Ch.116Chapter 19. Longing (5)

Only after coming this far did I finally realize that whenever Hayun and I met separately, she always lightly covered her face.

She never wore a mask, but she would wear a hat or face mask. Since Hayun was celebrity-level famous, she was probably worried about being recognized.

Though Hayun’s hair was pink, that color wasn’t so uncommon that people would definitely stare, so her disguise was somewhat effective.

Of course, even with those precautions, there were still people who recognized her and either approached to talk or passed by with snide remarks.

Most of those snide remarks were about her having “celebrity disease.” They probably meant that magical girls weren’t necessarily celebrities, but honestly, for Hayun who was more recognizable and popular than most politicians, those comments were just nitpicking.

“Is there really any need for that?”

Rose responded confidently after hearing the story.

Though it was a busy area, it wasn’t yet crowded in the cafe. Being a weekday before rush hour, that was to be expected.

Thanks to that, we were able to claim a corner of the cafe. The previously quiet cafe quickly filled with people after we arrived.

Some of them were openly taking photos of us with their phones.

“People who are going to recognize you will recognize you anyway, right? Sometimes trying too hard to hide actually draws more attention because it looks suspicious.”

“…But if you’re out in the open, even people who wouldn’t have recognized you will notice you,” I said to Rose, who nodded.

“That’s the important point. When people recognize your face, they’re less likely to openly start trouble.”

Seeing me blink in confusion, Rose smirked.

“Think about it—being famous means getting a lot of negative attention too. We cause a lot of damage during our fights, and areas get cordoned off afterward while roads get repaved. Buildings literally get destroyed.”

That’s… true. People online often criticize magical girls because of that.

“So if you hide your face, you only attract the weird ones—people who want to see under random strangers’ masks, or those who want to follow magical girls around.”

Is that so?

I gave her a slightly puzzled look, but Rose continued without paying much attention to my expression.

“It’s better to just show your face openly. You know what? Creeps usually target us when we’re alone or separated. It’s actually safer when there are people around. I don’t know about celebrities, but we have plenty of ‘people we’ve helped’ too.”

To be honest, even after hearing all that, I could only tilt my head in confusion.

I didn’t really know how celebrities lived, so that was to be expected.

“We’re not celebrities. We don’t perform or anything. If anything, we’re more like firefighters or police officers, just with really well-known faces.”

“Is that… how it works?”

But if that’s the case, aren’t we basically operating illegally now since we’ve essentially quit that job?

Well, even though the government wasn’t openly approaching us, it wouldn’t be strange to say we were half-authorized. We did receive thanks after preventing the incident at the warp point.

I didn’t really want to be convinced, but listening to Rose, I strangely understood her point.

And I felt a bit embarrassed for suggesting masks and hats when meeting with Hayun. It seemed like I had been acting like I knew better when I didn’t.

“Well, I guess it’s not a bad idea to cover your face if you’re going out alone,” Rose said, seeing my expression.

“Ju-a also covered up sometimes because she didn’t like being recognized, and you… well, you were just a civilian when you were hanging out with Hayun. I usually went around with these two anyway.”

“More like you dragged us along half the time,” Dalia said, sipping her coffee.

In the webtoon, these three didn’t get along well, but judging by how they talk now, they seem to be on good terms.

I wonder if the timeline now is slightly different from the webtoon. Then again, the webtoon was mostly episodic without a main storyline, so it was hard to judge the exact timeline.

“You’re a magical girl now too, so if you’re going to hang out with any of us, just do it proudly,” Rose said.

I finally nodded at her words.

I suppose if only one person wears a mask and hat, they might not stand out too much. But if two or more people walk around like that, they’d attract too much attention. With three or more, it would look even stranger.

We’re not a gang of robbers, after all.

“Getting photographed is unavoidable. You saw it yourself—they took pictures of us kissing and made it into news. Once you’re famous, you can’t completely avoid it. You have to accept it to some extent… though I’m sure this isn’t what you wanted.”

“…No, I’m prepared for it in my own way.”

In the end, this situation was my fault. I could have avoided all this by not becoming a combatant in the first place.

Things got complicated and led to this point, so I have to accept it whether I like it or not.

Thinking that, I sipped my peach ade.

Feeling someone’s gaze, I turned my head to find Hayun sitting next to me, staring at me intently.

She had a smile on her face, but as always, it wasn’t a fake smile.

When I turned my head the other way, Jihye was looking at me with the same expression. And if I looked straight ahead, Ju-a was sitting across from me. Unlike the others, Ju-a wasn’t smiling at me, but rather giving me a slight side-eye. I wasn’t sure what I’d done wrong.

