Congratulations on Your Magical Girl Duties

20 – Magical Initiation (6)

The first day in this new world was peculiar.

Clothing that had somehow shifted into the style of this other place.

The phone that had simply vanished from my hand.

A fantastical village square, the likes of which could never exist back home.

At that moment, I knew. This was another world.

Initially, it wasn’t fear I felt, but sheer exhilaration. The other world I’d only encountered in novels and comics was now something I was living, and I couldn’t help but shudder.

It was impossible not to be excited. It was only natural. Honestly, who hasn’t dreamt of another world at least once?

And now, that opportunity had found me.

Before the echoes of wonder could fade, a figure entered my view. A haggard-looking old woman selling vegetables by the roadside.

Without hesitation, I approached her and spoke.

I asked where exactly this place was.

If it truly was the other world I suspected.

At the same time, I harbored expectations. What special abilities would I gain in this world? What kind of protagonist would I become?

But instead of an answer, I was met with a blade.

It certainly wasn’t offered as a gesture of goodwill. No one would call trying to plunge a knife into someone’s neck “goodwill.”

Startled beyond reason, I reflexively cursed and kicked the old woman away, then fled.

That was my first day in this other world.

“I kicked a grandma selling vegetables.”

In a single phrase encapsulating the memory of that day, I uttered the deed I committed on my first day in this new world.

It was bitter, but now I could speak of it with a hint of relief.

I suppose it’s true what they say – with time, everything becomes a memory.

“…….”

“…….”

“…….”

But no one spoke. Only a silence, even more awkward and heavy than before, remained.

I couldn’t understand it.

What on earth was wrong with these people all of a sudden?

They asked me to talk, so why did they suddenly clam up?

Shouldn’t they at least react out of courtesy?

Perhaps sensing my frustration, the mint-haired magical girl broke the silence.

“Hey… you, just now, what did you…?”

It wasn’t exactly proper speech, but I charitably let it slide. My isekai experience was clearly far different from what she’d imagined, and she was taken aback.

Well then, I’d just have to explain it a bit more thoroughly.

“Just what I said. I kicked an old woman selling greens on the street. Really, it was nothing much.”

And it really was nothing much.

Compared to the series of events that followed, that first day was just a minor incident.

“Perhaps… was that old woman rich?”

“No. She was wearing clothes that were falling apart.”

I answered matter-of-factly.

The mint-haired magical girl asked me again.

“Th-then… was that old woman a person in disguise or something?”

“I don’t think so. Her complexion wasn’t good, and she looked quite uncomfortable in places. Which, luckily for me, made it really easy to kick her.”

“Hey… d-did you say anything to the old woman when you kicked her?”

“Ah, that? I told her to die gracefully if she was old.”

“…….”

I answered diligently, and again, they fell silent.

Don’t they feel even a little bad for the person talking?

Another heavy silence descends upon my unremarkable words. At the same time, everyone’s piercing gaze, for reasons unknown, focuses solely on me.

So many eyes on me made me feel slightly awkward, so I forced myself to add.

With the brightest smile I could muster.

“Really, it’s nothing much, right?”

At that moment, a voice, almost a scream, erupted towards me.

“Hey, you crazy son of a b*tch!!!”

She was a mint-colored magical girl.

What the hell is with this one now.

Did her magical girl-ness trigger a mental breakdown?

All magical girls are psychos, as I suspected.

Oblivious to my inner musings, the mint-colored magical girl’s voice strained.

“Just what were you thinking, doing something like that!”

“Nah, I wasn’t really thinking anything…”

“You weren’t thinking? Huh?! How could you not be thinking!”

I couldn’t understand it.

What got under her skin so badly that she’s this angry?

When you get down to it, I’m purely a victim here.

But there was something even more incomprehensible.

“Sunbae, I’m a little sorry to say this after telling you, but still, this isn’t right.”

Sora was looking at me, clearly showing her discomfort. She even started to distance herself, little by little.

I was dumbfounded.

Shouldn’t she at least be on my side?

“You’re the one who told me to do it.”

“Y-yeah, but I didn’t think it would be to this extent!”

As if Sora wasn’t enough, now even Whitedog, who’d been silently observing the situation, started talking to me.

“Blackie…not a human.”

“Are you saying Black people aren’t people? Don’t you think you’re going a little too far this time?”

“No, really, not a human! It’s not me being far, it’s Blackie!”

At this point, I was truly wronged.

Sora was scolding me, and Whitedog was showing the depths of racism.

The present world isn’t much different from this other world.

Meaning, I have no one on my side.

At that moment, the mint-colored magical girl screamed at me again.

“How could you do such a wicked thing!”

Who the hell did something wicked?

At least, not me.

“And you call yourself human? Pulling a stunt like that on a poor old woman!”

“What’s so poor about that old hag.”

“Do you even have the right to call her that?! Think back on the things you said!”

Now the mint-colored magical girl even had tears welling up in her eyes.

