Transformation or Death-Chapter 187

Training (9)

Orange Altair rose with her legs trembling.

“I really said it… I was betrayed… I’ll be scolded later… No, I might just die here today… Ah, did I say something unnecessary….”

Spitting out courageous words and then regretting them was truly like her. Could this situation be salvaged?

No, let’s think about that later. Orange Altair gathered her terrified expression and nocked an arrow to her bowstring.

“Ha. What a mess.”

The Archer looked at her and sneered.

“What difference is there between a nutcase and another nutcase hanging out together?”

“Shut up! You villain!”

With her trembling hands, she raised her bow and shouted confidently.

“I am the arrow that reaches the stars! Orange Altair!”

Her catchphrase once acknowledged by this villain. She uttered it to calm her racing heart.

I can do this… I can do this…

“Can an arrow not even properly aimed cause any damage!”

The Archer provoked, plucking the bowstring. Once again, an arrow comparable to a missile flew.

“…Ugh!”

Orange Altair reacted a beat late, plucking her bowstring. A much inferior arrow flew and struck his arrow, though it only slightly slowed its momentum rather than completely breaking it.

Ting! The arrow, its momentum reduced, was deflected by Watcher’s axe.

“Step back.”

Helping her was appreciated. But he was far too massive an opponent for her. One must know their own limits.

Challenging something while knowing you’ll fail isn’t courage, but recklessness, stubbornness, and bravado.

“Aren’t you shaking. I’m fine.”

“No!”

Orange Altair knew too. Her top priority had always been her own life. As such, she wasn’t unaware that she was being reckless right now.

“I’m the ‘nutcase’ he mentioned! I don’t know when to back down, I’m stubborn, and I’m moody!”

“….”

“Isn’t my life at stake right now? Am I in a position to worry about others? You should preserve that noble body…!”

Orange Altair raised her bow without hiding her trembling hands.

“Someday, I will pierce your neck. I can’t die right now!”

Ping! As her hand left the bowstring, the wind was torn. The arrow cried even more sharply than before.

The reason she didn’t leave, knowing it was recklessness, was simple.

Debt and grudge.

What she had received and what was taken from her. What needed to be returned and received. Between her and him, such things existed.

The one who rescued her when she was sinking into depression was not a comrade but an enemy, and shamefully, this was a debt of gratitude.

However, he was an enemy who caused chaos in society and humiliated countless magical girls. This was a grudge.

Therefore, Orange Altair’s answer to repaying her debt was simple.

Become great enough to be acknowledged, and someday defeat him.

This was why she was being reckless right now.

“No! That’s my job!”

Kwang! A flame kick adding power to her arrow. Brilliantly increasing the arrow’s lethality. The unprepared Archer couldn’t react.

Botis stepped in and deflected the arrow with her great sword. It seemed heavy for her too, as she was slightly pushed back. Had she not deflected it, it would have caused meaningful damage to them.

Tsk. With her surprise attack failing, the flame girl descended, clicking her tongue. She turned back and winked at Watcher.

“Hello! I’m Red Vega, who reached your heart like a red comet!”

Watcher looked at her, bewildered.

“Why are you….”

Certainly, this was not her usual stance of non-intervention.

“Right? I don’t know why I came either!”

Why did she come.

Red Vega herself didn’t quite understand. He was her rival. She shouldn’t help him. She should believe he could overcome the crisis himself.

This was correct and showed proper respect to her opponent.

But ultimately, she came anyway. To help him.

“I received a Scorpion from sister Sirius! She explained a bit about the interconnected relationships and Scorpions!”

Was it unbelievable? Or was her sense of justice shaken by the accumulated feelings between them? She had strayed from the path of a proper magical girl.

“My life is at stake! How could I, your student, rival, friend, and enemy, not get involved in something like this?!”

So, she made an excuse.

Because they had multiple relationships beyond being rivals. This sortie was for that purpose, so it wasn’t awkward.

“I will take your neck! It would be inconvenient if you died before that!”

Later, when she becomes a greater magical girl and confronts him, she must be the one to defeat him. So this was unavoidable.

There were many excuses. They were even somewhat convincing.

Especially the excuse that she alone should defeat him – isn’t this the most typical relationship between a magical girl and her rival, and isn’t it cool?

But honestly, she now wasn’t sure if she could kill him when that time came.

These deliberations shouldn’t exist if she were to awaken her sacred potential. A hero should be cold to create peace.

‘I’ve already come, so there’s nothing I can do!’

Regrets could be considered later. Red Vega clenched her fist. There was fear, but no hesitation.

“Oh right. Sister Sirius told me to tell you: ‘This settles our debt’.”

