Editing Mushi Uta:Volume 7th Episode 28 (section)

=== Part 3 ===

It is time to speak of a certain free girl and a windy island.

Having finished his internship at Akamaki City, just like he’d promised to the monster nestling inside him, he came to the sea.

“…Well, I did say I wanted to see the sea.”

The surface of sea visible from the hill was sublime.

Even bluer than the clear sky, a sea as far as the eye could see.

It sparkled as it reflected the sunlight and had the same color as Aria Varei’s cocoon when they first met.

“But, well.”

He inhaled a lungful of the salty wind.

It felt good, but his unkempt hair became even wilder. He doubted whether he could find any hair stylist to cut it for him here.

Aoharima Island.

He came to this small, solitary island that had a population of less than 300 people.

“That’s way too small! I never said anything about being surrounded by the sea!”

“Are you dissatisfied? I really like it.”

Several fishing boats floated in the sparkling sea around them.

Aoharima Island was an island of fishermen.

''Let’s get as far from Akamaki City as possible—

He somehow found this island after thinking this. 

Somehow thinking this what he found, was this island. The island’s residents apparently relied on the doctor in the mainland thus far and tried hiring a doctor to stay on the island countless times, but were ignored.

When he requested for it, he was easily accepted without any proper check. Even such a greenhorn doctor was better than none at all.

“Well… I do think it’s not bad.”

“I know, right? You’re so dishonest.”

“Hmph. If you say I’m dishonest, that means—”

“That I’m dishonest as well, right?”

He was already tired of resisting fate.

The zeal he had when first becoming a doctor and his intention to battle against fate were left behind in Akamaki City. As a parting gift to the girl called Hanashiro Mari who had such a splendid dream, he offered all of those up.

He thought that this island, isolated from the outside world, would be out of reach for fate.

Although he decided to become a hermit despite being so young, he didn’t feel lonely.

His badmouthed partner still stayed within him even now.

“So you’re going to live on nothing but fish? That’s so dull.”

“Isn’t it good for your health? Also, in this time and age, fresh fish are quite expensive.”

“Your optimism sure looks suicidal sometimes.”

“Makes it the perfect combo with your constant pessimism and self-preservation.”

As they spoke about nonsense on top of the hill, a sweet fragrance tickled his nose.

He turned around.

“What’re ya doing?”

Just like a careless bird on a deserted island—

A long-haired girl innocently approached him.

“…I’m looking for a beautiful dream.”

The reason for him to blurt out something without thinking was perhaps due to the sweet smell drifting from the girl.

Although he tried escaping from the ring of fate, something grabbed him tight and wouldn’t let go—

Such a delusion passed through his mind.

“And why are you here, young lady?”

The girl who looked at him with eyes like someone seeing a vagabond started sulking. As if she was saying he took her spot.

“I was looking for the beautiful sea and wind, you see.”

“Oh. Then I was in your way?”

“Yup. Go away.”

“Sorry. I want to be here just a bit longer, is it fine?”

“Nope.”

The girl had a mismatch between her sweet way of talking like a child and her adultlike body. Later hearing that she was the same age as Mari, he was shocked.

“It’s actually you who shouldn’t be near me.”

“Why?”

“You see, I end up eating people’s dreams.”

“Ooh?”

While he something true like a joke, the girl made a half-hearted reply, not understanding him.

That girl was called Shirakashi Ubuki.

She was completely unrelated to the twisted fate created between him and Hanashiro Mari.

Even if he were to be involved in some special fate here, it would surely be different from the one created by Hanashiro Mari and the Morpho butterfly—

“…Is ‘ooh’ all you have to say about it?”

The identity of the smell drifting from Ubuki.

That was undoubtedly the scent of a dream.

“It’s fine—”

Aria spoke seriously.

“This girl’s dream is still but a bud. Not enough to satiate our hunger…”

Were these words, unfitting for a dream-eating monster, directed at him—or was Aria Varei saying that to himself?

His partner’s apprehension surprisingly ended up as needless worry.

Shirakashi Ubuki’s dream stopped just a shade shy of being able to satiate their hunger.

One month passed.

Two months passed.
 
