6: Even fairies feel lonely when they’re away from their spring by themselves
6
Even fairies feel lonely when they’re away from their spring by themselves
On Friday, I joined rehearsal for the first time in three days.
Something felt off.
It’s hard for me to pin down what it was. The mood of the rehearsal itself, and everyone’s behavior… It was like they were gradually slipping out of place.
But the strangest thing there was how Kikuchi-san was acting.
It wasn’t that she was depressed or unable to communicate with the cast. Far from it—she was giving it her all.
She was interacting with our classmates more than ever before, talking to them despite her awkwardness, making sure to stay engaged and open.
I’m sure she was doing it so I’d be able to practice the comedy skit with Mimimi, and so she could become more like her “ideal.” I knew she was trying hard.
But something about it seemed wrong.
“…Hey, Mizusawa?”
“Yeah?”
I asked him what rehearsals had been like for the past three days, and he told me.
“Well, Kikuchi-san has been making a huge effort to talk to everyone.”
“She has?”
He nodded. “You know how you were directing the other day? It’s like she’s been trying to copy that.”
“…Uh-huh.”
“Okay, I feel bad saying this, but she’s not exactly used to this stuff, right?”
“Yeah…I guess not.”
Of course, that was probably the exact reason she wanted to change.
“It’s like we’re running around in circles. The group is kinda falling apart. And Aoi hasn’t been able to come recently, either.”
“Oh…”
“But if I jump in, I might hurt Kikuchi-san’s feelings, right? I don’t wanna just kick her aside when she’s trying so hard, so I’ve been hanging back and trying to support her where I can. Plus, I’ve got a main role, so I’ve gotta be in the rehearsal myself.”
“…Yeah. Thanks.”
“Ha-ha-ha. Why are you thanking me? Are you her dad or something?” Mizusawa laughed.
But now I had a handle on what was happening. Kikuchi-san had been attempting to cheerfully direct the rehearsals and bring everyone together.
I wanted to stand by her effort—but that still didn’t alleviate that strange feeling I had.
Was it coming from the fact that Kikuchi-san was acting so different from usual? Or…
“Um…”
Suddenly, Kikuchi-san walked over to us.
“What’s up?” Mizusawa replied, a bit too easygoing and friendly for my taste.
Hey, that’s what I was gonna say. Could you dial it back a little, buddy? Well, as long as it’s not Tachibana, I guess.
Kikuchi-san bowed politely to Mizusawa, then looked to me, seemingly unsure what to say. Did she want to talk to me about something?
“Anyway, talk to you later,” Mizusawa said abruptly, then walked over to a group of guys standing toward the front of the classroom. He must have guessed something was up.
Kikuchi-san looked up at me again. “I’ve been…trying my best these past few days.”
“…Yeah?”
There was something a little frazzled in her eyes. “…Do you think I’ve changed a little?”
I didn’t know what to say—but she was pursuing her own “ideal,” as she’d put it.
Her expression was completely innocent, her eyes focused ahead. She didn’t seem to be lying to herself.
In which case…I decided to agree with her. “Yeah. Just by doing it…I think you’ve changed.”
“Have I? Really? …I’m glad then.”
Her happy reaction comforted me slightly, although she still seemed drained.
Still, she was determined to keep moving forward.
* * *
It was the following Monday morning—five days until the school festival.
“Tomozaki-kun?”
Lately, Kikuchi-san had been coming to talk to me before morning homeroom fairly regularly.
“Morning.”
“Good morning.”
First, our greeting.
When I saw what was in her hand, I could guess what she wanted to talk about.
Without missing a beat, I asked her about it. “Did you…finish it?”
She nodded happily. “Yes. It took me longer than I’d hoped…but the script is done.”
“Awesome!” I blurted out.
She’d been so unsure about the conclusion, and now it was finally finished. The journey to this moment felt long and short at the same time, but right now, I only wanted to read the ending.
I just like Kikuchi-san’s stories, y’know?
“Can I read it?”
She smiled kindly and handed me the paper bag.
“Yes…of course you can!”
I used the breaks between classes and lunchtime that day to read the script.
After a while, I started feeling strange.
The story was moving in a different direction than I’d expected.
Libra and Kris have just taken their flight on the dragon.
After seeing the beauty and breadth of the world from the sky, Kris desperately wants to venture out.
Sensing her desire, Libra invites her to leave the castle. Now that the dragon can fly, they no longer needed to worry about impurities. No one had ever heard of a dragon learning to fly and then losing that ability. Libra thinks he can use his lockpicking skills to get out of the castle with Kris and explore.
Presented with exactly the offer she’d wished for, Kris readily agrees. Her heart leaps at the thought of being inside those beautiful scenes she’d seen from dragonback.
But once she’s outside, she finds that the scene before her is not at all what she’d imagined.
“Libra? Why is that child dressed so poorly for the cold?”
“Um…I can’t say it out loud. Come closer.”
“Huh?”
“…She’s poor.”
“Oh…”
“This world is still very unequal. Some people live happily…but not everyone.”
“Oh…I see.”
“Reality isn’t always as pretty as a fairy tale… The world is full of all kinds of stories.”
“…I understand.”
Fairy tales and secret gardens were the only things that Kris knew.
And that incident isn’t Kris’s only baptism by fire that day. As she walks around the town with Libra, they move away from the castle, through the residential neighborhoods, and into the market district, where it’s a chaotic mass of people, people, people.
“Ouch!”
“Whaddaya doin’, sweetheart? Watch where you’re goin’!”
“Oh, um…I’m sorry.”
“Where’s yer manners? Say ‘yessir’!”
“Y-yessir…”
People berate her as she tries to walk down the street, which is about all she can manage.
In a sense, this is another unfamiliar scene for the sheltered girl.
“K-Kris, are you okay?”
“Y-yeah, uh, I mean, yessir.”
“Ha-ha-ha. Kris, ‘yeah’ is fine.”
“Oh, it is? Uh…okay…I guess.”
“…Kris?”
The rest of the day is full of new experiences for her.
At the produce stand in the market district, she makes the owner mad because she doesn’t know how to shop.
When Libra bumps into a friend and the friend tries to talk to her, she can’t find the words to answer the stranger.
