He woke up.
Sousei sat up in bed and looked around the room. That voice was ingrained in his ears.
The voice of his big sister, Rio.
The door. There was something dark and cold lurking in front of the door. It might vanish into mist if he opened the drapes.
Sousei threw off his cotton blanket, damp with night sweat, and got out of bed. He approached the door. The dark thing was still there. Someone was still there.
Suddenly, he heard a voice coming from behind him. He couldn’t quite make it out, but it was Rio’s voice. Sousei turned around, but she wasn’t there. No one was. And nothing looked out the ordinary.
When he turned back to the door, the dark thing had disappeared.
“Big sister Rio…”
Riona Takarai had died. Sousei had killed her, and he had died as well. He’d checked when he came back to life. Rio hadn’t been breathing. Her heart had stopped. It hadn’t been his sister anymore, but something just shaped like her. His sister’s corpse.
I don’t know if I got that feeling or not…
Sousei had killed his sister.
But he didn’t know if he’d actually stolen her life. He’d died at the same time she had. Was that the only reason he didn’t know whether he’d had that feeling or not?
Sousei had killed his sister and died. Normally, that would mean he’d come out even, but he didn’t include his sister’s life in his number of lives. He didn’t see that as adding a life because there had been no proof.
I don’t think Rio is dead…
Perhaps it was her soul, or she’d taken a spiritual form. Riona Takarai had separated from her physical body and was still alive.
Big sister Touka, who landed the finishing blow on Father…had her evil eyes taken away from her. She was punished. I suspect that might have been the work of big sister Rio…
Sousei calmed down quite a lot while he was showering and eating breakfast.
I have that dream a lot. Even if it was a little unusual and the first time I’ve seen that version, it’s still just one variation of the same dream. It’s probably because I saw that hallucination of Kinoshita…
His older sister—not Rio, of course, but his other older sister—was apparently scrambling to get the situation under control. Touka had contacted him the night before to give him strict orders to carry on with his usual daily life. He apparently wouldn’t be able to work for the time being. For that, Sousei was grateful.
There had been no reports of anybody finding a corpse resembling Kinoshita. According to his sister, when they spoke, even the organization hadn’t found the body yet.
There had only ever been one time when Sousei hadn’t had that feeling after killing someone: when he’d killed his sister Rio.
He was concerned about the issue with the corpse, but Sousei had brought down Kinoshita. He was dead. That fact wouldn’t change, no matter what anyone said.
I did what I was supposed to do. I did my job, just as Sis told me to.
They simply hadn’t been able to find the body yet.
It was pretty tough. I don’t know what happened after that, but it’s not worth worrying about…
Sousei got dressed and left the house.
His sister had ordered him to live his life normally.
Outside of work, Sousei Takarai was a completely normal high school student. That was how he wanted it and how it should be.
The previous night, Sousei had also been contacted by someone other than his sister: Asumi. She’d sent him a message on the app they used. Sousei hadn’t realized this before, but the app had the ability to make group chats, and they’d created a group consisting of Asumi, Moena, and Sousei. The name they’d decided on was the “Potato Party,” for obvious reasons. Asumi had come up with it.
The Potato Party had agreed to act normally that morning.
Sousei arrived at school at a time that wasn’t particularly early or late. About half of his classmates were already in the classroom. He said a normal hello to Asumi and Moena, who were already there, then returned Wakkuu’s “Yo!” with a level of intensity that could be considered normal. Kuchina was sitting at the back by the window, her chin propped up on her hand. He felt a little relieved.
Yoh Mishima stumbled over, waving his long sleeves around. “Mohorning, Lil Sou.”
“…Morning, Mishima.”
“I prefer Mishii or Yoshii.”
“Huh…?”
“I would have preferred Mishii or Yoshii…”
For some reason, Yoh repeated the exact same thing but in past tense. His shoulders drooped, making the already long sleeves of his uniform appear even longer. He looked extremely despondent. It seemed he didn’t like being called Mishima.
“…Mi— Yo… Nah… Mishii, good morning.”
Yoh gave a wide grin. “Mohorning.”
…What was that all about? Sousei wondered, but Yoh had a smile that captivated people. Sousei was fine with calling him Mishii if he was going to smile like that.
It’s a little embarrassing, though…
Later on, Yoh’s name came up when Sousei was talking to Yukisada.
“Mishii’s a funny guy, huh?”
“…Ah, you call him Mishii as well, Yukisada?”
“I used to call him Mishima before, but he seemed kind of sad about that.”
“He told me he preferred Mishii or Yoshii, but I didn’t know which one to use…”
“Well, it’s ‘Yoshii’ from ‘Yoh,’ or ‘Mishii’ from ‘Mishima.’ That’s all.”
