Translator: Ranzan Editor: JackOFallTrades

After I left the hospital, two months had pa.s.sed.

The season was deep winter, a season when the dryness and cold permeated your skin.

I thought that the new life I worried about would finally become easy and quiet.

I had no connection with juniors at school as I as I had missed out on clubs and committees, and with cla.s.s change and my rise to senior cla.s.s I only knew Yuuto and Mai.

On the day of the disappearance, almost all of the junior cla.s.s, third group, that I was in was involved.

The only group that was saved were those that fell down from the surprise of seeing the magic circle"s light emerge, and after running were lucky enough to escape being taken by that magic circle.

That day, Mai was late and was running to school herself, and because of that she was able to escape the circle.

However, those two or three other cla.s.smates that were lucky enough in avoiding the circle, were all killed anyway.

It happened one month after I returned, those murders.

Mai"s friend, Satomi, was murdered.

In addition, there was the random group slaughter that happened about half a year ago.

Almost as if arranged beforehand, random attacks occurred on those related to the disappearance, and cla.s.smates were among the victims. Mai"s other friend Yuki also disappeared.

Now, the only ones left from junior cla.s.s, third group was Yuuto and I.

Anyway, now I hardly know anyone at this school. That"s why it now feels like I"m a transfer student in my own school, which makes me think that I have even more problems now.

Especially since everyone"s so interested in what happened to me during my disappearance.

However, on the other side of that, no one really ever asks me what happened.

『Everyone"s had a hard time more or less in this year since the happening…and with you not having any memory of what happened, we were told not to bother asking you to avoid more chaos』

Yuuto said with a slightly wicked smile, and I felt embarra.s.sed about myself.

Why do they all think about me more?

The only way I was given consideration was that I was allowed to sit next to Mai in the cla.s.sroom, so even with everyone around me conscious of me, I still got used to the situation quickly.

I was thankful that my new cla.s.smates treated me relatively normally, and my daily routine slowly seemed to return.

「Okay, time to give back the test. Until the regular instruction begins, take some time to look over your test answers.」

Hearing the loud voice of the morning homeroom instructor echo made my heart feel nostalgic after everything that happened to me.

「The last math test I think had careless misses. It makes me sad to see my scores.」

Hearing my sister say such honors-student-level things made my heart race.

「Oh…I see.」

We all were returned our tests by name, and after getting my test back, I sat down.

I tried as hard as I could to hide my test score!

「Brother? What is it?」

「Sorry, I have to go to the bathroom.」

Fwip, I got up from my seat and left the cla.s.sroom begin with my test in hand. I went to the bathroom.

I jumped in the first toilet stall and locked it, and looked at the answer sheet with something like a prayer.

「Uffh…」

However, I looked up into the air as I saw the reality of my marks on the answer sheet for the five subjects. Since I was in the toilet, I couldn"t see the sky.

(d.a.m.n, if she finds out…)

「『Brother…I"m so disappointed. I guess my brother"s finally become an idiot.』」

I imagined her breathing in a sigh, shaking herself, and then crushing the test answer sheet in her hands.

If she sees these scores, she would watch me every day including Sat.u.r.days before the retest a month later, and lord over me by making me study.

She would have no compa.s.sion, even as I was restarting my life as a student all over again.

My sister was going to a sword training ground in order to strengthen her body against that crazy cult, so when that offense-switch within her flipped, she turned into a compa.s.sion-less, smiling, Spartan devil.

When she found out that I was addicted to video games as a middle school student, she would always win her smiling arguments to my parents, and I never had a day of peace.

But because of it, I got 100% on my redo test.

「Fff, this sister…she beats me all the time. And just like that one manga character, I leave enough proof for her to find it.」

I tore the answer sheet and threw it away as I thought of her evil pursuit of me due to my grades.

After tearing the paper as small as I could so as not to clog the toilet, I flushed it one sheet after another.

「No proof…all gone.」

No conviction if there is doubt.

