We Don't Open Anywhere Volume 1 Chapter 8

An abandoned hospital. A forgotten cemetery. A tunnel that had fallen into disuse. A sea of trees where the sun's light couldn't reach.

He wasn't in any such place.

Let's say it was a completely ordinary shopping mall out in the sticks. The kind of place that would fill you with déjà vu the first time you visited it, a ma.s.s-produced mall with the same kinds of stores as any other. But because it's the most convenient one in the region, it's lively in its own way, with money changing hands and people strolling about.

That kind of place.

Masato Yahara was in such a place.

"Why are you in a place like this, Masato?"

"'Cuz there's nothing here."

"Nothing? It's pretty lively, isn't it?"

"Then go on, try to imagine somewhere with nothing in it. No people. No shops. No street lights. No streets. Does a place like that seem normal to you? Could ya stay in a place like that without feeling anything? You couldn't, could ya. A place like that's already special. There's somethin' called 'nothingness' there. And nothingness has too much of an impact. It's pretty d.a.m.n far from feeling like there's nothing there."

"So it's like… it's unnatural?"

"Yeah, basically. And I can't stay in a place like that. I stand out too much against nothingness. I become special. And an incomplete existence like me can't stay like that."

"So that's why you're here?"

"Yup. Place like this lets me blend into day-to-day life, become h.o.m.ogenized, and not feel anything. That's what I mean by 'there's nothing here'. ...Let's call it 'nil' to differentiate it from nothingness. Nil exists in places where I can exist unconsciously. I'm always right next to you. But nil is folded up real small, so it penetrates the little holes in our day-to-day life and makes you forget about it."

—Rattle, rattle. Rattle, rattle.

"What's that noise? Does it have something to do with nil?"

"Yeah. That noise induces nil. As long as it exists, we're gonna keep getting absorbed by nil."

"Is it bad if that happens?"

"What, you can't f.u.c.kin' tell? In nil, even a dead guy like me can exist. h.e.l.l, I can exist just as well as you can. So basically, the kinds of oblivious guys who live snuggled up in nil are worth the same as if they were dead. It means their lives have s.h.i.+t for meaning or value."

"But, there's lots of people like that."

"Exactly."

"Are you one of them, Masato?"

"If I'm not careful, I'll get engulfed."

"Is that why you tried to break free?"

"Basically. But I f.u.c.ked up."

—Rattle, rattle. Rattle, rattle.

What a grating noise. Every rattle makes me want to run away. It makes me want to succ.u.mb to irritation.

"Masato… I can't take it any more. I want to get out."

"You could probably actually make it, Kou. In the end, all I was was ordinary. I couldn't escape the noise. But you're different. You're special, you're abnormal. You can definitely make it out. I'm sure of it."

"But, what can I do?"

"Don't worry."

Masato spoke with a kind smile. He'd never smiled like that when he was alive.

"You already know the way."

I, who was still just barely "me", was melting. Melting like an ice cream cone that had been abandoned under a blazing sun. Halfway between a liquid and a solid, I spread unceremoniously across the ground and became worthless.

Becoming worthless like this was no good. I had to find a purpose again. Otherwise I would stop being human.

Then someone interrupted my dissolution from within, bringing along a sound that resembled chains.

Go ahead, do as you will.

I, Kouta Hiiragi, am "white".

I take on the colors of others.

Go on, I'm right here!

And thus.

Masato Yahara is right here.

From then on, I acted automatically. I became no more than a machine carrying out my duty. My field of view, perhaps the very world, became blurry and unclear. I didn't know where to focus my sight. I couldn't perceive the school grounds, which I should have been intimately familiar with, as anything but a meaning flabby ma.s.s. It was like the world had been overlaid by a mosaic. I hadn't lost any of my knowledge, so I was able to go through the motions of everyday life. Like an NPC moving according to its programming. But the ground felt unsteady. It felt unnatural and unsettling, like the soles of my shoes were covered in a powerful gum.

In accordance with the order that had come from deep within me, I was on the roof. Against a backdrop of twilight stained in week-old blood, I stepped solidly on the oddly-dirty concrete and looked down upon the gradually depopulating townscape. Lined up on the street was a stream of kei cars[1], all being sucked in by the flas.h.i.+est building in town: the pac.h.i.n.ko parlor.

A cheap end to a cheap world.

An obsolete townscape like that fit Shuuichi Akiyama perfectly. I wanted to dump bird s.h.i.+t all over his honors student's gla.s.ses and post pictures of it on Instagram. It would be satisfying as h.e.l.l, and I bet it'd get quite the response.

Now then, I'm going to thoroughly divulge everything about Shuuichi Akiyama. I'm going to expose him, enumerate him, crush him piece by piece, and pulverize him.

"What did you hope to accomplish by calling me all the way up here, Hiiragi?"

