Congratulations on Your Magical Girl Duties

82 – A Tale in Another World

“Brave Hero Oppa, I have a question.”

The girl’s sudden words.

The man called Brave Hero Oppa reacted a beat late.

“Ah, were you talking to me?”

The girl paused her hands, which were tidying the man’s hair, and smiled mischievously.

“Who else would I be talking to here besides Brave Hero Oppa?”

“Truthfully, the title Brave Hero still doesn’t feel quite right. Could you just call me by my name?”

“Oppa’s name is hard to pronounce. And Oppa needs to get used to it now. Oppa is the Brave Hero from today onward. The Moon’s Brave Hero, no less.”

“Well, I’ll try.”

The man laughed faintly.

The girl mirrored the man’s laugh.

“Speaking of which, can I ask you just one thing?”

“Hmm, if you answer my question first.”

“What is it?”

The man turned around, facing the girl who was tilting her head in question.

“What do I look like?”

The man’s words were very serious.

The girl answered without delay.

“Handsome!”

But the man’s expression hardened further.

“You said you were blind to me, you little wench.”

“Still, I’m not completely blind. I can see when the other person is smiling, at least a little.”

The girl smiled brightly, continuing her words.

“Anyway! No matter what anyone says, to me, you’re the most handsome hero in the world!”

“That’s something parents say to comfort their kids, half out of obligation.”

“I know.”

“Damn it, you-.”

The man, overcome, stopped himself, then sighed and opened his mouth.

“Ha. Okay, I get it. So, what are you curious about?”

“Where did you come from, Hero?”

“Why that all of a sudden?”

“You’re leaving tomorrow. I want to know even a little bit more about you before then. Where you came from, what you’ve done, things like that.”

“Hmm.”

The man hummed quietly for a moment.

The girl urged him once more.

“So, Hero. Where did you come from?”

Finally, the man smiled helplessly and answered the girl’s question.

“From a place of utter devastation.”

“How devastating could it be?”

The girl tilted her head, puzzled.

The man answered calmly.

“It was a land of death, where more people died than were born.”

“Oh, so essentially, you’re the only survivor from that place.”

“It’s not quite that extreme. It’s called a land of death, but it still had the form of a nation.”

“Ah.”

The girl nodded, smiling, then abruptly threw out a question.

“But if it’s a nation, wouldn’t there be a king? Wasn’t there any command to stop it from happening?”

“They made me dance a prayer for childbirth to the Gods.”

“Huh? Why ever would they?”

The man offered a faint smile at the girl’s incredulous question. It was a strange smile, half-resignation, half-longing.

“It was a theocratic state, you see. Put simply, religion was deeply rooted in the ruling class.”

“A country like that exists? We have religion here, but it’s nothing like that.”

“Hard to believe, but where I was, it truly was a theocratic nation. Even decisions that determined the fate of the country were often made after listening to a shaman.”

A shaman, huh…

It was the first time the girl had heard such a word.

“Shaman? Like a sorcerer?”

“Well, they’re similar. A little different if you get into the details, though.”

The girl thought it sounded like a bizarre place.

Even if you’re deeply religious, how could a country function like that? Surely everyone’s heads weren’t just decorative pieces.

“So, besides that, were there any other notable features?”

“Of course, there were.”

The man chuckled softly before continuing.

“The weather was much more volatile than it is here. At times, the earth would scorch with heat, and at others, we would be plunged into a bone-chilling freeze.”

“Then it must have been hard to farm?”

“Well, they did manage to farm in their own way, but you’re not wrong. Most of the land was rough terrain, difficult to develop.”

“So, how did you survive?”

In that instant, the man’s voice dropped, becoming deeper.

“Weapons.”

“Weapons?”

“Yes. We made a lot of weapons and sold them to other countries, trading them for food like milk and fish.”

“Really?”

The girl was taken aback.

She couldn’t understand it. In such a harsh and difficult land, how could they produce so many weapons to trade for sustenance?

As far as she knew, just crafting a single weapon required significant skill and resources.

“How is that even possible? You’re lying, aren’t you?”

