Chapter 3

“Don’t.” That was the first word out of her father’s mouth. Sitting in his hospital bed, Ayumu Mikura repeated it clearly, looking directly at his frowning daughter standing before him. “Don’t do it, Mifuyu. Ignore the note.” “But what if it’s real? What if it’s really from the thief?” “Then that makes it even worse. What, you’re gonna meet this thief? What if something happens to you? Why’s the thief calling themselves a fox anyway? And why’s it addressed to you?” “…I don’t know.” Mifuyu jutted her pouty lips even further out, scrunched up her face, and quickly racked her brains for ways to integrate that into her lie. She knew that her father was right. The note had been on the front door after she returned from the book world—a letter left by the thief themselves. She’d fretted for a while over whether she should just toss it in the garbage and forget about ever finding it. Even if she had wanted to talk about it with Hirune, her aunt wouldn’t wake up, and so she brought it up with her father. But she omitted anything about the book curse. “It looks like a thief might have been in Mikura Hall.” She’d concocted a lie with an emphasis on the “looks like” part, telling him that no books had been stolen and that she’d found the note on the outside of the door. The existence of the mysterious and decidedly nonhuman Mashiro, her PE teacher becoming a private eye, having people shoot at her—regardless of how she phrased it, he would never believe her. And it would bring nothing but trouble if he reported it to the police and everything got out of hand. The only evidence was this piece of paper anyway, so she doubted the police would take it seriously. But she wanted to know what was going on. She wanted to hear what the thieving fox had to say, and she wanted to find out who they were. “Okay. I won’t do it.” She exaggerated her frustration by exhaling dramatically out her nose, scooted her backless stool closer to her father’s pillow, and readjusted herself. She had assumed that her father would disapprove of her meeting the thief, but she felt disappointed all the same. Her mother passed away when she was a second grader in elementary school, and Mifuyu thought she and her father got along pretty well. They did what they could around the house, laughed at their mistakes, and anything they couldn’t do, they let slide, got help from Che’s family, or asked someone in the shopping district. Her father never pushed her mother’s responsibilities on her, and he never seemed overprotective. But sometimes—like now—she felt like a child who had to listen to what father said. “Good. How’s Hirune doing?” He suddenly started talking about her aunt, and Mifuyu reflexively looked around the room, her brain in high gear trying to decide how much to say and what to hide. “…She’s fine. Sleeping a lot like always. It looks like she’s eating, too.” She hadn’t lied. If nothing else, she’d seen her awake in the yard the other day talking with that stylish woman, and she had found evidence that she was eating. Ayumu nodded, crossed his thick arms across his chest, and looked thoughtful. “That’s good. Then you don’t need to visit Mikura Hall for a while.” “Why not?” Mifuyu said, louder than she’d intended. Someone in the four-person room coughed, and Mifuyu hurriedly lowered her voice. “Weren’t you the one who said I had to take care of her?” “Yes, but I’m concerned about this weird prank. This thief used your name. It’s creepy.” “So who’s gonna look after Aunt Hirune?” “I asked someone else to do that.” “What?!” Mifuyu blurted out, eliciting another cough of protest from the other patient in the room. Ugh, so petty, she thought. She wanted to ask her father what he meant. She didn’t need to go to Mikura Hall. Someone else could look after her aunt. If those options had always existed, then why even ask her to begin with? “Don’t worry, your ol’ man’ll take care of it. If you do everything, then you won’t have any time to study or see your friends.” “…It’s a little late for that, don’t you think?” Mifuyu gradually screwed up her face, feeling like the rug had been pulled out from under her. Just then, she heard the door open and the room fill with the lively sound of people. The dividing curtain was yanked aside, revealing her PE teacher, Mr. Kikuchida, and her Japanese teacher, Mr. Miki. That’s right; they said they would stop by today. In the world triggered by the book curse based on Black Book’s hard-boiled story, Mr. Kikuchida played the role of the protagonist, a private detective. He just recently looked so completely nihilistic in his black coat and fedora, but he now wore a neon-green tracksuit decorated with the logo of a sports clothing company. He faced Mifuyu, her eye twitching. “Hey, you’re here, too!” he yelled cheerfully. Not a trace of Ricky McCloy. A persistent fit of coughing erupted, and the phantasmal Mr. Miki suggested they move into the lounge. A mix of emotions swirled inside Mifuyu. She didn’t want anything more to do with this book curse, but at the same time, she felt inexplicably drawn to those worlds. In fact, being forbidden to visit them bothered her. The real world was more peaceful, kinder, and posed fewer threats, but she somehow remained curious. She quickly stood to distract herself from her thoughts. “Well, I’m off. See you later, Dad.” “What, already done visiting?” Ignoring Mr. Kikuchida’s comment, she bowed quickly to the neighboring class’s homeroom teacher, Mr. Miki, and waved to her father. Large gauze still covering his face, Ayumu seemed eager to say something, but instead, he slowly waved back. After leaving the hospital, Mifuyu walked sluggishly, turning at the corner by the station and meandering from the shopping district to the booksellers quarter, wondering where she would go next. So she didn’t need to visit Mikura Hall for a while. Her father would find someone to look after Hirune. She mulled the decision around in her mind. She hated Mikura Hall. She should be glad that she didn’t have to babysit Aunt Hirune anymore. She was restless; her anxiety wouldn’t dissipate. She found herself walking toward Mikura Hall, and so she turned right around and went back the way she came. “…Fine, I’ll never visit Mikura Hall again,” she muttered to herself. Deciding to get some fries at the fast-food place by the station, she lightly kicked at a pebble by her feet in frustration. It rolled down the sidewalk and hit the toe of someone standing in front of her. “Oh, sorry about that.” As she apologized, she noticed the shoes that the pebble had struck. Black leather with a sparkling, rectangular, gold buckle on the top, the wholly unique design included tips curved up like the runners on a sled. And to top it off, the person wore them over sheer socks. “…Something the matter?” the person asked. Mifuyu jerked her head up to find a woman she didn’t know. Thick silver earrings adorned her stylishly cropped haircut, complemented by her deep-green eyeshadow and glittering golden eyeliner. A red belt wrapped around her black T-shirt, which fell past her waist and covered part of her strangely off-center beige skirt. About thirty years old, she looked more suited for a larger, more cosmopolitan city than Yomunaga. Mifuyu remembered the day before. This was the woman who’d been chatting with Hirune in the yard of Mikura Hall. That didn’t matter, though, because Mifuyu wouldn’t be going there anymore. “No, I’m fine.” Mifuyu moved to walk past her. But the woman narrowed her crescent thin eyes and blocked Mifuyu’s path. “Um… Excuse me, but I’d like to get by.” “I’m aware. I have business with you.” “…What do you mean?” “I was waiting for you in the hospital lounge. I went to the bathroom…and you left while I was in there, so I ran after you. Don’t you recognize me? I’m the fox thief.” “What?” “Let’s talk somewhere, shall we?” She snatched Mifuyu by the wrist and dragged her away before she could protest. The next thing she knew, the woman had sat her down on a sofa in an old café at the entrance to the booksellers quarter and was ordering tea from the owner. The other customers, elderly patrons in their sixties and seventies, all stole glances at this oddly dressed young woman with her short hair, but she simply sipped nonchalantly from her glass of water. Mifuyu gulped down her water as she glared at the other customers, all of who quickly looked away. “All right. Now that you’ve brought me here, would you care to explain? You’re the fox thief? Really?” “If you don’t believe me, I’ll gladly repeat what you said to me in there. ‘Do you really want to die in this messed-up world? Because if you do, then just go ahead and die, you coward!’ Such wonderfully pointed words.” Mifuyu stared at her in shock. “What? That’s what you said, isn’t it?” “Yeah…I did.” It really was her, that thieving fox. Mifuyu sat so dumbstruck, she didn’t notice that the waiter had mixed up their orders. The woman spoke easily as she switched the white cup of tea and the ice cream float. “The whole thing was so surprising, though,” the woman began. “Sure, it’s my fault because I stole the books and all, but who would have thought that the entire town would change so drastically and that I would turn into a fox? I was shocked when everything suddenly became night and everyone vanished. They all eventually reappeared, albeit as completely different characters. So tell me, are the Mikuras witches?” “Of course not. I don’t really get it, either. I have absolutely no idea how or why all this stuff happens.” Mifuyu looked down at her cup of tea, trying to organize her confused thoughts. First, why had this woman stolen books from Mikura Hall? Second, why follow Mifuyu and question her instead of running away? Third, who even was this lady? Mifuyu took a deep breath, then lifted her head. The woman was transferring the bright-red cherry from the top of the ice cream to two napkins she had spread neatly on the table. This woman seemed ready to dictate the conversation, and that frustrated Mifuyu. “There are so many things I want to ask you,” Mifuyu said. “Yes, me too. Who exactly is that Hirune lady?” “Oh… Aunt Hirune? Honestly, I’m not really all that sure myself…” Mifuyu should really have been the one asking the questions, but the woman asked hers so naturally that Mifuyu answered almost by reflex. Hirune had lived in Mikura Hall for as long as Mifuyu could remember. Mifuyu could count on one hand the number of times she had seen her aunt outside. Whenever she visited, Hirune was either reading a pile of books, organizing the stacks, mending a book, or asleep and snoring. The rare occasions that they had spent together passed in uncomfortable silence. Hirune never talked unless Mifuyu spoke first. Mifuyu vastly preferred that to the time she had spent with her grandmother Tamaki, and Hirune’s infrequent smiles were pleasant. She didn’t dislike her; she just didn’t really know her very well. Her father had never heard this opinion, but Mifuyu secretly thought her aunt seemed like a fictional character come to life. Her father said that Hirune had read and understood every book in the building. But to Mifuyu, anyone who couldn’t take care of themselves was nothing but a helpless adult, regardless of how smart they might be. Mifuyu caught herself getting lost in thoughts of her aunt. She couldn’t let this woman dictate the conversation. “Forget about my aunt. What about you? Why are you stealing books from Mikura Hall? Were you the one who changed everything to that world that rained pearls last week? And what’s the thing you wanted to talk about that you mentioned in that note? Also, I saw you talking with Aunt Hirune yesterday. What were—?” “Hold it. One question at a time, please.” The woman held up a pointer finger with a cassis-purple nail, and Mifuyu shut her mouth tight. The woman then slid the empty ice cream float glass to the side, rested her elbows on the table, and leaned in. At this distance, Mifuyu saw her green-soda-colored tongue every time she opened her mouth. “My name is Keiko. It means child of the fireflies. It’s a good name, don’t you think? I turn thirty-six this August, and I work as a vagabond. My hobbies include reading.” “…Please be serious.” “I am serious. Now it’s my turn to ask a question.” “We never made any rule like that.” “Well, I just did. Question: How come you don’t change in those other worlds like everyone else? And when I was a fox running around that dangerous city, there was another girl with you. Who is she?” “That’s two questions… For why I don’t change, honestly, I have no idea. As for the other girl, all I know is that she shows up whenever a book is stolen.” “She shows up when a book is stolen? Seriously?” Keiko appeared surprised. She removed her elbows from the table and sank back into her chair with a nasty look on her face. “Come on,” she said. “None of this is real, right? You, me, this is all some kind of mass hypnosis.” “What do you mean, ‘mass hypnosis’?” “You know about hypnosis, right? Where someone says, ‘You’re getting very sleeeeepy,’ and then you actually fall asleep. You and I got subjected to some incredibly strong hypnosis—one that made me believe I’d turned into a fox and made you see me as a fox. And we thought we saw the town and the people in it transform.” “…And all the townspeople were hypnotized, too?” “Probably. Everyone in this town could have been affected.” For a second, Mifuyu almost bought into Keiko’s theory, but she told herself to not jump to conclusions and think. In the end, she disagreed. “I don’t think so. How could anyone possibly hypnotize an entire town? Besides, I’ve heard that hypnosis affects everyone differently. And even if it was possible, anyone visiting from outside town would mention how strange things were. But there weren’t any visitors. You can’t close off an entire town with hypnosis.” Before experiencing the book curse, Mifuyu would probably have believed in the plausibility of mass hypnosis. But sitting across from someone who had gone through the same thing, she couldn’t accept that the other world had been fake. “That makes sense. You’re smarter than you look, Mifuyu.” “Wow, rude.” A frighteningly serious look passed over Keiko’s face, like her reservedness until then had all been an act, and she placed a thin finger on her sharp chin to show she was thinking. “Then let’s head to Mikura Hall right now,” she said. “What?” “As they say, seeing is believing. If I steal another book, we might enter that strange world again. Let’s test it out.” Mifuyu sat in stunned silence as Keiko snatched up