Chapter 9: Cry for the Moon

I’m sorry! Kai thought.

Having returned from Aina’s house, he’d gone on to wring his brain for every drop of creativity he had. Nevertheless, he’d failed to produce any decent ideas. But Kai knew that if he gave up now, he wouldn’t be able to forgive himself for it later. Saying, “Nothing came to mind so I don’t have anything,” would be unacceptable. There was a bare minimum he needed to achieve in order to call himself a planner.

Kai may not have come up with anything good, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have anything. He’d dedicated an entire day to work following his encounter with Aina, and during that time a few ideas had taken form. The dead of night came and went, and he distinctly remembered having pushed on until the wee hours of the morning, but two all-nighters’ worth of serious brain power had caught up to him in the end, and he’d only noticed his nap upon waking. By the time he’d done so, he was on pace to be late for the club meeting, even if moving at top speed. So, he quickly rinsed his face off and flew out the door.

The first thing that came out of his mouth when he entered the club room was, “I’m sorry!” When he raised his bowed head, everyone but Eru (who was working away with headphones on) was peering at him with a puzzled look. “I couldn’t come up with anything I’m proud of,” he explained, laying out a few printed proposals. “...I’m sorry.”

“Senpai, don’t scare us like that! Well,” Aya amended with a snicker as she glanced at the papers. “On your end, it looks like things were pretty chaotic.”

“A-Ah-chan...” Nanaka said. “B-But, look, this ‘Characters blow up a balloon until it pops,’ idea seems intuitive—”

“But not quite good?” Aina finished. “It’s just the topics, as-is. There’s not really a twist, is there?” She looked over at Kai to silently convey that she was shocked at how poor his taste was.

“Aina-chan, not you, too,” Nanaka said sadly.

“No,” Kai interrupted, knowing that this wasn’t any time for consolation. “She’s completely right... So, I want to begin with a BSS here with everyone.”

“BSS?” Nanaka repeated.

“Brainstorm session, Nana-sen,” Aya chimed in. “Basically, we all throw out anything we can think of.”

“That...” As soon as Nanaka understood, her bright expression returned like the sun hidden by a cloud. “Yeah, that’s great!” she exclaimed. “I think it sounds perfect! Let’s do it, Kai-kun!” Then she quickly retrieved Eru from the back of the room.

This brought them all together at the same table for the first time in a long time—the first time ever with Aina in the mix. They were to prioritize quantity over quality, and bring up any idea that derived itself from the prompts ‘Character’ and ‘Breath.’ These were the rules as they began their brainstorm, but... in short, it was a nightmare.

“How about a gacha that you can roll with your breath?! Like this,” said Aya, enthusiastically blowing into her phone. “Or how about the game is set in space, so if you can’t pull anything good, you run out of oxygen and die?! It’s a life-or-death battle with the gacha!”

“Mm, what about a game where you blow into a girl’s ear softly to advance the dialogue?” Aina said, blowing seductively. “And the lines could change depending on how you do. Oh, and of course, I’ll be doing the voice acting. ♪”

Kai was happy and grateful that they were coming up with ideas. They were free to say whatever came to mind. But, well, you know, Kai thought. Aren’t you being a little too free with those suggestions?

“Ah,” Aya said, raising her hand like a student in the classroom. “I guess you could say I’ve been doing a little enemy reconnaissance. I was wondering if that blonde-drilled runt’s school posted anything,” she said, placing her phone in the middle of the table. “It looks like they’re right in the middle of a livestream.”

The image on screen was of Kongouin Academy’s club president, Kongouin Mirei—or the “blonde-drilled runt,” in Aya’s words—holding a microphone. There were comments scrolling across the screen from side to side, driving home that the stream was being delivered in real time.

“And that shall conclude our announcements on BeauSt! I’m quite sure all the information regarding the new event has you positively thrilled! Hm?” Mirei paused to read a comment. “...Ohohoho! Your opinions on the gacha are most valued among our management team. Would you kindly redirect your comment in chat to our in-game suggestion form? Our customer support staff will shed tears of joy! ...However! Should your verbiage be so vitriolic, they may very well find themselves in sad tears, so be sure to send those messages to my personal Twitter account... Am I understood?”

The comments rolling by on-screen included:

“Shut up.”

“What bullshit.”

“I’ll send it to both.”

In any case, they were being quite harsh. It felt like her chat was full of nothing but haters. They had seemed like a school with many enemies, but this was worse than expected.

“Well, it makes sense,” Aya explained. “Not only did they put up a new gacha banner yesterday, but the drop rates were lower than usual, there’s no safety net, and the character’s only good if you pull enough to max limit break her—but then she’s overpowered. They pulled out every trick to milk their player base on the banner of a popular character, so they’re getting a lot of flame.”

“I get it, ♪” Aina hummed. “This one was really nasty. Plus, the art is so pretty that it makes me want her!”

“I got her, though,” Aya noted.

“Aww, I wish I could say the same.”

“Huuuh?” Aya’s mouth twisted into a mean smirk. “Are you okay with that, Aye-aye? You know you’ll get her if you don’t give up, right? There’s no character you can’t pull if you keep going, you know?”

“I’m not a junkie like you, Aya-chan. Besides, usually you can’t do that, and you wouldn’t even if you could.” Turning to Kai, Aina continued, “Kai-kun, you don’t keep rolling until you get the character, do you?”

