The Lord Who Made Heaven and Earth (3)
As winter drew toward its end, four women walked the streets of Tokyo. Not one of them wanted for looks—each face finely drawn, each of them beautiful enough to turn a head—and yet no one approached.
"All thanks to Akane-chan."
"...You making fun of me?"
"Huh?"
"Right. Damn it. Like you'd even be capable of sarcasm like that."
At Tsunashi Tenka's offhand remark, Akaba Akane shot her a sharp glare. Deciding, perhaps, that the jab was wasted on someone with no self-awareness to speak of, she soon sighed and looked away, then caught the ends of her bangs and fidgeted with them. She knew perfectly well by now that ignoring whatever anyone said was the wiser course. That did not mean she felt no complex about it at all.
"Well... I rather think it's mostly because of me."
Whether Han Seoyeon had caught that subtle reaction, or whether she was simply saying what she took for the truth, she cut in all the same. Hearing it, Akane sighed again. Someone she hadn't even met that often was being this considerate, and her so-called friend was like that. Why was the consideration Tenka showed everyone else an exception only when it came to her? She grumbled over it inwardly. From Tenka's side of things, of course, it was probably special treatment—a mark of trust, different from how she treated anyone else.
"Once you get used to the aura she gives off, Shion really is a beauty, you know."
Hers had always been a face of sanpaku eyes and dark circles—gloomy, and sharp enough to cut. What unsettled people even more than the face itself was the peculiar atmosphere Han Seoyeon carried wrapped around her. There was no actual smell, and yet the reek of corpses and the perfume of blood, stuck thick against her soul, were not things easily washed away. There were other reasons too, her failure to properly rein in her own presence among them, but none of that mattered just now.
"You flatter me. Praise like that ought to be reserved for someone on the order of Ninomae, or Akaba."
"Ehehe... thank you. But I really do think Shion is pretty, you know? No matter what the rest of the world says, that's what I think."
Ninomae Hitomi said it with a bright, beaming smile.
...Ah. So that's how it is. She's practically dripping honey from her eyes.
Watching them, Akane's gaze twitched. She had more or less grasped what it was Ninomae felt for Han Seoyeon. The clear difference from the last time they had met was that the girl had become aware of her own feelings. A moment later, walking side by side with Seoyeon, Ninomae rose onto her toes and kissed her on the cheek, then smiled again—cute, and a little shy.
Thinking about it, yeah. Who even does that with a friend?
Of course, there were friends who touched often. There were surely people who wouldn't mind a peck on the cheek. But even they would never wear an expression like that. Of this, Akane was privately certain.
"That's true, though. The first impression was pretty scary, but once you spend time with her, she's just an ordinary good person. Get past the killing intent, and she's got an incredibly pretty face..."
And then there was her friend, barging straight into the middle of that without a second thought. Call it bold, or call it remarkably oblivious. Tenka sidled up beside Ninomae and inserted herself into the conversation, and the way she gently enclosed Ninomae's hands in both of her own was probably unconscious. Akane had memories of being on the receiving end of that, more than a few times, going way back.
What do you think you're doing to someone who already has a person she likes?
Even setting aside how little sense of distance she had, shouldn't she at least choose her targets? Since it wasn't a conscious act, it was hard to condemn her outright. Even so, Ninomae had to be uncomfortable with familiarity that unreserved—
...Or not? Is she just happy to be the flower in both hands?
Seeing the expression on Ninomae's face—half flustered, half delighted—Akane revised the thought. Even so, wasn't that girl a little too easy? A VTuber whose entire brand was yuri fanservice, and her resistance to actual yuri was this low? The thought slipped out before she could stop it. Even that, though, came off as cute rather than lecherous. That was probably Ninomae's particular talent.
The other coworkers dote on her something fierce, too.
She didn't know exactly how it stood among the second-generation juniors, but along the first-generation senior line, the one quietly doted on most of all was Mary Tepes. Ninomae. There was no particularly profound reason. She was simply, ordinarily kind, and cute—not only in her looks, but in her manner and the way she reacted. That was the general verdict among her colleagues. They were simple, obvious qualities, but people who actually possessed those simple conditions were, when you stopped to think about it, remarkably hard to find. It was not for nothing that even the company staff called her things like "the Princess of Anathema." The girl herself didn't seem to have noticed the nickname existed.
A human being the complete opposite of someone like herself. That was how Akane thought of Ninomae.
