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V9 Story II – Part 05

The bat carved a line in the snowy field, turning the snow into a powdery spray that scattered in the air.

Yusuke made his way straight to Yujirou, resembling a wild animal as he sprinted away. He darted across the dried-up creek while zigzagging and leaped over garden stones. Yujirou was crawling by a pond. His image wasn’t reflected in the water’s stagnant surface.

Yujirou tilted his head and peered into the pond. Yusuke swung the bat down at Yujirou’s exposed head, but it cut through empty air.

“Oohh…?”

Yujirou lifted his face, a twisted grin on his lips. There was no soul behind that smile.

As I had thought, this monstrosity could hardly be called Yujirou. It was only a lingering malevolence barely maintaining the form of a human. Yusuke, coming to the same realization, stopped his hand momentarily, but he raised the bat again. Despite knowing he wouldn’t land a hit, he continued to swing it wildly.

“Uhh? Ohh? Uhh?”

Yujiro pranced around gleefully, shaking the rope. He attempted to grab Yusuke.

Yusuke stepped back, skillfully dodging the approaching hands with a dance-like motion while swinging the bat. But its tip only plunged into the snow.

“Why?! Why won’t it hit?!” he cried like a child.

His actions resembled a comical dance. I put a cigarette in my mouth and exhaled smoke, deep in thought.

A child had died, and a boy had sworn revenge.

What went wrong in the first place?

Countless mistakes had been made. Me bringing the fox back. Pretending to understand grief. A woman exploiting her younger sister. Said younger sister being sold. The puppeteer family and its outdated traditions.

If you traced it back far enough, you would uncover all sorts of mistakes. And then…

The moment the boy’s stepmother and sister hanged themselves. The moment he snapped.

And history repeated itself. What had gone wrong?

Realization dawned on me now. Just like in the past, I pondered in front of the snow-covered mansion.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have turned away.

Yusuke’s bat struck the snow again. Yujirou grabbed his weary legs, and he tumbled. The rope writhed around his head. Extending from Yujirou’s neck, it moved like a living creature, attempting to coil around Yusuke’s neck.

Yujirou intended to hang Yusuke. Make him meet the same end.

Suddenly Yusuke’s body was lifted into the air, thrown high into the sky. His eyes widened.

“…Huh?”

A gigantic tiger caught him as he fell back down. The beast roared. Shirayuki stood next to it, holding a brush in her hand. Yujirou cocked his head. Yusuke’s mouth flapped open and shut like a fish gasping for air.

“Huh? Clan chief? Why?”

“An upsetting reaction. You should know.”

Shirayuki opened her fan and whipped her brush. Yujirou crept closer to the tiger. She couldn’t see him, but she could feel its presence. She frowned.

She closed her fan, opened it, and wrote with her brush.

“Whenever we hear of someone getting hurt, it is human nature to want to help.”

Thwap!

Shirayuki closed her fan and, in the same motion, swung it down. As a signal, the tiger dashed forward. Yusuke’s screams faded into the distance.

The tiger dashed through the garden, kicking away stones. I discarded my cigarette onto the snow and stepped out from behind a tree. The tiger I rode was waiting behind the bushes.

Its paws had not yet melted. Shirayuki and I climbed onto its back. We chased after Yusuke, hurrying to reach him before the tiger reached its limit.

Yusuke lay sprawled out on the snowy field, and the tiger lay down beside him.

He gazed blankly at the sky. “…Ah.”

Above him stood the pine tree. He stretched his hand toward it desperately.

His gesture filled me with rage. The pine tree should never be a symbol of longing.

Once again, I pondered what had gone wrong.

Everything started here. Asako and Aki hanged themselves, and Yujirou did the same. Hirugao hanged herself, leaving Yusuke behind.

Now he wanted to hang himself.

Yujirou’s rope extended from this pine tree. Yusuke wished to kill Yujirou to rid himself of the regret that had tormented him for a long time, but it was impossible. His father was already gone.

Yujirou was still tied to the pine tree, just as Yusuke was to his noose.

I recalled the scene I saw earlier. For a long time, he had held on to the memory of those two hanging bodies.

Since their deaths, he had intentionally broken down and continued living, carrying his wounds like a burden.

His life must have been entangled with his memories like a noose.

Everyone remained captive to the pine tree that had become a symbol of death.

I took a deep breath, then dismounted from the tiger and turned to Shirayuki.