“Uh... This time, I got her straight away,” he mumbled.

Aina didn’t open her mouth, but the color of her eyes conveyed the message, “Read the mood.”

Still, Kai couldn’t change the fact that he had gotten lucky. He had gotten the character in question off of his first single-pull, and had an inkling that he was on a wave of good fortune, so he’d kept going and picked up enough dupes to completely limit break her. But he felt like saying that would cause the innocent mask to crumble off of Aina’s face, so he used his better judgment and left that bit out.

As Aya and Aina engaged in verbal warfare between the haves and have-nots, Nanaka came over to ask Kai a question. “This kind of thing is hard to balance... right?”

He nodded and answered, “It’s one of the biggest headaches you’ll encounter while managing a game.”

On the surface, ‘limit breaking’ was a system designed to mitigate the issue of pulling duplicate items or characters. If there wasn’t any value in getting a character you already had, then the users’ desire to roll would drop dramatically—obviously, since the odds would necessarily worsen with every pull.

The need to alleviate this issue led to limit breaking. (Every game had its own term for it, but the concept was generally the same.) It was a form of insurance that a second copy of a character would make them stronger or give them a new costume, and it guaranteed a duplicate’s worth. Naturally, the users would also be happier to see that there was some kind of silver lining than not.

...However, this was the surface level explanation, and Kongouin Academy was being burnt at the stake because the darker side of limit breaking had crept up into the spotlight. Depending on its implementation, limit breaking was also a system that could make its players collect multiple copies of the same unit. Kongouin’s new character, who was ‘only strong if you max limit break her,’ was a blatant example.

By forcing the user to collect duplicates, a development team was effectively increasing the odds of there being in-game purchases. If one copy of a character were enough, then a user could get lucky and land them in one try, like Kai. But if they needed two or three, the odds skewed toward spending becoming a requirement due to simple statistics. As a result, the system could be abused by the developers to hike up their profit per spender, while the users were forced to walk into a hell of endless gacha pulls.

“But of course,” Kai concluded, “it still gives duplicates purpose, so...”

“...As long as you implement it well, it’ll be good for the user?” Nanaka filled in.

“Yeah. But... if you mess up, people will boil over and it’ll end up like this,” he told her. The chat window of the livestream was an endless flood of hate and anger.

Developer and user—to balance the merits and demerits for each was a talent that planners prized highly. Looking at the chat messages, it seemed that Kongouin’s planners had made a terrible mistake, regardless of what their intentions had been. When the player base had this much bottled-up frustration, it could even affect the management staff; this was not a desirable outcome.

“L-Let us take a step back and move on to our top-secret development team!” Mirei announced. While Kai had been looking away, she had moved to another location.

“M-Mirei-sama, what are you—”

“Move aside!” She kicked the tall boy who had tried to block her path—his name was Kinoyama, if Kai recalled—out of the way, and his mushroom hair swayed as a shudder-inducing “Nfough!” escaped his lips.

However, the comments in chat read:

“Mushroom’s here!”

“What a reward.”

“He’s gross, but I’m so jealous.”

They were somewhat more amicable than before. It looked like this wasn’t the first stream Kongouin’s team had hosted, and that Mirei and Kinoyama’s interactions were viewed as a running joke.

“Welcome to the place where we are currently focusing most of our efforts: the VR development team!” said Mirei. “Of course, I would never allow this to appear before our live audience had we not achieved verifiable results! That is what I plan to—”

“It will not do to show our work, Mirei-sama,” said the mushroom boy.

“Kinoyama,” she pressed.

“...As your attendant, there is a line that I cannot—hfough! Crooough!—cross...” Another kick from Mirei sent raw footage of the mushroom, shuddering in the space between pain and pleasure, across the feed for the whole world to see. The spectacle bordered on apocalypse.

“These people really are idiots,” Aya moaned.

“Well...” Kai couldn’t deny that. “But hey,” he said, “it’s incredible that they’re trying their hand at VR.”

“That’s where you put those giant goggles on, right?” Nanaka asked.

“Nanaka-chan, are you talking about head mounted displays?” Aina suggested.

“Oh, that! That’s it!” Nanaka exclaimed. “You get to play in a virtual world, right? I haven’t tried it, though...”

“You can experience a simplified version by combining your smartphone with some cardboard,” Aina explained. “Some companies even distribute cardboard do-it-yourself kits so you can play their social games.”

“Wow! Do you think Kongouin-san’s team is going to do that, too?”

“Ahh, they look rich enough to go for it,” Aya groaned. “I’m sure she’d say, ‘To distribute cardboard is but a single step of our marketing, ohohoho~’ or something like that. In the first place, I’d rather them figure out their gameplay before they get into this and that about VR and graphics.”

“Me too, ♪” Aina hummed in agreement. “I wish they made the game itself more fun.”

Kai couldn’t not hear the underlying ‘It’s boring as hell’ in her remark. In a sense, it was the honest opinion of a user—and that opinion didn’t need Aina’s voice to become visible in the stream’s chat box. The comments read:

“Graphics again?”

“VR is a pain.”

“How about you take off your clothes?”

“The graphics are more than enough, hurry up with a fun game update.”

“It’s impossible for these people to make a fun game, lol.”

“Impossible?”

