Chapter 46

Is Akari really human?

No, maybe I should change the question to whether she’s a monster now.

I definitely saw her chest pierced by Curs, but when I came to my senses, she was completely healed.

Something impossible for an ordinary human.

Even with my self-healing abilities, her recovery was beyond my capabilities.

“How’s your body, Akari?”

“I’m fine. I could even leave the hospital right now.”

She answered my question as if nothing was wrong.

She probably doesn’t remember what happened in the underground lab.

If she finds out her body is different from a normal person’s, how will she react?

That worry made it hard for me to speak up.

[Emerald, don’t worry too much. She’s fine now, right?]

“…”

I silently nodded to May, who was cautiously speaking beside me.

Yeah, she’s fine now.

“So, when can I go back?”

“…Ah.”

I was momentarily speechless at Akari’s question.

What do I see her as now?

An Apocalypse? A poor person experimented on by the Doctor? A monster unaware of her own identity?

My head was spinning.

*Growl*

“Pfft…”

“…You’re laughing again.”

No, Akari is just Akari.

Even after being hospitalized, she sneaks out for walks, gets caught but acts like she did nothing wrong, and even in this situation, her stomach growls loudly.

All of it proves she’s just Akari, not something else.

‘I know Akari best…’

If the Akari I usually see and the Akari now are the same, then she’s just Akari.

So stop worrying unnecessarily, Midori. Believe what you see.

I reassured myself and slowly exhaled.

“Sorry for being so difficult. Let’s just do one last health check and then discharge me.”

“Okay.”

She seemed pleased with the idea of being discharged.

A rare smile appeared on Akari’s face.

It was so faint you’d miss it if you weren’t looking closely, but it was definitely a smile.

‘…What was I even thinking in front of someone like this?’

Akari would probably stay the same even if she realized her body was different.

She might even casually ask, “If my body has turned into a monster, do I have to absorb despair too?”

“Shall we go, Akari?”

“Yeah, wha— huh?!”

“Akari?!”

As Akari tried to get up, she staggered and collapsed.

I quickly reached out to her, and she slowly lifted her hand, looking confused.

Her pale skin and the shadows on her face made her look even more frail.

“Are you okay?!”

“Yeah… Why did this happen?”

“…”

Her innocent eyes left me speechless.

She wiped her cheek, not looking like someone who just collapsed.

It was as if she found it fascinating.

“This won’t do. Let’s hold off on the discharge and monitor you a bit longer.”

“…I really can leave, though.”

“I’m just worried, Akari.”

If she had looked panicked, it might have been better.

But Akari seemed like she’d just brush off anything happening to her body with a “Huh, that’s weird~”

And people like that often push themselves too hard and collapse.

“Sigh… It’s just unnecessary worry. I’ll be fine once I get home, right?”

“Your home isn’t a cure-all, Akari.”

I shook my head at her confident expression.

This really won’t do.

I wanted to take Akari home, but her health comes first now.

“Here, let me help you up.”

“…I can get up on my own.”

Akari shook off my hand and, with trembling arms, stood up on her own.

It looked painful, but her expression didn’t change.

As if it wasn’t hard at all—no, as if she couldn’t let it look hard.

‘…Akari.’

Maybe her calm demeanor is to hide her fragility.

Akari, sitting on the edge of the bed and sighing, looked smaller today.

To be precise, I realized her body wasn’t that big to begin with.

Her usual confident actions made her seem larger than she was.

“Rest, Akari. If you need anything, just call. I’ll come flying.”

“…Go ahead.”

Her blunt answer stabbed at my heart.

Maybe I saw a side of Akari she didn’t want to show.

***

‘My body feels strange.’

I sighed deeply, looking at my trembling hands.

I was planning to go home after being discharged and feast on Tamako’s despair, but collapsing in front of Emerald ruined that.

‘…Am I getting weaker?’

I’d need to activate the Despair Circuit to know for sure, but doing that would definitely alert all the magical girls in the city.

Emerald, Peridot, Ruby, and even that cheeky magical girl chasing me.

I like eating magical girls’ despair, but I don’t like magical girls themselves. If that many showed up, it’d be troublesome.

*Growl*

“…I’m hungry.”

The despair I ate in the underground lab was quite tasty.

The problem is that it filled me up then, but now I’m starving again.

Why did I get hungry so quickly?

I had a vague idea.

‘Is it because I regenerated my wounds?’

The difference from usual.

It was regenerating my heart, which was pierced by Curs.

I must have used a lot of despair to regenerate a body with a hole in it.

…If I knew this would happen, I would’ve just rolled out of the way. Trying to look cool, tsk.

“What are you?”

Even an intruder barging into someone else’s hospital room.

The figure hiding in the shadows under the moonlight slowly revealed themselves.

Sorry, but I knew you were there from the start.

You hid your presence perfectly, but a magical girl’s hope energy is impossible to hide completely.

“Are you the Doctor’s experiment?”

“His experiment… Not entirely wrong.”

I was created through experiments, so I guess you could call me an experiment.

You’ve been chasing me since dawn and finally came at this hour, so you must already know what I am.

“…What makes you so confident? Do you think there’s anyone here to protect you?”

“What makes you so confident?”

Even in this sorry state, I could easily take out the magical girl in front of me.

I’d need to activate the Despair Circuit, but my patience was gone from hunger.

‘I want to subdue the magical girl in front of me, make her cry, and feast on her despair…’

At home, I could fill up on Tamako’s despair, so I didn’t have to think like this.

But now?

Can a starving beast guarantee it won’t eat the human that walked into its cage?

The beast’s answer to that question was ‘No.’

“Food is thrown in front of me when I’m starving, and the food doesn’t even realize it’s about to be eaten. The prey doesn’t recognize the predator in front of it, how foolish.”

“…”

A headache made my voice sound irritated.

So even this body can feel annoyance.

My body’s in bad shape, I’m hungry, and now a magical girl is in front of me. It feels like someone’s pulling my hair out.

‘…Calm down. If I lose control now, there’s no going back.’

“What will you do? Fight me and turn this place into a mess, or have a civilized conversation with me?”

Activating the Despair Circuit to win was uncertain, and getting injured would only make me hungrier from regenerating, so I didn’t want to fight.

Then what’s the best course of action?

How can I fill my stomach and get rid of this magical girl?

‘There’s the option of calling Emerald, but—’

I didn’t want to resort to that, even as a last resort.

I’d rather activate the Despair Circuit and eat her, yeah.