"I understand."
Hana lowered her head, waiting for the punishment she knew was coming. But Tono Zen simply tossed the bread into the trash and continued looking over the handout in his hands.
"Then please continue reading."
"Huh? Oh, yes, teacher."
For a moment, she was stunned. Then she quickly came to her senses, picked up her textbook, and read the passage aloud until she reached the end of the assigned section.
"Good. Now..."
Hana sat down, still looking as if she couldn't believe what had happened. Beside her, Yotsuya Miko probably didn't even know what to make of it.
"Yotsuya Miko, please read the next two paragraphs."
Tono Zen didn't look at the attendance sheet. Instead, he fixed his gaze directly on the black-haired, golden-eyed girl before him—the girl he'd thought strange back then, and who still seemed strange to him now.
"...Yes, Mr. Tono."
Miko paused, then stood up from her chair and focused on the text. Today's lesson was "The Spider's Thread."
It was another short story by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, about the chain of events set in motion by a single strand of spider silk. A bandit who had fallen into hell could have escaped the pool of blood thanks to a moment of kindness, but in the end, his selfishness cost him his chance at salvation. It was an unusual story that sharply conveyed the shifts in a person's inner feelings.
Miko quietly finished reading the assigned passage. Even after sitting down, she kept looking at Tono Zen in confusion, wondering if she'd imagined what she'd seen earlier.
But it probably hadn't been a trick of the eye. For a fleeting moment, as he smiled, the deathly stillness that had hung over Tono Zen's face suddenly faded, and the breath of life returned to it. It was as though a Buddha, after searching long and hard for the truth, had suddenly attained enlightenment beneath the Bodhi tree, his face lighting up as he understood the laws of cause and effect; the expression of one who had suffered the pains of all living things transformed into pure bliss. Or perhaps it was like Yin Xi at Hangu Pass, glimpsing the three thousand streaks of purple light, hearing the teachings of a sage, and seeing through the world.
To put it simply, it was like a freshly buried dead man, after all the funeral rites were done, suddenly bursting out of the ground and slapping the wailing living person. "You little punk, I'm not dead yet."
That was probably how Miko felt when she saw that sudden smile appear on Tono Zen's face. If her nerves hadn't forced her to keep her expression in check, she might have asked him outright what had happened to him to cause such a drastic change.
Could it be... that some other deity had really placed its divine power inside my Talisman Iron Pellet?
Yotsuya Miko suddenly felt that perhaps the rumors about an all-powerful Silver Ball weren't baseless after all. She spent the entire morning in a daze, until Hana finally snapped her out of it at lunchtime.
"What's wrong, Miko?"
"I saw something even scarier than a ghost."
Miko could only put it that way before shaking off the thought. She planned to ask Tono Zen what had happened that evening.
"Something scary? Do you mean Mr. Zen? Oh, I get it. I thought he'd get angry too, but he was so nice about it."
Hana patted her on the shoulder, looking relieved.
"Otherwise, I would've been in big trouble today. By the way, Miko, you should change your opinion of Mr. Zen. He's actually a really good person, but you always..."
"...I'm already changing it."
Yotsuya Miko gave up on thinking.
"Let's go have lunch with Yuria."
Yuria's lunch was quite impressive.
Yotsuya Miko quietly glanced at the tamagoyaki and octopus-shaped sausages in Yuria's lunchbox, then at the carton of milk in her own hand and the bagged bread Hana held. She took a sip of milk.
Because of their parents' jobs, she and Hana rarely got packed lunches. Most days, they ate bread or sandwiches. Miko's mother, for instance, had to shoulder the family's financial burden on her own after her husband died. It was hard to imagine she wasn't exhausted.
"Your lunch is fancy too, huh?"
Hana wolfed down her bread, expressing her amazement at Yuria's lunchbox—and her disappointment at its size.
"There's just not enough of it."
Several empty bread bags were already in the convenience-store bag beside her. Perhaps Hana's family didn't make her a packed lunch because of her astonishing appetite. Otherwise, she could probably fill an entire schoolbag with lunch alone.
