Chapter 99
Momo puts up a barrier that keeps outside energy from entering. I understood that.
The Abyss's magic already inside that barrier is covered by my magic. I understood that, too.
Then we press our bodies completely together to block off even more magic. I understood that, too.
Fuck, I understood everything. That's the problem.
'...Seriously? This is the only answer? Really?'
I was flustered.
No, of course, from Momo's perspective, it wasn't such a difficult request.
Hug tightly? It wasn't something I could do casually, but it wasn't something that required steeling myself to do, either. If we were the same sex.
That's the problem. If we were the same sex.
And I was the opposite sex. Pretending to be the same sex.
'...Ha, ha. Fuck.'
There was a reason I had minimized physical contact with other people while operating as Alice.
No matter how androgynous my build was, a closer look would inevitably reveal differences from a woman's skeleton and physical structure.
But now I had run into that very crisis. I had to press against her enough to embrace her completely.
Still, I couldn't refuse. In her current state, Black Rose's transformation would be forcibly deactivated within minutes, and I had no idea what would happen to her then.
...Even thinking as optimistically as possible, this was a situation where she was highly likely to suffer aftereffects that would affect her body or mind for the rest of her life.
'Haaaa............'
It couldn't be helped. I would just have to position myself properly.
Someone was on the verge of being seriously harmed right before my eyes. What choice did I have?
"...Miss Black Rose. You heard me, right? Alice is going to embrace you now. Try to breathe Alice's scent... rather than the outside air..."
Ah. Even saying it made something rise up inside me.
Though I described it theoretically as purifying the Abyss's energy with my magic, in practice it meant breathing in the magic and scent emanating from my body instead of air.
To a woman I barely knew. A much younger junior, no less. How could I say something like that? And I hadn't even properly washed after rotting in the Abyss for several days.
Even if the transformation kept my body clean, I felt too uncomfortable to endure it...
"Yee...s..."
"..."
At that moment, Black Rose's voice, sounding as if she were about to die, began to clear my head.
...What was I thinking?
Someone was in danger, and I was hesitating because I was embarrassed about something like that.
"...You have to do it properly. We don't know what effect the Abyss's air might have on an ordinary body that isn't protected by a transformation."
-Rustle
Black Rose was about as tall as I was.
Considering that I was quite short for a man and nearly average in height among women, I could roughly guess Black Rose's height, too.
We faced each other and embraced. I rested my chin on Black Rose's shoulder, while she rested hers on mine.
I grabbed a handful of her long white hair, pulled it to the side, and positioned it near Black Rose's face.
Even after rolling around in the Abyss for several days, her transformation had kept it clean. Her hair was still white and spotless.
"Rest comfortably, Miss Black Rose. If your transformation is forcibly deactivated, you'll probably fall into a deep sleep. As long as you keep your position properly... Alice and Momo will take care of the rest. Try to stay calm as much as possible. Once you've recovered, transform again right away. Understand?"
"Yes... I understand... Thank you, Senior..."
"...It's only natural for Alice to do this."
-Press
-Flinch
When I fully embraced Black Rose to prepare, the sensation I'd steeled myself for pressed against my chest.
The feel of that mass of flesh women naturally possessed.
'...It's fine. It can't be helped.'
I controlled my mind as much as possible and hugged her.
If you're wondering whether we really had to embrace face-to-face, it couldn't be helped; this was the optimal position. The energy purified by my body had to envelop Black Rose directly.
Other positions would only be half as effective, and this was not a situation where we had enough time to gamble. It was an unavoidable choice.
...However. If there was one problem...
'Calm down calm down calm down calm down fuck calm down you lunatic.'
This position was fatal to me, too.
No matter how uncomfortable old memories made me, I was still a man.
And after rolling around in the Abyss for several days, things like that could happen whether I realized it or not.
What things? Figure it out yourself.
"Senior... You can hold me tighter..."
"Ah, no. We need to keep this much space between us."
"Is that... so..."
The one bit of luck was that Black Rose's mind wasn't completely lucid?
If she had been lucid, she would have realized that my posture was strange. But, as her words about feeling like she was breathing at the bottom of the sea suggested, she seemed unable to perceive anything unless it was right in front of her.
'Damn. If I get this close to a woman...'
In this situation, where the scent unique to a woman's body and the feel of soft flesh were unavoidably pressed against me, my unnecessarily keen senses sent the information straight to my brain.
And what naturally came to mind was...
...In a pitch-dark underground where not a single ray of sunlight reached.
The arms I had barely managed to raise were seized, and soon lost all meaning as resistance.