He grew used to life on the island and spent it peacefully.

“—It’s that girl again. She’s going to come here soon.”

The island’s clinic was rebuilt form a facility to preserve food.

While working inside the sturdily built underground storehouse, he raised his face. He exhaled his breath in front of a jar used to store pickled fish, removing his gloves.

Mixed with the scent of fish in the underground room was the sweet scent he’d grown used to.

“You’ve got a good nose.”

“Yup. Among the Original Three, my sense of smell is outstanding.”

“Meaning that you’re the best weakling among the Original Three.”

“Hehe, yeah, that happened before. Even as I am, I was once cornered by that Elvioréne. …I get the shivers every time I recall.”

“Oh, what happened?”

“Hmm, well, you know. My previous vessel was an idiot as well… I should just stay weak.”

Climbing up the stone stairs, he exited to the surface.

The underground storehouse was inside a shack built right next to the clinic. From outside it just looked like a normal shack.

“Oh, Sensei. So you were there, eh?”

Shirakashi Ubuki’s face peeked from the clinic’s window. Thinking about it, most adults knew about the underground storehouse, but what about Ubuki? He vaguely pondered this.

“You can’t be outside the clinic. What’re you gonna if there’s an emergency patient?”

“Luckily, this island’s the very image of peace. Only ones to come here are people who were cut by their fishing gear or old people coming for checkups.”

“Ya gotta have some sense of danger! You’re a doctor!”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Shirakashi Ubuki had lost both parents and had no relatives. She was gathered with other children like her and lived in a facility on the island.

Coming back to the clinic, he stripped his coat and put on a doctor’s gown.

Only him and Ubuki were inside the room that had only the barest furniture. If he ever needed helpers, some people from the island would help him.

“Here you go, Sensei.”

“What’s this?”

“Meat sent from the mainland. I’m sharing.”

“Oh, looks great. Thanks.”

“Why don’t you come to the market sometime, Sensei?”

“Well… if I need anything.”

“Geez, that’s why you’ll never get used to the island. Do you put the meat in the freezer?”

Seeing off the back of the girl who ran toward the kitchen as she said this, he smiled bitterly.

“You’re completely used to this already.”

“She’s so full of energy. I feel relieved watching her.”

Whispering, he sat in the chair. He arranged the medical tools needed for the elderly patient about to arrive soon.

“That’s normal for a girl like her.”

“Are you recalling Hanashiro Mari?”

“…”

“Ubuki’s fine. She looks like she never even caught a cold, and most importantly, it doesn’t look as though her dream will catch my attention—”

It happened right before Aria finished talking.

There was a loud bang from the kitchen.

“W-what was that?”

“…Ubuki!”

He leapt out of the chair like a rocket, rushing to the kitchen.

Flying into his line of sight was Ubuki sitting on the floor. He saw white fragments all around her.

“S-Sensei…”

He unconsciously grasped Ubuki’s shoulder as she awkwardly turned around.

“Are you alright? Are you hurt? Are you fully conscious?”

“Sensei…?”

What sort of expression was he wearing at the moment? While he was absorbed in checking her wounds, her eyes and her pulse, Ubuki looked at him with surprise.

“Nothing happened to you? Really?”

Holding Ubuki’s cheeks in both hands, he checked her obstinately. She nodded.

“Thank god… Ubuki—”

He hugged the girl’s head. He could faintly smell a sweet dream.

“…”

He felt that Aria Varei inside him sounded like he wanted to say something.

He knew it.

Ubuki was not Mari.

He simply—didn’t want to lose anyone anymore.

“Sensei—”

Ubuki mumbled from within his arms.

“I just thought you haven’t eaten lunch… so I wanted to fix you something up—”

Raising his face, he saw the burnt microwave.

She apparently tried heating a raw egg in it. The fragments strewn about were egg shells.

“—I’m sorry.”

With her cheeks blushing, Ubuki lowered her face and apologized.

He separated from her and was about to impulsively yell at her.

“Haa… what a cliched failure.”

Before that, however, he was told this by his own voice.

“But how did putting meat in the freezer turn into exploding microwaves?”

''Pff,'' he burst laughing.

