Chapter 42

“It’s terrible, isn’t it?” said Kisara. “It’s still okay because the corrosion hasn’t reached the inside yet, but…to think that corrosion fluid can do this to Varanium…” “The Monolith…will really collapse, huh?” Rentaro tilted his head and looked up at the tip of the Monolith that thrust into the sky, lost in his complicated feelings. In the past, science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke defined the stone monoliths that appeared in his story as objects installed by God to stimulate mankind’s evolution. If that were the case, had mankind been able to learn anything important from the Gastrea War and evolve to a higher dimension? Thinking about it that way, was the destruction that spread out before him related to the death of God? He shook his head. Stop, you’re just avoiding the issue. The only thing he could say was that the Monolith was definitely going to collapse. And he needed to hold back the death that would result from that in order to connect to the future of the world. Kisara stepped back as she looked up at the Monolith. “Hey, Satomi, do you know how Monoliths are made?” “Now that you mention it…I’ve never seen it in person. Since we say that Monoliths are assembled, I’d say the parts are all brought to the location and—” Kisara looked at Rentaro with an expression that seemed to express her disgust. “Idiot. With an answer like that, I can’t even give you partial credit. The answer is, well, it would be easier if you imagined how ancient pyramids were built.” “Pyramids?” “Pyramids were built by taking cut stone blocks and using special tools to stack them on top of each other, right? Monoliths are also made from masses of blocks. Those are flown in with transport aircrafts or helicopters and stacked onto each other at the site. Of course, if they were just stacked, they’d quickly be blown over by the wind, so they’re stuck together by adhesive stronger than the stuff used in military aircraft and spaceships.” “Then this is made of piles of blocks? I can’t see where they’re joined, though.” “That’s because the precision of Japan’s Monoliths is considered top class even among the rest of the world.” Kisara boldly stuck a finger in the air. “It starts with a hundred meters.” She slid the finger she lifted and pointed at the Monolith. “When this Monolith 32 collapses, the initial construction will stack blocks up to a hundred meters high. With that, normal Gastrea won’t be able to come in anymore. After that, they’ll continue building for about a month until it reaches its final height of 1.6 kilometers. Satomi, you might not remember this, but after the War, the Monoliths didn’t start out this tall.” Rentaro shook his head silently. He did remember. The Monoliths after the Great War were a lot shorter. The endless fear of the Gastrea made humans create gigantic walls that were 1.9 kilometers high. “How long will it take to build it up to a hundred meters?” he asked. “If the materials and transport vehicles are all here, then it would take about half a day.” “That fast?” “Well, yeah. It’s not an individual or a company, but the Tokyo Area government that’s hiring all the general contractors to build this. Of the ten days it all takes, most of the time is spent making the Varanium the right shape. Well, in the end, even if it’s restored to 1.6 kilometers, that still doesn’t prevent the flying Gastrea from wandering in from a high altitude, though—” “That’s not all, is it? There will still be those Gastrea who run away from freak shows, research institutions, and collectors with unusual tastes, and those who run into the area protected by Monoliths with infected body fluids, and…” “Initiators whose corrosion rates went above fifty percent.” “Wait a minute, Kisara. Don’t you think this is weird? In the first place, why is the government trying to rebuild a Monolith here? Even if they desperately built a Monolith, if Aldebaran came to inject Varanium corrosion fluid again, it’d be all over, right?” He paused. “Wait, that’s not it.” Rentaro tried to put into words the doubts that were lurking in his mind. “Why hasn’t Aldebaran attacked any other Monoliths? Rather than attacking one place, wouldn’t it be more efficient to attack a number of different places at the same time to create a hole?” “That’s it. That’s the problem.” Kisara thrust her index finger at him. “Somehow, after observing for the past few days, the government has come to the conclusion that Aldebaran can’t attack other Monoliths. And in reality, Aldebaran hasn’t interfered with any other Monoliths.” “Is there a reason for that?” “The government looks like they have some theories, but in