Editing Mushi Uta:Volume 15 Chapter 3 (section)

== 3.02 Daisuke Part 1 ==

He felt like he came back to life—no, this experience did not fit that sort of expression.

His body was as heavy as though he was standing in the depths of the ocean and he couldn’t breathe. There was nothing wrong with his body, but he felt as though he was carrying several people on his back.

No, it wasn’t just a feeling.

When he was the boy called Taiki, he’d seen four Rank 1s’ worth of dreams.

He could feel part of their lives along with a fragment of their memories still inside him now. He was further carrying the “pain” of yet another person.

“Dai…suke…?”

As he stood there voicelessly, Ayukawa Chiharu looked up at him, her face wet with tears.

He opened his clenched hand.

“Thanks, Chiharu.”

He—Kusuriya Daisuke—smiled, returning the necklace to his sister.

Large tears started streaming down Chiharu’s eyes. She rose up as if to leap into his arms, but soon shook painfully and crouched again.

“How can you—no… I just—”

“What about Sanbikime?”

As Daisuke asked this, Chiharu’s movements stopped.

The girl fused with one of the Original Three, Sanbikime, wiped her tears roughly. Raising her face, she smiled toward her younger brother, Daisuke.

“Don’t worry. Aria—will stay with me forever.”

By eating people’s dreams, Sanbikime would keep only moving from their vessel again and again. It was the only reason they managed to live thus far without getting found out.

Staying with that monster for life meant she would no longer give birth to any Mushitsuki.

Meaning that as long as Chiharu was alive, she would have to keep suppressing the hunger to eat a person’s dream.

It was probably hell.

However, Chiharu was resolved to live this life of suffering along with Aria Varei—

“Don’t make this face, Daisuke. Rather than that, take this—”

As if to avoid Daisuke’s eyes, Chiharu brought out something other than the necklace.

[[File:Mushi Uta 15 p243.png|thumb]]

It was an old model cellphone. It was wrapped by something like a bizarre mist.

“It has Recall-chan’s ability on it. We believe you’ll be able to get to the Ark with everyone if you have this…”

Chiharu’s hand holding the cellphone was slightly shaking. She probably didn’t want to hand it over to him.

“Got it.”

As Daisuke accepted the cellphone from his sister’s hands, a voice called to him from the side.

“Daisuke-san.”

Ikarino Kirari presented him with an automatic pistol and a black long coat. At her feet was an opened bag and large goggles.

“…Thank you too, Kirari.”

Daisuke received his equipment and put it on.

“—You told me you’d let me choose, but you actually knew this, right?”

As he wore his goggles on his head, Ikarino Kirari gave a low bow.

“Thank you for using our services.”

Raising her face, the girl suddenly looked like she was crying.

It was the exact same expression Kirari had when she’d seen the ending of a certain Mushitsuki along with him.

“We will probably never meet again.”

Whenever Kusuriya Daisuke and Ikarino Kirari met, someone would vanish from the world.

She didn’t want to repeat the same kind of tragedy ever again.

Her words of farewell contained this wish.

Daisuke turned his back to the handyman called Kirari and back to the entrance to the garage.

“—Ririe.”

He calmly faced the girl in control of the Revived.

“Thank you for waiting for my—for Taiki’s choice.”

“The experiment has failed.”

The girl clad in a golden glow spoke in a voice without any inflection.

Daisuke shook his head to the sides.

“That was probably—a good family.”

“…”

Those two who were siblings not long ago looked at each other.

As he lowered the goggles over his eyes, mist started slowly wrapping around Kusuriya Daisuke—the Mushitsuki known as Blaze Class Rank 1, Kakkou. It came from the cellphone handed to him by Chiharu.

At the same time, Ririe—C’s body double raised her face with a twitch. She looked to the distance for a moment as if in response to something, then turned to Daisuke again.

Those two who were family until yesterday would now go back to their previous relationship.

Although various feelings crossed between them in this short time, in the end nothing changed.

The new generation of Mushitsuki, trying to create a new world without any pain.

The old generation of Mushitsuki, who fought in order to make their dream come true despite choosing pain.

“Let’s settle this.”

“C accepts.”

The two glaring at each other were wiped away from the garage.

C probably returned her body double to the original.

On the other hand, Daisuke—felt like he was falling. In the space of a few seconds, he flew through a strange space where darkness and light mixed and moved as an expanding mist—

And appeared on top of the supporting pillar of a huge bridge.

Fanned by the side wind, his long coat fluttered.

Apart from him other clumps of mist appeared on the ground, and people who looked like Mushitsuki appeared one after another.

Including Daisuke, the Mushitsuki were all led there.

It was a star-studded Ark of light—

No.

Daisuke knew that place.

It was originally created as part of a development plan, a reclaimed land on top of the sea. With a lone hanging bridge and train lines connecting it to the shore, it commanded a wide area. On the coast were a series of high bridges surrounding the premises, while inside them there were rows of multi-tenant buildings and roads.

Unlike the mainland assaulted by the deluge of blackouts, here all lights were on. Above all else the blinding lights of the capital were gathered right in the center.

In the very center of these high-rise buildings there was a single especially tall building. With a silhouette that looked like a giant spear piercing Earth, it was wrapped in a golden glow. —That building was the only thing Daisuke didn’t know.

It was a city developed as an experiment, able to house a population of 100,000 people.

Daisuke knew everything about this city.

After all, this place was under the jurisdiction of the East Central Branch, where Daisuke belonged—and in fact, was the collection facility for the empty shells of Mushitsuki, called the Fallen.

“It’s GARDEN…!”

East Central Branch jurisdiction, Fallen Assembly Facility, Hashiba City.

It was once called GARDEN—

And at present, it was the Ark taken over by C.