by Yuu Miyazaki
In other words, Ayato and the others would have no means of contacting them and no means of knowing where they were.
“…I need to ask, how is Miluše’s sense of direction?
“You saw it for yourself when we were running away from that thing,” Tuulia remarked.
“…Right.”
In that case, they would have to consider that neither of them would have a good sense of their bearings.
“Argh!” a panicked voice from the other side of the air-window said.
Miluše, it seemed, had managed to dodge a falling fist-sized chunk of rubble by only a hair’s breadth.
“It doesn’t look good. We’ll try to do what we can—”
But the distortion soon became too intense to hear what Saya was saying, and after a short moment, the transmission cut out.
Ayato and the four girls could only glance at one another in worry.
Although pale lights lined the underground passage at regular intervals, it was wide enough that they did little to illuminate their surroundings.
Nothing echoed within the dim, damp space but the sounds of the two girls’ footsteps.
“…”
“Hey, hold up! You’re…you’re Sasamiya, right? Hey, stop walking so fast!” Miluše followed nervously, as if trying to keep out of her line of sight, looking like she was about to start crying.
“There’s no need for me to wait for you,” Saya answered coolly as she kept an eye out for anything that looked like it might lead back to the surface.
She had heard there were areas in the underground blocks equipped with communication terminals for use by those who found themselves lost, but she couldn’t see anything that even slightly resembled such a device.
“I’m not a you—call me by my name, Miluše! But I guess it is a stage name…”
“Fine. You can tag along if you want, but stop complaining,” Saya muttered.
“What…?! Y-you can’t mean that!” Miluše’s eyes moved to and fro like a terrified animal’s.
The two had, after all, been at odds with each other until just a short while ago, when Team Hellion showed up. Saya didn’t particularly want to return to that situation, but she didn’t care to start getting cozy with Rusalka, either.
And what was more…
“…I’ll tell you this.”
“Wh-what?”
Saya stopped there, glancing back at Miluše, who all but recoiled in fright under her gaze. “Ayato’s enemies are my enemies. I won’t forgive you if you do anything to him.”
Miluše hung her head. “But like we said, Ayato Amagiri is—”
“Fine. Why don’t I tell you just how good he is?”
“Huh?”
As she continued down the passage, Saya raised a finger. “This was when we were around seven years old. We were training with Haru on the hill behind our houses. I was careless, and—”
“Do I have to listen to this?”
“You can go on ahead if you like.”
Miluše glanced into the darkness, swallowing her breath. “…No, go on.”
“Good,” Saya said, nodding, before going on to explain Ayato’s many kindnesses for upward of an hour.
“…And then Ayato made it there in the nick of time, like a prince on a white horse… Huh?” Saya stopped, crouching down.
“…Hmm? Is it over?” Miluše asked, her expression bored, her voice sapped of energy.
Saya pointed at her feet. There were footprints—and recent ones at that.
“Footprints? But why would anyone be down here…?”
“…There’s dust.”
When Saya lifted her finger after tracing it against the ground, it was stained almost black.
But there was no dust anywhere else.
“Maybe…” Saya stood up and put her ear to the wall for a few seconds before giving it several loud knocks.
“Hmm…”
Something wasn’t right.
All at once, there was a sound of something heavy moving, and the wall slid open, revealing another pathway.
“A-a secret door…? Why would there be a secret door here…?”
That was no doubt where the dust had come from.
And if so, that secret door had probably not been used for a long time, until—
“Someone’s been here recently,” Saya murmured to no one in particular.
“Hey, look! There’s something inside!” Miluše exclaimed with excitement.
Indeed, ahead of them, there was a plain, silver-colored door shrouded in shadow only five yards or so from where they were standing.
They exchanged glances before cautiously approaching it.
“It’s… It’s an elevator, isn’t it?” Miluše asked, a hint of relief in her voice.
It certainly did look like an elevator at first glance.
If so, they might be able to use it to make it back to the surface.
“…But there’s something fishy about this.”
“Well… I guess it is a little unusual,” Miluše admitted quietly as she knit her brow.
She quickly pulled herself together, however, and put her finger on the button off to its side.
There was a dull, echoing sound, and the doors slid open, revealing a square space roughly two yards wide.
“See, it is an elevator!”
“…I don’t know whether you’re brave or just stupid.”
“I’m terrified of monsters! And I can never work out what I should do, but if we don’t do anything, we won’t get anywhere.”
It had been a careless thing to do, but Saya had to admit that there was some truth to what she was saying.
Even if they kept on wandering through the passage, there was no telling when, or even if, they would be able to find an exit.
“There’s another button inside… What should we do? Press it?”
“…We’re here now. Do whatever you want.” Saya stepped inside, preparing herself for the worst.
“All right, then,” Miluše said, putting her finger on the button.