Ignoring Akiyama's question, I spoke.

"You can come in now, Sudou."

Instead of looking at the door she was coming through, I gauged Akiyama's reaction. He was frantically hiding his emotions, but he couldn't fully contain the look of surprise in his eyes.

"You're the girl who was with Yahara, aren't you."

Not knowing how much I knew, he gave a fairly safe remark.

"She's given me a lot to think about. ...First of all, out with it. Why didn't you come forward, even though you were the last one to see Masato?"

Akiyama gazed reproachfully at Sudou. Following his line of sight, I laid eyes on her for the first time since she'd arrived.

Her long, unevenly-dyed hair was blowing in the wind, and she looked more dishevelled than before. She was pale again today, too. Her habit of raising the corners of her mouth was unchanged, but although that made it look like she was smiling she was actually more frightened than normal.

She was frightened.

Not of Akiyama, but of me.

"Your manner of speaking has become quite haughty, Hiiragi. Are you finally showing your true colors? ...Well, that's fine. As for your answer, it's quite a simple matter. The reason I didn't come forward was for her sake."

That wasn't the answer I'd been expecting.

"What do you mean? What in the world does she have to do with you not coming forward?"

"Hmph. It's something of a delicate matter, so I was hoping not to have to say it, but now that it's come to this I suppose I have little choice. Our friend over there had been seduced by Yahara and was on her way to a hotel with him. I stayed silent because I would feel bad if I revealed that fact to the world."

"Didn't you think that, just maybe, your testimony would be important to catching the killer?"

"If I deemed that to be the case, I would have ignored my qualms and come forward immediately. My testimony would have been worthless. By no means would it have helped the investigation whatsoever."

"Way to go and decide that on your own. You never know what information might lead to the killer, right?"

"Quite so. They say that a b.u.t.terfly flapping its wings in one hemisphere can cause a tornado in the other, and the same could of course be said about murder investigations. But when I weighed that small chance against that young lady's privacy, I chose the latter."

It was a perfectly reasonable answer. And his voice had been steady throughout, almost as if he had been expecting the question.

With that, the reason I had initially suspected Akiyama vanished.

But that didn't matter.

I no longer doubted Akiyama.

I had already decided that he was the killer.

"Christ you're obnoxious. Just f.u.c.king confess already."

Taken aback at my harsh, exasperated words, Akiyama stiffened momentarily.

My words were simply the result of unintentional candor, but to Akiyama they must have seemed like a tactic to rattle him, because he shut his mouth and put on a composed expression.

The conversation heading in the direction seemed favorable to me, so I made no effort to correct his misinterpretation.

"Alright, next question then. When Yamazaki took his little fall, you were at the school, weren't you. That's what she claims."

After seemingly glaring at Sudou for an instant, he nodded with an, "Indeed."

"I was quite fl.u.s.tered when I found out about the incident. I suppose I can't blame you for being suspicious of the fact that I was at the school when Ryuusuke Yamazaki fell from the roof. Although I was in the parking lot and not on the roof, I didn't think that there was anyone who could corroborate my claim. I'm not proud of it, but I had no choice but to protect myself. I had no idea that there was somebody who saw me in that parking lot."

"Apparently Yamazaki was screaming. Why didn't you notice anything?"

"That's a difficult question to answer. I don't have much to say beyond that I simply didn't notice. I was deep in thought at the time."

Akiyama spread his arms exaggeratedly and shook his head.

Irritated by his affected behavior, I heaved a heavy, antagonistic sigh.

"Well then, how do we want to do this… Alright, let's go with that approach. Akiyama, do you believe in ghosts?"

Akiyama's eyes narrowed at my abrupt question.

"What's this, all of a sudden? Ghosts? Must I really answer that question?"

"Yeah."

"...Very well then. Ghosts, hm. There are no shortage of people who believe in them, so I can't just unconditionally write off their potential existence. However, I find it difficult to put much stock in something so unscientific. And with the proliferation of digital cameras, pictures and films of ghosts have been reduced to little more than fabricated entertainment. That is about where I stand."

"Makes sense. You would think that, wouldn't you. But even if you don't believe in them, you wouldn't exactly go around kicking gravestones, would you? And you'd still get creeped out by Suicide Forest[2], wouldn't you?"

"But of course. Anyone would be on edge and seized by fear upon visiting Suicide Forest."

"Right, so scared you wouldn't have time to be deep in thought."

I could hear Akiyama taking a deep breath. He was quick on the uptake and had probably realized the purpose of my roundabout line of questioning.

"Maybe it's not on the same level as Suicide Forest. But a school at night is plenty creepy. An outrageous, distorted inst.i.tution that crams a bunch of kids together and gives them all the same instructions. When night rolls around, that distortion stands out bright. It creates an atmosphere that pushes people away, so much so that someone once told me it was a barrier. It's one thing for a bunch of people to come together and shoot off fireworks, but there's no way one guy's gonna come to school alone at night and get lost in thought."

