Ch.239IF Side Story: From the Beginning (7)

For a while, the sound of a trowel moving soil between pots filled the air.

“Are you growing all of these yourself?”

“…Well, yeah.”

I asked while staring blankly at the pots she had moved aside, and Dalia answered somewhat reluctantly.

Her expression suggested she couldn’t understand why I was standing there watching her.

Though the weather was getting chilly, it wasn’t a problem waiting outside while the sun was high. Besides, I had just done some physical labor myself, so I wasn’t feeling particularly cold.

I considered helping with the repotting, but I’d heard plants can die from shock when their environment suddenly changes. Since I’d never really been someone who diligently grew things, I didn’t want to accidentally kill the plants she was caring for.

“Hey, are you really planning to wait until I finish all this?”

“If you finish and go home, we won’t be able to have our match today.”

“Is that so important to you?”

“It is to me.”

“…”

Dalia stopped working and stared up at me.

There was no hostility in her expression like before. Rather, it was more like she was looking at something strange and incomprehensible.

“Why?”

“Huh? Why what?”

“Why is competing with me and winning so important to you?”

“Well, because I lost, didn’t I?”

My answer made Dalia’s expression go blank.

“If I lose, I need to win at least once. That’s the only way I’ll feel better.”

Next to me, Hayun smiled as she looked at me. Right. Maybe this is why Hayun called me a magical girl. I would have reacted this way no matter who I fought with.

“…Then, what if I let you win once?”

“If I’m not convinced, we’ll have to compete again. I think I’d know if you lost on purpose.”

“Ha.”

Dalia let out a laugh as if she found it ridiculous, then resumed transplanting her plants with the trowel.

“Do you enjoy fighting that much?”

Hmm. Do I?

Honestly, I’m not sure.

I did enjoy games. After going to the orphanage, I could mostly only play mobile games, but still.

I do like PVP games, but enjoying games and enjoying fighting are completely different things. Even if the content involves fighting, it’s really more like racing with established rules.

Sparring or competing might not be that different, but still, directly attacking an opponent does make it somewhat different in nature.

“I don’t exactly love it.”

Unable to reach an easy conclusion, that’s what I said.

If I could win without taking a single hit, that would be fine, but it’s impossible to win every fight that way. Even I sometimes couldn’t completely dodge the punches thrown by other kids.

“But still, you absolutely have to fight?”

“I don’t like fighting, but I do like winning.”

“Dopamine addict.”

Dalia said that while giving me a sidelong glance.

“What about you?”

“I hate it.”

Dalia answered my question immediately.

Hmm.

That’s a bit different from the comics. There, she swung her staff with a smile, breaking a combatant’s ribs.

“Well, I might get used to it eventually if I keep fighting. To be honest, I already am somewhat. It feels good to win a fight. But I hate going out to fight. If I don’t have to fight, I’d rather avoid it.”

Maybe it’s because it’s still a year before.

I suppose even ordinary people would initially dislike being told to make fighting their profession.

Perhaps that’s why she didn’t get along with Seo-hee?

She had a bad relationship with the aggressive Seo-hee, and later, after she fully adapted to being a magical girl, maybe that’s why she didn’t get along so well with Seo-hee.

It means she eventually became similar to her.

“Hmm.”

I took a moment to organize my thoughts.

“Still, your magic skills are impressive, aren’t they?”

“…Huh?”

Dalia turned her head toward me at my sudden comment. This time her face seemed to ask what kind of trick I was trying to pull.

But this was sincere. I wasn’t trying to pull any strange tricks.

“It’s not the kind of skill someone can just teach you. You’re researching magic and doing your best in your own way, right?”

I knew this partly from experiencing her magic firsthand, but it was also something that came up in the comics.

Dalia uses magic that’s smaller in range than Delphinium’s, but more efficient. It was a fighting style she developed to efficiently and quickly subdue enemies.

