magical girls was simple.
Just as a hatchling imprints on the first thing it sees as its parent, Baek A-hee merely took the most intensely vivid first memory of her life and turned it into a lifelong idol.
Baek A-hee’s first memory had no shortage of spectacle.
Amid burning cars and cracked asphalt, tinnitus, screams, and noise clamored in her ears, while bright flames bloomed and decorated the bloodstains scattered across the road. The traffic light stayed a steady red, and the sirens were every bit as red.
A world drenched in crimson.
And in the middle of that chaos, starlight appeared.
It was the entrance of a magical girl.
An entrance that branded an indelible mark onto the brain of a girl still barely past infancy.
To her, it was as if a star had descended from a clear sky.
A vast, mysterious radiance that did not lose its light even outside the night sky.
To her eyes, it looked like a comet that had set itself ablaze and fallen to illuminate the world.
Her hazy consciousness turned every memory of that day into something like a dream, but unlike an actual dream, Baek A-hee remembered it day after day.
Baek A-hee became an orphan that day.
Yet the memory of that day did not exactly become a trauma.
The red-tinted memories were overlaid and obscured by starlight.
To a child who could not yet properly perceive the existence of her parents, the grief of loss was an act of reasoning that required considerable difficulty.
More than the grief of loss, what stayed with her was the beautiful thing she had seen that day.
The orphaned Baek A-hee went to live with her grandmother.
Because the old woman was an adult and not a child, she did perceive the grief of loss.
In those stagnant days, the old woman was unable to take proper care of the girl for a long while.
When the old woman finally surfaced from her sorrow, she told her only granddaughter that the starlight she had seen that day was a magical girl.
The girl’s eyes glittered with interest.
To the good and admirable girl who had not thrown a single tantrum despite losing her parents, the old woman showed the greatest hope she was capable of offering.
Mostly, that meant gathering information about magical girls from whatever media she could use and sharing it with the girl.
She borrowed magical-girl books from the library to read to her, and fumbled with old electronics to show her various videos.
The girl skipped meals, utterly absorbed by these beings called magical girls.
The vague idolization she had harbored took concrete shape and drew closer.
The starlight that had flickered at the corners of her eyes resonated in her heart, touched her soul, and planted a seed of change.
The girl who had idolized a star now set her sights on becoming one.
And so the girl came to have a dream.
It was the moment a dreamlike memory transformed into a dream for reality.
They were so poor she couldn’t even afford a proper snack or dessert, but that never really felt like a hardship.
At school she was quietly ostracized for doing too many offbeat things, but she was never really lonely.
The girl had her grandmother, who had raised her to grow up strong even without parents.
And she had a dream that could carry her through any trial and adversity.
From the day her dream was born, the girl poured enormous effort into becoming a magical girl.
No method for becoming a magical girl had ever been publicly revealed.
Even so, the girl kept at it.
She held the vague belief that if she carried a heart like a magical girl’s and did things like a magical girl would, then maybe someday she would become one.
She never stopped doing good deeds.
While other children played, she did small volunteer work like picking up litter on the roadside.
Otherwise, she mimicked magical-girl combat moves to build her stamina and maintain a fighting-ready posture.
Sometimes she did bolder things.
Once she entered middle school, Baek A-hee would occasionally ignore monster evacuation advisories and guide injured people all the way to shelters.
When she grew even bolder, she would draw a monster’s attention so that others could evacuate.
Every time, the magical girls gave her a furious scolding. These incidents piled up until Baek A-hee became a known person of concern even within the Magical Girl Association, earning their strict attention.
Those days were fairly fulfilling.
But Baek A-hee, who prided herself on possessing a greater aspiration toward being a magical girl than anyone, showed no sign of actually becoming one until a year before she would reach adulthood.
Most magical girls became one around middle school or when they were about to enter high school.
In extreme cases, some even became magical girls during elementary school.
Baek A-hee had missed her timing.
Many who had cheered on her dream gradually turned to pitying gazes as the end of her second year of high school approached.
Her grandmother gently suggested that it might be time to start looking into other paths.
Even so, the girl did not give up.
When faced with an impossible reality, a magical girl would naturally never give up.
The heroic ideal forged so firmly since childhood became her behavioral principle, and it became her stubbornness, her persistence, and her inability to let go.