truth, they don’t actually know. Hey, Satomi, since the two of us are here together, do you want to try reasoning it out?” Rentaro nodded silently. Ever since Rentaro heard the explanation of the contents of the job directly from the Seitenshi herself, he had doubts about the indifference toward other Monoliths held by Aldebaran, which was no more than a Stage Four Gastrea. It was reassuring to be thinking about this with Kisara, whose knowledge and insight surpassed his. Kisara held up three fingers to show him. “I have three hypotheses. The first is, when Aldebaran attacked Monolith 32, it used up all its strength and then needed to rest for a long time.” Rentaro put his hand on his chin. That was possible. If Aldebaran was a normal Gastrea, then just coming near Varanium electromagnetic waves would be enough to make it waste away. However—“It’s already been four days since that first incident, right? Wouldn’t it have recovered by now?” “No, there are individual differences, so we can’t necessarily rule that out. My second hypothesis is that because of where it’s situated, the Monolith’s effects are lessened.” Rentaro looked around them, but there were just plains as far as the eye could see. “Is there any difference between this place and the adjoining Monoliths 31 and 33?” Kisara raised her eyebrows and crossed her arms. “You could say they’re exactly the same.” “Is it possible that there’s something buried under ground?” Kisara shook her head. “Before the Monoliths are built, they do a simple soil test, so it’s hard to believe.” “Then that’s not it.” “Right, so the third hypothesis is, Aldebaran is not very smart, so it did not think of attacking multiple Monoliths at the same time.” “That’s not it.” Rentaro could deny that promptly; it was the least likely. “That guy even used the loyal ant Gastrea to stall for time in order to attack this place. Aldebaran is smart, provokingly so.” “That’s true.” Even though she had come up with this explanation, she did not seem to put much faith in it and withdrew it easily, folding her arms again. “But thanks to you, I’ve been able to organize my thoughts,” said Rentaro. “I have one more conjecture.” Rentaro looked up at the top of the Monolith that was being cruelly bleached. “What if there was some sort of problem with this Monolith in particular?” Kisara gasped and put a hand to her mouth. “But that’s…” “But if that’s the case, that would give a reason for why this Monolith was targeted and the others were not.” Kisara put a hand to her chin. “That’s true… You’re right… I didn’t think of that.” Kisara looked straight at Rentaro. “I’ll try looking into this Monolith a little more.” “Please do.” To discuss this further without waiting for the results of her research would just be piling inference on top of inference, so it was not constructive. His wise childhood friend also seemed to realize this, and she stopped the conversation with a “Yeah,” and gave a big stretch. She went to the sloped meadow and lay down facing the sky, patting the grass with her hand as she looked at him. “Satomi, why don’t you come lay down next to me?” Suddenly, his heart gave a big leap. “R-right.” Rentaro told himself to keep Kisara from suspecting that his heart was pounding inside and moved awkwardly to lie down next to her. There was a rustling sound, and the smell of warm earth reached his nostrils. Looking quietly next to him, he saw Kisara’s white arm stretched out on the grass, her pretty thigh and the line of her body, and the bulge of her chest pushing up the fabric of her clothes. “Hey, Satomi, look at the sky! Look!” Rentaro had only been looking at Kisara, so he didn’t look at the sky until she told him to, but when he did, he let out an involuntary exclamation of wonder. In the clear summer night sky with no moon, the Milky Way twinkled. There were so many stars that it was hard to find the Big Dipper. “Wow…” he breathed. “Amazing. That’s all I can say.” “We live in the middle of all the lights in Tokyo Area. Because of them, the light of the stars is drowned out. Even though they’re actually this beautiful.” Stealing another glance at Kisara’s profile, he saw that she had her mouth open slightly, her eyes fixed on the stars with a childlike expression on her face. You’re even more beautiful, you know. If he could speak the words that welled from his chest, it would be so much easier to figure out his relationship with her. Employee and boss, childhood friends, foster brother and younger sister born only a few months apart, student of the Tendo Style and senior disciple. Adjuvant leader and member. There were a lot of words that could be used to