Chapter 7

Kotori Conference

The scene before her could have easily been mistaken for hell.

The familiar streets of the residential area were alive with crimson flames. The neat rows of houses, the street she always took to and from school, the trees in the park—tongues of fire lapped at everything like her neighborhood was nothing more than a pile of burnable garbage, and the world around her was gradually reduced to ash and charcoal. Mixed in with the roar of the blazing conflagration were the shrieks and footfalls of people fleeing, punctuated every so often with the boom of something exploding.

“What…is this…?” Origami asked, stunned, as she stared at this scene removed from reality.

Asking questions was a waste of time. During the few seconds it took her to articulate the words, she would have been far better served by putting her feet in motion. But there was no one around to call her out on her foolish behavior. And for a child of twelve, the situation was impossible to grasp at the drop of a hat.

She had come back from the grocery store to a neighborhood that was something entirely different than the one she’d set out from. The fact that she didn’t simply sink to the ground right then and there might have been because she possessed some measure of composure.

And then her eyes flew open wide.

“Dad! Mom!”

Her parents would still have been at home.

The moment she remembered this, Origami tossed aside the bags she was carrying and started running.

It wasn’t as if a child could do anything charging in there by herself, and her parents might have already evacuated on their own. But in her confused state, Origami couldn’t think things through. She simply ran down a road that was in a very different state than it had been hours earlier.

When she arrived at her house a few minutes later, her face filled with despair. Her house was cloaked in red flames like all the others, and she could only see its shadow.

“No…”

It wasn’t as if she hadn’t imagined this would happen. Even so, she’d had hope—a tiny glimmer of it—until she actually saw her home. But now…

“…?!”

She jumped as the front door of her house was kicked open from the inside. Her father stumbled out, sweat pouring down his forehead, his arm around her mother’s shoulders.

“Dad! Mom!” she shrieked.

“You came back, Origami?!”

“Are you hurt? It’s not safe here. We have to run!” Her father called to her, reaching out with one hand and stepping forward.

She was so happy to see they were both alive. She nodded several times, tears in her eyes, and then reached out to take her father’s hand.

“Huh?” she said, unable to process what was happening for a moment.

As soon as she stretched out her arm, a beam of light shot down from the sky in front of her. There was a violent shock wave, and she was knocked flying through the air like a rag doll.

“Aaah!”

She slammed into a concrete wall a few meters away and coughed several times. Pain spread in her side each time she did. She must have cracked a rib or two. It hurt so much, tears filled her eyes.

She was more worried about her parents’ safety. Enduring the pain somehow, she turned her gaze toward the spot where she had last seen them.

But there was no one there now. The earth itself had been gouged out, and nothing remained in the area but a small crater.

She crawled toward it.

“Ah… Ah… Aaaaah.”

Origami found what had been her mother and father in the cavity, and her teeth began to chatter.

She felt dizzy, like the world was twisting. Despair descended upon her, painting over the bright reds before her with ash and darkness.

Why? How? The questions swirled around and around in her mind futilely, unanswerable.

“…!” She lifted her face, as if searching for the light that had just burned her parents. And she froze with shock once again.

“An angel…,” she murmured, stunned. There was an angel floating in the sky.

Of course, she knew that such a thing did not exist in this world, but this was the only word that popped into her head to describe the being before her eyes.

Vision blurred by pain, she couldn’t take in the details of the angel creature, but she could tell that it had a human shape. A slender silhouette floating above them all, as if lording over the burning town. Most likely, a young girl.

This shadow touched a hand to Origami’s head, and her body shook. Like she was crying. Or laughing.

“You’re the one who…”

To Mom. And to Dad.

Origami’s voice faded into nothing. She clenched fists dripping with blood and glared up at the angel floating above the sea of flames. She began to shout, her voice full of hatred, “You won’t get away with this! I’ll kill you… I will kill you! And that’s a promise…!”

Here, Origami Tobiichi regained consciousness. Her eyes flew open.

“…! …!”

Her breathing was ragged, even though she’d been asleep until that moment.

She sat up and took several deep breaths to try and calm her pounding heart. Air smelling faintly of antiseptic cycled in and out of her trachea and lungs.

Once she had her breathing under control again, she slowly looked around to see where she was. White ceiling and white walls. In the corner of her eye, she could see a stand with IV bags hanging from it.

She quickly realized she was in a bed in a room at the SDF hospital, a place where she’d received care many times before. Lucky for her, she’d been placed in a private room.

“…”

Wordlessly, she wiped her forehead. A bandage had been neatly wrapped around her head, but it was drenched from night sweat. Of course, the bandages in other places and the back of her hospital gown were also damp. She grabbed the gown sticking to her back and flapped it to let air pass through.

She didn’t usually sweat so much while she slept. This must have been because of the dream she’d just had: the scene when her parents had died five years earlier.

She later learned the name of the being she’d mistaken for an angel then. A Spirit, a uniquely catastrophic creature. That disaster had been caused by hands that were not human.

She’d stopped having the nightmares lately, so why was she having them now?

“…!” She gasped. She remembered the reason why she was there.

“Shido!” Origami called out the name of her beloved.

After engaging in combat with and being held captive by the Spirit Kurumi Tokisaki on the roof of Raizen High School, Origami had been knocked unconscious.

She was concerned about the well-being of Shido and Mana, as well as the current situation with Kurumi. (There may have been one other person on the roof who could be easily mistaken for human garbage, but there was no need to worry about her.) The fact that Origami was alive meant that it was highly likely the others were also all right. She could only conjecture at this point. At any rate, she wanted information.

