kscans

Chapter 352 - On Hold

""..................""

After we got home, we were practically dead.

As for me, I forgot to even question Ashe as she rolled into my room as if it were the most natural thing in the world—

As for Ashe, she was lying on the sofa, more drained than I had ever seen her, staring blankly into space.

This was all the fault of the Director of Yotsuya Development, who switched between casualness and its polar opposite with enough whiplash to make you sick. Does that man do anything besides drop bombshells?

"...Haru."

"What is it?"

"Are you okay?"

"Mentally, I might not be."

Unlike Ashe, who was maintaining her usual placid expression, I was still trying to process the very real shock I was feeling.

Starting with 'him'—Yotsuya Tsukihito—we were bombarded with all sorts of 'vague' stories, and our meeting ended after about an hour, but...

Well, how do I put this... the shivers just won't go away.

"His son is one thing, but..."

"Yeah."

"The 'someone' currently running things... it's probably what we think it is, isn't it..."

"...I suppose so."

I say 'probably'—perhaps unconsciously, as a way to protect my own psyche.

It's one thing in that virtual world, which is basically a fantasy realm, but to come face-to-face with that kind of thing here, in the real world... well, no one could blame me for feeling this way.

"A normal person... even if they weren't a normal person, managing that world alone would be absolutely impossible. Even for an existing online game other than Arcadia, I don't think it's realistic."

"...Well, there's a chance Mr. Togo is bluffing about a lot of things, like maybe they're using incredibly advanced AIs like the NPCs as a workforce...."

"If it's the former, that's scary in its own way. I don't think the latter is a possibility."

I turned my gaze to Ashe, who had spoken with finality. The princess was staring at the ceiling, her thoughts and words flowing in parallel.

"He stated at the beginning that there was much he couldn't say. If he wanted to keep it hidden, he could have just remained silent. And even if he were to lie, there's no benefit to deceiving us."

"No benefit, huh... No, you're right, there isn't."

I thought about her reasoning myself, but I couldn't come up with a counterargument. She was right. If he didn't want to talk, he could have just stayed silent, as he had before.

And even if it were a bluff, there would be no point in saying such things just to plant doubts in our minds.

In other words, the most likely scenario right now is—

"Considering how he emphasized 'a single individual'... that 'someone' is..."

Unlikely to be human.

I muttered a conclusion that was vague yet not vague at all, and her dark eyes turned to me.

"Haru."

"...Yeah?"

In a truly rare state, she was slumped on the priceless sofa. In a posture that would make the titles 'princess' and 'queen' weep, Ashe called my name.

She beckoned me over, and I peeked at her from behind the sofa—the hand that had summoned me was then held out.

What was this? Was she asking me to pull her up?

Thinking so, I obediently took her hand... but instead, she pulled my hand towards her, so it seemed that wasn't her intention.

"...What's wrong?"

Her usual quick responses were nowhere to be found. She held my lightly gripped hand captive beside her small face, closing and opening her eyes without giving an answer.

A strange period of silence continued—and just as the awkward posture started to ache in my lower back, Ashe spoke again.

"One reassurance, and one thing I don't understand."

I tilted my head at that equally 'incomprehensible' statement and prompted her to continue.

"Seeing his willingness to proactively provide information where possible, I felt that he desires 'cooperation' rather than 'use.'"

"Yeah, that makes sense."

That man is a doting father through and through.

From the beginning, I had held a certain level of trust in him, believing he wasn't the type to deceive me, who was close to Sora, or Ashe, who was close to me (?).

So, this meeting had, for me, somewhat deepened that trust... and it seemed Ashe had a similar impression.

"So, that's a small reassurance... At the very least, he seems like he will sincerely fulfill his role of protecting you."

"Us, you mean?"

"I... no, my family, the Whites, are not so weak as to need protection from others."

"Huh... oh, right...."

"...I see now that your interest in me is still rather thin."

"Wh-what, no, that's not...! Hold on, that's a misunderstanding—hey, stop it! Where are you trying to lead my hand...?!"

Do you think I'm the type of person who would brazenly search for an acquaintance's private information, no matter how famous they are? Even if it's public knowledge, looking it up myself just feels... wrong...!

"Seriously, what's gotten into you? This isn't your usual vibe."

Although I managed to prevent my hand from being led somewhere, I had to give up on shaking it free against her surprisingly un-ladylike grip.

Since my back was hurting, I knelt on the floor and rested my chin on the back of the sofa, going along with her mysterious behavior... but she, too, looked as if she didn't quite understand her own actions.

...Wait, could this be it?

That 'incomprehensible' feeling might be—

"Could it be that you weren't actually okay, either...?"

"..."

Aha, a bullseye.

Not that I'm going to laugh or tease her about it. I mean, I'm still getting goosebumps from the hinted possibility that fantasy exists in reality.

No matter how steely the mentality of the [Sword Queen], it's been proven in the past that she isn't immune to being shaken or troubled.

She even mentioned it briefly earlier, with the talk about AI—she said it was 'scary.'

"...I understood that [Arcadia]'s technology was abnormal, but..."

"To have one aspect of that abnormality clearly—well, vaguely, but still—presented in concrete terms... yeah, that's a different story from just knowing it was strange."

It's only natural for humans to fear the unknown.

As we trembled before the unseen—and possibly unseeable in the future—'Operator-sama,' the conclusion we, as mere players, came to for the time being was—

"—Alright, let's pretend we didn't hear it."

"—Thinking about it is useless, isn't it."

Together, we kicked the useless information out of our minds.