The Graduation Certificate

Shirase Kokoro took the notebook offered to her in both hands.

She held it without opening it for a long time. She stared at the distinctive handwriting on the cover as though it were a verdict or something.

"Go on and read it," I said. "That record is far more accurate than the weighty calculations you've been doing for two years."

The first page turned amid the sound of rain.

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【Day One. Shirase Kokoro, fourteen. Healing range: as far as the palm of her hand. The cause is neither mana capacity nor spell formula, but her gaze. She keeps looking at her own hand throughout treatment. —She's afraid. She's afraid in the right way】

【Day Twelve. Says, "If I fail, someone will die." The most sensible thing I've heard in the Training Wing this year. Don't take away her fear. Just change its direction】

【Day Thirty-Seven. For the first time, she healed while looking at the patient's face. On this day alone, her range reached twice as far. It will probably take six months to take hold. She hasn't realized it yet. There's no need to make her realize it just yet】

Each time she turned a page, her fourteen-year-old self was there.

The day she thought she'd be scolded for breaking the measuring device and shrank into a corner of the hallway. The day she was entrusted with her first critically injured patient, when her knees wouldn't stop trembling. 【Her healing is less "healing" than "going to meet them." I haven't found the right words yet. Homework】—in the margin, an answer had been added in ink years later. 【Found it: "I won't see anyone through their final moments." She raises her head so she never has to watch anyone die】...