“Clothes.”

“If you can do 3D then how about an action game?”

“No way.”

“lol 0% chance”

“If they could do it, then we wouldn’t call them Konstopin.”

“That’s true.”

These comments were the unfiltered truth, which was exactly what made them so biting. Like the endless bubbles of a boiling pot, they enveloped the entirety of the stream’s comments section.

“...Can I turn this off?” Aya asked. Her conversation with Aina had lulled, so she reached for her phone.

“Stop!” Mirei barked, as if she was reacting to Aya’s hand. Her voice was commanding, like the ringing howl of a prideful wolf. “Very well. We ‘can only create games that aren’t fun as games,’ was it? Quite. Whatever the truth may be, the fact that our dear users see us in this manner is but another truth we must accept. Then, allow me to make a declaration: as luck would have it, we are participating in Summit.”

“...Mirei-sama?” Kinoyama was a single step too slow to stop Mirei, whose cheeks were flushed with anger as she pointed her finger at the camera, her hand close enough for viewers to make out her fingerprint on their screens.

The prideful wolf had been replaced by a hound whose tail had been trampled. Snarling in rage, she said, “Our opponent is the unaccomplished Meikun High. They may boast an ace illustrator in Kuroba Eru, but the overwhelming skill gap between our graphics is capable of scoring a victory all on its own... However—let me swear this to you—we shall not hold back! We shall create an action game that will bring honor to the Kongouin name! Is that clear?! Our work will leave you floored! All of you who left comments ought to prepare yourselves! If you understand your folly, then admit as much in the chat!”

“M-Mirei-sama,” asked Kinoyama, “what are you saying?!”

“Make way, Kinoyama! Hey! Don’t cut the—” With a quick bzt, the video feed went dark.

Silently, the members of the Meikun social game club looked up at one another. “...I guess they’re making a 3D action game over there. Looks like our recon work was a big hit. But...” Instead of her usual boredom, Aya’s brow was twitching with uncharacteristic anger. “Well, it’s not like I care either way, you know? This blonde-drilled runt can say whatever she wants, and it won’t hold a candle to the gacha... But ‘ace illustrator’? I can’t help but feel like this pipsqueak is forgetting something. It’s getting on my nerves how thoroughly she’s underestimating us...”

“I think she’s a teensy bit stupid,” Aina agreed, “but isn’t she still miles ahead of us? We haven’t decided on anything yet.” Right, Kai-kun? She didn’t say the last bit aloud, but Kai got the message. It was so obvious that it didn’t need to be said, and it wasn’t as if he could mount any sort of protest.

“E-Eru,” Nanaka said, shifting the conversation. “Do you have any ideas?”

Eru didn’t have her headphones on, but that hadn’t prevented her from remaining silent and sketching away in her sketchbook. She stopped her pen and took a moment to think before finally releasing the seal on her lips. “Nothing in particular... except...”

“Except?” Nanaka echoed.

“Our topic includes the word ‘Character,’ so I do believe our plan should include character illustrations,” Eru told them.

“...That’s fair.”

She’s completely right, Kai thought. The word ‘Character’ could also mean something akin to personality or individuality, and those interpretations were within the bounds of this Summit’s rules. However, he agreed with Eru that it was best to simply take the prompt at face value.

What’s more, Eru’s art was one of Meikun’s most powerful weapons. It wasn’t an option to leave her on the bench during a competition like Summit. Kai wasn’t the only one who held this opinion, either.

“Welp, we need characters to make a gacha,” Aya said.

“I need a character if I want to voice act,” Aina added.

The two girls—each of whom had, up to now, been off in their own world—gave their approval, and Nanaka nodded along. Eru shot a glare at Aina when she spoke, but the situation hadn’t escalated any further.

They’d finally decided that, at the very least, they would include character illustrations. From that point on, a ton of suggestions flew across the room (primarily from Aya and Aina), but none of the ideas were constructive, so the last of the thinking fell to Kai and Nanaka as the planners.

Technically, Aina’s position in the club was that of a planner as well, but she played the fool and said, “I’ll try and come up with more, but I already told you everything that came to mind. ♪” But after taking turns hurling out ideas with Aya, it was possible that Aina really was out of leads. Even if she offered something new, it was sure to wrap back to using her voice at some point.

A short train ride transported the group to Niigata Station, where they broke off to head home. Aya lived on the opposite side of the station, so she left through a different gate. Eru simply stated, “Bookstore,” and disappeared.

Aina lived in the same direction as the last two, but she split up early saying, “I have to buy groceries for dinner. Buh-bye! ♪” Kai figured Haruko had told her to do so, and found himself alone with Nanaka before he’d even realized it.

“Hey, Kai-kun?” she said, pointing her finger toward the only family restaurant near Niigata Station. She continued on to ask, “Do you wanna stop by and brainstorm some more?”

“For the proposal?” he clarified.

“Yup! I felt like all we’ve done so far is listen to Ah-chan and Aina-chan,” she confessed. “How about it?”

Kai didn’t have any reason to refuse, so the two of them made their way inside, where they kept their order to a pair of fountain drinks and french fries to snack on. The fries came out right away, so Kai watched their food and only went to fill up his drink after Nanaka had returned from doing so herself.

When he sat back down with a cup full of melon soda, Nanaka giggled while munching on a fry. “That’s kinda unexpected,” she said with a laugh.

