Yeah, looks alright, everything seems to be safe.
The analogy of surfacing from the dark, cold depths of the ocean was fitting for this situation. Feeling a faint light on my eyelids and a solid weight around my lower body, I awoke.
For real, this ti.
Lifting my eyelashes, I remained stationary for a brief period of ti, doubting repeatedly, but the swaying curtains, the breeze, the sound of the cicadas, and most all, the suns rays, which I hadnt experienced in a long ti, convinced 80% that this was real, yet I was still on edge.
Because
A man in a suspicious suit, who was probably there before I opened my eyes, was sitting brazenly around my lower body, talking on his cell phone and gesturing with one hand.
Was I still in the midst of a crazy dream or was this
More importantly, was I alive?
Like I said, you dont have to co over here anymore, AkaneIts resolved. Youve been making phone calls again under the doctors watchful eye, havent you? Whatever happens, I dont care! Haha yeah ah, no, you cant, Ill get angry if you keep acting recklessly like that again.
A man. Or rather, a youth. Chestnut-colored curly hair, un-Japanese-looking features, and blue eyes. Despite it being sumr, he was attired in a black suit with a red necktie around his neck. He talked in a laid-back tone and was chattering happily with a smartphone in his hand. This guy was
He was with Yakumo before Yakumos friend
You are
Ah, youre awake Then, it is ti for to go to Akanes hospital room and hang up the phone.
After ending the call with a quick tap, the man turned to , seated while giving a gentle smile, much like Hyugas.
Good morning well, I am not supposed to say that huh.
Where am I and why are you did you not go back to Osaka with Yakumo?
Well, here is Nantouka General Hospital. And Im on a business trip right now.
What?
When I was stupefied, he brought his small cell phone up to my face and snapped a shot.
Excuse . Unless I do sothing like this, Akane is going to leave the hospital again with an IV in his arm. He said sothing like, Im worried about sonny! Thats why I have to confirm your survival.
With a giggle, he tucked it into his breast pocket.
Mister, your life is saved, isnt it? Thanks to you, my schedule has changed dramatically and I have one less job to do Well, I owe you a debt of gratitude, and my boss will be pissed off but as far as it goes, the outco is favorable, right?
While blabbing sothing incomprehensible, the man sat up from the bed, stretched, rolled up the curtains, and headed out.
So long, take care! Goodbye! Have a nice day!
At this point, the sound of the hospital room door opening preceded the departure of his footsteps, and I wasnt thinking rationally.
The young man in the black suit disappeared.
!? Ugh!
My body, which had not fully aroused, was awakened there.
A hellacious pain assailed like an electric shock, and I cried out briefly from sheer anguish.
Ouch oh, crap ouch!?
Even if I tried to twist my body, it hurt so much that I couldnt do that. The rest of my body, including my bones, flesh, and skin, was in excruciating pain simply from breathing. Physiological tears welled up in my eyes.
It hurt but the pain was
This was reality. Then, I was now ali
More importantly.
It hurtttttttttt!!!
Upon closer inspection, I found an oxygen mask over my mouth, a large amount of IV tubes in my left arm, connected to a huge machine of so unknown kind, with my neck tightly fixed, while my right leg was suspended by a cord hanging from the ceiling. My vision, which I thought was missing sothing, was only half open, and my right eye was crushed by a cloth that reeked of dicine. My right arm and left leg, which I thought were safe and sound, were wrapped in bandages, but my hopes were dashed by the exaggeration.
Just as I thought that was the end of it, my head, which had been complaining of a pain that felt like it was going to crack, felt surprisingly light. No way, I thought. It turned out that my head had been perfectly transford into a buzz cut.
Even without gazing in the mirror, it was evident to that I was a severely injured patient.
I an, seriously, this hurt, no joke. To the point that I was about to die.
No, it truly hurt. I might die.
Big bro big bro!?
Without noticing, my sister entered the hospital room as I was writhing in anguish.
Instantly at the sight of , she made a face as if she were looking at a monster and screeched. She hit the nurse call button repeatedly until it beca ludicrous. From that point on, it was all a madhouse.
My mother and my fatherwhom I hadnt seen in a whileentered the hospital room accompanied by a nurse and a doctor, whose complexions had shifted. Despite the strain of moving my lips and breathing, the doctor removed my mask and threw a few questions at before proceeding to do a whole bunch of other things to .
