Chapter 63: Give Me Your Despair

[Magical Girl Association dispatches investigation team to investigate inside Black Cloud!]

[List of investigation team inside Black Cloud revealed.]

[Including famous magical girls. Names of former Central affiliated Emerald and Northern affiliated Sapphire are also on the team.]

[What kind of monsters are inside Black Cloud? Let’s hear the experts’ opinions.]

[Omens of the world’s destruction. Prophets have been predicting this for 100 years.]

[Investigation team dispatch ceremony! ‘We will definitely check inside Black Cloud.’ Promise!]

“…Hmm.”

I thought they would come someday, but now that they’re actually here, I feel a little strange.

Shouldn’t I have given them just a little more time?

Tsk tsk, I put the newspaper into the shadows.

‘If only I had just a little more time, it would have stopped…’

Unable to overcome the regret, I tried to concentrate, but only slightly slowed down, and my despair circuit soon started spinning again.

Where on earth did the doctor go at a time like this?

I knew you wouldn’t be cooperative, but I never imagined you’d stay silent until now.

I didn’t know that there really were parents who abandoned their children twice.

Ah, since you’re a monster, maybe it’s natural for parents to abandon their children.

Grumble, groan—

“What can I do? I have to stop you somehow.”

Grumble, groan—

“You’re going to help me? Ha, I have to pay for all the time I’ve been playing around with. Right?”

You’re not going to do anything if you’re just despairing…

Hweowhiwu waved his hand, sighing.

If you’ve been enjoying my despair so far, then pay for the food, you unemployed monster.

Kkieeeek—

“Then you don’t mind eating the magical girls that come to you… Yes, yes, yes, do as you please if you can.”

“Give me despair, give me a—”

Anyway, as of today, the—

As I said that, as if I had given up halfway, the monsters around me started screaming all sorts of things.

“The magical girls are mine!”

“And I will eat up all the despair of the magical girls!”

Did they really dislike me telling them not to eat the magical girls?

I thought of them as if I was thinking of them, so I felt a little disappointed that they took it that way.

“Don’t think of me as a fool.”

Squeaky-!!

“You’re telling me not to cry because I ate a magical girl, you know? Seriously.”

Were those guys who were afraid of the magical girls and stayed away?

I wondered where they got that kind of confidence.

After all, their role was just to buy as much time as possible until the magical girls reached me.

I could have thought that they were treating their own kind like expendable items, but I did everything I could.

The place where I can live in peace and advise me not to touch magical girls.

The monster shelter has ended its service.

From now on, it’s time for everyone to become independent and work hard at living in society, right?

If we clap our hands twice, you’re saying we’ll be strangers from now on?

Grrrrrrr!

“It looks like we’re almost there.”

Still, the horde of monsters that filled my field of vision was quite a sight.

Even with Emerald or Sapphire, it wouldn’t be hard to get through, right?

If we did well, it seemed like we could stop the despair circuit before the two of them arrived.

Of course, it didn’t take long to realize that it was all useless hope.

Flash—

Kieeeeeeek!

Grrrrr!

‘It seems like they’re fighting better than I thought.

The sight of the magical girls’ hope energy and the monsters’ despair energy clashing was quite a sight.

Seeing the lightning flashing in the dark clouds, I felt like a survivor witnessing a scene from the end of the century.

Given the number of monsters, it would take at least half a day to get here.

Maybe even longer.

… That’s what I thought right before!

They say disappointment is caused by expectations.

I reflexively frowned at the huge energy of hope that approached me as if ignoring my expectations that I thought I would be able to hold out for half a day.

How could she eat up so much despair and not even be able to properly stop a magical girl?

Even if Emerald was out of standard, this was just too much?!

… Maybe it’s because monsters have something like hope.

“Akari!!”

“Ugh, what should I do with these useless guys?”

I reflexively sighed at Emerald, who waved happily at me.

I thought it would take at least half a day, but half a day was less than an hour, and the two people who had broken through despair came in.

