Interlude: A Faint Streak of Gray
[Peridot, are you okay?]
She had become a sudden object of public attention—enough to make the news—and yet Peridot's expression showed no intention of changing.
In that dejected, gloomy atmosphere, the little mascot beside her fidgeted and called her name.
"...Yeah. I'm fine."
A faint smile formed.
But how much sincerity was really in that smile?
Smiling because you can't cry might have been the perfect description of her just then.
They said I saved people. But there were far more I couldn't save than those I did.
Peridot was not so young that a few words of praise from the press would lift her spirits.
And that scene she had witnessed then—how could she ever forget it?
"...Shio."
[Yes, Peridot!]
"That girl... do you think she's okay?"
[...]
Peridot closed her eyes.
In the black landscape where nothing should have been visible, the face she had last seen began to surface with terrible clarity.
Resentment and resignation, and despair.
Those dark, sorrowful emotions—the kind that stabbed through her own heart, which used hope as power—drove themselves into Peridot's chest like thorns.
[...I can't say she's okay.]
"I figured as much."
A monster taking a human as a hostage was a sight she had never seen before.
If she had simply kept attacking, would something have been different?
If I'd come to my senses then...
I could have saved her.
She crushed her lips together and hunched over, and a small sob slipped through the gaps.
It's my fault. Because I just stood there like an idiot, that person—
Ding-dong—
"Hey! You in there?! I'm coming in!!"
"...Huh?"
A sound that smashed the gloomy atmosphere clean apart rang out.
The doorbell had only chimed once, neatly—but the voice from outside was nowhere near calm.
At the beeping of the door lock being unlocked, she scrambled up from her seat to lock it—only for the door to open the moment she ran for it.
"Hey, rookie!!"
"Hyaak?!"
Just before she reached it, the door burst open, and she landed hard on her rear.
Looking up with tears in her eyes, she found a pair of eyebrows twitching upward in what looked like anger.
"After a performance like that, what's with all this despair!"
"S-Senior... that..."
"When I said we might not be able to save everyone, you're the one who answered, 'Then I'll save as many as I can!'"
"...But."
But I might have been able to save that person.
If I'd been a little more skilled. Then surely...!
Smack!!
"Ah?! Senior?!"
At the palm that slapped her back, Peridot's eyes welled again.
T-This is the power of a mid-tier magical girl?
It looked like a light swing, but the force behind it was anything but ordinary.
"Rookie."
"...Yes, Senior."
"Just save more people next time than the ones you couldn't save this time."
"...And if there are people I can't save then, too?"
"Then the time after that, you save even more than the ones you couldn't save then."
Looking at her senior's grinning face, Peridot let out a hollow laugh.
That's so like you, Senior.
But Peridot knew how much anguish was hidden inside those casual-seeming words.
How sad she became when she couldn't save people, too.
"...Honestly, I just can't win against you, Senior."
"Right?"
Grinning, the other girl rested a hand on the top of Peridot's head and started thoroughly mussing up her hair.
As if telling her to shake off this gloomy atmosphere already—somehow, Peridot managed to tug the corners of her mouth upward.
Right. I'm a magical girl.
Someone who smiles as she takes down monsters, protects people, and scatters hope across the world—someone like that—
It's already... too late, isn't it?
—Could I become a magical girl like that?
A doubt about herself that even she had not noticed.
In that fleeting moment, a faint streak of gray was painted over Peridot's heart.
The gray called compulsion—that would one day, far in the future, devour her.
"Ah, come to think of it, there's that magical girl you like. That, uh, what's-her-name."
"Emerald-nim?"
"...You. Tsk. You call me just 'Senior' instead of 'Senior-nim,' but for a magical girl you barely know, you're happy to tack on 'nim'?"
"Because Emerald-nim is the magical girl I look up to! Using an honorific is only natural!"
So she was still a girl after all.
The moment the topic of her most admired figure came up, Peridot's eyes began sparkling a bright green.
Pure emotion, pure and simple.
How many people in the world could say something unkind in the face of that?
"...Anyway, about that Emerald character—apparently she's suddenly coming here."
"What?"
"Did your ears just clog up? That Emerald you live and die for is coming to this city."
"Whaaaat?!!?! P-Please tell me more! Why on earth is Emerald-nim coming here?! This is a backwater city that barely even gets Beta Class monsters!"