She lowered her eyes, searching her memories for the moments before she passed out, and then swallowed hard. When Origami had been held captive by the avatars and Kurumi had turned toward Shido, something impossible had appeared from the sky.

“A Spirit…of flames!” Origami spat, like a curse, seeing this Spirit flash through her mind.

A fire Spirit. Code name: Efreet. The one responsible for the infernal blaze in the district of Nanko five years earlier. The Spirit who had killed Origami’s parents right in front of her.

“I found you. At last…”

This was the enemy she had hunted and searched for over the last five years. The target of her vengeance, whom she had resolved to kill even if it meant her own life. Maybe it was a coincidence, but Origami had finally reached her.

Her heart pounded fiercely, and the breathing she had only just gotten under control grew ragged again. Her long-held desire was at her fingertips, and an emotion akin to ecstatic joy turned her mind upside down.

For some reason, however, she had the strange feeling that something was not quite right. She had seen the face of this Spirit of flames from the roof—Efreet—somewhere other than that excruciating moment five years ago. But where exactly? Even when she racked her brain, the answer would not come to her.

After considering this for a few minutes, Origami lifted her face and threw her legs over the side of the bed. She put on the slippers laid out on the floor and stood up.

She couldn’t change the fact that she couldn’t remember. Given that she had been brought here, however, she imagined Mana was probably also in the hospital somewhere. The girl might have more details to share.

Origami ignored the slight dizziness that washed over her and started to walk…until the IV tubes yanked on her arm, and she fell back onto the bed.

“This is…the place, right?” Shido murmured, looking back and forth between the map in his hand and the large building before him.

The sign on the gate read SDF TENGU HOSPITAL. It seemed like this was indeed it.

“I hope she’s okay…”

When Mana had come running to his side while he faced off against Kurumi the day before yesterday, Kurumi’s Seventh Bullet Zayin had stopped time, and Mana had been badly injured. If she were going to be taken anywhere, he guessed it would be to the SDF hospital, so he’d come to see how she was doing.

He slipped through the gates and walked up to the reception desk. “Um,” he started.

“Yes?” the woman at the desk asked. “Is this your first visit? If you’re a member of the general public, you’ll need a letter of recommendation.”

“Oh. No. I’m a visitor,” he told her. “Where’s Mana Takamiya’s room?”

“Mana Takamiya? Are you a family member?”

“Um… Y-yes,” Shido stammered. Mana Takamiya was Shido’s actual little sister. Apparently.

In point of fact, he himself had no memory of her, but Mana insisted there was no mistake. Shido couldn’t handle more questions that were sure to come if he denied that connection now. He simply nodded in agreement.

“Wait just a moment, please.” The receptionist began to tap away at her computer with practiced hands. A minute or so later, she opened her eyes wide in surprise and turned back to him. “Er, I’m terribly sorry, but Mana Takamiya is currently receiving special treatment. She’s not permitted any visitors at this time.”

“Wha…t?!” Shido cried. “I-is she going to be okay?”

“Hmm. The file doesn’t list any further details…”

“But her family deserves an explanation at the very least,” he protested.

“I really am sorry. Because special equipment is being used for Miss Takamiya’s treatment, we aren’t allowed to discuss any of the particulars with the public. Hospital rules…”

“That’s… Can’t you do something for me here?” he pleaded. “Just let me have a peek at her…please…”

“I—I understand you’re concerned, but…” The receptionist looked troubled.

“Shido?” said a familiar voice from behind him.

He looked over his shoulder and saw a girl in a hospital gown holding on to an IV stand.

“Origami?”

His classmate Origami Tobiichi was standing there. Her most distinctive features were hair that tickled her shoulders and a face like a doll. She had a bandage wrapped around her forehead and plasters patching up her slender limbs.

When she saw his face, she breathed a small sigh. Although her expression didn’t change at all, it seemed she was relieved.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” she told him.

“Y-yeah.” For whatever reason, he felt a little shy when she was so obviously worried about his well-being. He averted his eyes as he ruffled his own hair.

Origami continued to stare at him. “And Tohka Yatogami?”

“…?!”

His eyes snapped back to her face, surprised. Which was only natural. Tohka and Origami did nothing but fight when they saw each other. He never dreamed that Origami would ever be worried about Tohka.

Maybe being in the same class at school had given Origami a new understanding of Tohka. This made Shido happy somehow, and he nodded.

“Oh, Tohka’s fine.”

“Tch!”

“Huh?”

“Nothing.”

He felt like he saw an expression very unlike her flit across the face of Lady Origami Tobiichi—ever cool and collected—but maybe he’d imagined it. He decided to believe that and mustered a smile.

“A-anyway, what’s up?” he asked. “Why are you out here? Your room’s gotta be on a different floor, yeah?”

“Came to ask after Mana’s room. You?” Origami replied without shifting her gaze in the slightest.

“Oh, is that it? I came to see Mana, too.”

“You did. A visit?”

“W-well, yeah, I guess.”

“Just Mana?”

“Umm… And you, too, Origami.”

“You did,” she replied, her expression unchanging, of course. He wasn’t sure why, but he got the feeling she was very pleased. His conscience stung a bit. “So where’s Mana staying?” Origami asked.

“Uh… Oh. I guess she’s undergoing treatment, and she’s not allowed to have visitors. I was just asking if they couldn’t make an exception,” he explained.

“…They probably won’t budge on that, no matter how long you wait,” she said.

“Huh?”

“I can’t tell you the specifics, but she’s likely being treated using a highly confidential device. No one will be allowed to see her until she’s moved to the general wing. If you try to force it, you’ll be arrested.”

“…!”

