My youth story cannot be a knight war

And they have not repented of their murders, their sorceries, their adulteries, or their thefts.

——《新约·启示录》第九章，第2、3、11、12、20、21节选。

……

"Oh my, this is really..."

Looking at the series of actions of "herself" in the curtain, Arisu Sakayanagi covered her forehead with the back of her hand with a helpless expression. She knew that after this incident, how would those who judged her based on first impressions view her in the future.

However, she wasn't worried about the potential for trouble. Rather, she believed that by leveraging her "onscreen presence," she would undoubtedly gain more than she would lose. As long as she capitalized on her role as a story character, the initial impression she made could be recreated at any time, much like the image of a popular influencer. It was a sure-win deal.

As for the fact that his future self harmed "Hayama Hayato" in order to protect himself, Sakayanagi did not express any extra emotions except that he lamented that his future self would eventually become a bad adult.

Having been raised in the nation's top elite education system, Sakayanagi never considered harming others for her own benefit to be shameful. After all, the very existence of elite education is a subtle demonstration of privilege. In elite education, selfishness and self-interest are not acts to be felt guilty about or immoral; even repaying kindness with enmity is acceptable.

One can only imagine the profound difference in thinking between those raised with this kind of elite education and those raised with a more conventional education. It's practically a different world in every way. What would be considered reprehensible to ordinary people is commonplace to those educated with elite education.

As one of the masters of this kind of education, Sakayanagi naturally wouldn't feel any guilt about it. She even crossed her legs comfortably on the bed, smiling at the figure in the curtain who was desperately dodging baseball bats swinging from all directions.

"I've taught you a valuable life lesson, Mr. Ye Shan~"

"Pfft~hahaha!"

Looking at the familiar figure dodging the attack in the curtain, Yukinoshita Haruno was not worried at all. Instead, she was laughing in a very unpresentable manner on her bed, holding her belly. The rising and falling of the quilt vaguely cast a shadow of her fair complexion.

"How interesting~ I didn't expect that even in the future, you're still as naive as you are now, Hayato~"

Yukinoshita Haruno put her hand on her cheek with interest, and the thin straps slipped from her shoulders with clearly defined bone patterns, revealing delicate butterfly bones and the lower half of her face that was so magnificent that her sister Yukinoshita Yukino could not reach.

"I told you a long time ago, didn't I? In this world, not everyone is worth protecting. When you protect someone you shouldn't protect, you actually lose far more than you realize~"

She said with a smile, her tone still gentle and smiling, but her eyes became indifferent silently.

"Really? Still no progress at all."

[Click.]

White fingers opened the flip cover of the phone, then clicked on the address book, and a list of only a few people appeared on the phone screen.

If used as proof of the scope of her social life, the number of people in the address book is indeed too small. However, Hoshino Aiku and Aikai have always kept their social and personal relationships separate. She writes down names and numbers belonging to different scopes on two separate mobile phones, as if dividing one person into two different worlds.

This phone is used for private communication and has nothing to do with any social aspects. Every name in the phone's address book is equivalent to more than a hundred people recorded in the social machine.

Although there are only three numbers in the address book of this phone.

At this time, Hoshino stared at one of the names on the address book on the screen and fell into a long silence. He lowered his head slightly and sat on the motorcycle for a long time.

beep.

I don’t know how long it took, but the thumb that had been frozen on the call button like a stone statue finally pressed it and dialed the third number in the address book.

Putting the phone to his ear and listening to the beeping sound coming from the other end of the line, Hoshino felt as if the sound was echoing in his memory, awakening many memories that he thought he had long forgotten.

Some memories have never actually left our hearts, they are just sealed away, waiting for the moment to be opened.

And today, Hoshino chose to open this memory.

"——Moshi Moshi~Excuse me, who is this?"

The call was connected, and a gentle and soft female voice came from the other end of the phone. Hearing this voice, Xingye pursed his lips, and his voice became a few degrees lighter at this moment.

"It's me, Qian."

"Huh? Huh!"

Akane Kurokawa blinked, and when she confirmed that she had not heard the name spoken by "Hoshino Aikyuu Aikai" behind the curtain correctly, joy that was beyond words flashed from her eyes.

"Aqua, it's me! I think I'm finally going to make my debut!"

She laughed happily like a little child, reached out to hug Aqua's arm and rocked happily.

"I know, but don't act like a child..."

Aqua released the hand that was pinching Arima Kana's cheek. He looked at his nominal girlfriend helplessly and said speechlessly.

"Look, I've been on stage for so long, do I have to act like you?"