And so, in the end, she achieved it.
The spring of her third year of high school.
It was a day like any other, when she had happily neglected her studies, skipped school, assisted in a monster evacuation, finished her part-time job, and come home.
It had been an ordinary day.
The extraordinary began on her way home.
Strangely, even after the girl reached her house, the sound of sirens would not fade.
She thought she had finally lost her mind, but seeing people fleeing made her realize this was no auditory hallucination—it was real.
When a monster attacked the poor neighborhood where she lived and left multiple casualties, when her only remaining family was added to that list of casualties, when literally nothing was left to the girl except her dream,
Baek A-hee awakened as a magical girl!
**
Han Jae-jung’s state of mind was complicated.
Maybe because it was the weekend, the building was empty and deserted—he sighed as he looked at the slightly worn-down structure.
“I’m losing my mind...”
What face was he supposed to wear in front of that kid?
She’d obviously be terribly depressed. Honestly, if that were all, it would be a relief.
What if she had been scarred in a way that would never fade for the rest of her life?
Violence inflicts not only simple physical pain but also the terror of being suppressed, powerlessness, and shame.
No matter the excuse, education cannot be achieved through violence.
Guilt stabbed at his heart.
A faint taste of blood spread inside his mouth. He’d bitten the inside of his cheek from self-loathing.
Chewing on that metallic taste, he tried to think about how he should treat her.
Bringing up that incident for no reason would be rude, and offering clumsy consolation would just be meddling.
To begin with, she didn’t know his identity. Han Jae-jung acting like he bore responsibility for that day’s defeat would clearly look strange.
He rested his hand on his chin and mulled it over quietly.
‘Maybe I should just transform and do the kneeling bow of apology...’
That was a considerably extreme solution.
Han Jae-jung’s heart was as chaotic as a storm and as still as the eye of a storm.
‘No, apologies like this only ease the offender’s conscience. An apology the victim doesn’t want is just a nuisance. Wouldn’t it be better to let her resent me comfortably...?’
Any emotion pushed to the extreme drives behavior to extremes.
Guilt was no different.
‘No, this is something to handle as Watcher... What should I say to her right now? What can I even do?’
Advising her like last time would be awkward too.
Consolation was something to be avoided even more.
By what justification could he casually offer her words?
Beating a kid at night and then acting kind to her during the day?
What was he, a domestic abuser?
Hiding his identity made it even more malicious.
Damn quest.
Why had a quest telling him to beat her up even been issued?
Was this extent of measures necessary to prepare for a threat on par with Testudo last time?
Was it truly necessary to instill fear through violence just to survive a danger of that level?
What kind of possibility had this Belt seen to give such an order?
‘Still, in the end, the quest must have been issued because I felt the need to instill fear...’
“Bwah!”
At that moment, someone shook his back and shouted loudly.
Han Jae-jung flinched in surprise and turned around.
“Miss Vega.”
“Hehe, did I startle you?”
A playfully laughing Baek A-hee waved her hand.
“What were you thinking about so deeply?”
She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know that the lunatic who assaulted her and spouted nonsense stands right in front of her.
That’s why she can smile so innocently.
Han Jae-jung stood frozen in place.
Staring straight at the beaming Baek A-hee without moving.
“...? What’s wrong...?”
“Ah, I was just so startled...”
Han Jae-jung forcibly twisted the corners of his lips upward into an awkward smile. It was suspicious-looking no matter who saw it.
“...Don’t tell me I accidentally triggered some trauma of yours, Mr. Han Jae-jung...”
Baek A-hee jumped to conclusions and covered her mouth with her hands.
“No! Really, it’s absolutely nothing like that. In the first place, I don’t even have a past incident that would get triggered by being startled.”
If this kept up, misunderstandings would spawn further misunderstandings in a vicious chain. Han Jae-jung hurriedly made excuses.
“Seeing you again after so long, Miss Vega, I was just kind of... dazed because I couldn’t believe a magical girl like you is actually my counselor.”
There was no lie in that.
Why, of all people, is she my counselor?
“Oh my... Are you trying to flirt with me?”
“Please don’t say stuff like that; I’d rather not get arrested.”
The two exchanged playful banter as they approached the building.
Red Vega unlocked the door with her key and they went inside.