I stared coldly at Akiyama.

"And you wanna tell me that under those circ.u.mstances, you didn't hear Yamazaki's scream?"

After a slight pause, Akiyama replied.

"...I didn't hear it. I'm dumbfounded by my own thickheadedness."

Even if forced to admit unseemly things, Akiyama still feigned innocence. I supposed it was the proper reaction if he wanted to dodge the issue. Suspicious as he was, this wouldn't make for proof.

But I was cornering him bit by bit. I could see in his face that he was wondering if he had left behind any definitive evidence.

He probably didn't realize it, but he was remarkably easy to read.

"Next up, let's figure out a way to make someone fall off the roof from down in the parking lot."

Akiyama raised an eyebrow.

"...Does such a method even exist?"

Sudou interjected almost reflexively.

"If it's a trick you're looking for, there's plenty one could use. Just to make sure, Sudou, but all you saw was that Akiyama was in the parking lot, and not what he was doing. Is that right?"

"Y...yes…"

"As you can see, the parking lot is pretty far from the roof. But, and you can confirm this from here, there's a clear line of sight, so you can easily see what's going on up here from down there. And even though they've been talking about putting up a new fence up here for forever, there still isn't one. There was an incident, so it makes even more sense now, but this place has been off-limits for a while. If you're standing at the edge of the roof, all it'd take is a little push and down you'd go."

I revealed what I had been hiding in my pocket.

"What is that?"

I answered Sudou, whose face showed visible signs of relief.

"It's the remote for a drone."

As I flicked a switch and tilted a lever, the drone I had placed on the roof ahead of time took off. There was a cord of red yarn attached to its camera, the other end of which was firmly fastened around the doork.n.o.b.

"Sudou, would you mind not moving for a bit? I'm a beginner at this whole drone thing, so flying this is a little tough."

As instructed, Sudou stiffened her body. I then maneuvered the drone towards her back. As the yarn drew taught, Sudou received a solid thump to the back and stumbled a step forwards.

If she had been on the edge of the roof, she would have certainly fallen.

"I chose red yarn so it'd be easy to see, but it would be even more feasible with something stronger like piano wire. If you operated it well, you could easily use this setup to push Yamazaki and send him off the edge."

As I unveiled the trick, Akiyama just stared silently at me.

But his lips had lost their tension.

"...Fufu."

Little by little, his mask was peeling off. I could almost hear the tearing sound. His hideous true self distorted and expanded, making it impossible for the mask to stay on. His naked expression laid bare his exclusive true form.

No matter how hard he tried to conceal it, he could hide it no more.

—Akiyama was broken.

Ahh… I was successful.

My goal of exposing him was steadily coming to fruition.

"Hiiragi, I'm disappointed in you."

"How so?"

I posed my question, still sneering.

"You don't realize it? Your trick is riddled with holes. First of all, operating a drone like that at night is impossible. Was the sky clear that day? I don't remember, but even if it had been possible to make out the drone by moonlight, it would be far too difficult to maneuver the drone exactly as you wanted. Just as you yourself were struggling just now. In order to put this trick of yours into practice, you would need to practice during the day to even have a chance at pulling it off. But this is a school. If you tried to do that, even on a holiday, you would be sure to catch someone's attention. Practicing would be impossible. And the final nail in your coffin is the noise from the propeller. It's inconceivable that, being at the scene of the incident, she would have heard the scream but not the propeller."

"Well, you're not wrong."

"And furthermore, I own nothing resembling a drone. If you look into it, you can verify that easily."

Having trounced my crude trick, his face filled with triumph.

His triumphant face was so comical, I couldn't help but let out a scornful laugh.

"What's so funny?"

"Don't go jumping to conclusions on me, now. I mean, I wanted to see what kind of face you'd make, so I let you just to conclusions, but still. Who the h.e.l.l said anything about you killing Yamazaki with this trick? I told you, didn't I. There's plenty of tricks one could use."

"What do you mean by that?"

"What was I trying to prove with this experiment? There are certainly ways to make Yamazaki fall while you're in the parking lot. But they're all meaningless tricks like that one. This isn't some mystery novel; even if the trick isn't exposed, once you're suspected that's it for you. The cops'll take you in on circ.u.mstantial evidence, and once you confess during the interrogation, n.o.body'll care about how elaborate your trick was. The minute you let yourself fall under suspicion, your plan failed. And you know that just as well as I do. But you let your misgivings get the best of you, and you ended up at the school that night."

The one I looked at now was not Akiyama but Sudou. Just as I predicted, her look of relief from earlier had vanished, replaced once more by paleness.

"In other words, this incident was beyond your expectations."

I went on, sneering all the while.

