"Shiori!"
During PE class, a girl with long deep-purple hair tied back by a ribbon dashed over to Shiori's side and looped her arm through hers like they were a couple, pressing the considerable abundance of her chest against Shiori's arm until it changed shape.
Physical intimacy this close between girls might still pass as normal—maybe.
"Let's play that game from yesterday—the one where you use your fingers! (/≧▽≦)/" The naturally oblivious girl's remark swung the eyes of the class gossip trio straight toward them.
"I heard Itsuka-san likes girls—is that actually true?"
"I also heard she has a close relationship with an idol from the high school next door, and there's something going on with those new transfer twins too."
"Unbelievable..."
"She means a handheld game console—stop making it sound like something it isn't!" Shiori delivered a light karate chop to Tohka's head.
Tohka covered her head with both hands. "I understand, Shiori! Let's play the game that uses your fingers but is not at all inappropriate!"
"..."
This child—like Yimi—was a Spirit. Her codename was "Princess." She was also the first Spirit Shiori had ever successfully sealed, the beginning of everything.
As the number of sealed Spirits grew, the rumor that "Itsuka Shiori likes girls" had spread through the school in a way that was hard to avoid. She seemed to hear people whispering about it wherever she went. It was mortifying.
Shiori stifled an internal sigh—only to have her view blocked by the name "TOBIICHI" stretched across an approaching chest. Stretched, because it was printed on the front of a gym uniform.
"Shiori. Wait for me after school."
"Sorry, Origami—I have something today." Ratatoskr was calling a meeting to reopen their strategy for approaching Yimi.
Origami had launched a full lethal assault on Yimi just yesterday while Yimi stood right beside Shiori. And now here they were, classmates—even friends—at the same school the next day. Such a strange, delicate relationship.
Shiori stepped sideways to go around her, but Origami's own step mirrored hers and blocked the path again.
"Five years ago, my parents died in an attack by a Spirit wielding flame." The white-haired girl reopened that topic without warning, and Shiori's full attention snapped to her.
They had discussed this before. In Origami's memory, a Spirit who brought fire had killed her parents.
Efreet—that fire-bearing Spirit was Kotori, Shiori's little sister. In her childhood, an uncontrolled surge of her power had burned through nearly an entire city block.
But in the end that conversation had faded: Shiori insisting she believed in her sister, Origami dropping the subject.
"I was mistaken. I'm sorry."
Those words let Shiori finally relax.
It was only natural—an eleven-year-old in the midst of an experience so searing it nearly rendered her unconscious would have distorted memories. The timing had simply coincided with Kotori's power going out of control.
"What I saw was a pure white Spirit—like an angel. 'Disaster'—that was the codename AST assigned to her yesterday."
"Pure white..." Shiori only now understood.
She was talking about Yimi?
Origami gave a slight nod and took Shiori's hand. "The one who was with you yesterday. I hope you can tell me what she looked like."
That white radiance—holy and blinding both at once—meant that even attacking at close range, all she had seen was white, like something from a kingdom of light. If anything, the closer she had gotten, the harder it became to keep her eyes open. Even shut, she could feel it threatening to blind her short-term.
But Shiori had been face to face with the Spirit from the start. She must have seen her clearly.
Facing Origami's unusual expression, Shiori's eyes slid away. "I'm sorry, Origami—at that moment, I could only hear her voice..."
There had to be a misunderstanding. A child that small... Even if a Spirit's age couldn't be judged by appearance, Origami herself had said Yimi's codename was only assigned yesterday. And Yimi seemed to be the type who couldn't control her Silent Territory—the kind who triggered Spacequakes just by appearing.
"So..."
Origami released her hand. Her expression returned to its usual stillness, but Shiori could feel it clearly: genuine disappointment.
"Then next time, please don't get in my way."
She left with only those words.
"Origami..."
After school, the suspended Origami had nowhere to go but home.
And once again, on her mandatory route home, she encountered the cat. A different street from yesterday—the only identical detail was the cardboard box nearby.
Didn't it have an owner? It was certainly plump enough.
Origami crouched in front of Yimi, tote bag in hand, expressionless face level with hers. But the cat had no reaction to the girl she had mentally filed as "small idiot"—because she was asleep.
Cats don't sleep on fixed schedules the way humans do. Rain or raising kittens aside, they hardly need shelter at all. In broad daylight they find a sunny patch and doze off; when they wake, they look for food. Their night vision is strong enough that darkness doesn't restrict them like it does humans.
After what Shiori had said, Yimi had abandoned further attempts to eat Spacequakes for energy. She could only wait for the Holy Corpse to finish merging on its own—a process that required normal sleep.
Origami watched her for a while.
She picked up a small stone from nearby and placed it on the cat's head.
No reaction.
"Cats are very alert when they're sleeping."
She seemed to be recalling some nature documentary she had watched on TV as a child.
She picked up a second stone and stacked it on top. Still nothing.
She didn't press the pointless exercise further. The girl straightened up and continued toward home.
She envied cats. No worries. They could sleep anywhere comfortable.
After she left, a breeze passed through. The stones clattered off Yimi's head and hit the ground.
"Mew!" Yimi shot straight up and looked around wildly.
She slapped her own tail twice.
Was it you?
"How curious—a cat that lets 'me' touch it."
"My, my~ It lets 'me' approach so freely. What a carefree little one."
"Can I pet it?"
Several shadows fell across the small cat at once.
"Mew?" Yimi looked up at the women who had suddenly appeared before her, ears pressing flat in alarm.
They looked absolutely identical. The only difference was their clothes—some wore a school uniform with one eye covered, like the time before; most wore an uneven twin-tail style in Gothic Lolita dress, the previously hidden eye now revealing a golden clock face with an hour hand that actually turned.
The uneven twin-tails struck Yimi as oddly familiar—because Mother sometimes wore that same hairstyle.
These were Kurumi Tokisaki's clones—more precisely, past versions of herself summoned via the Eighth Bullet, one of her angel's twelve different bullets.
In most respects their personalities weren't far from the main body's. This made the clone at the very back—straining on her tiptoes to see—stand out considerably.
"Did you get to pet it? Let me~"
"Give it something to eat first—last time I didn't and then..."
"Its little paws are pink~"
"Mew?" All the cat registered was that they had produced food. Unlike the small idiot who had been scolded yesterday, these were good big-cats.
A cat that doesn't try can only be handled by women.
At the very back, a clone in a medical eyepatch who couldn't see the cat at all stamped her foot in frustration. She noticed no one was watching her side—and reached out to grab another "self" by the butt.
In the commotion of the yelp and the spin-around, she squeezed through and finally got to see the cat that wasn't running away.
"It looks like a panda!"
Eyepatch-Kurumi suggested: "It doesn't seem to have an owner. Why don't we bring it home and take care of it?"
She was a clone from the period when Kurumi had first become a Spirit—the most innocent one, with the largest deviation from the main body's personality.
The other clones showed a flicker of temptation at the suggestion, then all stroked their chins and shook their heads in unison: "No. We still have our own wish to fulfill."
"Exactly—young 'me,' don't let anything become our weakness."
"But it's so pitiful..."
"..."
"Goodbye, little cat. Once 'I' have rewritten history, I'll come back to adopt you."
The little cat used her hind leg to scratch an itch on her neck.
Yimi had a home. She didn't need other big-cats to take her in.