The doctor, who appeared to be in excellent condition overall, inford that I had been sleeping for a week and was allegedly on the borderline between life and death.
I knew it. That night, as I recalled, I had crashed on a curve, and plunged with my motorcycle into the cliff.
Had I been found even a few minutes later, I would have undoubtedly succumbed to death there. Shortly after the accident, fortunately, the manager drove by and, seeing the tire marks on the concrete, which appeared to be those of a brand new motorcycle, along with a wrecked guardrail that had been smashed through the steel plate and was clearly out of the ordinary, determined that it was an accident. An ambulance was imdiately dispatched and police were summoned to the scene to search for the victim.
The manager eventually realized for the first ti that I was the victim of the accident after discovering my cell phone on the road. Turning pale and panicking, he called my family, the night shift, several day and evening shift workers, and everyone else to search for . By the ti the people who were called in arrived later, the police and rescue team had already arrived. Understandably, the police stopped them, believing that an amateur would encounter major issues should they attempt to access the mountain at this ti of night, so everyone waited with bated breath at the scene of the accident as the hours ticked by. Not long after that, I was discovered in such an appalling condition that I could have been mistaken for a corpse.
Blood was all over , even my clothes were stained with fresh blood, bones were fractured everywhere, and my external injuries were nothing short of horrendous. I was literally dying.
Seeing after I was found, my sister fainted, suggesting that I must have been in a rather compromising situation. The reason I didnt die on the spot was that I was caught in a tree, which slightly suppressed the impact. Had I been unlucky, I would have been pierced by the branch and passed away imdiately from the shock of organ damage, which would have been horrifying to hear.
I was transported by ambulance and promptly rushed to the operating room, though. In the hospital at midnight, my mother was sobbing profusely and my father was still in a state of shock, still in disbelief.
Hours of surgery, during which I went into cardiopulmonary arrest multiple tis, was resuscitated each ti, given massive transfusions of blood, and had every part of my body gouged, cut, and stitched together. Everything was over just as the sun was rising.
Even though the surgery was said to be grueling, I persevered through it all; yet, I could not be regarded to have survived if I did not ultimately regain consciousness. Unless I regained consciousness, the doctors could not do anything about it. On top of not being able to do so, the current state of my condition was still poor, and they had even declared that I would likely spend the remainder of my life in a vegetative state, or worse, that I might die in a few hours or days without waking up.
Nevertheless, when I abruptly awoke, I was in a position where a person ordinarily would not even be capable of raising their voice properly, yet I was capable of cheerfully complaining that my body hurt.
It was a marvel that I was still alive, as the doctor claid.
My right eye, however, had been crushed in the crash and I would never be able to see the light again. Even so, there were no lasting repercussions from the unconsciousness, and so far my reactions have been normal, so it was certainly not the worst-case scenario. I was told that with proper treatnt, I could return to a normal life.
While repeating, Well, its truly like a lie, the doctor took my hand and shook it.
They would do a thorough examination next ti to determine if there were any other abnormalities In any event, I found it difficult to follow the doctors complicated explanation while being clutched in pain by my sister, who was sobbing next to . My physical strength had reached its limit, and I no longer felt like I was alive. Exhaustion, pain, and a sense of relief brought back to sleep again in no ti. By the ti I beca conscious again, it was around the ti the outside of the window was tinted orange.
Yo, you finally woke up, Sleeping Princess or is it Sleeping Prince?
It was Hirais voice, though a bit threatening
You dont have the features of a prince, huh?
Aya
With a laidback expression on her face, the person who entered through the curtains was again communicating to through the body of her daughter.
In all of my interactions with her, I had never gone without being teased, so I anticipated that she would tease once again. However, this ti, she talked to in a soft manner and seed to be sympathetic to my wretched condition.
Youve had a rough ti of it, my condolences.
No, Im not necessarily dead.
Your folks have gone ho to get your clothes and stuff.
I apologize for the inconvenience.
Im not inconvenienced by it. If I did, Id be worried. Make sure you tell your parents later.
Yes.
You lost your right eye but youre lucky to be alive. You ca back well.
I nodded with tears in my eyes as she said this gently.
Thank you
Perhaps Aya knew what I was going through. With a mild smile, she opened the canned coffee tab.
If you want to offer your thanks Tell it to that one and him.
Taking a sip of coffee, Aya pulled back the curtain behind her.
There it was
Against the white wall of the hospital room, sitting in a chair, Takenaka was asleep with his arms folded.