"There were two points I was trying to make there. The first is that this place is so dangerous, even a lame trick like my stunt with the drone could legitimately kill someone. The next is that if someone pushed Yamazaki, even by accident, he could easily have fallen."

I slapped Yamazaki's killer on the back.

"Isn't that right, Sudou?"

"—eep."

Sudou had been terrified when she was talking to me. She had been desperately trying to avoid having me suspect that she was hiding something.

But there was no way she could hide something like that from the "white" Kouta Hiiragi.

"Sudou, you referred to Akiyama as 'the bespectacled guy' as if you didn't know who he was, right? But given how obsessed with Masato you were, you were looking for leads regarding his murder, right? The minute you decided to seek out the truth, it would have been obvious what you needed to look into first. The last person to interact with Masato, his cla.s.smate with the gla.s.ses. Shuuichi Akiyama. It would be absurd for you to look into me before you investigated him, don't you think?"

"...Uu, ah..."

"But you hid that fact from me. It goes without saying that that was because that information was inconvenient for you. You thought that if I talked to Akiyama in any detail, my suspicions about Yamazaki's killer would turn to you."

Perhaps to keep her from confessing, Akiyama moved between myself and Sudou as if trying to conceal her. Although she was trying to feign composure, she couldn't begin to contain her trembling. What a shy girl she was.

"So in short, I ordered Sudou to push Yamazaki off the roof. Is that what you want to say? Why, I didn't even have a motive for wanting Yamazaki dead."

"Oh, but you did. He was complicit in Masato's death, right? I bet you made him transport the body."

That was probably what had happened. Akiyama's reactions had already pa.s.sed surprise and moved to downright panic. But no matter how obvious it was, he still frantically tried to keep up appearances.

"...That delusion of yours likely stems from having seen Yamazaki looking for me the other day. But we can set your delusions aside for a moment. Now, hypothetically speaking, let's say that I did have a motive for wanting him dead. Even then, how could I induce her to kill? We aren't even acquaintances, so there's no way she would follow such a command. And even if I had convinced her, don't you think it a bit odd that I would go out of my way to come to school at the time of the murder?"

"You just don't know when to give up, do you. I just said it; this incident was beyond your expectations. Sudou never had any intention of killing Yamazaki. His fall was nothing more than an accident."

"Your speculations become more and more preposterous. There are simply too many coincidences in your theory. Whether or not there was a fence, there's no way he'd simply fall."

"The first thing we have to figure out is why the two of them were on the roof in the first place. It's off-limits, and what's more, it was late at night. Of course, the meeting must have been arranged beforehand, but it's difficult to imagine Sudou having any reason to meet with Yamazaki directly. The one she was really on the roof to meet was you, Akiyama."

Akiyama scrunched up his face a bit.

"Sudou was probably pretty surprised when she got to the roof and found out she'd been tricked. Some happened that was so surprising that she accidentally pushed him off. ...Now, this is just me guess, but did it perhaps seem like Yamazaki was going to rape her?"

Sudou was trembling and holding herself tightly. Based on her behavior, it looked like my speculation was on the mark.

"I mean, it's Yamazaki we're talking about. He was probably shaking you down for hush money, so you decided to take advantage of his greed. 'I can't get you the money now, but I can get you a girl instead.' Something along those lines, right?"

"I… He told me that a man was waiting for me on the roof who could tell me about the murder…"

"Well, of course you didn't know about the give-and-take that you were being made a part of. And after being attacked by Yamazaki, you resisted. And because you don't go to this school, and because it was late at night and hard to see, you probably didn't realize that there wasn't a fence. So you pushed Yamazaki away with all your might, and—"

Splat.

"He ended up falling to his death."

"Ah, ahhhh…"

Sudou collapsed on the spot.

Her obsession with Masato hadn't been the only cause of her poor condition. Even if it hadn't been intentional, the sin of murder still weighed heavy on her. That, combined with the fact that she had to hide it from me, must have put enormous pressure on her.

Akiyama gazed at Sudou's fallen figure, his eyes as cold as if he were looking at trash.

"Akiyama's true objective in calling Sudou to the roof wasn't to have her kill Yamazaki. His plan was to become your ally after you had been raped, then to add you as a partner under the pretext of taking revenge on Yamazaki. Even if he couldn't inspire you to want to kill Yamazaki, he was hoping to at least trick you to the point where he would be able to use you. I can only guess at how he eventually planned on killing Yamazaki, but plenty of methods would have worked. For example, he could have given you a lethal poison to give to Yamazaki but told you it was a sleep medication. He could have told you to shoot Yamazaki with a model gun, only for the gun he provided to be real. Those were just off the top of my head, but you get the idea. The moment he made you his partner, Akiyama's plan would have been basically put into place. He would make you kill Yamazaki while he maintained a firm alibi. That was all he needed. ...And after that, well… Sudou, Akiyama never gave you a way to contact him, did he?"