The door slid shut, and with a frightening creak, the elevator began to move.
“…”
“…”
It took them a moment to realize what was going on.
“Th-this isn’t going down, is it?”
“…It’s going down.”
Saya didn’t have the energy to say any more than that.
Either it wasn’t moving particularly fast, or they were going particularly deep underground, because the elevator kept moving, on and on. They soon lost track of time, until finally it came to a halt, and the door opened.
“What on earth…?”
Saya and Miluše were left speechless by what lay before them.
They were in a space so wide that it was hard to imagine they were somewhere far underground.
Something that looked like a stage awaiting an upgrade was spread out before their eyes. Unlike standard stages, however, it was hexagonal in design, with pillars at each of its corners. The ceiling was unbelievably high, held up by the six towering pillars, which seemed to be carving straight through the pale light that filled the cavern.
The elevator was built into one of those six pillars.
Saya and Miluše, overwhelmed by what they had stumbled across, stepped out in silence.
At that moment, the elevator door snapped shut.
“Ah!”
By the time they thought to do anything, it was already too late. The door was locked tight.
And there was nothing nearby that even resembled a button.
“Wh-wh-what do we do now?!” Miluše cried out in panic.
Saya, silent, continued to survey their surroundings.
On second glance, the stage looked to have fallen into disrepair, and the pillars themselves looked as if they might come crashing down at any moment. Debris of every size imaginable lay scattered across the stage. Judging both by the state that it was in and the stagnant air, it must have been abandoned
long ago.
“It can’t be…” But when she glanced up, the stage was indeed surrounded by what looked like audience galleries—all but confirming her premonition. “…The Eclipse.”
She tried to remember what Ayato had told her about it as she stepped onto the stage.
The Eclipse—a secret, illegal tournament formerly held somewhere deep in Asterisk, in which there were no formal rules, and contestants practically fought to the death.
Ayato’s sister, Haruka Amagiri, had participated in it—and been defeated.
Almost as if urged on by some invisible force, Saya continued forward, until her eyes came across something lodged in the debris.
It was an eyeglass frame, fitted with broken lenses.
“…”
She fixed her gaze on it for a moment—before dusting it off, wrapping it carefully in a handkerchief, and putting it in her pocket.
“H-hey! Don’t leave me alone down here…!” Miluše called out, running after her. “…Huh? What’s wrong?”
Saya slowly shook her head. “…It’s nothing. Let’s try to find a way out.”
It was impossible to tell how long they had been down there.
Miluše was the first to break the silence. “Argh, I’m sick of this!” she complained, slumping down on a nearby clump of debris. “There’s no way out!”
Indeed, they had checked practically every square inch of the cavern, but they hadn’t found anything that looked like it might lead them back to the surface. On top of that, there was a deep groove between the stage and the galleries, too wide for either of them to jump across. The only places they could reach were the stage itself and the six supporting pillars surrounding it.
“…Panicking won’t do any good. Let’s wait for help,” Saya said, leaning against the same pile of debris.
She had reached the same conclusion as Miluše. There was nothing they could do.
“…How did we end up like this?”
“Because you all started meddling in other people’s business.”
“I told you—”
“Fine. Let me finish what I was telling you before. How about the time I got lost in town during summer vacation? It was the middle of the night, and it was raining, and I was just walking around, without knowing where I was going—”
“I’m sorry! I get it! You’ve already told me just how great Amagiri is—I know!”
“Good.”
Miluše let out an exhausted sigh. “I’m hungry… Oh, right!” Her expression suddenly brightened, and she took something out of her uniform pocket. “Ta-daa! I was planning to take them home! Pretty lucky, huh?” She was holding two packaged cookies in her hands.
“…I see. Good for you.” Saya let the words flow over her without paying them any attention.
Miluše, however, wasn’t finished. “Hey, for you,” she said.
“Huh?”
“Here,” she said, putting one of the packets in her hand.
“…Why are you giving it to me?” Saya stared at her suspiciously.
Miluše was under no obligation to share it with her.
“Well, I did mean to keep them to myself at first…”
She certainly seemed to have that sort of personality.
“But then I thought, that kind of person pops up in movies all the time, right? They’re so uncool. I don’t want to be like that.”
“Oh…” Saya seemed startled by the unexpectedly simple answer. “Well, then. I’ll take it. Thank you,” she replied, bowing her head.
It didn’t take long for them to finish eating. After that, they went back to waiting.
Eventually, Miluše, her chin resting in her hand and her expression bored, turned to Saya. “You take everything about Amagiri really seriously, you know. Is he really that important to you?”
“Of course.”
“So… Uh… Do you, like, l-l-like…him…?”
“…I guess you could say that.” Saya nodded.
“In that case…” Miluše’s face had turned red. “Why don’t you…you know…uh…take hold of him?”