Shido’s eyebrows shot up. A highly confidential device… Probably a medical Realizer. He was pretty sure Reine had said something about this hospital having them. The Realizer was a near-miraculous technology that made the imagined real and was also the nation’s most closely guarded secret. It was no surprise then that he was coming up against a wall with the receptionist.

“Okay. I’ll try again another day.”

Origami nodded and then didn’t say another word…while staring into his eyes.

For a while, there was silence.

He knew he was blocking the hospital corridor, trapped in this deadlock, but it was like the right moment to slip away had passed by him, and now he was stuck there.

“Uh. Um. Origami?” he managed to say, beads of sweat forming on his forehead. “You okay not going back to your room?”

“I’ll go back.”

“O-oh yeah? Then I’ll just be…” He was about to walk toward the exit when suddenly, Origami pitched forward like a plank of wood.

“O-Origami?! Are you okay?!”

He hurriedly crouched down, wrapped his arms around her shoulders, and lifted her up. Her nose and forehead were colored red, probably because she’d just slammed them into the floor.

The fall had been so ostentatious that the staff and patients in the area all turned to look at them in surprise. Origami seemed to pay no mind to the chatter that rose up around them as she turned her face toward Shido.

“Looks like I can’t make it back by myself.”

“…”

“Take me there.”

“…Um.”

“Take me there.”

“O-okay,” Shido agreed, giving up. “Do you think you can walk on your own, Origami?”

“Too hard.”

“…Oh yeah? Just wait here. I’ll go get a wheelchair.” Shido was about to stand up, but Origami grabbed on to the hem of his shirt. “Hmm? What’s wrong?”

“I don’t want a wheelchair.”

“Huh? Why not?”

“I get terrible motion sickness.”

“…”

He had a few things he would have liked to say to her, like asking if she would really get motion sick in a wheelchair gliding along the flat hallways of the hospital. Or asking how an AST member could even say that when she was whipping around in a CR unit on a near daily basis. But he decided to hold his tongue.

“S-so what should I do?”

“Take me on piggyback.”

“Huh?” he said, stunned.

“On piggyback.”

“Uh. Um.”

“On piggyback.”

“…Okay.” Realizing that it was pointless to refuse, he turned his back toward her. Instantly, she nimbly sprang to her feet and pressed her body against his. She moved so quickly that it was hard to believe she had just collapsed from dizziness. He honestly felt like this was less piggyback and more like he’d been ambushed from behind.

“Hngh…” Shido had experience piggybacking Kotori to her room after she’d fallen asleep in the living room on an almost daily basis, so he thought he was used to carrying a girl around. But this did feel a little different.

Her body was a bit heavier than Kotori’s, and the particular softness of a girl came through loud and clear on his back. He also felt like the level of closeness was higher than strictly required.

“Origami? Y-you’re maybe holding on a little too tightly?”

“I’m not,” she insisted, as she squeezed him even more. Her breasts pressed firmly against his back, separated by only a thin hospital gown.

“Uh. Ngh!”

From an objective viewpoint, Origami was not so developed in that area. But when it came to this kind of close combat, she did possess fearsome powers of destruction. Feeling his face turn red, Shido shook his head from side to side to clear his mind and took the IV stand attached to Origami’s arm in one hand.

“S-so… Origami. Where’s your room?”

“West building, third floor. Room three-oh-five.”

“Okay… Got it.” He nodded and began to move, pulling the IV stand with one hand as he followed the signs and headed for the corridor connecting the central and west buildings.

“Eeeek?!” He shrieked like a girl just as he was about to enter the corridor. Origami’s fingers were wriggling around suspiciously and groping him like uncomfortable tongues. “O-Origami. That tickles…”

“Oh,” she said and stopped moving her fingers at last.

He let out a sigh of relief and started walking again.

Once they reached the west building, he took the elevator up to the third floor and followed Origami’s directions down the hallway. After a while, she started to play with the back of his head.

But her arms were still wrapped around his neck. He frowned, and then quickly realized what was going on. It was her audible breath on his neck.

“O-Origami…?!”

Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale.

“Hey…”

Sniff. Sniff.

“I said, ‘hey’…!” He frowned and turned his head to look over his shoulder. “Eeek?!”

He felt something race along his neck then, and he jumped into the air. It was a ticklish sensation, like she was caressing his brain stem, even though both of her hands were occupied.

“What?! What are you doing to me?!”

Shido managed to suppress his panic and confusion long enough to run into the designated Room 305 and toss Origami onto the bed.

“…”

She fell like a pro and licked her lips for some reason.

“Haah…! Haah…!” Shido panted. Although the trip hadn’t been that far and Origami wasn’t particularly heavy, he was exhausted. He leaned against the wall for a minute to calm his breathing.

Once the pounding of his heart was under control, he looked around. A private room in shades of white. In the ten-square-meter space, there were a bed, table, TV, and chair, and on top of the table, there were a vase of flowers and a basket with some apples, perhaps from a previous visitor.

“Um… So, Origami. I should, uh,” he started, and Origami’s stomach growled. “Have you not eaten?”

Origami bobbed her head up and down.

“You haven’t…? Maybe you should try calling the nurse?”

“…” Origami lifted her face and took one of the apples from the basket. She thrust it out at him, together with a paring knife. “Peel it.”

“Huh? Oh… Fine.” He had no reason to refuse her. He sat down on the nearby stool, took the apple and the knife, set the basket on his knees, and began to peel the skin.

He was in the kitchen and handled knives pretty much every day. Peeling an apple was a piece of cake. He had cut the fruit into eight pieces in less than a minute and set them out on a plate at hand.

