“I’m sorry, and thank you... Dad, Mom...!”
The best parents in the world kindly waited for me to stop crying.
At this point, I was sitting on my mother’s lap. I was small for 15, you see.
“Annie, your hair sure has gotten long, hasn’t it?” Mom said, running her fingers through it.
My hair was the same as Dad’s, which he was so proud of: a light blonde, but very thin. If I tied it up with a ribbon, it would soon slip out of place, which made it tricky to deal with.
“Is it about time that I cut it?”
“That’d be a waste!”
“But if I can’t put it up...”
When I was seated, my hair reached all the way down to my knees. Mom had kept me from cutting it until now and it had kept on growing, but it seemed to be at its limit. Even if I didn’t go a lot shorter, I’d probably need to at least maintain the length.
“And so, my beloved daughter! What sort of bizarre magic did you come up with?”
“I-I didn’t come up with it!”
Don’t talk about it like it was my idea, geez!
...But after hearing that story, I couldn’t keep on hiding things from them. I worked up my nerve and said, “Gearcraft...”
“Gearcraft?” they both asked.
“It’s a skill... to create... gears...”
“Ooh, what’s that?”
“Sounds interesting, doesn’t it?”
“No it doesn’t...”
I raised my hand, palm upward.
Just above it, a metallic disk suddenly appeared.
“Ooh!”
“Oh, my!”
Sproing, sproing, sproing.
Spin, spin, spin.
I had made an impressive gear.
“It’s so pretty, isn’t it?”
“Ahahaha! Hey, it’s spinning! Amazing!”
“But the way it came out all gold-colored like that sure is mysterious, isn’t it?”
“You wouldn’t call it a pale orange?”
“Then it’s golden-orange? It’s so cute, isn’t it?”
“No, I think it’s weird to call a gear ‘cute’...”
I was shocked that they would accept it so easily...
I feel like an idiot for getting so worried.
“So, how many can you make?”
“Huh? I-I don’t know...”
I faced the palm of my other hand upward.
Fwoosh.
Sproing, sproing, sproing.
Spin, spin, spin.
...And now there were two.
“Ahahaha! Great! That’s just great, Anti!”
“Hey! Don’t make fun of me! This is hardly better than a party trick!”
“Ah, it got bigger just now!”
“Huh?!”
“When you yelled, Annie, the gear got bigger for just a second.”
“So you can change the size, too?”
“U-um...”
Woosh!
“Ooh, it expanded!”
“It sure is spinning!”
Oh, I changed the size...
I’d been too depressed to actually try anything before.
Ah, it went back to normal.
“Oh, that’s it! I was wondering where I’d seen that before!”
Mom suddenly lowered me down off her lap and headed off to the second floor. When she returned a bit later, she had a picture book in her hands.
“That’s...”
“You used to love this picture book, didn’t you? The Medium of the Sun.”
Wow, I hadn’t thought of that book in ages! I used to read this all the time...
To sum up the story, The Medium of the Sun went off on some sort of journey, and was helped out by all sorts of people, and protected peace with the power of the sun in some way or another.
“Here, look at this page.”
“I see! It really does look just like it!”
The page Mom had opened to was the last scene. The illustration was of a woman holding up one hand, with a distorted sun above her. The color and shape almost made it look like my gear.
“Wow, it really is similar, isn’t it?”
“Maybe the medium from this book was actually The Medium of the Gear all along!”
“W-what are you saying?!”
“But look, when you put them side by side, don’t they look identical?”
Just as Dad had implied, the official title of this book wasn’t actually The Medium of the Sun. The book was apparently originally found as images in some ruins, which were then studied and finally sold by the publishing guild, becoming a rather famous picture book. The size of the small gear spinning in front of me now and the sun (?) in the picture book were practically the same. Lining them up, they really did look identical.
“But I can’t do anything with this magic!”
“That’s not true at all. You could scramble up some eggs with it, I’m sure.”
“Hey!”
“Ahahaha! Well, I was half-joking there, Anti. But I don’t think it was a mistake that you ended up with that magic.”
“W-why’s that?”
“Well, I can’t really explain it well, but it’s gotta be the color!”
“C-color...?”
“The color of those gears really makes me think of your hair and eyes.”
“That’s true! It really does!”
“So that’s the only reason...?”
“But still, it just looks fitting somehow, having that gear spinning next to you. It’s definitely your skill.”
Hmm, I get the feeling that I’m being coaxed in a weird way...
“And also, Anti, you said that you can’t do anything with your magic, but come over here for a minit.”
“Hnm?”
I followed him outside, through the entrance to the shop.
It was just between between sunset and nighttime. That made for a wonderful sight, but there were people hurrying around to get home before the soon-to-come darkness.
“Take a look at that.”
“...The kids?”
Were they heading back home? They were holding pinwheels made of straw paper.
Spin, spin, spin.
“They’re spinning, right?”
“Yeah? R-right...”
Those are just toys, right?
“And look at that.”
“Alright.”
A carriage? It looked to be in a rush because of the impending darkness.
The wheels screeched a bit as they headed off into the distance.
“They’re spinning, too, aren’t they?”
“Huh? Um, yeah.”
“And then there’s this.”
Dad pointed to the gear spinning by my side. Even now, it was spinning happily along.
“What’re you trying to say?”
“Listen, Anti...”
He had a look on his face that seemed to say “Good grief...”
“Anti, pinwheels spin to bring children joy. Carriage wheels spin to carry people along.”
“...”
“‘Spinning’ brings about different types of power. I was kidding before, but if you stuck that gear into some eggs, you’d have them scrambled in no time. There’s sure to be plenty you can do with it.”
I understood what Dad was trying to say. He meant that it was possible that this power would be of some sort of use.
“I’m happy to hear you say that, Dad. That really may be the case. But I don’t think I’d be able to keep up with the lessons in school with this skill.”
“Ah, right. You’re 15, after all.”
“Yeah. Since all the students in class are 15 now, the lessons will all be about practical skills, and the lectures are getting switched out for self-study. I could make it through with bare minimum honors if I just ace the exams covering our lectures. But I could never go on to higher learning or get a magic-related job.”
“Listen, Anti... The truth is, your mom and I didn’t get you into school because we wanted you to become good at magic.”
“Huh?”
“Back when we were kids, this town wasn’t around yet, so there weren’t many places for kids to meet.”
“We wanted you to make a lot of friends your own age.”
“...”
I wouldn’t call them “friends” so much as “nasty brats” and “mean girls,” but......
“Ahaha, I’ve got no idea who’s got you making that face, but most of the kids in your class come to eat at our place, right? That makes them a pretty good group, wouldn’t you say?”
“I mean, maybe it’s just because I hate them, but I don’t see it that way...”
“You always look like you’re having so much fun when you’re squabbling with everyone, Annie!”
I mean, I’d say the fact that we’re squabbling means that we’re not getting along, though...
“B-but Dad, Mom... I feel bad for you two, but I get the feeling I’m destined to just be the poster girl for the restaurant...”
“Then here’s what we’ll do, Anti.”
“...?”
“This may not be the right way to phrase it, but we don’t care how skilled you are at magic. You’re still a good daughter. And if you’re working in the kitchen, it’d be a huge help!”
“In that case...”
“However, Anti, you can be our poster girl whenever, right?”
“Right. So why not try out other things first?”
“What do you mean?”
“We mean finding out what your little partner spinning by your side can do, and what you can do with that skill.”
“Hehehe.”
This thing is... my partner?
But... that’s true. I’ve got the opportunity, so I should at least give it a bit of a shot.
“Alright... I’ll try things out, at least a little.”