"You think everyone's like you?" Miko said irritably, crushing her empty milk carton and putting it in the bag beside her. She envied Yuria's lunch, but seeing how carefully prepared it was gave her an impression of Yuria's parents, too. They were probably a couple who adored their child.
"Did your mom make it?"
"Huh?"
Yuria was packing up her lunchbox when the sudden question made her freeze. She looked at Yotsuya Miko, her eyes flickering slightly.
"Mm—yeah, that's right. She... did. Anyway, why don't you two have lunchboxes?"
She awkwardly moved past the topic and shifted the focus of the question back to the other two. Miko, who had noticed Yuria's expression change, immediately forgot what she'd been thinking and was left in an awkward position by the question.
"Uh, well... actually..."
She faltered, but Hana beside her answered quite frankly.
"I want a packed lunch too... but Mom says making breakfast in the morning already takes so much time that she can't manage it."
It was a perfectly reasonable explanation. Yuria had seen Hana's incredible appetite more than once, so she wasn't surprised.
"Oh, I see. Your mom really has it tough."
"Yeah, she does. So I started eating bread at school. As for Miko..."
Hana threw an arm around Yotsuya Miko, who was still trying to figure out how to answer the question, leaving her startled.
"She told me she didn't want to trouble her family by asking them to make her a special lunch. She also said, 'I'm happy to eat bread at school with Hana.' It was so sweet of her."
"...Uh... well..."
At Yuria's gaze, Miko began to feel awkward. Her face flushed, and even the tips of her ears grew warm.
"Well... it's true, but don't just go telling everyone, Hana."
Once her little secret had been exposed, she could no longer endure Yuria's gaze, so she gave in and admitted it.
"Come on, it's so embarrassing."
"How so?"
Yuria looked at her in confusion, but Miko took it as nothing more than politeness.
"Go ahead and laugh if you want. Hana's the one who's in the wrong."
As she spoke, Miko grabbed Hana in a fit of embarrassment and tickled her. Hana's laughter only made Miko feel even more ashamed.
"I said, don't just go telling people..."
"No, what's funny about that? It's a really admirable decision."
Yuria stood up and looked at Yotsuya Miko with admiration.
"Someone like you... isn't that what it means to be a proper grown-up?"
At Yuria's words, Miko's hands paused. Hana took the chance to wriggle free and dart behind Yuria.
"Ah, finally, I'm saved."
Yurikawa Hana hugged Yuria tightly and hid behind her, her face beaming with a smile.
"See? Even Yuria thinks so. You're the only one who's embarrassed, Miko. How many times have I told you? You're really great, grown-up Miko-chan."
"...What kind of weird nickname is 'grown-up Miko-chan'?"
Miko covered her face, but a moment later she suddenly lowered her hands and laughed.
"What? So I was just overthinking it."
She looked at Yuria, who still had a serious expression, then stepped forward and started kneading her cheeks.
"Then thank you for understanding, Yuria-chan. And... you little glutton."
Even though Miko was squishing her face, Yuria didn't resist at all this time. Looking at the girl before her, whose lips were curled in a smile, the powerful psychic began to feel that they weren't so different after all. Just as she had her own troubles and worries, Yotsuya Miko had hers, too. She could feel awkward, embarrassed, or annoyed over things that had to do with her.
So... you're just like an ordinary person after all.
"I said, don't go calling me that!"
"Glutton, glutton! Hana's a glutton!"
"Miko! I'm going to get mad!"
"You're going to get mad, Yuria-chan? Is Hana a glutton?"
Yuria, who'd been lost in thought, heard her name and vaguely answered, "Yes." Only when the hands kneading her cheeks pulled away did she realize what had happened... She'd apparently answered Miko without thinking, and then...
"Even you think that, Yuria-chan?"
Yuria's face went pale. She recalled what had happened before, when a huge force had twisted her body and her head had once again been shoved into something soft. The familiar sensation had finally returned.
It was suffocation—terrible suffocation!
"Even you think I'm a glutton?"
Hana hugged Yuria with a heartbroken look and shook her.
"We're supposed to be best friends. Is that really what you think of me?"