“There. That good?” he asked, holding it out.

Origami shook her head, displeased.

“What’s the matter?” he asked.

“Feed me.”

“Wha—?” Shido shuddered, plate still in his hand. But he couldn’t let himself be thrown by something like this. He cleared his throat. “Uh. Can’t you do that yourself?”

“The doctor said to refrain from excessive exercise.”

“But you were walking around and dragging that IV stand.”

Origami ignored him and opened her mouth. “Aaah.”

“Geez… Fine. You win.” With a sigh, he picked up a piece of apple and brought it to her mouth. He saw her eyebrows twitch up.

“If you could use your mouth instead of your—”

“…! Here!” He knew he couldn’t let her finish that sentence. He shoved the apple into her mouth to silence her.

Origami bit into the apple, staring at him, chewed it up, and swallowed it. And then she opened her mouth again, as if demanding the other half in Shido’s hand.

“Mm. Okay, here.”

When he held the apple out, she clamped her lips around it and his fingers.

“Gah?!” he cried out, stunned. This was indeed unexpected. “Ha-ha… You missed.”

He laughed lifelessly as he tried to pull his hand away, leaving only the apple in Origami’s mouth. Instantly, she grabbed his wrist and held it impossibly tight.

“Huh…? Huh?!” he yelped.

“…”

Origami ignored his panic and let her tongue crawl over his fingers, still holding on to his wrist. Lick. Lick, lick. Lick, lick, lick. Slurp, slurp. Smack, smack. Shhrlp.

“H-hey, Origami… Uh, this is, I mean, really, O-Oreeegahmee?!” he shrieked and jerked his hand back and forth.

At long last, she opened her mouth and set his hand free, lines of shining saliva stretching out to connect his fingers with her lips. Shido turned red at this incredibly obscene sight.

“Delicious.” Origami wiped her mouth before putting her hands together and bowing.

He felt hot under the collar as he wiped his hand. “Th-that’s enough, yeah?”

Origami pointed to the table. “And that.”

“Hmm?” He turned his eyes to see what she was pointing at. A simple electronic thermometer.

“I have to take my temperature.”

“Oh, you do?” He picked up the thermometer and held it out to her, but she did not reach out to take it. “Hmm? What’s wrong? Weren’t you going to take your temperature?”

“Too hard. I want you to help.”

“Uh?” He frowned. “N-no, no, no. You just have to put it under your armpit or something, though?”

“No excessive exercise.”

“…Fine. I get it. Okay.” He felt like he’d been expertly duped, but his back was against the wall. With a sigh, Shido pulled the thermometer out of its case. “But like… How am I supposed to help you take your temperature? There’s basically nothing for me to do.”

“Sit here.” Origami patted the bed.

“Huh? Okay…” Cocking his head to one side, Shido sat down as instructed, and Origami got up and installed herself in front of him…in the exact opposite position from the piggyback he’d given her before.

“O-Origami?” He tried to look anywhere but at the pale nape of her neck peeking out from beneath her hair a hot breath away from him.

Origami didn’t seem to care, however. She untied her hospital gown and with no fanfare whatsoever, opened it up to the front.

“…?! Wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-what are you doing, Origami?!”

“When Kurumi Tokisaki transferred to our school, you were more than a little excited by her conduct.”

“H-huh?”

“And so I determined that taking the lead would be effective,” Origami said, almost to herself, and took Shido’s hand with the thermometer. She slowly guided it to her side. “Put it in, Shido.”

“…?!”

“The thermometer.”

“Oh.” Even though her words themselves were nothing out of the ordinary, he felt incredibly embarrassed. “Th-that’s kind of…”

“If you can’t, you can help me wipe down my body and—”

“I’ll do it! I prefer the thermometer!”

“Oh.” She nodded, seeming the slightest bit deflated, and turned her face forward.

Shido gulped and slowly moved the thermometer toward her armpit with a shaking hand.

“…!” When the tip of the thermometer grazed her skin, she shuddered.

“A-are you okay, Origami?”

“Fine. It’s just a little cold.”

“O-oh…” He pulled himself together again and moved the instrument once more.

“…! Ah… Mmm!” Origami made a sound like a groan or a moan so quietly that he wouldn’t have been able to hear it if he hadn’t been so close.

She would never sigh so weakly or so fleetingly under normal circumstances. Each time these little whimpers reached his ears, his brain cells ascended to heaven in the thousands.

“Mm… Shido, deeper.”

“Uh. Um.”

“If you don’t put it…all the way in…it won’t…measure…properly.”

“R-right…” He was only taking her temperature, but for some reason, he felt like he was doing something he really shouldn’t be doing. It had to be all in his mind. Definitely, completely in his mind.

To calm himself, Shido chanted the Heart Sutra (although he mostly made up the words) as he pushed the thermometer all the way into Origami’s armpit.

“Mmm!” She shuddered and threw her head back. Then her breathing grew ragged.

“O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-Origami?”

“Hold me close.”

“Uh. Uhhh… Wh-why?”

“The thermometer will…slip out.”

“Oh… Um. Mm… Right.” As instructed, Shido really threw himself into the embrace to wedge the thermometer into Origami’s armpit.

Yes. If the thermometer fell out, it would read an error, so he had no other choice. He just had to do it. This was a fundamental principle of the vast universe, and an insignificant human being like Shido couldn’t possibly go against it.

He felt the soft warmth of Origami’s arms, chest, stomach—and a faint scent of sweat from her neck that tickled his nostrils, making him feel like someone opened his skull and scrambled his brains. He no longer knew what was what.

