Editing Tabi ni Deyou:Journey (section)

===Interlude===

As soon as the Super Cub engine had entirely become inaudible, the doctor whispered, "...That was a noisy duo."

"Yes. And I am jealous of that."

Surprised by her words, he looked at her. He knew Princess as a girl who would never ever say it aloud even if she was jealous of anyone. He didn't know whether this was to pay respect to the others or to keep herself from feeling small, but not once he had heard that word from her mouth in the couple of months he had spent with her.

He also didn't know whether she was aware of her own change, but her countenance was clearly different from before. He could not even imagine what had happened between her and the boy the previous night.

Suddenly, he spotted a small something by the feet of Princess', whom he had gazed at.

It was a longish piece of paper with letters on it. Apparently, it was a bookmark made of thick paper. One side had been perforated and adorned with a pink ribbon.

The bookmark seemed to be hand-made, but its shape was a little uneven. Probably it had been made in a hurry.

"Hey Princess, what's this?"

"?"

She accepted the piece of paper Doctor had picked up and read the letters on it. She recognized it as the boy's writing because it resembled the handwriting she had seen in his diary. Written with clean letters, it read, "...'From the owner of Diary #1 to the owner of the Diary #2, the innermost secret. There is one rule you must keep whatever it takes when you write into this diary.'..."

The text stopped there and continued on the backside. The doctor, peeking interestedly at the text from beside her, wondered what was meant by 'innermost secret'.

Princess, still brimming with curiosity, flipped the bookmark around.

"...'Do not write any names in this diary. Be it your own names or the names of people and places you come across: you must not write any proper nouns. If you observe this rule, your writings shall remain'..."

Like a damaged light, it required a few moments until she understood what it said. And it struck her like a thunderbolt.


This bookmark showed the way to the loophole in the 'vanishing'.

When a person disappears due to the 'vanishing', it's the notifications of his name, the photographs and painting taken of him, the paintings by him and texts written by him that disappear along with him.

In the case of texts, unless it can be recognized at a glance that it was written by him, only those disappear that have the signature of the vanishing person.

That's why the "stop" signs on the streets didn't disappear and why parts of signboards that hadn't contained the shop's name were still there.

In that case, it was possible to leave behind texts by making it unclear "who has written it" and "who it was about".

It was possible to engrave one's trails in the world.


For a while Princess was absorbed in thought, while embracing the diary into which she had put the bookmark.

Though as dear the two travelers were to her, she had forgot about them for a moment and was thinking about her own path.

Before her eyes were the wide open school gates. Until now, these gates had been the start point as well as the goal for her strolls into town.

The gates themselves had not changed, but it was not too much to say that the world in Princess' eyes had undergone a radical change.

The possibility of going to other cities—even to other countries—beyond these gates had suddenly appeared to her.

The hope in the unknown, the thirst for the unknown and the fear from the unknown. Her rationality was telling her to stop such a reckless endeavor, but the boy's voice was still echoing in her heart. The love for her hometown was holding her back, but there was an empty diary in her chest.

All sorts of thoughts were running and dancing through her head.

However, she wiped away that chaos with just one deep breath.

"...Doctor."

"Mm?"

The school doctor looked at Princess who had just turned to him.

"I... want to go on a journey and I need your help."

For a split second, he rounded his eyes and looked away then.

He put on his sunglasses to conceal his eyes and started a tap dance of indecision and distress by doing strange things like scratching his head in some kind of agony, crossing his arms, meaninglessly checking the time or looking up at the sky to see how the weather was. It was the moment that his cool and collected style was shattered to pieces.

"...No...?"

No one know whether the doctor understood the concept of a man's weakness or not.

If he did or not, this word, spoken by a weak beauty with tough luck who looked up at him with puppy eyes in a pleading voice right before his eyes, pierced his heart for sure.

"...Come to think of it, a pal of mine from the medical school who works at the hospital now told me that he wanted to get rid of one of his motorbikes. One with a sidecar."

"Yahoo! You come with me, don't you, doctor?!"

"Y-Yeah. I guess I'll have the hospital dispatch someone for the old crocks here."

"But I am driving, okay?"

"HAA?! It's a large-size motorbike, you know?! The dead weight is easily three times your weight!"

"I do not care! Nothing is impossible with some practice! So I am looking forward to your instructing!"

"O-Okay...," he nodded, and while doing so, fired up his imagination.

What he saw was a slender Princess on a large motorbike in a black leather suit, wearing classic goggles and a crimson scarf, and himself in the sidecar, frantically trying to fit his legs into the sparse space.

"...Just one request, Princess."

"What is it, Doctor?"

"......Can we take turns at least?"


This was the start of Princess' journey. And the first page of her diary was sure to tell the events of that day.



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