by <unknown>
The curtain was tied to the balcony's railing, fluttering lightly in the wind. Torn apart, the curtain's pieces were tied together to make a rope, hanging over from the third floor to reach the ground floor.
Realizing what this meant, Kiyomi dropped the candlestick in her hand to cover her mouth with both hands.
"Oh no...!"
Chapter 1 - Tokyo Area's Holiday
Part 1
The edge of the sky was just beginning to glow as dawn's light blue color sternly made the atmosphere grow tense. With last night's rain accumulated on the road surface, trees were moistened while flowers and grass beneath were nourished.
To the young man—Rentaro Satomi—this scene prior to going to school was especially nervous.
Perhaps it was the twintailed girl ahead, looking back at him, whose nervous emotions were infecting him.
Enju Aihara's hands were tightly gripping the straps of the bright red grade schooler's backpack.
"I shall be setting off now."
Rentaro placed his hands on Enju's shoulders.
"Before that, let's confirm a few things, Enju. You must absolutely refrain from using your power, sit out of PE class, and if you accidentally get hurt—"
"'Hurry and press your hand over the injured part and run over to somewhere without people, to prevent others from seeing the wound regenerate no matter what.' Isn't that right? I have grown tired of hearing it."
"Yeah... I guess."
While wondering if he had reminded her that many times, Rentaro scratched his head. On the other hand, Enju was showing a confident expression, saying "this time I am really setting off," swaying her twintails while raising her hand vertically.
Although Rentaro remained worried, knowing Enju had made her mind, he could not keep her any longer.
He had no idea if Enju understood his worries but he watched as she disappeared into the morning mist without looking back.
"She left already?"
Rentaro looked behind him at the dojo's main entrance where a beauty dressed in a black sailor-style school uniform was emerging, as well as the blue-eyed blonde beside her. They had apparently just finished their morning training. Kisara Tendo was wiping the sweat off her red-flushed face with a towel.
"Are you worried about her?"
"Not exactly..."
Rentaro looked again towards the road where Enju had left.
"But on that note, I never expected her to have the perseverance to still go to school."
Kisara smiled with full understanding and glanced at him sideways.
"Because humans cannot live their lives alone."
Rentaro pouted.
"What, aren't I by her side too?"
Despite putting on a brave front, on Enju's first day attending a new elementary school, an occasion to celebrate, Rentaro noticed he was unable to share Enju's joy in an honest manner.
Ultimately, was it really worth celebrating the fact that the dust had been wiped off the abandoned schoolbag in a corner of the apartment?
Enju had been expelled from school due to her identity as a Cursed Child. After that, the open-air classroom had even met an even more tragic fate.
Feared and cursed by people, Enju was fully entitled to lamenting her own misfortune and wallowing in negative emotions. However, she did not do that.
Rentaro did not think that his guidance was what achieved this. It was due to Enju's inborn strength of spirit. If he had anything to be proud of, it was simply helping her to bring out her good side.
Seeing nearby schools all refuse to enroll Enju, he had no choice but to find this elementary school far from home.
This was the reason why Enju had to get up early in the morning to commute to school on her own.
"Tina, what are your plans?"
Rentaro asked the blonde girl next to him. She was also looking in the direction where Enju had disappeared.
"Please let me think more about it, including the fact whether I really need to go to school."
"......"
The girl before him had already figured things out. Ever since the calamity ten years ago, in this world that was slowly approaching destruction, it was questionable whether pursuing the usual steps, taken for granted matter-of-factly, of completing school and getting a job was really correct.
If anything, it would be closer to the sense of emptiness carried by members of the Lost Generation like himself or Kisara as though it was their fate.
At this time, a low rumbling came from somewhere, making Rentaro halt in his movements.
By the time he realized it was the sound of an airplane, Rentaro recognized the small dot of light in the western sky.
The rumbling grew louder as the dot of light gradually grew bigger. With a sudden great noise, the plane swept past with supersonic speed. Then a moment later, a gale blew, forcing Rentaro to cover his face hastily.
The surrounding trees also quivered. Rentaro looked up to see torn leaves fluttering all around in the surroundings. Taking a closer look, he found the dot of light just now had flown far away, impossible to see unless he stared intently.
"Seriously, why would a plane have an emergency takeoff so early in the morning?"
Spitting out the leaves that had entered her mouth, Kisara grumbled.
"That's one of the Tokyo Area's support fighter jets, right? Weren't almost all of them shot down during the Third Kantou Battle?"
"They apparently built more through emergency production. Right now things are still okay with both sides in a staring contest, but the gap in combat potential between us and the Sendai Area remains difficult to compensate for. As soon as war breaks out, it will be very disadvantageous for our side."
"...Will a war really start?"
Seeing Tina look down in worry, Rentaro instantly wanted to comfort her and say there will always be a solution, but fell silent before he could speak.
Only this once, Rentaro could not even see where things were developing towards either.
"She did not inform you this time, Satomi."
Rentaro snorted in response to Kisara's slight disappointment.
"Why do I need to be mentioned? A conflict between states is no place for CivSecs to enter the stage."