No. Time to drop these pointless thoughts. She shook the stray musings off and spoke.
"This way. Turn toward the main street up there and we're there."
Watching her lead the way, Han Seoyeon murmured.
"...You know the way quite well, incidentally. Have you been here before?"
The whole business about an adult shop had surely been nothing more than a pretext for coaxing Ninomae out.
"...It's hard to suddenly pull out, as an excuse, something you've never done even once."
In short, this was not the first time she had gone to buy that sort of thing as an offering for the shrine.
"I'm sorry for saying something unnecessary. It must have been an embarrassing question."
"As if. Do I look like someone who'd be embarrassed by that?"
"Before we even get to whether you look the part, Akaba is a woman as well."
"...Oh. Is that so."
Akane answered only curtly. Both hands shoved into the pockets of her jacket, she strode on ahead and kept leading the way, turning the words over inwardly. Been a real long time since anyone said something like that to me.
At any rate, they arrived at the destination.
"...It's more refined than I expected. Honestly, I thought the atmosphere would be a lot more decadent."
"Hmm. Maybe places like this are modernizing too?"
Perhaps because it was so unlike what they had pictured, Ninomae and Tenka murmured it blankly.
"Unlike the old days, there are plenty of shops now where couples, or even people just passing by, can drop in on a whim. ...So what are you doing? You coming in or not?"
"No, it's just—even with an atmosphere like this, I'm still a little reluctant to walk right in..."
It was her first time in a place like this, and she had the feeling people would look at her strangely. Ninomae said it in a voice that shrank smaller and smaller.
"Well. You needn't worry too much about the eyes around you. People are surprisingly uninterested in anyone else."
Han Seoyeon said it with perfect calm. Unless someone was making a scene, there weren't many who paid any attention to the pedestrians going by—who was walking where, who was stepping into what. They hardly cared, and even if they happened to see, they were quick to erase it from memory.
"Are you all right with this, Shion? You haven't... you haven't actually been to a shop like this before, have you..."
"I haven't, no. But I've seen far worse places. Any number of them."
A Holy Knight who guarded the hidden world—a Gravekeeper among them, and beyond even that, one chosen as an Apostle. She had surely been through every kind of thing. Recalling a few of the scenes she had witnessed, Han Seoyeon frowned faintly. The rites she had seen during the Quetzalcoatl subjugation, for instance.
"When you say worse..."
"At least this place sells things."
"...There are places that sell living things? Even granting it's the hidden world, the Church is supposed to be keeping order in this one, isn't it?"
"Well... there were even places the Church itself operated."
"Huh?"
Having said it, Han Seoyeon smiled bitterly.
"Whatever the reasons, if you knew how many lives I've sold over to demons, Ninomae, you would be disappointed in me."
"Ah—no! Disappointed... that would never happen!"
"...Hearing you say so is some comfort, at least."
"L-let's go in! Standing around out here is—you know!"
Sensing, somehow, that if they kept on like this they were about to step on a land mine, Ninomae hurriedly changed the subject. The hesitation of a moment ago was nowhere to be found as she pushed steadily at Seoyeon's back and stepped into the shop.
"W-wow... this is really, really..."
And before long her face was scarlet all over again. The goods on display filled her entire field of vision. In particular, the pillars stuck all over the wall—as if advertising just how well their suction cups held—drew the eye with special force.
"That's... pretty explicit."
"They're lumps of plastic and silicone. What's with that reaction?"
Glancing at Tenka, who had gone subtly rigid herself, Akane approached the displayed merchandise. She drew out the hand she had kept in her pocket, and resting in her palm was something that looked as if it belonged in an ancient tomb—a needle set at its center, giving the impression of an oversized thumbtack turned upside down. With her other hand she produced a disposable lighter and scanned their surroundings.
"Tenka. You keep watch."
"Huh? What are you gonna do?"
"I'm lighting a fire. It'll only be a small flame, candle-sized at most, but if a clerk sees it they'll stop me a hundred percent of the time. So cover me."
"Hmm. Got it, for now."
Tenka nodded, then stuck herself beside Akane at a convenient angle, blocking the line of sight between her and the clerk at the counter. In the meantime Akane lit a flame at the tip of the needle. Smoke rose like incense from a censer and began to writhe this way and that.
"Um... what is Akaba doing?"