Still dissatisfied, but I decided to think back on the things I’d said, for the time being.

If she’s appealing like that, there must be something to it.

“Hm.”

If I just extract the statements, it was roughly like this.

I kicked an old woman who sells wild greens.

An old woman who was not only poor but also had trouble moving.

To top it off, I even told her that if she was old, she should just die quietly.

Just looking at the content, I’m a complete b*stard.

But to survive in this other world, it can’t be helped. Someone has to acknowledge that all my actions are perfectly justifiable self-defense─

“Huh?!”

Ah, damn it. Wait a minute.

“Do you understand a little now? Do you understand! Even if we’re villains, we wouldn’t do something like that!”

Only then did I suddenly realize.

Why everyone was reacting to me like that.

Thinking about it again, the explanation was far too insufficient.

Even answering every single thing that didn’t even need to be answered, while not saying a single thing about the reasons behind it.

Just listening to the words, wouldn’t I just sound like a goddamn b*stard?

“Ah, ah, no! Wait! It’s not some weird thing you guys are thinking!”

I belatedly tried to make excuses. At this rate, I’d be irredeemably trash.

Yeah. Not just a villain, but utter garbage.

Assault, theft, torture, fraud, murder → A true villain.

Bullying a poor, sick old woman → A piece of shit.

So now I was desperately pleading my case.

“It’s complicated to explain, but anyway, it’s not like I wanted to do it! It was all self-defense!”

No matter how much I didn’t care about how others saw me, I had no intention of being socially buried.

But it was impossible.

“What do you mean, no!”

“That old woman was a real villain!”

“You’re the villain, you son of a b*tch!”

“No, I have my reasons! I didn’t do it on purpose! Really!”

“But a minute ago you said you weren’t even thinking!”

No matter how I tried to explain, I couldn’t get a word in edgewise, not with them snapping at everything I said.

“Look, on my first day in this world, some grandma I never saw before suddenly tried to stab me for no reason! I had no choice!”

“How could a poor, sick old woman do something like that to a stranger! Even if that’s true, you must have done something stupid to provoke her!”

Even when I barely managed to get an explanation out, they wouldn’t hear it.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to go.

How did things turn out like this?

“Woah, shit.”

At that moment, a single curse word rang out of nowhere.

Just three syllables. A truly light remark, easily dismissed as nothing.

But.

No one dismissed it lightly.

Not the magical girls who had been picking a fight with us.

Not Whitie and Sora, who had been scolding me.

And certainly not me.

It was inevitable.

“I’m so dumbfounded, I can’t even speak. Can you even call yourself human after that?”

Because the one speaking was the monster.

Yes.

The monster that Whitie and I had subdued.

That monster was lying on the ground, speaking. Despite not even having a mouth, his head just a flowerpot, he was speaking perfectly clearly.

And it wasn’t some twisted voice, like the roars or screams that typical monsters let out.

He spoke in a clear voice, in human language.

At that moment, a voice came again from the head that was just a flowerpot.

“What the fuck, what kind of son of a b*tch is this?”

An utterly unforeseen situation.

While no one besides the grotesque thing dared to speak, Sora, only Sora, burst out in a fluster.

“W-wait a minute! How can a freak even talk!”

But the creature didn’t react at all to Sora’s shrill voice.

“Hey, even for me, that’s a bit much.”

It simply continued to complain to *me*.

“How the hell is it there’s someone here more messed up than a guy like me? Driving me nuts, for real.”

Though it had no eyes, I somehow felt like it was glaring daggers at me.

“Live like a human being, for crying out loud.”

I was genuinely flabbergasted.

Okay, I admit it. Maybe I didn’t exactly phrase things perfectly. I fully understand that my lack of explanation led to misunderstandings.

But wasn’t this going too far?

Wasn’t it enough that I was surrounded by lunatics who called themselves magical girls? Now even this monster, who was supposed to be nothing more than the enemy, was giving me grief.

Besides, coming from a guy with a bonsai tree growing out of his head, who was he to lecture anyone about being human?

This time, I couldn’t just let it slide.

“Hey, you son of a b*tch! There’s a reason for everything I—!”

“I can’t stand the sight of you any longer.”

But before I could even finish my sentence, the creature shook its head.

“Let’s not meet again, you piece of trash.”

And then, it promptly offed itself.

– *BANG!*

Using Whitedress’s magic wand.

Whitedress had her finger on the wand’s trigger, but the creature pushed her finger, causing the magic to fire.

A succession of completely incomprehensible events.

The freak was talking.

It even committed suicide with a magic wand.

Because the flow of events was so unpredictable, for reasons no one could fathom, everyone remained silent.

Everyone except for two.

“Oh! My kill!”

Whitedress, letting out a joyful cheer filled with delight.

And then.

“Son of a b*tch…”

I exhaled the curse, thick with weariness.

My initiation as a magical girl had ended with a monster’s suicide.

What a fucked up day.