Editing City Series:Volume7 Layer 3 (section)

===Record 88: What is That?===
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'''10/16/1998

'''16:01

The athletic festival decided to annoy us all by not being over yet.

And as always, when things went wrong, we were sent out to deal with it. So the next thing I knew, Sensei was pulling me along toward the archery dojo.

“So what is it, Sensei? Is something weird happening at this dojo?”

“Yes, they say some of their arrows have gone missing.”

“Um, I don’t see why they need my help with that. Can’t the club members search for them or you buy some more with your pocket money?”

“I don’t have that kind of money.”

“That doesn’t really address my main point.”

Anyway, I entered the dojo training ground to find Snowy was already there. She briefly rejoiced upon seeing Sensei, but she looked really grumpy when she saw me coming in behind Sensei.

“Oh, she brought you. What are you doing here? Tell me.”

“Um, give me a second to think up something.”

She drew her sword.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! Put that sword away! This is an archery dojo, not your mental killing zone.”

“A true Japanese heart does not distinguish between the bow and the blade. And I am at my wits’ end here anyway, so you can help me blow off some steam. Do not attempt to resist.”

Sensei moved in front of me, spread her arms, and spoke to Snowy.

“Stop that. As a teacher, I can’t just stand idly by and let you do that.”

A rare instance of her saying something worthwhile.

Then Sensei looked back to smile at me.

“Okay, I told her to stop and no one can say I just stood idly by. So I’ll be stepping aside now, okay?”

The questioning tone at the end there infuriated me for some reason, so I slapped her on the back and used a special attack. Sensei shrieked and crouched down and Snowy took a step back.

“So what happened here?” I asked the latter.

“W-well, while the archery club was practicing the human hunt for their festival performance, none of their arrows would hit anyone. Even when they took careful aim with their scope-equipped bows, the arrows would disappear just before hitting.”

“When was this training?”

“Last night.”

I looked up into the sky from below the eaves, but I didn’t see any arrows stuck into the moon or stars which were visible during the day. None in the sky itself either.

“It was cloudy last night,” said Snowy, crossing her arms.

“Oh, then I get what happened.”

I stepped out of the dojo. Snowy frowned, but I kept going.

'''If you throw a punch with belief in your heart, all things will receive the blow in accordance with the conservation of energy.

My fist punched down an arrow that suddenly appeared in the air in front of me.

Snowy frowned further, so I explained with a bitter smile.

“You remember the Professor’s crazy theory about using light to accelerate and see images from the past? This is the opposite. The arrows lost their light in the darkness last night, which made them reverse-accelerate and fall into the future.”

More and more of the arrows launched last night appeared while I spoke.

“Hey, Snowy. Quit standing there and get out here. This is a great way to blow off some steam.”

I couldn’t believe how many flying arrows appeared. They had a lot of speed and a disturbing number were aimed at head height.

I punched them all down while humming and thinking about how the athletic festival would be over soon.

I had to tell the archery club to do their human hunt during the day.

'''Author Comment:

I had a friend who did archery and it apparently takes a lot of concentration.

I think the tranquil atmosphere at those places is extremely valuable.