Still sitting on the ground, Sudou nodded.

"Do you know why? Because it would be a problem for him if it could be proven that you two ever interacted. All he had to do to avoid suspicion from the police was to make them think the two of you hadn't met by the time you were made to kill Yamazaki."

"B-but I myself knew… And if the police caught me, there's no way I'd be able to keep silent…"

"All that means is that he had to kill you before it got to that point. Like, you killed Yamazaki out of hatred for him raping you, but then you couldn't bear the weight of your sins and committed suicide. He probably planned on using some plausible scenario like that."

Sudou's eyes went wide, and she looked at Akiyama.

Akiyama no longer took any notice of her.

"Why is it, I wonder? For some reason, I know exactly how this b.a.s.t.a.r.d thinks. Sudou, why do you think he chose you as an accomplice in the first place? It's because you're the kind of person he wouldn't mind throwing to the wolves… h.e.l.l, he probably thinks that you deserve to die. After all, you were gonna sleep with Masato Yahara the first time you met him. After all, men are creatures who view unchaste women as worthless. That's why so many serial killers go after hookers; they barely feel any guilt. I'm sure that's why Akiyama thought you'd make an excellent 'stepping stone' for him to carry out justice with."

Sudou could no longer bear to even look at Akiyama.

"Your words are all baseless. You've managed to spin quite the tale, especially in the face of the fact that she wasn't even raped."

But his voice sounded like he lacked the will to even bluff.

"Then let's not talk about your plans, and talk about what you actually did instead. After she killed Yamazaki, your biggest concern was that Sudou would turn herself in. After she did, all your crimes would be exposed one after another. You probably wanted to kill her, huh. And to buy time until then, you pretended to lend a sympathetic ear, lied and said you'd help her, and ordered her not to tell anyone else. You wouldn't be able to handle it if any information got out, after all."

I glanced at Sudou's expression to confirm my theory, but she was staring off into s.p.a.ce and no longer responsive.

"But Sudou didn't follow your directions, she came and talked to me before you could kill her. She wanted to know the truth of the incident so badly she couldn't help herself. And you can hardly blame her, after the curse Masato put on her. That's something you needed to realize if you were going to use her. But this is you we're talking about. You're probably under the misimpression that Sudou's idiocy let me figure out the truth. But that's completely wrong. After all, you were the one trying to use her. Your big failure was not realizing that she would come talk to me despite being told to keep quiet. That was your mistake."

Still grinning, I spit out my next words.

"Get it now, you incompetent excuse for a cla.s.s rep?"

"...Me? Incompetent?"

At that provocation, Akiyama's previously controlled expression s.h.i.+fted radically.

Of course. Questioning his ability to carry out his duty would resonate with him more than anything else. His pride was far too high to ever admit to his own failure. To that end, he was even willing to disfigure the truth.

"Impossible. Every choice I made was correct and proper. I could not possibly have blundered. This incompetent girl simply stood in my way and made a mess of everything!"

Unable to contain his rage, Akiyama foolishly acknowledged everything he'd done. A wry laugh escaped my lips.

"Nah, that's not it. You just weren't up to snuff. You're just fundamentally bad at using others. And you're definitely no magus. It's you we're talking about, after all. You seem to think that everyone else lives under the same value system you do. You can only measure with your own scales, so nothing ever goes the way you plan. Come on, man, not everyone lives in the same d.a.m.n world as you."

"You're babbling. There only is one world, is there not? Everyone lives in the same world."

"You see a rabbit pounding mochi when you look at the moon, of course you'd think that. You don't understand a d.a.m.n thing about what people are like behind closed doors. So you can't understand anything about other people. If you want to understand people, you have to start by realizing that you can never really know everything about someone. But you'll probably never really understand that, huh."

In response to my words, Akiyama knit his eyebrows. But before long, he let out a laugh that would put any B movie villain to shame.

"What, did I hurt your feelings or something?"

"Fufu… It seems I was right after all. Your remarks reveal your dogged insistence on manipulating others. You really do like manipulating others into doing your dirty work, don't you? And you riled up all of our campus's freaks for sport. Of course, Masato Yahara was one of them. Depending on how you look at it, perhaps he was a victim too. You were the ringleader behind this whole incident, evil in the flesh. So I suppose you learning the truth of this incident—"

His eyes, glittering with a dull light like the scales of a fresh fish, turned to me.

"—was merely a blessing in disguise."

Ahh, this guy.

He really didn't understand anything.

He didn't even realize that his malice far surpa.s.sed that of anyone else.

"Why are you smiling, Hiiragi? It seems you don't realize the situation you're in."

"You're the one who doesn't know what's going on. Did you really think I just called you up here to tell you that I knew everything?"

"...Are you saying you didn't?"

