Chapter 15
I was put on a cart with the Gremlin, Octameteorite, artwork, and the Red Magic Stone Meteor Flame, all stolen by the Dragon Witch, and hauled back to Okutama by the Blue Witch.
The Blue Witch was fast, and watching the scenery fly past from the cart was pretty fun. I think we were going about fifty kilometers per hour.
Body-enhancement magic could make us go even faster, but the body-enhancement magic derived from the Vampire Mage consumed blood as well as magic power. Apparently, even witches would collapse from anemia if they overused it, so she couldn't use it too often.
Man, I'm jealous. Even with the risk, I wish I could bulk up instantly~.
The Blue Witch reached my house in Okutama before sunset and kept insisting on things while helping unload the cart.
"Hey, why don't you reconsider? There's a comfortable house in Ome. Come live there."
"No way. I like my life here. I have the fields to look after, too. I'm staying here."
"What will you do if you're kidnapped again? I've disciplined the Dragon Witch, but there's no guarantee a wild dragon won't come along. Honestly, it was lucky that kidnapping was all that happened. I might not be able to protect you next time... Please, stay somewhere I can keep an eye on you."
"No."
"Damn it. Why won't Kei-chan or Dairi let me protect them...?"
The Blue Witch said, sounding frustrated.
Well, maybe it's because we don't want the same things protected. I dunno.
"It would be a huge help if you just dropped by now and then to make sure I'm safe. Don't worry so much. You saved me this time, too, after all. Speaking of which, how did you know I was being held there?"
"I went to give you some apples, and your house was destroyed. There were dragon footprints in front of it, and the rice field had been abandoned halfway through the harvest. It was obvious what had happened, so I ran straight to that piece of trash's nest."
"I see."
Now that she mentioned it, there had been some pretty obvious clues. It had been an extremely blatant kidnapping scene. I was so glad the Dragon Witch was an idiot with no cunning to hide her crime!
"I'm worried about you, Dairi. You were kidnapped just recently, and you're already making that absentminded face. You don't have enough of a sense of danger. You could at least move to a house closer to Ome, while staying in Okutama..."
"I do have a sense of danger. It's not like I haven't thought of any countermeasures, okay? I'm thinking of putting some steel plates or something into the walls while I repair them. I'll also make a hidden room to escape into. And even if I get worked up, I won't pick a fight with a dragon next time."
"You picked a fight with it!? You idiot! I told you to hide!"
The Blue Witch stopped worrying and started getting angry instead.
Damn it, I let that slip.
Well, I admit that part was my fault. I was careless. But the Dragon Witch was the one most at fault, and in the end no one got hurt—except the Dragon Witch—so don't forget that, too.
After lecturing me at length about the importance of being prepared to defend myself, the Blue Witch apparently realized that I was only pretending to listen and wasn't taking her seriously. She let out a deep sigh.
"You don't understand what dangerous times these are, when no amount of caution is enough. Fine, I get it. I'll think of something for your security measures, too. I'm going home today, but lock up properly, and don't go out at night. If something feels dangerous, don't approach it. Stay put and keep quiet."
"Got it, Mom. Ah!!! Right, I forgot. Since we're friends now, how about we play a card game sometime? My deck's at home. I've only ever played online, but I bought some physical cards, too."
It sounded more fun to play against the Blue Witch than to play both sides myself in a one-man imitation match.
I'd never once wanted to make friends, but I'd always thought that having one would be convenient since I wouldn't have to worry about finding an opponent for games.
When I called the Blue Witch back as she was about to leave, she said in utter disbelief,
"Another carefree conversation...? You don't mean playing cards, do you?"
"Like hell I do. Trading cards. A trading card game. If you don't know the rules, I'll teach you."
"Well, all right. Then I'll see you tomorrow."
The Blue Witch returned to Ome, looking worried and glancing back at me again and again.
Hmm. Do I really look like I have that little awareness of danger? I don't get it.
I always carry a Henden Show for self-defense, and I keep a compact first-aid kit with painkillers, disinfectant, and bandages in my knee pocket. I don't go near cliffs when I enter the mountains, and I stay away from the mountains and rivers the day after it rains. I am careful.
Maybe the level of danger awareness was different between me, living peacefully in Okutama, where monsters were dramatically fewer and weaker than in other districts and there was no human drama, and the Blue Witch, who had apparently overcome some incredibly tragic past.
Thinking again that the Reiwa era had really been a peaceful time, I followed her advice: I locked up properly, covered the broken wall with a blue tarp as a temporary repair, made a few small items, ate, and went to bed early without staying up late.
The next day, sometime after noon,
I welcomed two visitors while continuing the rice harvest.
The Blue Witch, wearing her usual tattered black robes and mask, and Professor Ohinata, dressed in stylish autumn clothes.
I beckoned the Blue Witch over and interrogated her in a whisper.