"Woo~ What a piece of wood!"

Upon hearing this, Kurokawa's expression froze. He turned his head and stared at Aqua, his cheeks puffing up again.

"Why? Normally it's enough, why do I have to see her in the future? Why why why why..."

Covering his face that was swollen from being pinched, Arima looked at the two people who were getting along like a couple. His eyes became dead in an instant. He lowered his head and kept muttering to himself, and a suppressed dark atmosphere filled the air around him.

"That's really... But it seems that Aqua-kun's emotional path in the future has finally been resolved."

Looking at the red-haired girl beside him who was surrounded by a dark aura, a drop of cold sweat ran down his forehead. He pushed up his sunglasses on the bridge of his nose and laughed dryly.

He reached out and tugged at his collar, a dashing smile on his face.

"Well then~! Even a trustworthy adult should do this for the young man's love—"

Lei Tian suddenly stopped talking before he could finish his words, and his eyes behind the sunglasses widened.

Not only him, but everyone in the rehearsal room also had subtle changes in expression at this moment.

【“——”

After Hoshino said this, a clear breath-holding sound came from the other side of the phone, and the person on the other end of the line was completely shocked.

A strange silence reverberated around Hoshino here and the communicator elsewhere. In a spacious living room, a beautiful and gentle woman with short blue-purple shoulder-length hair sat on the sofa with a dazed expression, holding a mobile phone.

In front of her was a turned-off TV with her own reflection on the screen. But at this moment, in the eyes of the woman named Kurokawa Akane, her reflection on the screen was distorted and gradually turned into another person.

He was a blond boy wearing black suit pants and a shirt of the same color. He sat quietly in front of the TV screen, staring at himself sitting on the sofa with his eyes that contained a strange hexagram.

Countless memories related to the boy in the mirror gushed out of my mind when the voice on the other end of the phone sounded, but they receded like the tide, leaving behind a mottled sea rock of memories.

"...Yes, Aqua?"

After a long silence, so long that all the past events had replayed in his mind, Heichuan spoke softly, with a faint trembling in his voice.

"it's me."

Hoshino waited for the response without any impatience, and when Kurokawa's voice came again, he spoke in a calm tone.

"Long time no see... How come I don't have any impression of this number?"

Kurokawa pulled back the ends of his shoulder-length hair, and his tone slowly returned to its original rhythm.

"I changed my phone. This is the phone Ai left behind, so I just took it and used it."

"Really? That's quite your style."

A smile subconsciously appeared at the corner of his mouth. Kurokawa restrained his emotions and spoke in a relaxed manner.

"Seriously, this is the first time you've called me in all these years... right?"

"Since we broke up."]

"……well?"

The shaking hands that were hugging Aqua's arms suddenly stiffened, along with the smile on Kurokawa's cheeks. She stared blankly at "herself" in the curtain, tilting her head, as if she didn't understand what her last sentence meant.

"Ugh?"

However, many sensible people immediately turned their eyes away from the two of them, pretending that they had not heard anything at all, while Arima slowly lowered his hands that were covering his cheeks, staring blankly at the equally blank Kurokawa.

But deep in Arima's dull eyes, there seemed to be some kind of different light gradually blooming.

"Gudong~"

His thick Adam's apple moved with difficulty. Lei Tian, ​​who had originally opened his arms to celebrate love, silently lowered his raised arms and stepped back quietly, as if he wanted to slip out of the rehearsal room when no one was paying attention.

Toshiichiro Kinda, who was standing by, glanced speechlessly at Raida, who was trying hard to reduce his presence, and reached out to rub his temples.

"I'm saying...were you a horse breeder in a daimyo's family in your previous life? So you accidentally killed a horse while chatting with it, and were eventually beheaded by the enraged daimyo and reincarnated?"

"……sorry."

"Yeah, about right."

"Puchi~ What do you mean by almost? How come your sense of time is still as slow as before~"

Heichuan covered his mouth and chuckled, ripples like lake water flowing in his clear eyes, each of which belonged to the past of the two of them.

"By the way, are Ruby, Kana and the others doing well? I haven't been in touch with them for a long time."

"Can we have a party someday? It's been a long time since we last met~"

"…Compared to this, I called you this time for something else."

Facing Kurokawa's question, Hoshino was silent for a short time, then said calmly:

"As expected, you're still the one who won't come to me unless you have something to ask... Tell me, is there anything I can help you with~"

Kurokawa teased Hoshino, but he shook his head, suppressing the unnecessary emotions in his heart, and his tone slowly became serious.

