Chapter 9
When another pair of arms started growing under her arms.
That was probably when it began.
When her mother and father decided to abandon her.
When they discovered the lower arms that had grown suddenly in less than three months, her father and mother tried to cut off her arms.
They tied her up and tried to cut them off forcibly.
When her father's saw dug into her lower arms, she was so scared and in so much pain that she unknowingly used magic.
Her father and mother were thrown away from her and hit the wall.
Her father was injured, and her mother screamed at her.
— I should never have given birth to something like you.
She clearly remembered those words.
She remembered her mother and father approaching her with kitchen knives and sickles, screaming that she was a demon and telling her to leave.
She cried and said she didn't want to go, but they swung the kitchen knife, leaving a deep cut on half of her face, and only then did Erpha leave the house.
If her family reacted like that, other people wouldn't be any different.
After being beaten with sticks and stones and chased away countless times, Erpha deliberately lived in the forest so that people wouldn't be surprised by her lower arms.
Fortunately, her genius magical talent allowed even a young child to live in the forest.
With four arms, she could work twice as fast as others.
And around the time she turned 12.
Eyeballs started growing one by one on the left side of her face.
It was a horrifying appearance even to herself.
So she covered half of her face with leaves.
In the forest, she freely used all kinds of magic even though no one had taught her.
Fire ignited at a word, fierce wild beasts met their deaths, and meat was prepared and cooked well before being placed before her.
But even though she could do all that, her creepy arms and face wouldn't be fixed.
One day, after dreaming again about the moment her parents abandoned her, Erpha made a big decision to remove her lower arms and left face.
Fainting and waking up repeatedly, the 15-year-old girl cut off two of her arms and scraped off the left side of her face.
Cauterizing her left face with fire and stopping the bleeding from her cut lower arms, she lay soaked in cold sweat, hoping that when she woke up the next morning, she would have a normal appearance.
But her body betrayed her hopes.
The next day.
When she woke up again.
She realized that her arms and face had returned to their original form.
The arms had grown back, and the eyeballs she had painstakingly plucked out had regrown on the hideously twisted, discolored skin that had been burned, as if mocking her.
They were hideous things, no mattet what magic she used.
They never disappeared.
For the first time, she felt a desire to learn proper magic.
She wanted to be able to wield more powerful magic.
She hoped that she could get rid of these arms and eyeballs and live like a human.
Among people.
When Tower Master Yorgen, who was passing by chance, discovered her living in the forest and invited her to the Magic Tower, coveting her talent.
Erpha didn't refuse.
And she researched like mad.
She researched and researched and researched more.
About ways to wield stronger magic.
And she figured it out.
The Three Primary Colors Research was the result of her research imbued with such obsession.
Optimization of magic.
While it could be seen as research on maximizing efficiency, in another sense, it was also research that helped control magical phenomena on a scale that humans couldn't handle with the mana contained in human bodies.
Through this research, she aimed to handle much larger magic to return her body to normal.
To return...
But.
"Ugly witch!"
"I'm really going to vomit!!"
"Uweeek!!"
Even if she returned to normal.
Would those people accept her?
Even if she appeared with the appearance of an ordinary human, would those people who had already seen her ugly left side try to treat her normally?
Mud covered in filth flew and hit her head.
With that, her head swung to the opposite side, and there she saw young mages and witches hiding among the crowd, snickering.
Is even this moment a joke to them?
Even in this desperate moment of destruction where someone's soul, life, and mind are being shattered, is all of this just funny to them?
Why?
Because I'm ugly?
Because I'm ugly?
Just because I don't look the same as them, they do this to me who hasn't done anything wrong and hasn't committed any wrongdoing?
Anger seized her body.
Slowly.
The enormous mana in her body and the genius of her overwhelming talent began to choose targets to spew its flames.
If she combined the results of the Three Primary Colors Research with the mana in her body, she could probably sweep away the entire capital.
And even the entire empire.
She was tired now.
The years she had lived struggling to be recognized by them seemed foolish. She no longer longed to live.
Along with this empire that had only given her pain.
She was prepared to burn.
Mana began to boil.
Magic so intense that it could instantly burst the miracle restraining her body began to form in her body.
Now she just had to spew it out.
If she spewed out this magic and burned together with everyone, it would be over.
Thinking that, just as she raised her head.
"Stop!! I said stop!"
"It's the Saint! It's the Saint!"
"Don't throw things at the Saint, you lunatics!!"
A strange sight entered Erpha's eyes.
One man.
Was looking straight at Erpha and slowly walking towards her.
***
You fucking idiots!
Why don't you just tap dance on a nuclear bomb while you're at it!?
Does everyone here want to die today??
Congratu-fucking-lations! You all win the Darwin Award collectively.
I jumped onto the road in shock, seeing the priests of the White Order who didn't know what to do with the mud and objects flying from all directions, and the four-armed witch being subdued and dragged between them.
The roads of this era were full of mud.