"I'm not planning on handing you over to the police. I have no intention of being so lenient. To be honest, I don't even give a s.h.i.+t if you're really the killer. I just can't stand you, so I'm going to completely pulverize you. But even though I've already exposed so much, you haven't shown a hint of remorse. You just got all defiant and went back to your little make-believe world. Honestly, I didn't think you were going to be this stupid, you f.u.c.king jacka.s.s."

I pulled out my phone.

"So now you've left me with no choice but to rely on my last resort."

I called a certain number. I had made them promise to come as soon as they received a call from me.

As I put my phone away, I spread my arms and laughed.

"Now then, let's see how much filthy pus you've got built up in there."

Footsteps rang out from the stairs, and the door to the roof swung open.

"Kusukusu… kusukusukusu…"

The girl seemed unable to contain her peculiar laugh, which sounded like it was coming from a gap in her teeth, in antic.i.p.ation of what we were about to do.

"Hiiragi, I'm here!"

Her bangs were cut diagonally, and her hair was braided in the back. Her childlike face and short stature contrasted with her large bust, she was a deeply immoral-looking high schooler.

Twisting even her malice into innocence, her unsullied mind was that of a saintly fool.

An "apparatus" I had been keeping in reserve.

Her rainbow-colored eyes looked like a drainage ditch filled with salad oil, and as she turned them to Akiyama she raised her voice in disappointment.

"...Ehh… Like, there's a sorta boring guy here… Hiiragi, you said there'd be something interesting up here, but this guy's just a common old dull red."

Confused, Akiyama was clearly panicking.

Up until now, Akiyama had always planned on retaking the initiative. No matter how close I got to the truth, all he thought he had to do was eventually kill me.

But in spite of how dense he was, he realized. That now that Ririko Matsumi, who had the power to destroy everything, was here, the situation had changed. That now, the place he was standing was no longer his stage.

There was no way someone like him knew of an easy way to control this twisted world, which was like a candy sculpture halfway through production.

"At this rate, Akiyama, if I just shove the truth in front of you, you'd just pervert it to suit your own self-righteousness and escape the violence I'm trying to cause you. If I want to crush you, I first have to teach you how to be afraid, or I'm not going to get anywhere. ....Matsumi-senpai."

"Aye aye!"

Glaring at Shuuichi Akiyama, I spit out my next words.

"Scan s.h.i.+ho Sudou."

Still sitting in shock, Sudou raised her head in surprise. She probably hadn't expected to be thrust into the spotlight again. But it couldn't be helped. She was clearly a member of the supporting cast here.

And now, she would taking the starring role.

"Sorry, s.h.i.+ho Sudou."

I wasn't even looking at the uninteresting girl.

"This was the real reason I brought you here. Just like how there needs to be a scene where someone dies at the beginning of any killing game novel, there needed to be a tutorial for Akiyama here."

So for the sake of the story, I need you to fall into despair.

"So I just have to scan that girl over there? Okey dokey—"

In her innocence, Matsumi-senpai hadn't picked up on any of my malice. I simply tripped her kindness and regressed her from a human to a machine.

"Beep bibibi, beep beep bibibibibi."

Her eyes went out of focus. But she was definitely perceiving s.h.i.+ho Sudou's core.

"What? What's going on?"

Anyone watching would no doubt be confused. Even if you didn't know exactly what she was doing, it was clear that it was nothing good. Even if you couldn't tell what was inside the jack-in-the-box, it definitely wasn't going to be anything pleasant.

"Beep bibibi, beep beep bibibibibi. ⸻Scanning complete."

"Good work, Senpai. Now, would you mind verbalizing it for us?"

"Sure!"

Sudou trembled in fear at Ririko Matsumi's eccentricity. She had been used by Akiyama, made to bear his sins, and now I was going to crush her. What a pitiable girl she was.

I felt guilty.

—Rattle, rattle. Rattle, rattle.

But those feelings of guilt were drowned out by the auditory hallucinations.

"s.h.i.+HO SUDOU, age sixteen."

Would she have known that name, even if I hadn't told her? I only half-knew how her scanning even worked.

"A second-year at the private Sakisei Academy. Lives with her birth mother, her stepfather, and her older stepbrother. Her house has four bedrooms. Her room, which is on the second floor, is so messy that there's nowhere to stand. Her father is a civil servant, her mother is a housewife, and their family finances are stable. Her clingy nature makes her disastrously bad at reading the mood, and she doesn't have many friends. Her few friends often betray her. She does not currently have a boyfriend, but she has slept with two men."

"Huh? What? What's going on…?"

Sudou still didn't understand what had just been begun. Judging from her pale lips, all she understood was that it was something terrifying.

