Editing Mushi Uta:Volume 14 Chapter 2 (section)

== 2.04 Harukiyo Part 4 ==

Hot.

Suffocating.

Painful.

These were the feelings that came to be experienced during the birth of the one called Harukiyo.

“Haa… Haa…”

Painful breathing sounds and horrible shaking transmitted a sense of fear to him, engulfing him.

He heard that there were people who possessed memories from right after their birth.

Harukiyo was probably one of them.

The first person he ever knew wasn’t his own mother.

“…L-lower your heads and head to the emergency stairs!”

She was a middle-aged nurse holding the newborn Harukiyo. Her hair was disheveled and her face was dirtied with soot and sweat, but her arms made him feel both warmth and strength.

“T-there’s a sign on the wall that leads to the emergency stairs, so follow that…!”

The nurse was shouting that toward the wall of fire.

This was something he’d investigated later, but the hospital Harukiyo was born in had been burnt down due to a fire of an unknown cause. It went up in flames just as he was born, and coupled with the fact that the fire-extinguishing equipment also malfunctioned, it apparently turned into a huge incident with many victims.

“Cough! Cough! Quickly, evacuate…!”

From the other side of the fire came another scream. The nurse warned them, and yet she herself was late to escape with Harukiyo in her arms.

The nurse went back to the corridor with the fire at her back. Weaving through the black smoke, she arrived at the stairs—

“Ugh…!”

Flames had already reached all the way to the regular stairway. Knowing the fate of the others who went down a floor to look for a means of escape, the nurse’s face froze.

“…!”

Apparently, the fire had yet to reach the upper floors. The nurse rushed up the stairs. Black smoke was flowing upwards, but she had no way to resist that flow.

Just as expected, as she came out into the top floor, the corridor was completely filled with smoke.

“It’s fine… it’s completely fine…”

The nurse peeked at Harukiyo’s face as he cried loudly. —This was the first and last time Harukiyo cried like that.

Right.

Harukiyo cried like this in his desire to not die so soon after he was born.

Although he knew nothing about this world, he felt attached to life—despite him knowing no words yet, this nurse who wasn’t even blood related decided to hear his wish and put her life on the line.

“Uuh—haa—”

The nurse crawled on the floor to look for an escape through the snoke.

Her fingertips then touched the knob of a door. She desperately opened it and rushed inside.

It led to a narrow room that was apparently empty.

She hurriedly closed the door behind her, but was unable to block the smoke from invading through the gaps.

“Haa… haa…”

The nurse and Harukiyo were cornered by the closed windows.

Soon the room was going to be filled with smoke and there was the smell of the door burning.

While feeling the pursuing heat, the nurse became aware of her own fate.

“—”

Looking at the Harukiyo nestled in her arms—she wore a gentle smile.

Had he been able to do anything for her at the time, as a literal baby? He couldn’t even grab her hand and take her somewhere safe, and he had no special powers like a Mushitsuki.

There was only one thing he was able to do at the time.

As she tried encouraging him despite herself shaking in fear, as the minimal attempt for comfort—

He returned her smile.

“…Pff.”

She probably hadn’t thought that he was going to smile back at her.

Wearing a smile as though she was relieved—the nurse gave him a tight hug.

She threw herself backwards in that position from the window.

The sensation of floating from free falling was etched deep into Harukiyo at the time.

The impact following this and the warmth of the nurse that stopped moving as well.

After saving Harukiyo she’d been carried to the hospital, but apparently soon lost her life.

“—”

At the time, Harukiyo had watched the burning hospital from the nurse’s bosom.

He stopped crying, didn’t smile anymore, and just stayed still.

Doing nothing at all, he simply realized that the world he’d been born into was that kind of place.

A world filled with misfortune where people ran around frantically trying to escape it.

However—it was also a world where people were able to smile while sacrificing themselves for strangers.

He started wishing to live more in this harsh yet beautiful world—

“—It isn’t my fault, right?”

The baby’s mouth moved, putting together actual words.

“I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t even hold my neck straight, so what the hell could I’ve done?”

Speaking with a mouth that didn’t even have teeth, Harukiyo turned his gaze to the side.

A lone youth was standing there.

That person shouldn’t have been there on the day Harukiyo was born.

“But apparently there’re those who’d call this the origin of my sin.”

The silent youth—Alpha—just stood in place.

His form was getting progressively younger, finally transforming into a baby.

“C’s using the Shinpu’s powers and she knows that bastard’s methods. In short, she’s apparently telling us to ‘repent’.”

Conversely, Harukiyo’s form started rapidly growing, and he became a boy not yet ten years of age.

“In the end, that mental pollution shit is just inside our memories and minds. Puttin’ just a little bit of effort allows me to control it. Well? Hasn’t it turned out quite interesting?”

The flame devil Harukiyo.

The primal Mushitsuki, Alpha.

They were two Mushitsuki with completely different positions and histories—

“Now it’s your turn. Can you show me a sin worthy of death?”

Now, the trial comparing their sins was in session.