Even if she looks at me with doubtful eyes, if there"s no proof, then that switch of hers won"t go off.

My sister was pretty solid in that regard.

If I said『there was no paper in the toilet so I used the test sheet』she would get angry and it would end with her saying『you need to learn to be more delicate, brother.』

I finally left the toilet, and entered the cla.s.sroom like a king.

「Welcome back, brother.」

As I got back to my seat, the homeroom ended, and there were about five minutes left until the beginning of first period.

「Ah, well, my stomach hurt, and there was no paper in the stall…」

「I see. That"s too bad. So, did you use the test sheet instead, poor brother?」

「Huh?」

I didn"t expect that kind of response from Mai when I got back.

(T…that was weird, really weird. This feels strange…)

I started to feel sweat pour from my brow as I began to feel scared.

「Brother, what"s wrong? You"re really sweating.」

「N…nothing, it"s, maybe the air is bad!」

「That"s not true, brother, last week someone came to repair the air conditioner. The room is just as warm as it needs to be.」

「Ah, I see, well, it"s still strange.」

Phew, I tried to blow it off, but she kept pushing me as she breathed in a long sigh.

「This girl only looks out for her brother for his own good. Even if he"s a pervert that likes to bully girls, or a pervert that likes to fall in love with his sister, or is a pervert with a thing for feet…I"m still going to watch over you.」

Whawawhawahaaat?!

「Whoaaaaaa, wait a second, what are you saying?! Stop it please, you"re going to make me look bad, look, even Nakamura it looked at me like some kind of monster, you"re going to make everyone think I"m some kind of weirdo!!」

「Weird like a brother that flushes his answer sheet out of confusion about what to do with hiding a test that he totally messed up on…I think you"re disgusting…you"re worse than human excrement!」

Ah, she found out.

No…this is not good.

Mai was looming next to me with a look of total knowledge, and I knew that her switch had been totally thrown by now.

「And that horrid score…it makes me so sad. I guess it"s an appropriate score for a brother that"s become a depraved little imp.」

「?! What? What did you say?」

Mai held up the test sheet that I thought I had flushed to the bottom of the ocean!

Mai"s hand gently shook as she looked over the scores.

「I never thought that my brother would do something like this. So I cried guiltily and asked for the teacher to give me a copy of the copy you got of your test answer sheet!」

Since it was now all out in the open, Mai now breathed out a sigh loudly.

「My brother has become a degenerate. It"s sad to see my brother sink so low.」

「Well, if you have any pity, no, I was thinking that maybe you"d be kind, I was thinking…and maybe let me off.」

I asked for pity, as anger oozed from Mai, and she said, almost as in prayer,

「Brother, during this lunch, we"ll formulate your NEW study plan.」

Then the bell beginning instruction sounded without any emotion.

「…okay…there go the sentimental days of my youth.」

My days hereafter will be filled with studying.

☆

「Nhhg…impossible…stop!」

It was on one day off, that I was studying as hard as I could at Yuuto"s house.

Yuuto lived alone in this room, in an expensive apartment building in the city.

Yuuto was an illegitimate child, in other words, he had a lot of complex family matters. Since he had lost his mother during his elementary school years, I heard that he received money to support his life from his father.

However, he wasn"t on good terms with his father.

The first time I heard about his father was when Kenta and Suehiko visited.

「…well, if you finished this far, you"re pretty good at math. I think you can pa.s.s the test.」

「Really? Yesssss! I can do it!」

After hearing circles showing correct answers being drawn over and over, I heard from Yuuto that I had pa.s.sed and without thinking jumped up into a victory pose.

Even though I was just about to take my college entrance and thought that I was thankful that someone could look over my studies and laugh, saying 『You"re fine, you have the basics down』…this and that aren"t the same.

I was the type to study all night the night before a test, that didn"t protect the time allocated to study.

That"s why I had this victory pose!