Then the thermometer made a cheerful beeping sound and brought Shido back to this world.

His drooping eyelids flew open, and he pulled the thermometer out from Origami’s armpit.

“Ah!” She shuddered again, but he tried his best not to think about that and looked at the numbers on the thermometer. “Thirty-six point two… It’s normal.”

“…Oh,” she said, sounding regretful somehow, and pulled the front of her gown closed with a lazy hand. Then she turned her head and looked at him. “Shido.”

“Wh-what?” he stammered.

“You were…incredibly good.”

“…! I—I—I—I was?” He had no idea what exactly he had been good at, but he got the feeling that he wouldn’t like the explanation, so he nodded. “O-okay… I’m going to head out now. Get better soon, Origami.”

He pulled away and took the long way around Origami to climb off the bed. Then he started to walk toward the door.

“One last thing,” Origami called out from behind him.

“…What?” he asked, a bad feeling sending a shiver up his spine. What demand was she going to make of him now?

But Origami surprised him.

“It’s about yesterday. I want you to tell me what happened after we fought Kurumi Tokisaki. Another Spirit appeared in the sky. A Spirit in a Japanese-style Astral Dress—one who controlled flames.”

“…” He gulped loudly. There was absolutely no doubt that Origami was talking about Kotori.

“Do you remember that?”

“…Y-yeah.” He nodded after a moment’s hesitation. He thought about maybe playing dumb, but given that Origami had seen Kotori, he decided there was no point in attempting that. If he said he didn’t know anything about a Spirit he had to have seen, that ran the risk of making her suspicious of him.

Whether Origami noticed Shido’s nervousness or not, she continued with composure. “Kurumi Tokisaki knocked me unconscious soon after that. I want you to tell me anything you noticed about that fire Spirit. No detail is too trivial.”

“Oh… Uh. Like. I actually passed out pretty quick, too, so I don’t really know.”

“Oh.” She let out a short, disappointed sigh. “If you do remember anything, I want you to tell me right away.”

“S-sure.” He bowed and frowned. Something wasn’t quite right here.

Origami was a member of the Self-Defense Forces Anti-Spirit Team. It was her job to defeat Spirits. So it was natural that she would want to know about a new Spirit. However, he couldn’t quite put it into words, but the way she asked seemed just a bit different from usual somehow.

“Why do you want to know about that Spirit so badly?”

“Because.” Origami stopped for a moment and bit her lip before continuing. “Do you remember what I told you before?”

“Before?”

“About my parents being killed by a Spirit.”

“…! Oh. Yeah, I remember.” He nodded. How could he have forgotten? It was the reason why Origami hated the Spirits, those world-killing catastrophes.

“Five years ago. A Spirit caused a large fire in the Nanko residential area in Tengu and burned my mother and father to ash before my eyes. It was that Spirit who controls flames.”

“Wha—?” Shido was speechless.

He felt like a hand had reached down his throat to squeeze his internal organs. It became harder and harder to breathe, and a violent desire to vomit pushed up from the depths of his stomach.

He took a deep breath and let it out again. He thought about what Origami had said. When he replayed her words, however, he couldn’t find any confusion or inconsistencies. She had definitely said that the Spirit of flames had killed her parents.

That Kotori had killed her parents.

“I’ve been looking for her forever. I’ve been searching all this time,” Origami continued, seeming not to notice Shido’s bewilderment. “I finally found her.

“At last, I found her. I’ll kill her. Kill her. I will kill her. With my own hands.

“That’s what these five years have been about.

“I joined the AST for this moment.

“I got a Realizer for this moment.

“I learned techniques and tools for this moment.

“All of it to defeat the criminal.

“All of it to strike the flame Spirit.

“All of it to kill Efreet.”

She laid out the words of her curse with an eloquence that was impossible to imagine from her usual demeanor. Her expression was dull, her voice flat. She wasn’t gesturing wildly, and yet there was a strong, deep resentment in her words that would leave anyone listening gasping for air.

Efreet. That was probably the code name given to Kotori as a Spirit.

And five years ago. That did line up with what Kotori had said.

“But that’s—you can’t… She’s—,” he protested.

“Do you know something?” Origami cocked her head to one side.

Shido gasped and shook his head. “N-no… That’s not what I was saying.”

“Oh.” She lowered her eyes, which had been trained on Shido.

Instantly, he felt all the tension run out of him like he had been released from an invisible cell. But he couldn’t let the conversation end there. “O-Origami,” he ventured to say.

“What?”

“If it’s too hard to talk about, that’s okay… But maybe you could tell me a little more about this Spirit from five years ago. I-it might help me remember something…”

She nodded a tiny bit. “On that day, when I came home from grocery shopping—”

Origami spoke in a quiet voice. About how her parents were alive at first amid the flames. How the Spirit appeared and killed them before her very eyes. How she couldn’t really see the Spirit properly because her mind was hazy and her vision blurry. How she later learned about the Spirit that was the cause of this fire, Efreet.

Even though it all happened five years earlier, she didn’t falter once. It almost sounded like she’d only gone through all this the other day.

“…!”

Shido felt his heart pounding excessively loudly. She still hadn’t told him the thing he desperately wanted to hear—some definitive difference between this Spirit and Kotori. He couldn’t actually believe that his Kotori had killed Origami’s parents.

“And that’s that,” Origami finished, without giving Shido the confirmation he had hoped for.

He turned toward her and took a step forward as if imploring her. Something. One thing—he didn’t care what. He just wanted proof that Kotori hadn’t done this.

“N-nothing else?” he asked. “Nothing similar to the Spirit you saw yesterday—?”

