Monica

**Monica** (モニカ *Monika*) is a character introduced in the *Wandering Witch* series. She is Saya's best friend and a novice witch.

## Appearance

Monica has purple colored hair and eyes. She wears a black outfit, navy blue skirt, white stockings, and long laced boots.

## Personality

Unlike Saya, Monica appears to be more calm and focused.

## Plot

### Past Events

Born in Emadestrin, Monica's mother ran away from home when she was very young. Her father is a doctor, but because of his work, he often leaves home early and is too busy with his job as a doctor, and when he is at home, he does nothing but drink alcohol. Monica has never played with her parents even once in her childhood. The citizens often look at and sympathize with Monica (Who is less than ten years old at the time) who has been neglected by her parents and has to do all the housework alone.

At the same time, a strange disease known as "Lycoris Disease" began to spread in Emadestrin. The infected person initially has a high fever, then the body gradually loses the ability to move, and eventually will be forever vegetative. However, Emadestrin forbids any act of taking the life of oneself or others, regardless of the reason. So the sick person has only two options; either leave the country and then die outside, or stay in the country on life support, racking up considerable debt in medical expenses for their families. Monica's father, unable to bear to see so the victims go bankrupt because of the unreasonable customs of the country, began to poison them to end their life painlessly. Because of that, he became more and more depressed, more and more immersed in alcohol. However, with the ability to read other people's minds, Monica clearly saw her father's pain, and at the same time she also knew that even without words, he still loved her more than anyone despite having beaten her.

When Monica was 15 years old, her father didn't want her to live in this awful country, and also guessing that his deeds would soon be exposed, sent Monica to study in United Magic Association and told her to "never come back". During her training, she meets and befriends Saya. Saya is the first and only friend to ever know that Monica can read minds.

Just before the training was over, Monica received a letter from her hometown informing her that her father had been arrested and was subject to "deportation", leaving a hefty fine. She was immediately summoned to her hometown. And even when she had to sell the house plus the life savings left by her father, she still could not pay off the compensation. From there, Monica took on the job of guarding in the country until the debt left by her father was paid off. And because she was no longer at home, she had to eat and sleep in the office.

Since working for the country, with the ability to read people's minds, she began to be tormented by the thoughts of patients with Lycoris without a cure, the doctors being helpless against this disease, people secretly think this country is absurd but dare not say it out loud or else they would be captured by the government. Thinking that someone needs to make a sacrifice, she begins to follow her father's old path by killing those infected people painlessly.

### Story Events

Due to the fact that after half a year had passed, and Monica still could not solve the serial murder case, the government thought she was incompetent, Emadestrin sent a letter asking the United Magic Association's witches to send more people to help. Coincidentally, the witch sent to help Monica is Saya, the only person Monica considers a friend.

Since then, Monica always drags Saya down the street to searching for information, even if the place has nothing to do with the crime scene. Both of them investigated for several days but still can't found anything. However, with her mind-reading abilities, Monica knew that Saya found something's wrong with her behavior. She realizes that Saya has begun to suspect that Monica might be the culprit of murderer case given how she tries to prevent Saya from continuing the investigation.

In an attempt to avoid being captured by Saya, both she and Saya fight against each other. However, as a novice mage, Monica wasn't able to defeat Saya, a full-fledged witch. After the conflict had ended, Monica receives the capital punishment from the government, Monica was led by two soldiers to the edge of the forest next to a field of resurrection lilies, her favorite flower. After asking if she had any last words and being told no, the soldiers fatally stab her and leave her to die.

When Saya arrived in the forest, she found Monica fell beside the blood-red petals. Saya tried to use magic to heal her, but Monica stopped her from doing so. Monica also revealed that she wouldn't have much longer to live anyway because she herself had long since been infected with Lycoris and she wouldn't live anyway. Before Monica died, she apologized to Saya for her actions earlier and said that she now feels happy to be in her arms as she dies.

After this incident, Saya was traumatized by Monica's death, having a mental breakdown afterward.

## Abilities

**Mind Reading**: Since she was born, Monica has a ability to read other people's minds.