the bill and stood. Regaining her senses, Mifuyu picked up her shoulder bag and, with hardly any time to throw it over her shoulder, rushed after Keiko, who was already paying at the register. “Absolutely no stealing!” Mifuyu said, louder than she’d intended. The elderly owner at the register cast nervous glances toward them. Keiko smiled. “Don’t worry, your restaurant is safe from me. I’m picky about my marks.” She then exited the store, whistling merrily, which only added to the owner’s confusion. Keiko moved briskly down the road, the hems of her black shirt and beige skirt fluttering in the sunlight that filtered through the leaves above the sidewalk. “Hey, wait—wait up! Are you serious about this?” Mifuyu asked her. “If you don’t want to join me, then feel free to stay behind.” “Come on! I can’t just let someone steal books from us…” “Why not, Mifuyu? I thought you hated books.” How does she know that? Disturbed, Mifuyu stopped in her tracks before shaking her head and running after Keiko again. “It doesn’t matter if I like books or not. I’m telling you to not steal anything! I’ll call the police!” A white mountain bike sat parked in front of a thick camphor tree, its bike lock wrapped around a NO BICYCLE PARKING sign. Whistling, Keiko undid the lock and hopped on the bike. “I guess you’ll have to catch me, then. Let’s play a little game of cops and robbers. Ready, set, go!” “Hey, stop!” Keiko dashed off as though she didn’t hear Mifuyu’s protests. Mifuyu frantically chased her, but as someone who could scarcely run a fifty-meter dash in less than ten seconds, she just didn’t have the stamina to keep up. Keiko disappeared in the distance. Alternating between running and walking, Mifuyu was gasping for breath by the time she reached Mikura Hall, her calves screaming in pain. Steadying her breathing, she wiped the sweat from her forehead with her arm. Keiko’s white mountain bike was already parked in the yard. Mikura Hall and the giant ginkgo tree stood silent, as though nothing was amiss. Irritated, Mifuyu pushed Keiko’s white mountain bike through the gate to the street in the hopes that someone would pick it up for illegal parking, and she walked back into the yard. The handle of the front door opened easily when she pulled it. “…I’d expect nothing less from a thief.” It was like the last time. The alarm system hadn’t gone off before the book curse, so Keiko must have had a copy of the key. “Keiko? Where are you?” Mifuyu called. She walked inside, but there was no sign of anyone—just what sounded like Hirune snoring. Mifuyu quickly removed her shoes, walking in without placing them in the shoe cubby. Keiko’s mountain bike was here, which meant that she probably hadn’t left the building yet. The doors to the stacks were all closed. Mifuyu ran toward the sunroom. Nothing there had changed since she came back from the world of Black Book a mere couple of hours ago. Sunlight still poured in through the large window, Hirune continued to sleep, and nothing appeared to have been moved. Mifuyu glanced at the stairs to the second floor, then strode over to Hirune. She looked down at her hand and sighed in resignation. Hirune held a slip of paper. A talisman with letters written in red ink, the same as those that appeared when the book thief struck. Without hesitating, Mifuyu plucked the paper from Hirune’s hand and read aloud the strange letters adorning it. “‘Whoever steals this book…shall be enveloped in a mist of illusions and steam.’” The wind blowing outside immediately stopped, and the plants and trees in the yard on the other side of the sunroom window froze, bathed in the yellow of the afternoon sun. She remembered something that Keiko had just said. Mass hypnosis. Was this really happening, or was it part of some hypnotic trick? Mifuyu looked from the frozen scene outside to the paper in her hand. Before any other words were spoken, Mifuyu said her name. “Mashiro.” “It’s our second time today, huh, Mifuyu?” Turning, she saw the girl she had just said good-bye to. White hair, with a polo shirt and jeans that matched Mifuyu’s. “So she did steal something,” said Mifuyu. “It’s strange, having two thefts in one day. Are you upset?” “No. It’s just… Sorry… This time, it’s partly my fault.” As she apologized, Mashiro’s already wide eyes swelled ever larger, and Mifuyu looked away, unable to bear her gaze. As she related everything that had happened with Keiko, a frigid sensation ran across the bottom of her feet and through her stomach—the same cold jolt as when her grandmother ruthlessly scolded her for bringing that lady to Mikura Hall all those years ago. Mifuyu slid her hands over her stomach. She remembered very little from her childhood. She could, however, vividly recall standing in the entryway of Mikura Hall with its musty smell of old books as her enraged grandmother harshly berated her. But Mifuyu couldn’t recall how her grandmother had handled the situation; she hardly even remembered what the lady she’d brought with her looked like. Tamaki had made it abundantly clear that Mifuyu was to never bring any friends into Mikura Hall, and the lesson seared itself deep into Mifuyu’s memory. And yet she had let Keiko inside. This woman even announced beforehand that she would steal a book. Mifuyu had run after her to stop her, but she had failed. “Mifuyu?” Mashiro’s voice brought her back to the present, and she steeled herself. She saw her grandmother behind Mashiro, staring daggers at her— No, she wasn’t actually there. Mifuyu had just mistaken an old coatrack in the corner of the sunroom for her because it was covered by a lime-green cloth that was the same color as her grandmother’s favorite kimono. “Are you okay? You look pale—” “It’s nothing. We have to find Keiko and get that book back.” Wiping her sweaty palms on her jeans, she urged Mashiro, who looked worried, toward the stairs. “No, not there this time,” Mashiro said, and guided Mifuyu toward the entryway. Doors to various stacks lined the hall. Mashiro opened the one on the far right and beckoned Mifuyu inside. “This is it. Go on in.” “…I should’ve checked here first instead of going to the sunroom.” “She had already left by the time you arrived.” “What?” After the thief exited Mikura Hall with the stolen book, Mifuyu had no idea how they actually turned into a fox. She had assumed that Keiko was still here because her bike was parked outside, but apparently, she had been wrong about that. “Don’t worry about it,” Mashiro assured her. “We just need to catch her, and everything will be okay. Come, let’s go.” This storeroom was also dark; there wasn’t a single candle anywhere, though tiny, muted orange lights shone around the room. Following Mashiro as she walked between the rows of shelves, Mifuyu came upon a shelf with some books missing, leaving an empty space on the left in the far back, the cover of a solitary book facing them. The cover illustration showed a blue sky tinged with gray, gradually fading into darkness. There were black mountains and the silhouette of a village, with the picture of a creature like a dragon or a wolf. “…The Silver Beast. What’s it about?” “It’s a little bit like Black Book.” “Ugh, not more shoot-outs.” “What’s a shoot-out?” “It means shooting at people and getting shot at.” “Oh! I see. It’s an adventure story, so there might be shoot-outs.” “What do you mean, ‘adventure story’?” “Hmm, it’s a genre where the protagonist needs to go on a quest or a journey… Anyway, The Silver Beast predates Black Book by a bit, but it’s more than some old story about the past. A special technology has been developed in this world, so it feels quite futuristic. It’s a really good story, Mifuyu. I think you’ll like it.” The Silver Beast—when was the first time I heard that tale? The beautiful beast, its entire body fashioned out of the purest silver, was said to have existed long before our town of Stemhope came to be. The beast made its home in the empire’s northern lands and was known to shake its silver fur, breathe out white puffs even on the hottest days of midsummer, and cry with a voice clearer than a nightingale’s. It was the gentlest, strongest, and most magnificent creature in all the land. That fairy tale, which Gramps recounted to me over and over, was usually sweet and peaceful, even slightly melancholic. Gramps worked as a steam-locomotive engineer and claimed to have seen the Silver Beast once with his own eyes. His locomotive traveled distances unimaginable to me. Each time Gramps left for work, it’d be a while before I saw him again—yet once he did return, he would rest at home until the new moon became full. During those times, he would regale my sister and me with stories. A new coal mine called the Pincushion had just been discovered in the northern region of the empire. The miners extracting the coal that powered the steam locomotives would swing their pickaxes to unearth the material, their sweat causing their pale muscles to shine as they breathed in the stale air of the mine shafts. One day, a young man let out a scream as he was loading coal onto a minecart. The miners who rushed to help him witnessed the young man convulsing and frothing at the mouth, pickax in hand and eyes rolling back in his head. His pickax was still embedded in the shaft, its tip glowing red as if superheated. His fellow miners hurriedly tried prying the pickax from his hand, but his body had already grown too hot to touch. A few moments later, the moisture in the young man’s body evaporated, causing him to shrivel up and fall to the ground, dead. A survey team was quickly dispatched after the incident was reported to the empire’s magistrate. The Pincushion was closed, and with their livelihoods gone, countless miners ended up in poverty. The soup rations made from scraps of meat grew thinner, and as the small children and the sick began succumbing to hunger, a deafening explosion erupted from the Pincushion. A wasteland stretched out before the people who walked outside to investigate. The Pincushion was gone. The ever-present, precipitous black peak that had loomed so intimidatingly had suddenly disappeared. Humanlike figures emerged from the thick smoke hanging over the newly formed wasteland and approached the people. It was the survey team, covered from head to toe in a cocoon of protective gear. They walked silently through the crowd’s questions and protestations, boarded their carriage, and drove off. When the smoke eventually cleared, the remaining miners and their families heard something akin to birdsong, clear and beautiful. The next instant, the head of a great beast emerged from where the Pincushion once stood. Its neck was long, its head nearly brushed the heavens, and its thick torso was covered in fur. It walked on four legs but had a tail like a fish. This strange, silver-colored beast was an amalgamation of mythical creatures: dragons, wolves, and mermaids. Rays of sunlight pierced the small gaps in the overcast sky, causing its silver body to shine as bright as gold. The beast moved its head slowly, opened its long snout wide, and released a cloud of white smoke. As the people stood motionless in shock, the beast’s breath came down upon their heads. The dreadfully hot steam vaporized everyone present. A second lungful of air chased after those who had barely avoided the first wave, evaporating the moisture inside their bodies until they withered away. But the Silver Beast was halted in its tracks. The survey team had gone to the nearby cliffs in secret, where they ignited the blasting powder that had filled the Pincushion’s mine shafts, loosening the bedrock beneath the beast’s feet. That was when the waiting troops attacked the Silver Beast. —So went the story Gramps used to tell us about the creature. I sit here now in my factory school, writing this tale with my quill during one of my tedious classes. My teacher is droning on about immensnium. This incredible ore has propelled our nation centuries ahead of others. Unearthed in the remains of the Pincushion, this ore contains a thousand times more energy than coal. Back when little was known about immensnium, many of the empire’s scientists died in laboratory explosions, unable to control the immense energy of the ore. But they eventually discovered ways to mix immensnium with other metals, and research advanced by leaps and bounds. They created such wonders as immensteel, which was even harder than diamonds, and combustion engines capable of withstanding the metal’s massive energy. We learn how to handle immensnium at school, but they never once mention anything about the Silver Beast, which appeared at the Pincushion. Yet I believe the two are connected. After all, Gramps said he saw the Silver Beast on the day of the disaster as his train passed the nearby town. I awake every morning at four AM. I live in the student dorms—attached to the factory workers’ lodge like an afterthought—sleeping in the cramped middle bunk of a three-tiered bunk bed. The bell rings, and the dormitory director screams, “Wake up! Wake up!” until we all groggily set our feet on the wooden floors. I pull my shirt, still smelling vaguely of detergent, over my patched-up underclothes, only for the boy in the bunk below me to laugh and say the laundry-room tag is still attached to my shirt. We all then head to the cafeteria, where I— “…Hey, do you smell something?” Mifuyu asked. Her head shot up from the book, and she sniffed the air around her. “It smells like sewage. And it’s funky, like someone who hasn’t taken a bath in a while.” She looked toward Mashiro, whose face was already scrunched up, both her hands covering her nose. “I’m—ew—a d-dog, so my sense of smell is really strong…” “Oof, that sounds rough.” Mifuyu fished around in her shoulder bag until she grabbed a tissue, ripped it cleanly in half, and shoved each piece up Mashiro’s nostrils. “Oh, ah, ahhh … Oh, dat’s a liddle bedder,” Mashiro managed to say with tears in her eyes. She looked so silly that Mifuyu couldn’t help but laugh. Then Mifuyu remembered Keiko and composed herself. “Okay, let’s go,” she urged. “It looks like we’re already inside the book world. Who knows if Keiko is already a fox or not, but we have to find her.” They left the stacks, opening the front door of Mikura Hall with spirits high. Then their jaws dropped to the ground. Yomunaga was already completely different. Elevated tracks passed above Mikura Hall, accompanied by the sounds of trains. The vehicles driving on the ground looked like horse-drawn carriages without any horses; they possessed the same boxy body as the ones from a century ago that were now seen in museums, but they had thin wheels instead. They drove at incredible speeds. The small vehicles zipped over the roads so fast that Mifuyu’s head spun. Every vehicle had what looked like a kiln on the roof that emitted a glittering trail of silver steam. Everyone’s clothes were different, too. Most of the women wore long-sleeved blouses that were puffy at the shoulders, with thin waists leading to skirts that rose high in the back. The hair bundled atop their heads were accented with tiny hats. Mifuyu almost felt like she had walked onto a movie set. Some people, however, looked rather poor, with thin blouses and skirts and ratty shawls draped over their shoulders. The men wore bowler hats or flat caps with either a three-piece suit or slightly dirty jackets over faded shirts and patchy lint-covered pants. Mifuyu waved away the mist in front of her, and passing cars honked at her as she ran to the other side. She felt people gazing at her and heard them whispering to one another: “My, do you see how those girls are dressed? They might as well be in their skivvies.” “Must be slaves from the north.” She and Mashiro were completely out of place. Mifuyu flushed in embarrassment. “Let’s run, Mashiro.” Mifuyu grabbed Mashiro’s hand and started off through the wall of people. It reminded her of something from TV—Sherlock Holmes. She had learned about that time period in school, something like nineteenth-century England. But this place was so uncomfortable. The road had changed from its regular asphalt to European-style cobblestones, and the stench of the sewer prevailed. Flies swarmed around piles of garbage, causing Mifuyu to gag and rush off with her hand covering her mouth. The tissues clogging Mashiro’s nose seemed largely ineffective; she looked pale. “Argh, this book curse has gone too far. Nothing about this is the same as Yomunaga. It’s way too elaborate!” “Wair ah we goi’g, Bifuyu?” “What?” “Wair ah we goi’g?” “…Oh, ‘where are we going?’ I don’t know. But we need to hurry up and catch that thieving fox Keiko. This place is making you sick, right, Mashiro?” “But we don ha benny clueth.” “I have no idea what you’re saying.” Hurrying down the cobblestone road, they turned a corner and got ready to cross the street, but Mifuyu had not been paying attention to her surroundings. A big black car—a massive vehicle with numerous gears turning the wheels—came from Mifuyu’s left and stopped next to her. The rattling exhaust pipe emitted a noise like a sigh as it spewed a column of steam. Mifuyu and Mashiro were too busy choking on the steam in their lungs to notice the car door rattle open and police officers in shakos emerge to stand in front of them. The officers immediately seized them, put them in handcuffs, and dragged them toward the car. “What are you doing? Let go of us!” “Quiet, slave!” One of the police officers slapped Mifuyu across her face. She sat stunned, eyes wide-open, and covered her stinging cheek with a hand. Mashiro’s fur bristled in anger. As a ripple of scornful laughter spread through the police officers, she attacked, biting the neck of the officer who’d slapped Mifuyu. He cried out in pain. “Restrain this one! Put her in another car!” “Mashiro!” Regardless of how much otherworldly power she might possess, Mashiro couldn’t overcome four adults restraining her arms and legs. Some officers shoved Mifuyu into the car, slammed the door, and drove off as other officers kept Mashiro pinned to the ground. “Mashiro! Mashiro!” Mifuyu screamed, only able to hear Mashiro’s pained whimpers as the car drove farther and farther away. The black-painted paddy wagon raced through the transformed Yomunaga. A massive rail line floated above the streets, while a web of thick pipes crawled over the ground, steam pouring from gaps in seams held tight with gigantic bolts. The paddy wagon had one small window, but with the iron bars and the police watching her, Mifuyu could hardly see outside. Moving even an inch would cause the black-clad officer guarding her to threateningly bang his baton against the wall. Someone from Yomunaga should be playing this role, but she didn’t recognize him. Her face drained white, Mifuyu looked down at her hands. The handcuffs around her wrists had a strange design—two hollow gears connected in the shape of a peanut, and when someone put their hands in the hollow centers, each gear would rotate to close the hole, eventually clamping down until no gap remained. No matter how much Mifuyu struggled to free her hands, they stayed locked tight. No partition stood between her and the driver, but she could not reach the front. A giant furnace roared in the space between the rear of the vehicle and the driver’s seat, a peculiar purple flame burning within. The furnace emitted a low growl as it pushed a piston up and down. This moved a walking beam that was connected to a bronze crank glistening from oil before rotating the wheels. She had never seen such a strange engine. If she tried to run to the front, the officers would probably grab her while she struggled to get past this device. The paddy wagon stopped at several places, each time emitting a loud noise as the door opened and officers escorted in men and women dressed in emerald-green coveralls. She recognized most of the faces, which provided momentary relief knowing that she was still in Yomunaga, but the dejected look on each face paired with the same geared handcuffs around their wrists eventually deflated her spirits. Barely sitting on the narrow bench attached to the wall, no one spoke, and everyone simply stared at the floor. After a rough, winding drive through town, a police whistle rang out, and the car stopped with a shrill racket. “Get out! Out!” The people in the coveralls were practically dragged out of the paddy wagon, with Mifuyu following. Mifuyu had lived her entire life in Yomunaga, but she had no idea where she was. The station, the stores, the bookshops, the hospital where her father stayed—none of them existed. In their place stood giant factories, grouped untidily together like clumps of metal. A white mixture of steam and smoke poured from the chimneys. Mifuyu looked up at the scene, dumbstruck. Rows of buildings towered high like a metal fortress. In the center, gears rotated on a machine magnitudes larger than the one in the paddy wagon. This Yomunaga didn’t focus on bookstores, but on the factories shuttered behind a giant gate. Roads led to several sides of the factory town, spreading out like the arms of an octopus. Workers in coveralls filed down every road, punching their time cards at the gates as the lines slowly advanced inside. The detail of the worlds in the other book curses she’d experienced so far were no match for this one. Uneasiness worked itself into Mifuyu, and she wanted to run screaming, but she suppressed the urge for the sake of Mashiro, wherever she was now. “All right, line up!” A baton pushed her to the end of a line, where she joined the slow movement of the emerald-green workers. All the people around her, be they workers or guards, were most likely residents of Yomunaga. She recognized some of the faces farther up the line from her middle school days, and the guard who had pushed her with the baton owned a variety store in town. But everything was just so different that seeing them provided no comfort. She had to hurry up and save Mashiro. Or would it be better to catch that despicable thieving fox first? No matter how drastically the world changed under the book curse, she knew that catching the thief and retrieving the books would return everything to normal. But escaping this line seemed near impossible. Mifuyu was the only one not wearing a uniform and was last in line, so she stood out. She intertwined her restrained hands, swallowed, and gritted her teeth to hold back the tears. Her only option was to procced forward submissively. Eventually, she passed through the gate, where the workers spilt into lines along diverging pathways, finally consumed by the countless factory buildings. Mifuyu entered the largest one in the center of the complex. Metal double doors three times as tall as Mifuyu hung at the factory entrance, each one of its iron studs as large as her fist. The shuffling line continued inside, and upon entering, she saw a mud-brown hallway stretch before her, the steamy heat intensifying with every step. The stench of steam and sweat choked her. The metal doors shut behind her, followed by the sharp sound of a key turning. At the far end of the humid hallway, she walked into a corridor shaped like a protruding balcony, the view of the factory suddenly opening up before her. A giant vault stretched deep, deep down into the earth. The floors extended like an infinite torus toward the ground and ceiling, a strong breeze blowing through it all. The thought of accidentally falling from the railing, which was lined with beacons, sent shivers down her spine. Everything was so different than with the printers in Black Book this morning—compared with this factory, that printshop was just a plaything. What did they make here anyway? Endless gears, chutes, belts, and cranks filled the spaces between each floor, roaring as they operated. Ten or so tunnel entrances led from the wall of the torus-shaped balcony, and the workers lined up like ants returning to the nest before being swallowed by the tunnels. Signs reading SCREWS, LIQUID METAL, RODS, GLASS, and other such things hung above the tunnels, but Mifuyu couldn’t make sense of any of it. Someone called to the guard behind her, and Mifuyu took the chance to slip out of the line. No one noticed. The front door was already closed, a giant lock hanging from it. Mifuyu sidled along the wall and darted into a nearby tunnel. The hallway narrowed quickly, and workers disappeared into the mist behind her beneath an eerie red light. Mifuyu sneaked forward, wondering if she could find a key somewhere that would unlock her handcuffs. Creeping along, she saw the factory floor—workers in hooded masks huddled around metal machines filthy with oil, all surrounded by belt conveyors turned by a series of pulleys. At regular intervals, the mouth of a machine would open and spit out a small part, which would then travel down the conveyor belts. She stopped and stared as people dressed in black coveralls walked among the emerald-green workers. They wore round metal goggles and a metal box strapped on like a backpack, which released steam and lifted the workers into the air. They appeared to be doing maintenance on the top of the machine, inserting the thin end of glistening oil cans into the gears and cranks to ensure that they functioned properly. “You there,” came a voice, startling Mifuyu. What rotten luck—I knew I should’ve kept moving. Turning around, she saw a girl about her age with her hair in a short bob. Mifuyu had seen this girl before. The metal chain dangling from her glasses was new, though. It was the girl from Mifuyu’s school who’d invited her to join the literary club. But the girl standing before her wore a green blouse with high collar, ruffled shoulders, a leather corset, and a long maroon skirt. Like the others, the clothes made her look like a time traveler from the Victorian era. “…You’re from the literary club—” “I beg your pardon?” “Oh, um, never mind.” “You’re quite peculiar in both dress and speech. Come with me. You must get changed.” Mifuyu followed the literary-club girl among the heavy sound of machinery. They walked the way Mifuyu had come, exiting the tunnel, heading back to the balcony floor, and entering another tunnel. Red light illuminated this tunnel, too. Doors ran the length of the dim hallway, which was filled with the pungent smell of metal, an engraved plate above each entrance: SMALL PARTS CONTROL, LARGE PARTS CONTROL, LEATHER BAND TANNING, and OIL & POLISH MIXING, among others. Walking through one of the doors, the literary-club girl inserted a long metal key into Mifuyu’s handcuffs and unlocked them. As Mifuyu rubbed at her reddened wrists, the girl handed her a pair of coveralls. It was the same emerald green as the others, with black covered buttons running from the neckline to near the stomach. Glancing quickly at the girl, Mifuyu was met with a glare that caused her to hurriedly put the clothes on. The fabric around the shoulders was stiff, and it was rather uncomfortable. Mifuyu had secretly been hoping that the girl might leave her alone once she had finished changing, but those hopes dissipated when the girl ordered Mifuyu to follow her. She wanted to start searching for Mashiro or the thieving fox immediately, but she decided it’d be best to obey the order. “Excuse me… What’s this factory for?” “You don’t know? Well, I suppose a northerner like you wouldn’t.” The girl smirked at her with an air of superiority. “This is where we process immensteel.” “What’s immensteel?” “A truly robust material made by mixing immensnium with other metals. Immensnium, the miraculous ore we use for fuel, produces too much heat and destroys the engine when it’s put in a normal iron machine. That is why we have to use immensteel, a mix of immensnium and other metals, to build parts and containers that can withstand the ore. This is where we forge it.” Mifuyu remembered reading a word like that. She recalled the start of The Silver Beast, which this world was based on, and sighed at how little sense this book made. At least her Japanese textbooks at school would never have a story like this. Who would write something like this anyway? She didn’t even know who put the book curse on these books or how any of this worked. Thinking about that made her realize something. She couldn’t remember the author’s name. Had it been on the cover? Books almost always included the name of the person who wrote the story on the front or the side. But searching through her memories of the books used for the book curses, try as she might, she couldn’t recall the author’s name. If she knew that, then she might be able to figure out why they created this world, or at least yell at them for everything they were subjecting her to. Wait—they weren’t listed in the book ledger. This morning, before entering the world of Black Book, she had looked through the ledger, which had been underneath Hirune’s face as she slept, and couldn’t find The Brothers of the Lush Village. They approached an intersection in the hallway, and she followed the literary-club girl to the right down a small hall. It was incredibly bright. Not artificial light, but actual