"I hope you can help me investigate someone."

……

“—Ugh!?”

When the medical cotton cloth touched Qing's swollen face, a tingling sensation like an electric shock instantly spread throughout his body, almost breaking the tense facial muscles of Hayato Hayama, and a low wail came from the depths of his throat.

"Sorry, sorry~ Did it hurt you? Please bear with it."

Arisu Sakayanagi said while holding a cotton swab. She smiled and poked the bruised and twitching cheek of Hayama with the cotton swollen swollen swollen scalp, with uncontrollable surprise in her eyes.

"But I really didn't expect it. I just wanted to use you as a shield and take the opportunity to escape, but I didn't expect you to actually knock all those people down."

Sakayanagi was surprised and impressed when she recalled the scene where Hayama was accidentally hit on the shoulder by a baseball bat while dodging, and then she immediately turned around and attacked ruthlessly, single-handedly beating those troublemakers to the ground and making them wail.

"You're so skilled, why didn't you fight back at first? Do you want to be my bodyguard? I promise you'll be satisfied with my monthly salary."

"—No thanks! I don't want to die young."

Ye Shan reached out and snatched the cotton swab and the wound spray from Sakayanagi's hand without any hesitation, and looked at her sideways with a bad look.

"Now, can you explain to me why those people are chasing you? Depending on the situation, I will consider whether to call the police."

Those social figures were extremely brutal. They said they wanted to teach Ye Shan a lesson, but it was obvious that their intention was not just to disfigure him, but to actually send him to the hospital.

Feeling threatened, Ye Shan resorted to violence to protect himself. While those men fought ferociously, they were clearly no match for Ye Shan, who had come all the way from the bloody battle with the mirror monster. With a bit of effort, he knocked them to the ground.

But this does not mean that he has no complaints in his heart. It is more like no one would be in a good mood when encountering something like that just now, so Ye Shan was also very angry with Sakayanagi Arisu, the culprit who actually caused this situation.

However, the etiquette he received since childhood still came in handy at this time. Suppressing the frustration in his heart, Ye Shan chose to understand the situation first.

"Oh my? I didn't expect that after encountering such a thing, the first thing you did was to ask me what happened instead of taking your anger out on me? You really are a good person~"

Sakayanagi said this with her hand covering her mouth with a smile, but when she saw that Hayama's face had darkened this time, she shook her hands in dismay and said:

"Okay~ It's my fault. Stop looking at me with such a scary look~ Can't I explain it?"

She tucked the hair that fell on her face behind her ears, sat down on the chair next to Ye Shan, and explained with a chuckle:

"I'm a lawyer. The people who chased me and were knocked down by you just now were the subordinates of a former client of mine, and they are here to seek revenge on me."

"I've personally experienced that last point. Please get to the point."

Ye Shan sprayed his rolled-up right upper arm with the spray and said with a cold face, while the corner of his eye twitched due to pain.

"Okay, that client was a real estate swindler. He used unfinished buildings to embezzle clients' money, then simply ran away with the money and left the project unfinished. He was later sued in court, and I took the money and helped him clear his name."

Sakayanagi spread her hands and said this, and at this point, the corners of her mouth suddenly curled up slightly.

"However, that client was later found guilty of corruption, bribery, forcing women into prostitution, and hiring a killer. I didn't defend him this time, so he ended up holding a grudge against me and sent his men to seek revenge on me."

Sakayanagi raised his long eyebrows and looked at Hayama with a half-smile.

"But as for why they wanted revenge on me, it was probably because I accidentally found out about something that client was doing behind their backs. And then I kindly put the information I found in a bucket, doused it with gasoline, and burned it on a rainy day. But after I left, someone actually dug the information out of the bucket. So, they can't blame me for that, right?"

She pointed at her pointed chin with her delicate index finger, rolled her eyes and muttered to herself.

"By the way, I asked Kamuro-chan to do the cooking, and I even asked her to wear gloves beforehand. How did they know that? It's so strange~"

"...I already understand the general situation. That's enough."

After listening to Sakayanagi's explanation, Yeshan's anger gradually subsided. He carefully pulled down the rolled-up sleeve of his right arm, turned his head and looked at Sakayanagi and said unhappily.

"Forget it this time, but next time... No, there won't be a next time. Goodbye."

"Well, don't leave so quickly. You saved me after all."

Seeing Ye Shan stand up and choose to leave without any reluctance, Sakayanagi quickly stood up, walked to Ye Shan with his hands behind his back with a smile on his face and stopped him.