Rokujouma no Shinryakusha!? - Volume 36 - Chapter 6

Upsy-daisy

Monday, July 11th

With the fighting over, Maki found herself looking over the mountainous roadway where the battle had taken place. Much of it and the surrounding area was destroyed. Black smoke rose up here and there. Remains of skeletons and zombies were scattered all around. The sight of such devastation broke her heart—a sign of the change that had come over her. Such sadness was something that had eluded her before, but there was another feeling welling up in her chest too. One she didn’t recognize.

“What are you doing over here, Aika-san?”

“Satomi-kun...”

Koutarou had noticed Maki standing off on her own and come over to check up on her. She hadn’t noticed him until he spoke up.

“I was just contemplating what it is that I’m feeling,” she confessed.

“If it’s not too much to ask, could you tell me about it?” he asked.

If he left her be, Koutarou knew she would just keep worrying on her own. And so he’d decided to pry a little deeper.

“Sure,” she replied with a nod. She would never consider hiding anything from Koutarou, though it was true there were times that she didn’t speak up unless someone asked. “When I was fighting... I was angry the entire time...”

“Angry? That’s unusual for you.”

“Is it?”

“Yeah. Lately, you’re always calm and kind.”

Maki blushed at Koutarou’s unexpected, honest appraisal. She was pleased, and also embarrassed to hear it to her face. But most of all, she was thrilled that she truly had changed.

“Er, sorry for saying something unnecessary,” Koutarou apologized when he saw her face. “Please, continue.”

“O-Oh, right...”

Maki didn’t think he’d said anything “unnecessary” at all, but she could appreciate that they were straying off topic. Maki looked over the devastated battlefield once more and tried again to explain herself.

“When we were fighting... I was thinking, ‘What if my parents were among the zombies and skeletons?’”

Her parents had died in the epidemic over a decade ago, but they hadn’t been buried in the mountain cemetery. Maki was speaking purely in a hypothetical sense.

“The thought made me unreasonably furious... and that anger lasted the entire battle.”

“So you’ve already forgiven your parents, huh?”

“What...?”

Maki was taken aback by Koutarou’s question. She’d thought she still bore a grudge against them for selling her all those years ago.

“If you hadn’t forgiven them, you wouldn’t get angry about what might have happened to them. Pretty natural, don’t you think?”

“I’ve already... forgiven my parents?”

Maki pressed her palm to her chest and looked back over the battlefield. When she mulled it over for a moment, she felt Koutarou might be onto something. She still didn’t know why her parents had sold her, and now there was no way to find out. They were long dead, meaning they’d suffered the worst possible punishment even if they were guilty. When she thought of it that way, the idea that they might be tortured even still as undead puppets infuriated Maki all over again.

“Maybe you’re right, Satomi-kun...”

When Maki interrogated her feelings more, all she wished for her late parents was peace. She no longer resented them for what had happened.

“So, are you still angry?” Koutarou asked.

“I think it’s settling down,” Maki replied. “Now I just feel sorry for the zombies and skeletons...”

“Don’t worry. Rainbow Heart will make sure they’re all buried properly.”

“I’m glad...”

“Since you’re part of the organization now, maybe you’ll even get to help out in the process.”

“If I am formally hired, I would like to help out,” Maki said with an embarrassed smile.

Koutarou could read her true emotions through that smile. They were endlessly beautiful in his eyes.

Aika-san is too good for her own sake... She needs someone to notice her and praise her more.

Right now, Maki was a genuine magical girl of love and justice. That much was clear to him. If Yurika was a sunflower that bloomed in the light, Maki was a nameless, shade-loving blossom. She flowered secretly out of sight. But what if someone shone a light on her? Or, better yet, moved her into the sun? What if someone—

Am I the only one...?

There, it finally hit Koutarou. He was the only one who saw this nameless indigo flower, meaning he was the only one who could transplant it. And so...

“Okay then.”

He picked up Maki. He was exhausted after the battle, but with his powered armor, she felt as light as a feather.

“Kyah!”

This unexpected turn of events made Maki yelp, although she wasn’t upset. She was just a little embarrassed to be so close to Koutarou. She quickly piped down and slowly turned her earnest eyes up toward him.

“Upsy-daisy,” he said, lifting Maki high into the air like a child.

“Satomi-kun?” Maki asked with a questioning look, unsure what the gesture meant.

Her hair fluttered as she looked at him, and he smiled at her in return.

“I’m just praising a good girl who always does her best. You couldn’t tell?”

“I’m not a child anymore.”

“But you’re still my little Aika Maki.”

Those words held great meaning for her. They encapsulated everything that had happened between her and Koutarou, everything that had happened between her and her parents, how her life had changed, and so, so much more. He couldn’t have said anything more profound.

“You’re the only one who would say that to me...”