sunlight. Mifuyu looked up and saw that the center of the hall stood open, with just four thick bronze pillars protruding into space. A fence surrounded an area with a vaulted ceiling. It looked like some kind of device. Countless cords ran from the walls, wrapped around the pillars like snakes, and connected to a black belt, gears and pulleys running along the side. The literary-club girl pressed a round button in front of the fence, and the gears and pulleys began turning rapidly, moving the belt vigorously, a piercing sound accompanying something rising from below. A box of glass and metal—an elevator. With a loud thud, it stopped in front of Mifuyu, billowing steam. The girl grabbed the handle on the forest-green door, which was wet with vapor, and slid it open. “Rather impressive, isn’t it?” she said. “This is an automatic lifting device. Just one of the conveniences that immensnium provides.” “Sure…” Mifuyu had to admit that it was impressive. She had ridden in elevators more times than she could count, but never one this strange. She hoped the belts wouldn’t snap on the way down… Mifuyu cautiously stepped inside and waited for the literary-club girl to close the door and press the button. The elevator plummeted vertically like the drop tower at an amusement park, the belts staying intact as they safely touched down on the ground. Pale white for a while at the experience of weightlessness, Mifuyu covered her mouth and shakily stepped out. They proceeded underground to a place that was radically different than the factory floor. It had machines installed inside a reddish-brown tunnel that was hollowed out from bedrock, and groundwater seeped out from the walls. Cold air rose up from her feet, and Mifuyu rubbed at the goose bumps on her arms. This place definitely could not be called Yomunaga anymore. “There’s one job that all new workers must do. Go through that door over there,” the girl said curtly before returning to the elevator to leave Mifuyu behind. “What about you?” “I’m not going. Just you. Best of luck.” With another tremendous burst of steam, the elevator lifted like a rocket and disappeared from sight. Rubbing her arms, Mifuyu pressed against the door, praying that the other side would be warm. The other side of door certainly was warm. It was more than warm. The heat was so intense that she could feel sweat boiling out from her pores. And the noise was deafening. “Hey, pick that up and get going! Now!” “Don’t rush me, you moron! Handling them roughly makes them harder to clean up!” “Whatever, just move! Unless you want more work tomorrow!” She could barely make out the mass of people moving through the gloom. What seemed like an infinite amount of bulbs tried to provide light but failed to illuminate such an enormous room. The floor, however, glowed faintly, a purple dust glimmering mysteriously all over the ground. The air swelled with some indescribable odor—a muggy, offsetting musk. To Mifuyu, it smelled exactly like simmering mushrooms in ink and topping them with crushed nuts. Hesitantly walking forward, she took in her surroundings. She saw at least fifty people nearby dismantling a small hill of what looked like dirt, then taking the debris somewhere. A dozen workers stood on top of the hill, using pickaxes and shovels to break pieces off and load them in a wheeled minecart down below, where a small tractor with a rotating beacon light waited to haul them away. Like the other vehicles, the tractor contained a furnace that burned a purple flame to drive the gears. Everyone worked intently and noisily, looking like they had no time to concern themselves with a new worker. Now’s a good opportunity to escape and find Keiko, that despicable thieving fox. Mifuyu began to stealthily search for an exit. The place was a sort of cave, the walls of the exposed bedrock glimmering with subterranean water. Just then, however, a tremendous roar shook the ground, rattling the underground cave. “Wh-what was that?” After a tremor like one from a massive earthquake, Mifuyu crouched against the wall. The roar sounded two, three times from somewhere nearby, each time shaking the ground violently. The voices of the workers rose as one and grew more frantic as they yelled to one another to hurry. Mifuyu fearfully forced her trembling legs to rise and faced the direction the roar had come from. She saw two lights next to each other in the air ahead where there had just been darkness. It looked like two crescents had been broken off a pale-blue moon and hung upside down in the sky. She remembered the Black Cat of Night from The Brothers of the Lush Village, but this felt completely different. This felt frightful. “The beast is awake!” A creature the size of a small hill shook its neck, bumping into a lamp overhead which shattered on the ground. That set fire to some oil, which immediately grew into a carpet of flames. Illuminated by the blaze, the creature could truly only be described as a beast. A long neck like a dragon that might attack a castle in a children’s book she read once, a chest covered in soft fur, four thick legs for support, and a tail like a fish’s. The long nose on its face looked as much wolf as dragon. In addition to that, scales glittered around the strange beast’s body, like a blend of fish and reptile. Its entire body shone a beautiful white. “Is that the Silver Beast?” The creature that Mifuyu had imagined emerging from the mine when she read The Silver Beast only slightly resembled the one she saw now. Mifuyu had pictured a creature much more ordinary, more like what you might find in a zoo. A cage surrounded the beast, but the steel fence didn’t reach the ceiling, so more than one third of its long neck protruded above the enclosure. Perhaps they had run out of materials when building it. Upon closer examination, a leather harness wrapped around its neck and torso and was connected to a chain to prevent any further movement. The beast must have knocked down lamps frequently, because several workers sprayed water from the fire extinguishers strapped to their backs in a way that seemed almost routine. The cold air spread over to Mifuyu as the fire was brought under control. The beast, however, let out a violent cry like a baby being disturbed from a deep sleep. “…Wasn’t it supposed to have a voice like birdsong?” As Mifuyu recalled the story and watched, some workers climbed the cage and pulled on the chain connected to the beast’s collar, guarding it. She prayed they would control it…but it wasn’t that easy, with several workers being knocked to the ground the moment they grabbed the raging beast’s chain. Just then, a buzzer sounded. The beacons mounted on the wall spun, illuminating the cave like red disco balls. With this, the beast suddenly stopped thrashing, its blue eyes widening as it lifted its head, its nostrils sniffing at a scent near the ceiling. The workers rushed to get down from the cage. Because of the darkness, the beast’s long neck, and her position on the ground floor, Mifuyu hadn’t noticed the rust-red iron door carved into the rocks up above until the red beacons flashed. “What’s a door doing that high up?” There were no stairs or ladders to the door, making it impossible to get in or out. A door and stairs that led nowhere—perhaps they were remnants from a renovation or demolition and so had lost their purpose. That useless-looking door slowly creaked open. A short board, decorated with a mass of rattling gears, protruded from inside, followed by two workers in white hoods who began turning the handle on a series of connected gears. This extended an arm out from the board, which stopped directly above the beast’s head. More boards shot out from the bottom of the arm and instantaneously joined together, forming the shape of a long, thin catwalk. So the metal door hadn’t been useless after all. The workers faced each other and saluted. A human figure moved inside the door. Someone emerged, dressed in a uniform like a red trench coat. A key ring rattled at their hip, and they carried chains in their right hand. They strode down the catwalk, which floated amid flashing lights, with animals tied to the end of the chains. A yellow fox, a white dog, and a brown horse. “Mashiro!” The white dog had to be Mashiro. Things were so loud, however, that her voice stood no chance of reaching her. Mifuyu ran as though possessed and yelled to her again as she approached the beast’s cage. “Mashiro! Can you hear me? Mashiro!” At that, Mashiro’s ears twitched, and she lifted her head—but something about her seemed off. Normally, she would have recognized Mifuyu’s voice, but she instead limply drooped her head as though exhausted. If Mifuyu pushed just a little farther forward, she would be within arm’s reach of the beast’s cage; just then, the alarm stopped. The person in red bent over and undid the chain on the fox’s collar. “Hey, wait! What are they doing?!” Mifuyu was so upset that she grabbed the arm of the worker next to her and asked them what was happening. “Oh, are you new here? That’s its food. It’s time for the beast to eat.” Mifuyu’s head was spinning. “What? Food? It eats animals?” “Of course it does. You eat animals, too, don’t you?” With that, the beast let forth a clear, brilliant song. Entirely different from the shrill, anger-riddled scream from earlier, this resembled birdsong. Then like a dog waiting for food from its owner, the beast raised its front legs in anticipation and placed them on the edge of the cage. In the next instant, the catwalk floor under the fox opened, and the small yellow shape tumbled straight down. The beast stopped singing and opened its jaws wide. Mifuyu screamed and struck the pillar-thick bars of the cage. Was that fox the thief, Keiko? If she died in the world of the book curse, she might die in the real world, too. But the very moment before the fox fell onto the beast’s glistening wet tongue, it righted itself, kicked off the beast’s massive teeth with its hind legs, and jumped away. “Keiko!” The fox moved to the beast’s nose before running between its eyes and leaping like a graceful dancer through the air over the cage, landing on the ground and bolting off at full speed. It came down on the opposite side of the cage from Mifuyu, dashing past the tractor with the minecarts and disappearing into the depths of the cave. The beast immediately let out an irate roar. Furious at seeing its meal escape, it thrashed its tail, striking the cage as though trying to break it. The bars shook, pushing Mifuyu away. She bumped into the small hill behind her, spitting dirt from her mouth as the crowd of workers ran her direction. “Where’s the tranquilizer team?” “We’re here! We’re on our way! On our way!” A swarm of feathered darts from tranquilizer guns pierced the beast’s torso and neck, draining the strength of the wildly thrashing beast. It collapsed on its side in the cage, closed its blue eyes, and went to sleep. The harp-like sounds of the slumbering beast contrasted starkly with the sight of its violent rampage. The workers shook their heads at the close call and went back to their tasks. The worksite returned to normal. “M-Mashiro.” Looking up, Mifuyu saw that the catwalk had vanished during the commotion, along with Mashiro, the person dressed in red, and the brown horse. The metal door once again stood closed. How could she get up there? The best way would be to go inside the building, but nothing guaranteed that walking through the mazelike factory would lead her to the area behind the door. So should she wait here for it to open again? Mifuyu looked over to the tractor carrying minecarts piled with dirt. She wondered what lay in that direction. Plus, the fox had just run off that way, too. She knew that if she didn’t save Mashiro, then she’d be fed to the beast the next time it woke up. So she tightened her shoelaces and followed the minecarts. Going after the fox would be better than blindly searching for a path that would lead her to Mashiro. The tractor kind of looked like a golf cart to Mifuyu. Riding a minecart would probably be easiest, but she couldn’t bring herself to sit down on the dirty black soil piled inside, so she decided to walk behind one instead. The rotating beacon light on the tractor acted as a signal in the dark cave, and it moved slower than a bicycle, so Mifuyu could follow without losing it. She worried more about the stagnant air and the smell. Constantly breathing that mixture of mushrooms, ink, and nuts made her want to vomit. The smell of human sweat posed its own problems. Covering her nose and mouth with her sleeve, she breathed through her mouth as much as possible while walking in the shadow of a minecart. The tractor finally left the factory floor, but it continued down a narrow pathway. After passing through the gate, it ascended a slope; already winded, Mifuyu felt a sharp cramp in her side. She pushed herself up the hill because a white light shone down from above, clearly light from the sun, and she felt that she needed to get there no matter what. She was right. At the end of the sloping hallway, both the tractor and the minecarts were heading to the ground outside. The exit. Mifuyu was too exhausted to walk, so she collapsed behind the minecart at the end of the line, having left the factory. A layer of black dirt covered a barren wilderness with no place to hide. Lying on her back, Mifuyu thought about how glad she was to have changed into the coveralls. She wondered where in Yomunaga she was now. The sky contained not one cloud, and no birds flew in the air. Driving into the open area, the tractor stopped inside a metal enclosure that resembled the rib cage of some giant animal, the row of minecarts clanging to a stop like a line of balls. The solitary worker hopped down from the driver’s seat and pressed a switch on the gate. The floor of the riblike cage rattled as it tilted, tipping the entire line of minecarts to the side. The worker then opened a gate on the side of the first minecart, releasing the dirt. She had to move before the worker reached the end of the line. Mifuyu whipped her tired body up, and when she did, a small figure with a black mask covering their face appeared from the tractor’s shadow. “Huh?” The black-masked human looked about ten years old. They walked right next to the riblike cage and pushed the button before quickly darting away. The cage emitted a sharp squeak, and the minecarts all returned to their original positions. “Great, just great.” The solitary worker dumping out the dirt walked back to the button when, behind him, more