At the end of a long day of walking, she twists her ankle as they head home, and Libra has to carry her on his back all the way to the castle.
Needless to say, sneaking back in unnoticed is impossible, and the guards catch them. Afterward, they get a long lecture from the castle staff.
As Kris watches Libra apologize to the minister, she thinks about what happened.
He opened the garden door and took her outside, for her. He came to her rescue when people yelled at her and when she fell down.
Now she’d gone and caused him even more trouble.
She hates her own weakness—but finally, she realizes something.
That garden she’s spent her life in, that place where she was locked away, where she’d dreamed of escaping.
As long as she stays there, she gets clean clothes, delicious food, and regular visits from her dear friends. And she doesn’t even have to lift a finger.
Maybe that garden is the most convenient place for her to be.
“Libra? I think…I’ve kind of been getting a free ride, haven’t I?”
“What do you mean?”
“I haven’t had to work at all to have a good life…and I’ve stayed here, cut off from everything. This garden is so big, but it’s so small.”
“…I don’t think that’s true.”
“No, I realized something.”
“You did?”
“When you look at the outside world from far away, it’s as beautiful as magic fireworks…but if you really want to be part of it, you’ve got to work hard.”
“…Kris.”
“Libra, I’m going to try.”
From that day on, she slowly begins to change.
She tells herself she has to be the one to break through the life of ease she’s lived so far.
Slowly, she learns the wisdom of the outside world, studies various skills, and waits for an opportunity. She changes her way of thinking, learning things she couldn’t do before, and gains confidence.
Sometimes, with advice from Libra and Alucia, she gradually acquires the skills she needs to live outside.
Then one day, she disappears from the castle without a word to either of them. Maybe she didn’t want to cause them more trouble. No one at the castle expected this, but from the perspective of the state, she had finished raising the dragon and had nothing more to offer. She probably would have been given the same task when the chance arose to raise another flying dragon, but no such plan exists yet. No elaborate search party is sent out, and her escape is implicitly accepted.
She heads for town. Using all the knowledge and skills she’s gained, with plenty of mistakes along the way, she tries to forge ahead independently in the world.
Several weeks pass, and she finds an opportunity in the market district. The owner of the produce stand, who scolded her before, now accepts her as an apprentice.
She sends word to Libra and Alucia and receives their congratulations on the start of her new life.
Her hard work pays off as she begins to save money from her job, having found a way to live independently—and that’s where the story stops.
I finished reading the script, bewildered.
“Hmm…”
So that’s what happened, I thought. The story undercut my expectations in a realistic way, like a dark Andi story.
But after I was finished, I didn’t feel satisfied at all.
It was similar to how I felt as I watched Kikuchi-san try to force herself to blend in with everyone—sad and lonely. As if everything Kris had built in her life had been for nothing.
* * *
During break before we switched classrooms, I went to the library and asked her about it straight-out.
“Kikuchi-san?”
“Oh…Tomozaki-kun.”
She turned toward me nervously. She probably guessed what I wanted to talk about.
“I read it.”
“Oh, thank you so much.”
She bowed her head, then took up a listening posture, silently preparing herself for my comments.
“Um…I wanted to ask you something.”
“Y-yes?”
I asked her point-blank. “Why did Kris…end up like that?” I realized how sad that came out, so I tried to cover it up by smiling. “Um, it just bothered me a little,” I added.
She regarded me solemnly. “…What do you mean, ‘end up like that’?” Her eyes swam. Was she surprised, or sad, or uncertain? Anxious, definitely.
“Kris left the garden and her two friends…and went to live alone in town, right?”
“Yes…”
“I know you must have put a lot of thought into it…but when I read that part, it made me kinda sad.”
She listened in silence.
“Like her whole life in the garden was almost being erased…and that’s why I wanted to ask you why.”
She was quiet for a moment, organizing her thoughts. “Well…” Finally, she answered, an earnest expression on her face. “One of my favorite Andi books…is Poppol and Raptor Island.”
“Poppol… Oh yeah, I know the title.”
The first time I talked to Kikuchi-san in the library, when we had the misunderstanding about Andi’s books that ended up creating a connection, I remember her saying, “It’s just like Poppol and Raptor Island, isn’t it?!”
I hadn’t read that book since most bookstores didn’t even have it, but I knew it was important to Kikuchi-san.
“It’s a very positive story.” She started outlining the plot for me. “Poppol is a different kind of creature from everyone else, but he doesn’t know what exactly he is…”
He was blind and a foundling. That was why he didn’t know what he was. After his parents were killed, he was all alone in the world. That was when he left on a solo journey in search of companions.
“At first, all the other creatures fear him—they say he’s strange and grotesque. But with the power of language, he can gradually create relationships. Over time, he makes friends.”
Having created a cross-species band of companions, he set out to see the ocean.
“Hmm… Sounds like an Andi story.”
With its blend of fantasy, loneliness, and warmth, it did strike me as classic Andi.
“When I read it—and for a long time afterward, really—I thought Poppol represented an ideal for the world.”
“An ideal?”
She’d used that same word when she told me about her decision to change herself.
“He doesn’t even know what kind of creature he is…but he makes friends with all kinds of other species. He uses the simple power of language and a little effort to overcome those boundaries.”
“…Uh-huh.” I was slowly starting to understand Kikuchi-san’s point.
“It’s kind of like you two…”
“You mean…?”
“Yes. You and Hanabi-chan.”
He doesn’t fit in with everyone else but uses the power of language and effort to overcome boundaries and make friends.
That definitely did sound similar to Tama-chan, who Kikuchi-san had described as “ideal” several times, and to my own path, too.
“Plus,” Kikuchi-san continued, “readers don’t know what kind of creature Poppol is until the very end.”
“Really?”
They know he’s strange and feared, but they don’t know exactly what he is even though he’s the main character, which makes for a fairly unusual story.
“Yes. That’s why I think Poppol represents the ideal for that world. His species isn’t revealed—but the other side of that is he’s able to become friends with everyone no matter what they are—don’t you agree?”
“Ah…I get what you’re saying.”
Her perspective was surprisingly convincing.