“What is?” Kai asked.

“That,” she clarified, pointing toward his drink. “You like melon soda?”

“Um, well... I wonder,” he admitted. “I wasn’t really thinking when I filled my cup... Oh, but I drink this pretty often when I come to these kinds of places. Maybe I do like it?” The end of his sentence inflected upwards, as if to convey doubt.

“Kai-kun, I can’t answer a question about your taste,” Nanaka told him.

“O-Oh, right.”

“That is right,” she laughed cheerily. “I feel sort of relieved.”

“...Did something happen?” he asked.

“Well... that ‘something’ is you, Kai-kun.”

“Me?”

“Yup,” she said, shifting her pointer finger toward him. “When you told me, ‘I want to write the proposal myself.’ ...No, even before that. Ever since we left Tokyo, I felt like you were a bit off.”

“That’s because—” you wanted to show off your cool side to Nanaka-chan, right? he thought, and stopped speaking mid-sentence.

“...Kai-kun? You okay? Your face is getting red...”

“Um... It’s just... I was feeling a little stressed,” he told her, as a little Misako danced around his brain with a smug grin. You only noticed thanks to me! she said, and he swatted the image out of his mind.

“I see,” said Nanaka. “Was it because of that Hifumi Tetsuya person and Kongouin-san?”

“No,” he replied. There was that, too, but that wasn’t quite the core of it.

“Something else?”

Kai began to nod, but froze midway. If he nodded, then the next thing Nanaka would ask about was what he had been stressing over; that much was plain to see. It would be simple to say, ‘I’m stressing because of you.’ The words were simple, and what’s more, it was the truth. Even he could probably say that much. But it wasn’t the whole truth; there was something more that kept him from nodding.

No one would sit by idly when told something was their fault. Kai knew that he would definitely ask for the reason if someone said, “I’m stressing because of you,” to him. And thanks to his stupid sister, he knew exactly why he was stressing over Nanaka.

He could tell her. He could convey that idea if he wanted to: ‘I was stressed. I felt like you would continue walking forward without me. I wanted to prove to you that I could do it, too. I wanted you to see my cool side, just this once. I wanted to show off.’ If he really bit the bullet, he could say all of this. After all, it was only the truth.

But that wasn’t it, either. There was something even beyond that. Why did he want to show off his cool side? Why had he panicked, when he’d felt like she was leaving him behind? To answer that, he arrived at a single conclusion: he didn’t want to be left behind because that meant he wouldn’t be beside her. The trigger for his unusual urge to talk big and show off... If he answered these questions, there would be no denying it.

It wouldn’t be any different than telling her, ‘Shiraseki Kai _____ you.’

“Kai-kun?” said Nanaka.

“Y-Yeah?! U-Uh! Um, sorry! It’s, uh, nothing.”

“R-Really?”

It obviously was more than nothing. Even to Kai, his reply sounded pathetic. “Um... how do I put this?” he said, trying to explain. “The reason you thought I was acting weird... and the reason I’m acting weird now, is because my circumstances... er, my headspace? Yeah, my headspace is a little off. So don’t worry about... Nanaka-san?”

“Pft,” Kai looked up to see that Nanaka was holding her mouth and chuckling at him. “S-Sorry,” she apologized, joyfully stifling another laugh and wiping at her eyes. “You’re so funny, Kai-kun.”

The soft smile on her face pierced through Kai’s heart all too easily.

“Okay, let’s get started,” she said, clearing the air. Then, the two of them nibbled on fries and visited the drink bar as they put their heads together to pump out new ideas.

Even with two of them, there was no guarantee that a stellar, revolutionary, overwhelmingly new idea would fall into their laps. The creativity slowly dwindled, and the time spent looking up at the ceiling with their arms folded, or staring outside, or groaning with their heads in their hands increased.

The time ticked away, but they didn’t throw in the towel. Having someone struggling together beside you is reason enough to push forward, Kai realized.

“Whoa, it’s already this late?” said Nanaka, checking her phone.

The summer days were now long enough for there to still be sunlight, but it was nearly 6:00 pm. They paid their bill and stepped out of the restaurant into the hot midsummer air. The temperature had hardly fallen since noon, and it completely enveloped them. It was hot. Beside him, Kai could see Nanaka groaning about the heat while fanning the collar of her blouse.

“Alright,” she said, “let’s go home.”

“Oh, sorry. I’m going for a little walk,” Kai replied.

“A walk?” asked Nanaka, tilting her head in confusion.

Kai couldn’t blame her. Until now, he hadn’t acted like the sort of person who went for walks. He’d look more natural cooped up indoors, like a snail in its shell, having a staring contest with his smartphone. That impression of him wasn’t exactly wrong, per se.

“My sister told me to take a walk when I was feeling stuck... Probably as a change of pace,” he explained.

“Change of pace...” echoed Nanaka.

Last time, by some unbelievable coincidence, Kai had run into Aina’s grandmother and ended up following her to her home. The whole ordeal overwrote any sense of mental organization he could have amassed. He did learn something from his encounter with Aina herself, though; Misako would likely tell him that those unimaginable events were an important part of what made walking outdoors special.

“Kai-kun,” Nanaka took a step forward from his side and twirled back to face him. “In that case, would you mind going out with me tomorrow morning?”

