Editing Kami-sama no Inai Nichiyoubi:Volume5 Chapter2 (section)

===Part IV===
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"And! Cheers!"

With Gigi leading, "Cheers!" everyone shouted along, and toasted to each other. The drinks ranged from tea, lemonade to fruit juice and and other miscellaneous things, the only thing in common was that ‘they were not alcoholic’.

The Class 3-4 students, who never had a drop of alcohol, were having lots of fun. They placed crackers, played tricks, and chatted loudly like explosions.

Tired of being bombarded with questions, Ai kept a low profile and moved on. Scar remained very popular and still in demand with Celica.

"Ai."

Alice called out from behind her.

"Come here."

Alice deftly slipped through the gaps between the tables and led Ai to the kitchen in the back.

It was a world of magic.

"This place is…"

The kitchen was empty, with only ingredients and dishes dancing in every direction. The kettles flew about, brewing coffee, and the fruits were cut into parfaits all by themselves.

Ai had already seen this scene many times. Newspapers were being dropped into the mailbox on their own, and the snow on the roofs were shoveled. The place Class 3-4 were in had all kinds of supernatural phenomena.

"What are you doing?"

Alice said to Ai, who had stopped trying to move further in.

"Don't look at them too much. Otherwise, everything will be inconsistent."

"Inconsistent?

"Inconsistent, yes…and especially don’t mention it to those guys in class 4. Worst case scenario, the class gets reset."

Ai had no idea what was going on, but she nodded and followed Alice upstairs. They went past a sign ‘night onwards’ and went to the second floor.

He said the second floor was where they served alcohol starting in the evening. On first glane, there was a shockingly fancy bar, and one could smell wine, cigarettes, and perfume.

Alice entered the counter in a familiar motion, pulled out a few bottles from the shelf, and began to pour them in a shaker.

"Is it okay to do that?"

"I used to work part-time here…and the owner of this place isn’t around anymore."

Ai thought it was not a sufficient reason for him to do as he pleased.

"What do you want to drink?"

"…I can't have alcohol."

"Of course not, you idiot—Come on."

Alice mixed a few liquids together, and poured out a yellow steaming liquid. <i>Is this orange, or grape juice?</i>…she had no idea what it was, but it was tasty. Alice too helped himself with a serving, and strode off to the window, unbolting it.

The breeze felt good.

The chill of the place was a welcome relief to the hot body, and made the cocktail taste even better.

"What do you think of class 4?"

Alice asked, not drinking the cocktail, but using it to warm his hands.

"It's fun. Everyone is so nice, and funny. It's just..."

Then Ai paused.

"Just?"

"—No, it's nothing."

"Tell me."

"No, maybe I'm just imagining things."

"You feel distanced, right?"

"You knew?"

Ai looked to her side in shock.

That was right. While Class 4 was friendly to her, she felt disconnected to them, as though there was a thin membrane between them.

It felt as if she had wandered onto a stage accidentally without a script, such a dissonance.

"This world is created as a replica of the world fourteen years ago. I say that, but as you can see, it's pretty flimsy—the establishment is rather weak, and they can’t really accept transfer students. Part of the reason why everyone’s so noisy is because they’re trying to relieve their stress. They’re subconsciously trying to get along with you, but they can’t really accept people like you who don’t exist in this world to begin with."

"…Everyone doesn’t know they’re trapped in this world, right?"

It was one of the points she had heard the previous day. Of the members of class 4, Alice and Dee were the only ones who were aware that this was an abnormal world. The others did not know it was a sealed world."

"You’re not telling them?"

"I’ll tell them when the time to free us comes. Even if I do, it’ll only add on to their stress. It’ll be terrible if we end up killing (resetting) each other again."

"…That happened before…?"

Yeah.

There was a slight pause in the conversation, and Alice, after stirring his cocktail, tapped the floor with his toe before getting to the main point.

"I want to 'destroy' the world. I did mention it before, right?"

Ai nodded her head. She finally understood what he meant.