…This is strangely uncomfortable. It feels like I’m in the middle of a love triangle. More accurately, it felt like I was sitting in the center of the triangle rather than at one of the corners.

Rose, Dalia, and Delphinium seemed to notice the situation too, but none of them seemed particularly concerned.

Hmm…

Maybe I’ll just pretend not to notice.

Though the body heat from Jihye and Hayun pressing in from both sides felt unusually high, I decided it was just my imagination and focused on drinking my iced tea.

*

After living together for a few days, everyone seemed to be figuring out how to spend their time at the orphanage.

I had a feeling that if we stayed here too long, this place would become our permanent hideout, but I couldn’t think of any alternatives at the moment.

The building the government offered to lend us seemed too suspicious, and we couldn’t exactly rent another place with our own money right now.

Rose seemed to like the children quite a bit, and the children appeared to like her too.

Not just the girls, but the boys as well.

At first glance, Rose had a somewhat rough personality, but she wasn’t too boyish either. If anything, she had the lively energy typical of girls her age.

She had a nice figure too, so honestly, I suspected some of the boys playing with her might already be experiencing their first crush. Well, there wasn’t much I could do about it, so I didn’t plan to say anything.

Dalia and Delphinium were also popular with the children.

Dalia wasn’t as outgoing as Rose in approaching the children first, but she couldn’t bring herself to refuse when they came to her with questions or homework.

She actually seemed to enjoy helping the elementary school children with their homework.

Delphinium was similar. At first glance, she gave off a very cold impression, so children didn’t flock to her like they did with Rose or Dalia, but perhaps because of that quiet atmosphere, the quieter children at the orphanage would sit beside her.

What they were doing together in silence was anyone’s guess.

Hayun and Ju-a were popular too. They seemed to prefer staying with me, but they couldn’t refuse the children who came clinging to them, so they ended up playing with the kids, swept along by Rose.

Which meant that Jihye and I were finally left alone in peace after a long time.

“Looks like I’m not popular,” I said incredulously.

Jihye burst out laughing. “No, that’s not it.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Even if your first love is right next to you, it’s natural to be momentarily distracted when celebrities show up.”

“First love…”

Me, the object of someone’s first love?

Well, it’s not strange. “Jeong Jieun” is pretty and has a nice figure. Though I’ve never received a confession from someone my age, looking back, I was quite popular with the children.

There were boys who would blush when they saw me.

I feel sorry for those kids, but even if both of us became adults, I would never date or marry them.

“You might actually receive confessions later,” Jihye said.

But that sarcastic pre-teen who coolly asked “You’re back?” when I returned is now playing with Rose.

I snorted in disbelief.

“What about you? Have you ever received a confession?”

I asked as I flopped down on the bed, and Jihye’s eyes blinked.

“Me?”

“Yeah.”

“I go to an all-girls high school.”

“I know, but you know those types. Boys who hang around outside girls’ schools and confess.”

“…Were there such boys?”

Aren’t there?

I thought I’d seen them in dramas and movies.

…Well, there weren’t really such boys at my school either. The atmosphere wasn’t like that. You might receive a confession in front of the school gate, but from a stranger’s perspective, that’s no different from a complete stranger asking you out.

That might have worked in romance movies from 20 or 30 years ago, but these days, unless the person is extremely handsome enough to make you ignore all the risks, it’s not a very successful method.

…Or am I wrong? Am I just too far removed from dating to know? Well, it doesn’t really matter. I’m not particularly desperate for romance right now.

“There were,” I answered, feeling mischievous.

Jihye’s eyes widened. “Really? For real?”

“Yeah, well.”

I was going to admit it was a joke right away, but her reaction was more interesting than expected, so I found myself continuing the lie.

If it had been Hayun, I wouldn’t have played such a prank, but this was Jihye. We’d been playing tricks on each other since we were young.

Actually, she started it first, and I just responded in kind.

“Have you received confessions too?”

“Yeah, well.”

My words completely froze Jihye.

Suddenly her face filled my vision, startling me a bit.

She didn’t climb on top of me or lie down next to me, but she knelt nearby, placing her hands beside my face and looking down at me with an intense expression.

Her short hair hung down, tickling my face slightly.

“Why are you so surprised? Is it that strange?”

When I asked incredulously, Jihye finally backed away a little. She seemed a bit surprised by her own actions.

“No, it’s not that…”

Actually, I’m more surprised that Jihye hasn’t received any confessions.