The species of the main character is concealed, and he’s only described as abnormal. That makes him a wild card—anyone could be him—and that’s probably why the messages he leaves with the readers last so long. Including the one that you can make friends with anyone with language and a little work.
“That’s why I like Poppol so much, and why I think he represents an example to follow in the story and in the world…and why I felt I had to become like Poppol myself. But then I gave up. I didn’t think it was possible for me.”
“…Uh-huh.”
She smiled at me. “But then I saw you and Hanabi-chan. You were both so brilliant, such ideal people…and I thought maybe I could become like you.”
“That’s why you decided to go for your ideal?”
She nodded. “I feel like this is my chance to become a Poppol.” Her eyes were full of both determination and anxiety.
The story was important to her, and she saw in it what she wanted to be. She’d thought she couldn’t achieve that, but then she saw two members of her own “species” who’d worked and overcome the obstacles.
Essentially, she saw the shadow of Poppol in the changes Tama-chan and I went through.
That’s why she wanted to change, too—she wanted to seize her chance.
“And Kris is the same. Like Poppol, she changes herself to fit in. After all, that’s how we should be.”
“…Huh.” I thought about it.
Kris’s character had a powerful link to Kikuchi-san herself.
“I was struggling with who would end up in a relationship with Libra. But in reality, the story is about how Kris wants to live her life.”
“Yeah… I get you.”
Kikuchi-san’s words gave me a glimpse into the thoughts and experiences she’d had in the past, but I still only had a superficial understanding of them. I wasn’t in any position to give my random opinions. As always, she spoke quietly but convincingly, leaving no room for counterattack.
That’s why I felt like my only choice was to back her up as she worked toward her goal.
“…But listen…” I took one step, or maybe half a step, into the topic. “What if that was just…a pause in the new section of the play?”
“…A pause?”
I didn’t intend to block the path she’d chosen, not at all. I wanted to help her follow it, like I was helping her with the script.
But all the same, the ending didn’t sit right with me.
“Just give yourself a little time to think about it. If you decide it has to be this way, that’s fine. I know we hardly have any time left…but I just feel like it’s too sad.”
She pondered that for a moment. “…All right, I will,” she replied earnestly.
I wasn’t sure what she was thinking at that moment, but I did know that I would have regretted keeping that thought to myself.
* * *
After school that day, Kikuchi-san was once again leading the rehearsal.
Like the week before, she was trying her best to be actively involved with the cast and as cheerful as possible.
Hinami was there for a change, so the focus was on doing a run-through without understudies. When that ended, everyone asked Kikuchi-san what she thought and talked about anything that came up.
She was in a fairly important and mentally demanding position, but she was getting better at communicating with everyone. Maybe she was settling into the role.
I didn’t know what goals she’d set for herself or what work she was putting in, but she’d already changed so much that she’d met one of my own very first goals: other people noticing her growth.
“Kikuchi, so about this line…,” Erika Konno said, giving her opinion.
“That’s a great idea! Let’s do that.” When Kikuchi-san answered, her voice was slightly higher than usual and very approachable. Just seeing these two talking to each other was totally weird, but Kikuchi-san was on such a different wavelength that you could practically call this an alternate universe.
Incidentally, the change that Konno proposed had to do with making a relatively formal line a bit more conversational. I could tell she was only asking so that it would be easier for her to say, but surprisingly, the change actually did make the line sound better. Guess that’s the power of girls like her.
By and large, Kikuchi-san and Hinami were guiding the flow of the conversation.
“Okay. I’ll check with Kikuchi-san, so why doesn’t everyone else get started on rehearsing the rest?” Hinami’s instructions to the group were unpretentious and efficient.
Maybe because Kikuchi-san was here with this “ideal” (in a sense) school heroine, she seemed to be copying Hinami’s approach more than a little.
“That sounds good! Please get started, everyone!”
But the truth was, Kikuchi-san somehow seemed to be running in circles.
I couldn’t help wondering if her whole plan to change was a good idea in the first place.
“…Shit’s getting weird, huh?”
“Geez!”
I jumped at the cool voice next to my ear. When I turned around, there was Mizusawa. He was leaning against the wall right next to me, aloofly surveying the classroom.
“Ha-ha-ha. A little jumpy, are we?”
“Don’t sneak up on me like that!”
This guy’s movements are so natural, he’s always right in my face before I even notice he’s there. Is that how you approach girls, too, Mizusawa?
He laughed off my complaint, then focused back on Kikuchi-san. Only his mouth was smiling now.
“So what happened?”
“…With Kikuchi-san?”
He seemed impressed and glanced my way. “You’re getting pretty good with nonverbal cues, Fumiya.”
“Huh?” I said.
Mizusawa kept observing me with the same expression. “I mean, I didn’t say who I was talking about right now, but you noticed I was looking at her. You didn’t start paying attention until really recently.”
“Oh…”
He could be right. I feel like I do the same thing when I’m with Kikuchi-san and Mimimi, too. Another sign of growth?
“Anyway, back to Kikuchi-san,” he said, smoothly returning to the point.
“Oh right.”
“Why’s she acting like that?” He turned his attention to her again, and I did the same.
Only I knew the truth behind her recent changes, but I wasn’t sure how much I should tell him. I decided to start with something vague.
“Apparently, she’s been thinking about some things.”
“Hmm. ‘Some things,’ huh?”
His voice was flat, but he was casually probing. Wish he’d stop that, because I could see myself accidentally telling him what he wanted. I thought for a minute and eventually decided that as long as I kept it abstract and didn’t give away the specifics of her thought process, I should be okay. After all, this was Mizusawa, not Tachibana.
“…She felt like she had to match an ideal.”
“An ideal?” he pressed.
“So she fits in better and makes more friends. And that’ll bring her more in line with an ideal for the world…”
I sidestepped any concrete details.
Mizusawa pursed his lips disinterestedly. “The world’s ideals, huh…” He laced his fingers behind his head. “Well, if that’s what she says, then who am I to object? Still…”
He brought his hands down and slapped them on his thighs. He was watching Kikuchi-san with a vaguely jaded expression, seemingly unconvinced by my explanation.
“…What do you think about it all, Mizusawa?” Something was clearly bothering him, so I might as well ask.