“Attention, visitors. Visiting hours have ended for the day. All visitors are asked to please make your way to the exit. I repeat…”

The announcement came in from the hallway and drowned Shido out.

“What were you saying?” Origami looked at him, expecting Shido to repeat himself.

But he quietly shook his head. “N-no. It’s nothing. Get better soon, Origami.”

She nodded, and he hurried to make his way out of her room before she said anything else to stop him.

Although visiting hours were over, he probably had a few minutes’ leeway before someone came and herded him to the exit, but he couldn’t bring himself to ask his question again. The announcement had killed his momentum, true. He knew that wasn’t the whole of it, though.

He was scared—terrified that Origami would say something that actually proved that the Spirit five years ago was Kotori.

“…” He closed the door as quietly as possible, dropped his gaze to the floor, and began to walk.

This was a hospital hallway. Walking too quickly could pose danger and was not permitted. His pace naturally quickened, however, as if to release the thoughts that had nowhere to go. He pressed a hand to his chest to try and suppress the wild pounding of his heart as his footfalls echoed around him.

“…!”

The phone that vibrated in his pocket stopped his feet on their march toward the exit. He had forgotten to turn it off when he entered the hospital. He hurriedly stepped outside, pulled the phone from his pocket, and pressed the answer button.

“Hello?”

“…Hello? Shin?”

“Reine?” He had been in too much of a hurry to check the screen before he answered, but the sleepy voice and nickname told him exactly who it was. It had been quite some time since they met, but Reine still was getting Shido’s name wrong.

“…Yes. Are you done with your visit to Mana?”

“Oh. Yeah. I mean, sort of.”

“…? That’s not really an answer.”

“Um, the truth is, she’s in treatment and isn’t allowed to have any visitors.”

“…Hmm, she is?” Reine groaned.

“? Is that a problem?”

“…No, it’s fine. Anyway, Shin, can you maybe come back to Fraxinus now? It’s about Kotori.”

“…!” He held his breath. He had been shaken by how Kotori looked when he saw her before leaving Fraxinus earlier, and with what Origami had just told him, he felt his insides twist around. “D-did something happen with Kotori?!”

“…No. After some discussion, we’ve decided to hold a strategy meeting.”

“A strategy meeting?” he asked, frowning.

“…Yes,” Reine replied. “…Shin, you said it would be hard for you to make Kotori weak in the knees…but you do have a big advantage that you didn’t have with Tohka or Yoshino.”

“I do?”

“…Mm-hmm. It’s very simple. Unlike a Spirit that appears out of nowhere, this target has spent years with us. Her preferences, likes, dislikes, favorite places, things she wants…et cetera, et cetera—we have all this information. And on a level that doesn’t even begin to compare with the other Spirits. There’s no way this won’t prove useful.”

“Y-you’re right.”

Now that she mentioned it, that was exactly it. True, Kotori in commander mode was more difficult to handle than pretty much anyone else, but if they only looked at the personal data they’d already amassed, then she was nothing compared to the other Spirits. In that sense, she might have been the easiest Spirit to come up with countermeasures for.

“…So we’re gathering the crew members who know Kotori best to discuss the plan for your date in two days. I thought it would be great if you could join, too, Shin.”

If that was the case, he could hardly say no. He nodded. “Understood. I don’t know how helpful I’ll be, but I’m happy to do what I can.”

“…Great. Fraxinus will pick you up. Can you go back to your house?”

“Okay, got it. And, Reine?”

“…Hmm? What’s up?”

“Um. About the thing five years ago. Kotori…”

“Kotori what?” Reine asked.

Shido couldn’t put the rest of the words together. Maybe it was that his thoughts were muddled, and he didn’t know how to phrase the question. Or maybe he hesitated to even put a question like that to Reine, Kotori’s subordinate and good friend.

“…It’s nothing.”

“…? Yeah? Okay. See you later,” Reine said and hung up.

Shido silently pressed the end button, shoved his phone back into his pocket, and began treading forward with heavy feet.

“Shido!”

When Shido was brought to the ship with Fraxinus’s transport device, Reine and Tohka—both dressed in the same military uniform—were waiting for him.

“Oh! Tohka! You’re awak—”

Tohka leaped at him without waiting for him to finish his sentence.

“Wh-whoa!” He stiffened in surprise.

Tohka paid no mind to this as she wrapped her arms around his neck and squeezed tightly. “Mm! Shido! So you’re okay! That’s great!”

“Mm… Thanks to you.” He struggled to breathe and patted her shoulder to get her to let go of him.

“Mm,” she said and was about to pull away, having intuited his intent. “Hmm?” She furrowed her brow doubtfully and brought her face close to his neck once more. She twitched her nose, sniffing around.

“Wh-what? Is something wrong, Tohka?”

“Oh… I thought I smelled something yucky,” Tohka said, scowling. “I don’t know what… It’s like I was expecting to smell something good, but then just sniffing it made me all grumpy or, like, angry… Oh, that’s it! It smells like Origami Tobiichi.”

What an incredible sense of smell! Shido’s heart nearly beat out of his chest. “…! M-m-maybe it’s just in your mind…?”

“Mm… Maybe. I guess. Is there something wrong with me? I mean, why would I be smelling Origami Tobiichi on you, Shido? Her scent wouldn’t get on you unless you were, like, giving her a piggyback ride or something.”

“…! R-right. And there’s no way that happened.”

“…Maybe we should get going, Shin?” Reine spoke up, head gently wobbling, as she watched Shido and Tohka from the side. As usual, she looked sleepy, or more like she would collapse at any second.

“Oh… Sure. Sorry.”