Still, since I couldn’t see anyone else but the two of them, I guess they were holding on to the rest of the magical girls.

At least it was a blessing in disguise.

“Didn’t something happen to you?!”

“Didn’t you hear my story from Sapphire?”

“Lonely being alone…”

I frowned at Emerald’s actions of looking around my body to see if there were any injuries.

It wasn’t like I ran away from home and met a lost pet again, so why was my reaction so intense?

Compared to Emerald, who was moving around frantically, Sapphire was quite calm.

It was the same feeling I had when I first saw her.

No, it wasn’t the same?

The corners of my eyes seemed a little sharp, but not…

It was as if someone had heard a story about me—about the apocalypse, to be exact.

Did Emerald talk about the Apocalypse?

But Emerald’s expression was too bright for that.

There was no way this damned magical girl, who was purely happy to see me, would say such nonsense about me.

“What are you planning on doing by coming in so brazenly? I thought we’d be able to get rid of this damned Halo soon, but tsk…”

“Well, then I thought of a way to do that…”

“…A method? What kind of method?”

Emerald seemed to see things differently when she heard the tempting words.

Could it be that she was thinking of a way to stop the despair circuit for me?

Oh, then could it be that she came to me so quickly…?

If that were true, I would be a little, just a little bit touched.

“If I put a lot of hope in it and neutralize it, wouldn’t it disappear?”

However, the words that came out of Emerald’s mouth did not live up to expectations at all.

What?

“If I put a lot of hope in it and neutralize it, wouldn’t it disappear? Is that what you call a statement?”

It must have been a decision she made after much thought, but since I was a monster, it seemed like a conclusion she had just roughly thought about—no, without even thinking about it.

Pouring hope into the despair circuit… Ugh.

It was horrible just to imagine.

So much so that I didn’t want to think about it again.

Even thinking about it in my head made me feel nauseous, perhaps because the despair circuit was activated.

Ugh, I hate hope.

I’m not sorry at all, but just stay 100km away from me.

“Akari?!”

“I was a fool to have expectations of you. Well, since you’re a magical girl, all you have to do is defeat monsters.”

“Ah, no… T-that’s not it!”

This time, I didn’t really have any expectations, but I felt betrayed.

Rather, it would be more correct to say that I felt betrayed because I heard such words from someone I didn’t expect.

I should have just kept my mouth shut like Sapphire.

Even if I just stayed still, I’d be halfway there, tsk.

“But I can’t stay here alone forever, right?”

“If I’m going to eat hope, I’d rather stay alone.”

To me right now, hope wasn’t just a tasteless food; it was almost like poison.

Of course, Apocalypse’s body wouldn’t die that easily, but it was foolish to do something that would make me sick just because I wasn’t dying.

“Soon, magical girls wearing Sapphire’s defensive magic will arrive here one by one.”

With Sapphire’s defensive magic, at least I wouldn’t be killed by monsters.

For some reason, the moment after she fed me despair, Sapphire was emitting a different level of hope than before… I might get even more annoyed.

“If that happens, it’s all over. It’s okay for me and Sapphire, but if the other magical girls see Akari, she’ll definitely be chased for the rest of her life.”

“Are you threatening me right now? If you don’t want to be chased for the rest of your life, listen to me?”

To be honest, I felt bad.

It’s true that I tried to cling to Emerald because I didn’t want to be annoyed, but I absolutely didn’t want to cling to her while hearing things like this.

Being chased for the rest of my life? Who? Me?

It wasn’t something a magical girl who had been chased by Apocalypse for her entire life would say.

‘Of course, I didn’t mean it that way…’

She exhaled slowly and collected her thoughts.

Calm down, Akari.

It seemed that I had been annoyed for a moment because I had finally seen Emerald’s hope after such a long time, especially when my despair circuit was still on.

“No, I’m saying this because I trust your kindness.”

“What kindness…”

Where on earth is there a monster that isn’t as kind as me?

Even though it had been a long time since we met, Emerald was still talking nonsense.