They were just as slender, arms that looked almost exactly alike, yet the difference in strength coming from them was overwhelming. No matter how much I trembled and pushed them up with all my strength, a playful flex of those arms alone was enough to slam me into the floor.
The flesh-colored afterimage lingering in my eyes and the lingering scent in my nose bored into my head. Even when I closed my eyes, a horrifying voice reached my ears, and I couldn't block it even when I wanted to.
My body, and the white and black hair left on the floor, were far longer than my own.
At some point, the tears stopped coming.
'...'
Dirty memories. As memories I didn't want to remember surfaced, the strange feelings completely subsided.
The scent and sensation of being pressed against her, too, were nothing more than traces of another human being with different chromosomes. They held no meaning beyond that.
And around then.
-Flash!
[Alice! It's coming undone!]
'...!'
Black Rose's head drooped, and a faint light spread from her body.
The effect of forced deactivation wasn't flashy. Her strength had simply given out. After holding on and holding on until the end, her transformation finally came undone with a faint light, and she returned to her original form.
And Black Rose's true appearance was...
'...She looks like she might be a musician.'
She was a conventionally pretty woman. She had the sort of face I felt I might have seen on TV at least once?
Most magical girls had the looks to match. It was easy enough to expect her original form to be pretty, and she was exactly as pretty as I'd expected.
[Oh. So it was you.]
'...Do you know who she is?'
[A few years ago, there was a group whose concert was ruined when an Abyssal One barged in right after their debut, leaving the members injured and forcing them to retire. One member was the only one who remained active, but then her agency went bankrupt and she disappeared... So she awakened as a magical girl.]
...Her life really was a difficult one. After going through all that, she awakened as a magical girl, only to be dragged into the Abyss.
-Squish
...Come to think of it, although her transformation had been deactivated, she felt even heavier.
That happened sometimes. Some people used the body they could adjust through transformation to make it smaller instead.
Most magical girls enlarged those parts or left them as they were; not many deliberately reduced them... but I had heard it happened occasionally. The main reason was usually how their clothes fit.
Black Rose's outfit was a fairly elaborate dress with decorations, so I assumed that was probably why.
...She wasn't extremely large or anything. Just moderately full.
.........Smaller than Mia.
...............Why am I thinking about this.
'Miss Momo, how long will it take her to stabilize?'
[It would be best for her to sleep soundly and wake up. Hmm... about six hours.]
'...Then could you keep me company with some conversation until then?'
"Mmm..."
"D-don't move. Good girl."
We were pressed together because of unavoidable circumstances, but I could only hold her in a somewhat awkward position. Alice's body was sturdy enough that it didn't strain me physically, but the boredom was a problem.
...At this rate, if I kept monologuing, my thoughts would keep drifting in that direction.
* * *
-Blank stare
-Drip drip
"...We're screwed."
An Abyssal One appeared nearby today.
It wasn't an Abyssal One with particularly strong destructive power, but it possessed a technique that drastically raised the humidity in a specific area. Calling it humidity was being generous; it was more like dunking the entire space in water and pulling it back out.
...And unfortunately, our house was within its range.
The furniture and electronics... well, let's set those aside...
"......It's all melted."
Mr. Sejin's medicine had melted away, leaving nothing recognizable.
It had been in a medicine pouch, but that wasn't enough to block the humidity completely.
...I didn't want to look it up in case it was sensitive medication, but I have no choice now. If it's something I can get prescribed, I'll get it... Otherwise... I'll have to tell him. Unfortunately, it all melted.
"What does it... say..."
I painstakingly followed the traces blurred by the water and somehow managed to search for it.
And the medicine Mr. Sejin had been taking was...
"...Antidepressants?"
...It was completely unexpected.
Antidepressants? Mr. Sejin?
He did look somewhat tired, but...
-Gulp
'There wasn't just one.'
There was more than one kind of medicine.
In fact, having come this far, the polite thing would have been to quietly cover it up... but this time, I couldn't stop.
I had discovered that Mr. Sejin was taking medicine not for a physical illness, but for a mental one. How could I stop?
-Tap tap...
-Tick...
"..."
The results of searching the medicines together were... just as I'd expected... No, they were even more shocking.
"PTSD, seizures caused by trauma, to be taken in the event of a panic attack..."
...These were clearly medications he had been taking. And quite regularly, too.
This wasn't just something he'd kept around for emergencies, just in case... It meant he'd been taking them continuously.
"......"
Behind the Mr. Sejin I knew, I began to see another Sejin, tormented by something and trembling in fear.
...Perhaps I... had arrogantly assumed I knew him, despite knowing nothing.