023
“Surely thou must not object? In fact, thou must wish for this. Ye simply happened across Kissshot this spring break─and because ye happened across that fearsome vampire, ye had no choice but to enter into a partnered relationship. Restored to this current state, ye must have no desire to shoulder such a heavy burden─or am I mistaken?” asked the boy Aberration Slayer, staring at me.
Me, someone he’d consider his junior.
“Kissshot needs not two thralls─would ye not agree?”
“She shouldn’t even need one,” I answered─something like an attempt to steer the conversation off-topic, but I’d also thought so for a while. “Both you and me─we became her thralls by accident. She never planned on creating any.”
“I do wonder about that.” The boy Aberration Slayer gave a weak laugh. “Well, she is indeed aloof enough.”
Though I couldn’t help but feel annoyed that he was acting like he knew Shinobu, when I thought about it, he did know more about her than me.
My relationship with her had only lasted for the half-year or so since spring break, but the amount of time Kissshot Acerolaorion Heartunderblade spent with the first Aberration Slayer four hundred years earlier spanned years. From his perspective, I was greener than green.
“I do of course believe I understand the situation─I know ye and Kissshot are bound to one another in a relationship that can never be severed.”
“You know…”
About my relationship with Shinobu.
A warped master-and-servant relationship between soulmates.
Right. In that sense, my stance regarding Shinobu was different from the first Aberration Slayer’s─theirs was pretty warped itself, but probably not as much as ours.
My relationship with her was more irregular than his─which is why, according to him, I was the one who ought to step aside.
“But why do you know th─”
“There is nothing I do not know about the stories of aberrations that take place in this town─I am close to omnipotent as far as aberrations in this area.”
For fifteen years now, he said.
Fifteen years ago─when the first Aberration Slayer, turned to ash after throwing his body under the sun, was assembled here after four hundred years of convergence, carried bit by bit by winds and waves.
Ever since, it became just a little bit easier for aberrational phenomena to occur in this town─making his existence an underlying cause of every such tale.
The crab. The snail. The monkey. The snake. The cat. The phoenix.
If he understood everything about it all─then that’s where he got his knowledge, having regained consciousness.
He’d done all his fieldwork by way of his own ashes─which meant he could probably speak any Western name he wanted, not just Kissshot’s.
He only grew stronger and stronger, and endlessly gained in knowledge. It felt like he was trying to show just how much greater the First was than the Second.
Shinobu may have called it pointless to compare us, but at this point, there was nothing to even compare.
He was incomparable.
Who was more suited to be the thrall and slave of the iron-blooded, hot-blooded, yet cold-blooded vampire? The question wasn’t even worth asking. The answer was simple, a freebie.
But…
“I don’t understand. Did you come back to form a partnership with Shinobu? What is it that you want? Why are you telling me to leave Shinobu?”
“Shinobu─Shinobu Oshino. Yes, so that is what ye have decided to call Kissshot,” he took in my question without giving a direct reply. “Why do ye not call her by her name? Is that not an affront to a vampire?”
“You know why. You claim to be omnipotent. Why would you ask that if you’re basically this town itself?”
“Calling me that goes a step too far─ah, I keenly see how distinct our personalities are. What a difference there is between the First and the Second.”
I found it hard to believe he was being considerate as he spoke to me, but disparity might have been more apt─I bet he never expected his successor to be a youngster like me.
Of course, in his current form, he was far more of a youngster than me… But there had to be some kind of sly intent behind his delicate, all-but-girlish features.
“My goal is─Kissshot,” he said with his pandering looks. “To reconcile with the one ye call Shinobu Oshino.”
“R-Reckon?”
“Reconcile. Now that my physical form has been restored, I desire the same for our relationship. Thou must know, given thy demeanor. Kissshot and I separated after a quarrel─I said such heartless things to Kissshot in a misguided moment. I wish to apologize to her, and to be forgiven.”
“…”
“Then, just as we did before─I would like for us to fight aberrations together. I would like to defend the back of that spine-chillingly beautiful one with the looks of a goddess, fighting as her sword.”
Ye may not understand─he said, as if to draw a line between us, and in fact, I didn’t. Well, okay, I knew that Shinobu─the former Shinobu was a spine-chillingly beautiful demon, that I would never deny.
But fighting as her sword?
Is that─something he desired as an expert?
Or was it something he desired as a vampire thrall?
He was requesting the return of the Aberration Slayer’s enchanted blade Kokorowatari─so that he himself could become a blade, his master’s right arm?
Maybe he wasn’t yet able to make his intentions clear back when he entrusted me with his message? No…how could I believe that?
Then Kanbaru had the right take on the situation.
As nothing more than ashes gathered in Kita-Shirahebi Shrine.
He sensed Shinobu’s presence, which excited him into existence all to meet her again─his determination was singular. While Miss Gaen was dismissive, it did make some sense.
If we went with our magnetic theory to explain why he was roused, the same thing should have happened in the world of eleven years ago that we visited the other day, traveling through time. After all, if we went back and looked at the timeline, that was when Shinobu visited that spot for the “first” time.