black masks poked up from the thick piles of dirt. Every person was skinny, and they quickly climbed on top of the minecarts. One of them scrambled to the tractor’s controls, but the worker was so focused on their task that they didn’t notice. “Hmm, is it broken? Huh…? Hey, you!” In the same instant that the worker realized what was happening and yelled out, the tractor drove away, spilling clumps of dirt as it dragged the minecarts behind it. The black-masked children laughed with joy. Mifuyu grabbed the edge of a minecart, clambering onto the dirt she’d just been grumbling about. The worker stood in shock as he watched the tractor drive before suddenly coming to his senses and chasing after Mifuyu, but she hit his hands, and he fell face-first in the dirt. “Stop! Get off there!” the worker yelled, covered in dirt, as he slowly faded into the distance. “We have a passenger!” “Kick her off! Get her outta here!” “Aw, I feel bad, though. She looks about the same age as my big sister.” They lifted their masks to reveal their faces. These children really were only around ten years old. There were about ten kids in all, two sitting on the tractor while eight rode the minecarts. Covered in dirt from head to toe, they wore strange clothes. One of them had a cloth covered in small gears and screws wrapped around their forehead. Another wore a bottomless bucket for a hat, while a third child donned a sleeveless jacket over pants with suspenders and a bare chest. Someone else wore a gown covered in rows of sewn feathers, while an adult shirt hung like a long dress on yet another. “Who are you guys?” Mifuyu asked. Examining the children more closely, she recognized every face. They were all students at her father’s dojo. The composure that Mifuyu had forced herself to maintain melted, and she burst into tears. “Whoa, she’s crying!” “She’s crying! Why’s she crying?” “She must be hurt!” “She’s scared of us!” The children began nudging one another on the side and shoulders, admonishing the other to comfort her or telling someone to go do it first. Ultimately, however, they just bickered among themselves, perhaps too shy to comfort an older girl they didn’t know. Then a boy riding on the tractor’s roof turned around, walked down the rows of minecarts while shaking his head in resignation, and stood among the noisy children. This boy also studied at the dojo in the real world. Mifuyu might not remember the names of the other children, but she knew his. He had the presence of a leader, excelled at judo, and both Ayumu and Che adored him. They called him Kakkie. Short hair, a strong face, and muscular arms protruding from a shirt with the sleeves ripped off. “Pipe down, all of you.” “But she’s crying.” “And? Leave her alone, then. Let her cry.” Kakkie seemed to play the role of a leader this world, too. He stood in the middle of the children, staring down at Mifuyu. Not caring about getting the dirt on her cheeks, Mifuyu wiped her tears away and confessed that she was looking for a fox. “Has a fox come by here? I saw it run this way.” The children exchanged glances. “Animals around these parts? They’re all food for the Silver Beast, right?” “That sounds like bad news!” The children slowly inched backward, climbing over the rim of the minecart to escape to the ones in the front. Only Kakkie and a child with different-colored lenses in their glasses remained with Mifuyu. Arms crossed, Kakkie looked full of arrogance, carrying himself like he was Mifuyu’s equal—even though she was three or four years older than him. “Do you have any idea where you are?” he asked irritably. Mifuyu sheepishly looked around. “Where…?” The sky shone clear overhead, but the surrounding buildings appeared only as silhouettes through the haze of steam around them. The place was huge. In the real world, TV shows always noted the size of a place in hectares, but she didn’t know how big a hectare was and so couldn’t guess how many this place contained. If she had to compare it to something, she’d say that if this was a park, then her entire school grounds would be the size of the sandbox. Haphazard mounds of black dirt covered every surface, and the same smell as the one from underground filled the air. “I guess…a farm?” said Mifuyu. The dirt smelled like organic matter, which made her think of the fertilizer they spread over fields on farms. But Kakkie just laughed. “Wrong! This is where they dispose of the Silver Beast’s poop.” “…Y-you’re joking, right?” “Why would I joke about that? You came from underground, so you must’ve seen its feeding grounds. Feed it something, and something else has to come out. And that stuff is brought up here for processing.” Mifuyu gagged at the acrid smell wafting up to her, spitting and slapping away the stuff on her face and body. Seeing this, the boy with glasses comforted her. “Come on, cut her a break. Honestly, though, it’s just ordinary metabolite. The Silver Beast’s organs are very unique, and it doesn’t have an actual anus.” “Man, spare us the details. Anyway, there’s no need to freak out. It won’t hurt you.” “Cut it out!” Mifuyu yelled. The boy in glasses shrank back, head tucked into his shoulders like a turtle. “Yeesh,” he said. “She’s all yours.” “All right. Seriously. The Silver Beast’s poop, the metabolite, isn’t used for anything. It just smells funny and can’t even be used as fertilizer. It doesn’t mix with dirt and doesn’t dissolve in water, so it’s very hard to process. It just keeps piling up.” “…Why even keep an animal like that?” “Because it makes immensnium.” Immensnium—that ore from the story. Mifuyu realized that the purple flame glowing in the paddy wagon, the alarms, and the elevator was the blaze of immensnium. It powered every single machine in this world. The turtle boy in glasses cleared his throat, stood up straight, and stepped forward. “Immensnium is one of the waste materials produced by the Silver Beast. It’s mixed in with the other substances excreted from between its scales and all over its body.” “So the underground workers slave the day away searching for the immensnium buried in the Silver Beast’s poop. But it’s horrible work, so they make other people do it for them: new folks, slaves from the north, or orphans like us.” “…You were both down there, too?” “Yep. But we escaped. Life at the factory sucks.” Now it was Mifuyu’s turn to snort. “You escaped, but you came back? They’ll catch you if you’re not careful.” “Sure, but we need money.” Right after Kakkie answered her, the tractor braked, and the final minecart where Mifuyu sat slowed to a halt. In front of them stood a long, two-story building that looked like a school. Adults as filthy and funky-looking as the children stood in front of the open doors, all gathered around a machine. It vaguely resembled a light truck, but the attached gears and ducts of some unknown purpose made it look like a device belonging to this world. It lacked the stove that would burn the unique purple flame of immensnium, and a young man turned a handle on it, sweat dripping from his brow. The machine hummed noisily and vibrated slightly, dumping volumes of black sand from the duct on the right and small lumps of glittering purple pebbles from the one on the left. The fumes from the exhaust were sooty and heavy with the familiar smell of charcoal. “It’s weird, but I kind of miss this smell now,” Mifuyu said to herself. Kakkie must have heard, because he laughed next to her. “You’re a strange one. Missing charcoal? You’re definitely not from here. Do you really not know what immensnium is?” “No. This is the first time I’ve seen it. What’s that machine doing?” “It’s harvesting the last scraps of immensnium. It’s not enough to use for fuel, so we can’t sell it to any factories or businesses. But it’s worth something as jewelry. Foreigners like yourself buy it.” The children already lounged about inside and outside their house. Kakkie told Mifuyu that they lived here. “We have adults, kids, babies, and old folks here. We’re not related by blood. We live here together, and we’re all runaways since none of us have anywhere else to go. You’re welcome to live here, too. Interested?” Looking back at Kakkie, Mifuyu gasped. His ears. Two soft fox ears jutted out of his head, growing like mushrooms. Panicking, Mifuyu checked her head and was disappointed when her fingers felt something fluffy. She reminded herself that she needed to focus. Stories had magical powers. She had gotten completely absorbed in this world and forgotten her original purpose. If she didn’t save Mashiro, her friend would be fed to the Silver Beast once the tranquilizers wore off and it woke up. She had to find Keiko the fox and return the world to normal before that happened. “Hey, about what I said earlier. You really haven’t seen a fox? If I don’t find it soon, bad things are going to happen.” “A fox, huh?” Kakkie crossed his arms and looked thoughtful. “Someone might have eaten it.” “Eaten it? Are you kidding?” “Not in the least. We’re all starving here. It’s hard to get food. We don’t get much for the immensnium after the middlemen take their cut. Right now, some people at the factory who know about this place sneak us cold porridge, potatoes, and fish that’s about to go bad, and we get by on that. So when some of the beast’s food gets loose, we catch it and eat it. We’ve set traps all over the place.” She suddenly saw the faces of the children and adults turn vicious. With their fox ears and tails, they really looked like predators now. Eyes shining, they seemed to be staring at a small animal cowering in front of them, primed to attack any second. Mifuyu turned and ran. Kakkie yelled after her, but she ignored him. She felt her arms and legs become as smooth as velvet, and her movements gradually grew more fluid. I’m changing into a fox! What if she transformed completely? She didn’t have any clues to help her catch the fox thief, and the Silver Beast’s waste processing plant was so large that Mifuyu wouldn’t be able to find her on her own. She had arrived here on a tractor, and the factory, visible through the haze, looked small in the distance. The Silver Beast might already be awake, getting ready for its next meal. Mashiro’s face appeared in the back of her mind. They had just been sitting together in front of the café, talking in the dark, dangerous world of Black Book. She would not abandon her. Determined, she found that running on her hands and knees was easier than running on two legs, no longer felt her long hair fluttering, and sensed the nerves in the tip of her tail when she flexed the area around her tailbone. She dashed across the field of metabolite at an astonishing speed. Run, run, run. Breathe, keep moving, don’t stop. She could hear her heart pounding deep in her ears. She must keep going, keep running, even if her heart exploded. Tearing through the fog, she saw the same pathway leading underground, and she slid into it on all fours. Using her tail to maintain her balance, she darted down the slope and back to the Silver Beast’s feeding grounds. The scene there was radically different than last time. The workers had continued their transformation into foxes, rows of tails and ears driving tractors and gathering around clumps of immensnium to check the luster. The Silver Beast still lay asleep in its cage. Praying that it hadn’t already finished eating, Mifuyu looked back and forth between the wall and her hands. Her claws were as sharp as ice axes, and her body weighed much less. She dashed to the side of the cage, quickly removed her shoes and socks, tossed them aside, and dug her claws into the rock wall. “I can do this.” Using her tail for balance, she climbed the craggy wall. She didn’t have time to worry if anyone saw her. Hurry, hurry, hurry. She felt impatient. Scurrying her arms and legs, she passed the cage in no time, scaled the rock wall, and arrived next to the Thomasson metal door. The rust-colored door was closed and lacked any handles. But a breeze blew through the gap at the top. Her left hand gripping the wall and her feet clinging to it, she inserted the claws on her right hand into a gap and tried to somehow open the door. But it wouldn’t budge. It was like she was wearing mittens. They worked well for climbing the wall, but not for finer operations. Mifuyu focused intently on her task. She didn’t notice the crack forming in her foothold. Irritated, she put her hand inside the gap and tried to hook the door with her claws—and the moment she did so, her right foot, which supported her body, slipped, and a chunk of rock fell away. “Ah!” Her balance broken, Mifuyu frantically clung to the gap in the door, somehow avoiding a fall. But immediately after that, an ominous noise rang out. The rock had bounced off the Silver Beast and woken it. Mifuyu broke out into a cold sweat. The fur on her entire body stood on edge and wouldn’t stop quivering. She sensed something behind her. She heard a growl and felt warm air brush over her. Turning around in fear, she saw two giant blue eyes shining next to her, and her heart practically stopped. Right on cue, the buzzer sounded again, and the beacons flashed. Distracted by beast’s giant face, Mifuyu forgot that the door could move. “Uh-oh.” The swing of the door as it opened caused Mifuyu to lose her balance, and she fell straight down. The catwalk appeared, with Mashiro at the head. Nothing had changed since the last time, with Mashiro, still a white dog, bent low and urged forward by the person dressed in red. Part of her feeling like she was watching everything happen to someone else, Mifuyu muttered Mashiro’s name as she fell, watching as the beast’s long neck turned in her direction. It was a small whisper, but Mashiro’s ears twitched, and she looked up. Mifuyu’s mind replayed all the events of the book curse, like watching her life flash before her eyes. Mashiro had flown down and saved her when she fell trying to help the child of the Black Cat of Night. Mashiro always saved her. Just then, she glimpsed the face of the person in red standing next to Mashiro. Keiko. Her transformation into a fox was almost complete, but her face was still human. It was definitely Keiko. “What’s going on?” Mifuyu said. She felt the breath from the beast’s nostrils as it sat in open-mouth anticipation, and just as she felt herself land, she opened her eyes. Twisting her agile fox body, she dodged the beast’s fangs as though her ineptitude at sports had all been a lie. Its fangs just grazed the tip of her tail, but she gritted her teeth and endured the pain. Landing on the beast’s