A bombshell statement—well, it wasn't a bombshell to the person who'd said it, but still.
At her senior's words, Peridot's eyes flew open as if they might burst.
At the same time, she seized her senior's clothes and started yanking.
Feeling the clear determination to tear the fabric to shreds if she didn't explain, the senior resigned herself to the bother and decided to explain properly.
"Because something worse than a Beta Class monster showed up, obviously."
"..."
"Relax. She's not coming here to cause trouble."
Her senior laughed as she spoke—but despite that laugh, the silence that had colored Peridot showed no sign of fading.
Emerald-nim was a central magical girl through and through.
Someone who fought monsters worse than Gamma Class was suddenly coming to a backwater city like this?
And for the reason that a Gamma Class monster had appeared?
I'd rather have died than be the only one to survive...
Grrk, grrk, grrk!
A girl's voice echoed in her mind.
And at the same time, a monster's mocking cry filled her head as well.
A monster that takes humans hostage... was that really just a Gamma Class monster?
If it wasn't merely Gamma Class but something worse—then why would a monster like that appear in a backwater city like this?
Through the dizzying swirl of questions, a single scene suddenly flashed through her mind.
A soft smile—
Recalling the girl who had managed a faint smile the moment she was seized by the monster, Peridot slowly closed her eyes.
What had that smile been?
Had it been a sneer directed at Peridot, who in the end hadn't been able to save her either? Or a serene smile born from the thought that she could meet her family?
And if it was neither—then what on earth had that smile meant—
"I went to all that trouble making you to kill magical girls, and if you won't even listen, what's the point—what's the point!"
"..."
"Monster Girl! Are you listening to me?! Kuh—after putting me in this state, you've got some nerve looking so calm...!"
From the Doctor ranting at the top of her lungs, I could hear the familiar nagging of a mother.
Just for turning on a single fluorescent light, bandages were wrapped all over the Doctor's body.
Haah. Should I turn on one more?
When I slyly reached toward the switch, the Doctor's body began to twitch.
"K-Kuh! S-See—the masterpiece of my life! Wicked enough to put any other monster to shame! No—far more vicious!"
"That... doesn't sound like a compliment."
"Of course it isn't a compliment, so it's only natural you'd feel that way."
Not even teasing me properly, this personality-deficient Doctor.
Since things had come to this, I decided to hit the switch—to test how long the light needed to stay on before the Doctor burned to ash and vanished.
Yeah. If the Doctor hadn't latched onto my arm with all her might, that probably would have happened.
"S-Stop it! If I take any more light, I'll burn to death!"
"That's why I'm turning it on."
"You...!"
Apparently sensing genuine intent in my indifference, the Doctor's grip on my arm grew tighter and tighter.
Was this really the Doctor I knew?
Or had she maybe regressed to childhood from the light exposure?
She'd always been a monster who wasn't right in the head, but right now she looked even less normal than usual.
Grrk, grrk, grrk!
"Don't you laugh at me, test subject! The one I sent to find this one in secret is off indulging in despair and taking her sweet time—and what does she have to be so pleased about!"
Oh, so you don't listen to the Doctor either?
Feeling my affinity for the monster rising, I gave a little smile.
No—more than that.
I thought it felt a little different from an ordinary monster. Looks like this one's a handmade creation of the Doctor's as well.
Handmade, though.
If it was the Doctor's handmade work, did that make us siblings?
Huh. So that strange sense of familiarity had actually been real?
"Ahem ahem—anyway! Discipline is needed for those who don't listen. Test subject! Seize the Monster Girl!"
Grrrk.
"No backtalk—hurry up!"
Grrrrrk.
Unable to withstand the Doctor's temper, the monster writhed its shadows and seized me.
I'd felt it earlier too, but this texture was strangely addictive.
The only complaint—if it was a complaint—was that I couldn't move my arms properly, so I couldn't touch it as I pleased.
Anyway.
"Since I built the Despair Circuit on a magical girl base, it's a total mess—a mess! I'll remodel that rotten mindset of yours into something properly monstrous!"
With a mad scientist's signature smile, the Doctor started walking.
Just how much more monstrous do I have to become to be recognized as a real monster?
Even as I sighed inwardly, I made up my mind that someday I'd turn the light on again and roast the Doctor nice and golden brown.
A true unfilial child.
Or, put another way—monster-style filial piety.