He answered calmly. “Oh, I think it’s a good thing. It takes a lot to make up your mind to change and then to actually do it. Not everyone can pull that off.”
“Yeah…”
I knew that much from experience. If you’re already content where you are, it’s really hard to throw it away and set out toward something new. But Mizusawa’s comment was somewhat detached. “And on top of that, she’s doing it to become an ideal person? All the more impressive,” he said flatly.
I didn’t get his point. “What’s so impressive about shooting for an ideal?”
He raised his eyebrows, apparently surprised I didn’t get it.
When he answered, he sounded like he was stating the obvious.
“I mean, what she’s doing—is the opposite of you, right?”
He was trying to illuminate whatever I was missing, but I was still not following.
After all, Kikuchi-san had combined her observations of the changes in me and Tama-chan with the “ideal” she’d sensed in Poppol, and she was trying to change herself in the same way.
I could understand if he’d said she was doing the same thing as me—but the opposite?
“Um, in terms of the direction she’s going in, I feel like it’s actually the same,” I said.
Mizusawa frowned. “Huh? What are you talking about?”
“What are you talking about? It’s obvious, isn’t it? She’s putting in the effort to change so she fits in better…just like Tama-chan and I did.”
Once I’d gotten that specific, Mizusawa finally got it. “Oh, that’s what you mean! Ah, okay. So that’s how it looks to you!”
“Wh-what’s that supposed to mean?”
“Everything makes sense now!”
“Wh-what does?”
He was obviously stringing me along, but I had to take the bait. I hated myself for doing it, but I needed him to enlighten me.
Maybe because he wasn’t sure how to explain his point, he stared at the floor for a minute before answering:
“You know, when we went on the overnight…do you remember the conversation I had with Aoi?”
Suddenly, he pierced me with a serious look. The way he switched between fastballs and slow pitches always caught me off guard.
“Of course I remember.” Yeah, that conversation—about masks and reality, performances and true feelings.
A player’s perspective versus a character’s perspective.
The two of them lived in a world of masks, and Mizusawa wanted to take his off. But Hinami wouldn’t even admit that she had one on; she maintained her stance as a player manipulating the character “Aoi Hinami” until the end.
Overhearing that conversation had confirmed my discomfort with her approach, and afterward, I found my own hybrid playstyle that combined her skills with my goals.
But how was that related to Kikuchi-san?
“I mean, think about what Kikuchi-san said.”
Mizusawa stuck his pointer finger in the air. “She wants the world’s ideals.”
“Oh…”
“Not her own. Right?”
I was starting to get his point now.
He pushed me toward understanding the rest of it with his next casual comment.
“Essentially, when you changed, it was because you were heading toward what you wanted. You saw your ideals from a place rooted on the ground. But she’s heading toward how the world says she should be. She sees her ideals from a bird’s-eye view, right?”
The character’s perspective and the player’s perspective—ground-level and bird’s-eye.
The pieces were slowly falling into place in my mind.
At the root, we were talking about motivation.
I’d become Hinami’s student and had transformed to enjoy the game of life.
Tama-chan had learned to fight from me and made her transformation in order to prevent Mimimi from being sad.
So what was driving Kikuchi-san?
A desire to get closer to the world’s ideal.
Essentially, she wasn’t motivated by what she wanted to be from a subjective, character’s perspective; she was motivated by what she thought she should be from a bird’s-eye-view, player’s perspective.
That hazy, off feeling I’d been getting? This was it.
“…Oh, so that’s what’s going on!” I blurted out excitedly.
Mizusawa smiled wryly. “Ha-ha-ha. It’s not really worth getting that worked up over, is it?”
Maybe not for him, but for me, this was a revelation. “Actually, I think this is really big. Thanks.”
Mizusawa nodded sincerely, then laughed a little regretfully. “But I guess you wouldn’t realize it on your own, would you?”
“Huh?”
His words didn’t seem to match his expression.
“I mean, you take your perspective for granted, don’t you?”
“My perspective—? Oh.” I didn’t even have to finish the question.
That conversation he and Hinami had on that trip.
Mizusawa was struggling to free himself from a player’s perspective, one where he was “not really playing” but instead just “going through the motions” and watching himself “from a distance.” What he wanted was a character’s perspective.
In other words, he had a kind of complex about the perspective he was trapped in—and that was why he put so much value on who had which worldview. He couldn’t help paying attention to it, even if he didn’t want to.
That’s why he’d sussed out Kikuchi-san so quickly.
Meanwhile, I took my character’s perspective for granted, which meant I wasn’t paying as much attention. As a result, I hadn’t noticed the problem with Kikuchi-san’s approach.
You could even say that for Mizusawa, who had trouble adopting the character’s perspective, my own viewpoint was a sort of model.
As I waffled over how to put all that into words, he chuckled good-naturedly at me. “Yeah. I’m one of those people who wants to come over to your side.”
In a sense, he was revealing a weakness, but his smile was bold and full of confidence. I think that’s the kind of thing that shows his real strength.
A different kind of strength than Hinami’s.
“…Huh, yeah,” I agreed, as sincerely as possible.
“Ha-ha-ha. Glad you’re following.”
This time, his smile was pure confidence, zero weakness, like he was making sure I knew that he was still strong in his own way. Impressive, right?
* * *
“…You’re right.”
Rehearsal was over, and I was in the cafeteria with Kikuchi-san. When I told her what I’d realized after talking to Mizusawa, she accepted it quickly.
The player’s perspective and the character’s perspective.
In a sense—she was the same as Hinami.
“I do think I see the world from what you’d call a ‘player’s perspective.’”
“Huh…” But now I didn’t know what to do next.
Should I encourage her to leave that perspective behind? Or should I respect her own choice?
As nanashi, I’d always thought it was best to play games from the character’s perspective. I’d been very successful and, most importantly, had more fun.
But did the same apply to everyone else? Was this just my own playstyle? I didn’t know.
As I ran around and around in circles, Kikuchi-san dropped her own words into the vacuum to give me an answer.
“When I heard you explain, I thought…”
“Yeah?” I asked, switching to listening mode.
“…unlike you, I see the world…from an author’s perspective.”
“An author…? Like, of a play or a novel?”
