“If I win, you have to help me protect our world.”
As she spoke, she stared at me with eyes as blue as sapphires.
Her skin was as white and pure as virgin snow. Long hair just as blue as her eyes slid all the way past her hips to her thighs. Held together with a white ribbon, it fluttered in the wind.
Her name was Yukihime Yukigane.
“Sure. If you win.”
“You think you can beat the strongest person in the world?” she asked.
“I don’t care who you are. I have to win this.”
“Does protecting people really sound that bad to you?”
“Yeah, it does. It’s just not for me.”
“...Come on, there’s more to it than that, isn’t there?” Her voice had a twinge of sadness. She must have realized my true feelings about this.
“You already know how I feel, yet you still want me to do as you say. That’s why we’re fighting, right?”
“...Yes, that’s right. I know that you have your own duties, just like how mine is to protect...” Yukihime trailed off. “But I still want you to fight alongside me.”
My duties – Kokuya Kurono’s duties – were to take care of the only family member I had left, my little sister... and to avenge my dead parents.
In order to do this, I needed strength. I needed to become stronger than anyone else. I needed to defeat Yukihime and become the world’s strongest star sorcerer. I had no interest in protecting people, and an avenger like me had no right to take on such a job anyway.
But she wasn’t going to back down just because I said no, which meant I had to fight. And so, I fought...
...and lost.
“Now, fulfill your promise, and help me protect our world.”
“Okay, okay... If you insist.”
As I spoke, I could see Yukihime smiling contentedly, and it made my heart ache a little. If I hadn’t been carrying this burden... would I have been able to walk boldly alongside her, without all this pain? Would I have been able to fight for justice and strive to whole-heatedly fulfill my duty, like Yukihime did?
For some reason, I found myself pondering a meaningless ‘what-if.’