"I want to destroy this place and save Class 3-4 (everyone)."

Alice picked up a dart that was lying on the table and flicked it. It was obvious without looking, 40 points (Double bull).

"This place will continue to repeat an annual loop that <b>ended</b> on August 27th, thirteen years ago. But there are a few inconsistencies—like say, those who died in this space will simply die."

"!!"

"I guess it’s because there wasn’t any plan for anyone else. I tried to bring some Dead in as an experiment, but it didn't work. They just couldn't get through that entrance. I could bring in Gravekeepers…but…"

"…What happened to them?"

"The moment they entered this world, they looked around in amazement. ‘Our task is finished…’ and they just laid around and didn’t move until they died…maybe that's what will happen to them in the outside world, when they bury all the Dead…I feel sorry for them…"

"……"

Perhaps Ai and Scar did not become so as they were malfunctioned Gravekeepers?...no, it did not matter. Scar and her had already left such a phase.

"Also, there’s the issue of those deformed. Anyone with any ability can’t enter. This includes Hampnie Hambart."

"……"

"The only exception is my Buzzer Beater."

He said, and threw three darts. Each dart hit the circle that was the size of a ring.

"It doesn’t make sense. The awakening of my Buzzer Beater ability happened <b>in the future way after </b>the loop in this world. I felt something’s wrong here, and that’s how I managed to notice the anomaly of this world. I figured it out in the first month after I got reset three years ago, and then things escalated…I read books, rode my motorcycle from one end of the continent to the other, and finally got out of here…"

"Wa-wait, wait! From one end of the continent to the other? How big is this space!?"

"The round-the-world exploration team returned just a while back."

Ai was dumbfounded.

"W-Why is it so uselessly big?"

"Who knows? The exploring scholar I knew said that it was probably <b>created by observation</b>."

"Huh?"

"In other words, this space was originally only as big as it needed to be. When we were the only ones here, it was just this city, and as more people came, more space was observed."

"I don't understand."

"I only found out after seeing the World Tower that this world is the same as that place. It’s ‘a world created by many people’—the more people that form this world, the bigger the world. That finally made sense…when I first rode a bike to try and leave this place, I had a feeling that I just couldn’t reach the end no matter how far I rode…it felt like the goal-line was chasing after me as the same speed…"

Then Alice suddenly noticed something, and shook hishead.

"Uh oh, I talked too much."

"Is that so?"

"Ahh. I beg of you, don’t ask me too many questions. No, please assume that whatever I say is wrong.".

"…Well, I guess it’s better not to ask then."

"Right?"

"Yeah, and there’s someone eavesdropping…"

The moment Ai said this, there were footsteps at the stairs leading to the first floor, followed by a slip, "Owie…" and then a grumble.

"…Feels like she’s been really clumsy ever since she got her actual body back."

"No, that’s how she’s always been."

Alice downed the cocktail he had not sipped, and stood up,

"That's all I can say. Please take care of the rest."

Ai had no shovel, no straw hat, and no Gravekeeper's clothes. "Yes" She could only answer proudly.

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A week passed in a flash.

In that amount of time, the group adapted to the world at their own pace.

Celica was the first to take action. This baby appeared to assume that she should not be adapting to the world, but that the world should adapt to her (which, in hindsight, she had been doing the entire time). On the second day, she crawled up to class 4 in search of Scar, and attended class with her. The young teacher was quite bewildered, but the old teacher accepted the situation with an air of calmness, "It's nothing to worry about." Thus, Celica was the only one who would not be reproached for falling asleep in class, and reigned over class 4.

This act seemed to help Scar a lot, and using Celica as a bridge, she slowly blended with crowd. She had a ‘trying’ attitude when she first transferred over, but it seemed she had enjoyed herself somewhat..

Julie rarely remained in a conspicuous place, but it seemed he was working everywhere behind the scenes. Whenever Ai went to the shopping district, people would say, "Are you Julie’s child" and give her great discounts.