"She's looking for an item properly imbued with yin energy or yang energy. It's something to offer a god, after all. She can hardly buy just any piece of plastic."
Watching, Ninomae asked as if puzzled.
"But everything here is unused, isn't it?"
"They're displayed like this, though, aren't they? At that point you already have to consider it halfway to a ritual offering."
"...So faith accumulates, in some form or another?"
"Yes. Something like that."
"Faith dwelling in adult toys... What kind of place is the hidden world? No matter how much time passes, I just can't get used to it."
"I'm the same," Han Seoyeon murmured, letting out a small sigh.
"Th-that aside, though, Shion?"
Then Ninomae changed the subject, as if something had suddenly occurred to her. Thinking about it, that was right. They had come all the way to a place this explicit; subtly figuring out Han Seoyeon's preferences had been the original purpose, hadn't it?
"While those two look for the right item, shouldn't we look around at something too? Right?"
"Hmm. Even if we look around..."
"W-we don't have to buy anything...! It's not a place we usually come, so I'm kind of interested, that's all! Yes!"
Rambling a little, Ninomae pressed on with the conversation anyway.
"Do you... have an interest in places like this as well, Ninomae?"
"Yes! Well, of course! I'm human too, aren't I? Depending on the category, I have a little interest, I guess!"
"Depending on the category?"
"Uh, that is—I mean, things like this...!"
Honestly, about half of it had come out without much thought behind it. Her only real idea had been to drag Han Seoyeon into this conversation somehow, and of course the act of grabbing whatever happened to be nearby was less genuine interest than pure impulse.
"Ah... so you have... that kind of preference...?"
"Huh? ...Aaah?!"
Only after Han Seoyeon's delicately pointed remark did Ninomae properly look at what she was holding. The feel of it was soft and fluffy, like touching some cute baby animal—but when she shook it, a light metallic jingle rang out. They were handcuffs. Covered in fluffy fur to protect the wrists, they were clearly not made for actual criminals, but for play.
"Mm. Mmm. If that sort of thing is your preference, Ninomae, I'll respect it as best I—"
"Ah, aah, no?! A mistake, this is a mistake?! I picked it up by accident!"
"You may tell me honestly. I won't look down on you for something like this. So... of the one who wears them, and the one who puts them on, which is your preference..."
"I told you it's really not!"
Ninomae's face went scarlet in an instant. For a moment Tenka's and Akane's eyes turned their way, but they quickly looked back to what they had been doing. Confirming that, Han Seoyeon cleared her throat once and tidied the conversation up as best she could.
"In any case, you're saying what just happened was a mistake?"
"Yes, yes! That's right!"
"Understood. So being restrained and the like isn't particularly to your taste, Ninomae."
Ninomae bobbed her head in a vigorous nod—and then stopped dead.
"...Hm? Ninomae?"
At that reaction, Han Seoyeon looked at her face, puzzled as to what was wrong. Under that gaze Ninomae ducked her head and fidgeted with her fingers, and yet she opened her mouth again, hesitating.
"I... um, I just imagined it, and I wouldn't say it's definitely not—depending on the person, a little bit might be okay... thinking about it, if it were you, Shion, I'd actually want—no, what are you making me say?!"
"I wasn't encouraging anything at all, though..."
When Ninomae lifted her face again, it was considerably red. Whether from the imagining she had just mentioned, or from the shame of having blurted it out to Han Seoyeon with her own mouth, it was hard to say.
"In any case, you wanted to be on the receiving end..."
"No, that's—nn... y-yes..."
Turned into a bright red tomato, Ninomae ended up affirming it, and the two of them fell silent once more.
"...I'll go ahead and buy them, then."
"...Hweh?"
A brief moment passed, and then Han Seoyeon said it in a whisper right by Ninomae's ear. At the ticklish brush of breath against her skin, Ninomae's body gave a start. A beat later she grasped what Seoyeon had said, and stared at her face with wide eyes.
"Y-yes? You're—you're buying them...? Shion? Huh?!"
Seoyeon did not answer.
"Shion?! Wait a second?!"
"...Mm. I think it would be all right for you to look forward to it. Just a very little."
"Hweeeh?! What—what does that mean?!"
At the words that followed, Ninomae froze where she stood.
"All right. This'll do. We're done here, so let's head— ...What. What's wrong with her now? Her soul has completely moved out."
"Who knows? She seems a little tired. We've been walking for quite a while, after all."
"...Oh. Is that so."