The teacher kept them sitting in the orientation room for a long time.
She looked at Yuki most of the time. Yuki listened without showing any expression, sitting with her back straight and her hands on her thighs, her eyes fixed on a spot on the wall.
Aoi listened without moving.
Takeshi listened without processing almost anything that was said.
In the end, the teacher let them go home when classes were over.
Takeshi left the building alone.
The sun was already going down and the main courtyard was almost empty. Classes had ended and only a few students were still outside. Takeshi crossed the courtyard toward the school exit without looking back and stepped out onto the street.
He stopped on the sidewalk.
'Wait a second…'
He didn't know where he lived.
He thought about it for a second, and then the memory came on its own. The address, the route, the street names, the number of blocks, the appearance of the building. Everything complete and organized, as if it had always been there.
But it hadn't been there before. Suddenly, the deity spoke.
"Ah, right… I implanted some memories so you wouldn't get lost. You can thank me later."
Takeshi clenched his teeth.
'Damn it!'
He started walking in the direction the memory indicated.
The walk took about fifteen minutes on foot. The streets were normal, nothing out of the ordinary.
Takeshi walked at a leisurely pace and let his mind work.
'Good thing I managed to avoid dying again thanks to that teacher…'
The memory didn't feel foreign on the surface, but Takeshi knew he hadn't formed it himself.
It unsettled him in a way that was somewhat similar to finding an object in his pocket that he didn't remember putting there.
He kept walking.
He passed a pharmacy next to a bakery and arrived at a five-story apartment building with a cream-colored facade. He entered the lobby, went up to the third floor by the stairs, and stopped in front of the door to apartment 304.
He remembered the number without having to look for it.
He took the key out of his backpack and opened the door.
"You're home?"
The voice came from the kitchen. Takeshi entered the apartment and closed the door behind him. It was a small but tidy space: a living room with a sofa next to a coffee table, an integrated kitchen in the back, and two closed doors that the memory told him were the bedrooms.
A girl poked her head out from the kitchen.
She had dark brown hair tied in a low ponytail and the uniform of a different high school from Takeshi's, though she wore the blazer open and the collar of her shirt unbuttoned. Her eyes were dark and looked at him with the normal expression of someone seeing a person they expected to see.
Above her head, the sign.
[AKARI FUJIMOTO]
[Life: 100%]
[Sanity: 100%]
[Trust: 100%]
"You look exhausted."
Akari said as she wiped her hands on a kitchen towel.
"Did something happen?"
Takeshi looked at her.
'Who the hell is this?!'
The deity had implanted the apartment's address, but apparently hadn't included anything about the person living in it, because Akari Fujimoto was a complete stranger standing in the kitchen of what was supposed to be his home.
When Takeshi was about to ask, his mouth started speaking without him having control over it.
"Nothing happened."
He answered.
"Just stuff from class."
Akari looked at him for a moment longer and then went back into the kitchen.
"Well, dinner's almost ready, so go change and come eat."
The memory indicated which of the two doors was his room.
He entered, closed the door, and sat on the edge of the bed. The room only had a desk with neatly arranged books, a slightly open closet, and a window with a view of the building across the street. Everything matched the life of a high school student.
He changed out of his uniform into casual clothes he found in the closet and went out to the dining area.
Akari already had the plates on the table. Rice, soup, some stir-fried vegetables. She sat across from Takeshi and started serving without ceremony.
"I had a chemistry test today."
Akari began.
"I think I did well, though I didn't quite understand the last exercise."
"Ah…"
Takeshi replied.
"How did it go for you?"
Takeshi picked up his chopsticks.
"Fine."
Akari glanced at him briefly and then lowered her eyes to her plate.
"So talkative."
They ate in silence for a few seconds. Takeshi paid attention to everything Akari said and to every pause while she ate with the naturalness of someone who had eaten at that table hundreds of times.
"Are you going to practice tomorrow?"
Akari asked.
'Practice?'
Takeshi had no idea what she was referring to.
"Probably."
"Probably?"
Akari repeated, staring at him.
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah."
Takeshi said.
"You're acting weird."
"I'm… tired."
Akari watched him for a moment with her chopsticks suspended over her plate, as if evaluating the answer. Then she went back to eating.
"Get some sleep early then."
She advised with her mouth half full.
"Yeah."
Takeshi replied.
They finished dinner. Akari cleared the plates, Takeshi offered to help without quite knowing why, and the two of them cleaned the kitchen in silence.
Akari talked a bit more about something that had happened at her school that afternoon, about a classmate who had said something that didn't make sense.
When Akari went into her room, Takeshi returned to his.
He sat on the bed again. The room was silent and the light from the window had disappeared. He stared at the ceiling and opened the stats.
[Life: 100%]
[Sanity: 60%]
[Points: 3]
'So that was an event, I guess…'
Because of the event he had died four times in a single day.
He lay down on the bed without taking off his clothes. He stared at the ceiling for a moment, with all that data moving through his head.
'When I open my eyes tomorrow,'
He thought.
'All of this will have been a dream.'
It was the only thing that would let him close his eyes right now, so he left it there and closed his eyes.