The townspeople were basically ‘invited here by Alice to save him’, but in fact, it felt like ‘Alice was saving them when they had nowhere to go’, which was why they were especially kind to Ai and the others. In addition, the autonomous organization seemed to have made some kind of decision and notice, for there was surprisingly little confusion about Celica.

Scar was often begged to go into town to parade her baby.

<i>She’s not for show! </i>Julie was originally angry and opposed, but there was an endless stream of people who wanted to see Celica, and those who actually saw it were moved to tears, and none of them were laughing. Thus, Julie relented. Celica aside, Scar was not opposed to this, and this seemed to be the decisive factor as to why Julie agreed.

The entire town had become much livelier thanks to the baby, and in response, the three of them were doing just fine.

Ai was the only one who was not well.

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"Muuugggaaahh!"

Ai shouted and plopped down on a pile of newspapers.

Perhaps as a reaction to having acquired so much information on the first two days, the rest of the week was surprisingly uneventful.

(I wonder if I'm doing this wrong…)

She lifted her face and looked at the materials scattered before her.

Ai's first task was to investigate ‘what happened fourteen years ago?’ and ‘what happened during the fourteen years?’

The <b>yesterday</b> newspapers that were printed fourteen years ago were already complicated and weird on their own, and there were earlier issues. Next to them was a pile of scrapbooks and documents.

Ai thought that Alice’s metaphor was really appropriate, the one about the cage, the key and the treasure.

Class 3-4 was trapped in this world, but it did not mention they were in a cage. Their predicament was akin to having to solve a ridiculous question. They were in a cage, and yet outside the cage. What was the one thing that could never escape a cage? That would be the cage itself.

Ai's role was to break the cage free, and not necessarily to know the treasure inside. She thought one way was to break the cage forcibly without unlocking it, or knowing its secret, and free the contents that was class 4.

But Ai did not want to do that.

Because, after all, it was the place of some people’s wishes.

Though the wish was distorted and thus created a lot of misfortune, the initial emotions were not a lie. Ai did not want to trample upon them.

She wanted to choose a solution that was in line with everyone's ‘wishes’, as much as possible.

However, despite this, the investigation was not progressing.

Alice stopped expressing his own opinions as he had originally declared, and instead of helping Ai, he started attending club activities (he was apparently the manager of the basketball team). He had said so much, but it felt as though he was enjoying this world thoroughly.

And there was also a problem with the material research.

There was only so much material in this world at this point. The most crucial part, the ‘end of the loop’, was completely omitted however, and it was impossible to grasp what happened at that moment.

She had no idea as to ‘what happened 14 years ago’, and ‘What happened during these fourteen years’ remained a bigger mystery.

The reason of it all was the ‘reset’. The ‘reset’ resulted in a breakdown of information, and the footprints during those fourteen years became a black box. Even Alice had no idea as to what happened in the early days.

And and there was Dee.

Ai had a feelt that Dee and her got along really well. Ever since Dee regained her body, she was using it well to help these people who had absolutely no life skills. Seeing her sweep the floor and cook, one would not have imagined her to be the same person as the ‘Ghost’ outside. It seemed she was well suited for this role (Though she was a klutz).

But that did not mean she had lost her ghostly fangs.

(Seriously, she…)

Ai flipped through a stack of documents. It was a lot, but on further thought, it was not much.

Most of the materials was hidden by Dee. She would steal or destroy the information to a point where the rest would not occur. (And she had pretended to be klutzy by spilling tea or slipping, which Ai failed to realize initially). Ai tried to ask her directly, but she turned Ai’s words against the latter. Ai’s mouth was no match against the Ghost’s, and she was at her wits end.

"Muuugggaaahh!"

Tired of the reality where she understood nothing at all, Ai plopped down on her desk, screaming like a dying warthog.

"…Young Astin."

The chief of the newspaper club, Mr. Witz, appeared to have had enough as he reached to nudge his glasses up, grunting in annoyance.