She shook her head slowly. “Well, like that, too…but more like I’m writing the story of our world.”
“A story of our world?”
She nodded. “I’ve been like that for a long time. I don’t ask myself what I want to do; I ask which action will make the world more beautiful and bring it closer to how it ought to be. What is the ideal form? I’ve always thought like an author. It really is like…life is a novel to me.”
Her whole worldview was summed up in those words.
Up till now, I really did think she’d seen life from that perspective.
Even when she wasn’t involved in class events, she observed them more serenely than anyone else, thought about what should be done, and expressed her thoughts clearly. She was far more objective than me, and her way of thinking about the “ideal” for any given situation had saved me multiple times. Her writer’s eye was probably the reason.
“And I think I’m fine just like this.”
“With a player’s perspective?”
She smiled gently and shook her head. “Those are your words.”
Stroking the cover of an Andi book lying on the table, she continued:
“In the world of games, the opposite of a character might be a player. But in the world of novels, I think the opposite of a character is an author.”
She smiled again and placed her palm on her chest.
“I’m satisfied like this. I want an author’s perspective forever.”
Her words flowed into my ears like water, washing away my doubts.
“…Oh, okay.”
I finally understood.
It wasn’t even our playstyles that were different—after all, that was based on games.
What was different was the premise beneath that premise.
I was playing the game of life as a player.
Kikuchi-san was writing the story of life as an author.
She was the only one who could choose the right path for herself.
“I think what’s important to me are the ‘ideals of the world’…although I was a little surprised to hear you say that means I’m like Hinami.”
“…Yeah.”
Something in her words tugged at me, but I nodded anyway, and she smiled wryly.
“But…when I think about it, it could be natural.”
“Natural?” She nodded—to herself, I think.
“I’m certain that Hinami is also working toward a vision of how she ought to be. That’s why she’s always able to maintain an ideal form…and I want to attain an ideal form, too, just like her.”
“An ideal form just like Hinami…huh.”
Her words had a certain deeper meaning to them.
She smiled again and answered in a confident tone.
“Yes. After all, Hinami is a very ideal person, isn’t she?”
* * *
That night, I was sitting in my room at my desk, thinking.
About what I’d realized thanks to Mizusawa, and what Kikuchi-san had said.
Over and over, I broke the ideas down abstractly and put them back together concretely. I replayed what Kikuchi-san had said again and again in my mind.
It did make sense. It was calm, rational, and clearly well thought-out. I had to respect that; I couldn’t shoot her down without giving it some serious thought myself.
But I also felt like something was lacking.
Maybe it was a misunderstanding. After all, Kikuchi-san’s ideas were more than adequate. The progression of her logic seemed sound, too.
But if there was a weak spot…
“She’s…the same as me.”
She was.
I’d been thinking about what dating meant to me.
I’d thought about it so much that most people would have gotten tired of it by this point. I’d piled theory upon theory, and I was fairly sure there weren’t any major holes in my logic.
What I was lacking was actual experience.
I was certain that Kikuchi-san was like me in that way—she lacked experience, so she thought things through in her mind instead.
As for our differences—she probably used her cool observations and skill as an “author” to arrive at what seemed to be the correct answer.
Those answers guided her actions, and in a sense, they were the chains that bound her.
What should I say to a person like that? Did I even need to say any more? And if I did, what new possibilities should I show her?
She was similar to me and Tama-chan in that we all wanted to change ourselves through effort, but as she’d said herself, when it came to her motivation—her view as an author striving toward an ideal—she was actually the same as Hinami.
Of course, I couldn’t reject the player’s or author’s perspectives without listening to their arguments. But I did know that they weren’t factoring in their own desires—only norm-based ideas about what “should be.”
If she pursued that principle, she wouldn’t end up like me or Tama-chan.
She’d end up as a literal “ideal woman.”
As a “perfect heroine” like Hinami.
Ultimately, was that the best path for her?
If not, which one should she take?
No matter how much I thought about the future, I could only come up with vague answers. What was she thinking? What could she see? What did she want? If I didn’t know, I couldn’t choose a path for her. Barging into her brain and forcing my own conclusions and decisions on her was obviously wrong.
“Huh?”
…Barging into her brain?
“Aha!” I realized something extremely simple—there was a way in!
What was going on in her mind was recorded, albeit in an abstract way.
I quickly pawed through my school bag and pulled out my hint from a clear plastic file.
I set the bundle of a dozen or so sheets of paper on my desk.
Exactly.
The script for “On the Wings of the Unknown.”
“Maybe this is it…”
This was no simple story. It was the story of Kikuchi-san herself.
Now that I knew a portion of her thoughts…a second read might tell me more.
At the same time, I realized I had another clue.
I searched for what I was thinking of online.
“…Ooh, there it is!”
An e-book version of the Andi book Kikuchi-san had mentioned, Poppol and Raptor Island.
She’d said most bookstores didn’t carry it, but those kinds of books were the ones you tended to stumble across in digital form.
I downloaded it right away and added it to my library.
Then I went to the kitchen, got myself some tea and snacks, and sat back down at my desk. I was going to spend the night with Kikuchi-san’s script and Andi’s book.
“Here goes!”
As excited as an elementary school kid about to stay up all night, I opened up Poppol and Raptor Island on my phone.
It was warmhearted and realistic. Friends didn’t just fall into Poppol’s lap—the plot was filled with his travails, his clever strategies, and a little bit of feel-good luck. The story pulled me in.
I read it very carefully, like I was solving a puzzle—and finally…
“…Here it is.”
…I found a clue that might give me an answer.
* * *
The next day, during the break before we switched classrooms, I went to see Kikuchi-san—in the library, of course.
In her garden.
“Hello.”
“Hello.”
She’d gotten there before me, and after we exchanged our usual greeting, I sat down next to her.
I searched for my opening, then eased us into the topic. “Um, actually…”
“…What is it?”
Maybe because she noticed I was acting different than usual, she shifted her gaze from the book she was reading over to me and tilted her head.
I started with: “I read Poppol.”
“Did you really?! The bookstore had a copy?”
Her voice was much louder than usual. I had to smile at the way her eyes lit up with excitement—but today, I was after more than a book review.