body, Mifuyu sprung off her hind legs onto the bars of the cage and jumped high once more. She felt like a paper airplane. A paper airplane released into space, riding air currents through the sky. She headed for the catwalk. As she flew, her nose began to itch, informing her that her nose had stretched into a fox nose. But the world continued. She would make it. Mifuyu might have felt like a paper airplane, but everyone else saw her zoom like a projectile. She jetted to the person in red, now mostly transformed into a fox. Keiko fell backward, her paws releasing the chain. “Mashiro!” “Woof!” Mifuyu desperately thrust out a hand and grabbed Mashiro’s neck. Her long, soft fur and familiar scent. Free of her chain, Mashiro let Mifuyu hop onto her back and leaped from the catwalk into the air. The Silver Beast yelled furiously, releasing a deafening roar and thrashing hard enough to break the cage. “Mashiro, Keiko isn’t the thief. She told me she was going to steal a book, but she lied. That, or someone else sneaked in and got in the way before she was able to take it herself. Either way, there’s a different fox thief this time.” Mashiro barked in reply, slipped between the raging beast’s legs, and dashed out of the cage. The wheat-brown fox clung to the back of the gliding white dog, eyes shut tight against the oncoming wind. The creature inside the cage, the silvery beast that looked like an amalgamation of a wolf and a dragon, stomped the ground in dismay at seeing its food fleeing, causing the entire room to shake. “Mashiro, put me down somewhere! I-I’m about to get blown off!” Mifuyu yelled. She was already a fox. “Woof!” Mashiro the dog barked cheerfully in reply. The workers looking after the Silver Beast had all changed into foxes. Managing the Silver Beast was a daunting enough task as humans, but now that the workers had shrunk to about one tenth their original size, trying to control it now was nigh impossible. Dozens of foxes worked together to pull at the chain connected to the beast’s collar in an attempt to restrain that giant creature, but with a shake of its head, the beast sent them flying like flags in a storm. Mashiro landed for a moment before kicking off the ground again, flying above the crowd of foxes. She then passed through the entrance that Mifuyu had first come through, slowing to a walk in the dark vacant hallway before eventually stopping in a concave section of the wall. The light of the elevator glowed. Gripping Mashiro’s long fur like a rope, Mifuyu dangled her short legs, shocked again at how her body had changed completely to one with smooth, light-brown fur. Her feet would have immediately touched the ground as a human, but now her toes hung in the air regardless of how far she stretched them. With only one option left, she steadied herself, released Mashiro’s fur, and—landed on the ground with a strange sound that belied the bravery and physical prowess she had just shown. Perhaps she had relaxed a little now that she felt safe. “This is the worst… I’m completely a fox now.” Looking down, she saw the white fluff of a furry stomach. Begrudgingly checking her arms, tailbone, and entire body, Mashiro trembled. Her white fur bristled like feathers, and she turned back into a girl. “…Why are you the only one still human?” Mifuyu asked. Mashiro looked a little sad under Mifuyu’s persistent stare. “Well, because I’m… Mifuyu, you really don’t remember?” “Remember what? What are you talking about?” she replied gruffly. A tremendous thud erupted from the Silver Beast’s room, and all the foxes fled. “Run, run!” “Get out of here! The Silver Beast broke out of its chains!” The ground pulsed. Mifuyu and Mashiro looked at each other and ran in a frenzy. But there were too many foxes, and the elevator quickly filled to capacity, the remaining foxes either clinging to the box or climbing up the shaft. Each one obsessed with getting to the top floor, they left not the slightest gap to squeeze into, like aphids on a plant. As they clambered in, the beast roared as the last fox ran screaming, “It destroyed the cage!” before slamming the steel door shut and throwing the bolt across. “What about the others?” “They escaped through the service gate! It’s coming this way!” The footsteps grew louder, and the shaking intensified—sure signs of the beast’s approach. Mifuyu’s shoulders drooped in disappointment. “We should have run in the other direction.” “Why?” “It’s the service exit, so it’s really big, and everyone would have gotten away easily.” But she never thought that the Silver Beast would break its chains, destroy the cage, and escape. If they didn’t do something, then the beast would eat everyone. A giant thud came from the metal door as it warped, and all the foxes screamed. The beast was slamming its body against the door. Mifuyu’s knees went weak. But as she saw the beast’s nose through the cracks in the dented door, she came up with a plan. “Mashiro, change into a dog!” Mashiro did as instructed. The situation was do or die, so the only option was to try. Mifuyu climbed up on her back and whispered in her ear. “Once it gets inside, fly over its head. It’ll come after us, and we can lead it away from here.” Without any time for Mashiro to even answer, the door split in two, and the rock wall connected to the hinges crumbled to dust. The beast’s long neck stretched through the rain of dust, steam billowing from its gaping red mouth. “Now!” At Mifuyu’s command, Mashiro kicked off the ground and leaped in front of the Silver Beast. The blue eyes followed them. Its open mouth, crimson tongue, and scarlet throat drew agonizingly close. The raw, peculiar smell assaulted Mifuyu’s now-sensitive nose, and she reflexively lowered her head. Its razor-sharp teeth might pierce and kill her. But all Mifuyu could do now was hold on tight to Mashiro’s body. She felt that she’d be okay so long as she was with Mashiro. Mashiro dodged this way and that, slipping away right as the beast’s teeth crashed together, luring it down the first tunnel. The diversionary plan worked like a charm. The beast ignored the foxes huddling near the elevator and chased after Mashiro instead. The two animals cut across the cavernous work floor, heading for the opposite side as the sound of the beast’s footsteps hammered behind them. But after they passed through the narrow hallway, bounded through the gate, and headed up the slope, they saw the service exit gradually shrinking. The workers who had escaped this way earlier were closing the shutter to trap the beast inside. “Wait!” But her cry must not have reached them, for the shutter continued its merciless descent. Mashiro sped up. Right before it closed completely, the sunlight almost extinguished, Mashiro dashed through like a lion leaping through a ring of fire. A cool wind blew across Mifuyu’s body, and she timidly raised her head, seeing them safely outside. “Mashiro, you’re incredible!” Mifuyu flapped her arms and legs in a display of joy, stroking the white fur until it almost turned into a mess. Flattered, Mashiro blushed. They were in the metabolite-processing area from earlier. They’d jumped so high that the foxes that had fled here looked like beans, and the black, metabolite-covered soil like a lone mushroom. Independent from the other facilities on the outside, the processing area connected to nothing. Bottomless black pits gaped around it. Mifuyu wondered if those trenches were the reason Kakkie and his group couldn’t leave. “…Do you think we can really turn Yomunaga back to normal?” She spotted the two-story building with the machine that separated immensnium from the metabolite. Smaller foxes gathered in front of the building, looking her way and waving. “That must be Kakkie’s group.” At Mifuyu’s signal, Mashiro slowed, turned, and landed. “Whoa! A flying dog!” The boisterous children swarmed Mashiro, who turned back into a girl, which disappointed them terribly. “Oh, it’s a girl now.” “Boooo.” “How’d you do that, miss?” Screeching, each little fox spoke simultaneously as they pressed around Mashiro before Mifuyu interrupted their barrage. “Enough, enough! So you guys turned into foxes, too, huh?” “What? Foxes? Please, we’re humans.” So they didn’t realize it. Come to think of it, no one seemed surprised to have grown ears or a tail. “Made it out alive, did you? I heard that the Silver Beast broke free,” said one outstandingly strong-looking fox—the only one that wasn’t frolicking. A hint of the aura from its human form still remained. It had to be Kakkie. “Yeah, it should be still in the harvesting area, though,” Mifuyu replied. “Assuming it hasn’t destroyed the shutter, at least.” Mifuyu must have gotten used to seeing foxes, because she was starting to understand the subtle differences in their individual facial expressions, mannerisms, and postures. “…I guess it’s like someone being able to pick out their cat from a sea of similar cats, huh?” she mused. “I have no idea what you mean by that, but we need to get out of here,” said Kakkie. “You’re right. We should leave soon. The Silver Beast made quick work of the door to the elevator hall.” “Okay, then. Megi, Leda, tell the adults it’s time for us to use it.” At Kakkie’s command, two of the young foxes nodded and dashed off into the building. The rest of the young foxes lined up behind Kakkie and followed him off somewhere. “Mashiro, what should we do? Should we go with Kakkie?” The fox thief had fled this way and should still be somewhere nearby. If they could just find the thief and the book, they could restore the world, and they wouldn’t have to worry about the Silver Beast. But it didn’t look like that would happen anytime soon. “I saw the thief run this way after it escaped the Silver Beast. But how are we supposed to find them now that everyone’s a fox?” Mifuyu asked. At this, Mashiro folded her arms over her chest and cocked her head to the side, seemingly deep in thought. “That Kakkie boy is probably playing the role of Sasha,” she said. “Who’s that?” “A friend who helps the main character in the story. He’s the leader of the orphans.” “The story? Oh, the one this world is based on. That’s right, that thing. And?” “In the original story, the main character tames the Silver Beast. He has a device that ‘allows any living creature to be returned to their true form’ and is able to reveal the true identity of the Silver Beast. So if we find the main character, then maybe we can tame the beast and even turn the thief back into a human.” “Really? Where’s the main character?” “We might find him if we follow Kakkie.” “You should have said so earlier! We need to stick with him.” They caught up with Kakkie in front of a dome-shaped hatch. The rusted green entrance loomed massive and heavy. It seemed unlocked, but the five young little foxes pulling desperately at the handle could only open it a few centimeters. “Allow me.” As the only human, Mashiro grabbed the handle and, grunting and bowlegged, lifted it up slowly, the hinges squeaking as it opened. Mifuyu crept forward and peered inside. She had assumed it concealed a deep hole like a manhole connecting to a shelter of some sort. But it didn’t. “What is it?” A light-brown cloth covered some huge thing stuffed inside the hole, with hardly enough space to hide a fox, much less a human. Mifuyu eyed it dubiously, and the fox with the different-colored lenses grinned. “We’re not meant to go down into the hole.” “Then what’s it for?” “Boss! Specs! The device is out!” a little fox reported, dirt on its pointy ears and fluffy belly. Some foxes had apparently excavated a machine buried under some metabolite outside the hatch. The same green color, the machine had a handle and a lever with a red ball. “Fall back, everyone!” At Kakkie’s order, the fox children moved away from the hatch, formed a circle, and saluted. Kakkie’s black hands turned the handle. As a fox, even Kakkie had a hard time with the physically demanding work, but with Mashiro’s help, the handle started to rotate. In all her life, Mifuyu had never seen a spectacle like this. The hole began to glow immensnium purple, and she heard an intense crunching noise. Suddenly, the light-brown circular cloth swelled and poked up through the hole. It looked like a sponge cake with too much baking powder. “What is that?” Mifuyu asked, her eye twitching anxiously. The round sponge cake continued to swell until it was first the size of a giant mushroom and then as tall as playground equipment. It eventually inflated to the size of a gas tank so large, she had to crane her neck to see the top. Stepping back, she shaded her eyes with her hands. The cloth had already grown as enormous as the Silver Beast and was bulging with air, rising gently with a shimmer. Mooring lines extended out from it. “Is that…a hot-air balloon?” Mifuyu said. It was larger than any hot-air balloon she had ever seen. The light-brown cloth now glowed the purple of immensnium, swaying in the wind against the ropes that held it. Covered in sweat, Kakkie and Mashiro gasped for breath as they pushed the lever to the side, causing something under the ground to shake violently before emitting a jet of steam. “Everyone, get back!” Mashiro rushed behind the small foxes. A chasm opened where they had just stood, something rising up from inside. The steam cleared, and a covered gondola in the shape of a boat appeared beneath the balloon. Larger than a regular boat, it could fit everyone in Mifuyu’s class. A giant propeller sat at the back. “Wow,” said Mifuyu. “It’s like something from an anime.” Cautiously advancing toward it, Mifuyu touched the steel gondola. A green hatch sat at the entrance to the gondola. It looked like the manhole cover from before. “Quit spacing out—either step aside or get in. You’re holding up the line!” At some point, a group of adult-sized foxes had arrived. Flustered, Mifuyu backed away from the hatch, and the small foxes boarded the gondola, followed by the adults. Mifuyu pondered what to do, but in the end, her curiosity won out, and she stepped on board. The inside smelled of metal. The children frolicked around this strange vessel, rambunctiously crowding around the porthole windows and dashing between the benches, but it was spacious enough to accommodate everyone. It was perhaps only meant to travel short distances, because there was no other equipment aside from the benches, and no rooms that seemed intended as sleeping quarters. The back housed an engine with gears and pistons. Walking around oohing and aahing, the foxes suddenly screamed, “Ah! Over there!” The Silver Beast’s