“Shirayuki-san, I have a request.” I glanced back at Yusuke.

She nodded firmly, and I returned the nod. She had already given her consent. The words I was about to say were meant for Yusuke to hear.

Yusuke got to his feet. Before he could turn around, I took a deep breath.

I stretched my hand high, pointing my finger toward the towering pine.

With a heartfelt smile, I declared, “Please knock down this pine tree.”

This thing should disappear from the world—that was my final conclusion.

“…Huh?”

Before Yusuke could say anything, Shirayuki gracefully moved her hand, and characters appeared on her sleeves.

Black letters glowed against white cloth. Swiftly, she moved her arms, drawing large characters.

Crow.

Numerous crows unfurled their wings, black feathers fluttering from her sleeves. Overlapping wings burst forth. The blackened sleeves billowed as if blown by a powerful gust of wind.

From within, a swarm of crows emerged. Countless flapping wings converged on the pine tree. Beaks pecked away at the tree’s bark one after another.

Slowly but surely, like a needle carving through stone, the tree began to disintegrate. Shirayuki had chosen crows instead of dragons to draw out the destruction, to make a spectacle of it. Each time pine resin stuck to their beaks, new crows took their place. Swirling black shadows and flying wood chips created a magnificent scene.

As I watched with rapt attention, a punch landed on my cheek.

“What the hell are you doing?!”

I tumbled into the snow. Yusuke straddled me and grabbed my collar.

I glanced at Shirayuki, and she gave a smile, her eyes conveying words of encouragement. I smiled back at her. This was the moment when I needed that punch.

“What the fuck… What the fuck are you doing?!” Yusuke screamed.

“Yujirou’s rope is tied to the pine tree,” I explained matter-of-factly. “I’m not sure if it’s because he’s bound by this place or a grudge, but probably both. If the pine tree is gone, he will lose his vessel, and he might disappear. Well, if it doesn’t work, you’re already outside. You can just run away.”

Yusuke showed no signs of calming down. Instantly, his fist swung towards me. I clenched my teeth, and he glared at me.

“That’s not the problem… You should know! I’m supposed to hang myself there!”

“You… you don’t need to, do you?”

Yusuke’s face twisted with loathing. His grip on my collar tightened, his eyes blazing with rage. He squeezed my neck.

“What does that mean? You think you know how I feel?!”

“You don’t need it. Asako-san and Aki’s bodies have already been lowered. You want to hang yourself up there? Sounds like it makes sense, but it actually doesn’t.”

Yusuke furrowed his brow and loosened his grip.

I took a deep breath. What I was about to say might sound like an accusation, or perhaps the words would turn into medicine too potent that it became toxic. Nevertheless, I asked the question.

“If you really wanted to die immediately, anywhere else would have sufficed.”

Cracks appeared on Yusuke’s face. He appeared so genuinely shaken by my question.

Taking this reaction as a confirmation, I continued to press like probing a wound. “You want to die where the people you loved died, right? That makes sense. But in your case, you’re just haunted by regret and sorrow. You mentioned you should’ve hanged yourself. Should have, my ass. It’s ridiculous any way you look at it.”

Anyway, I’m exhausted.

I remembered the words he left in the notebook. Back then, he couldn’t have had the luxury to contemplate what to do about his death. Things have changed now.

“Do you genuinely, from the depths of your heart, on your own terms and feelings, want to die? I don’t think so.”

Kugutsu believed he should die because he was a dog. Yusuke was acting just like him.

Following Hirugao’s death, Saga Yusuke broke down. As he couldn’t even cling to the idea of revenge anymore, he chose death. Consumed by self-blame, unable to vilify others, he had nearly killed himself.

“…Can you genuinely say you want to die?”

He used to live because he didn’t want to die. After Asako and Aki’s deaths, he intentionally spent his days broken to avoid confronting the grief.

Asato said that he was trying to live life while broken. But when Hirugao died, he couldn’t bear it any longer. That was probably slightly incorrect.

He himself had realized that he shouldn’t bear it.

It’s too late to go back now. I was wrong about everything. Sorry, I’m a little confused. Anyway, I’m exhausted.

He realized that it was wrong to hurt others because his loved ones died. At that moment, any reason for him to keep living, any excuses, all vanished.

He said he was exhausted, yet he didn’t end his life right then and there. He must still have a will to live.