14. Melting Point (12)
14. Melting Point (12)
Last night, when Wonderstein proposed his treatment plan, Reina doubted her own ears. She was certain she had misheard him.
"I have to dress like... a kindergartener?"
The mask hid her expression, but Wonderstein could see her ears flush crimson. He fought down the laugh bubbling up and laid out the quest details in an even voice.
"Yes. As I said, to raise a four-year-old Shadow to five, you need the right bait. In your case, Miss Reina, that bait is 'kindergarten life.'"
The premise sounded absurd, but the quest itself was persuasive. The mere fact that a quest had appeared proved her Shadow was ready to accept the terms. Member Quests manifested by detecting a troupe member's desires and wishes, after all.
"I-it isn't just putting on the clothes, is it...?"
"Of course not. You wear them, yes... and then you go outside, play with children your age, attend a lesson with a teacher, go on a field trip — we'll need to try several things. And naturally, you will do all of this without your mask."
That final sentence sent her mortification rocketing past its limit. She shook her head wildly side to side and burst out.
"Th-that's insane! I-I mean, even if what you say is true and I get cured... isn't this putting the cart before the horse...? The whole point of treatment is so that nobody sees me acting like a child..."
Wonderstein smiled as if to tell her not to worry and produced an object from inside his coat. It looked like a checkbook — a bound stack of stiff, palm-sized slips.
"We'll use these."
Reina recognized them at once. She had seen them yesterday.
Role Name Tags. A magic tool: write a subject's name on the paper, attach it to your body, and others would perceive you as that subject.
"With these, people will see you as a five-year-old, Miss Reina."
The day before, she had watched Umon stride confidently through a crowd wearing one. Her voice softened a little as she asked the next question.
"But... is this really all right? What if the magic wears off partway through...?"
"There is a time limit. Each tag lasts twelve hours. And the effect isn't perfect, either. These tags can't alter a person's senses. They merely distort the observer's perception. That means the greater the mismatch between the tag's subject and the person wearing it, the higher the likelihood the perception impairment breaks. The probability also climbs if someone observes you up close or already knows you well. So to avoid being caught, Miss Reina, you will need to actively... behave like a child of that age."
She had trained to stand before the public from the age of eight. Simon had drilled her to maintain a cold expression, to walk with an arrogantly lowered gaze, and to speak in a frosty, measured tone. Following his instructions, she had lived that way for ten years.
Joining the Monster Circus Troupe had not changed her bearing. She was gentler with the other members, true, but around outsiders she maintained her lofty, chilly poise. Laughing brightly in a crowd or chattering in a cheerful voice made her feel oddly self-conscious.
And now Wonderstein was asking for far more than that.
Dress like a child, act like a child, speak like a child?
Her face burned.
"Ugh..."
The moment she took off her mask, her body fell under the Shadow's control anyway. If she simply shut her eyes and plunged in, the Shadow would handle things on its own.
But Reina could not treat it as someone else's business. She and her Shadow shared every memory and emotion. Without her mask, she was, roughly put, like someone too drunk to command her own body.
Which meant every time she put the mask back on, she had to writhe in shame, reliving the previous night's drunken antics with absolute clarity. Pressing herself against the Troupe Leader with her body bare, chirping in a childish voice, reaching a peak under his touch — she felt it all as vividly as if she had done it herself.
Doing those things alone with the Troupe Leader was mortifying enough. But in broad daylight... on a public street, with crowds watching... pretending to be a little child?
Her heart hammered. This was far too much. No matter how powerful a magic tool they used, she would be exposed a hundred percent.
If that was how things would end... could she not just go on living as she was? She could bind her whole body with ropes before removing the mask, or fasten a sturdy leash — with enough precautions, she could still manage the Shadow.
Fear rippled through her. Then a gentle, warm touch wrapped around her body.
"It will work. Have courage, Miss Reina."
"Troupe Leader..."
Reina's lips trembled as she looked at him. Wonderstein nodded as if he already knew what she wanted to say.
"Right. That would be easier for now. But you know you cannot live like that forever, our daughter. Keeping your Shadow bound up forever — you cannot do that to yourself, either."
"...Dad."
He was right. The longer she kept the Shadow forcibly restrained, the more resentment and hatred toward Wonderstein would accrue inside it. And those feelings would be shared with her Persona-wearing self. She doubted she could endure receiving those emotions.
"Will you trust your dad and come along?"
"Yes."
Reina nodded. She thought it was truly fortunate she was still wearing her mask. Otherwise, he might have seen just how foolishly and helplessly she beamed — wrapped in his arms, gazing up at his smile.
That feeling was not born from gratitude toward the benefactor who had saved her, nor from a daughter's heart toward the father indulging her in family play.
You are a sly man, Troupe Leader.