"Presuming that she is involved, she is thoroughly obsessed with Masato Yahara's incident. She killed Ryuusuke Yamazaki by pus.h.i.+ng him off this roof. She has tried to kill herself twice before. However, not even her parents showed her any sympathy. She is lonely. She is lonely. She has a strong inferiority complex in regards to her looks and academic ability."

The things she tried to hide, the things she needed to hide, were being exposed in front of all of us.

No longer able to even speak, Sudou's eyes were bugging out at Matsumi-senpai as though she were looking at the Devil.

"She has both been bullied and bullied others. She strongly desires power. She fears the strong, yet is jealous of them, and she finds the weak rea.s.suring, yet despises them. She lacks willpower. She is bad at forming habits. She is not a morning person. She dislikes using stamps on LINE. She enjoys spending time on p.o.r.nographic websites."

People, surprisingly, don't know themselves particularly well. So when a fortuneteller or a swindler makes surprising inferences from just their personality, they believe in the illusion that their true nature had been probed into.

But what Ririko Matsumi does is expose them objectively.

Everyone wants to believe that they're special. They want to possess some sort of unique ident.i.ty. Some would even go so far as to say that not being special is the same as being worthless.

But although this may seem obvious, the vast majority of people aren't anything even approaching special. And whether they are or not, they're too small to ever change the world. One person can't save the world, nor can they destroy it.

And s.h.i.+ho Sudou was no exception. What became eminently clear when her true nature was exposed like this was that she was the kind of common, ordinary person that you could find anywhere. The reality of it was that she was inferior, not superior.

            She had been trying to avoid looking straight at that reality despite becoming gradually aware of it, but now it had been firmly thrust upon her.

"She has been coerced a number of times by her NEET brother to have physical relations. Although she despises him, she relishes the feeling of being desired. Her father also views her in a s.e.xual light. She is aware that her mother is jealous of her as a woman. As a result, she doesn't feel like her home is somewhere she belongs. She hates her home. She doesn't feel like her school is somewhere she belongs. She hates her school. She doesn't feel like society is somewhere she belongs. She hates the world for being unkind to her. She wishes it were kinder to her. She wishes she were held more dearly. But she doesn't care. She doesn't care what happens to her. But she doesn't want to be ignored. She wants to be saved. She wants to be saved—"

"Stop it! Stop it already! Stop, stop, stop!"

Wailing, Sudou tried to lunge at Matsumi-senpai. But I had antic.i.p.ated that, and stopped her by holding her down. She soon stopped resisting and, drained of strength, collapsed on the spot.

Without moving, Sudou began crying like an animal.

The exposed viscera inside her was unsurprisingly grotesque. That was all there was to it, but that alone was as intense as could be.

"Wah. Why are you crying? Now I feel all sorry…"

Ririko Matsumi had no idea how cruel a thing it was to expose somebody to the world. And she could hardly be blamed for that; to her, being able to see everything was the only condition she knew.

Looking down on the sobbing s.h.i.+ho Sudou, I felt like I understood why she had been to fixed on on Masato's incident.

s.h.i.+ho Sudou was full of openings. And she didn't much care what she filled those holes with. She just needed something that let her believe that her existence was important.

So she embroiled herself in a murder investigation, thinking that perhaps she could play a key role. It was a tragedy, but ironically therein lie the meaning that she had been seeking. By pursuing the truth behind the incident, she could escape from the idleness she felt plaguing her life.

It was no secret that she was full of openings. And regrettably, everyone around her took advantage of them. Her family did, her cla.s.smates did, Masato Yahara did, Shuuichi Akiyama did, and I did. Without someone to protect them, a person with such openings had no choice but to used by others.

—Someone to protect them.

—A person filled with openings.

It was an a.s.sessment I had heard somewhere before.

But I wasn't going to think too deeply about it.

In any case, s.h.i.+ho Sudou wouldn't be able to go back to normal after having her heart rudely trampled all over like that. Once a person has their existence put into words and forced upon them, they can no longer flee from their sins. She would probably end up turning herself in, after which the inquisitive eyes of both the media and the world would see her as a murderer and violate her by digging up her past and family circ.u.mstances. I didn't know if she'd be able to recover from that or not.

s.h.i.+ho Sudou's end was here.

"My condolences."

I put my hands together perfunctorily.

"Now then, what's become of you?"

I turned to face Akiyama. Just as I expected, his face had gone pale and he was trembling in fear.

He must have known instinctive what would happen if his insides got exposed.

"...Your actions cannot help but confirm it. The one who induced Yahara to try to kill me was you — Kouta Hiiragi."

I heaved a sigh in exasperation at his inane comment.

"Are you still going on about that? In the first place, aren't you the one who killed Masato?"

"The fact that he tried to kill me is beyond a doubt the truth."

So in other words, the reason he ended up killing Masato was because Masato tried to kill him first and he fought back?

...That makes sense. The last piece of the puzzle slid into place.