「Okay, next is the social studies test, Kaito.」

「Whaaa?」

「Don"t say what. You got a lot wrong in that one, right? Sorry, but this time I can"t be your ally, okay? Mai-chan with threaten me…she asked me to do this.」

Yuuto said while averting his eyes and with a pale face.

d.a.m.n sister. My almost completely handsome friend was reduced to a weakling by her.

「Well, it"s bad to just push ourselves this hard for this long. Let"s take a break and get some coffee and something sweet.」

「I"d like a Snow Mark coffee, okay?」

「Sure, but…that"s not coffee.」

I watched Yuuto leave the room with a grimace, and shut the door with a fwump.

In order to cool my head from all the numbers I had been thinking about now that I was alone, I put my pen down on the low table and fell back on the floor, still cross-legged.

(I wonder if Mai is okay…)

I zoned out while listening to the tick, tick, tick of the clock.

Today, Mai was going to the 100 day memorial service of the death of her friend Satomi.

It was a memorial service only for the family, pretty much, but Satomi"s family said 『You should come too, Mai』so she attended.

「…」

I remembered Mai leaving the house with a mix of loneliness, sadness, and a smile that morning.

「Ah, no, no, now I can see why Yuuto is so weak to her!」

Hup! I sat up, and decided to search around Yuuto"s room.

I couldn"t let Mai"s sadness bring me down. I had to do something stupid so that I wasn"t always thinking about Mai all the time.

「Okay, then, let"s take a look at this. Let"s see if there"s any dirty mags of his that I haven"t found yet.」

Just like the crazy stuff we did before…just like always.

But…this time I really couldn"t think about it.

「…」

Looking at his room, voices, thoughts, something was lost.

Almost like were shut in a cage that had closed us off.

A red pen had Xed off the faces of pictures of those posted in SNS feeds, bulletin boards, internet posts, and newspaper articles…walls upon walls of them.

This sucks, d.a.m.n it all, why…I can"t give up…why.

WHYWHYWHYWHYWHY, WHY WHY, a screaming, cutting voice seemed to cry out.

All there was…a year that I didn"t remember, and a year of pain that Yuuto felt.

It wasn"t a place that I could just enter myself.

I shut the door, hit the wall with my fist, and then put my head in my hands.

「Why, why did this all happen to me.」

I said to myself, alone, quietly alone.

Yuuto came back, and he handed over the food and drink I wanted, we took a break, and then again began to study.

As a result, I couldn"t say anything about what I found, and just blew it off as if I saw nothing.

Also, I had no idea about what I should do.

「Okay, are you ready to go to the hospital?」

While I was answering questions silently next to Yuuto, who was quietly reading a novel, I noticed that the clock said it was already past 3 PM.

「d.a.m.n, this time already?! I need to hurry up a little bit.」

I remembered the time that I had to see the doctor that we decided on last week, so I hurried and got ready to return home.

「Make sure you review when you get home okay? I don"t want to have to go over all this again.」

「I know. I don"t want to get them wrong and have my Spartan sister kick my a.s.s over it. I have to be the one that lords over her.」

「d.a.m.n you and your sister-fetish.」

「It"s not a fetish…it"s just…normal.」

I said as I reached the entrance and opened the door.

「Okay, Kaito, get better quickly.」

「Yeah, see you at school.」

I left his room, and made my way slowly to the hospital.

I walked to the psychological clinic, and expected to see the doctor that my previous doctor Maeno had introduced me to after being hospitalized.

In order to return the memories that hadn"t come back during my hospital visits, I instead went here to find the cause.

「If I can just remember where I was, I wonder if I can then help Yuuto?」

From the day I returned after the disappearance, there was something telling me that somehow there were chains inside me creaking, holding back something that was trying to break free.

However, there was no answer as to what that was.

But still, I knew it. Until I could remember it, it was like the heat of melted magma being fanned by winds inside me.

The answer to the reason for it all still hadn"t emerged.