This should have been a moment for cold calculation of probabilities and costs. But when he came to her this way, she had only one choice she could make.
"I'll do as Dad says."
She rested her head against his chest. One hand pressed his abs, and the other gripped the firm muscles of his back. Perhaps, she thought, she had wanted to savor this relationship forever.
And so the next day, she stepped outside without her mask, into public view. Yet no matter how hard she tried to gather her courage, she simply could not lift her face.
This was not ordinary embarrassment. Standing on a street in broad daylight wearing children's clothes, both legs fully exposed — it was mortifying beyond words.
"Hah, hah."
Reina breathed raggedly. She stood in the small shopping street near their lodgings. Barely a minute had passed since she emerged from the alley, and over a dozen people had already walked past.
Even her Shadow had never stood before so many people before. Brazen as the Shadow could be, it could not act as wildly as it did when alone with Wonderstein. It kept glancing around, uneasy.
They will find out. They will find out. They will definitely find out...
Every time a lone pedestrian or a group of two or three passed, her mind went blank. If their gazes so much as flickered toward her, her body locked up until she could not move a muscle. But contrary to her fears, they walked on past her without any reaction at all.
Had she been standing there in her usual clothes, they might have sensed something amiss — those clothes were far too adult for a five-year-old.
But right now she wore a kindergartener's outfit, and the passersby saw clothing appropriate for a five-year-old and accepted it without a second thought. As long as the commonsense pairing of "five-year-old" and "kindergarten uniform" held, people registered it as normal.
Now and then someone's gaze would snag on her tall frame and mature figure, but their eyes would dart away at once with a startled expression — flustered at themselves for harboring indecent thoughts about a child. Those people rapidly dismissed their suspicion and hurried off, fighting not to revisit the same thought.
Having Ruelo beside her in identical clothes helped distort their perceptions further. It was like seeing a young man with a shaved head in civilian clothes walking behind a uniformed officer — you would assume he was a soldier, too. A genuine child beside her reinforced the perception impairment.
After a few minutes of watching pedestrians go by, Reina finally trusted the Role Name Tags' effect.
"Can I call you Samson?"
Reina looked at her identically dressed companion and spoke in a bright, innocent voice. The core personality was different, she knew, but seeing Ruelo's familiar face made her glad. The reply that came back was frosty.
"Hey, you're five, aren't you? You can't be talking to me like we're equals. I'm six."
"H-huh?"
This was not the adorable youngest member she usually knew. The eyes glaring at her were sharp, and the words that spilled out were rough. That day Reina learned, for the first time, that Ruelo's face could wear such a defiant expression.
"If you really want to call me something, it's 'big sister.'"
"Uh, o-okay. B-big sister..."
Reina felt something was not quite fair, but she was cowed by Samson's force of presence and had no choice but to bow her head.
Samson looked at her and let out a soft snort. He had gotten a rough briefing from the Creator, but seeing the lofty Reina genuinely act like a little child was hard to believe. He had been granted an outing today in exchange for helping with her treatment, so he treated her exactly like a five-year-old little sister.
"What a good girl you are, Reina."
Ruelo's small hand stroked her lowered head.
A shiver ran through Reina's whole body.
"Ah..."
What she felt was happiness. Without her mask, as the Shadow, she had gained a kind of freedom — but the Troupe Leader had been the only one she could form a bond with. She could act like a child around him as much as she wanted, but he was still older than her, and he had already been playing along with the "dad" game from the start. So she had never truly felt younger.
But now, being treated like a little sister by a six-year-old in a public place made it sink in — she really had returned to being four years old. When she lifted her head, her expression had eased into a smile far more comfortable than before. It was so innocent, so genuinely childlike, that even Wonderstein, watching from nearby, wondered if the tags' effect might be reaching even him.
"Hehe, I like big sister. Is big sister happy to be out with Reina too?"
"Yeah. It has been a while since my last outing, so I'm enjoying it."
Ruelo kept a cool expression as she spoke, casting a languid glance over the world around them. Reina was impressed by Samson's composure.
Shadow or not, she retained her full memory and judgment — treating someone far younger as a genuine older sister was not easy. It broke the immersion. But Samson's manner was so mature that treating her as a real older sister posed no difficulty at all.
A hunger stirred inside Reina — she wanted to be treated even more like a little child.
Wonderstein was satisfied. Samson was playing her role exactly as he had hoped.
"All right then, children. Now that we have all introduced ourselves, shall we set off?"
"Yes, Dad!"
Reina answered in a loud, spirited voice. Wonderstein looked at her and shook his head.
"Reina, I am 'Dad' at home, but here you should call me 'Teacher.' This is 'kindergarten,' after all."
Kindergarten! The place she had wanted to attend so badly when she was five!
The four-year-old Shadow shouted with delight.
"Yes! Teacher!"