Chapter 81 : The Call of the Goddess Religion

I sat in the apartment courtyard and listened to Ichika about the fierce defense battle that took place in China and the aftermath that followed.

“…So Li Na and Li Meilin cried all night after the battle ended, barely pulled themselves together, and held a joint funeral. The people who evacuated from Beijing returned to their places.”

“I see. Everyone worked hard, and I’m sorry I was the only one who collapsed.”

“Well, if you hadn’t stopped the nuclear weapons, we wouldn’t have the luxury to talk like this!”

Hahaha

Ichika laughed heartily until her stomach hurt, then handed me the Glass Star left by the magical girl of [Sword] and silently looked at the clear winter sky for a moment.

A sky without a single cloud, shining beautifully and piercingly.

Under the quiet sky, Ichika suddenly asked me a question.

“Leader.”

“What?”

“Is this world going to end soon?”

“…”

“Somehow I’ve been feeling it since I fully bloomed recently. Like ‘At this rate, humanity is in big trouble!’”

“…Yes.”

“Then have you been acting like you know everything to prevent that? For example, starting from Fujimoto.”

“Yes.”

“I see. Then nothing has changed.”

“Huh?”

Ichika gently raised her eyes, tinged with a faint green, and smiled.

As brightly as a sunflower blooming on a summer day.

She was smiling like a hot summer flower blooming under the cold sky.

“I fight believing in you. And you entrust me believing in me.”

“…”

Seeing that smile, I carefully brought up words I hadn’t been able to say to Ichika until now.

“Weren’t you suspicious of me all this time, Ichika?”

“About what?”

“About how I perceive and act on the traps and magical girls of <Magical Girl HAZARD> that no one else knows about. If you were curious, I could have told you.”

Despite that, Ichika and Kyoko never once questioned me suspiciously about why I knew. Not once did they ask what I was preparing.

They just helped their best in their own positions.

“Xìn (Belief).”

“Huh?”

Ichika, who had muttered something in Chinese, spoke to me in Japanese again.

“Because there’s belief between you and me.”

“Belief?”

“You never once asked ‘Why are you so good at fighting?’, ‘How do you know that?’, ‘What have you been doing?’ and helped Kyoko and me.”

“…”

“That’s why I also believed in you without asking anything. At least the actions of yours that I saw were full of righteousness.”

“I see. Thank you.”

Ichika grinned and held out her fist, and I grinned back and bumped fists with her.

Thump

The hand of the girl I met in a seaside warehouse on a summer day was rough like a stone but full of warm belief.

“I’m counting on you from now on too, friend.”

“Yeah. Thanks… friend.”

We were lost in romance for a moment with our fists bumped together, then returned to cold reality.

“Oh, but what should we do now? We can’t find new rent at this point.”

“Water and electricity?”

“Yeah. Kyoko seems to be having a hard time.”

“What’s Kyoko doing?”

“Seems she’s staying in the guest room at the cafe master’s place for now.”

“I see. That’s good.”

Even after the Christmas party when I realized the sense of discomfort I had about this apartment, the rent envelopes no longer disappeared. At the same time, it was gradually turning into an abandoned building as if something in the system constituting this apartment had been shattered.

“I think it’s about time to move.”

“Heng. It would be funny to have another housewarming party after just half a year.”

Several candidate places that could be used as residences came to my mind.

Since there’s a warp gate, we could move between self-governing body offices and dormitories. Maybe we could even live together in the Relief Corps building where the Free Magical Girl Federation is staying. It would be chaotic enough now that changing addresses and such doesn’t matter.

Wherever we go, I’ll inevitably have to reveal my face… it seems the time has come to reveal my identity as well.

‘Honestly, I wonder if there’s any point in hiding that I’m a girl named Shirogane Hikari anymore.’

Unlike last summer when I thought it was a success to just nervously keep an eye on the surroundings including the Garden. Now I wanted to receive help from a wider world and try to save more people.

‘To win the fight against [War] who wants chaos, I’ll probably have to stand in front of everyone.’

Now that my presence has grown enough to have a voice in the world, it’s time to let them know.

The fate of this world.

The mission of magical girls.

And what I want to do.