Cars and trains were around, but radios weren't even nationally distributed yet. From a modern person's perspective, it was a violent era where romance and barbarism were still alive and breathing.
I started to approach the witch, pushing through people who were throwing mud covered in filth, stone fragments, and bottles while giggling without any sense of guilt or awareness of the problem, and naturally, stray projectiles started flying at me too.
Mud mixed with feces, urine, and vomit flew and stuck to my clothes.
A stone fragment or glass fragment thrown by some idiot hit my head and bounced off.
Blood soaking my head flowed down my cheek and fell onto the roadside.
Seeing this, the holy knights of the Sun Order, the police, and the poor people I had been treating finally rushed out and started to stop the people.
"It's the Saint! The Saint!"
"What are you doing!? Stop immediately!!"
"Don't harm the Saint!!"
An enormous number of poor people instantly took control of the street, and there were no more filth and stones flying towards me and the witch.
I was so tense, not knowing when the witch might explode, that I didn't even have the leisure to wipe the blood flowing down my cheek, and slowly, mechanically advanced towards the witch.
"Stop! This one is an abomination!"
"She's a harbinger of calamity who brings disaster!! Stop! Don't come any closer!"
"If you come any closer, we'll attack…"
The priests of the White Order raised their hands towards me, but their words were cut off immediately by the holy knights of the Sun Order surrounding me.
"What nonsense are you spouting to the Saint directly sent down by the Goddess of Grace!!"
"Show some respect!! This is a Saint chosen by God!"
I'm telling you, I'm not!!
I have nothing to do with Goddess Lilia!!
I've never even uttered the “Li” of Lilia!!
Why are you spreading such rumors!!
I wanted to shout, but I was too scared to do so, fearing that it might provoke the witch and make her explode.
I slowly approached the witch.
"D-don't come..."
Seeing my frozen expression in front of what could be a bomb that might go off at any moment, the priests of the White Order must have misunderstood something again, as they retreated backward, soaked in fear and terror.
As they retreated, naturally.
The miracle binding the witch's body was released.
As the miracle was released, I carefully supported the witch who was about to collapse onto the dirty mud floor.
Wow.
I'm so fucking scared.
I'm really terribly scared.
Even when I first threw a grenade at the training camp in my past life, I wasn't this scared. Really.
This is too cruel a trial for a mere man like me.
But what can I do?
If I don't do it, everyone here will die.
Including me.
I slowly started to wipe off the mud covered in filth on the witch's face and body while holding her in my arms.
This is like.
Similar to soothing a cat before neutering surgery.
There, there.
Good girl?
Please don't explode?
Please don't explode.
Fuck...
Please don't explode, I beg of you.
"Are you okay?"
Moisture mixed into my voice without me realizing.
Because I'm so fucking scared.
So terrified.
I was barely holding back from collapsing while pissing and shitting myself simultaneously if I relax even a little, and managed to turn it into just tears.
I didn't know what came over me, but I succeeded in wiping off all the mud and filth on her face.
Her face revealed like that was...
Oh boy.
Gross.
But I didn't care at all.
I had a high tolerance for gross things.
My hobby in my past life was watching anime and gore movies.
This level might be terrifying and shocking to the primitive people of this era, but to me, well.
It wasn’t much different from the monster girl Arachne erotic images one could find with a little internet search.
"...Do you find me ugly too?" the witch lady in my arms looks up at me with unfocused, blank eyes and asks as if muttering.
Fuck.
Fuck.
Fuck.
This doesn't look good.
Is she going to explode at this rate?
No!! I don't want to burn to death!
What should I do about this!?
Please, my brain!
Think of something!
I was a virgin who had never even held a girl's hand in my past life. I had no information on what to say to make a girl feel better when she reacted like this.
In a situation where I had to do something immediately.
The choice I reflexively made was this.
Slowly.
I bent down and kissed her hideously ugly left face.
With a prayer that she wouldn't explode, that was.
The witch's body flinched at my kiss.
Her body started to tremble uncontrollably.
I'm so fucked!!
Was this a mistake!!
Is she going to explode!!
Right!
Of course she'd hate it if a strange man suddenly kissed her!!
A line!!
I need to deliver a line!!
A super touching line!!
A super cool line!!
Is there nothing!
Even with all the time I’ve wasted watching anime and movies, I can't think of anything, damn it!
It was said that a person's brain worked faster in extreme situations.
Finally.
One line came to my mind.
I'm sorry, Grandpa Miyazaki!
Let me plagiarize a bit!
"You're not ugly."
I hugged her tightly.
"Live."
I didn't have the courage to look at her face.
Because I felt like I would lose all composure and faint while pissing and shitting myself the moment her face changed even slightly for the worse.
Is this what it feels like to dance on a knife's edge?
Due to fear and terror, my voice was now so full of moisture that I couldn't hide it.
"You are beautiful."
Please.
Please.
Don't explode!!
Don't explode!!