◇

‘If you’re looking for a change of pace, then let’s go shopping together.’ That was essentially what Nanaka was proposing. Her invitation was so simple that Kai nodded along, half sighing out the word, “Sure,” but that was nothing more than a surprise-triggered defense mechanism. Her words circled around his brain until he finally comprehended their meaning, and then he revised his reply: “S-Sure?!” It was less of a reply and more of a reflex.

“Okay, I’ll see you in front of the station at ten,” she concluded.

Well after Kai had split off on his own path home, the words repeatedly haunted him: it was only a change of pace. They were only going shopping together.

Apparently Nanaka’s laptop had been on the fritz, and she wanted him to come along to help her pick out a new computer. It was a normal shopping trip, with a clearly defined goal.

Nanaka had even added a disclaimer, saying, “You know... if you’re just looking for a change of pace.” She had seemed pensive about the fact that there didn’t seem to be anything in it for Kai, but he couldn’t have cared less. He was overjoyed. Personal benefit was the last thing on his mind. In fact, the entire situation was a benefit—just the fact that he could go shopping with her. He could have easily convinced Nanaka not to worry if he had explained all that, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it.

When Kai arrived home, he quickly found himself in a frenzy. Clothes, he thought. They didn’t have a club meeting tomorrow. Since they weren’t going to school, he couldn’t justify wearing his uniform. That meant he needed to wear his own clothes, but his habit of purchasing things with plain, boring designs meant that every combination he tried was a tired copy-paste job.

Pulling out his wardrobe left him in a state of shock. After staring down his fashion choices for a while, he took a deep breath and decided that there wasn’t much to deliberate on, and that he would go dressed in his usual attire.

However, reaching that decision didn’t stop him from worrying about it, and he found himself unable to focus long enough to come up with anything new for the project proposal. With his recent all-nighters in mind, he slipped into bed early to rest his body, but there was no way he could fall asleep so easily. His eyes were shut, but his mind was as bright as day.

We’re just shopping. We’re just shopping. We’re just shopping. As Kai chanted his Buddhist mantra, his mind finally wandered into the realm of dreams.

Kai sprang out of bed the next morning before his alarm had even rung. He committed himself to his usual routine of social game documentation to calm himself down, but his heart was busily thumping its way out of his chest.

After completing his work, Kai changed into his drab t-shirt and pants. There was still an hour to go, so he opened his laptop in an attempt to work on the Summit plans, only to find that his brain wouldn’t cooperate. He gave it up within 15 minutes and began to fiddle with other apps, looking for inspiration, when he realized that he could also do this at their rendezvous point. Laptop aside, there wasn’t anything out of place with a guy standing around, playing on his phone.

No matter what, he wanted to avoid being late. Kai was on pace to wait a full half hour for Nanaka, but he didn’t mind the downtime. The clear skies relentlessly barraged him with rays of sunlight as he stepped out of his house, realizing that this could very well have been the hottest it had been in days. It wasn’t even noon yet, but the broiling heat wrapped around his skin, causing beads of sweat to gather on his arms as he walked to the station.

Nanaka wasn’t there yet by the time Kai reached his destination. He checked the time to see that he was exactly 30 minutes early. No wonder she wasn’t around, he thought, given that he was way ahead of schedule.

Kai made his way into the shade and booted up the app he’d downloaded at home. He may not have been in the sun anymore, but it was still burning outside, and he could feel the heat creeping into his hand as he held his phone.

After waiting for around 15 minutes, he heard a light set of footsteps and a voice calling, “Kai-kun!” Nanaka waved in his direction as she approached, wearing a cool blue top with a bit of breathing room around the collar, along with a skirt and sandals. The simple outfit fit her well, and she looked like she had jumped straight out of the ‘summer stylings’ section of a fashion magazine.

“You’re early!” she said enthusiastically. “Did you wait long?”

“No, I just got here,” he told her. “I didn’t wait at all.”

“...Hmm,” she mumbled. Then, after staring at him for a moment, she laughed. “That’s a lie! You’re sweating a lot, you know?”

Kai wiped his hand across his forehead, only to find it awfully moist: the shade hadn’t been enough. He pulled a small towel out of his shoulder bag to clean away the sweat.

“You could’ve waited in a nearby convenience store,” she pointed out.

“...Now that you mention it...” That would have been the logical conclusion, but Kai’s brain had been too entrenched in the idea that they were meeting in front of the station. It was sad how quickly his brain overloaded.

“If you’re good to go, then let’s get moving,” Nanaka suggested. “It’ll be cooler in the store, anyway.”

Kai quickly lined up beside her as she began walking. Their destination was the electronics store beside the station, so it didn’t even take them five minutes to walk over. Once inside, they rode the escalator up to the floor with all of the personal computers.

“Are you looking for another laptop?” Kai asked.

“Nope!” was Nanaka’s reply. “I was going to, but when I asked Eru and Akane-san, they said a desktop would be better for me.”

“I guess that makes sense if you’re going to use it for a while,” he said thoughtfully.

“Yup. That, and apparently desktops are cheaper for their performance. Also, they told me it was a plus that I could switch out the monitor.”

“I see.”

