Editing Mushi Uta:Volume 4 Prologue (section)

==0.01 The Others==

At a place near the Nishito City station, a baptism of light welcomed Anmoto Shiika.

“''Nn''…”

Seating in the front passenger seat of a luxury car, Shiika looked towards the source of the intense light rays.

Mesmerised by the beauty of what she saw, Shiika unconsciously held her breath.

It looked as if a gigantic crystal had grown up from the ground.

She could see the apex of the gigantic tower and dome-shaped building. The shiny silver surface had reflected the evening sun rays onto the location where Shiika was at.

“Building Complex, ‘URBAN’. Due to an impasse in the midst of the project, it is an establishment that had yet to be christened.”

The middle-aged man sitting in the driver’s seat and holding onto the steering wheel, Munakata Kaiji, explained.

“‘URBAN’…”

The car that Shiika is in was caught in the evening rush hour.

A single boy was seated in the back seat. With his hair bundled behind a headband, he was a youth of the same age as Shiika. Half-closing his long-slit eyes, he let out a big yawn.

“It’s a pity but we do not have time for a tour. We have no business in this city. Also, we need to put as much distance between us and the Central Headquarters.”

In response to Munakata’s words, the boy opened his mouth in a while.

“No, in fact it may be a good idea to stay here for a short while.”

“What do you mean, Aijisupa?”

“Ever since we were in Ouka City, there were people lurking around in our surroundings.”

“What was that? Why didn’t you say anything up till now—”

“Ah!”

As Shiika looked back and forth between the gigantic tower and the traffic jam, she spotted something on the street.

“E-erm… please wait for a bit.”

Without waiting for an answer, Shiika opened the door and jumped out.

“''Muu!''”

“''Tch!''”

With Munakata’s puzzled utterance and the boy clicking his tongue at her back, she ran into the dark street.

Over there was an animal.

“…”

[[File:Mushi Uta 4 p043.jpg|thumb]]

“A cat, huh. Looks like it’s already on its death bed. It was probably hit by a large model car.”

The injured white cat was breathing roughly on the floor.

Blood was flowing from its stomach and it seems like its legs were broken. Its originally beautiful white coat was stained crimson by the large amount of blood it bled. The golden pupil in its thinly opened eyes were staring into the air as if seeking something.

A trail of blood continued endlessly from beyond the street. Looking at its source, the trail pointed in the direction towards ‘URBAN’.

Shiika lifted the white cat up in an embrace. Even without the boy behind her saying anything, she understood. There was no saving this cat.

“…''Kuhuu''.”

Shiika widened her eyes.

“''Kuhuhuu''… ''Kuhuu''…”

The shaking voice of the boy came from behind.

“I-it’s laughing?”

In the middle of Shiika’s arms, the white cat laughed. Although the cat seems to be gasping in suffering, its lips was twisted into a smile.

That laughter sounded as if it was a warrior who had completed some kind of big mission and was extremely proud of that fact, feeling completely satisfied.

“''Kuhuu''…”

The cat’s laughter gradually got softer and softer.

The heartbeat from its small body grew weaker, signalling the eventuality that it would stop. Even as the white cat stopped breathing, it still had a smile on its face, seeming to say that it did not have any regrets.

“…”

The voice of Munakata came from the car, saying, “It is pitiable but leave it. Regrettably, we do not have the time for mourning”.

Having witnessed the passing of a tiny life, Shiika bit her lips.


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Konomura Chami raised her head with a ''pikun''.

Looking up in the distance, a silvery tower—Urban Tower loomed tall above the surrounding buildings.

Walking along the street in her uniform, Chami saw a red smoke heading towards her direction from the tower. The smoke which had formed into the shape of a bee, was absorbed into Chami’s body and disappeared.

“…”

Chami stood still in the middle of the crowd. The lace tied around her head in replacement of an Alice band fluttered in the wind. She stared fixedly at ‘URBAN’ through her stylish triangular spectacles.

“Owl? What’s the matter…?”

The girl walking beside her inquired in a subdued voice. A gaze filled with vigilance rather than worry peeked out from long forelocks that hid both eyes.

Chami grinned back.

“Nope, nothing in particular. Just that the amount of my pawns have decreased by one.”

“…?”

“More importantly, can you check for me if there is a white cat inside a two kilometre radius of ‘URBAN’? There’s a high probability that it is injured. It’s not just any stray cat though. Please narrow it down to the most beautiful one. With your ability, even this much is possible, right, Konoha?”

The girl called Konoha seemed surprised at the sudden order. But, she immediately retreated into a narrow alley and did as she was told.