“That’s…”
…none of your business, she wanted to say but thought better of it.
“I don’t want to tie him down.”
She herself didn’t really know why she said the words—they just seemed to slip out of her mouth.
“Huh? I don’t get it.” Miluše rested her hands behind her head, all but screaming out that she didn’t understand. “When there’s something I want, I’d do anything to get my hands on it.”
“…So what do you want?”
“To be the world’s number one, of course!” Miluše said, jumping to her feet with her fists clenched.
“The world’s number one?” Saya tilted her head uncertainly.
“I’ve come this far! All that’s left is to outdo Sylvia, and I’ll have reached the summit! The top of the world!”
“Ah… Music.” Saya hadn’t fully understood what she had meant until she heard Sylvia’s name.
Another question came to mind.
“But… In that case, why were you harassing Ayato about her?”
“Ah… I—I mean, you know…,” Miluše stammered, looking away.
They remained that way for a short while, and when she finally turned back, her expression was serious. “…For us, Sylvia’s like an idol. We all want to be like her. No, not just us—everyone at Queenvale.”
“…”
Saya said nothing, merely urging her to continue with a meaningful look.
“Three years ago, nobody knew our names. We were total nobodies. But Sylvia was already the world’s most popular songstress… That’s why we promised to beat her one day. Back then, I would have done anything to beat her.” Miluše’s voice was the calmest it had been since they had found themselves trapped together. She took a deep breath before continuing. “But if she’s being tricked by someone—if she’s just being played around with—that’s too sad. So we thought we had to do something.”
“…You aren’t making any sense.”
Or perhaps, Saya wondered, she was simply being honest about her inconsistent feelings.
“What’s wrong with that? Back then, I would have done anything to get to the top! And I’m still going to get what I want! And then there won’t be any more problems!” she declared before returning to her earlier composed tone of voice. “I mean, if I try to deny my feelings, I’ll just end up regretting it one day, right?”
“…!”
At those words, Saya’s eyes opened wide in realization.
Without even noticing it, her hand had found its way toward what she always kept hidden in her pocket.
“…Regret it, huh?”
“Exactly. I mean, that’s what they say, right, that it’s better to do something and regret it than not do something and regret it.” At this, Miluše flashed her teeth in a broad smile.
Saya could answer only with a forced smile. “…So you’re going to put everything into surpassing Sylvia Lyyneheym?”
“That’s easier said than done, though.” Miluše’s shoulders fell dejectedly. “I’d be happy to beat her in either music or battle. Just one of those would be enough…”
Saya let out yet another small sigh. “The way I see it, you’re fighting in the exact same arena as she is. If you want to win no matter what, it isn’t like there aren’t other options available to you.”
“Huh? R-really? L-like what?” Miluše jumped up, clutching Saya firmly by the shoulders.
Saya pushed her away gently and cleared her throat. “…Like in the Festa.”
“In the Festa…?”
“Sylvia Lyyneheym hasn’t been able to win one yet.”
“Well, she had to go up against that monster in the Lindvolus.”
“That monster”—the Witch of Solitary Venom, Erenshkigal.
“Exactly. She’s only focusing on the Lindvolus, and the odds of winning that are pretty slim. That means you have an advantage that she does
n’t.”
“I see!” Miluše’s expression suddenly brightened. “If we can win the Gryps—”
“But not this time. Maybe the next one.”
“What do you mean?!”
“We’re going to win this time,” Saya said matter-of-factly.
Miluše startled. “Wha—?! Th-that’s my line! We’re the ones who are going to win!”
“…That’s not going to happen.”
Their gazes clashed—the sheer intensity all but enough to send sparks flying across the room.
“Good grief…,” a voice from behind them said. “To think that you both managed to find your way down here.”
They spun around to find an instantly recognizable, dignified woman emerging from the elevator in the nearest pillar.
“…Commander Lindwall?”
Both Saya and Miluše stared at her in amazement.
Behind her stood Ayato and the other members of Rusalka.
“Ayato!”
“Miluše!”
They all rushed over, their faces filled with relief.
“It’s good to see you both safe and well.” Helga’s smile was genuine, but her voice soon changed in tone. “This place is off-limits—or rather, you shouldn’t even have been able to access it in the first place. You’re going to have to tell me how you got down here.”
CHAPTER 6
THE LYRE-POROS
A melancholic evening sky. Familiar streets lined with houses. The sound of crows cawing in the distance.
She recognized it all immediately—she was dreaming, reliving a memory from long ago.
“Oh my, what is it, Saya?” Haruka, a shopping bag in her hands, had called out to her gently.
“…I had a fight with Ayato,” she’d responded, sitting on the veranda with her hands on her knees.
“…I see.” Haruka had glanced at the building behind her.