"That may be true but you've always gotten yourself caught up in similar affairs."
"Unlike the Third Kantou Battle, this situation is too complicated. Rather than CivSecs, what we really need to mobilize is an ambassador adept at negotiations."
Raising his arms in a surrendering gesture, Rentaro instantly felt a chill in his palms.
The sun happened to peek out from behind the clouds in the east, its rays shining bright on the ground.
As though reminding Rentaro to pay attention, Kisara clapped her hands.
"It is precisely during times like these that we must carefully protect our everyday lives. Let's go. If we don't hurry up and get ready, we'll be late to school."
Part 2
To Enju Aihara, this place had a different atmosphere compared to Magata Elementary School and the open-air classroom.
She had heard previously that this was an elite school. Enju wondered if this was the reason, but felt unconvinced.
Due to her Gastrea factor, Enju's sense of smell was keener than a normal human's. While walking through the corridor, she sensed a strong smell of adrenalin creep into her nose.
This place was filled with terror and nervousness.
This impression remained unchanged even when she entered the staff room to meet the teacher.
Calling herself Yagara, the middle-aged teacher had such deep smile lines that Enju wondered if she could poke a finger into them. When smiling, those lines became even deeper and more obvious. However, her thick lips were unnaturally large while in contrast, her eyes were tiny, giving a very cold impression.
Not the kind of teacher whom students would feel comfortable approaching to discuss private matters.
After listening to simple explanations and when the bell rang for homeroom, Enj
u was taken to the Year 4 Class 5 classroom where she made her self-introduction.
Although Enju's legal guardian always called her careless and insensitive, she still felt her back stiffen from nearly forty pairs of eyes staring at her.
"Hello everyone, I am... I'm Enju Aihara. I transferred here because of my parents. Please to meet you all."
After condensing the prepared greeting so that it was short enough to avoid mistakes and taking a bow, Enju was assigned to a seat apparently prepared for her on the last row next to the window.
She heard people whispering between themselves. "A transfer student at this kind of time." Indeed, coming across the Libra crisis during transferring could only be considered a great misfortune.
Not particularly interested in Enju, Ms. Yagara reminded them "okay everyone, despite the times we're in, please do try to get along" thus ending the extremely ordinary self-introduction.
At this moment, a lively-looking boy sitting in the front row yelled "teacher!" and raised his hand to ask:
"Funagasaki Elementary nearby has stopped their lessons. Why do we still have to go to school?"
Although no one nodded, all the classmates were showing silent agreement.
Yagara smiled lightly and said:
"Your parents have entrusted our school to nurture you all into amazing people. None of your parents want you to fall behind in the curriculum."
Although the teacher's tone was calm, there was a commanding attitude to her.
The classroom's atmosphere immediately changed. Yagara organized the class register on the lectern and said "although it's very sudden" to change the subject, but at this moment...
All the students' faces went tense and they shut their mouths completely.
This tension was very uncomfortable. This was also the smell of adrenalin from earlier. Compared to the boys, the girls' nervousness was overwhelmingly higher.
Enju looked at Yagara at the lectern to see her lips curling up coldly, showing sadistic glee in her expression.
"Today, I have important news for everyone. Miss Kamo from Class 2 has been expelled after the staff meeting made a decision. She will be handed over to the IISO. This is the fate most befitting carriers of the Gastrea virus."
Enju instantly tensed up, breaking out in with tons of cold sweat all over.
"Thus a viral carrier is eliminated. I hope everyone will be good students from now on. That's all. Oh right, although I'm sorry to have to tell you so soon after you transferred, Miss Aihara, we will be going on a school trip to a power plant in an outskirt zone the day after tomorrow. Please decide on your group within today."
Saying that, the teacher left the classroom, her high heels clacking away.
It was time for the brief break after class. Amidst the noisy chattering, Enju forgot to wipe her dripping sweat, simply looking down, clutching her knees hard with her fingernails digging in.
She felt she was already dead.
"Ms. Yagara is a bit neurotic, so don't feel too concerned."
Enju looked to the side, startled. A girl was standing there. She was dressed in a border with a short jacket, standing there elegantly like a retro actress.
Perhaps due to feeling nervous, the girl kept rubbing her hand against the back of her thigh.
She had short curly bob cut with something resembling a wry smile on her face. Although it looked like the girl was trying hard to act in a way not to arouse wariness, it also meant that she was very shy.
The girl timidly pointed at Enju's desk.
"Miss Aihara, that's..."
Following her gaze, Enju saw the laptop she was using for class, which was covered all over with Tenchuu Girls stickers.
As though resolving herself, the girl brought her hands out from behind her back and raised them before Enju's eyes.
This was her tablet computer. When Enju looked at the modular back panel, she instantly widened her eyes.
"Th-That's! The limited edition Tenchuu Red special multicolored back cover offered to subscribers of Girls' Dreams monthly magazine!"
Taking a closer look, Enju found that even the stylus was a Tenchuu Girls related product.
Who could this be? Thinking that, Enju re-examined the girl. The girl went "ehehe" and smiled for finding a fellow fan, then shook the tablet noisily.