Drops of salty water began raining down on Koutarou’s forehead—a sign that the true meaning of his words had reached Maki. That’s why he pretended not to notice.

“The others don’t know that you’re still just a child, Aika-san. You’ve still got a ways to go. The only thing that’s grown about you is your appearance. Everyone else is just fooled because you look so mature.”

“Then... will you watch over me? Until I become a proper adult?”

“Only until then?”

“I think I’ll be an old lady by then...”

“Ahahaha, I’m no match for you, Aika-san.”

“In return, I will watch over you too. Forever...”

“...I really don’t stand a chance against you, Aika-san...”

They smiled at each other. That was all they needed right now. They both understood that, and so they kept smiling until the other girls came to get them.

After winning the battle, Koutarou and the others returned to Grevanas’s tomb to find it empty. Grevanas was missing, and no clues remained behind. The lich and his research were nowhere to be found. As for where they’d gone...

“I believe this has helped you understand magic.”

“Oh, I understand perfectly now, Grevanas! Magic is a wonderful thing! No wonder it got the better of my uncle!”

Grevanas was currently with Ralgwin. The Gray Knight had brought them together after he and Ralgwin had worked behind the scenes to spur Grevanas’s resurrection by his followers. He’d orchestrated the incident to bring Grevanas to their side and to show Ralgwin what magic could do. It was a success on both fronts...

Especially because Koutarou and company still didn’t know that Grevanas and Ralgwin were allied. They’d yet to realize that the Gray Knight had been the one behind Grevanas’s followers. So even though the immediate battle had been lost, victory was truly theirs.

“Indeed. Magic, the power to alter the world, is what kept Vandarion from achieving his goals,” said the Gray Knight. “But not you, Ralgwin.”

“That’s right! I shall defeat the legendary Blue Knight with this!”

Ralgwin had now succeeded in uncovering the mysteries behind the Blue Knight’s spiritual and magical powers. The fact that he now had access to both for himself thrilled Ralgwin. This was a feat that had eluded even his uncle—and it meant he was just as powerful as the Blue Knight. He had every right to be excited.

“Grevanas, how many of those vials were you able to retrieve?” the Gray Knight asked. Quite unlike Ralgwin, there was no hint of elation in his calm voice.

“Thirty-eight. I had fifty-eight in a usable state, and twenty of them went with the horde.”

“Twenty? Don’t you think that was giving them too much?”

“If it were any less, the Blue Knight would have been suspicious. You could also say it was a little thank-you gift for resurrecting me.”

“I suppose. But so be it. We’ll just cultivate what we have and make more.”

“A wise decision.”

In reality, Grevanas’s followers moving on Thorthe were nothing more than a decoy. The Gray Knight’s real goal in the Folsaria operation had been to retrieve Grevanas and the vials of black liquid. Koutarou and the others had caught on much faster than expected, so he’d given the followers a few vials as a diversion. It had been a last resort, but a rather successful one.

“By the way, Sir Gray Knight...” Grevanas started to ask.

“What?”

“Is it true that Ralgwin-dono is Maxfern-sama’s descendant?”

“It is. Maxfern’s family was ruined after the civil war, but their bloodline carried on in the Vandarion family.”

“Meaning... that is your true intention?”

“If it wasn’t, would I have resurrected you? It’s clear what you wish for.”

“How frightening you are sometimes... But what is it that’s changed you so?”

A strong tension hung in the air. And there was an awkward atmosphere between the two men, like two gears grinding against each other.

“...”

Someone silently observed them from the sidelines. It was Ralgwin’s subordinate, the sniper Fasta. Ever since the Gray Knight had appeared, things had been going smoothly for Ralgwin. Too smoothly. They’d solved the mysteries behind the Blue Knight’s powers in the blink of an eye. It made Fasta wary. This was all just too good to be true.

Even if the Gray Knight was in this for Ralgwin’s troops and technology like he said, why would he introduce them to magic for free? Ordinarily, someone would expect something in return. And now the Gray Knight had brought Ralgwin here to resurrect the Grand Wizard.

Fasta couldn’t help worrying that the Gray Knight was up to something far more dangerous than what Ralgwin believed. She was also leery of the Gray Knight’s assertion their alliance was only temporary. That could mean he planned to betray them eventually.

“Behold the wonders of magic, Fasta! Let us make you a rifle with it at once!”

Ralgwin, however, didn’t seem to share any of Fasta’s concerns or even notice how apprehensive she seemed to be. He was completely charmed by his new toy, magic.

“Ralgwin-sama...”

And so Fasta made up her mind then and there. If there was a conspiracy looming over Ralgwin, she would put an end to it herself.

Though Grevanas had ultimately escaped, Rainbow Heart secured both his followers and the black vials. There were twenty in total. Nineteen were safely incinerated, and one went into heavily guarded hazmat storage just in case. The reason was the same as why Grevanas’s research had been sealed away intact—a precaution in case it should be used against them one day.