 "Okay, I get it now. What's manipulating you — no, what's manipulating all of us, what's controlling us, isn't me. I don't have that kind of power."

"What…?"

"The thing that led us all to this point is Masato."

Akiyama's eyes widened.

"In a way, we're victims of the bomb he set off. I got dyed in him, and you got destroyed by him."

"...You say I was destroyed?"

"Wouldja just f.u.c.king notice it already? You're pretty far off-sync with your ideal self. Off-sync with your sensible, exemplary self. Think about it. You've been going around killing people you see as evil. Is that really in line with your ideals? Is a barbaric ideology like that really your idea of justice?"

His eyes still wide, Akiyama didn't say a word.

All he had to do was self-reflect for an instant and he'd know the answer.

There was no way that's what his ideals looked like.

"That what was it that made you like this? Did you really think that killing me and Yamazaki was the right thing to do? Whose idea was that?"

That's right, Shuuichi, remember.

I don't even need to invoke his name. Those feelings that you're fleeing from were your true feelings all along.

Now then — tremble in fear.

"Matsumi-senpai. Scan Shuuichi Akiyama for me, would you?"

And fall into despair.

"You got it!"

Ririko Matsumi was an insane, deadly weapon. It was the Devil's own magic, and it could thoroughly drive Akiyama into a corner.

"Beep bibi, beep bibibi…"

"...Stop it…"

"Beep bibibi, beep bibibi…"

"STOP ITTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT!"

In a fit of madness, Akiyama lunged at Matsumi-senpai.

"Kyah!"

Returning to her senses, Matsumi-senpai gave out a shriek. Akiyama was leaning over her collapsed figure with his fists raised. Her unseemly shriek was only natural.

I drew near Akiyama. Taking no heed of me, Akiyama was about to continue hitting Matsumi-senpai — continue hitting the truth that was about to be revealed, but he stopped when he noticed what I was pressing against him.

"Kouta, Hiiragi… You're…"

I was pressing a fruit knife against the nape of his neck.

"...You understand, right? I'm dead serious. If you keep getting violent like this, you're going to find your neck short a few arteries."

Although a moment ago she had been being punched and looked as though she was about to cry, the fear vanished from Matsumi-senpai's face in an instant and was replaced with surprised glee.

"Huh? What's going on, what's going on?"

Her cheeks lit up in excitement.

"Tanihara's supposed to be dead, so why are you him?"

—Rattle, rattle. Rattle, rattle.

The blade still flush with his nape, Akiyama peered into my eyes.

"You're not Kouta Hiiragi… Masato Yahara…? No, that's ridiculous… But now that I think back, everything you've done and said has been just like him. You're even putting a knife to me the same way he did."

"Well, that's 'cause I am Masato Yahara."

"...Are you saying that you're acting as his proxy?"

"Oh, it's nothing so half-a.s.sed as that. All I have to do is ask, and Kou'll give over his body in a heartbeat. I am Masato Yahara himself."

"Why would you do something like that!?"

"For revenge, of course."

—Rattle, rattle. Rattle, rattle.

"That's why I didn't care about exposing your crimes. My true objective, well that's—"

"—to trample over Shuuichi Akiyama's body and spirit, then kill him."

Akiyama was silent. He knew very well the danger he was in.

After all, we had both had our moral foundations destroyed by Masato Yahara.

"If I have her scan you, it'll definitely destroy your spirit, but that won't even be necessary. Just explaining how messed up in the head you are will be plenty."

I in close to his ear and whispered.

"You're an honors student, and you believe that everything you do is just. That in and of itself proves that your self-a.s.sessment is soft. You spend so much time preparing escape routes for yourself, arming yourself with ideological arguments. Even when you committed the grave sin of murder, you couldn't bear not justifying it. Even though you normally would have thought it insane, you had to build up a desire to kill us."

"...Stop it...Not another word…"

I had no intention of stopping.

"After you killed me, you had no choice but to rationalize murder."

I spat out the phrase that would finalize his destruction.

"You never really wanted to kill me."

"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"

—Rattle, rattle. Rattle, rattle. Rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle.

G.o.d, it's obnoxious.

This guy's chains really are louder than anyone else's.

The knife was in my hand. Akiyama could no longer resist. There was no reason to hesitate. One push, and my revenge would be complete. There wasn't a single reason to waver. There wasn't a single thing that could stop me. All I had to do was slash a shattered man with a knife. It was as simple as that.

I put my strength into the hand holding the knife.

I just needed to give in to my desire to kill.

And I could finally escape from this "nil," this feeling that I was in a ma.s.s-produced shopping mall!

"Noooooooo!"

I could hear footsteps running towards me, along with a voice I recognized.

But compared to the voice—

—Rattle, rattle. Rattle, rattle. Rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle.

The sound of chains was far louder.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kei_car https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aokigahara