Chapter 39 : Magic Girl, Magical Sword Star (1)

It was about 10 Earth years ago.

A young man, full of vigor, was dragged into the world of Murim.

An ordinary person would have fallen into confusion and despair.
At the very least, they would have lived with depression.
But he, with his vibrant and positive personality, was in many ways an extraordinary person.

-Ah. In the sky of Murim, stars were likely not there from the beginning. Now I… shall stand above the sky.

Saying so, he recklessly threw himself into Murim.

Fortunately, the man, who usually read many martial arts novels, also had a talent for martial arts.
Watching swords being swung, he grasped the mysteries within their trajectories, and with a single breath, he absorbed the abundant energy of nature.

Like that, somehow rolling around as a wanderer, he spent 30 years in Murim.

He became a respectable martial arts master, firmly establishing himself as a pillar of the orthodox faction.
His wife died giving birth to their daughter, but still, he formed a family.

Yes. That young man worked quite hard in the place called ‘Jungwon’, less than half the size of his original world.
*(TL Note: Jungwon refers to the Central Plains, the traditional setting for Murim stories.)*

By the time the young man became middle-aged, he had accumulated much renown thanks to his efforts.
Enough to send his precious daughter, raised like a jewel, as a named disciple to the Wudang Sect.
*(TL Note: Wudang Sect is a famous fictional martial arts sect, often portrayed as righteous.)*

It was an unconventional measure.
Though not an inner disciple who could rise to the position of elder, women had rarely entered Wudang.

The origin of Magic Girl, the 37th Head of the Wudang Sect, Seolhyang, began here.

That’s right. Strictly speaking, ‘Magic Girl’, renowned as an S-rank Hunter and Returnee, was not originally Earth-born.

Similar to Bari… she was closer to the second generation.

“Yep! Right, I heard a lot from Grandpa! Agathe, nice to meet you!”

Smiling brightly, Seolhyang waved her hand enthusiastically.
I nodded slightly in greeting.

“…Right, nice to meet you.”

I scanned her body.
Just as I, reborn in the Land of Prosperity, became fundamentally different from Earth humans, she too, born of Murim, had differences from modern humans.

Namely, her internal energy , or Neigong.

Seolhyang, calling herself a magic girl, possessed a Dantian to store internal energy and meridians through which Ki flowed.
All characteristics of a Murim warrior.

“Second time seeing you. Seolhyang.”

Caspar greeted her briefly, then raised the corner of his lips, burning with fighting spirit towards her.

…Not a kid anymore, really.

“Aha, Oppa too. You wanna go another round with me?”
*(TL Note: Oppa is what a younger female calls an older male sibling or close older male friend/boyfriend.)*

Smiling faintly, Seolhyang raised her sword.
Though wearing an innocent smile, I thought I read a sly intention within it.

*Grit.*

That b*tch…

“Caspar. Don’t play with the kid. She’ll develop bad habits.”

Narrowing my brow, I stepped between Seolhyang and Caspar.

“Hehe. Agathe Unni, are you jealous? Hmph. Cute.”

“Aren’t you the older one?”

Though my age, combining past and present lives, exceeded half a century, it would likely be less than Seolhyang’s, who stopped aging after achieving age reversal.

…Probably.

“What are you saying! Magic girls don’t age! Don’t you even know that?”

“How would I know something like that? Ah, but I do agree with what you said. Age should be judged by mind and appearance.”

It’s absolutely not that I have a complex about being old.
Just, um. Right.

Aren’t we ageless beings liberated from aging?
One can’t judge age by secular standards anymore.

And isn’t there a saying that 32 sounds old, but 320 sounds kind of okay?

Well. Not that I’m that old.
No, maybe if you count only the mental age spent in lucid dreams, it might be around that…

“…Agathe?”

Oops.

“Ah. Yes. Spaced out for a moment, Caspar. Sorry.”

Regaining my senses, I pressed close to Caspar’s side.
Then, glaring at Seolhyang, who was playfully twirling her sword, I said.

“Anyway. If you carelessly touch my husband, I’ll blow your hand right off.”

Click.

I summoned my Magic Bullet from thin air and aimed it back at her.

“Hmph. Unfair. Did I touch him? Your husband touched me first…”

I willingly refuted the words of the mentally ill Murim warrior calling herself a magic girl.

“You must have seduced him. Growing up in Jungwon, you should know, right? If a husband comes home after meeting a woman somewhere, it’s not the husband’s fault, but because there was some b*tch who dared seduce a man with her lewd body.”

Yes. So Caspar is innocent.

“…Crazy concept-addict. Didn’t know there was a b*tch worse than me.”

Don’t know what she means. Does this look like a concept?