“…Mm. Then follow me. Tohka, maybe you could play with Yoshino for a bit?”

“Hmm? Can’t I go with Shido?” Tohka looked up at him, her eyebrows knitted together.

He felt a stab in his heart, but there was no way they could let Tohka attend a meeting on how to make Kotori fall for him. “Sorry, Tohka. I’ve got a thing to take care of.”

“Mm… Fine.” Tohka acquiesced, even as she pursed her lips in a pout, and slowly walked away.

“…Okay. Let’s get going,” Reine said and staggered away. Shido followed her.

They went a route he’d never been before and arrived at a large door. When Reine stood in front of it, there was a beep, and the door slid open automatically.

“…Go on in.” She stood by the side of the door and urged him to go ahead.

The space inside was large. In the center of the room, there was a round table with several crew members already seated around it. This was apparently the strategy meeting room.

“…Go on and take a seat wherever.” Reine tottered forward like a ghost and plunked herself down in an empty seat.

Following her lead, Shido sat next to her. He looked down to see a small LCD and a keyboard. It seemed that simple consoles had been set up at every seat.

The man seated next to him cleared his throat and got to his feet. His hair reached down to his back, and he had a chiseled face that was quite un-Japanese. A tall man looking like something out of an old shojo manga.

Kyouhei Kannazuki, deputy captain of the airship Fraxinus and vice commander of Ratatoskr operations. With Kotori held in isolation, he was now in charge, for all intents and purposes.

“Thank you all for coming. With the urgent situation, I, Kannazuki, will take the lead here on behalf of our commander. Shido, I would be happy if you could join us for a little while.”

“Yes, of course.”

Kannazuki nodded, satisfied, before continuing. “Then, let us get straight to the main agenda. I know some of you have known for a while about the situation with the commander, while others are new to this knowledge. But I look forward to cooperation from you all.

“Our agenda today is to create a plan for the date between Commander Itsuka and Shido two days hence. We will each present what information we have so we might create a day that will delight the commander from the bottom of her heart.” Kannazuki looked around at the crew assembled in the room before taking a deep breath.

“…Shin. Cover your ears,” Reine warned.

“Huh?” Shido looked at her, confused.

“Now, people. Dear personnel of Ratatoskr. This affair with our beloved goddess is serious business. It is time to repay our daily blessings. To the commander! To Commander Kotori Itsuka!” Kannazuki shouted in a voice that carried. “She needs our help! Do you have the spirit to meet that need?!”

““Aye!”” The crew around the table raised their voices in response. The roar shook the air and reverberated off the walls to assault Shido’s eardrums.

“Wh-what?!” he cried in confusion.

“Do you wish the commander to praise you?!” Kannazuki continued.

““Aye!””

“Do you wish to see the commander smile?!”

““Aye!””

“Do you wish to be kicked right on your heinie with the heel of her boot after being made to crawl on all fours?!”

““A…ye?””

It seemed that this did not obtain agreement. Kannazuki cleared his throat.

“Now is the time! We must show our love! Sing her name!”

““KO-TO-RI!

““KO-TO-RI!

““L-O-V-E KO-TO-RI!””

The briefing room was ablaze with passion. This wasn’t so much a superior officer issuing commands or subordinates asking questions as it was something from an idol’s concert.

“Excellent!” Kannazuki declared. “Now begin the reports! We shall fulfill our commander’s hopes, her desires, her everything, and make her weak in the knees!”

““Yeaaah!”” The crew began to tap at the consoles before them and flip through the materials they had brought.

“Wh-what was that?” Shido shook his head slightly, his ears still ringing.

“…What? Everyone loves Kotori,” Reine replied.

“Uh-huh…,” he said, a trail of sweat sliding down his cheek.

Someone spoke from the opposite side of the round table. The voice belonged to a lean man whose hair was starting to gray. Shido was pretty sure his name was “Boss” Mikimoto.

“Vice Commander! Me first!”

“Excellent!” Kannazuki cried. “Permission to speak granted!”

“Yessir! The most essential element is presents! Given that we know her likes, we can say that this is easier to understand than with a regular Spirit! As we all know, the commander’s favorite candy is Chupa Chups! What if we were to create an original flavor and present it to her?!”

“Non!” Kannazuki snapped. “We haven’t the time for that! Do you honestly believe we can transcend the commander’s Chupa love with knowledge on the level of what we possess?! Pay mind! The most difficult present to give is that which the receiver already loves!”

“…! M-my sincerest apologies!”

“Next!”

“Yessir!” Another crew member stood up. “Dimension Breaker” Nakatsugawa. “According to information from the commander’s junior high school friend, Kana Saotome, she has recently been devoted to a phone app to raise a pig—”

“Hey! Where did you get that information?!” Shido shouted, outraged.

Nakatsugawa smiled with great satisfaction and snapped a thumbs-up at him. “No need for concern. I paid her quite handsomely to stay quiet about this. And so that she would not learn of our existence in Ratatoskr, I made sure to play the part of a pervert stalker obsessed with Kotori!”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?!” Shido moaned.

“Haah… Haah… Hey, little girl? Are you friends with that girl you were walking with earlier? I-I’ll give you some pocket money if you tell me all about her.”

“Grossssss!” Shido yelped. “And, like, Kana sold her friend out to a creep like you?!”

“It seems her mother is quite ill, and she needed the money. She made the decision to do this after a lot of time spent hesitating. She still wets her pillow with tears of regret.”

“Sorry, Kana, for involving you in our business!” Shido cradled his head in his hands.

“Vice Commander, if I may?” A middle-aged man stood up next. “Bad Marriage” Kawagoe.

