The Sasaki siblings, who might be a bit too warm and fuzzy, entered the house under Yamashita’s permission.
Since everyone was gathered, it felt a bit awkward to send Shii back alone. And it would have looked peculiar to send just one high school student back at this hour.
Fortunately, the mansion had plenty of spare rooms, so Sasaki didn’t end up tangled up with us.
Well, even if we really didn’t get tangled up, there would be quite a bit of conflict if this story got into Nakahara or Hagiwara’s ears… but that’s a problem for Sasaki.
At least Sasaki had already familiarized herself with us during the last training camp. The kids didn’t outright reject her.
It was incredibly awkward, but Sasaki managed to fit in to some extent and held a conversation.
“…Older Brother, can we talk for a moment?”
But ultimately, perhaps feeling the awkward atmosphere, Shii said that to Sasaki.
“Sh-should we?”
Sasaki brightly accepted Shii’s rescue.
“Well then, I’ll excuse myself for a moment.”
Shii politely bowed to us and then went off to spend time with her ‘Older Brother.’
They probably settled down over some tea and had a calm chat.
If the sun were out, I would hope they would have a relaxing talk.
If it were just the two of them, I’m sure that’s what would have happened.
*
We all fell asleep late at night.
I didn’t feel like anything was particularly strange. I had stayed up all night doing things when I was a high school student too.
…Even if it wasn’t for fun. Back then, PC rooms and karaoke rooms wouldn’t admit minors past ten o’clock, yet schools, academies, and study rooms would cram students in and try to make sure they did some studying.
I think that was later prohibited as well, though I don’t exactly remember when.
In this world too, I didn’t have the diligent personality that went to sleep right at nine o’clock.
Even so, since I had to get up early, I hardly ever stayed up all night, but there were a few times I watched aimless TV with Koko until after midnight.
Well, still, gathering with friends and staying up like this was something that hadn’t happened since I became an adult, so today wasn’t uninteresting.
Around one in the morning, Koko began dozing off.
At that point, we spread out a blanket on the floor.
From above, the sight of blankets laid around a round tree was oddly peculiar. It wasn’t outside, but perhaps because of the tree, it felt strangely like we were camping.
Finally, after turning off the light and unplugging the power cord connected to the little lights on the tree, the room went completely dark.
“Uu….”
I laid Koko down, who seemed reluctant to sleep, and pulled the blanket over her.
Yeah, I think I understand why she didn’t want to sleep. She probably wanted to see Santa.
There was a Santa I had prepared in advance, but… it probably wasn’t necessary to show her such a stereotypical Santa, right? If she wanted to see that person again next year, I’d have to bring them again.
If possible, I’d prefer a Santa with a tad less character.
“Merry Christmas.”
At my words, Koko’s eyes sparkled open.
In the midst of drowsiness, it was exceedingly difficult for Koko to blink her eyes, yet she looked up at me and smiled.
“Merry Christmas…”
Then she soon shut her eyes and began to breathe peacefully, soundly sleeping.
“Merry Christmas.”
Yuka, who was beside me watching, whispered quietly.
“Merry Christmas.”
I said it once more to Yuka.
Thus, I celebrated my first Christmas in this world.
A Christmas that I didn’t know if I could celebrate again.
*
The reason I woke up partway was a trivial one because I needed to go to the bathroom.
Looking up at the dark ceiling, I seriously contemplated whether to just hold it and fall back asleep or to stubbornly get up and go to the bathroom.
If this had been one of the rooms in a large apartment, I would have had a bathroom close by, but unfortunately, this place was an enormous traditional Japanese mansion.
Perhaps in modern times, they might have increased the number of bathrooms, but—no, they must have increased them since there are bathrooms inside the house.
Still, no matter how many bathrooms there were, the sheer size of the mansion made it inconvenient.
Getting out of the room alone was a risk for me.
It was already chilly outside this room, and how cold would the hallway be with only a wall separating me from the outside? Plus, there were windows down there.
After wriggling around in my warm blanket, I finally decided to go to the bathroom.
It wasn’t that there were overly many bathrooms. But now here I was, with a high school girl who thought she would die if she didn’t wash up in the morning.
On top of that, there was Sasaki, whom I had awkwardly brought in, making it hard to just send her back.
Thinking of the bathroom overflowing in the morning, it seemed better to resolve it now rather than later, so I got out of bed.
“Uwah…”
Koko released a surprised sound, and I froze, thinking maybe she had woken up, but it seemed like she was just mumbling in her sleep. I let out a small sigh of relief and moved slowly.
I stepped out into the hallway without waking anyone up and shivered.
It was so cold.
Anyone saying it wasn’t colder than Korea would only have that opinion after putting on proper winter clothing. The hallway without heating was naturally freezing.
I made my way towards the bathroom with hurried steps. I didn’t run into anyone in the hallway. Even Yakuza Santa hasn’t prepared anything yet. Was he waiting to fall asleep more soundly?
Thanks to that, I was able to resolve my situation without having to wait around.
