The only reason they were here was because Hayoon was here.
“So?”
I finally spoke to the other kids.
“What do you plan to do now?”
I tried to sound as irritating as possible.
“Why? What did you come here for? To make peace or something?”
None of the kids replied, not even Hayoon.
Strangely enough, none of them seemed angry at my words.
Even though, to them, I must be the villain in this story.
Yet here I was, a villain taunting them, and they were just sitting quietly, enduring it.
“If you want to go back, just say so. I’ll give you back your circuits and send you off somewhere in Seoul or wherever. Honestly, there’s no reason for you to be here anyway.”
I repeated myself, but this time the kids just looked at Hayoon.
“What, did you run away from home? Got sick of the Federation?”
I forced myself to turn and face Hayoon.
Her expression was slightly crumbling.
I had achieved my goal, but there was no satisfaction in it.
“Hayoon.”
“So what? Are you going to say something like, ‘Now that you know the truth, what will you do’?”
“Yeah.”
This time, Rose answered instead of Hayoon, as if she couldn’t stand my whining anymore.
“Seohui unnie.”
“Hayoon, you need to say something. You can’t just stay silent forever.”
Rose stiffly turned to me, forcing the words out.
“You’re right. About the terrorist incident…
…we know it wasn’t you.”
“Oh? Did you finally catch the real culprit? Or did you find undeniable evidence proving I wasn’t the one?”
No, that’s not it.
“You didn’t know from the beginning?”
That was it.
The reason I had been so angry.
The reason I had to go this far.
At least when it came to that incident, I wasn’t in the wrong.
I wasn’t a murderer.
Serving a few years in prison or being protected by youth laws wasn’t the issue.
People died in that terrorist incident.
Too many were injured.
But at least…
As someone who opposed magical girls and indirectly got entangled in corporate schemes, at least…
At least I didn’t kill anyone.
“I was there. We all were.”
I had been furious just moments ago, but as I spoke, my anger seemed to cool, replaced by an eerie calm.
Like an overloaded circuit, my emotions seemed to overflow and then stabilize.
“But no one said anything.”
At my words, Rose bit her lip slightly, as if something had struck a nerve.
Then she spoke, wringing the words out like squeezing water from a dry cloth.
“We wanted to speak up.”
“Even so, it’s too late now.”
“I know.”
Rose replied.
“You knew, and yet you still did this?”
I asked, incredulous.
“Your brilliant idea was to follow someone hiding in the middle of nowhere? You could’ve gone to the Federation and defended me. Or given an interview to the press. Or at least gone to the orphanage to protect the kids.”
I knew this was all just me projecting blame onto them.
But even so—
I couldn’t just accept everything so easily.
Too much had happened in such a short amount of time.
I still didn’t know if Ji-hye was okay.
They had torn her apart because of me, and the media didn’t even care about what she had gone through.
Instead, they sniffed around her school, throwing my name into their vile speculation about whether I was a [perpetrator or victim?].
“And now, what’s your plan? Did you think following me would magically solve everything? Is this what you thought helping me would look like?”
I said to Rose.
“Weren’t you just running away too? You didn’t want to face the fight; you just wanted to escape and do nothing. You didn’t speak up because you were afraid of being criticized, weren’t you?”
If the magical girls had testified, my situation might have changed.
But they couldn’t have done that.
If they had, I wouldn’t have ended up here in the first place.
“So—”
“Jieun.”
Before I could finish, Hayoon spoke.
“…It’s my fault.”
At her words, everyone’s eyes turned to her, including mine.
Hayoon hugged her knees, her expression on the verge of tears.
“It’s all my fault. If I had stepped forward…”
Seeing her like that, I felt like I couldn’t breathe.
“I thought—I thought I could help you. I thought you could have a fair trial.”
“That’s…”
I wanted to respond, but the words wouldn’t come.
I was suffocating, as if my heart had stopped beating altogether.
So Hayoon had been thinking that all along.
“I thought I could go out there and testify for you. So I just…”
I was scared of what she might say next, so I stood up abruptly.
Stomping loudly, I walked out.
The soles of my shoes were caked in dirt, and it smeared across the plastic sheets the kids had worked so hard to lay down.
But I didn’t have the bandwidth to care about that.
I slid open the old door and stepped out, pushing aside the plastic sheeting.
The cold night air hit me, and I breathed it in over and over.
My fingertips trembled violently.
I knew.
I knew Hayoon might have thought that way.
She believed in justice, after all.
She was a magical girl.
A girl who never gave up hope in humanity.
If I had a fair trial, and Hayoon testified, I could’ve been acquitted.
I pressed a hand to my chest, taking deep breaths.
Maybe if Hayoon had testified, things wouldn’t have gone so far.
Maybe she would’ve come to get me before things turned serious.
Maybe none of this would’ve happened if I had accepted her help.
But even so—
—I didn’t want that.
Because I wanted to stand as her equal.
No.
The truth was, I wanted to be above her.
Like the protagonists in those reincarnation novels, I wanted to become her indispensable ally, her unrivaled partner, and ultimately, the one who held everything.
Wasn’t that why I resisted her help?
The thought sickened me.
It felt like someone was whispering those ugly truths right into my ear.
“Jieun.”
I turned around at the voice.
Hayoon was looking at me with a worried expression.
When our eyes met, her face turned pale.
I was panting.
When Hayoon took a step toward me, I instinctively stepped back.
“Ji-Jieun, I’m sorry. I just—”
Thud.
My legs gave out, and I collapsed to the ground.
“Jieun!?”
Hayoon ran over and caught me.
She supported my back with one arm and lifted my upper body with the other.
Her embrace was warm.
Just like earlier today when she hugged me from behind.
And that terrified me.
I hated myself for dragging her into this mess.
I hated myself for resenting her even in this situation.
And I hated myself for feeling relieved that she was here.
“…Let go.”
I forced the words out as I tried to catch my breath.
“Jieun, I just—”
“I said, let go.”
I shoved Hayoon’s hands away with all the strength I could muster.
And then I staggered to my feet.
I stared straight at Hayoon.
As if overwhelmed by my gaze, Hayoon shrank back slightly.
I forced my mind to keep turning.
“You said you’d do anything, didn’t you?”
I deliberately took a step closer to her.
Hayoon didn’t retreat.
Even with a slightly fearful expression, she stood her ground and looked up at me.
I took another step closer.
“Then, cooperate.”
Even when I stood right in front of her,
Even when our faces were so close that we could feel each other’s breath,
Hayoon didn’t flinch.
My heart pounded violently.
To hide that,
I whispered, almost threateningly:
“I want all of you to help me with my revenge.”
Hayoon looked up at me.
Her fearful expression—
The kind of face that seemed ready to crumble at the slightest touch—
Yet she still didn’t back down.
I didn’t like that.
It scared me a little.
Hayoon nodded.
“At least, I’ll do what I can.”
For a long moment, the two of us simply stood there, staring at each other.