Due to the holiday, the only users of the building today were the two of them.
“I’m sorry. Because of my circumstances, you had to come out here on a weekend for nothing.”
“I’m jobless right now anyway. Call me anytime.”
“Self-deprecating remarks aren’t good!”
“What can I do when it’s the truth?”
Behind his chuckling face, Han Jae-jung felt a suffocating tightness like his breath might stop.
Red Vega looked bright right now, but it was nothing more than cheerfulness wrung out by force.
He felt it unmistakably.
The scent of her perfume was strong, and her makeup was thicker than usual.
She’d begun by paying attention to her outward appearance in order to hide something.
Had she transformed, she wouldn’t even have needed such cumbersome grooming, but out of concern for his trauma, she had come in her normal appearance so as not to draw attention.
From start to finish, every single bit of it was his fault.
It felt as if everything below his neck was burning black.
“Still, I’m thinking of starting my job search soon.”
How could he help restore her shattered self-esteem and honor? How should an offender offer atonement to a victim?
It was a situation where no matter what he did, it would be mere hypocrisy.
While desperately racking his frozen brain, Han Jae-jung tried to emphasize the sense of brightness he’d gotten from Red Vega in order to nurture her self-worth.
“It’s all thanks to you, Miss Vega.”
“I, I haven’t done a thing...”
“Just having you by my side is such a huge source of strength. And didn’t you just say yourself that self-deprecating remarks aren’t good, Miss Vega?”
No matter what words left his mouth, he didn’t feel at ease. No—he shouldn’t feel at ease.
Right now, his priority had to be the comfort of the girl named Baek A-hee, not his own comfort.
Even if the result was a lifetime of discomfort for himself.
“Besides, Miss Vega, it’s not like you’ve done nothing. You saved me from suicide, after all. Psychologically, and physically.”
Han Jae-jung resolved to somehow heal even a small part of her wounds during this session.
The positions of client and counselor had reversed.
“Miss Vega, you are a far more precious and special person than you think.”
Clunk.
The moment those words finished, the counseling room door opened. Inside the fairly spacious room—for two people—stood rows of tables and chairs, along with a whiteboard and other items.
Maybe it had originally been a recreation facility.
A wide-open window that gave a clear view of the sky imparted a sense of openness.
Today was a bright, sunny day, and the sky seemed bluer than usual.
Something moved in that sky.
It was too radiant to call a plane or a helicopter.
It defied gravity too much to be called a comet.
And it was faster than a comet.
It was approaching.
Starlight was approaching just beyond the window.
By the time he came to his senses, the window was already engulfed in a mass of light.
As if possessed, Han Jae-jung wrapped himself around Red Vega and threw himself backwards.
KWA-BAAAANG!!!!
The starlight smashed through the window and surged in.
A colossal tremor that would mock even an earthquake, and ear-splitting tinnitus. A long, piercing b-b-beeeep rang out. It was the beginning of destruction.
The building collapsed, and a piece of stone struck Han Jae-jung on the back of the head with a thud.
Smack!
**
“Ugh... uhh...”
“Mr. Jae-jung! Mr. Jae-jung!”
At the sound of someone urgently calling his name, Han Jae-jung regained consciousness.
Red Vega filled his vision.
There was a wound near her head, and her arm was severely swollen, maybe fractured.
The injuries were substantial. She must have gotten hurt during the collision.
“Ah...! Mr. Jae-jung, are you all...”
“You’re hurt...”
Han Jae-jung spoke haltingly. He was worried about this girl.
And then he felt it.
The sensation of his body was strange.
Especially around his abdomen.
[Excessive blood loss. Staunch the bleeding. Attempting transformation in your current state carries a high risk of death.]
At the Belt’s voice, he slowly shifted his gaze below his chest.
Something like a metal pipe was embedded in him, and blood was pouring out like a flood. His legs were pinned under the rubble, twisted at unnatural angles.
The moment he transformed, he would die.
He couldn’t protect this girl.
She was too badly hurt as well to fight a monster.
“Young lady.”
The identity of the starlight that had arrived here.
Libra spoke.
“Move aside.”
Han Jae-jung understood.
He finally understood now.
The meaning of the violence he had carried out that day.
Why he had needed to instill fear so urgently.
It was so that when the moment came, she would abandon the person about to die here and flee.