The bar for computer specifications was higher than usual for those working in computer graphics. The requirements for most digital drawing programs were high enough on their own, but on top of that, a game developer could be expected to study 3D modeling software, as well. This meant that, in terms of cost-performance, an upgradeable desktop PC with a separate graphics card was better. Even if Nanaka bought a whole new computer one day, she could at least reuse the monitor.

Nanaka wrinkled her brow in the desktop aisle for a while, taking pictures of the computers she was considering. She talked it out with a nearby employee as she looked through all the available options. After an hour or so of consideration, she stopped in front of one of the PCs and exclaimed, “Alright! I’m picking this one!”

It wasn’t a cutting-edge product, but the CPU, RAM, and GPU were all competent enough for digital art software. What’s more, it would have cost at least twice as much to buy an equivalent laptop. It wasn’t a state-of-the-art item, and it was priced accordingly. Lastly, there was a summer break sale that offered a sizable discount for students.

“Okay, let’s call that employee back over,” Kai said.

“No, wait!” Nanaka objected. “I’m not buying it now! I’m planning on coming back some other time with my dad to buy it.”

“I see,” Kai observed. “So today’s trip was just an appraisal.”

“...‘Appraisal,’” Nanaka snickered. “...‘Appraisal.’”

“N-Nanaka-san...?”

“No, it’s just—” she said, shaking her head joyfully. “—I thought, that word choice was so you.”

“I... see.”

“Yes, you do.”

Kai didn’t have the faintest idea what she meant by that, but Nanaka seemed to be having so much fun that he couldn’t be bothered to care.

“It’s about time for lunch,” she continued. “How about that restaurant again? Kai-kun, have you made any progress?”

“No, nothing good has come to mind...”

“In that case, it might not be for long, but let’s work on it together over lunch!”

“That sounds—” Kai stopped to think on their exchange. In the first place, Nanaka was buying a new computer for her future as an illustrator. She had realized that her working environment wasn’t conducive to serious growth, so she had mulled it over and came up with a solution. All he could say was, “...I’m sorry. For making you help me out on the planner’s end all the time.”

Where some people gained a hundred stat points in an hour, others only gained one. The time they had to spend was the only thing they had in common, and it was no exaggeration to say that time was priceless.

Nanaka would have been able to spend her time improving her artistic abilities, if he hadn’t stolen it away with his incompetence. To make matters worse, he had been so caught up in this ‘change of pace’ that he hadn’t gotten anything done the day before, either. Kai was nothing if not ashamed of himself.

“Hey,” said Nanaka, breaking the silence. The sour look on her face was atypical, and she went on to lift her index finger. “I just remembered something about you that made me really mad,” she told him.

“Mad...?”

“Yup. Do you know what it is? I’ll give you five seconds. Fiiive, fooour, threeee,” she counted down.

“Huh? What? I made you mad?” Kai had been so pitiful these past few days—not to say that he had been anything to write home about beforehand—that there were too many possible answers for him to choose from.

“Twooo, ooone... Zero. Time’s up.” Nanaka pouted her lips and clapped her hands together before announcing, “The answer was... the time we went to Tsukigase!”

“Tsukigase... You mean, the Rondo incident?” Kai guessed.

“Yes! Kai-kun... I told you, over and over and over! I told you that I would come along, but you didn’t listen to me at all. That’s it. That’s what made me mad!”

“B-But... The ordeal at Tsukigase really was my own personal problem,” he protested.

“There it is!!!” Nanaka shoved her raised finger into his face with vigor.

Kai couldn’t help but feel like this had happened before... Oh, that’s right, he thought. There had been a similar episode previously, in which Nanaka had come over to his apartment in order to work on a specification document.

“Listen,” she resumed in a calm, explanatory voice. “Kai-kun... you can rely on me, too, okay? Of course, part of it comes from the fact that we’re clubmates. But... I don’t know if this’ll get through to you, but I can’t rely on you if you don’t rely on me.

“I know you don’t realize it, but you’ve helped me out a ton, and I lean on you a lot,” she continued. “You’re the reason I’m trying my best to continue with art... And sometimes, I get worried that maybe I’m relying on you too much... You’re always doing your best on your own, so then I get really lost thinking that maybe I shouldn’t depend on you...”

Nanaka’s face had been pointed toward the ground during her soliloquy, but now it suddenly shot back up. “Anyway! I lost track of what I was trying to say halfway through... but basically! I want to keep relying on you, so you have to rely on me, too! That’s it! Got it?! Do you understand?!”

“Y-Yes,” Kai fumbled. Overwhelmed by her energy, all he could do was nod along. “I got it.”

“...Thank God,” she said with a smile.

Behind her, Kai caught a glimpse of the employee who had helped them pick out a PC. “Um... Ma’am?” he said. “You’re bothering the other customers, so if I could ask you to quiet down a tad bit...”

The pair looked at each other, now remembering what she’d said and what he’d been told, which caused their faces to flush red in sync.

“...We’re sorry,” their two embarrassed voices overlapped before they went speeding out the door.

◇

After putting the electronics store incident behind them, Nanaka and Kai walked over to the family restaurant without saying a word. They poured themselves fountain drinks and waited for their orders to be served—a plate each of doria and pasta—when Nanaka finally broke the silence.

“I’ve been thinking that I want to do everything I can,” she announced.

Kai looked up from his doria and met her gaze.