head emerged from the factory’s service entrance. It had broken through the shutter and entered the open processing area. The Silver Beast saw them at almost the exact moment that the gondola’s engine sputtered to life, billowing steam as it rose into the air. The propulsion of the spinning propeller and engine combined with the lifting force of the balloon to raise the metal gondola off the ground. Mifuyu quickly pressed herself to a window to watch the situation outside. She couldn’t see Mashiro. She wasn’t on the gondola. The Silver Beast sang with its beautiful voice, shaking the ground with its thick legs. Then it swung its massive head and started running toward the gondola. “Hurry, it’s going to catch us!” Kakkie’s voice mixed in with those of the adults in the cockpit. Mifuyu’s face distorted as she pressed a cheek against the glass, yelling for Mashiro. The gondola sputtered steam as it desperately tried to flee, but the Silver Beast’s legs were powerful. It caught up to them a moment later, its blue eyes visible directly next to the windows. Its small black pupils shone like the eyes of a bird of prey. It sang again. The voice was smooth and clear, and as they listened, the foxes on board felt their minds wander. It sang the same song as when it had prepared to eat the thieving fox at the feeding ground. Someone yelled, “Cover your ears! Don’t listen to its song!” but everyone sat captivated by the melody. All eyes drooped, and the foxes in the cockpit began to go limp. The gondola slowly lost speed. Just then, a giant white dog flew forward, darting between the gondola and the Silver Beast. “Mashiro!” Mashiro fluttered in front of the Silver Beast’s eyes like a bird, turning circles and spinning around. It was the same diversionary tactic from before. She must be trying to get the Silver Beast’s attention and draw it away from the gondola. The beast stopped singing, its blue eyes closely following Mashiro’s movements. “Now’s our chance! Turn hard to port!” “Wait! What about Mashiro?!” But they didn’t hear her. The gondola sped up, angling away from the confrontation between Mashiro and the Silver Beast, hastily putting distance between them and the fight. Pressed hard to the window, Mifuyu could only pray that Mashiro would escape safely. The gondola rose above the factory grounds, over the black trenches encircling it. Mashiro also spun around, moving away from the beast to follow the gondola. Perhaps Mashiro’s eyes and thoughts were too focused on the gondola, for the Silver Beast, stranded by the trenches, raised its neck in a final effort and opened its large mouth. In that moment, Mifuyu couldn’t even scream. The Silver Beast snapped its jaws shut, and Mashiro disappeared. Mifuyu could only see the steamy fog and the processing area far off in the distance. “Please go back! It ate Mashiro!” Frantic, Mifuyu grabbed the foxes in the cockpit, and the gondola shook violently. “There’s nothing we can do about that! No point in going back!” Mifuyu felt her entire body go pale, and she swayed before crouching on the floor. Her forehead on her knees and eyes closed, she prayed that she would wake up from this dream. This was the world of a story. The characters were just the people from town, everything was different from the real world, and it operated on its own set of rules. “I have to help Mashiro. She can’t die. She just can’t…” Repeating that to herself, she squeezed her hands into tight fists. She had to save Mashiro. But when Mifuyu steeled herself and stood up, she saw Mashiro standing in front of her. “Ah! A ghost!” Mifuyu jumped back, lost her footing, and tumbled backward to the floor. The foxes that had seen the whole thing whispered to one another in a rumble of voices. “I’m not a ghost. Look.” Mashiro smiled, crouching down to Mifuyu’s level. She had returned to her human form and seemed perfectly fine. “…But it just ate you. And how did you even get in here? I didn’t hear the hatch open.” She had come in from outside without using the door. Did she teleport? Or maybe… “Mashiro, are there two of you?” “Of course not. There’s only one of me, Mifuyu. Just one Mashiro.” “I don’t get this at all. I mean, the beast closed its mouth, and you were gone. Don’t get me wrong—I’m happy that you’re alive, but I’m so confused.” “I’m sly as a fox.” Mashiro broke into a faint grin. Then she suddenly looked to the window and nodded. “We’re going to land soon.” The gondola set down on the small hill in town, and the engine stopped with one last gust of steam. Opening the hatch, Mifuyu stepped outside with the other foxes and looked around, her eyes straining against the bright sunlight. She sighed in relief. She knew this place. It was near the shrine next to Mikura Hall. A train bridge covered in a thick blanket of soot, smoke, and steam ran directly above the hall. It looked terrible, but the area around the small hill remained strangely calm, the vibrant green vegetation swaying in the breeze. Looking toward the top of the hill, Mifuyu saw that the shrine and its red torii gate remained. The foxes turned away from the shrine and walked down the hill, chatting about a “Cornelius” who was supposedly waiting at the foot of the hill. Mifuyu wondered who they meant. “The protagonist,” Mashiro whispered to her. “Good thing we came with Kakkie, right?” Cornelius, the hero in the story The Silver Beast, lived with an elderly man in a narrow three-story house that resembled a stack of wooden pillars wearing a pointy hat. The group opened the rusty door, their view immediately hazing over with steam strong enough to choke Mifuyu. The smell of oil filled the air, together with the sound of gears turning. The cramped room was a workshop, though at a much smaller scale than the factory where they fed the Silver Beast or any of the neighboring factories. Heading into the back, they saw bronze pipes running around the room, while a strange chartreuse liquid boiled in a glass jar. “Hey, Sasha.” A small, skinny fox inspecting a machine turned around, shifted its goggles onto its forehead, and waved hello. Watching Kakkie, who was playing the role of Sasha, as he ran forward, Mifuyu leaned into Mashiro and asked, “Is that him?” “Yes, that’s Cornelius. This is just like in the story. Now we need to wait for Kakkie to ask him to get rid of the Silver Beast.” “Cornelius, we need your help! The Silver Beast has escaped the factory! It’s going to eat everyone!” “You see?” Mashiro smiled, a little proud that events had unfolded exactly as she’d said. Mifuyu and Mashiro sat down on a spiral staircase in the corner of the workshop, watching the foxes who had taken on roles of the characters in the story. “…I wonder who’s playing Cornelius,” said Mifuyu. “Everyone’s a fox, so I can’t tell.” “Definitely someone young,” replied Mashiro. “That’s way too vague. There’s something like three thousand young people in Yomunaga.” Mifuyu heaved a sigh, set her elbows on her knees, and rested her chin in her hands. She had only read the first part of the story, but it seemed like Cornelius was a kind of genius inventor who had created a device that “allows any living creature to be returned to their true form,” just as Mashiro explained. Kakkie suggested using the device to tame the Silver Beast, but Cornelius didn’t seem excited by the idea. “It’s still in the testing phase. What if it malfunctions and something terrible happens?” he said. This served to only befuddle Kakkie. Gradually getting more and more irritated, Mifuyu walked straight up to the two of them, claws clacking against the floor, then stood on her hind legs and said, “Hey, are you guys about done here? You don’t know if it’ll go wrong unless you give it a shot. I don’t have time to waste. If you’re too chicken, then show me how to use it! I’ll do it instead!” Cornelius stared at her, mouth agape. “Who are you?” “That doesn’t matter. I’m at least willing to do something.” Mifuyu straightened her back, the fox fur on her chest bristling. “She’s right,” Kakkie added. “If we don’t act soon, the beast’ll come for this town, too.” “Okay, okay. I get it. But don’t blame me if something goes awry.” His fluffy tail drooping, Cornelius reluctantly opened the door leading to the research lab in the basement. “What’s up with him? He doesn’t act like a protagonist,” Mifuyu grumbled. Lanterns provided a dim light in the stairwell, elongating the shadows of the three animals and one human—Mashiro. “Well,” said Mashiro, “you’re not in the original story, Mifuyu. Cornelius spends all night ruminating, and only makes up his mind after he has a strange dream.” “Whatever. I don’t read. We just have to catch that thief; that’s all that matters.” Mashiro bent over Mifuyu and looked her in the eyes. “Hey, careful,” said Mifuyu. “You’re the only one that big right now.” “Mifuyu, you still haven’t changed your opinion of books.” “Why would I? I never liked them to begin with, so how would getting mixed up in this weird stuff make me like them? I don’t need an imagination. I just watch TV, mess around on my phone, and go to school like everyone else. That’s the safest, easiest way to live.” “…I see.” Mashiro’s voice sounded heavy. Mifuyu cast a pointed look up at her. “Don’t be like that. I’m not making fun of people who like to read. It’s just not for me. People who like books should read them, and those who don’t shouldn’t have to. Right?” “…Sure.” As they reached the research lab at the bottom of several flights of stairs, Mifuyu suddenly said, “Hey, I’ve been meaning to ask. Who wrote this story? None of the books so far had the author’s name. And The Brothers of the Lush Village wasn’t even listed in Hirune’s ledger.” The books that appeared when the book curse triggered didn’t list the author’s name on the cover. Slightly surprised, Mashiro looked excited. “Mifuyu, you’re interested in who wrote the stories?” “Don’t be silly. I’m only curious to see what kind of people would write such weird stuff.” “…You’ve met them before.” “What?” “You’ve met them before, Mifuyu. Trust me.” Mifuyu jumped over the last stair, looking puzzled. “What do you mean by that?” “Come on, you two, this way!” Kakkie called. “It’s time to unveil the device.” Mifuyu looked back and forth between him and Mashiro, but Mashiro must not have had anything more to say. “Let’s go,” she told Mifuyu, nudging her in the back and walking ahead. The device that “allows any living creature to be returned to their true form” was much smaller than Mifuyu imagined. It was a circular disk small enough for a fox to carry in two paws. Knobs and levers decorated the device, and it glowed purple in the center. “So this has that immensnium stuff inside it, too. How does it work?” Mifuyu asked. Cornelius traced a paw over the surface of the disc. “Listen closely to the machine’s voice. When it’s in a good mood, the immensnium will sparkle.” Mifuyu resisted the urge to make fun of him. “Oh yeah, great. That’s incredible. And then?” “Then you pull the lever on the right and press the blue button.” “That’s all?” Cornelius glared sharply at Mifuyu. “It might sound easy, but it’s actually quite complicated. This thing gets sulky in the blink of an eye. If you use it when it’s in a bad mood, like right now, then something could go wrong. For instance, it could try to drive anyone who doesn’t belong here out of town.” Mifuyu thought the glittering disc flashed like a Christmas tree ornament. “It’s sparkling,” she observed. “A little. But it’s still not ready yet. It’ll malfunction,” said Cornelius, still indecisive. “Argh, I can’t take it anymore!” Mifuyu lost her temper and snatched the disc from him, quickly pulled the lever on the right, and pressed the blue button. Neither Cornelius, Kakkie, nor Mashiro had enough time to stop her. The disc shook, and the purple light immediately went dark. Then after a short moment when everything was as silent as a total blackout, an explosion of light burst forth. The blinding light caused Mifuyu to drop the immensteel disc, but it was unaffected. It emitted a trail of purple smoke, and Mifuyu coughed violently. “I-I’m sorry. That was stupid of me…!” Coughing, she felt her body change. Her hands became smoother. Her velvety fur disappeared. Her face lost its fur, her hands touched silky hair, and her ears returned to the side of her head. What’s more, she was wearing the same clothes she had arrived in. “I’m human again!” Mifuyu saw her face reflected in the glass of the cabinet nearby, and she emitted a squeal of joy upon seeing that she had definitely returned to normal. “Yes! It worked!” But as the steam cleared, Mifuyu became more perplexed. “How come I’m the only one?” Cornelius and Kakkie stayed the same, fretting over whether the disc was broken and not realizing that Mifuyu had returned to human form. Just then, she heard hurried stomping above. Such heavy footsteps couldn’t be from something as light as a fox. “For instance, it could try to drive anyone who doesn’t belong here out of town.” “You’re kidding. It can’t be, can it?” Mifuyu clicked her tongue, jostled Mashiro to move, and burst up the stairs like a gust of wind. She climbed the stairs easily with her human legs, arriving at the first floor in a matter of seconds. Throwing the door open, she saw the dumbfounded young foxes turning to her as one. “The door opened, but there’s no one there!” “The front door just opened all on its own, too! What’s going on?” The foxes let forth a volley of high-pitched screams. She must have been expelled from the world. That’s why they couldn’t see her. She yelled at them to get out of her way, tiptoeing across the floor to avoid stepping on the little foxes and eventually reaching the front door. Just as the foxes had said, the front door, which should have been closed, stood ajar. “Mashiro, turn into a dog and take me into the sky!” “What?” “Hurry!” Following Mifuyu’s request, Mashiro morphed back into a dog, flew into the air, and turned around before deftly picking up Mifuyu and setting her on her back. The voices of the young foxes faded as the two soared high above Cornelius’s house. Straddling Mashiro’s back, Mifuyu stared intently down at the foggy town. “We’re looking for a human. The thief should’ve returned to their original form.” Not able to answer now that she had turned into a dog, Mashiro looked back and whimpered. Mifuyu petted her shoulders to soothe her. “I’m serious. That disc—it might have been in a bad mood. Remember how the protagonist said it could drive anyone who doesn’t fit in out of town? That means it’s only me and the thief, since