describe them, but none of them hit the mark. For some reason, her left hand stretched out on the grass seemed far away. If he could just muster the courage, it would have been possible for him to gently cover it with his palm. Rentaro shook his head softly. “Kisara, do you know what light pollution is?” “Light pollution?” “Yeah, pollution caused by light.” Still lying down, Rentaro wrote the words out in the air for her. “Just as you say, the lights from the city are man-made, so they’re not good for natural organisms. It can be so bright that it can even be seen from man-made satellites.” “Really?” “Birds will fly in circles around the searchlight of a lighthouse until they finally fall from exhaustion. Bats and mice have also become easier to see by their predators because of the light, so they’ve become more cautious. Migratory birds think that the day is longer and eat for longer, making them too fat. Just-hatched baby sea turtles look for the ocean based on the reflection of light, so some get confused and end up going not to the ocean but to a hill. And fireflies who look for their mates using light can’t find their lovers because of the artificial lights leaking out.” Glancing next to him, he saw that Kisara was looking at him with a faint smile. “Am I boring you?” he asked. “No, not at all,” she said. “I think it’s wonderful.” Rentaro paused for a moment. “Hey, Kisara, why did you ask me to come to a place like this with you? You should be able to tell me now, right?” Kisara gazed at the stars in silence. Rentaro looked at her profile and asked as quietly as he could. “Are you scared? Of the Monolith collapsing?” She shook her head quietly. “Saying something like this might be inconsiderate, but right now, I’m so happy it’s scaring me.” “Happy?” “Yeah, I’m really happy right now. Even though we keep hearing about the Monolith collapsing, it still hasn’t sunk in yet.” “I…get that.” “And at the Tendo Civil Security Agency, we have Enju, and Tina, and you. We’re like a family. We aren’t making money at all, as usual, but we have enough to survive.” “Tina said she was happy right now, too, you know. I’m sure Enju is, too.” “What about you?” she asked. “I am too, of course.” Kisara closed her eyes quietly. “Recently, I’ve been having this dream.” “A dream?” “Yeah. When I come to, I’m on a bridge surrounded by the morning mist as far as the eye can see. I don’t know how I got there or why I’m there, but I just know that I have to move forward. So I move forward in one direction on the bridge, but there’s no one there. Eventually, the bridge ends abruptly and my body is swallowed up by this black swamplike thing. I just watch it silently until finally even my head goes under, but eventually, I figure out how to breathe and eventually feel better.” Rentaro didn’t say anything. “When I wake up in the morning and look in the mirror, I realize that my face is streaked with tears, and after that, I kept seeing the same dream over and over, so I started to think about it. And then I realized.” Looking next to him, his eyes met Kisara’s. Kisara looked like she was about to be crushed with worry, and her eyes were wet. “I realized that I was crying because I understood that this happiness had to end someday.” Kisara shook her head with delicate eyes. “I killed them. I killed everyone in the world.” “Idiot.” Rentaro put his hand on top of Kisara’s and squeezed it. She was warm and slightly sweaty. “You’ve become overly sensitive without realizing it. Don’t worry. Neither Enju, nor Tina, nor I will disappear.” “Yeah… You’re right.” Looking sideways at her, he saw a slight hint of relief on her face, but in Rentaro’s heart, slight ripples were spreading. During puberty, people saw a lot of different dreams, so it might not have been worth mentioning or making a fuss about, but when interpreting dreams, bridges were important metaphors that connected this world from the next, and the present to the future. And swamps represented wicked feelings or spite, envy, or jealousy, and the color black also had similar meanings. Generally, people who dreamed that they sank into swamps were very stressed and struggled to get out, but even when Kisara realized she was sinking, she was unimpressed and accepted it, which was somewhat eerie. What did that mean? Rentaro suddenly shook his head to clear it of the thoughts he was having. No way, what am I thinking? Whatever he was thinking definitely didn’t apply to Kisara. “Satomi?” she said. “Huh? What? Oh, what’s wrong?” Suddenly, Kisara lifted her left hand and tapped her watch. “Today will end in five minutes. And then we will be one day closer to the collapse of the Monolith.” “I-it’ll be fine. I-I’ll protect you, Kisara.” Kisara looked a little surprised but immediately turned bashful and smiled back at him. “Thank you, Satomi.” Rentaro felt his cheeks grow hot and looked away. And then the second hand went around the dial four times, and the countdown began. “Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four—” Rentaro felt a squeeze from the hand he was holding, and Kisara’s nails dug into his skin a little. And then, the next moment, Japan entered the next day. Rentaro let out the breath he had been holding. The Milky Way still hung above them, unchanging. There were two days left until the collapse of the Monolith. 