“Ohh, it’s from his first and last names. I see. That makes sense…”
“Maybe you chose based on whether it was his surname or his first name,” Yukisada said with a chuckle. His intuition was strangely good at times. The two of them weren’t so close that they hung out after school or anything, but he understood Sousei’s personality.
It would be scary if he was my enemy, but as a friend…
Sousei was lost in thought during class and noticed that he felt internally conflicted about something.
It goes without saying, but I can’t open up to anyone about my work. That’s a part of myself that I have to keep hidden. I have to put on the mask of a normal high school student, and I can’t let anyone catch on that it’s only a mask, obviously. I’d be in so much trouble if anyone found out about my job. If things go wrong, they’d have to be silenced…
Of course, Sousei wouldn’t want to do it, but his sister would probably have a different opinion on the matter.
…This is just a hypothetical, but if someone did have to be silenced and Sis ordered me to get rid of them…to get rid of a friend, I…
Would he obediently do as he was told? Or would he disobey his sister?
I don’t like either option. I have to make sure I’m not caught so it doesn’t come to that. But…I like the strangely sharp Yukisada. And although Mishima—Mishii—gets real buddy-buddy real fast and confuses me a bit, he’s kinda fascinating. And even with everything that’s happened between us, Asumin still wants to be my friend. I truly have nothing but gratitude for her… No, not just gratitude. If possible, I want to stay friends with her.
Sousei told himself he shouldn’t take risks if he could help it. It would be better if he did his best not to let people get close to him. He should be distancing himself from others like Kuchina Hitsujimoto was, for his own sake and for the sake of others.
I know that… Or at least, I thought I knew that, but…
It might be too much for someone like Sousei Takarai to hope for. He should know his limitations.
Seriously, I don’t want to keep living like this with no one to understand me. That’s not living. There’s no point in living like that…
Kuchina was looking out the window with her chin propped on her hand.
Wouldn’t Hitsujimoto feel the same way…?
As soon as lunch break began, he started walking toward Kuchina’s desk. Asumi and Moena held their breaths as they watched. The Potato Party had decided in advance that this was what they’d do.
Kuchina didn’t move. Their classmates were getting their lunches. Some of them took out lunch boxes they’d brought to school, while others were heading to the cafeteria to buy food.
“Miss Hitsujimoto.”
She didn’t move a muscle. They’d expected that, though. Sousei wasn’t shaken, just nervous.
He’d been nervous for a while.
As a matter of fact, his heart had been racing for a long time now.
“How about today?” he asked, being careful to keep his voice steady.
A part of Kuchina’s body tensed slightly. Was it her head? Her shoulders? Her arms? Sousei couldn’t tell exactly, but she’d definitely reacted.
“Do you want to go eat french fries?”
He thought his voice might have gone a bit higher.
Kuchina sighed and didn’t so much as look in his direction.
“Listen carefully, Sousei,” his sister warned him over the phone that night. “This is the greatest crisis we’ve ever faced. While you’re pretending to be a carefree high school student, people are running around everywhere doing all sorts of different things. Who brought about this catastrophe? It was you, Sousei. You need to be aware of your responsibilities.”
As his sister berated him, Sousei’s heart tightened, his stomach clenched, and he found it difficult to breathe. That was a conditioned response. His sister had conditioned him over time so her threats made him tremble and he had no choice but to obey. He was just like Pavlov’s dog.
Even though Sousei knew what was happening, he would still obey like a faithful pet if his sister assigned a job to him.
However, the current conditions weren’t conducive to work.
An abandoned house had burned down and three charred corpses were discovered, two of which had been identified. Even though the corpses were burned, that hadn’t been the cause of death for any of them; they had been dead before the fire started, and residents in the area had heard what sounded like gunshots at the time. During the on-site investigation, a number of objects that resembled bullets had been found, and immediately after the fire had started, someone had forced a train to make an emergency stop on the railway bridge. Witness reports from the train driver and multiple passengers said that they’d also heard something that sounded like gunfire.
Riamu Kinoshita was presumed to be dead, but his corpse hadn’t been found.
His sister wasn’t wrong: Sousei had been the one who caused this chaotic and troubling situation. He was probably deeply inconveniencing the organization. It was no wonder she was so angry.
Sousei suffered when his sister scolded him. It wasn’t just mental anguish, but physical pain, and there was nothing he could do about it.
But the situation wasn’t as bad as his sister made it out to be.
He didn’t have to work.
He wouldn’t have to do the loathsome job of laying the groundwork to kill someone and then executing them.
And he also had the Potato Party.