"Are you messing with me? Why'd you bring Professor Ohinata here? If you had business with me, a letter would have been fine!"
"So you can learn magic you can use for defense right now. Even if I send you magical incantations written in phonetic symbols, Dairi, you can't learn them, can you? Learning directly from Kei-chan is the fastest way."
"Stop punching me with facts."
I glanced at Professor Ohinata. Professor Ohinata raised a basket while giving me an incredibly radiant, extroverted smile, bright enough to rival the clear blue sky of a crisp autumn day. A delicious, savory smell drifted from it.
Damn! A good kid who remembered to bring a gift despite being a child! But that only made my stomach hurt more. Talking to Professor Ohinata in human form made me feel like my own inadequacies were being shoved in my face. It was stressful.
No, Professor Ohinata was a good kid, really. This wasn't about disliking the professor. We were simply incompatible.
"Oh, right. Before I forget. Hang on."
Before my brain could be wrung dry by the emergency magic lesson that was apparently about to begin, I went back inside, fetched a picture frame, and returned.
"Here. I made this picture frame to thank you for saving me yesterday. Use it if you want. Your sister liked pink and kept a Java sparrow, right? I worked those things into the design."
I knew that the Blue Witch carried her sister's picture around in a mini-album. The parts that seemed to have shown her parents and childhood friend had been painted black. Dark.
The mini-album was already pretty battered, and I thought putting the picture in a frame and displaying it would be a good idea.
The Blue Witch accepted the picture frame I'd given her and stood perfectly still, staring at it. Just as I began to wonder whether she'd been hit with a petrification spell, she said quietly,
"Thank you."
"Huh? Are you about to cry?"
"Tch. Shut up. If you're going to be concerned about someone, keep it up for at least five seconds."
"S-sorry. When I'm talking to the Blue Witch, I let my guard down and say things without thinking. If having someone I can talk to this casually is what friendship means, then I suppose it's not so bad."
"...What exactly do you want to do to my emotions?"
The Blue Witch saw Professor Ohinata grinning from ear to ear while watching our exchange and cleared her throat.
"Anyway, I've already explained the situation to Kei-chan. Learn some magic to protect yourself. I'm going around Okutama and wiping out all the nearby monsters."
With that, the Blue Witch hurried into the mountains.
Left behind with me, Professor Ohinata spoke to me in a friendly, unreserved manner, even though being left alone with the professor made me feel extremely awkward.
"It's been a while, Dairi-san. We've been corresponding, but I'm happy to see you again in person! But talking to me is still difficult for you, isn't it, Dairi-san? I've picked out some magic that's easy to remember and looks useful, so let's learn it quickly! The sooner you learn it, the sooner we'll be done. Let's do our best!"
Professor Ohinata clenched a fist in front of the chest and encouraged me.
Nooo! That's exactly what's wrong with you! You're so organized, considerate of my feelings, and cheerfully supportive! I'd rather you were more mechanical and bureaucratic, with no humanity at all, but I couldn't bring myself to reject the professor's kindness. That's exactly what I mean! (I was incoherent.)
"Ah, then let's go to the workshop... No, the workshop is destroyed right now. The living room will work for the lesson, I guess."
"Yes. I'll come in, then. Also, here are hash browns made with new potatoes. Have them for dinner!"
I finished the last bit of the rice harvest, then took Professor Ohinata back to the house.
Since they would taste better warm, I took the professor's one-on-one lesson while nibbling hash browns and sipping hot water.
The professor began with an intake interview, holding a list Professor Ohinata had written on loose-leaf paper.
"Well then."
"As for the magic we're going to learn today, your magic power places limits on what you can use."
"To deal with monsters of a certain strength, you need powerful magic, and powerful magic consumes a lot of magic power. Spells that consume a lot of magic power tend to be advanced and often contain unpronounceable sounds, but there are exceptions."
"Today, let's learn one or two convenient advanced spells that don't contain those unpronounceable sounds and that you have enough magic power to use."
"To do that, I need to determine how much magic power you have. I hear you have a lot, Dairi-san, but how many consecutive shots can you fire?"
"Hmm. Come to think of it, I've never measured it properly. How many...? Maybe fifty or sixty? I can fire Frozen Javelin three times. Four is impossible."
"I see, I see. Then anything above that might be impossible... Hmm. You can answer based on your gut feeling. Of these three—'summon a familiar,' 'produce a lost-person fog,' and 'enter a deathlike state'—which would you like to learn?"
"That's really only two choices. Is a spell that puts you in a deathlike state actually useful?"
"It makes you harder for monsters, witches, and mages to detect, both visually and by smell. I don't know the exact principles behind it, though."
"That sounds useful."
If it was called a deathlike state, I assumed it would make me unable to move, but it sounded incredibly useful for avoiding enemies. It had the feel of a weak person's spell for getting through a situation without fighting.