3 After sleeping for two nights in a tent in District 40, Rentaro had gotten used to life there. However, Tina and Midori, who seemed more delicate, could not really stand the rugged floor of the tent and sleeping bags, and complained lightly. Under Gado’s command, this morning they were making barbed wire and sandbags and setting concrete blocks normally used to stop tanks in the areas where they predicted Gastrea would enter. The remaining time was spent in the classroom reviewing what they went over the day before, and as a final top off they were given details about the punishments for disobeying orders directly from Gado himself. Apparently, Gado was pretty nervous about the civil officers not being able to agree on a course of action, so he was trying to prevent that by implementing a harsh punishment. Well, that was only natural, Rentaro thought. Even if the civil officers were a bunch of show-offs, if just one person turned and ran when the Gastrea attacked, it would have an effect on everyone’s morale. If he was the commander, he would want to eliminate those rotten eggs who thought of themselves before everything else to the detriment of the group as soon as possible. He had no objections to Gado’s way of doing things. After they were dismissed, Rentaro dropped off Enju, Tina, and Kisara at the outdoor classroom, changed trains, and got off at Magata City. Sadly, even though Rentaro had brought a tent with him, he had completely forgotten to bring a change of clothes and underwear. Enju had already run out of underwear and was currently renting Tina’s. Himself aside, as Enju’s guardian he couldn’t make her do something so crass. Therefore, “Mr. Rentaro” was taking a day off today. When he got off at Magata City and started walking around, he immediately felt tension in the air and stopped. The first thing that met his eyes were the large amount of flyers covering the ground that looked like they had been blown over by the wind. Picking one up, he saw that there were conspiracy theories written on them, like “Don’t forgive the tyrannical government! The government had already decided all who would be evacuated to the shelters from the start!” Now that he thought about it, it had been two days since he had been home to Magata City, but in those two days, the city had turned into this. Near the concourse, there was an old man with white hair and a white beard, outfitted like someone homeless, standing on a wooden crate yelling in a high voice about the destruction of the world and the new hope that would come after that. Normally, no one would pay any attention to such incoherency, but Rentaro could see many cheering him on. The bottoms of Rentaro’s shoes crunched as he walked through the shopping arcade in front of the station. Display windows had been destroyed and looted. A little while later, Rentaro passed a truck with looted goods on it and was shocked when he realized that the driver had a vigilante group armband around his arm. So even those who had previously maintained society had become accomplices to criminality. He had heard about it on the news, but the situation was worse than he had imagined. There were few people walking around outside. Naturally, evacuation had already started for this block. It was easy to forget when in the Outer Districts, but right now, the whole city-state of Tokyo Area was in an emergency evacuation. While he was thinking this, he reached his apartment. It was still peaceful around here, but it would probably be caught up in the looting soon. Thinking that, he stuffed necessities and consumables into his overnight bag, not letting his hand stop. When he finally lifted his swollen bag, he felt its weight at the base of his arm. Standing at the entrance to lock the door, he gazed at the eight-tatami-mat room with a swell of emotion—it was possible that he wouldn’t return to this room again. But Rentaro brushed off the sentiment and pushed the sadly creaking door shut. He inserted