After washing my hands and drying them thoroughly with a towel, I walked down the hallway when suddenly I felt a sense of discomfort.
I felt the same discomfort when I walked with Yamashita earlier.
It wasn’t the kind of chill you’d feel when detecting a yōkai. It was way shallower, a type of discomfort so faint that you’d hardly perceive it unless you were paying attention.
As I walked through the hallway chatting with my friends or when rushing to the bathroom, I probably would have overlooked this shallow discomfort.
Normally, I would have just brushed it off as nothing.
The reason I took notice of it might be that my heart was completely relaxed.
After all, it was Christmas. It was vacation time anyway.
Thinking that as long as I was careful during next year’s Hyakki Yagyō, there wouldn’t be any major issues for a while.
Well, that discomfort hadn’t caused any significant trouble, after all.
But, as if I was holding onto a thin thread that might snap if I pulled too hard, I slowly approached the room.
When I cautiously opened the door, no one was inside.
“…”
And, that room was one I recognized.
I stepped in and turned on the light.
The atmosphere had completely changed since the last time I saw it. Back then, it had felt like a murder scene, blood splattered everywhere.
No, even if a murder had happened, there wouldn’t be that much blood. At that time, it had been a deliberately scattered scene.
Yeah. This was the place I had wandered around while trying to catch loneliness, the place I had splattered blood.
The room was completely empty. Though at that time, it seemed like there might have been something. Now, it seemed no one had been lingering here.
I slowly surveyed the room.
The walls seemed to have been repainted. Or, since this was a traditional Japanese mansion, did they perhaps take some other measures?
From the ceiling to the walls and floor… It certainly was clean, but…
“…Ah.”
In one corner of the room, there was a small black mark.
I knelt down on the floor and examined the mark closely.
It didn’t look like a circle drawn with a pen. It seemed like a circle that had been painted over in the middle.
So… at first glance, it appeared like something drawn with a black pen, but in reality, it looked like dried red blood turned black.
My blood.
Once I stepped into the room, the feeling of discomfort intensified greatly.
What exactly this meant, I did not know.
However, the moment I noticed it, my heart began to race fiercely.
I left the room.
Then I rummaged through the mansion. I hadn’t even thought about running into anyone during this.
The ‘thin thread’ I referred to was really like a spider’s web. I was just moving while holding onto a single strand of that web.
It seemed like I had carefully spun that ‘cobweb’ throughout the mansion, wherever I had sprinkled my blood.
I was probably right. I didn’t remember every space I had wandered through back then, but I had managed to find some of the spots where I hadn’t completely erased my blood.
“…Here.”
The last place I arrived at was a spot I remembered precisely.
It was the place Mori was bedridden. The spot where I had splattered blood while I was at it.
I opened the door carefully.
There was no one inside, but still, this room had the ambiance of someone living there. At least the way the furniture was arranged wasn’t drastically different from the last time I had seen it.
“Miss?”
I heard a voice calling from behind me.
Turning around, I saw the Yakuza Uncle looking at me. He wasn’t the one who had played Santa, but I had seen him when entering here.
“Is there something you need here?”
His voice was a little tense.
He was on guard against me.
Well, that makes sense. I was visiting as a guest here. It would be suspicious if I were rummaging through the owner’s room after all.
…It shouldn’t be suspicious, but—
“I’m here because of the blood I spilled last time.”
“Yes?”
It seemed my unexpected comment left him a bit flustered.
“…When I fought loneliness, this mansion was covered in blood, right?”
“Oh, yes. That’s true.”
“How did you manage that blood?”
Only after listening to my words did the Yakuza Uncle seem to have an inkling of why I was checking the room, scratching his head and speaking.
“We cleaned it up as quickly as we could since Lady Yuuki was here. The wallpaper was redone as much as possible, and parts that couldn’t be painted over were simply replaced.”
So it meant there could still be some traces left. It’s not like it could be helped. The spot I found was only a small dot, so unless someone went digging around, they wouldn’t find it.
The real problem wasn’t that bloodstains remained.
It was that some… phenomena seemed to be happening in this house because of that blood.
Moreover, I hadn’t only spilled blood in this house.
I had spilled it at school as well, and last time I had spilled it in the mountain; basically, every time I needed it, I ended up cutting my wrist and spraying it everywhere.
“…”
I thought… that Nirlas simply wanted to torment me.
Could it be that there was another purpose?
“…Uncle.”
“Oh, yes. Is there a problem?”
“…No, not really.”
Seeing my serious expression that had created the current situation, the Yakuza Uncle looked uneasy too.
“Could I borrow a knife?”
“Yes?”
But my next words seemed to have left him slightly bewildered.
*
I took off all my clothes and stepped into the shower room.
Isn’t it Christmas? I didn’t want to worry my friends by wearing blood-stained clothes.
Entering the shower room, I turned on the water.
Then, kneeling on the floor, I pressed my wrist as close to the drain as possible and put the edge of the sharp knife against it.
Then I hesitated for a moment.
In a situation that seemed to have some problems because of the blood, was it really right to spill even more?