“I had a little conversation with Akane-san,” she continued. “She told me there’s a bunch of different paths to take, even as an illustrator. There are experts like Eru, who focus on nothing but their drawing abilities, but there’s other roles, too. For example, there needs to be an art director to manage the Erus of the workplace. I... still don’t have a clear image of how I’ll turn out, but I can’t just stand still when I know there’s a chance.”

“In that case—” Kai began to say, but Nanaka cut him off mid-sentence.

“‘You should focus on your art’... That’s wrong, Kai-kun! I want to do everything I can,” she insisted. “I want to experience it all. For example... if I end up in a management position like that, I’ll be talking to planners a lot, too, won’t I? In that case, the work I’m doing now definitely has its own purpose. Of course, I’ll give my drawings 100%, too! I really will! But I want to try my hand at everything! The plans we’re writing up now are just as important to me! Am I... being too greedy?”

“No... No, you’re not,” Kai told her. “I think that’s just like you.” And... Listening to her talk, Kai found himself daydreaming. The image of a distant future came to mind. Distant as it was, he was sure that it would realize itself before he knew it.

I would be foggily glaring at my company computer after an exhausting all-nighter. I’d get up and gather a graphic request form and maybe a specification document that contained some new change from my desk. Then, I’d walk down a hall connecting me to a different department. After a long trek, I’d come to the desk of a raven-haired illustrator, who’d be furiously scratching away at her tablet with headphones on. It’d be a whole ordeal just to get her attention, but there’d be no helping it, since I’d need to talk to her about the form.

Just as I would finish preparing myself, a voice would call out, “Kai-kun,” and there you’d be. I’m sure I’d feel relieved to hear you speak. I’m not sure how that would reflect on me as a planner, but there’d be no helping it. That’s just how much I’d trust you.

And then, instead of causing a huge commotion the way I would have, you’d handle the matter amicably and even send me off with a cheer. After that, I’d take the new specification document over to a girl with blonde twintails in a programmer’s cubicle.

Such was the blinding fantasy Kai found himself in. “No matter what the situation may be,” he spoke, “Simply having you by my side is reassuring, Nanaka-san... And it makes me incredibly happy.”

“...I-I... see...” she replied haltingly. “You’re happy... Wow.”

“Yeah,” Kai replied frankly, without giving it much thought. But after a moment, he noticed a strange lull in the conversation. When he looked up, Nanaka had frozen solid with bright, rosy cheeks.

“...Ah,” he said awkwardly. What did I just say? Nanaka being here makes me reassured and happy? “No, uh, I meant, um—” Kai floundered as he tried to explain the situation, but ‘I was fantasizing about our future office work where you saved me’ would have been unintelligible and probably make the current situation worse.

What do I do? he asked himself. I guess I give up, he thought. But just as he had surrendered, a voice interrupted his thoughts.

“Huh? Oh, look, it’s Nana!”

“Hm? You’re right, it is. Long time no see.”

“Ch-Chie? Minori?” said Nanaka, greeting two girls from their class, who were standing beside their table. If Kai remembered correctly, their names were Tsukahara Chie and Sasa Minori. He had never talked to them before, but Nanaka could be seen chatting with them regularly.

In a way, with how influential their voices were, these two girls stood at the center of their class. Tsukahara Chie was lively and loud, while Sasa Minori was very laid back, which was reflected in her slow speech patterns. The former had short hair and the latter had a long perm. That was the extent of his knowledge on the contrasting duo.

“’Sup! And you are... uh?” Tsukahara Chie made her confusion clear with an energetic, “Umumum?”

“Huh? ...Hmm?” mused Sasa Minori. After a slow epiphany, she continued, “Oh, right. Shiraseki-kun.”

“...Ohhh? What’s this? Nana, could this be a date?”

“I-It’s not!” Nanaka protested.

“Reeeally?”

“Really! Right, Kai-kun?!” said Nanaka, turning to him for support.

Suddenly, Kai was on the spot. He nodded, despite feeling that it probably depended on what the definition of a date was. Regardless of their reason for having done so, it was true that they had gone out together, so “date” wasn’t that much of a stretch... or at least, he thought so. It sort of felt like one, but being denied so thoroughly filled him with an emotion that he couldn’t put to words.

“Hmm?” Sasa Minori looked over, surveying his expression instead of Nanaka’s. “In that case, you can make it, right? Come on, Nana, let’s go to the fireworks festival.”

“Oh!” Tsukahara Chie literally jumped up in surprise to the point where Kai wondered if her exaggeration was deliberate. “That’s right! Nana, why can’t you come?! You’re single, aren’t you? Let’s go see the fireworks together! It’ll be a summer memory!”

“That, and...” Sasa Minori said with a pause. “If you don’t come, then Chie’ll be in hot water since we won’t have as many people as Mizuno-kun’s group... right?”

“Yup! Hot water! Actually, I kinda told them you’d be there when I invited them!” said Chie.

“W-Why did you...” Nanaka spluttered. She was clearly dumbfounded. “Chie, listen to me,” she said. “I told you I’m not into that sort of...”

Kai had frozen up due to the sudden intrusion and lightning quick conversation that had followed, but the words were still coming in. He had a decent grasp of the situation at this point, which was as follows:

Niigata had a fireworks festival near the end of summer break. He already knew this. There were posters for it plastered up at the train station, convenience store, school, and pretty much every other location he could think of. That was probably the festival they were talking about.

