Chapter 7 : Chapter 7
Chapter 07: Fine Then—You Have No Magic, and I Have No Magic Either!
There had originally been some author rambling here.
Considering the later reading experience, it was deleted.
It was not removed completely in order to prevent paragraph comments from going out of alignment.
As mentioned before, Chang Rong had been an utterly ordinary student whose character model had been regrettably low-detail. Clearly, he bore no resemblance whatsoever to the white-haired boy in the mirror, whose anime-style refinement was hardly inferior to that of the other prospective witches.
“Even if the spawn point was complete trash, the default character design is not bad. It would have been even better if I could have gone with a broad-shouldered heartthrob style. No, actually, that probably would have made my art style clash even harder with everyone else’s.”
Chang Rong muttered to himself while striking JoJo poses in front of the mirror.
It seemed this scammy transmigration system was not entirely useless after all. At the very least, it had known to pick him a decent skin. After all, if he had been dropped into this setting looking the way he had before transmigrating, the result probably would have been something like one of those faceless mob extras from bad doujinshi.
Although he had apparently lost ten centimeters of height compared to his original body, his current size did not seem to affect his movements much. The reduction in bodily discomfort was probably one of the standard bonuses that came with transmigration too, just like the crash-course Japanese.
“Yo, Classmate Nikaido, do you still have anything else you want to ask me? This young master knows all and tells all.”
—After muttering to himself at the mirror for half the day, he suddenly turned around and started talking to me with this bizarrely punchable confidence and a different manner of speaking...
Hiro frowned as she looked at Chang Rong. Based on the evidence presently available, she could not determine whether this fellow had always been a complete lunatic, or whether he had just stepped outside and been possessed by Reiya—Prince Charming herself.
“I have no interest in questioning an idiot.”
Hiro waved her hand impatiently, indicating that she could no longer be bothered dealing with her dear fellow inmate.
“Then I actually have a few questions. Could Classmate Nikaido answer them for me?”
“Go ask someone else.”
“You are idle anyway.”
“I am the one who was treated as a suspect and is waiting to be executed, not you!” Hiro snapped harshly, her brows tightly drawn. In her eyes, Chang Rong’s “frivolous” attitude was practically the same as picking a fight on purpose.
“Then let’s sort through this case together. Think of it as preparing in advance for the witch trial, all right?”
Although Hiro hissed at him yet again, Chang Rong’s attitude this time was much more resolute, as though he had already decided to stick to her no matter what.
“...Did Emma Sakura say something to you? Something like, ‘Please help Hiro-chan, she must be feeling helpless right now,’ perhaps?”
Judging from the white-haired boy’s abnormal behavior, Hiro roughly guessed that during the brief interval between his getting out of the dungeon and being thrown back in, he must have had a short conversation with Emma.
Emma Sakura... a thoroughly hypocritical creature. A weak and shameful creature. A twisted and evil creature.
“I do not know the full situation between you two, but Classmate Sakura has been taking care of me the whole time, and she is genuinely worried about you.”
“That is nothing but a disgusting mask she wears. As for this case, what exactly do you know?”
Hiro gave a cold snort and shifted the topic, accepting Chang Rong’s suggestion. It was hard to tell whether she simply did not want to discuss Emma Sakura, or whether she had actually been moved by Chang Rong’s sincerity.
“Hmm... The room was white, someone was dead inside it, and you were lying on the floor too.”
“And then?”
“The room was pretty spacious.”
“Go and take a crash course in converting images into words, then find yourself a corner to squat in and stop bothering me...!”
“Eek?!”
Hiro hissed again.
—What exactly did he come here for!? What is even the point of exchanging information when his intelligence is this swamp-brained? But speaking of information, I do not have any information either.
Hiro clenched her teeth and furrowed her brow. That sense of ignorance—having no means whatsoever to resist the execution drawing near, and no understanding whatsoever of the case itself—made her grow increasingly anxious.
Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip—
For a while, the once-noisy confinement room fell deathly silent, leaving only the sound of water dripping in the corner, like a tightening noose slowly drawing closed around Hiro’s neck.
“Haa...”
After an unknown amount of time, Nikaido Hiro let out a long, heavy sigh, as though she had finally been defeated by herself. Then she rose and walked over to where Chang Rong was sitting blankly in the corner.
“What are you doing?”
Hiro looked down at the white-haired boy curled up in the corner and asked him.
“Counting dust while wondering whether I am actually the male protagonist of Gal Game.”
—As usual, I have no idea what he is talking about. And yet, strangely enough, that makes me feel a little more at ease.
Hiro leaned back against the table behind her, the one covered in all manner of peculiar tools, and folded her arms across her chest.
“If what you said earlier is true, then right now you probably do not even understand why a murder happened in the first place. That ignorance is 【incorrect】, so—what is it you want to know?”
“Ohh, Classmate Nikaido!”
The moment Hiro主动 opened a topic with him, Chang Rong instantly perked up and hurried to his feet.
—For some reason, this felt like a scene I had seen many times before. Only, Emma Sakura was more like a puppy, while this one...
Without showing any outward reaction, Hiro gave Chang Rong a measured look and finally let her gaze settle on the long white side-locks hanging down to his shoulders.
A lop-eared rabbit...?
“Classmate Sakura said everyone here is a ‘prospective witch.’ What exactly is a witch? And earlier, when you and Classmate Hasumi—the ‘Prince’—were talking, what was that ‘witchification’ you mentioned?”
Chang Rong did not bother circling around the issue. He intended to squeeze out as much information as he could before this hissing mushroom of destruction started hissing again.
“You are starting with something that basic... 【Prospective Witch】 is the collective term for people who possess compatibility with 【Witch Factor】. Those people are generally capable of using the abnormal, non-scientific power known as ‘magic.’ As for Witch Factor, you may think of it as something like an influenza virus. It can spread and infect others, but not everyone who is infected will go on to manifest the corresponding symptoms. According to the records I know of, the number of witches who successfully activate Witch Factor is extremely small—small enough to be concealed by government agencies and allowed to circulate only in a limited way as urban legends at most. In practice, that is exactly what they have done: secretly testing for Witch Factor, taking carriers into custody, and suppressing public discussion. This prison island exists precisely to detain 【Prospective Witches】.”
“So, Classmate Nikaido and Classmate Sakura are both superpowered people?” Chang Rong immediately extracted what he saw as the key point.
“Unfortunately, I possess no magic whatsoever. My being here is most likely due to government negligence. I do not know how they screen for Witch Factor carriers, but I imagine the accuracy is not one hundred percent,” Hiro replied flatly, spreading her hands.
“As for Emma Sakura, she claims she has no magic either, but I do not think the government’s accuracy could possibly be that low. She is most likely hiding something.”
“Maybe she has some stylish ability like Imagine Breaker, something cool that normally does not show up at a glance—wait, in that case, am I not the greatest possible evidence of government incompetence? They were trying to arrest witches and somehow hauled in a guy instead. They even managed to arrest the wrong species!”
Chang Rong had gotten halfway through imagining Emma Sakura having a dazzling hidden ability before finally realizing that he did not seem connected to the idea of witches at all.
The original owner of this body appeared to have been a genuine old hand on this prison island.
Which meant that, from the government’s side, they really had arrested a man and thrown him in here before.
“As for that—there is actually no evidence proving that men cannot be infected with Witch Factor. And you definitely possess magic. Otherwise, there is no explaining the condition Xueli and Hanna found you in,” Hiro said, sounding wholly unsurprised by the idea of Chang Rong being a ‘male witch.’
Rather than that, the very existence of ‘witches’ was already far too mysterious. Who knew what kinds of things that category might include?
