6 - Epilogue

A man sat on a bench in the park, alone. His ragged clothing almost made him look like a homeless man. His appearance by itself would be enough to invite pity, but added to the melancholy aura around him, there was no sorrier sight in the world.

“Oh, hello there, Taker!” a voice called to him, addressing him by his internet handle.

Taker slowly lifted his face and turned towards the sound of the voice. A petite girl wearing the blazer uniform of a nearby middle school was running up to him energetically. There were two plastic convenience store bags in her hands.

“Shoko, huh?” he said. “Just call me Trash.”

“Aw, are you in gloom mode again?” Shoko promptly plunked down next to the self-styled “Trash,” head tilted. “Why? Because Tsuwabuki beat you up?”

“That’s part of it... Actually, you disappeared at some point, didn’t you?” he asked.

“Heh heh! Invisibility Technique!” Shoko shot him a cheerful and carefree smile. “But y’know, you oughta stop asking people to call you ‘Trash’ when you’re feeling low! It’s de-purr-essing!”

“Better than someone who uses cat puns in real life...”

“Aw, so mean!” Shoko laughed, seemingly without a care in the world.

She pulled out a number of rice balls from the convenience store bags, and handed them to “Trash.” At first, he tried to demur, but Shoko quickly pointed out the sound of his rumbling stomach, and he took them without further complaint.

Shoko was truly insightful for her age. He’d heard she’d had a complicated past, but he had never pressed further on it. Having a friend so far from his own age had been helpful to him, so as pathetic as it was, he was grateful to have her around.

“So, Trash, what’s bothering you?” she asked.

“Leader.”

“Ah, Nem.” Shoko nodded as she munched on a rice ball.

“We couldn’t help her with her problem,” Taker sighed.

“Hmm, you were taking it pretty seriously, huh?” Shoko asked.

“Of course I was,” he replied. “We’re the friends of the less talented.”

The sight of Nem growing even more depressed than she had been before had tanked “Trash’s” self-confidence. He couldn’t help but feel that his attempt to resort to force had made things worse. At the same time, he didn’t know what else he might have done.

“Talent isn’t something you can unlock with some magic key,” Shoko said. “You have to work for it, right? And at the end of the day, the only person who can help a person is themselves. That’s how people work.”

“Oh?” he asked.

“It’s true! That goes for your problem too, Trash,” Shoko said in a laid-back voice, pulling out a pudding cup from her plastic bag.

The man who called himself Trash watched her, then whispered, “Shoko, where’s my pudding?”

“You don’t get one!” she declared. “You always just use them to make fake boobs.”

“Happy birthday, Sakurako-san,” said Ichiro.

“Ohh...” Sakurako gasped.

As Sakurako logged out, Ichiro came to meet her. The table was lined with foods she hadn’t made herself.

They seemed to have been sitting out for a while, which made Sakurako scratch her cheek self-consciously.

“So you did remember...” she said. “You completely ignored it this morning, so I felt a little sad.”

“I felt that a surprise party might be an interesting thing to try,” he said. “Well, have a seat.”

“If you insist...” she answered. “You always do cook Italian or French, don’t you? I suppose it’s because you have an image to maintain.”

“Nonsense,” he said. “It’s because you always make Asian food for me.”

Yes, Sakurako Ogi’s birthday was July 20th, and it was the one day of the year that he cooked for her. Ichiro took a bottle of wine made in the year of her birth in one hand, then voiced a question off the top of his head.

“I was wondering, why did your parents name you after cherry blossoms, when you were born on the former Marine Day?”

“I don’t know,” Sakurako said. “My parents never told me when I asked. Maybe they just picked it out of a hat?”

“Oh? Well, here’s your present.”

Ichiro handed her a small package. It was the one that had been sent to him last week, the same day he’d received his brooch. He hadn’t told her what it was when she had asked, but she would never have dreamed it was a present for her. Sakurako Ogi was overcome with emotion.

“Though I suppose it wasn’t much of a birthday, thanks to me,” Ichiro added.

“Not at all. I enjoyed it quite a lot!” cried Sakurako. “I got to say a line I’ve been waiting to say for a long time... Oh, Ichiro-sama. Please, allow me to pour the wine.”

“Oh, nonsense, nonsense,” he retorted. “You sit there.”

Sakurako was just about to stand up in her usual manner, but he stopped her, and poured the wine into the glass.

Sakurako squirmed a little, fretfully, then looked up at the ceiling. “You were about to break things off with Nem, weren’t you? That gave me chills.”

“I didn’t want to do it, either,” Ichiro said. “I think of her as a good friend. I don’t think it would have been good for either of us, so I’m grateful to Iris for sparing us that.”

Iris had expressed regret that, in her words, “if I’d made up my mind sooner, Mr. Kirsch wouldn’t have had to fight,” but Sakurako, as Kirschwasser, had reassured her with the same words she had spoken to Ichiro just now. She really had enjoyed the fight.

Of course, it was no time to be saying things like “all’s well that ends well” or “thank goodness that’s behind us,” either. If Iris and Nem competed, Iris would clearly be at an overwhelming disadvantage, and it was possible that not even that would resolve the issue in Nem’s heart.

“Well, Sakurako-san, let us eat,” said Ichiro. “Happy birthday, once again. I look forward to another year with you.”

“Ah, yes. To another year, Ichiro-sama,” she said.

He poured wine for each of them, then sat down. Their glasses let out a sharp, cool sound as they clinked together.

“Oh, Ichiro-sama,” she said. “There’s something I want to ask you.”

“What is it?”

“Ichiro-sama, you must have been enraged during that last fight. Summoning all those Monetary Blades...”

Ichiro’s hands stopped on their way for his knife and fork.

“Was that for my sake?” she asked, in a joking way.

Ichiro just laughed. “Nonsense.”

She had thought that he would say that, but the ease with which he dismissed it still gave Sakurako a slight sting of pain.

“Does this mean you’re now three years older than me, Sakurako-san?” Ichiro asked.

“N-Nonsense! It’ll be back to two years again very soon!” she exclaimed.

Incidentally, two days after this cheerful conversation transpired, Ichiro got a call from Azami Nono.

The main subject was a clear change she had picked up in Rosemary’s thought patterns, that “she seems to be quibbling with a lot of things” and “she’s frequently using the word ‘nonsense.’”

When asked what on Earth he had put into her head, Ichiro merely replied with his usual phrase.