Chapter 299: Could Her True Wish Actually Be...
Translator: imperfectluck Editor: vb24
"Yep, this incident arose from the Story of One Hundred Demons game, which is based on the Night of One Hundred Demons, so maybe it's not an appropriate suggestion. Despite this, I think transforming into Blue Lantern Ghost is a way for you to confront your fears directly." Seiji rubbed his chin. "Sensei, you know about Blue Lantern Ghost, right?"
"I do," Mayuzumi replied. "It's the lantern that's used in ancient times when playing the Story of One Hundred Demons game, right?"
"That's right. Lanterns with blue covers can transform into this type of demon. Some say that they're tiny demons who carry lanterns. Others believe they're young women who like to listen to ghost stories, or female demons who collect ghost stories; in short, there are many different views about this. At any rate, it's a demon with no set appearance."
Seiji's eyes flashed with a strange light. "I personally believe that Blue Lantern Ghost is a beautiful female demon and one of the strongest among all demons! That's because she was born from gathering a hundred ghost stories. If you think about it, isn't that equal to the Night of One Hundred Demons? Just this one demon is equal to one hundred demons, so of course she's incredibly strong!"
"Sensei is a beautiful manga author, which could be reworded as 'a beautiful woman who continually tells stories!' Although you don't tell ghost stories, modern-day fantasy manga and anime probably seem similar to ghost stories for ancient people, so it could sort of count as tales of the abnormal."
"A beautiful woman who tells tales of the abnormal receives powerful strength from the Story of One Hundred Demons ritual. If you view it like this, isn't this almost exactly like Blue Lantern Ghost!? You could definitely transform into a powerful beautiful demon!!"
Mayuzumi was rendered speechless by all this.
"Cough cough, excuse me for getting somewhat carried away." Seiji did his best to retract his excitement. "Please don't mind me and treat that as a joke. My thought process suddenly exploded on me, so I apologize."
The manga author chuckled. "Blue Lantern Ghost… a powerful female demon… Honestly, Haruta-kun?"
Technically, telling her to transform into a demon was rather rude, but she didn't dislike it.
'A beautiful and powerful female demon… If I can really transform into something like this, perhaps I'll be able to truly conquer my fear.' Mayuzumi thought of it like this.
The third day in Reo's soul.
After Reo went to school, Seiji took Mayuzumi outside to go meet with the angel-winged "Seiji" and the others.
And then everyone had fun chatting and playing cards together… whoops, Mayuzumi did as Seiji suggested and tried to influence them using her imagination.
After a while, the angel-winged "Seiji" said, "I'm your companion; I'll fight for your sake!"
Seiji decided to create a wooden target dummy with his imagination and asked Mayuzumi to imagine that it was her enemy.
Then, the angel-winged "Seiji" really took action and smashed the target dummy to pieces with a single punch!
After a few more tests, they confirmed that this indeed worked.
Seiji and Mayuzumi were both in high spirits from this.
By the end of this day, Mayuzumi successfully converted "Seiji," "Saki," "Mai," and "Hoshi," to her cause. She now had a total of four characters willing to fight for her, and she even succeeded in increasing their combat strength.
The situation was developing even better than they expected.
The fourth day.
"Chiaki," "Mika," "Kaho," and "Mayuzumi" were also converted successfully.
As planned, Mayuzumi divided them into two small teams of four.
Seiji acted as their opponent for a practice battle.
And he was almost defeated!
Together, these two small teams had excellent combat strength, and he was unprepared for their combination attacks. He had to get serious in order to gain the upper hand.
Seiji gave Mayuzumi a big thumbs-up after the practice fight. "This is great. Let's continue adding companions and creating combat teams."
The manga author revealed a delighted smile.
The fifth and sixth day passed… time marched on just like this.
Mayuzumi converted more and more NPCs every day and continued to increase the strength of her army.
On the other side, Reo grew closer and closer to Seiji and grew to like him more and more.