No, that wasn't it.
Yuria wanted to deny it, but she couldn't speak with her face buried firmly against Hana's chest. She struggled with all her might, but Hana's small frame left her powerless to do anything.
Yotsuya Miko, who'd started this whole ordeal for Yuria, was interestedly snapping photos of the scene with her phone, a mischievous grin on her face.
"Of course, that's what Yuria thinks."
She continued to add fuel to the fire without the slightest self-awareness, tormenting the little blond girl.
After their lunchtime antics, Yotsuya Miko spent the afternoon peacefully.
Although the Silver Ball incident had caused quite a stir, and one of the most popular people around was at their school—Natsukawa Yuki—the school managed to contain the fallout and gave the still-frazzled Miss Natsukawa a week off.
Tono Zen, another figure drawing plenty of attention, gave the reporters' questions a stiff response. His unhurried tone sent them away disappointed, leaving them to vent their frustration in their articles. Thanks to Miss Natsukawa Yuki taking the brunt of the media attention for the many Silver Ball holders, the spotlight hadn't spread to each individual holder just yet.
The local government, too, handled the situation calmly. After all, it involved some mysterious power—perhaps even a deity. They weren't about to risk their lives just to test whether the reckless actions of certain reporters might anger a god. So they dealt with the thorny issue properly—without bowing to anyone—and made sure it would fade from public attention as soon as possible.
Their efforts had clearly paid off. Although the story was still developing today, people were far calmer than they'd been the day before. Their attention had moved on from the Silver Ball to even more explosive celebrity gossip.
"I can't believe he has a lover... and it's a man. That's incredible."
"Yeah, I felt so grossed out when I found out. I immediately stopped loving him."
Yotsuya Miko, one of the people involved, listened idly to her classmates gossiping about some celebrity. She didn't pay much attention to the Silver Ball story fading from the headlines, since she didn't really understand some of the things that were going on. She only knew that she'd probably have to keep hiding for a while, until the whole matter was truly over.
"Those rumors about the Silver Ball..."
Hana, who was just as out of the loop as Yotsuya Miko, had only found out about the Silver Ball today. She was slumped over her desk, eating bread.
"If this great deity could just make sure I'm full every day, that'd be great."
She munched as she made her wish. The deity beside her could only think that it was a wish she really couldn't grant.
"Even a god can't grant such a greedy wish, can she?"
"Then make me eat less."
Hana ripped open another bread bag and continued eating, looking listless.
"Afternoon classes are so boring."
"Yeah, they are."
Miko nodded in agreement. Her heightened senses kept picking up the students' conversations, and she began to realize she might need help from classmates who were always on the front lines of the latest news. That was the only way someone as out of the loop as her could hear about things sooner.
"I heard... Natsukawa Yuki-sensei is going to quit."
"Really? But I can see why. It'd be hard to withstand this kind of public pressure."
"I never thought someone so legendary would come from our school. The media are calling her the Witch of the Silver Ball."
So the Silver Ball had already been turned into a myth. Yotsuya Miko glanced at her shoulder bag and idly wondered: if Miss Natsukawa was the Witch of the Silver Ball, what did that make her? The Deity of the Silver Ball? Or Santa Claus of the Silver Ball?
But none of that had anything to do with her. At school, she was just an ordinary high school girl; at home, she was just an ordinary girl. Oh, she had one new qualification now: a girl who liked calligraphy.
"Hana, are you free this weekend?"
"I am. Why?"
Yurikawa Hana looked at Miko, pausing in the middle of eating her bread.
"Is something up?"
"I'm planning to enter a calligraphy competition this weekend. Would you come with me?"
The calligraphy competition was drawing closer, even though Miko hadn't prepared at all. Still, she planned to practice for a while, using the time she'd usually spend drawing talismanic patterns to work on her calligraphy. Her younger brother, Kyosuke, probably wouldn't want to watch the competition; the kid had never had any faith in his big sister's calligraphy. Her mother didn't have the time or energy, either. So the only friend left who could accompany her to the competition was Yurikawa Hana.
Before you continue