Episode 45 (Yuria’s POV): “Don’t Cry”
“Fiine—?!”
At the edge of her vision, a pitch-black light appeared.
At its center was Fiine.
(Just a moment ago, Fiine was fighting using Self Marionette. But this light now — is this something different?)
Self Marionette was Fiine’s unique magic; Yuria had seen it in action a few times before.
It had struck her as exactly the kind of unique magic that suited someone so skilled in both operation magic and creation magic.
(Could it be — her limit? If so, I need to transport her too, right now…!)
With every second, the number of people needing transport kept growing.
There was no way to rank lives by priority, but there was one thing Yuria absolutely could not allow: losing her closest friend.
“…Eh…”
The instant she broke into a run, Fiine leapt into the sky.
The movement was on a completely different level from anything before.
Flying through the air, flame bursting from her palms, blowing apart a massive monster in a single strike.
(This isn’t the Fiine I know…)
The moment one monster fell, without ever touching the ground, Fiine simply moved through the air toward the next.
Defeat that one, and immediately on to the next after that.
It looked as though she were automatically targeting whatever monster happened to be nearest.
The sight of her looked less like a human being, and more like—
“…like a real doll.”
Fiine’s unique magic, Self Marionette, was supposed to work by treating herself as a doll and consciously operating that doll.
But right now, Fiine looked like nothing more than a doll moving on pure mechanism, nothing behind it at all.
“Could she be — out of control?!”
If magic was used continuously for too long, both mind and body would eventually hit their limit, and the caster could fall into a state of total loss of control.
But in most people, magic power itself ran out long before that limit was ever reached.
Fiine’s magic reserves, though, were far from ordinary.
If her body had reached its limit before her magic power ever ran dry —
If she’d already lost her will entirely, and was simply running out of control right now —
“Fiine’s in danger…!!”
Kicking off the ground, Yuria broke into a full sprint with everything she had.
*
Fiine came falling from the sky.
Catching her in a panic, Yuria found wounds covering nearly every inch of her body.
The wound on her right shoulder, in particular, was severe — almost certainly from being bitten by some beast-like monster.
(I have to transport her, now…!!)
There’d been no way to catch her while she was still flying through the air; in the end, Yuria had only managed to catch her once her body finally gave out and she began to fall.
Yuria herself was close to her own limit too.
“…Yuria…?”
“Fiine. It’s okay. I’ll transport you right away.”
“N-no… don’t, because, Yuria’s…”
“I’m fine. I’ll run and get myself out of here soon enough. You know how fast I am, right?”
Transport magic couldn’t be used on oneself.
Which meant Yuria herself had no choice but to retreat from the battlefield on her own two feet.
She had no intention of doing anything reckless. There was nothing more she could accomplish by staying here any longer anyway.
(This is probably the last time I’ll be able to use transport magic.)
Summoning what strength she had left, she was determined to save her closest friend, no matter what.
“Yu… ria… run. Behind… you…!!”
“Eh?”
Turning around, she found a black troll closing in from behind.
Low intelligence, but its raw physical strength was nothing to underestimate.
“No, don’t, Fiine too…”
She tried, in a panic, to lift Fiine up in her arms — and failed. Her arm wouldn’t rise.
It seemed her own limit had been far closer than she’d realized.
“Yu…ria…”
“…Leave it to me.”
The black troll’s footsteps drew closer.
The ground shook with each heavy, thudding step, and yet, strangely, her heart didn’t race at all.
Her mind was already made up. There was no hesitation left in her.
(The one who should go on living longer isn’t me. It’s Fiine.)
She hurried to trace the magic circle.
Watching her, Fiine seemed to understand her intention at once.
“D-don’t, Yuria…!!”
Summoning the very last of her strength, Fiine threw her arms around Yuria’s neck.
Something warm trickled down against her throat — her tears, probably.
Pink and gold — her mismatched, fairy-touched eyes.
Fiine always called them a complex, something she hated about herself. But Yuria had always loved that heterochromia of hers.
(And I was always so proud, that my own hair was the same color as one of your eyes.)
An impact beyond words tore through her body.
Everything in front of her turned white, and then, after that, black.
The last thing she heard, as her vision faded away completely, was the voice of the person she loved most.
“Yu—ria, Yuria…!!”
Don’t cry.
That she couldn’t say those words, couldn’t hold Fiine in her arms one more time — that, more than anything else in the world, was what Yuria regretted most.