She finally looked at me, her defenses completely gone. Her face was a picture of pure, heartbreaking sadness.
My hand slowly moved across the table and covered hers. "I don't know the details of your choice or what you sacrificed. But I can hear it in your voice."
"I can see your dream. You want a family, don't you? And you want your own children, the ones you can hold. But you can never have them."
This time, she didn't pull away. She grabbed my hand, her fingers digging into mine with desperate strength.
It was the first real, warm touch from another person she'd allowed herself in a decade, and it was like a dam breaking.
A choked, wounded sob escaped her.
"I do! I want it so much it hurts to breathe," she wept, her shoulders shaking. "I see families in the park. I hold the babies in the hospital, and it feels like a hole is being carved in my soul. A hole I can never fill."
"How can a dream feel so real, but be so impossible? I'm a magical girl. My power is to heal people. But I can't heal myself. I can't fix this."
"I'm broken, Hakuto-san. And I have to stay broken forever, or my power won't work. It's the price. It's the pact I made."
She had just laid her entire curse, her pain, and her hopeless dream right at my feet.
"She had just shown you her weakness," Gemgem whispered in my mind. "And she handed you the keys to her soul. She thinks her curse is unbreakable."
"You know it isn't. It's time to give her the choice, host."
"A magical girl?" I asked, pretending to be surprised. "Aren't they usually teenagers? That sounds crazy, but I guess you have no reason to lie. It's just... you seem too mature for that, Chiyoko-san. Can you show me your power then?"
My question pulled her out of her spiral of sadness. "S-Show you? Here? Now?"
"I can't! It's a secret! And my powers are for healing, not for showing off in a diner!"
But a part of her wanted to. She wanted to prove that her sacrifice and her curse were real.
She pulled her hand away and placed it flat on the table. "Okay. Just... a little. Watch."
She closed her eyes. A soft, pearly light began to glow from her palm. The little wilted flower in the vase on our table slowly started to revive. Its petals unfurled, the stem straightened, and the color flooded back into it, vibrant and full of life.
She opened her eyes, looking tired but proud. "See? This is my power. This is my curse. To give life, but to have none of my own."
I nodded slowly, my eyes fixed on the revived flower. "I see. Thanks for trusting me, a total stranger, enough to show me that."
I met her gaze, my expression turning serious. "I guess it's my turn to be honest with you, too, Chiyoko."
I opened my hand. A small, shadowy tentacle twisted into the air from my palm. It was pure, unnatural darkness, the complete opposite of the gentle, life-giving light that had just bloomed from her hand.
Chiyoko stared at it. Her mind, already shaky from her confession, couldn't process what she was seeing.
The color drained from her face. Her breath hitched. She didn't scream or run. She was just too shocked.
Then my words hit her.
"My past, what I told you about my wife, that was all true," I said, my voice low and even.
"But I came here to find you. I was planning on corrupting you, turning you to the dark side." I took a sip of my sake.
"But instead, I found someone with the same pain. Someone who sacrificed way too much for others, just like me."
The pieces clicked into place with a horrifying snap. The weird fortune teller. The scarily accurate reading.
She wasn't talking to a friend or a bystanding stranger, but her hunter. The trust she'd felt, that sense of connection, curdled in her stomach.
But my last sentence threw her off.
I wasn't a monster looking for prey. I was just a guy who saw the same pain in her that I felt in myself.
She looked from the dark tentacle in my hand to my eyes. She didn't see a villain, just the same sadness from before. She was trapped in a storm of fear, betrayal, and a strange, stubborn echo of the bond she'd felt.
"Corrupt me?" she whispered, her voice trembling. "I don't understand. What are you?"
"Why... why are you telling me this? If you came to hurt me... why are you being honest?"
"Because I'm giving you a choice. Instead of just tricking you like I planned," I said simply, then leaned back to give her some space.
"The first option is you forget we ever met, go back to your life. You can also report me to the Aegis of Light if you feel like it. I'll just find our team another healer."
"The second option is to become mine. I'll break your pact and your curse. You'll be free to find love, to have that family you want."
My words laid out two paths with brutal clarity:
Path one is the safe path. Go back to her lonely, predictable prison.
Path two is the path of freedom. A terrifying, unknown freedom that promised her everything she'd ever dreamed of.
"Free?" she whispered, her mind reeling. "You can break the pact? But how? My power comes from the Light... from my sacrifice!"
"If I break it, I'll have nothing! I'll be useless!" She was pleading, desperately trying to find a flaw in the hope I was dangling in front of her, because the hope itself was too painful to accept.
"We're not going to take your healing power," I explained gently. "We just overwrite it with a new pact.
Your old power came from being alone. The new one will come from desire, lust, or love for the person you're healing. Darkness is selfish, you know?"
I shrugged and grinned. "Your pure white outfit will probably change, too, if you care about that stuff."
"You don't have to decide now. Just think about it."
My explanation was the final blow. Instead of destroying her power, I was making an offer to reforge it: To change its source from selfless sacrifice to selfish love.
It was the complete opposite of everything she'd ever believed.
The Light demanded she give up love to heal. The Darkness was telling her that love and desire were the key to even stronger healing.
Chiyoko looked down at her hands, the hands that had eased so much pain but had never been allowed to hold someone they loved.
She thought of the kids in the hospital, of the lonely nights. She thought of the man she'd saved, living the life she could never have.
This was a choice between a noble, lonely, slow death of her soul and a dark, selfish, vibrant life she might get.
She slowly got to her feet. Her face was pale, but for the first time, her eyes weren't filled with sadness. They were filled with a terrifying, desperate clarity.
She had already made her decision.
"...I don't need to think about it."
She came closer until she was standing right in front of me. And then, in the quiet corner of a cheap diner, the kindest woman in the city, Magical Maiden Cherish, slowly bowed her head.
"My life of sacrifice has brought me nothing but pain," she said, her voice firm. "If you can really give me what I want. If I can have my life back, then I accept. I will be yours."
She bowed her head in total surrender. She had chosen to be selfish this time; she had chosen the darkness.
"Right. Well, next are the details, I guess," I said, caught off guard by how fast she decided.
"To... complete the corruption, we need to make contact. My Gem has to touch your magical core." I cleared my throat. "It will be quick."
Chiyoko lifted her head, her expression calm and determined. A faint, sad smile touched her lips. "I'm afraid that won't work, Hakuto-san. Being a magical girl for so long, my magical core had already fused with my body. My belly and ... womb, exactly."
"Interesting! Do not worry, host. The Gem can taint its host's semen with a substance that can corrupt magical girls." The Gem answers coldly, but I can feel the faint amusement in its voice.
I found myself stumbling over my words, suddenly feeling shy. "In that case, we will need a more direct approach."
"I mean, I will need to... pump my corruption seed into your body, where the core fused with, Chiyoko-san. That might... hurt if you've never done it before."
A chuckle escapes Chiyoko's lips. The "monster" who came to corrupt her was being more considerate than the "Light" ever was.
Her gaze met mine, steady and direct. "That's okay. The pact I made cost me my chance at love and family. The pact I make with you should be the opposite."
She took a deep breath. "So, if I'm going to be yours, Hakuto... then let's do it properly. Give me your corruption seed."
"Your place, then?" I asked, standing up. "I guess it would be more comfortable for a girl at her own room?" I grinned. "And you still owe this poor man a meal, Chiyoko-san."
A small, real laugh escaped her, a sound that seemed rusty and new. "Of course. A deal's a deal. And yes... my apartment is nearby. That would be better."