In the original comics, everyone had their reasons for fighting. Even though the magical girl job was portrayed with an atmosphere similar to burned-out office workers at their workplace, those girls each thought they were fighting for justice in their own way.

Dalia was like that too. Otherwise, being here doing this would be too painful.

“You’re fighting hard because there’s something about Noir Corporation you don’t like, right?”

Hope.

Magical girls fight with hope. Hayun does, and so does Seo-hee. Naturally, Dalia and I do too.

I fight with the hope that I might someday stand by Hayun’s side. Seo-hee fights with the hope that her skills help people.

Dalia, too, must have her reason to fight and her hope.

“…”

Dalia returned to moving the pots without answering. Does she not want to answer?

Well, it doesn’t matter.

I stayed beside Dalia until she finished her work anyway.

Finally, Dalia finished her work and let out a deep sigh.

“Fine.”

Dalia said as she stood up.

“Let’s go spar. If I win once today, you’ll stop following me around today, right?”

Hayun’s eyebrows twitched slightly at those words, but I just shrugged. Well, it was true that I’d been following her around lately.

Hayun seemed to glare at me for some reason, but I wasn’t sure why.

Surely it couldn’t be jealousy.

*

You know, when you get beaten up repeatedly, you start to see patterns.

Even if I follow those patterns, my chances of winning are still too low.

It’s impossible to rush in before she finishes her incantation and slam her to the ground. Dalia’s incantation takes about three seconds. I could get tantalizingly close, almost within reach, but never quite make contact. Before that, I’d get hit by her magic and roll across the ground.

So there’s only one option: dodging that magic.

Fortunately, the magic doesn’t fly like a “bullet.” If anything, it’s more like a soccer ball kicked with full force by a player. But it had some homing capability, and the longer you gave your opponent time to chant, the bigger it got.

Initially, she creates a magic orb of that size in three seconds. There’s a reason it’s three seconds. That’s just enough time to create a ball large enough to send me flying right before I reach her.

This means that if I can still be standing when those three seconds are up, the next ball she throws will be smaller.

Maybe I could just take the hit and endure it?

…There were several misconceptions in my thinking.

First, dodging the ball wasn’t entirely a misconception. Since its trajectory wasn’t consistent, it was difficult to dodge by sight, but if I threw myself sideways with all my might—like avoiding a boss monster’s opening attack—I could dodge it reasonably well.

If I launched myself diagonally forward while dodging, I could save time too.

So, my first strategy seemed to be working fairly well—

“Haah.”

Dalia sighed softly as if she had expected this all along, and swung her staff without an incantation.

Magic without even an incantation was like a tiny metal ball. It was so small it was barely visible, and too close to dodge.

And Dalia scattered several of these small orbs at once.

Shotgun pellets have less penetrating power. Each of those small orbs individually would have less power than a larger caliber bullet.

But that doesn’t mean they don’t impact when they hit your body. They’re still bullets, after all.

If it were just one small orb, it might not have been enough to completely subdue someone charging in—but when you spread orbs with the same kinetic energy widely, it means that energy is received over a wider area.

As I fell backward, I thought it was unfair.

…Well, it wasn’t cheating. It was Dalia’s magic, after all. I just didn’t like losing.

“Ugh.”

Falling to the floor, I slid backward, polishing the floor with my back.

Then I sprawled out completely.

“Haah.”

As I sighed deeply at the thought of losing again, someone entered my field of vision.

Dalia was looking down at me.

“Here.”

Dalia pointed the tip of her staff at me.

…Does she want me to grab it?

I took hold of it with my hand, and Dalia helped me to my feet.

And then—

“Will tomorrow be the same?”

She asked me.

“Well, yeah?”

When I answered as if it were obvious, Dalia nodded.

And then, whether resigned or something else, Dalia said:

“Well, give it your best shot.”

“…”

Dalia coolly turned and left, and I heard Hayun running toward me.

Um… so…

Was that permission?