“No, I found an e-book version. In translation.”
“Wow…!””
She seemed to have had no idea it existed. Well, she really did love paper books. Actually, I wouldn’t want to see her swiping away on a phone or a tablet to read an e-book.
“What did you think?!”
She was actively trying to expand the conversation this time. Damn, that sparkle in her eyes when she’s talking about something she likes is really attractive.
“I think my favorite scene was at the end where Poppol’s friends use the power of language to communicate the beauty of the sea to him.”
“Yes, that was really good, wasn’t it…?”
She sounded like she was trying to keep her emotions from completely overflowing.
“Yeah. Andi must really believe in the power of words…”
“I know what you mean…!”
Her face was burning with excitement. This was the genuine Kikuchi-san.
This one—not the Kikuchi-san who forced herself to direct rehearsals.
“Also, one other part stuck with me.” I shifted my tone a little to redirect her attention.
“…It did?” She tilted her head.
“Yeah.” I imagined my words leaving my mouth in a straight line. “The firelings.”
“Ah…”
For some reason, that word alone made her catch her breath.
“Poppol uses language to make friends with all the other creatures, but the firelings are the only ones he can’t connect with.”
“…Yes.”
This was the other distinctive element of Poppol and Raptor Island.
Poppol believed in what words could accomplish, making friends with various species despite his strange appearance.
But he wasn’t able to befriend all of them.
“The firelings can’t leave the lake, so they can’t live with everybody else, right?”
“Yes, that’s right. So it’s not true that every single species…can be friends. That makes Poppol…a bit of a grown-up story.”
She spoke slowly, like she was remembering something.
I nodded. When I read that part of the book, that sense of dissonance reminded me of how I’d felt when I heard Kikuchi-san talk about “ideals.”
“Kikuchi-san,” I said to get her attention. She looked at me, surprised but serious.
“You said you live life from an author’s perspective, right?”
“…Yes.”
But if that was true, one thing didn’t make sense.
That one thing was her true feelings, hidden by her “ideals.” And I had a clue that proved those true feelings existed.
I locked eyes with Kikuchi-san and confronted her with the contradiction.
“If you really saw the world from an author’s perspective—then you’d accept the existence of the firelings.”
Firelings.
A species that by its very nature lived a closed-off existence, unable to build relationships with others.
Poppol wasn’t like anyone else, but he was still able to make friends with all different species.
I admit that he’s a brilliant character, one people might even aspire to. I could even see how Andi might seem to be presenting him as a model to copy.
But in that world that Michael Andi created—firelings still exist.
And that’s where Kikuchi-san’s contradiction lies.
It’s a realistic incongruity born from the complexity of human emotions.
“But—you say you feel like you have to become Poppol. Doesn’t that mean you reject the firelings?”
With those words, I took a step or two deeper in.
Kikuchi-san’s breath hitched. “…Yes.”
No wonder she reacted that way.
I’d just rejected the premise that, I think, had been ruling her life thus far—the idea that she saw the story of life from an author’s perspective.
“If you really saw life like an author, I think you’d say it was fine for the world to have both Poppols and firelings. But you don’t. You think you have to be Poppol, which shows you’re thinking about how you should be for yourself, right?”
“…I guess you might be right,” she replied uncertainly as I poked at her most foundational emotions.
I was definitely treading on thin ice. Essentially, I was rejecting her definition of herself and trying to replace it. And I might not be able to take responsibility for the consequences.
But when I saw her lead Kris into that lonely life, and when I saw her trying so hard to fit in…I wanted to help her, even if it meant overstepping.
And I wasn’t motivated by obligation to help her—I wanted to. I wanted to, from the bottom of my heart.
“So I think you don’t have to see the world as a player or an author… You can see it from your own perspective. From a character’s perspective.”
Maybe Kikuchi-san was hiding her true self behind the conclusions she’d found through her logical and observational skills. But I was certain—those deep, gut emotions Kikuchi-san had felt over the past few days were rooted in who she was as a character.
“You’ve just lost sight of it because you’re overthinking things.”
Once I’d finished saying what I wanted to say, I sat quietly and waited for her answer.
When she responded, she was full of doubt. “…I just don’t know.”
“…You don’t?”
A mixture of anxiety and sadness was in her voice. She looked down, shaking her head weakly.
“You say I’m seeing the world as a character, but…I don’t know what I’m looking at, or where I want to be.” She bit her lip in frustration. “After all—the world I see is gray.”
Her black eyes wavered, drained of strength.
She shrank into herself as if the world itself had abandoned her, her shoulders shaking like she might shatter at any moment.
I didn’t want to see her in pain, so I mustered my confidence and tried to lift her spirits.
“That’s simple!”
To reassure her, I gave her a smile as carefree as I could manage.
“Andi’s books!”
I ran my finger gently over the cover of the volume she had placed carefully in front of her.
“You love Andi’s books. That’s set in stone, right?”
She stared at me and blinked a few times. “…Is that enough?”
She glanced down for a moment, then gave me a questioning look.
“That’s plenty! I mean, Andi’s books showed you a colorful world for the first time, and I bet his books are always there in your heart, aren’t they?”
“Yes…but…” She still seemed unsure.
“This is what I think.” I pulled my phone out of my pocket. “Right now, you feel like you have to change, and you’re trying to fit in with everyone in our class. But if you’re a fireling and the rest of the class is a different species…you don’t need to.”
She followed me with her eyes, but she didn’t say a word.
“I’m not saying that firelings should just go off and live by themselves. I mean, that’s hard. And lonely.”
“So…?” Her defenses were completely down.
I smiled back at her. “That’s simple, too!”
I turned the screen of my phone toward her.
“Look for the lake where the other firelings live.”
Twitter’s user search was pulled up on the screen of my phone, with “Michael Andi” in the search bar.
“That’s…,” she said, her mouth open in surprise.
I went on. “You can find as many people as you want with the same interests as you on here. Of course, at first, you won’t know what they look like or where they live. But if you put in the time to establish connections, you can make friends you get along with so well, you’ll want to meet them in person one day.” I tapped the screen with my fingernail. “Heck, pretty much everyone on here’s a fireling.”
Kikuchi-san burst out giggling at my weird attempt to sound cool. “…You’re amazing.”