Perhaps wearing the crown they want from me was an unavoidable thing due to my actions and karma.

To move towards an even greater path.

To be a man not ashamed before my mother.

To be a girl more noble than anyone.

Maybe the only path left was to magnificently overcome all destruction and return proudly.

-May you be happy.

I wasn’t afraid because I realized anew in just one night that there were people who showed me such infinite affection and trust.

“Ichika. I’m thinking of creating a magical girl kingdom, can you help me?”

“Huh? Then who should I beat up first? If it’s not Fujimoto Eiji, I’m still thinking of slapping him once.”

I couldn’t help but laugh at the answer that came without a moment’s hesitation. And seeing that, Ichika also chuckled and left the apartment saying she’d go see Kyoko.

‘Oh right, my phone.’

Before solving the residence issue, I felt I should contact people around me, so I went into the apartment room and turned on my phone.

Ding dong ding dong ding dong ding dong

‘Yuki…’

The incoming message sounds from the messaging app pouring in as soon as I turned on the phone.

457 messages.

All of them were from Yuki.

I smiled bitterly as I looked at the messages she had sent up until just before I visited Yuki’s house. While I was pondering how to reply, suddenly my Glass Star also started ringing.

‘Huh? The Council?’

It was a call from Sumire.

―――!!!

And at the same time, a presence that felt like the air was trembling warned me, beating against all my skin.

A huge power had invaded my domain.

An enormous resonance.

That resonance contained a power of the world greater than a fully bloomed 3-star.

And the being containing that power was calling me.

* * *

“Wh-what on earth is this…”

“An island…?”

Hundreds of coast guard members aboard ships and huge cargo ships stood still, staring straight ahead.

Although there should only be the endless Pacific Ocean spread out before them.

In the waters off Chiba Prefecture, there was a huge island that didn’t exist until yesterday.

[This is the waters near Chiba Prefecture!]

[I repeat, this live broadcast is showing the actual situation without any editing!]

[As you can see, a huge island has appeared in the waters off Chiba Prefecture!]

[The size of this island is being confirmed to be comparable to a local Japanese city!]

Reporters from broadcasting stations were continuously reporting the sudden appearance of the island from helicopters, their voices almost breaking.

[We can see people on the island! Girls… girls wearing white clothes are on the island!!]

A square rocky island that looked as if it was carved out of a huge white rock.

It was full of all kinds of flowers and plants, and there was a village built in ancient architectural style in a corner of the island.

A village where dozens of buildings made by carving white rocks were clustered haphazardly.

Dozens of girls wearing white clothes who had come out to the huge open space in front of the village.

In the center of the village stood a dazzling white lighthouse proudly. Boasting a size comparable to a dozens-story building that was hard to believe the girls had made.

[The appearance of this island is like… like the garden of gods appearing in mythology.]

It was such an astonishing sight that no one rebuked the reporter’s dazed comparison.

And at the top of the huge white lighthouse.

A girl standing on a white disc recording the movement of stars was wrapped in white cloth over her slender body, and her hood was pressed down so deeply that her appearance couldn’t be seen.

That girl slowly took off her hood.

Silver hair swaying in the sea breeze.

Skin whiter than any jewel.

And red eyes that seemed to suck you in.

She spoke.

“Following the order of the first goddess, we have come to transfer the Goddess’s Garden to ‘the one who connects lies’.”

Her soft voice sounded like Japanese but mixed with a peculiar intonation.

“O successor who has glimpsed the future and come, who seeks to save humanity.”

A beautiful and rhythmic but eerie voice that felt like a machine.

“Accept the last arrangement prepared by the goddess before destruction.”

The language of the mythical age passed down since the time when human language was only one.

“Inherit the will of the first goddess.”

Although the sound of her speaking from atop the lighthouse should have been erased by the sea breeze and inaudible, it was clearly heard by thousands of people who had gathered to see the island and millions of witnesses.

“The first… goddess?”

“The first goddess.”

“The first goddess.”

Everyone there murmured those words.

The age when gods and humans coexisted, now forgotten by humanity.

The first teaching older than records.

It was the moment when the Goddess Religion, a fragment of that teaching, revealed itself again after tens of thousands of years.