“We also endured a great war between people of the same ethnicity, not just with other countries. War had continued right up until I came to this place.”

“War… you say…?”

“Yeah, that’s right. War. That’s why we were forced to become good at making weapons. The pain of war was so deeply rooted that people clung to them like madmen.”

“…”

The girl remained silent.

She knew what war was. Though she hadn’t experienced it directly, the village elders who had survived told stories of a conflict that was truly horrific.

And to think that such a war was still ongoing.

A truly wretched thing.

With effort, she opened her mouth.

“Why did Hero-Oppa live in a place like that?”

“I didn’t have the strength to leave.”

The man smiled lightly. But to the girl, that smile felt so heavy.

How worn down must a person be to wear such a smile? And yet, he so readily agreed to her request.

She felt deeply sorry.

And grateful.

The girl embraced him tightly.

“… It must have been hard on you, Oppa.”

“It’s alright.”

She knew it wouldn’t do much, but she hoped that this gesture might offer some comfort.

Wanting to lighten the subdued atmosphere, she forced a cheerful tone.

“What did you do there, Hero-Oppa?”

“Hmm, there’s so much it’s hard to say.”

“Then, what was the last thing you did?”

“The last thing…”

The man trailed off, then continued with a faint smile.

“I used to dry the soaked earth when it rained.”

“How did you end up with that job?”

“Well, I complained to the stars a few times, waving a gun around. Told them life was too hard. And that was the task I was given.”

“Oh, so the stars granted your wish? Like wishing on a shooting star!”

“Something like that. Though, it wasn’t quite the wish I wanted.”

“Wow, that’s amazing. I wish the stars here would grant wishes too.”

The girl grumbled, pouting.

The man stroked the girl’s hair.

“Anyway, after that, I’d always end up drying the soaked earth after the rain.”

His voice held a deep longing. The girl found she quite liked that voice.

“But.”

In that instant, the man’s voice turned stark.

“Each time, the stars would come and relentlessly trample and defile the dried earth.”

“No….”

It was such a pity.

If you’re going to grant a wish, grant it fully. What kind of torment was this?

What was so good about recklessly trampling on the precious land someone had worked so hard to cultivate?

Before the girl could even express her anger, the man’s voice softened once more.

“That wounded earth, I would cradle and pack it down again, rolling a giant hunk of iron over it. No matter how many times the stars trampled and defiled it, I kept going.”

He was truly a remarkable person.

Faced with relentless and brutal violence, one’s spirit was bound to break. Hadn’t her own heart faltered when others rejected her?

Yet, the man hadn’t despaired, but risen again, silently continuing his work.

Noble, sublime.

Was this the kind of being adults called a saint?

“Doing such amazing work, were you a hero back then, too, Oppa?”

“Well, not entirely wrong, but I was something a little different. So the name I was called was special, too.”

“Really? So what was Hero Oppa?”

“Ah, me, you see…”

Watching the sparkle of anticipation in the girl’s eyes, the man grinned brightly.

“I was a tennis court groundskeeper.”

A strange word, the girl thought.

Like the man’s name, the word was difficult to pronounce, but strangely, it didn’t feel unpleasant.

Like the taste of honey, a flavor she’d only known a few times in her life.

The sweet fragrance of that honey seemed to waft through the air.

Then, suddenly, a question occurred to the girl, and she voiced it.

“So, Hero Oppa, what did you do when you rested?”

“Rest?”

“Yes. Even for a hero, oppa can’t keep suffering like that, can he? He needs to rest when he can.”

The adults said so. The girl added, as if echoing them.

“Well, even before what I just said, whenever I had some free time, I used to climb the Tower.”

“You climbed the Tower? That’s not exactly resting.”

For a brief moment, the man’s face clouded over.

“It was the only thing I could do, for my parents, betrayed by the hands of others.”

“……”

The girl’s expression fell as well.

She felt terribly sorry. It was as if she’d forcibly poked at a wound he’d painstakingly kept covered.

“Who killed your parents, oppa…?”

“People I thought were comrades on the battlefield.”