***

Though there was a brief commotion, the reason Magic Girl Seolhyang visited was simple.

For the Hell raid.

“Right now, I’m desperate enough to borrow even a cat’s paw, so we can’t let such talented personnel rot.”
*(TL Note: “Borrow a cat’s paw” is a Korean idiom meaning being extremely busy and needing any help available.)*

She came seeking me and Caspar to close even one more Gate.
To request cooperation, in her own way.

“…Your way of speaking is quite normal?”

Being a magic girl, I expected her to use some unique speech pattern.
Like adding strange endings to her sentences.

“As you know, I am, after all, the Head of the Wudang Sect. Well, I do have my signature poses and lines. But other than that, I usually speak normally.”

Hmm. Well, any normal person would naturally do that, but…

“Then why do you call yourself a magic girl?”

I knew some anecdotes about the S-rank Hunter Magic Girl.
Because she was a figure always appearing in the history of improving Returnee rights.

Seolhyang’s father died long ago.

It wasn’t that he couldn’t return.
He stepped onto his homeland soil just before dying of old age.

However…

He didn’t die of aging.
Back then, the rights of Returnees weren’t guaranteed.

Furthermore, it was an era when research on otherworlds and Gates hadn’t even begun.
In those chaotic times. The government designated ‘Murim’ as a hostile force.

Thus, the Returnee, already aged, couldn’t withstand the attacks from his compatriots and died.
A death most meaningless.

But fortunately, his only daughter survived, and becoming an S-rank Hunter, she actively worked for other Returnees afterwards, spreading information about them.

My knowledge of Magic Girl’s past ended there.

Seolhyang half-closed her eyes and calmly unraveled the story.

“Father and my martial brothers all died in bombings, my homeland shattered overnight and vanished beyond the dimensions. Left alone, all I could do was stare blankly at the TV in a semi-basement room.”

Using the knowledge of Earth her father taught her, she desperately disguised herself as a civilian.
Discarding her sword, tearing her martial arts uniform, she clung precariously to life.

Thanks to her martial arts, her body was sturdy, so she could do manual labor.
In the semi-basement room obtained through such hardship, she endlessly killed time.

Then, Seolhyang happened to see a girl in frilly clothes on TV.

It was a cartoon her father used to tell her about when she was very young.

Since the cultural industry was shattered, the media at the time was endlessly replaying old masterpieces.

Luck. One could perhaps call it that.

“In the name of love and justice-. That was the phrase. Yes. Seeing that, I decided. To become a magic girl.”

To Seolhyang, greatly weakened at the time, those words resonated strangely.

No. Honestly speaking, she bawled her eyes out.
Crying all day, and crying again, she recognized her miserable reality.

That she was just a child who couldn’t do anything.
Even the young child on screen fulfilled her duty.
Yet she couldn’t protect anything.

Seolhyang cried until the heavens seemed to split.
Until she vented all the resentment and sorrow within her, continuously.

Crying like that until exhausted, she fell asleep and woke up.
She had returned to her teenage years.

Having emptied her mind in unintentional seclusion, purely observing herself and reaching the extreme of emotion, she had attained the state of age reversal.

The last disciple of Wudang, returned to her initial form, gripped her sword again.

She couldn’t possibly call herself a Sword Saint .
She was far too lacking to be called a saint.

But…

Maybe even someone like me could become a star?

A twinkling star in the night sky, capable of bringing hope to others?

Therefore, Sword Star .
*(TL Note: The characters for Saint and Star are homophones (聖/星) pronounced ‘seong’.)*

Perhaps the only sword star shining in the shattered sky of Murim.

“Did you know? Until 5 years ago, child soldiers were quite common. I was fine since I was born in Murim, but it was shocking. Father always used to say. In his homeland, killing people was rare enough to be big news.”

Agathe nodded.

“It was. Long ago, it was like that. I remember.”

The two Returnees looked at each other.
Though with exotic appearances, and one not even Earth-born…

They shared the same sentiment.

“Even though I achieved age reversal, no one found it strange when I was active. Everyone fought like that. That… was sad.”

Heh. Seolhyang let out a strange laugh.

“Isn’t it amazing? It’s an old appearance I don’t even know myself, a time people here forgot long ago. But this country my father told me about in his childhood, seems it was incredibly precious to me.”

Someone’s reality was like a fairy tale to another.
To a child who lived in Murim, the stories of Earth were from another world.

So she wanted to protect it.

Amidst the ruined world, the child who remembered the good old days sought to protect the last remaining remnants of the past.

Thus, she took up the sword.
Dressing like a vibrant child, crying out for love, justice, and the like.

Magic Girl.
The birth of Magical Sword Star.