“I have high hopes from you.”

“Sir! Please take a look at this. It’s video from May second.” Kawagoe tapped some buttons on his console, and video from the bridge was displayed on the monitor in the middle of the round table.

Kotori was sitting in the captain’s chair. It looked like she was just finishing up some tasks. She stretched and rubbed a shoulder as she opened her mouth.

“…Phew, I’m beat. I wish I could go to the hot springs and just relax.”

““…!”” The assembled crew began to chatter.

“Th-the hot springs…”

“Yessir! The commander did indeed say this. And so this is my proposal,” Kawagoe began, and the image on the monitor switched to a traditional hot springs resort hotel. “Delivering a moment of total Zen. To refresh body and soul and free yourself! Tsukimigahara Hot Springs! A four-night package! Natural hot spring water flows from its underground source and is sure to take the tension out of the commander’s shoulders and heart.”

“I-interesting!”

“And that is not all. Albeit with time restrictions, at this resort…there is mixed bathing!” Kawagoe declared.

““Wha—?”” Once again, a shiver of excitement ran through the room.

Kawagoe threw his arms out with a maniacal grin. “After an extensive investigation, I have learned that the last time the commander bathed with Shido was five years ago!”

“H-h-how do you even know that?!” Shido shouted and was magnificently ignored.

“Although they are brother and sister and normally unaware of each other as man and woman,” Kawagoe continued passionately, “by bathing together again after such a long time, Shido will notice his sister’s surprising maturity, and the commander, too, will have mysterious feelings about her brother’s body! A pounding of the heart that betrays reason. Each time skin touches skin, they are made aware of each other once more! Naturally, we will double the usual number of cameras to record this scene!”

““Wh-whoa!”” The crew grew excited. Although there were several female crew members present, for some reason, they began to breathe heavily with excitement as well. Almost as if this had been their objective all along.

“And then the final night comes for them. This delightful sojourn must come to an end at last. The commander will muster up her courage and say, ‘…Hmph. I guess I could let you sleep with me just for today.’”

““…! …!”” The crew twisted around as if in agony.

“With neither starting it, their hands touch, and body joins body. And then lips touch lips! Aah! Congratulations, Commander! Congratulations!” Kawagoe covered his eyes.

When Shido looked closely, he saw that he was crying. And it wasn’t just Kawagoe. All the crew around the table except for Reine were moved beyond reason and had tears in their eyes.

“Shido… Be good to the commander…”

“Please make her happy.”

“Ah, ah, ah…”

Several damp gazes turned on him.

“Uh, that’s a whole thing…” Shido picked at his skin, dumbfounded.

“Such a half-hearted response! And you call yourself a man?!”

“That’s right! Stand up and take responsibility!”

“We can’t give our commander to a man like this!”

They all sounded like Kotori’s father now. Shido frowned and put a hand to his forehead.

Kannazuki clapped his hands to get the room under control again. “No, but his plan is wonderful! A Saint Kotori for you!”

“Thank you so much!” Kawagoe pounded a fist into the palm of his hand and bowed his head.

“Um, what’s a Saint Kotori?” Shido asked Reine in a quiet voice, as he watched all this.

“…A button badge Kannazuki made using a picture of Kotori.”

“…I see.” This wasn’t an award that was particularly worth wanting.

The crew nodded at one another as if the plan was half-settled already.

“…But I wonder if four days will be too much for Kotori,” Reine said.

““…Oh.”” The crew’s jaws dropped, and they looked at one another. And then they frowned at the same time.

“Mm. Hmm. Now that you mention it. Can we make it a shorter trip?”

“No! This plan will only succeed if they toe the distance between them for the previous days, which will act as the trigger for that final night!” Kawagoe shouted.

“…And I feel like Kotori’s actions on that final night are closer to a hope than a plan,” Reine added.

““Ah…!”” Everyone gasped, as if they had only realized this once Reine pointed it out.

“Ngh! In that case, what should we do…?” Kannazuki groaned in anguish.

Reine let out a small sigh. “…Well, I don’t really think we need to make it more difficult than we have to.”

“M-meaning?”

“…Shin, is there anywhere Kotori mentioned wanting to go?”

“Somewhere she wants to go?” he asked.

“…Mm-hmm. Instead of someplace you heard about from someone else or from eavesdropping on her, a place she mentioned knowing that you could hear her would be ideal. The best location would be somewhere she specifically asked you to take her.”

“U-uh…” Shido put a hand to his chin. Somewhere that Kotori had pestered him to take her… “Um… Oh, I know! I don’t know when it was, but I feel like she told me to take her to Eibu Ocean Park after seeing a commercial for it.”

“…Mm. She did? Then wouldn’t that be good?” Reine said, nodding.

“W-would it?” he asked. “I mean, she did say that, but it wasn’t in commander mode, you know? She was in sister mode.”

“…Doesn’t matter. It’s not like she has a totally separate personality like Yoshino,” Reine replied. “In fact, that’s when she’s displaying her true feelings, so this might be the perfect situation.”

“Uh-huh…”

Kannazuki frowned, troubled. “Ocean Park? Well, that is a spot typical for dates, but we can’t exactly declare the matter settled without indicating a clear course of action.”

The other crew members seemed to be of the same opinion as Kannazuki. The corners of their mouths were turned down, and they looked unlikely to agree to this.

“…If we do Ocean Park, you’ll be able to see Kotori looking adorable in her bathing suit,” Reine remarked.

““…!””

Shido heard them all gasp. It seemed like it would be surprisingly simple to settle on a plan for a date that held the fates of Kotori and Ratatoskr.