The four of us exited the White Cube together. Aside from the girl herself, three of us, myself included, had seen the Purple Lightning’s magic. One of them was a receptionist there, who said it had apparently broken their records.
“I never imagined her magic would be that powerful...”
The guildmaster with the moustache, whatshisname, was left speechless.
The purple lightning she had let off had distorted the surface of the White Cube’s wall, like movement disturbing the surface of a lake. I suppose that definitely would be considered out of the ordinary.
When I glanced over her way again, I found the Purple Lightning happily discussing something with the receptionist. Well, no, it seemed like the receptionist was the only one talking. She was actually a pretty young receptionist, now that I looked. I suppose that young girl may not have had many chances to talk to anyone near her age. Despite being able to let off that powerful of a volley of lightning, she was apparently no match for the receptionist’s uninhibited nature.
Haha, it made for a charming sight.
Suddenly, things grew frantic around the guild’s entrance.
“H-Help us! Forest wolves, they... they snuck into our town, Cardiff!!”
The young receptionist’s expression instantly grew serious as she listened to the details from the man who had come running in. From what I overheard, there was a town called Cardiff to the west of here, and apparently several forest wolves had slipped past their barrier fence. Those things were way stronger than normal wolves. When there were more than three of them in a pack, their teamwork got to be real troublesome.
“This is bad, Guildmaster... It’s been getting warm lately, so all the adventuring parties are out on campaigns. It’ll be tricky trying to find someone to take such an urgent quest. Let’s put a call out for solo adventurers and try to build a party!”
“H-Hey! Please, I’m begging you! There’s lots of the things, and they’re huge! We can’t do a thing about them! You need to hurry! Please!”
“Calm down and listen. There’s a lot of people out on a quest to handle some goblins, and it’s really far from here. Even if we were to call them back, it would take some time...”
“T-That can’t be...”
“Should... I go?” the girl (who at some point had wandered over beside me) suddenly eked out. “If it’s just forest wolves, it’ll be easy. I could blow them to pieces... really quickly.”
“W-What’re you saying, little miss...? The wolves that came into our town are thiiiis big, and there’s a number of them! Seriously, that joke’s in poor taste... Just head on back home, little miss...”
This man from the neighboring town had no idea of her power. But even the teamwork between forest wolves that would normally take several parties to overcome would be nothing in the face of her lightning.
No, wait, there was something that bothered me, though. When he told her to “head on back home,” the Purple Lightning’s expression clearly grew cloudy.
“I... don’t... want to... go back...”
She said it so quietly, only I could hear her. But that was enough for me to tell.
This girl had been enjoying our trip. It was nothing but a round trip north and west in a carriage. When I took this girl back north, I’d likely be returning her to days of being treated coldly as nothing but a rare test subject. She may not even have another chance like this to so much as go outside. Alright...
The old me never would have done something like this. But when you get to be an old geezer like me, you’re supposed to be at least a bit of a softy, right?
I practically threw some money at the driver, got atop a horse, and ran, ran, ran to the west. The little girl in front of me looked surprised by the shaking she could feel from atop the creature’s back. I gripped the reins and yelled, “Your trip isn’t over just yet!”
“...!”
As the scenery flew by around us, she turned back and looked at me with her shining, light purple eyes.
When we made it to Cardiff, I could hardly sense anyone around.
The town was right near Donius. It couldn’t have been more than three or four hors since the forest wolves snuck inside...
It took a few hors to get from Cardiff to Donius, even on horseback. But I could see some simple wooden barricades here and there throughout town. The entrances to the buildings were crudely barred.
I see, so they evacuated up to higher ground... Looks like there was someone in this small town who knew what they were doing when it came to monsters.
I got down off the horse, then helped the girl to the ground. It would’ve been nice if we hadn’t come on an unfamiliar horse, but we did what we had to.
“There’s... nobody around... Were... they eaten?”
“Don’t just go saying stuff like that. They’re hiding up above and being as quiet as they can. That was a good call.”
“...Right. Let’s look... for the wolves.”
We walked along through the town. It was so silent, it felt like time was standing still.
Baaaaaaaaaaaam!!!
“Huh?!”