“No, I’m not. I’m just crafty.” After all, nanashi’s strong point is his willingness to use any means to reach the end.
Plus, I’ve got a lot of experience with social networks. Hinami’s Instagram assignment is partly to thank for that, but I’ve always made it a habit to check out the accounts of top Atafami players on a regular basis.
I haven’t gotten involved myself because I’m socially awkward, but as far as I can tell, a majority of the top players, at least, seem to meet IRL. Come to think of it, I met with NO NAME offline myself.
But Kikuchi-san’s expression quickly clouded over again. “Can I…really do that?” she asked uncertainly.
“Really do what?”
She glanced down, unsure of herself. “You and Hanabi-chan are so involved, and you fit in with the class so well now. I’d be the only one left…” She was humbly revealing her inferiority complex.
But while it might sound weird to say this—I was glad to hear it.
“Yeah, it’s fine.”
“…It is?”
My oddly casual tone seemed to confuse her. After all, she knew her problems must seem insignificant to me, but to her, they were painful and heavy and must make her feel worthless.
“I’ll say this straight up.”
That was why I wanted to tell her what I’d learned from six months of practical experience—six months that had been crammed with experiences.
“I love Atafami, but I decided to try facing life head-on and change my position at school, my friendships, and my image. And I learned something from changing everything like that.”
I told it to her exactly as I saw it.
“The friendships you make at school? They aren’t anything special.”
“Huh?”
I know that might have sounded callous, like I was indifferent to everyone. But it wasn’t.
“For the past six months or so, I’ve gotten to know all kinds of people, and there’s quite a few people I’d call friends.”
“Yes…it seems that way,” she answered, a bit gingerly.
I hoped what I said next would erase part of that doubt.
“Some of them… Maybe it’s one-sided, but I can have real conversations with them and understand them on a deeper level. I’m sure I’ll be friends with them for a long time.”
“…Uh-huh.”
“But that’s not because I met them at school.”
I meant it.
Based on Hinami’s instructions, I’d strategically gotten involved with top-level people in order to improve my position in school, and I’d taken steps to establish a place for myself. But the deeper connections I’d made through that process had nothing to do with those strategies.
“I just happened to connect with those particular people—it has nothing to do with everyone else at school. School only provided the opportunity.”
School just happened to be where we met. We hadn’t become friends because we met at school.
“As long as you’re able to meet people, there’s no rule that says it has to be at school,” I announced confidently.
I mean, that was true for me, too.
The most important connection I’d made in the past six months, the one I was most grateful for—I didn’t meet that person for the first time at school.
I met her in an Atafami match.
You’ve got to build your lifestyle out of your experiences.
I wanted to get that point across to Kikuchi-san. I spoke slowly and gently, affirming my old self in his entirety.
“There’s nothing that says you need to be friends with everyone because ‘that’s what people have to do.’”
It’s true.
That day when it all started, I rejected school and the normie lifestyle flat out, and Hinami rejected my “sour grapes” way of thinking.
Now here I was, trying out the game of life according to her instructions. I was tasting those grapes for myself.
Were they as sweet as she’d promised? I wouldn’t say so. But I wouldn’t say they were as sour as I’d expected, either.
At this point, I simply knew this:
Some of the grapes growing around here are sweet, and others are sour.
I didn’t go overboard rejecting them or accepting them.
This was just one out of the many grapevines growing in the world, nothing more.
When I finished talking, Kikuchi-san seemed to have been freed from the demon tormenting her.
“…Wow.” Her next words were soft, as if she was emerging from the swirl of anxiety and doubt to celebrate herself. “Then I’m fine the way I am.”
“Yeah.”
“I’m…not some anomaly…that has no place in the world.”
“No, not at all. Definitely not.”
I nodded confidently, affirming who she was even as her lips trembled.
If you can’t reach the sweet grapes, then look for some sweet strawberries growing on the ground.
If you don’t like sweet things, look for nuts.
If you’re not hungry to start with…then just have fun however you want.
Find your place. Find how you want to live.
When I finished saying everything I wanted to say, I took a breath. “Okay, moving on to the main topic.”
“What? There’s more?” She widened her eyes in surprise.
“Yeah, I mean…do you know how to use Twitter?”
“Oh…that.”
I still had to tell her how to get to the lake.
“Um, no, I don’t…”
“Ha-ha-ha. Thought so. First, you create an account right here…”
As I showed her the Twitter ropes, I was thinking about something.
I used to be like her.
I used to look at the accounts of other top players, but with my awkwardness, I believed it wasn’t my place to say anything.
But what if…?
Actually, I already knew the answer.
Just like Kikuchi-san had decided to dive into the lake of the firelings, maybe I should, too.
Maybe I should try swimming in that lake.
* * *
After school that day, I decided to help out with the rehearsal so Kikuchi-san could focus on finishing the real conclusion of the script.
But that plan quickly encountered a hiccup.
As I headed toward the practice room, Kikuchi-san stopped me. “Um…we’ll be fine without you today.”
“What? Wh-why?”
We’d just talked about how she didn’t have to force herself to get along with everyone—but did she intend to anyway?
“Oh, um, no, that’s not it…”
“It’s not?”
I was giving her a puzzled look when someone tapped my shoulder.
“Huh?” I turned around—and saw Tachibana.
“Heard you guys needed some help with the play. A director, right?”
“Uh, what? Oh, um, yeah.”
“I’ll do it. You’ve gotta work on that skit with Mimimi, right?”
“Uh, yeah, but…Kikuchi-san?”
As I floundered in an enormous whirlpool of doubt, Kikuchi-san awkwardly tried to explain the situation.
“Um…Tachibana-san got in touch a few times after we exchanged contact information, and he said I could go to him if I ever needed anything, so…”
“Oh… O-okay.”
Well, this definitely counted as needing something. She’d definitely made the right call. And yet…
“Go ahead and don’t worry about us. I can’t wait to see that skit.”
“Oh, uh, you won’t be disappointed…?” By this point, I didn’t even know what I wanted or didn’t want to do, so I just said, “See you later,” and watched the two of them walk down the hallway side by side. Actually, Kikuchi-san was walking a couple of steps behind Tachibana, and if I could trust my eyes, I think she was keeping about an extra foot of distance from him compared with when she walked with me. Whatever. They were still close.