It didn’t happen in the world of eleven years ago because only four years had passed since the ashes arrived in the air pocket, and he couldn’t even subconsciously recognize Shinobu… Shouldn’t that be how I looked at it? Shinobu then used up all the aberrational materials in that location, which is why the First never returned in that timeline…
But would Miss Gaen overlook something that even I noticed?
“Surprised, Sir Araragi? That I wish to issue an apology to Kissshot?”
“Not surprised as much as it just sounds like a lie to me. In fact, you’ve already sent an assassin Shinobu’s way─that mockery of a monkey aberration.”
“That was an assassin sent thy way─just as the mockery of a snail aberration was. Just a bit of harassment of my junior… But do not worry. I shall dispatch no further mockeries now that I have seen the sign and seal on thy face. To thee, of course, or to Kissshot.”
“It just sounds to me like you’re trying to talk your way into getting close to Shinobu so you can get your revenge.”
“Revenge? Revenge for what? What reason do I have to resent her? Ye who call her a name such as Shinobu?”
“Yes, you do have a reason. Don’t try to gloss over it by calling it a misguided moment. You said some awful things to Shinobu.”
“None more awful than calling her Shinobu, in my eyes─but such fruitless arguments aside, indeed, I cannot deny that. Thus I wish to apologize. I wish to meet her myself and apologize.”
“Meet her yourself? Wait, so are you asking me to put you two in contact?”
“I shall say nothing of the sort. I do not expect thee to mediate between us. All I need from thee is thy separation from Kissshot.”
She needs only one thrall, the boy Aberration Slayer said to me─with determination.
“I can become Kissshot’s right arm─while ye could become nothing more than her shackles. Am I mistaken? Have ye once protected her?”
“What about you? You tried to kill her. And even that enchanted blade you said to return… If you go all the way back, you made that sword to kill her, didn’t you?”
“Indeed I did. That imitation is a great sword created for the sole purpose of killing her─made with my flesh and blood, my body and bones. I cannot deny that either─but have ye never tried to kill her thyself? I was under the belief that we shared this one thing in common, but am I mistaken? Do ye wish for me not to treat us as similar?”
“You’re surprisingly talkative,” I said. “I imagined you to be more of the reserved type. Like the way you were in that armor.”
“I could no longer keep my silence. Though for the time being, one may say I’ve been pulled into speaking by this tiny appearance of mine… Sir Araragi. Thou once tried to kill Kissshot thyself─but now ye have reconciled, have ye not? Do ye find it audacious that I wish to do the same?”
“…”
“She brought me back from the brink of death. Though I may have flipped out at the time, I am now grateful─are such words that strange to hear?”
I did find it strange to hear him say flipped out, but he wasn’t wrong as a whole. It felt like we’d said and done the exact same things.
But while I couldn’t deny his words, whether or not I could affirm them was a different question until I had a clearer view.
Yes, he might be right, we had that in common, but we could hardly contradict each other more regarding everything else.
Call me petty, a shortcoming I recognize myself, but I wouldn’t be the only person to feel displeased, or as the boy Aberration Slayer might say, like flipping the hell out, upon being told to step aside.
I don’t have the kind of integrity required to reply with a quick is that so and a nod.
Even if logically.
I thought he was right.
“Do ye not wish to leave her? Though anyone could replace thee, I could be replaced by none. For I am special. I am a chosen human.”
“I love that. I wish I could say that kind of thing even once in my life─not that I’d ever be able to, given how flippant I’d sound.”
“Hahaha. No, Second, I have not taken such offense,” the boy Aberration Slayer said with lighthearted affectation.
I didn’t understand what this reply meant for a moment, but then I realized he probably thought flippant was the adjective form of flip out.
…His self-claimed omnipotence had its limits.
I felt just a little more like I might be able to debate him on even ground─he may have been the first Aberration Slayer, but he wasn’t faultless like Hanekawa.
If anything, the way he awkwardly tried to introduce modern words into our conversation felt like an attempt to vie against me, someone from four hundred years in the future.
That’s right.
He was─just as serious about this as me.
On an edge just as sharp as a katana.
“Thou saved Kissshot─ye happened upon her in a time of crisis and saved her. But wouldn’t anyone do the same and save a beautiful woman collapsed and on the brink of death?”
“…”
“’Tis something anyone could do, and something that could happen to anyone─a common occurrence that could happen anywhere in Japan. In that case, why not switch places with me? No…” He shook his head. “I suppose there is no point in confronting one another with our flaws and weaknesses so. What good would it serve for us to argue─’twould be nothing more than an unseemly civil war. For in the end, this is a case of two men fighting over a woman─I see everything about thee as flawed, while thou must see everything about me as flawed. They say that not even dogs dare to interrupt a quarrel between lovers. Not even an aberration would think to bother with a quarrel between slaves.”
What good would it do to demonstrate to one another our slavishness, the boy Aberration Slayer said, before clapping and taking the cap off his plastic bottle.