All of a sudden, the Purple Lightning took off running in the direction of that loud sound, and I followed. We arrived at a building and found the forest wolves gathered around it, trying to climb its walls. A flame-wielding woman looked to be fighting back from atop the roof. And there were a lot of places on that building for the wolves to use as footholds. The woman was using some splendid fire magic, but the wolves were still going to be able to rush her. In other words, this battle was proving one-sided. And there probably wasn’t anyone else skilled with magic in this tiny town.
The woman wore a look of disbelief when she noticed me and the girl approaching. Taking advantage of her momentary shock, one of the wolves leapt up the building. A look of shock mingled with anger crossed the woman’s face as she fired off as much flame as she could. The wolf, however, made a mesh out of the vines coming from its body and warded off the attack. It had lost a good bit of the branches composing its body, but the forest wolf was still alive. It was sent flying and landed with a thud right beside the Purple Lightning.
“Watch out!!!”
A young girl’s voice rang out loudly, and it wasn’t that of the Purple Lightning. There was a little blonde girl leaning out of an upper-floor window of another building. Her hair shined like the rays of the sun. Now that I looked closely, the concerned residents of Cardiff were peeking out of other windows, too.
The forest wolves shifted their attention to the prey that had suddenly appeared: me and the Purple Lightning.
The woman on the roof was chanting a spell, a pained expression on her face. I drew my sword.
All that, however, was for naught.
The Purple Lightning lifted up her fair-skinned little hand, and...
“...Goodbye.”
Booooooooooooooom!!!!!!
The lightning fell down upon the forest wolves with a thunderous roar, and in an instant they were reduced to nothing but a pile of twigs.
Silence fell over the scene, and I felt the warmth of the sun’s rays... That was splendid...
For a while, time seemed to stop for all who had seen that sight, myself included.
And now, the Purple Lightning was surrounded by the people of Cardiff. It sure was a crowd. Guess that was only natural, though. I mean, that little girl had gone and saved their town, after all. It was like the place was positively sparkling, overflowing with their smiles.
But the star of the show, the Purple Lightning herself, looked so panicked that you couldn’t help but pity her.
Hmph, aside from that power of hers, she was just a normal, shy little 11-year-old girl. It may have been just a small town, but she still wasn’t able to handle all the sudden praise from almost the entire population at once.
Just as she dashed around behind my back, trembling, the blonde girl appeared.
“Haah... haah... Um...! U-Um...”
I had already noticed back when she screamed out that warning, but this girl had some seriously beautiful golden-colored eyes. Golden hair, and golden eyes... If you were to call the Purple Lightning the moon, then this girl would be the sun. And they looked like they must have been just about the same age, too.
I went and gave the girl hiding behind me a gentle push on the back, bringing about a meeting between the sun and the moon.
“...! U-Um...”
“T-Thank you so much!! You’re, like, seriously amazing!!”
“Ah...!”
“You’re about my age, but you saved everyone just like that, and it was so incredible!”
“R-Right...”
The Purple Lightning stopped trembling and opened her eyes, fascinated by the blonde girl with a smile that seemed to almost sparkle. A girl like the sun, and one like the moon. Both were blushing.
The blonde girl reached out and grabbed the Purple Lightning’s hands.
“Thank you. I’m so glad you came here...”
“Right...”
It was like the two girls holding hands were etching the colors of each other’s eyes into their hearts.
✦ ✦ ✦
The Purple Lightning ended up staring out the window again on the carriage trip back. In my hand, I held the data on her magic that the receptionist from the Donius Guild had measured. Huh...? Unable to detect any mana? That can’t be... What does it mean?
“It was... pretty...”
“...What was?”
“That girl’s hair... and her eyes...”
“Ah, yeah. That’s for sure.”
“I wish... I had asked her name...”
“...!”
This girl... She may have just wanted a friend...
“The people of that town aren’t likely to forget their gratitude to you anytime soon. You can just go ahead and go back there when you’re bigger, and ask her what her name is.”
“...! Do you... really think I can...?”
“I’m sure you will, someday.”
“I’d like... to meet her again...”
You’ve got an old bag of bones like me rooting for you at least, girl. So hopefully one day, the sun and moon will get to meet again.
The scenery outside the carriage steadily shifted from a vibrant green to the pure white of snow...