If her contact hadn’t been there in the first place, they wouldn’t have come either. Without knowing the circumstances, they couldn’t obtain a motivation to move.

“…Heh.”

Watcher laughed.

Countless debts and grudges saw him off at the very end of his life.

These debts were the trajectory of his life.

Joo Ah-yoon protecting his narrow path, Ara’s current recklessness, Baek Ah-hee’s contradiction, Yoon Seol-hwa’s repayment – all of this was the life he had walked.

Their appearance was utterly unexpected, but this coincidence gave him the driving force to live.

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It sounded like the path he had walked so far was not wrong.

“Well, the future great hero is going!”

“The, the future great hero is going!”

They stepped forward before Watcher, surrounding him protectively. The backs of these two small girls, much smaller than him, somehow looked larger.

“…Go ahead.”

With Red Vega’s mumble, thunder roared. The sounds of swords rushing, arrows cutting through the wind, and flames rising decorated the aftermath.

***

Ippotranslation

***

Receiving help from numerous people, he moved forward.

The thunderous sound was as ferocious as a beast, biting the neck of another beast.

He caught the next Scorpion. Ridiculously and sadly, this too was a clone.

It seemed like some kind of trick.

Now, literally, there was no way back. This was his task. Fifty-fifty probability. It had become no different from gambling.

The problem was that the stakes were too high. Failure meant certain death, and potentially world destruction.

Who would do such gambling?

‘I’ll do it, damn it.’

Watcher swallowed his curse and moved his foot towards the next target. The moment he took a step, he felt dizzy.

His body, exhausted from fighting without rest, found even such a small movement burdensome, and he momentarily lost balance and fell.

“…Huh.”

Exhaling a heavy sigh, he raised his body. Using his axe as a cane to support himself, he forcibly lifted his completely drained legs.

“You look tired.”

A girl blocked his path. Watcher looked up at the girl.

Normally, with her quite small height, he wouldn’t have needed to look up, but now, as he was hunched over, his line of sight had changed.

A small girl who looked around ten years old. Among everyone he’d met so far, she had the appearance least suited to a battlefield.

Helios.

“I don’t have the energy to deal with you.”

“I don’t need the energy to deal with me. I just need the energy to deal with the Scorpion.”

She grabbed Watcher’s arm and helped him up. Given her size, she wasn’t much help, but his two legs did touch the ground again. Watcher raised himself. Now with the correct line of sight, he looked down at her.

“Two remain?”

Yellow Castor. She was sharing information with magical girls in real-time. Particularly, the battle between Watcher and the Scorpion, with its massive starlight exchange, was something she never missed.

By calculating the number of battles and the remaining clones of the Scorpion, the result automatically came to two.

“This is serious. At this rate, you’ll lose all the Scorpions to me. Are you going to die young?”

Contrary to her words, her face was a calm, expressionless one, making it hard to tell if she was serious.

“Are you going to interfere?”

“It depends on interpretation. If it’s interference, then interference. If it’s help, then help. Should I call it a deal?”

Helios proposed, looking up at him without changing her expression.

“Let me knock down one of the remaining two. Then I won’t interfere.”

“That’s not a deal, that’s a threat.”

“No? It’s a deal.”

She denied it as calmly as her expression.

“You’re tired. Can you handle both of these Scorpions?”

“I don’t need to….”

Watcher tried to object but swallowed his words.

‘…No, I do.’

There was no guarantee that the next Scorpion he would catch would be the main body. One must always consider the worst-case scenario. If he accidentally catches a clone, the true main body might awaken.

But what if he takes down both Scorpions? If he kills them before the main body awakens?

‘It’s possible.’

Certain death is the worst-case scenario, but world destruction can be prevented.

Of course, world destruction was just a hypothetical. But it was a confirmed matter that it would cause significant damage.

“…This is a matter of life and death. Can’t I take over everything?”

“You’re selfish.”

“I should be selfish at times like these.”

Helios let out a small laugh. The moment her expressionless face broke.

“You’re right. That’s why I’m selfish too.”

But she immediately erased her smile and encouragingly patted Watcher’s shoulder.

“This is also a matter of life and death for me.”

“…? Didn’t you just have your time stolen?”

“Ah, so that’s what you thought. No wonder your reaction was strange.”

Helios moved her lips lightly, as if discussing something trivial, like making small talk.

The content was far from trivial.

In fact, even in the original work, there was a sense of dissonance. In her last monologue before dying, she seemed to know that she had to die.

In some ways, it looked like regret from the battle with the Scorpion ten years ago, where she had to stake her life to kill it.

But that wasn’t it.

“The time I lost wasn’t just simple age, but the period of my life.”

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