"Can I call you Ayane? You can call me Ophelia if you'd like." Ophelia speaks politely as I sit on the incredibly soft and comfortable couch.
"Yes, you can call me Ayane." I say, easily accepting it as she grabs an old-fashioned wooden chess set.
"Wanna play? I like older games too, it could be good to pass the time while I explain some things to you," Ophelia says as she opens the game and places it on the table in front of me.
"Sure, why not, but I'm not very good at it," I tell her.
"Do you know the rules?" She asks, setting up the game on the table.
"Yeah," I know a bit, but I'm not smart enough to compete and form brilliant strategies like many players.
"That's enough then, you can choose if you want to go first," Ophelia says invitingly, and it makes me realize something.
"...Wait...wouldn't that be unfair for me?" She's able to use her magic to know exactly what my moves will be, among other things.
"A little, I see you're perceptive, that's good. Many magical girls just blindly accept playing the game and lose quickly to me because I have an intuition of what they'll play."
"But don't worry, Ayane, I'm not unbeatable. I've been defeated a total of 5 times even using my ability. In the end, it's just an intuition, I can't know exactly what your playing style and moves are," Ophelia says with a smile as I choose to play first.
"You know, we have some rules on this basis," Ophelia starts speaking a bit more seriously as we play.
"First, if you want to get paid, you need to register. You're free to come and use the facilities without registering, but if you want to receive payments, you'll need to be registered in our system."
"In other words, we don't force new magical girls to enter the facility's registry, but we only pay those who are registered. Our facilities are very extensive."
"We have leisure areas and, most importantly, a medical wing with trained psychologists and magical girls with the ability to purify your mind."
"What do you mean by that?" I question why she said that's the most important.
"Ayane, are you a virgin?" Ophelia suddenly asks, making me blush and look away because of the personal question. I fumble my chess move but quickly correct the piece on the board
"Hmm, it seems so, but you should be ready to not be one anymore," Ophelia says.
"H-Huh?"
"Monsters, you must know what they do. It's not uncommon for magical girls to be defeated. This isn't a cartoon or a game, and unfortunately, we're not invincible. We can easily lose a fight if we're not careful or if we face the wrong enemy."
"The psychological support is for girls who have been used by monsters, and the magic to purify their minds is to try to reduce depression and suicide attempts."
"..."
"Unfortunately, we can't completely cure someone who is mentally exhausted, but we can reduce their burdens and make them more bearable. I hope you understand that it's inevitable."
"We don't like it when our companions are raped or physically tortured, but in our dangerous line of work, we're helpless when it comes to that."
"..."
"Ayane, I hope this doesn't bother you too much, but on the positive side, we always rescue captured or kidnapped magical girls. If one of them doesn't show up for a while and no one has news, we'll search for the missing person."
"The longest time it took us to find a kidnapped magical girl was the unfortunate 1 month... but the fastest time was 35 minutes, so we can actually rescue them quickly, depending on whether we know you went on a mission."
"Do you understand what I'm saying? If you go out to save someone, try your best to report back to our base, so that if you take too long to let us know you're okay, we'll search for you."
"Oh, I... understand." I had tried to act alone, and I could have been captured. I knew things were serious, but it seems to be much worse than I imagined.
"Don't worry about things like payment for using the medical facilities, everything in the building is free. We just won't pay you for being here if you don't register, and besides, I'll also be paying for any damage to the city."
"So if it's necessary to destroy a house or building, I'll pay for the damages and take care of the press to avoid nosy people trying to find what they shouldn't," Ophelia says as we continue the game, and she's winning.
"Ophelia, why do you take care of everything?" I ask curiously. She must be absurdly rich to be able to handle all of this.
"...Personal reasons, but know that they're not good reasons. Terrible things happened to me, things that made me lose the ability to move my legs."
"Things I don't want to happen to anyone else, and that's why I do all of this, to help people not suffer the same as I did," Ophelia speaks with seriousness, weighing down the mood.
"I'm sorry..." I apologize for touching on a subject I shouldn't have.
"It's okay, don't worry about it. It's just something from the past. I understand your curiosity. I'm also quite curious about certain things when they're new," Ophelia says to dispel the bad mood I unintentionally created.
"But hey, talking about good things, many magical girls here are students, doctors, teachers, among many other professions or areas of activity, and most are quite welcoming."
"In other words, you can always ask someone for help, and you'll almost always be able to solve your problems. Many of them became magical girls for personal reasons, but they're still quite altruistic," Ophelia speaks enthusiastically about the others.