"You have been making noises for a while now. Is there a problem? Don't bother others just because you're stuck."

"I'm sorry…"

Ai looked up. The newspaper that was stuck to her forehead fell down.

[[Image:Kamisama v05 Illustration 06.jpg|thumb]]

They were in the newspaper club room.

There was a huge desk with piles of papers scattered all over it, and the walls were covered with shelves with papers shoved into them. The floor too was dirty, with ink vials that surely had fell to the floor, becoming stuck with the floor. The area around the stove was the only clean part, but she could not lean over, but there were signs of countless scorch marks on them.

Ai had Alice arrange for her to use this place freely, and brazenly occupied a table to work. The chief appeared displeased, and would insult her whenever he had the chance to.

"Goodness…our newspaper club is the bastion of knowledge and conscience. What are you thinking, making such noises that aren’t intellectual in the slightest? If you want to growl so badly, why don't you go to a pig farm?"

"Well, well, chief, that's enough …."

Maki, the male advisor, followed up. Not only that, the other members of the club were generally friendly towards Ai.

They were <b>not</b> Class 3-4 students; Ostia had about 500 students at this point, and they were run so differently from the past. There was no longer an academic year system or class system. The ages of the students range from fifteen to sixty-eight, and the school has become a kind of university where those who were unable to study during the turbulent fifteen years could freely attend. In fact, the chief of the department was nineteen years old.

Alice had said that the act of bringing in 35,000 people was a failure, but that might be hard to say in. The influence of bringing others in was firmly shown in this world.in reality, we still didn't know. The effects of letting others in are clearly visible in this world.

However,

"Ehhh~, is that what you should be saying, chief<nowiki>~~</nowiki>? Don’t you always get impatient and talk to yourself whenever it’s almost the deadline?"

Standing up was Kate Ann,  register number seven of class 3-4, vice chief of the newspaper club. Her freckled cheeks flushed, and she pointed her ink-stained fingertip as she turned to wink at Ai. It seemed her desire to protect her classmates took precedence over her club allegiance, and she often defended Ai..

However.

"Wha! Don’t slander me! I would never do such a thing!"

"Oh, you're trying to get away with it? That's not like you, chief <b>Maki</b>. I thought you wouldn’t deny it at least no matter how horrible a person you are…"

"My name is Witz!"

"…? What are you talking about, Chief <b>Maki</b>?"

The air in the room changed drastically. Kate herself did not appear to notice this as she continued to call <b>Witz</b> as <b>Maki</b>.

The name, of course, did not belong to Witz.

It belonged to,

"Okay okay."

In the same tone of voice as before, the teacher Maki Collect said.

"That's enough, both of you."

His voice was stern, gentle, and compassionate. Witz gave him a gaudy look, while Kate looked incredulous at him.

Ai's brow furrowed as she endured the scene in front of her. The same could be said for the other members.

Professor Maki Collect was an alumni of Ostia School. He used to be a member of class 3-2, and was a member and chief of the newspaper club during his tenure.

This world as perceived by the students of Class 4 was quite different from the real one, and the unnatural scenario of ‘not thinking this world as unnatural’ would not be possible. The cognitive adjustments were flexible, and could allow for people who should not have existed back then—like Ai and the other students—and even become friends with them. Even if the loop developed differently, it could continue to run if there was no major dissonance.

However, the really important matters would not change.

For Kate, the head of the newspaper club was Maki Collect, a fact that she could not change and a memory she could not forget.

And it must have been the same for Maki Collect who, after fourteen years, decided to return to this place and stay by her side as a teacher...

<i>Don't think about it any more.</i>

Ai shook her head and just read the material furiously.

<i>They need to be released, no matter what.</i>

So she thought.

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"I'm back."

"I’m home~."

Ai brushed the snow off her boots outside the door, took off her coat and scarf, and went inside. The house was warm, and there was a nice fragrance. Dinner was already prepared in the living room, and the lid of the pot was shaking in the fireplace.

"You're late!"