An entirely fresh white gauze and a huge adhesive bandage were placed on Takenakas well-grood face while he was sleeping. Compared to Takenaka, my wounds were probably more critical, but it did not an his injuries were not sothing to be overlooked. I couldnt help but widen my eyes.
Let him sleep, he must not have slept much in the last few days. You dont know anything about this, but he was the one who went through the greatest trouble to try to save you this ti.
Takenaka did that
You saw that one, didnt you?
I moved my head when I realize she was talking about Hyuga.
She was able to reach you, all because of his efforts He helped her extend the ti she could be with you just a little bit and now you must know the real reason why that girl died. Otherwise, it would be too undeserved. Even if she said she would still be okay with it. Were both won after all
Setting the coffee on the side table, Aya said she would share with the battle that had been going on without my knowledge and the truth of it all.
That pitiful figure of Hyuga that haunted was nothing more than an illusion created by my guilty conscience. In a nutshell, I had been plagued by an apparition who was the physical manifestation of my own guilty conscience over the previous few weeks.
How did I co to see such things? It was deeply connected to the sea of trees and my faltering spirit.
Youve been entranced by the neclues of that sea of trees.
Thats
You asked the other day whether there is sothing deeper and more sinister out there. Oh, of course I knew; there was no way soone as powerful as could have failed to detect it inside. At the ti, I sensed that your ntal state was fluctuating, so I played dumb and feigned ignorance, lest I cause you undue anxiety. Well, that backfired this ti, though Geez, I should have given you so guidance if it was going to co to this.
A plethora of grudges, envy, grief, and resentnt was prevalent across the vast spiritual magnetic field. The nucleus of the sea of trees was, so to speak, a monster of thoughts created from the concoction of such negative power.
That was the nucleus of the sea of trees.
Always sucking up the filthy emotions of the people who congregated in the sea of trees, it grew up, and in rare cases, it possessed a ntally weak or unstable person and sought to draw them in.
There are sites known for suicides and automobile accidents, and the reason there is an unceasing stream of suicides is that those who are strongly embedded in such locations are responsible for them. Furthermore, unlike people, it could not rest in peace, and it is born from the strongest emotions of human beings, which makes it all the worse.
Subsequently, neither the possessed person nor the people around them were conscious of what was taking place until sothing transpired since it progressively corroded peoples minds from the inside out. It could be described as a fungus that corroded peoples minds, contaminating their spirits, causing them to hallucinate, driving them mad, and even leading them to death. Although insubstantial, in combination with negative emotions, it was said to be able to transform itself into what humans dreaded the most and visualize it. Feelings of guilt and the belief in my heart that Hyuga would co to kill soday resulted in seeing such an apparition.
It wasnt Hyuga who materialized in front of that night; rather, it was my regret, remorse, and fear that had manifested as a figure. Takenaka sensed that I was possessed by that thing and was about to be dragged into it. The devils curve, which would be quite perilous if I kept going in the sa direction, would be approaching . He told over and over again over the phone.
Nonetheless, I was still in a panic when the phone eventually went dead in the middle of the call. At that instant, Takenaka, picturing the devastation in his mind, ran out of his parents house and called Hirai. Soon after, he heard from the manager that I had been involved in a falling accident, and with his heart pounding, he headed for the hospital.
By the ti Takenaka, who had driven his car, arrived at the hospital, I was in the operating room repeatedly undergoing cardiopulmonary arrest. The situation was so tense that even the doctor feared I might not be able to survive any longer. People waiting in the corridor had slumped their shoulders, and an air of resignation pervaded.
Among them, only one person, Takenaka, did not relent. In front of the operation room, where those who could only wait for the worst to co were hunched on a couch corner, he asked my sister to lend him my mobile phone, which would soon be turned into a nto belonging to the deceased.
After making sure with my sister, Takenaka contacted Kinoshita, my closest friend from high school, and inford him that I had been in an accident, that my life was in jeopardy and that he required his assistance to save and asked him for the location of our old school.
Takenaka knew that you had been beckoned by the other side and that you were already being dragged very deep and that if you stayed there, you would surely die, so he ca up with a plan, the only way to save you.
No way
Right, Takenaka took a gamble. He bet that she would bring you back from the brink of death.
But Hyuga is
Thats right. She didnt rest in peace, she was still here in this world. On the roof of the old school building. She beca a specter bound to that place, though.
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