Bitter cold wind carrying ice crystals howled past the exposed black rock face above the snow line. Massive glaciers silently meandered in the distance, reflecting the cold moonlight. Pale and another girl were currently on the leeward side of a snow mountain, having barely found a shallow cave hollow in the rock that provided some shelter.
The campfire crackled, dispelling the night's chill while casting dancing spots of light in Pale's indifferent golden eyes.
Actually, magical girls could use magic shields to resist the cold, but the magic power contained in the other girl's body really couldn't support her through this exceptionally treacherous stretch of road.
Their destination was the snow woman settlement at the mountain peak.
The calamity's progression had reached the extreme north.
Pale knew... the final judgment... might be coming.
Pale sat bolt upright as usual, holding a tree branch in her hand with a piece of charred, unidentifiable meat skewered on it. The heat control was... as disastrous as ever.
Precisely maintained at the critical point between "edible" and "completely inedible."
A black-haired girl, Xinya, was tightly pressing her lips together, her fair cheeks slightly puffed, her long eyelashes trembling violently, as if engaged in an extremely difficult internal struggle.
Xinya's silky black hair flowed with an inky luster in the firelight, several strands unconsciously wound around her fingers and twisted tight.
The coarse black cloth outfit she wore had some grass clippings on it, yet still appeared neat and orderly, completely different from Pale's utility-focused messiness.
She seemed to finally make up her mind, and with a "prepared to die" attitude, extremely slowly chewed once on the piece of "roasted meat" Pale had just handed her.
The next second...
"Ugh... ptui! Cough cough cough!"
Xinya sharply turned her head, coughing violently. She barely managed to swallow that small bite of meat, even having physiological tears well up in the corners of her eyes.
She raised her head, those beautiful red eyes now brimming with moisture and anger, glaring fiercely at Pale.
"Senior! Are you trying to kill me?"
Then, Xinya dramatically leaned back, exaggeratedly covering her fair, slender neck with her hand, continuing her accusation in a wailing tone:
"Could it be that I, the world's number one beautiful girl, am going to perish here today~" Her slender fingers trembled slightly, black hair cascading like a waterfall with her movements. "All because of Senior's unprecedented and unparalleled terrible cooking skills."
Pale's motion of rotating the branch paused. Her golden eyes looked toward her calmly and placidly, her tone completely flat, even carrying a trace of confusion: "High protein, can replenish energy consumed in combat. Wilderness survival, efficiency first." She seemed to completely fail to understand the core demand beneath the other's exaggerated performance.
"Oh~ my lovely senior, I really want to vigorously flip you up and down and inside out, then properly look at what's inside your little head."
"What does that mean?"
Pale tilted her head, showing an innocent and puzzled expression.
It sounded... like she wanted to learn combat techniques from her?
Didn't this little girl dislike fighting and killing?
And Xinya was typically high attack, low defense.
She just wanted to tease Pale a bit, but didn't expect the other party to seriously ask in return.
What Xinya had in mind was that even if Senior could show just the slightest bit of a charming or shy (⺣◡⺣)♡ expression.
How am I supposed to answer when you ask like this!
"It's... it's..."
Xinya's small face flushed bright red even in this freezing world.
"It means I'm going to teach Senior how to cook!"
"Ingredients! Yes!"
Xinya exaggeratedly nodded. "Ingredients need to be flipped up and down to taste good!"
Her voice grew smaller and smaller, finally almost becoming a mosquito's hum, completely unconvincing. She herself didn't know what nonsense she was spouting.
This godforsaken place was probably driving Xinya crazy.
Pale still quietly watched her, the confusion in her golden eyes not dissipating but seemingly deepening somewhat.
She seemed unable to understand this overly jumping and emotional expression. After several seconds of silence, she spoke again, her tone still steady as usual.
"Our journey is too arduous, food sources aren't abundant either. Sufficient energy is enough. Your magic power reserves are insufficient, you need to eat more high-calorie things."