Nanaka had been invited to that festival. The group she was slated to go with probably included Tsukahara Chie, Sasa Minori, and a handful of boys from their class. The ‘Mizuno’ referred to earlier was also one of the main characters of their class. His looks were good enough for a guy to tell he was cool, and he was always hanging out with at least a few other guys. Kai had often seen him talking to all three of the girls here, too.

It wasn’t anything to be surprised about. Nanaka’s circle of friends was incomparably larger than Kai’s. Strangely, she talked to everyone at least a little. He often witnessed her turning down invitations because she was busy with club activities, but that was a testimony to how frequent she was asked to hang out in the first place.

They were going to go to a giant fireworks festival with a new group of friends at the end of summer. It was a common story, with nothing remarkable about it. Kai knew that there were people who spent their time like that while he played social games. Nothing strange about it.

However... while the situation was neither strange nor surprising, Nanaka was clearly in distress. Even now, as Tsukahara continued to energetically invite her and Sasa worked to persuade her, Nanaka was conversing with a troubled smile.

She glanced Kai’s way, and they made eye contact. After letting him see her cornered gaze for a moment, Nanaka realized her error and turned back to their classmates.

“Excuse me!” The act of a human decoration opening its mouth got all three of the girls to look his way. “Are you talking about the festival that’s being held next month?”

“Yeah, why?” asked Minori.

Kai wondered if the pressure he felt from her confusion was simply one of his bad habits as an introvert. “Um, well...” He was choking up, but knew it was too late to back down, so he put some strength into his legs and continued speaking. “...I’m sorry, but Nanaka-san can’t join you for that. We already decided to go as a club. Also...”

Of course, they had never made such plans. Kai was simply letting his mouth run wild. Still, he didn’t care what he’d said so long as it got them through this mess. All he wanted to do was help relieve Nanaka of that worried expression.

Kai’s heart was on the verge of exploding with anxiety, so he balled up his fist underneath the table. He sucked it up and looked the girls straight in the eye. This is no different from a presentation, he thought. It doesn’t matter who I’m speaking to. I can’t look away.

“You’re clearly bothering Nanaka-san,” he told them. “If it’s something that I can notice... can’t you, as her friends, be more considerate of that?”

◇

Fortunately, they wrapped up the incident without any further problems. Nanaka immediately played along with Kai’s story, which went that the social game club had made plans to go together all along. Kai was worried that he might have caused some undue strain on their relationship, but Nanaka managed to settle it without any major complications.

Kai and Nanaka couldn’t get back into the spirit of writing a proposal after the girls left, so they finally called it a day. Kai resumed his brainstorming as soon as he returned home, but he was still a little too shaken up to focus. He hadn’t made any progress by dinnertime, so he stepped out to a nearby supermarket to buy a pre-made meal.

Just when he started worrying whether he had done the right thing or not, his phone began to vibrate. There was a LIME notification from Nanaka. He opened it right away to see a stamp of a seal peeking out from behind a wall.

Nanaka: Whoa, you opened my message so fast!

Kai: Yeah.

Nanaka: Thanks for everything you did today... You really helped me out.

Kai: ...I’m glad to hear that.

Kai’s mind drifted as he typed his reply. Come to think of it, he realized, he had almost never messaged Nanaka privately like this. This was mainly due to the fact that they used the group chat, which had all of the club members in it. Naturally, this also meant he had never texted anyone in real time like this before.

‘Read’: these four letters instantly latched onto every message he sent.

It wasn’t as if there was someone on the other side of his phone screen, but mysteriously, he could feel her presence beside him. He could hear her breathing.

Nanaka: Hey, do you actually wanna go to the fireworks festival with everyone?

Kai: That sounds good. I’ve never been to one before, so this will be my first time.

Nanaka: Whaaat?!

Nanaka: A stamp of a seal rolling around in shock

Nanaka: But Tokyo has the famous Sumidagawa fireworks show!

Kai: I just... wasn’t interested.

Nanaka: That means it’s your inaugural fireworks festival!

Kai: Is that what this means?

Nanaka: That’s what it means! I’m looking forward to it!

There was a pause before Nanaka’s next message. Perhaps she herself couldn’t decide whether or not to send it.

Nanaka: ...Hey, Kai-kun? ...You were really cool today. Thank you. I mean it.

How was he meant to reply? he wondered, but couldn’t think of anything to say. Kai’s fingers hovered above the touchscreen without moving a muscle. For whatever reason—maybe because they were talking about fireworks—he looked out his window to see a full moon floating amidst the night sky like a giant, white jellyfish. Its beauty was captivating; a perfect circle had been carved out of the dark heavens.

It was a coincidence that he looked outside, so the next message he received shocked him.

Nanaka: Wow!

Attached to her one-word message was a photo of the same enchanting lunar body on the other side of the window.

Kai’s hands acted faster than his mind, and he, too, captured a picture of the moon beyond the glass. The word ‘Read’ immediately popped up when he sent her the image. He could hear Nanaka say, “We’re seeing the same thing,” on the other side of those four letters. He saw her gazing toward the same moon, in the same way, from her own room.

Nanaka wasn’t physically here with him, but he felt her presence—her breath. Without a word, her entire being was condensed into those four letters.

Oh, he realized. Something in his brain snapped wide open. This is it.