And with that, Maki’s test mission was concluded. Rainbow Heart gave her an excellent grade. She didn’t get full marks because Grevanas had escaped in the end, but her assessors understood why. The mission had turned into something much larger than anyone had expected, so they left a note in Maki’s file explaining that her evaluation should be given special consideration accordingly. She really was a top-class magician. In other words, Maki was hired.

Now that she was formally an intermediate Rainbow Heart agent, Maki was immediately dispatched to Corona House’s room 106. Her official mission was to support Yurika. Yurika was technically supposed to be showing her the ropes, but anyone who knew them both knew that Yurika would be learning more from Maki than the other way around.

Maki’s assignment to room 106 wasn’t just because Yurika and Signaltin were there, however. It was a special place for Forthorthe, Folsaria, and the People of the Earth. It was also a critical location where emissaries of all three factions met for secret discussions, making it invaluable from a political standpoint.

There was a secondary objective to the magical girls’ mission as well: keeping watch over Kisshouharukaze City. A major incident had happened in Folsaria, which was on the verge of major political changes, but cracking down on magic-related crimes and preventing such things from happening in the first place was a magical girl’s real job. That was why Yurika sometimes went out on patrol with Nana and Maki. Today was one such occasion, and the three girls departed Corona House after dinner to survey the city.

“Wow, Satomi-san really did that?” Nana asked.

“Augh, that sounds nice... He’d never do that for me...” Yurika whined.

Whenever they were out on patrol together, the three magical girls would pass the time chatting about this or that. It was awkward to walk around in silence, and there were things they could only talk about when it was just the three of them. In that sense, going on patrol was convenient.

“But he wakes you up all the time, Yurika,” Maki reminded her.

“Not nicely or anything! He does mean things like make me too hot or cold, or even keep me from breathing... Every morning is an ordeal!” Yurika continued to complain.

“I wish I could find a special someone who’d do that for me too,” said Nana enviously.

She’d been mature from an early age, so she’d essentially missed out on the simple pleasures of her younger years. No one could blame her for wanting a doting boyfriend of her own.

“Your ‘special someone’ isn’t supposed to treat you like that!”

“But Satomi-san is your special someone, isn’t he, Yurika-chan? You’ve paid off your debts, and yet you’re still living in a wardrobe in his apartment.”

“Well... yeah...”

Yurika blushed when Nana pointed that out. She had indeed now paid off her massive debts, but she was ignoring that fact and voluntarily living a life of poverty... all because she wanted to stay close to Koutarou, at least until they graduated high school.

“It doesn’t matter if you’re in debt or not. Satomi-kun isn’t going to kick you out,” said Maki.

“Meow,” Snoozy agreed. He didn’t understand what Maki was saying, but he was always on her side.

“But... I still want to be a little troublesome for him...”

“Heehee. That’s just your way of showing love, Yurika-chan. I really envy you.”

Nana truly was jealous, but she was also relieved. Yurika was easy to misunderstand, so she was glad that her pupil had settled into such a happy life. Such pleasant thoughts were interrupted, however, when Nana thought she heard a low hum from somewhere.

“...Oh?”

“What’s wrong?” Maki asked.

“Do you hear that strange noise?”

Nana focused on her left arm as she spoke. Grevanas’s old staff, Encyclopedia, had been incorporated into her body there. Using its power, she cast a spell to enhance everyone’s senses.

“It’s up there!” Maki then called out.

She was pointing above them at what looked like a star... but it was slowly getting larger as the humming noise got louder.

“Why is that light getting bigger?” Yurika asked. “What is it?”

“It’s a meteor! And it’s falling!” Nana screamed.

Meteors always had tails streaking behind them with one exception—if they were headed straight toward the observer. The tail wasn’t visible in that case, as it was trailing out of sight on the other side of the meteor from the viewer. The light just got bigger and brighter.

“Everyone, run!”

“Kyah!”

“Nooooo!”

Even three powerful magical girls were powerless against a falling meteor. They scrambled for a moment before throwing themselves behind the closest cover.

Kabooom!

Seconds later, the meteor became a meteorite... But no matter how long the girls waited, there was no shock wave from the impact. Confused, they all peered out to see what had happened.

“Owowow...”

And where they’d expected to find a space rock, they found a lone girl. When she stood up to brush herself off, the nearest streetlight illuminated her face.

“Higashihongan-san?!” Maki and Nana exclaimed.

“Sanae-chan, why did you fall from the sky?!” Yurika shouted out in surprise, one beat later.

Hearing their voices, the girl’s eyes opened wide.

“Yurika! Maki! And Nana too! I did it! It worked!”

Indeed, there was no doubt that the girl standing before them was Sanae... although she looked a little older than the three magical girls recalled.