He’d said something earlier along the lines of being more talkative because he had a boy’s body, but knowing when to pause for breath at just the right time suggested that he was never a poor speaker to begin with.
“In that case, what should we do? Just start praising each other?” I asked as I waited for him to take the bottle away from his mouth.
“Now, that would be unseemly,” he answered─sensibly. “So allow me to present the benefits. Sir Araragi, I shall inform thee of all the wonderful things that would befall thee were ye to leave Kissshot─as I do, think of what wonderful things would befall me if ye did not.”
“B-Benefits? Wonderful things?”
The words felt completely out of place and ill-timed─like they ran counter to our situation. Was this that kind of negotiation?
“’Tis not a negotiation. I will merely explain to thee in a kind and meticulous manner those things thou must not understand. That ye will be freed were ye to leave Kissshot─that ye will be untied from those knots named Kissshot. That ye can be free from the way ye two are entwined and bound to one another. In other words, my proposal is nothing short of an offer to assume thy burdensome responsibility to her. I see the impressive settlement thou hast come to regarding Kissshot. It seems laudable from an expert’s perspective─I know not who wrought it, but ’tis superb. Yet ’tis not as if ye pay no cost to maintain it. Thou must live a warped life─and I am offering to take over this distortion that has come to thee.”
“Everything, then?” I answered cautiously─no matter what he said, I couldn’t afford to speak thoughtlessly. The conversation between the First and the Second had indeed entered this sort of phase. “You’re saying─you want to replace everything about me?”
“From my perspective, ’twas thee who replaced everything about me. Ye─took over my place. All I want is to have it back─my sword and my position. I could become thee, but thou could never become me.”
“…”
“Or do ye claim to be capable of better serving Kissshot? An amateur─better than I, an expert? Thou must realize I do not intend to slight thee, one who stayed by Kissshot’s side while I was gone. Or to be more frank, I do not wish to hurt thee, one who must be important to her in his own way.”
“I gave her your message,” I said in a low voice.
Her reply was the one piece of evidence that might allow me to stand against the boy Aberration Slayer.
“It sounds like─she has no interest in seeing you.”
“Is that so. Well, surely ’tis so.”
He didn’t seem affected─as if he’d all but expected my response. As if he saw straight through anything Shinobu might say…
“But whatever Kissshot’s intentions may be, I must have her return to me what I have lent her.”
My sword, and my position.
He almost sounded like a bill collector.
“I wish to bloom a second time. I wish to shine once more after four hundred years. I do not see this as shameful─if anything, is not thy grasping at thy position of Second shameful?”
“Are you sure it’s not as a human you want to bloom a second time? A thrall to Shinobu? Even if it isn’t for revenge, aren’t you trying to meet her so you could return to being a human?”
“I cannot return to being a human,” the First shot me down. “It has been four hundred years, after all─too much time has passed. We two are different from that perspective as well. But…I no longer consider this a tragedy. ’Tis because ’tis too late for me that I wish to stay forever, semi-eternally with Kissshot.”
“You might see that as true love or something, but these days…we call people like you stalkers.”
Hm?
Something felt strange about this line coming from me─why? What felt unnatural just now? No, maybe not unnatural, but a strange concordance─
“As I said before, let us not give ourselves to disparaging one another. More importantly, did ye think of something? What great things will come to me if ye refuse to leave Kissshot?”
If I stayed with Kissshot.
Remained with Kissshot─
“…”
I of course couldn’t come up with a thing─I couldn’t come up with a single thing, and so to stall for time, I twisted the cap to the bottle of tea I’d been given. This was my relationship with Shinobu: something that made everyone unhappy, that brought despair to all with no survivors. I’d drink the tea─but I’d never come up with any idea. I just wanted to escape being chased down and cornered by the boy Aberration Slayer. I took the bottle, and as if I were dodging my right to answer him, I put it to my mouth.
My mouth.
I put it, put it─
“?!”
I couldn’t put it anywhere.
It disintegrated.
I leapt back in surprise.
A silver something passed in front of my eyes at an incredible speed─and in the blink of an eye, smashed the bottle in my hands, contents and all.
It was crushed into dust─pulverized.
But neither a fragment of the bottle nor a drop of its contents fell on me. I’d lamely flopped over onto my butt before they could.
It wasn’t that I’d reflexively bent backwards. I was more like…blown back by the violent wind pressure of an object passing before me at a terribly high speed.
Of course, the boy Aberration Slayer intentionally and immediately hopped up and back to avoid─it.
It─being a massive silver cross.
That’s what he evaded.
The cross stood in the ground of the empty lot, buried deep like some sort of grave marker. This wasn’t my first time seeing the impossibly large silver item. I recognized it.
This striking item that vampires would be weak to─
A vampire hunter’s weapon.
“What the hell are you doing, drinking something an enemy gives you without a second thought? And I still saved you despite how much of an idiot you are─just how peaceful of a life do you lead, anyway? Even with your link cut the way it is now, you wouldn’t last a second if you drank holy water…”
There he stood─golden hair and golden eyes.
A young man in a white traditional school uniform.
“Gotta love it.”
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