Xinya sharply raised her head, her red eyes glistening with moisture, shame and anger intermingled, almost jumping up: "Senior, you're a big idiot! Super ultra cosmic number one big idiot! Blockhead! Idiot idiot idiot!"
Xinya knew... she couldn't accompany Pale through the entire journey.
Inside her body, several incurable diseases were mixed together. Being able to live until today was already completely a miracle.
Magical girls were the embodiment of miracles.
So Xinya often joked that she was a natural-born magical girl.
She wanted more time. Wanted to walk further with her. Wanted to... teach this life idiot to at least make food that was edible.
Pale didn't understand why Xinya was suddenly so emotional. She only felt she had done something wrong to make Xinya angry.
She silently took out a meat pie from her magic space, wrapped tightly in thick oil paper and retaining a trace of warming magic fluctuation.
Pale was very conflicted.
She didn't know if Xinya was angry because of the food or not.
Finally, Pale still slowly, tentatively handed over that warm, carefully wrapped meat pie.
Food... should be able to... make Xinya a bit happier, right?
Pale thought so.
This meat pie was given to her by the highland dwarves.
Those tough little craftsmen lived year-round in harsh environments. Their food was always high-calorie, easy to store, and... usually not bad tasting. After Pale had cleared out rock-shell demons entrenched deep in the dwarf mine tunnels, the dwarf elder had given her a small batch of such food as thanks.
Xinya huffily snatched it over, roughly tearing open the oil paper. When she saw the perfectly roasted meat pie inside that was even still steaming slightly, her movements clearly paused.
She viciously took a big bite, as if chewing on fate's injustice and a certain idiot senior's wooden head.
She thought.
Senior was so dense, so stupid.
If she left, who would take care of her?
Can't cook, can't dress up properly. Clearly so beautiful, yet every day wore a stern face looking bitter and resentful.
Would she go hungry, would she be malnourished, would she be deceived by other bad women...
"You... you still have some conscience, knowing not to give such things to your cute junior."
"Hmph!" While eating in small bites, she secretly observed Pale from the corner of her eye. Seeing the other party seemed to relax slightly because she accepted the food, Xinya felt she had an obligation to teach Pale to love herself.
"But!" Xinya swallowed the food in her mouth, raising her head again, using her reddened eyes to glare at Pale, her voice carrying unprecedented seriousness.
"After we come down from the snow mountain this time, you can't eat this kind of thing anymore!"
"From now on, only I can make the meals!"
"But..."
Pale wanted to object. Xinya's cooking was too troublesome. Meat needed to be bled and sliced, vegetables actually had to have their outermost layer thrown away, and moldy biscuits couldn't be eaten anymore...
"There's no 'but'!"
Xinya seemed angry again, her red eyes staring fixedly at Pale.
Finally, Pale could only nod.
"Okay..."
"And you have to learn cooking from me!"
"I..." Pale opened her mouth. Facing Xinya's unprecedented firm attitude and those eyes that seemed to burn with flames...
"Okay..."
Pale sighed, silently taking out firewood from her space and adding it to the fire.
The small flames illuminated both their faces.
○
"Is this the guest's happy memory?"
"Do you like that girl?"
The teddy bear made a strange laugh.
The surrounding soft flesh seemed to cater to its master's will, wrapping tightly around again.
Pale increasingly felt difficulty breathing.
Normal air grew less and less. All she could inhale was sickly-sweet, nauseating pink mist.
"Leave my memories..."
Pale's tone was icy.
Pale tried to mobilize her magic power but found the energy flow in her body had become sluggish and viscous. That warm, slippery embrace seemed able to absorb and assimilate magic power, gently dissolving, dispersing, and merging any attempt to gather power into this sickly-sweet ocean.
"Oh~ do you want to see this girl? Xinya?"
The teddy bear laboriously pronounced this name.
"Here... I can grant her eternal life."
"You'll be together forever..."
"And those other girls too."
"Guest, you really are quite the heartbreaker~"