Every day they would do homework and play games together. Every weekend they would go out to have fun. Together they toured the streets, visited the amusement park, went camping, and explored the aquarium…
Seiji was happy to see the little girl having fun.
Disregarding the nature of their situation, it was actually pretty fun living together with Mayuzumi and Reo.
It was also an experience that gave him... some benefits.
After all, since they were living together, he saw the beautiful manga author in so many different ways. He got to see her while she was cooking, immediately after she finished showering, and when she woke up. On a few occasions, he saw her making silly mistakes, and once he even saw her when she was in the middle of changing her clothes… cough cough, at any rate, he would occasionally get lucky.
Not to mention the gentlemanly benefits such as bathing or hanging panties and bras out to dry. He was truly grateful for these opportunities.
After they felt that it would be okay, Seiji and Mayuzumi moved onto the next phase of their plan.
"I have some things to do, so I won't be coming back tonight. Reo, stay at home and watch the house together with Brother Harano."
Reo was dissatisfied with her "mother's" words, but after Seiji's gentle coaxing, she agreed.
She didn't have any particular reaction to the fact that her "mother" was absent for the entire night. With Seiji accompanying her, the next morning arrived just as normal.
This was a symbolic first step.
Afterwards, Mayuzumi continued to leave the house for extended periods, slowly getting Reo accustomed to the fact that her "mother" would not always be at home.
The next step was to increase the time that Mayuzumi remained away from the house.
At first, it was two days. Then, three days.
During this, Seiji paid close attention to Reo's condition.
Whenever she began to show obvious signs of loneliness, he would come to her room before she fell asleep and tell her stories as a way of coaxing her.
For example, the story of "The Feather Cloak Girl."
The plot was basically about how a boy found an extravagant feather cloak and later met a crying girl. When he asked what was wrong, he learned that she had lost her feather cloak.
The boy returned the feather cloak he picked up to her, causing her to become overjoyed. After she thanked him, she put on the feather cloak and turned into a bird that flew away.
Afterwards, the boy grew into an adult and met a beautiful woman. They fell in love with each other, got married, and gave birth to a cute baby girl.
Later, the husband felt that his wife was keeping a secret from him. He secretly investigated and found that his wife was hiding an extravagant familiar feather cloak, which he took and confronted his wife with. However, his wife gave a deep sigh, put on the feather cloak, turned into a bird, and flew away.
The husband greatly regretted his actions and fell ill as a result. In the end, he died of illness caused by depression.
Their daughter was left all alone and continuously cried.
Finally, their daughter saw a large bird bring a feather cloak to her, and she put it on. She also transformed into a bird and flew away with the large bird.
It was a rather tragic bedtime story, but it was Reo's favorite story. She had Mayuzumi tell it to her countless times already.
Seiji surmised that the feathered woman's ethereal figure he saw in the real world was created from Reo's image of her mother combined with the feather-cloak woman from this story.
This story probably represented one of Reo's deepest memories of her mother Hinako Haza.
He didn't know what the specific connection was. Mayuzumi had asked Reo long ago why she liked this story so much. Her only answer was that she enjoyed listening to it.
"What part of it was enjoyable?" Mayuzumi had asked.
Reo replied by saying that it was enjoyable because it was enjoyable.
This was a complete child's answer. It didn't answer the question at all.
Although Seiji knew that it was probably meaningless, he still tried asking again. "Why do you like this tragic story?"
"Because the mother came back and took her daughter to fly away with her…" Reo muttered.
Then, she blinked and revealed a confused expression.
"What did I say just now, Brother Harano?"
Seiji looked at her and blinked as well. "You said that this story was enjoyable to listen to."
'Reo Tachibana… could her true wish actually be…' He inwardly sighed.
He reached out his hand and patted the girl's head.
"Good night, Reo-chan."
The little girl didn't respond. It seemed that she had fallen asleep.
Seiji got up and left.
After he exited Reo's room and closed the door, some light green feathers quietly appeared, floating in the air for a few brief seconds. After that, they disappeared just as quietly as they had appeared.