"Eh—No way! So you commute all the way from Magata City?"
"Mm-hmm, it takes an hour and a half to get here by train."
Enju wolfed down the hot dog bun from the school lunch while the girl with curly hair looked down while curling fried noodles around her fork.
"I see—Because of your parents. It must be tough for you. This is an elite school after all, so there's a lot of homework."
"Oh."
"Yes. Ah, especially be careful of Mr. Katakura who teaches science class. He always gives hard questions on purpose to test the poorer students."
So that kind of teacher exists in every school—Seeing Enju cross her arms and mutter like that, the girl giggled.
By the lunch break, Enju and the girl were already great friends.
From Enju's standpoint, she could not be luckier to have a kindhearted classmate at school who could remind her of rules and things to pay attention to.
This girl with the curly bob cut was named Momoka Hieda. By this point, Enju and Momoka were already close enough to address each other by first name directly.
"Oh, my home happens to be in the train station's direction. Uh, if it's okay with you, can we go home together after school?"
"Mm-hmm, of course it's fine."
Momoka clapped her hands together, smiling while she said "Really, I'm so glad" quietly. This girl was so cute. Enju analyzed her while wondering if she was Rentaro's type, but could not ignore the fact that Momoka's personality differed from hers by a lot.
"Umm, Momoka, umm... What was actually going on?"
Finding an opportunity, Enju asked a question that had been weighing on her mind.
"Which?"
"Umm, that. The expelled girl we were told about this morning."
Probably guessing what Enju wanted to say, Momoka smiled wryly and said:
"That kind of tense atmosphere was really unpleasant, right? But the school has been pushing a trend of encouraging informants, with Ms. Yagara as a major proponent."
"Uh, so that Miss Kamo who got expelled was... a so-called Cursed Child?"
The girl shook her head in a dilemma.
"I'm not sure."
Enju stared wide-eyed.
"Not sure?"
"Our school is kind of special. In fact, it doesn't matter whether someone is a Cursed Child or not, as long as they are suspected, they will be taken to the IISO. Even if the IISO comes back with negative test results, almost everyone finds it impossible to continue staying in the school after being suspected once... According to rumors, students unwanted by the school will be accused forcibly and sent to the IISO."
I see, so that's why the atmosphere in the class—especially the girls—was that tense.
Enju recalled what Rentaro had said before. The school had some kind of conservative thing going and could easily turn into a hotbed for a peculiar environment, which most likely referred to this.
Unaware of Enju's speechlessness, the girl before her said cheerfully, perhaps trying to drive away the tense mood:
"We can't possibly be one of those 'red-eyes', ahaha."
Enju could only smile awkwardly to cover things up.
"Hey! So in Tenchuu Girls' Episode 13 'Population Explosion! The Terrifying Pond Algae,' it mentioned about catching the lord of the lake, the Carp King, it's not made up?"
"Apparently for realism, the staff actually went and caught one."
"Then in the second season, Episode 21's 'Waiting for Godot,' what was that all about? Tenchuu Red spent a full thirty minutes waiting for Mr. Godot while arranging chairs and talking about God. The internet said it was a tribute to Samuel Beckett..."
"Ah yes, that seemed
to be written after the script writer had a nervous breakdown, so other people had no choice but to make the story kind of literary."
"......"
"Anyway, forget about that. Did you know? In the last episode of Tenchuu Girls' second season, although they invaded Kouzukenosuke Kira's house to defeat Kira, but actually, Kira had used cloning to make seven clones of himself—"
"UWAH! I still haven't watched it so stop spoiling!"
Ignoring Enju who was screaming with her ears covered, Momoka laughed happily.
After digesting a day of classes, Enju and Momoka were on the way home from school.
Still quite hot from the lingering heat of summer, the September sun shone brightly, attacking their skin mercilessly, but even so, Enju still walked with very lively footsteps.
The sunflowers flourishing around the school were smiling at full bloom. The cicadas were also singing their favorite songs with all their strength.
"I'm so glad I came to school."
Enju lifted her straw hat and smiled, looking up at the radiant sun. Momoka cocked her head lightly in puzzlement.
"Why do you say that?"
"Because I got to know you, Momoka."
Probably unused to Enju's direct manner of speech, Momoka pulled down the brim of her hat to hide her face. In the end, she finally said "me too" quietly in a voice that was almost covered up by the cicada sounds.
At this moment, an urgent cry of "Momoka!" came from another direction.
Immediately, Momoka was tightly embraced almost like a collision.
"Mother!"
The hugged Momoka exclaimed, feeling troubled. She relaxed her guard against the woman who had suddenly appeared and examined her face.
"Oh dear... Thank goodness. Are you alright?"
The woman whom Momoka called mother was wearing copper-rimmed glasses, dressed in a black pants suit threaded with gold. She looked like a tiger mom from a wealthy family no matter how you looked. Upon closer examination, there was an expensive looking car parked on the side. She had probably come rushing out of the car as soon as she spotted Momoka.
"I was worried out of my mind after hearing that one of those red-eyes had appeared at your school. Did you get touched by that thing? You might have gotten infected with the virus."