While Hayun might not have had the opportunity because of her position as a magical girl, Jihye was just an ordinarily pretty, normal girl.

If she had gone to a co-ed school, it wouldn’t be strange if she had a boyfriend. And she could have been introduced to someone through friends.

“…”

Hmm…

Actually, imagining Jihye with a boyfriend made me feel a bit strange. Not in a good way.

It might be petty of me, but honestly, I might not be very happy about the girls around me getting boyfriends. Am I still viewing them as potential romantic interests even in this situation?

“S-so, what was the person who confessed like?” Jihye asked.

“Taller than me, broad shoulders, small face. You need that kind of confidence to confess, right?”

There are supposedly 40-year-old men who confess to female college students working part-time at cafes, but that’s a different issue.

Only teenagers can confess to teenagers. No matter how capable or handsome a man is, the moment he confesses to a teenager in front of a school gate, he becomes a criminal.

Even a first-year college student confessing to a high school senior creates an awkward atmosphere. No matter how confident someone is, I don’t think anyone in their right mind would do that.

…That’s also why I can’t think of the kids that way.

In this world, I might be a teenager, but I still have those feelings.

That’s why I still can’t see men as romantic prospects.

“…So, what did you do?” Jihye asked with such a serious expression that I had to think carefully about my answer.

Then I said, “Well, I rejected him. I’m not interested in dating yet. Besides, I’m not naive enough to date someone I just met.”

In reality, I probably would have rejected them out of fear.

“You could start as friends first, you know.”

“Hmm, I don’t know.”

I believe men and women can be friends. I’m not going to definitively say such relationships are impossible.

But that’s only possible when one side doesn’t have romantic feelings for the other, or at least can perfectly hide those feelings.

There’s no credibility in someone who was rejected after confessing saying “Let’s be friends first.”

“Anyway, I don’t want to date anyone. Not yet.”

“I see…”

Jihye responded with a somewhat dazed expression.

Hmm.

I was considering whether to reveal it was a lie, but this time Jihye’s expression was too serious.

“Actually—”

“I see. So Jieun has received confessions.”

“Hey, hey.”

She kept muttering as if shocked that I had received confessions when she hadn’t, so I quickly sat up and said, “It’s a lie, a lie. How would I receive confessions?”

I said that because I was afraid she might actually believe it, and Jihye looked at me with a slightly dazed expression and asked, “A lie?”

“Yes. Of course it’s a lie. Who would confess to someone they only know by face?”

It could happen, but at least I had never experienced it.

“Really? You’ve never received a confession?”

“Never.”

“Not just at the school gate, but maybe while waiting for the bus…”

“How could that happen? Hayun was always with me then, so ask her. Besides, we often went to the bus stop together from the orphanage.”

“That’s true.”

“Are you worried I might date someone? Why? Afraid you’ll have less time to hang out with me?”

I asked teasingly, but Jihye’s answer was outside my expectations.

“Yes.”

She nodded firmly while looking at me.

“Huh?”

“If you get a boyfriend, I’m worried you’ll only hang out with him.”

“…Me?”

“You’ve spent a lot of time outside with school friends before.”

“Hey, do you think I did that because I wanted to?”

But even as I answered, my face was slowly turning red.

For Jihye, those words probably didn’t have any deeper meaning, but for someone like me who had lived a previous life without immunity to women, they were devastating.

Even though we had kissed before, it was still the case. To be honest, even knowing that she didn’t mean it that way since we’re both women, it was the kind of statement that could easily make me misunderstand that she liked me.

“…”

I was a bit surprised to see Jihye turn her head away, looking slightly upset.

We’ve lived together since childhood and have had our share of fights, and it’s not like she’s never been upset like this before, but she had never reacted this strongly to my light teasing.

“Sorry. Was my joke too harsh?”

“…No, it wasn’t harsh.”

Only after I said that did Jihye look back at me, a bit flustered.

“I was just a little surprised.”

“What’s there to be so surprised about?” I asked incredulously.

“Dating isn’t such a strange topic.”

“Yeah… I was surprised because it’s not a strange topic.”

“How does that work?”

“Well, you’re pretty, Jieun. It wouldn’t be strange for boys to like you. I said so earlier too.”

“I see…”

Jihye saying that only made my face situation worse.

“Ah, geez.”

In the end, all I could do was make an ambiguous sound and lie back down on the floor.

Pretty, really.

I didn’t know hearing it from someone else’s mouth could be so embarrassing.

It was something Hayun often said when comforting me.

…I should refrain from now on.