The girl touched a portion of the wall of the alley, causing it to swell up. The portion gradually turned green, turning into a Mushi that blended into the wall. It had a weird appearance of a single large compound eye sandwiched between two leaves.

The strange-looking Leaf beetle assimilated with the wall, sliding up to the rooftop. Stopping at a spot with a good view, the large compound eye gazed over the cityscape.

A few minutes passed before Konoha started to speak.

“I found it…”

“That was long. Were you taking your own sweet time?”

“…It’s nearby. Despite being covered in injuries, it seemed to have walked a distance from ‘URBAN’, but… it has already died…”

“I already knew that. Show me the way.”

The place that Konoha led them to was a sidewalk along the main street.

Chami looked down at the white cat that had taken its last breath in the corner of the alley. A red ribbon tied in a butterfly knot was placed next to the cat in replacement of flowers. It appears that somebody had looked over the cat during its last moments. An out of character emotion welled up in her as she thought, ‘Well, I thank you for that’.

“…”

One of her pawn—indeed, she was just one of Chami’s servant, simply one for which existed for her use. Moreover, it was merely the result of an experiment when Chami used her power for the first time.

She gently stroked the smiling white cat with her fingertips.

Doesn’t seem like an injury that was caused by an accident… a large animal, or perhaps a Mushi got her. If it was a Mushi, it must be a minion type which attacks directly. Looks like I must confirm what happened onsite at ‘URBAN’. Good grief, this is going to be troublesome.

In her mind, she considered how to move from now onwards. But, this unmistakably means—.

“It seems that something has happened around Ayukawa Chiharu. Although nothing happened these five years, what a truly shitty timing it is for something to occur now.”

Ignoring Konoha who was standing in puzzlement, she stood up.

As she looked down at the figure of the cat, it seemed to overlap with the image of her as a corpse. For all she knows, that illusion may come true in the future. Chami held onto her ambitions with the knowledge that she may die at any time.

—How about we trudge onwards together along this shitty life!

Recalling the words that she muttered in the past, Chami flashed a fearless smile.

“…Looks like you were in happiness as you died. Escaping from this shitty life all by yourself and leaving your master behind? Good grief, how audacious…”

Chami muttered in such a soft voice that it didn’t even reached Konoha.


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In the lounge on the second floor which was transformed into a jungle, Ayukawa Chiharu was wracking her brains alone by herself.

“Ah, this definitely feels good.”

Growing in the nutrient-rich soil, weeds grew thick and fluffily till knee-length height. Maybe it was because they have been sprayed with pesticides at the start, there were no pests. With abundant sunlight filtering down from the atrium ceiling, it has become a paradise for plants.

In the centre of that paradise, two girls were lying down.

One of them was Ayukawa Chiharu, belonging to class H of the second year of Nishito Sousei High School. Not caring that her long hair had fallen onto the soil, she was looking up at the ceiling while sprawled in the shape of a ‘大’. Apart from having a tall stature amongst her class’s girls, and being the vice-chairman of the student council, she was just a normal highschool girl with no outstanding traits. Or so, that was what she thought about herself.

“Anyway, relatively speaking, that doesn’t matter at all.”

She rolled her body, turning over to stare at the sleeping girl’s face.

“The question here is, who are you? Intrigued by that weird attire and unsteady footsteps, I just unintentionally ended up following you.”

Chiharu stared at the girl lying on her side sleeping peacefully, watching her light breathing. Her hair, which was even longer than Chiharu’s, was scattered radially on the grass. Even Chiharu, who was of the same gender as her, felt that she was a beauty, although her age seemed to around that of Chiharu if not lower.

The girl was dressed in a simple in-patient garb from the hospital. Adding on the fact that one would not usually walk around the streets in such outfit, Chiharu now realised that she must have been in some trouble. There was a red stain on the hem of her outfit.

“Don’t tell me this blood belongs to her? ''Aha, ahaha''…”

Unaffected by Chiharu convulsing laugh, the girl continued to sleep with an innocent look.

“Perhaps, she is an assassin belonging to some secret organisation? Or maybe she is a fugitive at large? No, she does not have that bloody impression. Could she be the princess of a country somewhere in the midst of an escape? If that were so, then could this be the start of a great love story. In that case, was it alright for a girl like me to have found her?”

Resting her cheeks in her hands, Chiharu let her imagination run wild. She would not have been able to find the answer even if she did so, but a smile grew on her face as she thought. —She could hear some sort of noise coming from outside since a while ago, but since it stopped right after, she did not see the need to find out what happened for herself. For some reason, she felt that it was a pity to leave the girl’s side.

When she lightly poked the girl’s cheek, her eyebrows slightly knitted.

“Hey, who are you?”

In response to Chiharu’s enquiry, all she received was a light sneeze from the girl.

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