“T-this really is a mess. I didn’t know that putting meat in the freezer could cause the microwave to explode…!”

“D-don’t laugh at me! It’s always my brothers and sisters cooking meals, so I never—”

“Haha!”

“Sensei, you idiot!”

Her face red, Ubuki flew out of the kitchen. He saw her off while still sitting.

She was fine.

Shirakashi Ubuki stayed as energetic as always.

“She has great fortune, that one.”

“…Yeah.”

Surrounded by broken egg shells, he laughed.

“You really are an insensitive guy, though. She might hate you for laughing so hard, you know? Even though she was your only friend here.”

“You’re the one who made me laugh.”

“You’re the one who decided to laugh, though?”

“Sure, sure. I’ll go apologize after a while.”

Grabbing the egg shells, he pelted them away with a flick.

“When she comes here again.”

Ubuki was not like Mari.

Since she was different, she shouldn’t become like her.

So he could laugh it off.

Until that time—



It had to be some mistake.

That was the first thing he thought.

“No, Sensei! We can’t send a boat to the mainland in this storm!”

It was as though the entire Aoharima Island raised a scream.

Hit directly by a typhoon, the seas, trees, and the small clinic were all exposed to the violent wind.

He could hear the sounds of wind and rain, as well as the residents’ screams—

“Sensei! Save Ubuki…! Please…!”

Why was she laid on the clinic platform in front of him right now?

Someone said she fell from a cliff.

She apparently played around in the strong wind and rain, joking with her friends.

He thought that everything about that explanation was a lie and that perhaps they made fun of him.

“T-this isn’t my fault—” said Aria.

However, it was real blood dripping from Ubuki’s head.

She was already unconscious, her pale face not even twitching.

He knew at a glance that he couldn’t save her in this clinic.

“This time, this isn’t my fault! I can’t bear seeing even someone with a dream I wasn’t aiming for suffering so horrible a fate! This has to be some mistake!”

He ignored the monster inside him growing crazy.

He soothed the island residents clinging to his white coat and drove them out of the surgery room. He mumbled some selfish excuse about bacteria. Clinging to him until the end were Ubuki’s siblings that weren’t related to her by blood. He knew they drowned Ubuki in love as the youngest among them.

“Why! Why did this…!”

Being alone with Ubuki—no, with Aria as well, he crouched at the front of the surgery room.

He gripped the hand of the girl losing her body heat, groaning.

“Say, Aria…”

His hand was trembling.

He didn’t want to feel this again.

He knew that life was spilling away from his hand.

“I wish I hadn’t met you—is me thinking this so late a sin?”

“—”

“Is me thinking that I wish I hadn’t met Mari a sin?”

“…No.”

“Is me wishing to have never met Ubuki a sin?”

“It’s not.”

“Or maybe I’ve done something really bad without knowing? Everything I think now is a sin—and it’s punishment for that?”

The sound of the typhoon hitting against the clinic was loud. Perhaps the restless residents were pounding the doors.

”—He, hehehe.”

Suddenly.

The dream-eating monster laughed derisively.

“You’ve been caught in my trap, idiot.”

“…”

“Believing everything I said and accepting me was the end of your luck! This time my vessel was so friendly it was a piece of cake! Oh, Hanashiro Mari’s dream was scrumptious! And now I have another delicious dream in front of me!”

The edges of his lips rose. Clear droplets plopped down on his knees.

“…Dammit, you really got me.”

“You’re an idiot for falling for it!”

“You monster.”

“Yup, humans are so easy! How many Mushitsuki do you think I gave birth to, until now?!”

“You’re horrible.”

“I’ve deceived so many people! Everyone is idiots!”

His self-derisive laughter overlapped with Aria Varei’s loud laughter.

He grasped Ubuki’s hand hard.

“The only thing you resemble me in, is how badly you lie…”

“…”

“You’re so kind.”

Without Aria Varei, he couldn’t have rewound Mari’s fate.

As well as now.

He couldn’t do anything—

“Much better than me, who’s still hesitating…”

Was him redoing Mari’s fate once really a good fortune?

Since he didn’t know the answer, he hesitated.