“Hmm. Well then. Okay.”
When they were gone, I tore my eyes away and reluctantly headed off to practice the skit. Hmm. N-not that I care or anything.
* * *
It was the next morning.
“Tomozaki-kun!”
As I was walking up the stairs toward class after my morning meeting with Hinami, I suddenly heard Kikuchi-san call my name on the landing.
She was very obviously excited, and she was holding a paper bag that probably contained the script. But she didn’t have her bag with her…which must mean that she’d been waiting for me there.
“What’s up? You sure are in a good mood.”
“Oh!” She blushed. “I—I am…?”
When Kikuchi-san blushed, it tended to be contagious, which was why my own face was growing steadily hotter. Plus, we were on the landing of the staircase leading from Sewing Room #2, so hardly anyone used it. The embarrassment was only natural.
“Um, yeah. You sounded super energetic…”
“O-oh, really…?”
There was a very awkward pause.
“B-but that’s not the point,” she said, pouting a little.
“Um, the script?”
“Yes!”
She blushed in surprise that I’d guessed why she was there. Uh, that’s not really a reason to blush, is it?
“Well, you were carrying a bag…”
“Oh, that’s true!” She floundered.
Once again, I felt my face burning after that oddly timed blush attack.
As if to cover up her expression, she lowered her voice like she was telling me something very important. “…I decided.”
“You did?”
“Yes.”
She pulled the script out of the bag, but instead of flipping it open, she hugged it to her chest.
Then without lowering the bundle of papers, she began to tell me the ending to “On the Wings of the Unknown.” Slowly, in her own words.
“In the last scene, Kris leaves the castle and tries to fit into the outside world, right?”
“Yeah.”
That ending had left me strangely sad, and I’d asked her not to let it end there.
“Well, yesterday, I thought about what you told me…and I decided that Kris was the same. Forcing herself to fit into the outside world didn’t have to be her only choice.”
“…Oh, you did?”
Not everyone has to be a Poppol—some people can live in the lake of the firelings.
That really applied to Kris, too, who had grown up ignorant of the world.
“So this is what I did.”
She playfully gathered her hair together with her hands.
“She loves to make flower garlands, so I had her become an apprentice at a workshop that makes them.”
I had to smile at the solution she’d found. “…Huh. That’s a good ending.”
“Isn’t it?!” She grinned. “After so long alone, she wouldn’t know anything about the outside world—but she would love working with flowers, I thought.”
That description reminded me more of Kikuchi-san herself than of Kris.
“Yeah. I think she’d like something creative.”
That’s why I answered in a way that could apply to either of them.
“It would help her find happiness, I think. Definitely.”
“…Huh. I’m really glad about that,” I said, holding back my own flood of happiness.
Kris—and Kikuchi-san, too—had both come to understand themselves. They’d created a place for themself full of the things and people they liked, where they could be happy. Kikuchi-san had put that beautiful answer into her story world, and for some reason, I was grateful to her for it.
Somehow, what I felt wasn’t nervous excitement but an emotion closer to respect.
From the bottom of my heart, I also wanted to share every drop of that passion and happiness.
A peculiar feeling was sprouting inside me—something peaceful and very warm.
“Kikuchi-san.” The words came naturally.
“What is it?”
Of course, I wasn’t just completing an assignment—I was doing what I wanted to do.
The emotion was spilling out of me without any logic or reason.
“After the play ends on the day of the festival—there’s something I want to talk to you about.”
I only realized what I’d said after I closed my mouth. The words had left me before I could even process them.
What I wanted to do was tell her the truth of how I felt. I’d had those feelings when we watched those brilliant colors exploding across the night sky together, but I’d failed to say them.
Of course, I could find plenty of reasons to explain what was going on inside me. Gratitude for teaching me something important. Respect for the seriousness with which she worked on her stories. That experience in your gut when you understood someone else down to their very core.
But I think the real meaning was different from any of that.
For the past week, I’d been laser-focused on finding some specific reason for my decision.
But now I knew that a “reason” was just…whatever you found afterward when you needed to turn your uncontrollable emotions into something special.
She blushed, as if some sudden realization had made her shy.
“…O-of course.” She nodded hesitantly, but at the same time as if she’d already guessed everything, and then looked up at me.
Just then, I remembered something. This was one of Hinami’s assignments.
Fine then. Might as well complete it right now.
But—I’d do it in a completely different way than she’d imagined.
“Let’s make sure this play is a success.”
I reached my right hand out toward Kikuchi-san.
She glanced back and forth between my face and my hand with surprise.
Finally, she smiled kindly, extended her own small, white hand—the hand that wrote the stories I loved—and placed it on top of mine.
“Yes…let’s.”
Our hands linked together as our words did, too. Respect and affection and goals were all jumbled together in my heart.
And that’s how I successfully managed to intentionally touch hands with Kikuchi-san for more than five seconds.
* * *
At lunch that day, I was still floating on air somewhat when something occurred to me.
Kikuchi-san had written a story that ended with Kris finding her place in the world. What was going on in Kikuchi-san’s fireling lake—the lake that gave rise to that ending?
Feeling vaguely like a father watching protectively over his child, I decided to take a peek at Kikuchi-san’s Twitter account.
“Huh…?”
That was a surprise.
The account we’d just created yesterday? The one that was supposed to let her follow people who liked Andi books and make friends with people who were similar to her—the account that would lead her to the fireling lake?
The bio had drastically changed.
Michael Andi, cafés, second-year high school student, reading, and writing
That was what we’d come up with together, after I told her she should keep it simple and list some things she liked and facts about herself. As long as she was trying to find people who shared her interests instead of trying to get a lot of followers, I thought that would work really well.
But all that had been erased—and replaced with two words.
Aspiring writer
My finger stopped moving on my phone screen, and a smile spread over my face.
“…Okay.”
Just as Kris had found her way, just as Kris had decided to turn her passion into a job and leap out into the world, Kikuchi-san wanted to do the same.
“…Go get ’em.”
Right then, I made a decision.
No matter what happened, I’d stand by her.