"Still, I'm most interested in summoning a familiar."
"Understood. Then let's learn the familiar-summoning spell. Um, the incantation goes like this."
Professor Ohinata wrote the ominous phrase "If I could know my son was safe, I'd gouge out this eye" in large letters on a blank sheet of loose-leaf paper, added the pronunciation "Yomohorogejuya Taketatee, Kunnumu Waa," and showed it to me.
That was terrifying.
"Wait. Does this spell gouge out your own eye?"
"No, it doesn't. You're fine. That's just what the incantation says. When you cast it, an eyeball familiar pops out."
"This familiar-summoning spell belongs to the Eyeball Witch-san. Its core word is 'eyeball': Kunnumu. When you chant it, one eyeball familiar appears, and you can move it freely just by willing it. You can share the familiar's vision, as well as hear sounds through it and transmit your voice. Its ability to fly is a major advantage, too, though its maximum altitude is only around ten meters above the ground."
"The special feature of this spell is that once you cast it, the familiar remains until it is destroyed or you dismiss it yourself. The amount of magic power used to cast it is deducted from the user's maximum magic reserves, and that portion never recovers. But, for example, if Blue-san kept the familiar you summoned, you could contact her at any time in an emergency and call for help."
"That's basically a video call."
What she was saying was insane. In a world where the electrical and communications networks had been destroyed, I could have a communications device? That was wild! From the sound of it, it could be used for reconnaissance, too. I'd have an information advantage over everyone!
"Exactly. It's rare for a human to be able to use it because of the high magic cost, but you should be able to summon one, Dairi-san."
"Does this spell have a maximum communication range? Like, 'the radio waves stop reaching you after this point'?"
"Good question. Apparently, the communication range depends on your magic-control skills. The Eyeball Witch-san has a radius of 180 kilometers, but when I use it, my radius is twenty kilometers. It should be about the same for you, Dairi-san."
"Twenty kilometers..."
While eating hash browns, I pulled out a map and checked. Ome was within reach from Okutama. More than enough.
"It can also carry objects weighing up to two or three kilograms. It has no combat abilities, but it can serve as a decoy."
"So it can be used as a drone, too. I'm learning this."
"Oh? You don't want to hear about the other spells? My recommendation is the lost-person fog spell."
"No, I'm choosing the eyeball. There's no way around it. It's incredibly useful."
If I got enough of them, they seemed to have the potential to bring back the internet and mail-order shopping. That was another point in the spell's favor. This spell deserved to spread across the whole world. It would be difficult, since people with little magic power couldn't use it, though.
"It really is incredibly useful. All right!"
"Let's start practicing right away. All together, nice and loud!"
"If I could know my son was safe—Yomohoroge Juya Taketatee."
"Yomohoroge juya taketatat... I bit my tongue."
"Are you all right? Yes, try pronouncing it slowly at first. Taketatee is especially easy to trip over, so focus on that part."
"Now, slowly. Repeat after me! If I could know—Taketatee."
"Taketatee. That's wrong. Takatet, takatake... I'm going to snap."
"P-please calm down...!"
I spent half a day learning the eyeball familiar spell, taking breaks along the way.
During one of our breaks, Professor Ohinata told me that the Red Magic Stone Blood Moon, confiscated from the Dragon Witch, had temporarily been placed in the custody of the Tokyo Witches' Assembly, in accordance with the will the Vampire Mage had left with his lawyer.
The plan was to hand it over once research into magical language had progressed and enough ordinary people with high magic power and combat abilities had been trained, on the condition that they protect Minato Ward.
Apparently, the Vampire Mage had sensed the limits of rule by witches and mages and planned to promote the empowerment of ordinary people and, ultimately, their participation in politics.
Smart. If humanity's overall technology and abilities were raised, it would be possible to prevent people with the power of the Dragon Witch but the personality of a piece of trash from running rampant. Rather than give magic stones to already powerful witches and mages and make them even stronger, it made far more sense to give them to ordinary people who had learned magic, giving them an advantage.
I only learned about the Vampire Mage after his death, but the more I found out about him, the higher my opinion of him rose.
Meanwhile, the Dragon Witch's stock kept falling even though she wasn't there, because she'd stolen the magic stone in defiance of the Vampire Mage's will and pocketed it.
I still think killing her would have been better. If she screwed up again despite being disciplined, the Blue Witch would probably go finish her off next time without me even having to say anything.
In any case, the research into magical language at Professor Ohinata's lab, begun by the Vampire Mage and inherited by the Foresight Mage, had borne fruit.
After practicing the pronunciation over and over, I finally activated the spell. As I poked the gently floating eyeball familiar, I felt grateful for the human will passed down through the ages and the results it had produced.
I'll reach out from just outside the circle of human bonds and use the fruits of their labor!