If she became a Mushitsuki, she might live through days that were much more painful than death.

Since he knew that and he was only human, he hesitated.

“Say, that once only thing—would it work on another human?”

Although he hesitated, he’d already decided on doing it.

Because he was a human who couldn’t do anything, he could only continue ahead, single-mindedly.

In his minimal resistance, that is.

Until the day he received his punishment and suffered, he could do nothing but struggle.

“I’d never given birth to two Mushitsuki while inside a single vessel…”

“So you don’t know what’ll happen?”

“Yes.”

“I see.”

Then he was the one who decided.

The sin about to be repeated here was not Aria Varei’s.

“Ubuki—”

He brushed off the sand stuck to Ubuki’s cheek as she lay on the bed. Her face was calm and looked like she was sleeping.

“Sorry for laughing at you, that time.”

He apologized as he wanted to do the next time she came there.

He wouldn’t apologize for making her a Mushitsuki.

It was much too heavy of a sin to beg forgiveness for.

“Please live…”

His whisper, full of emotions, was drowned by the sounds of the typhoon—



Days of peace came to Aoharima Island.

As always, he spent his days examining his regular patients, and at times patients with mild symptoms.

“Take care.”

Seeing off the old man accompanied by his daughter, he stretched his back.

A pleasant wind blew through the island again.

As he saw the blue sky and the trees shaken by the wind and narrowed his eyes, he heard the sound of rubbing metal from his chest. Sticking his hand inside his clothes through his collar, he pulled at the silver necklace.

A proof for having lived—so Mari said.

“Say, Aria.”

Sitting in the clinic, he removed the necklace.

“Is your nose working? Please remember this scent…”

Thinking about something, he spoke to the monster nestling inside him.

“…”

Aria Varei—was still inside him.

However, no reply came even if he waited for a while.

“…Good grief, I’m so lonely.”

As she smiled bitterly, a sweet voice leapt to his ear.

“G’morning, Sensei.”

Peeking into the clinic was a girl with long hair.

He smiled.

“Hello, Ubuki.”

“Your doorplate outside fell again. You gotta fasten it with something.”

“I just think it’d end up falling anyway. What about school?”

“No afternoon classes today.”

Sitting on the spinning chair for patients, Ubuki spun around and laughed.

Shirakashi Ubuki became a Mushitsuki.

He saw her near the usual hill using black wings to soar up into the sky. Her ability was nothing more than allowing her to fly. She didn’t know that he turned her into a Mushitsuki, and hid her being a Mushitsuki from him.

“Ubuki.”

When he presented her with the necklace, Ubuki stopped spinning.

“Wuzzat?”

“A gift that someone important… who was important to me gave me. I’ll give it to you.”

“Really?”

“I want you to have it. …No, I think you should have it.”

He wanted her to live for as long as possible.

He thought so from the bottom of his heart.

He wanted her to live even a day longer and become happy.

“…Thanks.”

Seeing Ubuki happily hug the necklace, he was happy as well.

Following this, she leapt out of the clinic, elated. She probably rushed to show this present to her friends and siblings.

“…Is that fine?”

Inside his head echoed a lazy-sounding voice. He smiled bitterly.

“Mari said this was the proof she lived. If so… it’s not something that I ought to hold onto, since I’d forget her one day.”

“There’s no way she will know about Mari…”

“She’s the same Mushitsuki as Mari, so at least I think she’s something special. Because I’m going to forget even that.”

“…”

“It’s been about three days, Aria. Is it almost time?”

“I really thought it wouldn’t hold for this long… I’m so, so sleepy. Not being able to fall asleep when Ubuki became a Mushitsuki and staying awake is a living hell…”

[[File:Mushi_Uta_Bug_7th_p277.jpg|thumb]]

Aria Varei made Shirakashi Ubuki into a Mushitsuki.

However, he apparently couldn’t go back to sleep. The irregularity that happened once seemingly continued. Even so, it seemed that this wasn’t a full change like it was with Mari, and Aria’s voice sounded like he was in pain.

According to him, it was a feeling like running a marathon right after finishing a marathon—apparently. Aria was already dead tired, and he actually felt him weaken.