“Me? But I honestly do not know what sort of bizarre ability I have. Come to think of it, what exactly did I look like when you found me?” Chang Rong looked down at his hands. They did not look like the sort of hands that could launch fireballs, nor the sort that could gather a shockwave punch.
“You can ask Xueli about the details later. She is the blue-haired one with the magnifying glass. She and Tono Hanna were the ones who brought you out. In any case, I am certain that you must have used some kind of magic in order to ‘come back from the dead.’ Perhaps your magic is precisely 【Back from the Dead】 itself—”
After saying that, Hiro glanced at Chang Rong, but did not see even the slightest shift in expression on the white-haired boy’s face.
—Looks like Nikaido has taken me, this supposed veteran—or rather, this old frozen relic—for some witch whose magic is powerful enough to win a revival match. Unfortunately for her, my revival mechanism is nothing more than “transmigration taking over an account.” Of course, even if I said that, she probably would not believe me.
It was not that Chang Rong was especially wary of others and deliberately hiding information.
He simply felt that no one would buy a story like that.
“But this is strange. From the sound of it, these are basically just people with superpowers. Is there really any need for a nationwide manhunt and imprisonment on this scale?”
After listening to her explanation, Chang Rong could not help feeling that the government was overreacting a little. What was the point of making such a huge fuss? Or was there some other purpose behind it?
“No. According to what that warden said, 【Prospective Witches】 and 【Witches】 are two things that resemble each other only superficially.”
Nikaido Hiro frowned slightly and continued her tutorial.
“【Prospective Witches】 are humans who possess immature magical power. But 【Witches】... if what that owl said was true, then a 【Witch】 is a symbol of calamity: an inhuman, twisted, immortal existence that knows only how to destroy and kill everything indiscriminately.”
Hiro’s tone gradually grew heavier.
“The process by which a 【Prospective Witch】 transforms into a 【Witch】 is what is known as 【Witchification】. During this process, although the prospective witch’s magic, constitution, and physical strength all increase, her original personality is also gradually overtaken by extreme emotions. She may even... develop an irresistible urge to kill.”
“To kill...”
“I had originally thought that was nothing more than an empty threat. But you have already seen the result, have you not?”
Hiro looked at Chang Rong, demanding a response from the white-haired boy.
“This murder case...?” Chang Rong swallowed hard as he answered.
“Bingshang Meruru was murdered. I do not care whether she was some so-called ‘mastermind.’ I only know that one prospective witch did undergo witchification, that she was dominated by the urge to kill, and that she carried out a murder because of it. That thing is an incorrect existence. It is evil. It is filth that must be cleaned away. In that case—I will drag that witch out into the open, send it to the gallows with my own hands, and witness that thing’s death with my own eyes.”
“Witches are evil, but I am not. I will correct this world and set it back on the proper path. To that end, I will kill witches—I will kill every last witch.”
“...”
Chang Rong stood perfectly still, able only to watch as Nikaido Hiro opened her blood-red eyes wide and delivered a speech like some conquest-mad tyrant proclaiming universal extermination.
At that moment, this “something” teetering at the edge of madness and obsession bore no resemblance whatsoever to the dignified, rational, Yamato Nadeshiko-like girl he had seen only minutes earlier.
The Nikaido Hiro before him was more like a car racing down a highway with the accelerator pinned to the floor, somehow maintaining an impossibly fragile balance as though it were already half-lifted from the road.
All it would take was one tiny stone—one utterly insignificant pebble, one fleeting thought.
And the vehicle called “Nikaido Hiro” would crash instantly into an irretrievable ruin.
From the knowledge he had just learned, that stone happened to be called “witchification.”
Looking at the unfamiliar Nikaido Hiro in front of him, Chang Rong suddenly realized something.
—This prison island was built to confine prospective witches. In other words... if a “prospective witch” landmine girl like Nikaido was one of them... then around me... there were still... eleven more?
Good lord.