Chapter 35: Meeting before the last meeting

As soon as I got out of the sewer and stepped on solid ground, I created a blade and slashed my palm.

The trajectory of the wound was the same as always, and the pain didn’t change at all.

The ritual to forget the feeling of loving Happy, which had filled my consciousness, was effective this time as well.

It was a moment when the worry that it might become too familiar and less forgotten became insignificant.

However, the reason for eliminating the manipulated emotion didn’t appear.

I couldn’t feel the peace that came when the flowing blood stained my palm red.

I frowned at the rising annoyance, as if it would boil over if I heated it for just one more second.

The cause was that d*mn magical girl, Joy.

“Cough! Hack!”

She, who had become like a water-soaked rat, continued to cough while lying face down on the floor.

Each time, the water flowing from her mouth was mixed with saliva, boasting a sticky viscosity.

The frills attached to her outfit and her blue hair, which she always cared about, had lost their color and shape.

It was a ridiculous figure that didn’t offer any elegance or beauty.

That’s why I was annoyed.

To think that I thought the past me resembled such a b*tch.

I hated myself for being overly swayed by the punishment given by the ‘Quest Jewel.’

My body temperature rose with a well-mixed feeling of shame and anger.

“Wait… Just a minute!”

I immediately grabbed Joy’s hair and forcibly pulled her up.

Despite suffering from the pain of how much water she had swallowed, the amount of water pouring from her eyes, nose, and mouth didn’t decrease at all.

“You said you’d save me… I don’t want to die! Please save me!”

It wasn’t an annoyance that would subside by listening to a scream close to a shriek.

Rather, the things that happened in the sewer began to come back to me vividly.

Abusing Joy,

demanding her to call me Unnie,

and even kissing her on top of hugging her.

Those weren’t memories but nightmares.

The more I thought about it, the more the sadism towards her increased.

I started to worry about how to k*ll Joy, whom I had personally dealt with 131 times, this time.

But I didn’t.

It wasn’t that I felt sorry for her or felt guilty and quit.

The forgotten efficacy of self-harm had been revived, but it was small compared to the anger accumulated in my heart.

Even death would be an expensive luxury for a useless, stupid magical girl.

I released the strength in my hand that was tightly gripping Joy’s hair.

Then, I glared at her, who had plopped down on the floor, and opened my mouth.

“Get lost.”

“Thank you!”

Joy, who ran out of the place as soon as she answered.

Whether she had completely forgotten that she was a magical girl or not,

she never cast magic, even though she experienced the pain of falling and getting up repeatedly.

As time passed and she disappeared from view, I let out a deep sigh.

It was a moment when the feeling of wanting to get rid of things and the light heart of thinking I could finally end today and the feeling of sinking as if I had fallen into an abyss because today wasn’t over yet felt so equal that it was difficult to determine which one was superior.

Therefore.

I wanted to gain peace and commune with the ‘Quest Jewel.’

I took the red jewel out of my pocket, wiped off the moisture, and kissed it.

The attitude of calmly accepting this situation, which I would have been frustrated with if I had lived a life that ended when I died, was mixed with arrogance that went beyond confidence, as I had been granted the 133rd life from the ‘Quest Jewel.’

As a result, I regarded negative emotions as utterly useless.

“Now I have no choice but to find out from Happy.”

While fearing the meeting with Happy that would happen in the future, I didn’t fear it.

I hoped that she would tell me the information I hadn’t gotten an answer to willingly.

No, she would definitely have no choice but to tell me.

Because today is the last day of this life for me.

I was prepared to do anything to get the information.

After putting the red jewel back into my pants pocket, I took out my smartphone.

I hadn’t taken care of electronic devices, so even though it kept getting wet, I tapped the screen, and the time was displayed.

4:19 PM.

Today still had 7 hours and 41 minutes left.

I took out the resident registration card that was inserted in the smartphone case and checked the address.

The blood flowing from the wound I made to forget the artificially created love stained the smartphone.

It wasn’t noticeable because it was a black electronic device, but it was a color that was enough to take my attention away.

Was that why?

The determination to meet Happy immediately dulled in the face of the excessively inflated peace.

“Should I rest for a bit?”

When I think about it, I repeated the same life 132 times because I didn’t achieve the 100th goal.