“Let’s go on a walk tomorrow, Aria. Before the next appointed mail comes, we’ll go around the island.”

After turning Mari to a Mushitsuki, he decided to go see the sea.

Therefore, he’d do it even after creating his second one.

So he decided.

“—I don’t think there’s any need to leave the island, though.”

Just as promised, the day after he handed over Ubuki’s necklace, one man and creature came on top of the hill.

The sea sparkling from the sunlight spread in their sight.

Although they saw this sight every day, he wasn’t tired of it. This island suited him much more than he thought.

“If I forget only her, she’ll definitely be hurt by this.”

Sitting on the hill where the wind blew, he spoke with a partner that looked just like him.

“And I already found a doctor who’ll come here instead of me.”

“She’s going to get her heart broken.”

“It’s just admiration. —Anyway, it doesn’t change the fact I did something horrible.”

“You really are a sinful man…”

“A man who does nothing but sin is called a sinner.”

He kept committing sins and run away.

And he was going to forget about all of it.

He knew no villain worse than him.

“If you say that, it means that I was a sinner from the very moment of my birth.”

The Original Three called Aria Varei mumbled forlornly.

“Even so, no one begrudges me… none of those I turned into my vessels hated me. If they just hated me, I could become a real monster. All of them were idiots.”

How many people knew of the being called Aria Varei? From what he heard of Aria’s stories, there shouldn’t be many.

Hearing the lonely monster’s lamentations, he asked something that came to mind.

“Say, Aria. Is it really impossible for your vessels to recall you?”

“There’s no way for them to recall me. I’m just made that way. You guys forget everything and have the right to live in bliss. However, if—”

“If?”

“No, it’s nothing. It’s better for you to not remember. Nothing good would come out of it anyway.”

“Say it. It’ll be just our little secret.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“It really is a secret, alright?”

“Yes, just our little secret. I’m going to forget it anyway.”

“Then I’ll say it. Just pretend you haven’t heard it. If one of my past vessels ever ended up remembering me—”

Aria spoke.

“…I’d be very happy.”

He burst into a smile.

It might be so.

Aria Varei might have been a monster drenched in sin—but didn’t quite manage to become a villain.

He could live along with him because he was such a partner.

If Aria was a villain, then he’d become a villain as well. He would go against selling his soul to the devil, and without thinking of his sins as sins, he’d forget everything.

“The wind sure feels nice…”

“Yeah…”

Before parting, they should remember the scent of the island’s wind.

He’d never forget how this pleasant wind felt—

It happened just as he thought this while being caressed by the wind.

“—What’s that?”

Looking at the distant sky, he frowned.

Something was shining.

It looked like a small dot, but it was floating in the sky.

“Something’s… approaching—”

“…!”

He stood up vigorously.

As he gazed at the sky, his hair emitted a blue glow. His unkempt hair rose and his eyes emitted an azure light.

The moment he activated his ability, ''it'' came to the island.

It was something thin, long, and emitting smoke.

It reached him instantly from the distance and struck him on the hill.

“—”

Plunge.

The rod large enough to fill his sight buried inside his body—and, while spreading an azure glow, passed through his back.

His permeation ability as Aria Varei saved his life.

However—

“…!”

As he turned to look at the island along with the roaring wind, he tried shouting something.

However, his voice formed no words, and was nothing more than a scream.

The rod that passed through him without inflicting even a scratch went past the hill and hit the center of the island.

The entire island shook.

Large explosions blossomed and a fire column rose.

This was no mere rod.

—It was a missile.

“—”

As he raised a voiceless scream, a bomber jet passed overhead in the speed of sound.

Another missile fell down and the island was engulfed in flames.

“Wh-what is going on…”

Fighter planes were making round trips over the island and a large fleet of ships was visible in the horizon.

Explosions rose and the land shook.

The sinners that were even now gathering on the island, unseen.

Miguruma Yaeko.

The devil of flames.

That was the final day of Aoharima Island, when it was removed from existence.

“WAAAAAAAAAH!”

Screaming at the sight of the burning island, he certainly heard it.

He heard fate laughing at him as he tried to escape and wouldn’t let go—