Chapter 405 - Time Bomb
—Three figures floated in a cloudless azure sky.
One was white, one was blue, and one was a mix of white and blue. Clad in colors that seemed to blend into the clear sky, their gazes converged on the 'White' below them.
And then, one of them—the young man clad in white and blue—was so completely into it, wearing a vicious grin so intense it would make any onlooker writhe and think, Seriously, give me a break and get a grip, that he let out a roar in a booming voice that made you wonder just who he was—
"I'm here for my revenge—Tsarkalv!"
""Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeah!!!""
"Just kill me."
"Kaede, remember to breathe."
"I can't...!"
The morning after the fierce battle with the 'White Throne'.
After answering a demonic barrage of messages and calls that made me worry my phone would explode, I found myself sentenced to an early-morning forced summoning, surrounded by my friends.
We had already shared our schedules for yesterday. I was supposed to meet up with them today to hand over the data for the archive upload, so in a way, it was all according to plan.
However, I certainly hadn't heard anything about being woken up at five in the morning and summoned to the Shijo residence before six. You geeky college students have way too much energy.
And so, here we are now, in the middle of a viewing party for the raw, unedited data—a special type of video recording that can only be manipulated with the [Arcadia Archive].
The archive data records everything around the recording player, so despite being recorded by a single person, it isn't bound to a single perspective.
Simply put, it's not a two-dimensional recording, but a three-dimensional one. Unlike a camera that can only capture a flat, single-perspective image, 'recording' in the world of Arcadia captures everything around the person filming.
So, even during playback, you can freely move the viewpoint, switching between first-person and third-person as you please... well, that's the gist of it.
It's a piece of over-technology, fundamentally different from any existing video technology.
Due to these bizarrely complex specifications, the editing process is also bizarrely complex and highly difficult. It seems to be a tough job, to the point where Kaede's older sister—a professional in video editing—and the team of brilliant college students often scream in frustration.
According to Toshiki, studying for entrance exams was easier. I'm sure they're getting paid a decent wage for this part-time job, so I really hope they stick with it.
—Anyway,
"Alright, let's move on to the Nozomin interrogation!"
"""No objections."""
"Objection."
After we'd gone through all the footage, the situation shifted, as expected, from the usual Q&A session to what felt more like an interrogation. I tried to rebel against the flow, which even Kaede had uncharacteristically joined without hesitation, but sadly, my objection was unanimously ignored.
An interrogation sounded rather harsh, but I had a pretty good idea of what they were going to ask. Now then, which topic would come up first—
"Let's start with the lighter topic. What's the deal with that super-cute partner of yours?"
"You just said the answer yourself. Exactly that, she's my partner."
So, it seems they decided to grill me about Sora first. The lighter topic... well, I guess it is the lighter of the two if you don't know the truth.
Of course, I haven't told my friends that Sora is the young lady of the Yotsuya family, Sora Yotsuya herself, nor that we're in a fake engagement to avoid various complications. And I have no plans to.
That said, I never intended to hide the fact that I met 'Sora' through Arcadia and that she became my partner. So, now that the cat's out of the bag, I have no hesitation.
"It's a pain to have you guys speculating, so I'll just lay it all out—"
How many times had I told this story, from my first meeting with Sora to everything that followed?
I recounted the whole process—meeting her on the very day I started the game and adventuring together ever since, skipping over certain parts... and yep, there's the reaction I expected.
"You really are a light novel protagonist, aren't you?"
"What's with that textbook boy-meets-girl story?"
"...Conversely, how are you still just partners after all that?"
"............!!!"
Is Kaede okay? Is she breathing?
Anyway, I had learned from experience that the quickest way to handle this was to swallow my embarrassment and make a firm 'declaration'.
"—She's important to me. So, don't tease me about it too much."
"...Whoa..."
"Wah..."
"...Mm, got it."
"............!!!!!!"
"Mizuki-san, a rescue, please."
"Kaede, breathe."
And with that, I succeeded in getting the four of them to accept it (or at least shut up). I was a little worried about the condition of one of them, but I was relieved to see she was breathing without issue.
"...So, what's next?"
I was embarrassed myself, but this sort of thing is probably embarrassing for the listeners, too. I prompted my friends, who had fallen silent with unreadable expressions, their momentum clearly lost.
In response, the one who pulled themselves together to ask the next question was—
"Ashe."
Mizuki spoke up, taking over for Shoko, who had fallen silent, blushing slightly and looking awkward.
"You called the 'Princess' that."
"Yeah. It was her request, or rather, she practically forced me to call her by a nickname—"
"Family."
"—so I did... huh? What was that?"
"Family, you say?"
As I asked, a bad feeling grew inside me. It was that familiar feeling—the atmosphere that meant I was missing some piece of critical information.
I've never gone out of my way to look up information on Ashe—that is, Iris, also known as Alicia White. She's a friend I've met in real life... well, yeah.
I feel weird about researching someone who's more than a friend. I believe that if you're going to get to know someone, you should do it by talking to them directly.
But this time, it seems that policy was a fatal mistake.
"It's a pretty well-known story among her fans, but..."
The 'new information' that calmly spun from Mizuki's lips was,
"The only ones allowed to call her that are people who have a very special relationship with her—in other words, only her family."
For me, that bombshell was nothing short of a death sentence.
"......May I ask just what kind of relationship you two have?"
"..............................For... for now..."
"...can we put a pin in that?"
Because I suddenly have a lot of things to confirm with a certain 'Princess'.
A certain princess: "People close to me call me that. I wasn't lying."