the key and twisted the lock, shutting away the room and his memories. The next time he came, it would be to unlock it with Enju. Putting the bag on his shoulder, he got on the train to head back to District 40. Even though there were not many people inside the train car, it was tense with the feeling of forcibly repressed panic. It was suffocating. Looking for an escape for his eyes, he noticed a hanging advertisement near the roof. The headline of the handwritten ad said, BLOOD RETRIBUTION AGAINST THE CURSED CHILDREN! LYNCHING IN DISTRICT 3!!! The deterioration of public order had gathered in the easiest place for it to be vomited out. The image of a certain girl recalled itself to his mind, and his heart skipped. No way. He shook his head, but the idea wouldn’t leave once it had taken root. Rentaro wasn’t able to contain himself, and stuck his hand in the closing door to get off the train. Rentaro had gotten off at the District 9 station he had stopped by when he visited the Katagiri Civil Security Agency. Moving through the sparse pedestrians as he rushed out of the station, he pushed aside a couple and overtook an elderly walker as he strode with impatient steps. He couldn’t explain why he was in such a hurry, but he didn’t falter either. Finally, he approached a five-road junction and climbed up the steps of a wide pedestrian bridge. She shouldn’t be here. That’s what he told himself over and over. She had promised. He heard clamoring from above and felt murderous intent prickling on his skin; he could see a crowd of people. Panting, Rentaro dashed up the steps, and everything came into view. He saw a rush mat spread near the middle, and the metal bowl the girl had used was knocked over, with coins spilled out on the ground. There she was: Lying facedown on the ground was the caped girl. Around her was a band of grown adults. There were eight, in a wide range of ages from twenties to forties. “What are you doing?!” Rentaro rushed over in front of the waif. The fallen girl used her left had to try to push herself up with all her might and looked at Rentaro with her unseeing eyes. “That voice…are you that civil officer from before…?” The girl had scratches all over her face, and the wound on her right arm that she was pushing down on had a spreading bloodstain that showed no sign of regenerating. Surprisingly, the girl’s smile did not go out even after all this. “Damn it, what a disgusting brat!” Facing front, Rentaro saw that the oldest man in front of him was holding a Varanium switchblade dripping with blood, his face twisted with hatred. It was a thin knife with a blade about twelve centimeters long; it was too short to fight off a Gastrea, so it was hard to think of what it could be used for other than to deliver a fatal wound to one of the Cursed Children. The beggar girl shook her head, still bent over on the ground. “I’m sorry, Mr. Civil Officer. Even though I promised…I deserve what I got, but I, I just…” “It’s fine. I get it. Don’t talk.” Just then, the middle-aged man with the knife took a step forward out of rage. He had a wide forehead and was plump, with flesh sagging underneath his chin. If he smiled, he probably would have looked very kind. Rentaro was shocked that even someone who seemed good would commit an act of violence against a defenseless girl. “Move!” the man yelled. “That girl mixed in with the rest of us with an innocent look on her face and attacked when she found a chance. She’s worse than the Gastrea! We have to eliminate the Cursed Children from the city!” Rentaro knew the reason for the man’s thoughtless anger. In short, this crowd was scared. Ever since that news, they were afraid of the Cursed Children coming after them for revenge. Rentaro closed his eyes and drew his XD gun from his belt. Then, lifting his arm, he fired one shot into the sky. The kickback roiled through his arm and the gun’s explosion roared into the sky. The agitated men stopped in surprise. “I’m a civil officer.” Rentaro very calmly took his license out of his breast pocket and held it in front of the men. Quietly, he said, “Try taking one more step closer. Next time, I’ll shoot you.” Facing the men, who were stirring nervously, Rentaro continued. “You’re not done yet?” The men snuck glances at one another for a while, but it was obvious that they had lost their spirit. The middle-aged man in front turned on his heel and spat, “The ones you civil officers are protecting are those brats after all, huh?” The good-for-nothings snuck spiteful glances back at him and finally retreated like an ocean wave. As Rentaro looked around, the onlookers around them also hurriedly scattered.