"Yeah, that's great." It seems I worried too much without reason and was just thinking I'd have problems with the others.
"Now, how about I see your future?" Ophelia says in a playful manner.
"Sure, I'm curious!" I respond enthusiastically to her statement.
"Don't expect too much, okay? I can only say something very vague, but hey, at least I can tell you if you'll have a lot to worry about, or if you'll have a more peaceful future..."
"Unfortunately... about 80% of the magical girls I've looked at had a vague, sad future. Of course, it's not that reliable, after all, it's just an intuition. It's not like I'm really seeing such a thing happen," Ophelia speaks to avoid scaring me.
"It's okay, I understand." She's already said that it's very vague and uncertain, so it's not really that worrying, I think. It would be truly worrying if she could really see or predict the future.
"Checkmate," Ophelia says, moving a piece and defeating me in chess.
"!!!" I'm shocked. We've been playing for less than 7 minutes, and I've already lost. She's really very good at this.
"Let's see what your future holds for you, I wish you all the best," Ophelia says with a smile, closing her eyes briefly and opening them again with a slight glow.
"..."
We remain silent as she gazes at me for a brief moment, and her body visibly shivers, and her gaze becomes uneasy.
"Ayane... I'm going to ask you a serious question. Do you want me to tell you my intuition?" Ophelia asks with a seriousness that truly makes me uncomfortable.
"S-Sure, go ahead..." I say nervously, waiting for Ophelia's response. She thinks for a moment.
"Do you have a boyfriend?"
"N-No?" I respond, confused by the question. I thought she would talk about my vague future or something like that.
"And how about a girlfriend, are you a lesbian?"
"N-NO!" I exclaim, full of embarrassment. I like men, not girls. Why is she asking me all these embarrassing questions so directly?
"Hmm... Do you have a secret admirer, or an ex-boyfriend?"
"No, why are you asking me these things?" I question nervously.
"...You have a dark future, Ayane... very dark, involving a lover, someone who loves you, but who will bring you a lot of suffering, or not..."
When Ophelia says the "or not" part, I'm confused.
"Wait, will I suffer or not?"
"I don't know. As I said, it's extremely vague and imprecise. Besides, your future indicates some pretty bad things, a toxic relationship, full of control, surrounded by uncertainty."
"A terrible relationship with someone who loves you, but doesn't define a limit between love and other bad feelings. However, since it's uncertain, you can change that, just take care and manage it."
"Ophelia, how do you know it's like this?"
"Intuition. Many of the magical girls I've also tried to see the future of had vague futures linked to it in some way, not always related to the monsters."
"Yours is an intuition about your personal relationships and your own personal life, and about that person who loves you. That's why I asked if you had a boyfriend, but if you don't, maybe it's something in the distant future, so be careful."
"Don't let this vague vision scare you. I could be wrong, but choose well who you get involved with, and above all, don't regret your choices," Ophelia says the advice as if she were an old friend of mine.
"I-I understand, I'll be careful." I don't plan on dating anytime soon. I'm only 18, and I haven't even seen any boys in my class that are my romantic type, so I think that will take a while.
"Well, do you want me to see anything else? Like find you something?" Ophelia asks friendlily as she puts away the chess board and goes with her wheelchair to her desk.
"No, I don't need it. I think that was too much emotion for today, and I want to go home. It's really late."
"I understand. Unfortunately, I can't accompany you to the exit because, as you can see, my mobility isn't the best, so I limit my general movements."
"However, you can come here anytime, and I strongly recommend you join the registry. The pay is very good, enough for you to buy the things all teenagers like."
"Sorry, but how old are you?" I know it's impolite to ask someone's age, but the way she speaks is so "old-fashioned," and now she's talking about teenagers.
"Hahaha, I'm still young, I'm only 22 years old."
"Wow, you still look like you're 18!" I say, shocked.
"Yes, it seems being a magical girl slows down aging. I became a magical girl at 16, and honestly, I haven't changed much from that time till now," she responds with a smile.
"Uh-huh, you look beautiful... Well, have a good night, I'm going home."
"Yes, have a good night... and... be careful with obsessive people, or you may suffer more than you can imagine," Ophelia says in a way that gives me chills.
As a warning of something bad, I just swallow hard, deciding not to take it too seriously yet, as I don't even have relationships with anyone and am just beginning to make friends for now.