I hadn’t rested comfortably even once during that time.

At first, I tried to corrupt myself, saying what nonsense I was talking about, but the voice of weakness begging me to rest for just a moment was charming today.

At the one word, “Okay. Let’s rest for a bit to calm our minds,” the tension that had been built up densely for the past two days collapsed.

Suddenly, I thought of the monthly rental room I had contracted because I wanted a normal life.

Growl

As the place to rest was decided, my dried-up stomach became noisy.

The only food I had eaten today was a green apple, and even that was vomited out due to Happy’s abuse.

I nodded at the protest demanding gluttony and entered the water to swim towards the monthly rental room.

“…D*mn it.”

However, I didn’t imagine this would happen even in my dreams, so I inadvertently cursed.

When I actually tried to buy food, I didn’t have any money on hand, so I ended up using the xxPay on my smartphone.

I was worried and at the same time expected that Happy might find me, but even if I unlocked the blocked number, there was no contact.

“If that were the case, she would have come when I cast magic.”

Of course, that wasn’t the only reason I cursed.

The menu I decided on after coming out of the lake near the monthly rental room and looking around at the restaurants was… spicy stir-fried chicken boasting a strong sauce.

Why on earth?

Am I cherishing the memory of licking the stir-fried rice that fell on the floor like a dog?

Is that really a memory?

Not a nightmare?

I was overwhelmed by the weight of the stir-fried chicken in the bag.

I wanted to go back to the restaurant and get a refund right away.

The only reason I didn’t was because of the punishment given by the ‘Quest Jewel.’

I thought it was natural while hating myself for missing Happy in this way.

I even stopped the action of immediately creating a blade and slashing my palm.

‘It’s a punishment, right?

If you can’t avoid it, you have to enjoy it.’

…I feel like I’m enjoying it too much.

Shut up.

Anyway, this will end when this life ends.

I suppressed the precariousness that I might fall over if I turned my steps and silently walked towards the monthly rental room.

When I finally arrived, it was as if nothing had happened there.

The door whose hinges had been torn off by Happy’s anger and

the wall that had been damaged because I rushed out

greeted me with a neat figure.

“…I was trapped in an illusion.”

Clearly, the feeling of loving Happy is also just an illusion.

I don’t know why I’m suffering so much.

I sighed deeply, opened the door, and went inside.

“Welcome.”

No, it wasn’t an illusion.

“…Huh?”

The thoughts I had been constantly worrying about while walking to the monthly rental room disappeared without a trace at the kindness of Happy, who greeted me happily wearing an apron.

Without knowing why, I stepped back at her expression mixed with the feeling of wanting to whine to me and the feeling of being happy to see me.

I dropped the bag containing the stir-fried chicken on the floor and at the same time tried to create a blade and slash my palm.

To tell you the results first, I couldn’t run away even a step, and blood didn’t flow from my palm either.

The first reason for failure was that the door installed just half a step behind me was blocking me.

“Where are you trying to run away to?”

The second reason for failure was that I was being toyed with by Happy’s strength as she grabbed my hand and pulled me in.

“Why…”

“Am I here?”

At first, I thought it was an illusion.

Like someone who lost their way in the desert and craved an oasis, I judged that an illusion had appeared because I was missing Happy.

But the touch I felt when she hugged me and rubbed her face against mine wasn’t an illusion.

“I knew Unnie would do this.”

Happy opened her mouth again and stepped out of my arms.

Then she took out her smartphone from her arms and held it out to me.

It was a message telling me where I bought the stir-fried chicken.

“And. I wanted to show you this at least once.”

Step by step.

Happy slowly entered the room.

I followed her to narrow the distance that was getting further and further away.

Now I had even forgotten the judgment that I would be freed from the punishment given by the ‘Quest Jewel’ by cutting my palm.

The coercive power of artificially created love was that much.

Constantly leaving scars on my body,

committing all sorts of bad deeds to steal my heart,

and destroying the evil organization Darkmoon, which I had built up over a lifetime, not to mention

the commemorative first subordinate, Alpha, as a hostage,

“Me in Unnie’s room.”

That magical girl

“How is it?”

I was captivated by the ecstatic spectacle she was producing.