we’re from the real world. If I turned back, then they probably did, too.” Mashiro barked a little more energetically, gliding over the mist-shrouded town. “Search the area around Cornelius’s house.” “Aroo?” “I’ll bet the thief was hiding nearby once they escaped from the processing plant, and once everyone turned into foxes, they blended in and stayed with the group. So they were probably on the gondola with us when the Silver Beast attacked. But when they turned back into a human, they panicked and fled.” The loud footsteps they’d heard must have been the human thief fleeing. “Woof!” Having just pieced it all together, Mashiro flew past the circular house with the pointed roof and dashed around the large roads, small streets, and steam-locomotive bridge in search of a human. “…They’re not here. Maybe they went inside a house or a store.” Only foxes walked the streets. Foxes left stores carrying paper bags in their arms, foxes stared out the windows of the steam locomotive, and foxes whispered sweet nothings to each other on park benches. “Okay, Mashiro, let’s check out Mikura Hall. It’s the one place that hasn’t changed, and that might be where the thief feels safest.” Mifuyu tapped Mashiro’s side, and she changed direction to fly along the locomotive line. Young foxes squealed in glee upon seeing a flying dog, leaning out the window and waving. “…But they can see Mashiro,” Mifuyu muttered. She examined Mashiro again, the fluffy back of her head. I could’ve sworn that the beast had eaten Mashiro. And she wasn’t one of the people who “didn’t belong” here. Which means— Mifuyu still wasn’t sure. Of all the things in Yomunaga that had changed—the town, the land—the only things unchanged were Mikura Hall and the shrine. They stood silently, like remnants of the past left behind by a modernizing world. They landed in front of Mikura Hall, rushed through the yard, and opened the front door. In the foyer sat a single pair of men’s sneakers; they were completely different from the funky shoes Keiko wore. One shoe rested on its side, perhaps because the thief had been in hurry. “Mifuyu, be careful,” Mashiro warned. Back to human form, she slipped her hand into Mifuyu’s. They crept into the hall, careful to mask their steps. At the far end of the long hallway, they saw a human figure slink through the sunlight filtering in from the sunroom. Either Hirune had finally woken up, or it was the thief. Feeling her heart pounding in her chest, Mifuyu gripped Mashiro’s hand tightly, flattened her back against the wall, and nervously peeked into the sunroom. Hirune still lay on her side, snoring peacefully. A young man stood in front of the sofa. “Hello.” The mushroom guy. His skinny, pale frame, a haircut like the round cap of a mushroom, a pair of glasses. A white shirt and blue jeans. She knew the face but couldn’t remember the name at the moment. “You’re that guy from the bookstore…” “Yes, I’m Haruta. Hi.” He worked at Wakaba, the bookstore her father frequented. Just this morning, he’d rung her up when she bought the book for her father. She had been so certain that Keiko was the thief; she hadn’t considered anyone else. The thief’s identity came as such a surprise that, for a while, her mouth wouldn’t move. Haruta looked down awkwardly as he walked forward, then held a book out to Mifuyu. It was old, with plants on the cover: Raffles: The Amateur Cracksman. “I’m sorry,” Haruta said to Mifuyu. “I hope you can forgive me. I only took this one book.” “You stole this from our shelves? Why…?” Mifuyu looked between Haruta, the book, and Mashiro at her side. Once she took the book and grabbed Haruta’s wrist, everything around them would return to normal, and Mashiro would disappear. In the other worlds, until now, she had caught the thief in fox form without knowing who it really was, but this time was different. Facing the thief like this felt too heavy a load for Mifuyu to bear on her own. Haruta temporarily lowered the book and said in a low voice, “We just wanted to know how the system worked.” “‘We’? ‘The system’?” “Yes. We wanted to know how Mikura Hall’s security system worked. At first, we thought it was just some urban legend, some baseless rumor. But Keiko actually tried, and something unbelievable happened. That got us excited, and everyone just—” “Wait a second. ‘Everyone’? You said ‘we,’ too. Does that mean there’s more of you in here?” She placed her palm on her forehead in an attempt to ease her confused mind, trying to somehow make sense of the situation. As she did, Mashiro paced around Mifuyu and Haruta, glaring viciously at Haruta like a dog trying to intimate an enemy. “Mifuyu, let’s catch this guy already. He doesn’t think he did anything wrong.” Mashiro looked ready to turn back into a dog, bare her fangs, and attack. Haruta started making excuses in a panic. “I know! I know it was wrong. I should never have done it. We’re—Yes, we’re an alliance of booksellers throughout Yomunaga. We deal with people trying to steal books every day. Keiko is one of us.” “Wait, Keiko lives in Yomunaga?” Mifuyu asked. She didn’t think she could forget seeing someone like Keiko with her stylish hair and funky clothes. But Haruta corrected her. “She doesn’t, no. She runs a small used bookstore with an art gallery inside. We only just met her recently.” “Okay. But what does shoplifting have to do with this?” Mifuyu crossed her arms arrogantly. Haruta heaved a deep sigh. “…Shoplifting is becoming a much bigger problem for bookstores than people think. Books disappear almost daily, so much so that the used bookstore Iwatobi closed. Even large chains with the latest security systems have left town. Some people don’t come to Yomunaga to buy books—they come to steal them. “So we started discussing what to do about all the theft. We tried a number of things, but we never saw any definitive results. That’s when Kaname, who runs Books Mystery, told us about Mikura Hall.” Mifuyu silently cursed the old man, whom she never got along with anyway. “…He said that Mikura Hall had some mysterious security system. That Tamaki, the previous owner, had installed something otherworldly, and now, Mikura Hall was the only place safe from theft.” Hearing that made Mifuyu resentful, and she turned on Haruta. “It’s not like we’ve never experienced theft. People stole from Mikura Hall plenty of times. Once, someone took a ton of books from us, and that’s why now only family members are allowed to enter. Plus, Mikura Hall is a pain to take care of. Honestly, it’s been a total nightmare! If the shoplifting bothers you that much, then you should just try harder.” After that onslaught, she saw Haruta smile uncomfortably, and she covered her mouth. She understood why they wanted to know how the security system worked. “Exactly. We thought Mikura Hall’s measures were unfair. I mean, we can’t do anything like you did. You can restrict entry to protect your collection, but people visit bookstores every day. Anyone can walk in and grab whatever book they like. We make our living by stocking and selling books. But bookstores aren’t museums, and we can’t make people stop coming.” Haruta kept his tone measured, but he was clearly resentful. “…I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that,” Mifuyu told him. “Mifuyu, don’t apologize,” Mashiro snapped. “He’s the one who stole the book. What he did is no different from shoplifting. It doesn’t matter why he did it or how he felt; theft is theft! He doesn’t seem to regret it at all!” Haruta flinched as Mashiro threatened him with a throaty growl, catching his heel on the carpet and falling backward onto the sofa. “I-I’m sorry. You’re exactly right… I sincerely apologize. I’m so sorry for stealing. I regret letting this whole thing get out of hand and backfiring. I’ll never do it again.” At that exact moment, Hirune let out a tremendous snore, and everyone jumped in surprise. Distracted, Mashiro shrunk back a step while closing her mouth tight. His nerves settled, Haruta managed to right himself. “I once asked Ayumu and Hirune what kind of system was installed here, but they just pretended not to know. The old man from Books Mystery said that since the system is so mysterious and no one will say anything about it, we should test it ourselves. But it’s hard to get into Mikura Hall, so we weren’t sure how we would manage that. Then we had an opportunity when Ayumu was hospitalized. The person who helped Ayumu after he fell by the river bank was a member of our booksellers alliance. They found a key that tumbled out of Ayumu’s pocket…and with Ayumu out of the picture, it was just Hirune at Mikura Hall. The temptation was too great. We’d planned to borrow a book for a little while and return it once we knew how the system worked.” “You’re just making excuses,” Mashiro spat icily. Haruta placed the stolen copy of Raffles: The Amateur Cracksman on the table and stared at it silently. “You’re right,” he said. “We became thieves to protect ourselves from thieves. But some of us did resist it. The first two thefts were Keiko. She said she didn’t feel as bad about stealing from Mikura Hall because she doesn’t live in Yomunaga… Keiko was the one who called in the fake complaint about the alarm to make sure that Hirune was at Mikura Hall by herself.” Mifuyu recalled her earlier conversation with the assistant instructor Che when he said someone had called about the alarm, even though he hadn’t heard it. “Keiko experienced the security system firsthand and came back completely in awe, absolutely absorbed in telling us what had happened. But no one believed her. They said it all sounded so ridiculous and that we should stop snooping around Mikura Hall. But Keiko didn’t give up. Without mentioning anything about the theft, she tried convincing Hirune to join the booksellers alliance, but Hirune refused, of course. In the end, Keiko reached out to me personally. I got off work early today, since the media’s in town, and she asked me to take a book while she distracted you.” “…Keiko introduced herself and said she was going to steal a book from Mikura Hall,” Mifuyu mused. “That’s why I thought she was the thief, but it wasn’t her at all.” “Yeah… She got me to steal the book because she wanted to see what would happen from the outside. She wanted to know if it would just be the thief and you who retained their mind while in the strange world. Or would she remain herself, too, if she was nearby? To do that, she needed an accomplice.” In the Silver Beast’s feeding grounds, Mifuyu had seen Keiko playing the role of a character in the story. In other words, the book curse would treat people who were not the actual thief—an accomplice, for example—as innocent if they observed from the sidelines. The system had room for improvement…or so Mifuyu thought, but she first had to wrap her head around this. “Please understand, I am truly sorry about this,” said Haruta. “I experienced the system myself, and it’s far too much for us to handle. We can’t go on these adventures every time a book is stolen. I’ll tell everyone that we need to find other ways to combat shoplifting. I’m very sorry we stole your books. It won’t happen again.” Haruta bowed. Mifuyu scratched her cheek. She looked at Mashiro, who seemed wary, and Hirune, who was still asleep. Mifuyu sighed. “I want to say we’ll forgive you, but I need to talk with my dad first. I’m still a minor and not legally in charge of Mikura Hall. But like Mashiro said, theft is theft. So how about we let my dad decide how to handle this?” “Of course. I’ll bring everyone from the booksellers alliance who was involved, too.” “Okay. Is that good with you, Mashiro?” “…If you say so, Mifuyu,” Mashiro replied reluctantly, still looking apprehensive. Mifuyu picked up Raffles: The Amateur Cracksman from the table. “Okay, then. Haruta, give me your hands.” Haruta calmly extended both his hands. “I caught the thief.” Mifuyu lightly clasped Haruta’s wrist, and the second she did, the ground beneath her feet warped, and her mind tumbled. She closed her eyes under a sensation like that of falling into a dream. When she opened her eyes again, Mifuyu sat up quietly without any commotion. Hirune was still asleep, and she heard the clock counting off the seconds. Neither Mashiro nor Haruta were anywhere to be seen. He must have woken up first and left Mikura Hall. “…Well, I should start by telling Dad.” Scratching her head, Mifuyu put on her shoes in the entryway, opened the front door, and stepped outside. She noticed something amiss soon after. The sky shone blue, the clouds swam lazily in the sky, and a gentle breeze swayed the treetops. The afternoon sun warmed her back, and the air was hot enough to make her sweat. Biting back a yawn, Mifuyu opened the iron gate and glanced at the street in front of Mikura Hall. A car sat parked on the road. Not on the side of the road, but right in the middle of the lane. Not just one car, though. The car behind it, and the one behind that one, and the one after that—they were all parked in a row, stretching down the street. The same had happened in the lane going the other direction, no car moving, not even when the stoplight turned green. But even with that, she heard not one person complaining. “Wh-what is happening…?” A great silence filled the area. Mifuyu slowly approached a car and looked in through the window. It was empty. Both the passenger and driver’s seats were vacant, with no one there to drink the can of coffee in the cup holder. A pink toy dangled from the car seat in the back. Mifuyu nervously shuffled to the next car in the line and looked inside, but no one sat on the light-blue cushion. The same held true for the next car and the one behind it. No trace of anyone remained—just the empty shells of cars and the traces of the people who had been there. Even though the sun warmed her, a chill ran down her back, and her legs began to tremble. “Calm down, calm down… All the doors are open a little, so everyone decided to get out on their own.” Reassuring herself with that didn’t lessen her trembling in the least. Mifuyu realized she was running. She needed to find someone. She needed to ask them what had happened. But no matter where she went, she couldn’t find anyone. The sidewalk, the used bookstores, the streets—they were all empty. The lights were on, the shutters raised, the merchandise neatly arranged. But no one was around. All the humans had vanished. The wind blew a plastic bottle that someone had been drinking down the sidewalk before pushing it into the gutter. The residents of Yomunaga had vanished.