It's horrible…
Even as of now, she can still see it…
The countless corpses lying in the train, blood painted all over the places…
And she, terrified by everything, shuddered before those two overwhelming powers…
Those two fought with all their heart out, without caring of those left behind.
In front of them, she can do nothing but shake in fright…
At that moment, she's no longer the hero she aspires to be, she's just a scared child caught between the conflicts…
Even after getting rescued, she can't get those horrifying sights out of her head.
She still has nightmares about that, so much so that she can't even sleep at all.
Every moment for her is more than torture, being helpless in everyway…
She can't see anyone else in the eye, even her own dad, without remembering those empty eyes that slowly loosen the light…
She always thought that she could deal with anything, but that confidence shattered with the classes of sword and claw…
For that reason, she now stayed in her room, covering herself with layers of blankets with an emotionless expression.
No one else came for her, to comfort her and ease her out of the trauma… She's all alone by herself to deal with the nightmare…
Not even her dad cared to even question her concern, and opt to scold her for being "weak". He was always strict like this, but she can't bear to care anymore.
Funny, she's always wanted to get recognition from him, but now she just gave up the goal like that.
In the end, after some deep thought to avoid remembering the hellish nightmare again, she doesn't want to care anymore…
[Swush.]
Something suddenly appeared in the middle of her room, and she unconsciously ensconced herself deep in the blanket.
After everything happened, she couldn't take any more "supernatural" things in her sight.
But now, something weird has happened right at her room, the only place she can express her weakness.
Not even her own room is safe from those "monsters", and she can only helplessly stare at her possible doom while can do nothing against that…
She shivered deep in the blanked, not even daring to shiver out of fear, as she watched the space getting distorted.
And then, someone appeared out of the distorted space, and she instinctively locked her eyes on that one.
"Ugh!"
The figure let out an annoying moan after falling on the ground, and he slowly stood up while taking a look at the surroundings.
At that moment, their gaze met each other.
"Eek!"
With a frightened sound, she hid deeper in her blankets, praying that the guy didn't mind her gaze just now.
"You are… Aya?"
The figure slowly asked for her name, and her trembling started to slow down.
"It's me, Jouno, Jouno Tsukami."
The figure started to reveal his identity with a calm manner, and it took quite a while for her to realize the name.
"You are… the one in the chat…?"
"Yep, the one and only."
She started to calm down a bit after his revelation, but she still kept her guard up. After all, he just showed up from a distorted space right in front of her, and she's now quite allergic to unnatural events after yesterday…
"So… why are you here? In a girl's room?"
"Eh…?"
The figure scratched his cheek out of confusion, trying not to look around too much.
"To be honest, I have no idea where the quest will take me. But to appear in another girl's room, this is the first time…"
He then explained the World's Mission to Aya, and her expressions darken as he went on. She then checked the chat group again to make sure of his legitimately, which turned out to be all truth.
" … So, what will you do now?"
"I have someone in my mind already, but for now."
With a slight action, he then approached her and put his hand on her forehead hidden in the blanket with a soft expression.
"You okay?"
"Eh…?"
"I know you're in pain right now, so don't mind me and show it all out."
"B–But…"
He let out a fainted smile with her, his eyes filled with compassion and determination, which made her startled a little.
" … Why do you care? We're just two strangers after all."
She buried herself deeper into her arms, avoiding his stare. After all, she can't bear to look into his eyes, or else the nightmare will surface again…
"Why not?"
His genuine question made her flinch a bit.
"Why shouldn't I help you? Just because we're strangers? There's no reason to not care for others without something back, after all."
"Besides, heroes never grow up without experiencing pain. This is the fact that you must accept to help everyone else."
She slightly shook at his word at that part, and he quickly caught the glimpse at that.
"I wanted to help because I wanted that, end of story."
He swiped his hand away with his own words acting dramatically, and she peeked a little peek at his outlook.
In all honesty, he can't be called extraordinary or even handsome… Although she hasn't seen many people, she can confidently say that Jouno seems… perfectly normal.
Brown hair, brown eyes, slight figure.
That's all she can say about him. He's the type of person that could easily blend in the crowd, and she would forget him by the next hour…
Since he's the one who knows most about her world, outside of that annoying guy, she expected him to possess some kind of special properties…
At least he doesn't look that bad though…
"… So what do you say? Wanna let me help you?"
With a curious look, he asked Aya.
After some thought about his words, she reluctantly nodded her head.
The fear and trauma is still there… but she has decided to resolve them all at once.
As he said, the hero path has never been easy, she knew that a long time ago. And she almost forgot that fact until he reminded her again.
She is still scared of the "ability" thing, of course, and all this may go meaningless in the future… But at least, she won't regret this…
With her determination now slightly restored, she checked the mission again… and gave her final decision.
[Aya Koda has participated in the mission.]
[Saruyama Kenichi: WHAT?! Now Aya too?!]
[Kasumi Miwa: Oh my… what a surprise.]
"… Um, what?"
Jouno looks down on Aya with a dumbfounded look, still can't quite catched on with the current situation.
After all… she's still just 10 years old! How the heck can she take on the damn division?!
But more than that, he is still curious… why did she decided to take on this seemingly suicide mission. She's no idiot, he can confirm that, so why did she risk herself like this?
"I hope you can support me in this mission, Jouno-san."
With a slight smile, she looked at him with a faint look, which made him feel uncomfortable for some reasons.
Snap… gotta change the whole plan, he thought to himself…