Julie was angry. His face was filled with deep wrinkles, and his legs were quivering, as though he was sick or something.

"You’re so late! Why are you home so late!? Didn’t I tell you to be home by sundown at the very least!?

"I thought I answered that I can’t guarantee that."

<i>I'm back~. </i>After greeting Celica, she reached out to tickle the latter’s belly, and then laid out the her shoes and coat next to the fireplace.

"No! No! No! Ehhh, you too Alice! Why didn't you tell Ai to leave earlier? Didn’t I ask you!?"

Alice, who was also hanging up his clothes next to Ai, was startled.

"Eh, you’re mistaken, old man? You said that if she’s going to come home late, I should at least accompany her—"

"It’s obvious without me telling you that you’re supposed to send her home early!"

"That’s pushing it."

"Shall we go, Mr. Alice?"

Hey, Ai! I’m not done—"

"I'm going to gargle and wash my hands."

Ai glanced aside at Julie, whose words were stuck in his throat, even giving a childish look before closing the door. Alice Alice muttered, "that stubborn dad."

"—Goodness, that old man’s having the time of his life."

"Good grief. Can’t he think about how he’s always late at home because he’s always going out with friends or working."

"That old man definitely never followed a curfew when he was a student. That’s hypocritical of him."

After gargling and washing their hands, they did not want to go to the living room, so they went upstairs through the kitchen. This time, <i>bam!</i> the door was barged open, and Dee, holding the pot, charged out.

"Move, move, move!"

"Whoa."

"Oops."

The contents of the pot were dumped into a colander, and steam kept rising as the glossy pasta appeared. Dee deftly drained the water, lifted the colander, and went back to the kitchen.

"Whoa!"

"Kyaahh!"

"Woooaaaa!"

It was just in the nick of time: Alice caught Dee who was about to fall, and Ai caught the colander before the pasta could fall out.

<i>Phew, </i>The three of them slowly stood up, letting out an unanimous sigh of relief.

"I-I'm sorry, you two, and thanks."

Dee bowed her head while she was still held up by Alice.

"Dee<nowiki>~~</nowiki>~please hurry back soon!"

But she paled the moment she heard a scream from the kitchen.

One had to wonder what project was going on there. The fragrant smell quickly turned into a smell of paint and concrete, and the steam turned to purple smoke.

And Scar's scream came from the other side.

"Dee, the pot, the pot—!"

"Wait, Scar, what are you doing? I'm coming, don't touch it!"

Saying that, Dee gulped and charged into the kitchen with the expression of a fireman headed towards a severe fire.

"Ahhh, it exploded."

"Oh, why does it always happen?

The menu for dinner was pasta with meat sauce and dried salmon soup, along with pickled vegetables salad.

Somehow, it was delicious.

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And so, the the days passed, leisurely for some, and frantically for others.

Ai's room was slowly filled with things. First were cabinets and desks for storing materials, then heaps of stationery and paper.

At night, Ai was lying prostrate on the desk under a light that had been left on. Drool and snoring oozed from her mouth, about to stain the borrowed materials.

Dee speaked at that scene. She did knock and call out to Ai, but since there was no response, she opened the door.

"…I knew you’d fall asleep like this again."

She sighed and entered the room. "Ai, are you asleep?" She walked up to Ai, stole a glance at the material, and heaved a sigh of reief. For some reason, it seemed Ai was researching on something related to water and sewage in Ostia. Dee was relieved to see that there was no progress at all, so she set her hand to the second objective.

Dee picked up Ai, carried her to bed, and tucks her under the blanket. The heating was switched off late at night, and her little body was pitifully cold.

Dee wrapped her hands tightly around Ai to warm her up, then prepared a hot water bottle and put it under her feet before leaving the room.

Suddenly, she noticed a blanket on the floor under the chair Ai had been sitting on.

It appeared someone had draped it over Ai's shoulders, but it had fallen off.

"……"

Dee folded the blanket carefully, held it in her left hand, switched off the light and left the room.

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