He’d lost his parents because of betrayal by the very comrades who should have had his back.

“So I compulsively climbed the Tower. Even when everyone told me to come down, I wouldn’t listen. I felt like I couldn’t face my departed parents if I came down.”

How tormented he must have been.

How difficult it must have been.

The girl couldn’t even begin to imagine.

“That must have been hard…”

“It’s alright. It’s all in the past now.”

At the man’s faint smile, the girl quietly shed tears. As if she were crying in place of the man, whose heart had been worn down so much he could no longer weep himself.

The man gently stroked the girl’s hair and continued.

“But it wasn’t all bad. I joined the Gold League in just a year, you know.”

“The Gold League? Is that good?”

“Yeah, my skill in climbing the Tower was exceptional. I couldn’t reach the Jade or Platinum Leagues because of my teammates, but my actual skill level was that of a Challenger.”

“Wow, that’s really amazing!”

The girl exclaimed with genuine admiration.

She was truly surprised.

She didn’t really know what Platinum or Jade were, but surely they weren’t more precious than Gold.

And Challenger, no less. She didn’t know what he was challenging, but it must be something grand.

However, what the man said next surprised the girl even more than before.

“But, I later returned to the Metal Leagues.”

He had given up gold, was what he was saying.

The girl couldn’t grasp it.

“Huh? Why?”

“The people in the gold industry, they only shone on the surface. Their skills were often…lacking. Especially those who wandered aimlessly in the woods.”

“You mean the hunters?”

“Yes, them.”

It was difficult for the girl to understand, but she could still grasp the gist of it.

“So, others made mistakes, but they pinned the blame on you, Hero-oppa.”

“That’s right. All I did was diligently climb the tower.”

“They’re all too much!”

A gloomy expression settled on the girl’s face.

It wasn’t that he had abandoned gold of his own volition.

He had been forced to give it up because of others.

It was infuriating. The ones who were at fault were someone else entirely, so why should an innocent person, someone who did nothing wrong, suffer the consequences?

As if to console her, the man smiled brightly and stroked her head.

“It wasn’t all bad, though. I got to experience a lot of different things in the metalworking industry.”

His smile was so agreeable that the girl returned it with one just as bright.

“So, Hero-oppa worked at places like blacksmiths? Wasn’t hammering hard? It looks like I’d die just watching.”

“Well, I did hammering and chopping. I dealt with swords quite a bit too. And sometimes, when I felt lonely, I would take a cat and climb the tower.”

“Wow, a cat!”

The girl’s rose-pink eyes sparkled with anticipation. Watching those beautiful eyes, the man stroked her head.

“If we can go someday, let’s go together. I’ll let you ride the cat then.”

“Yes! And you’ll name me then, oppa!”

“Alright. Then give me the evening primrose then.”

“Okay!”

After a short exchange of smiles between the girl and the man, the girl raised a question.

“So, even when Hero-oppa was resting, he must have been seen as an amazing person. Did people have a special way of referring to you?”

“Of course.”

The man nodded in response to the girl’s words.

“People denounced me as someone pathologically obsessed with climbing the tower, but at the same time, they acknowledged my ability and praised me as reaching the realm of the gods.”

“So,” the man continued,

“That’s what they used to call me.”

“Called you what?”

And then, he smiled.

“The Madman of the Tower.”

Brighter than the moon in the sky above.

A single night, scarcely a day.

In the girl’s life, a time so fleeting it could only be compared to a moment.

But, the most dazzling moment in her life.

Because of the beautiful memory of that day, because of the precious promise she shared with the man, because there remained one evening primrose, yet ungiven…

The girl, she was alright.

“Brave warrior…”

Even if each day was spent in fearful anticipation, never knowing when death might come, even if she waited endlessly for a reunion that felt more like a dream.

And.

Even if her entire being was consumed, leaving behind only half her head, a fragment of her torso, and an arm clutching a trampled evening primrose…

Even if she realized now that a reunion was no longer possible, and that it was something she should no longer wish for…

“Please, don’t be in pain…”

The girl, she was alright.