It didn’t take long for me to come to a conclusion.
I made a cut on my wrist.
Yeah. I had already sprinkled blood around in various ways. Adding one more wasn’t going to make a significant difference.
“Were you called to extend a Christmas greeting? I would be glad if you had a gift for her.”
Considering you had been watching all this time, how shameless of you.
“Isn’t it a day that has nothing to do with you in the first place?”
Does a God, as spoken of in Christianity, exist in this world? I doubt it. With such omnipotent beings in the Lovecraft universe, it would lessen the sense of fear.
“How rude.”
But Nirlas’ voice didn’t sound particularly hurt.
“I have one question.”
“If you answer, I’m curious about what you would do for her.”
“…What are you after?”
“Who knows.”
Nirlas seemed to ponder for a moment before responding.
“Right now, I don’t have any specific desires. I doubt the story would flow particularly pleasantly no matter how she acts in this situation.”
Nirlas knows me.
If they proposed a transactional condition that crossed a line, I would stay stagnant. I’d rather choose ignorance.
That said, moving my body by Nirlas’ hand would also be a boring thing for them.
A cheat key should be used sparingly at crucial moments to make the story enjoyable.
“Then does that mean you won’t answer any questions I ask?”
“It depends on the question. Whether it’s something she could answer without any issue or not.”
If it’s a question tied to a transaction, they probably wouldn’t answer, and trivial questions would just be told.
“…Then I’ll ask.”
Nirlas at least keeps promises. It might eventually become a situation like ‘I never lied,’ but at least until now, that’s not been the case.
“When we fought in this mansion last time, I spilled a lot of blood. Since coming here today, wherever that blood was, I felt discomfort. What does this mean?”
“Hmm? Don’t you know?”
Nirlas let out a chuckle.
“I am curious about what you heard when I first addressed you.”
“…You said I was your avatar.”
“Could it be that the blood you spilled is also a part of that avatar?”
“…”
When I couldn’t say anything, Nirlas smiled.
I couldn’t see it, but I could feel Nirlas doing just that.
“I’m curious if that’s all your questions.”
“…Yeah. That’s all.”
“Don’t worry about the wound on your wrist.”
Nirlas said something as if teasing me in response.
“It won’t be long before it disappears. By the time you leave the bathroom, no one will notice.”
Then, leaving nothing but an unseen smile, Nirlas disappeared.
Time began to flow again, and my wrist ached.
As Nirlas had said, the deep cut began to close rapidly.
The red blood mixed slowly into the stream of water from the shower and flowed down the drain.
At first, it was crimson, then slowly lightened, until nothing remained.
A part of my body.
Like Koko, who had been torn apart.
How much blood have I spilled… here?
Is it possible that I have already become far larger than Koko?
I spent a while lost in those thoughts.
*
Well, it’s all water under the bridge.
In reality, I’d have to continue spilling blood going forward. If I got too hung up on such things, it would get increasingly difficult to do it.
Besides, this was the first time I had felt such discomfort. I had often spilled blood in my own house, yet I hadn’t felt much discomfort there.
So, there probably won’t be any major issues. Perhaps the blood I created my loneliness from had some effect as well.
…Let’s talk about that later with Kagami.
I cleaned myself up, got dressed, and left the shower room.
Of course, I planned to hand the knife back to the Yakuza Uncle as soon as I exited.
I felt tired.
While my body may have recovered, the mental fatigue wouldn’t just disappear easily.
Besides, I hadn’t woken up in the middle of the night for nothing. The aftereffects of that were hitting me all at once.
Among the kids sleeping in the same room, there were some dependable ones like Yuka or Mako. Even those kids might get a bit lazy on their days off, but at least in my experience, Yuka had never overslept when she was with me.
If I didn’t go get some rest quickly, tomorrow was going to be quite tiring.
Thinking that, I sped up my footsteps a bit—
“…”
“…”
I just happened to bump into a large man in a red outfit in the hallway.
If Yamashita hadn’t introduced me to this Uncle earlier, I would have surely thought a thief had broken in.
His large bag over his shoulder must be full of gifts.
“Ho… ho ho ho.”
As expected, he wasn’t imitating a woman’s laugh but mimicking Santa Claus’s laughter.
It sounded rather splendid, I guessed, maybe because he had heard it multiple times when he was a child.
What can I say?
Uh… so, should I go in first?
“…Could you wait five minutes before going in?”
“Ho ho ho.”
I took that laughter as a response and stepped inside.
And it hadn’t been long after I burrowed into the blanket and closed my eyes—
Click.
The door opened again.
It was opened with the utmost care not to let anyone hear—
“Uwah?”
“…!”
At Koko’s voice, I involuntarily sat upright and turned to Koko’s side.
Koko had her eyes open.
Her eyes sparkled in the light coming through the gap in the door.
“Santa grandpa!”
“Ho… ho ho.”
Our Yakuza Santa seemed caught off guard by this unexpected call, halted in a pose tiptoeing like a thief breaking in.
…W-well, what should I do?
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