Chapter 109: And then they die, bad ending afterward.

Truth be told, compared to last autumn, when I first came to Central Tracen, the amount of time I actually spend working has gone down.

Back when I was drowning in what felt like an infinite amount of work shoved onto me by that idiot moron dumbass of a brother—"If I can do it, then Masa should be able to as well," he said, dumping it on me under the excuse of "newbie chores"—I genuinely thought, Is this guy trying to kill me? But… in a way, that experience paid off. By the time I got used to it, my efficiency skyrocketed, and I could handle the same tasks in not just half the time, but closer to a quarter.

So now, even if my brother piles on a few more assignments, or the number of cases and investigations increases… yeah, I can probably still secure about five hours of sleep a day.

Of course, handling Hoshino Wilm-san or Mihono Bourbon-san entirely on my own is still too much, but that’s only because they’re the core of their generation. If it were a moderately popular Uma Musume, I might be able to manage being a trainer even without a sub.

…No, that’s just complacency from getting used to things. I shouldn’t get carried away.

Anyway, I’ve cleared a fairly high hurdle. People often say the beginning is the hardest part of any job, and maybe this way of doing things was like boiling that idea down to its essence. Since I joined here last year as an intern, the fact that I made it through without ever thinking "I want to quit" means I overcame it.

…However.

Even if my working hours have decreased, the workload itself has increased dramatically. That day, too, I typed away at the keyboard with practiced calm, while my mental stamina was slowly, steadily being worn down.

You can see it in how my brother’s been acting since breaking up with "her," but for a trainer, the most enjoyable moments are when they’re interacting with and training Uma Musume. I mean, that’s why we became trainers in the first place—to raise them. Of course the moment you fulfill that purpose is the most satisfying.

Which also means that time spent on miscellaneous paperwork like this inevitably feels like a drag.

"……Phew."

I let out a sigh after bringing one task to a close. On the monitor in front of me was the accounting software, now filled in with the last few days’ worth of financial transactions. All that was left was to check that the totals matched, make some fine adjustments to the budget proposal, bundle the receipts, stamp a few seals, and then contact my brother about a couple of things.

Thinking that, I checked the current balance…

"Ugh."

It’s off. The balance in the passbook and the balance in the accounting software don’t match.

The difference is… the passbook has more. Twenty thousand, eight hundred eighty-nine yen more.

What is this? Where did I mess up? Since it’s an odd number, it’s not a simple debit–credit reversal. I have no memory of any expense that would come out to such an awkward amount. It doesn’t feel like a straightforward input typo either.

…I don’t know the cause. Seriously? Do I have to cross-check hundreds of entries?

"Ahhh…"

That did it. My concentration snapped—completely, utterly snapped.

I was already at my limit after about eight hours of nonstop paperwork, and now having to recheck entries that took over an hour… yeah, my mental endurance finally hit its breaking point.

Alright, let’s take a short break. If I pull my thoughts away for about five minutes, my focus should come back a little.

With that in mind, I stretched in place…

"Mmm… huh?"

And then I noticed it.

When I looked up, there were two black… somethings.

I, Horino Masa, have something like spiritual sensitivity.

Honestly, there’s a lot about it I don’t really understand. As soon as I realized it was abnormal, I stopped telling even close family—my parents, my brothers—about it. I thought about consulting a specialist once, but the first one I tried turned out to be a total fraud, someone who very obviously couldn’t see the weird things that were right there. After that, I gave up on trying to find someone like me.

So even now, I don’t truly know what this "spiritual sensitivity" actually is.

What I do know for sure is two things. First, that I can see, hear, touch, and even erase beings that most people can neither perceive nor interact with. Second, that in order for me to perceive them, our "wavelengths"—or something like that—have to line up.

In other words, my sensitivity isn’t all that strong. From experience, I need to match wavelengths to see them.

My mood that day, my physical condition, what I ate, my monthly cycle, and various other factors… basically at random, my wavelength lines up with theirs. Once that happens, until it shifts again, I can perceive them. When I was a kid, that caused me a lot of trouble because I kept seeing strange things… but that’s beside the point.

That’s why I thought the black somethings I saw that day were just another transient phenomenon. Our wavelengths happened to match by chance, and within thirty minutes or so, I wouldn’t even be able to recognize their existence anymore.

In fact, their "color" wasn’t anything unusual. Probably human or Uma Musume in origin—a complex hue. From the black, messy mass, I could glimpse deep regret and despair. Neither of those is rare. From experience, higher-intelligence beings are more likely to turn into things like this, and those who can’t fade away even after death often cling to dark emotions.

So I decided…

"…Back to work."

I chose to ignore them.

Once the wavelengths shifted, they’d disappear. I didn’t feel any intense malice directed at me, so leaving them alone shouldn’t cause any harm. Sure, if they realized I could perceive them, there was a chance they might take some kind of action, but I’ve been dealing with this stuff since childhood. I’m a veteran at completely ignoring an existence.

If something abnormal happens, ignore it. If something does happen, don’t worry about it. And if it really becomes harmful, then at worst, I can erase it. Just like how most people define them as "nonexistent," they’re things that don’t need to exist in this world—things that were never meant to intersect with it. Overthinking it would just burden me with unnecessary stress.

More importantly, accounting work takes priority. If I don’t do this properly, Hoshino Wilm-san, Mihono Bourbon-san, and—incidentally—that idiot brother of mine will all be inconvenienced.

Rather than wasting energy on pointless things, I want to be of help to the Uma Musume I’m caring for, even if only as a sub—Hoshino Wilm-san and Mihono Bourbon-san. And as a bonus, I want to support my brother, the main trainer.

…It’s something fundamental, and probably obvious far too late, but Horino Masa is a daughter of the Horino family who likes Uma Musume more than she likes ghosts or monsters.

…That said, about a month ago, I was still being that carefree about it.

"Haa…"

At this point, though, I can’t keep overlooking it.

When I lifted my eyes from the delivery slip for Mihono Bourbon-san’s shoes, there they were again: the same black, crumpled-looking somethings. More clearly visible than before, they were wriggling faintly as they drifted in the corner of the trainer’s office, just like every other day.

…They won’t disappear. Not at all.

I thought that after thirty minutes our wavelengths would shift and I’d stop seeing them, but that never happened. Contrary to my expectations, they stayed there the whole time.

In the place where I spend the most time—the Central Tracen trainer building, in the trainer’s room assigned to my brother. A relatively tidy room compared to others, specifically the far-left corner by the door leading outside. Ever since the first time I saw them, the two black somethings have been standing there. …Well, there were rare occasions when they suddenly went somewhere else.

More than just not disappearing, though, they’ve been getting clearer over time.

At first, all I could tell was "black" and "something like the color of a soul," but now I can recognize details: "crumpled," "slightly floating," "occasionally moving." That means… our wavelengths are aligning even more.

I set the papers down and rested my chin on my hand, wondering what to do.

So far, they haven’t shown any bad signs. Their presence hasn’t negatively affected my brother or the Uma Musume, and even though they probably realize I can perceive them, they haven’t tried to interact.

They don’t behave like living humans, so they seem aware that they’re dead… but they don’t try to drag me in out of loneliness, nor do they go mad and act strangely.

They’re just… there. Except at very specific times.

If they were harmful, this would be simple. I’d erase them immediately.

Apparently, while my spiritual perception is weak, my destructive—or exorcising—power is fairly strong. Ever since I was little, I’ve been able to resist strange things like this. Honestly, if I didn’t have that strength, I probably wouldn’t have made it to this age in one piece. I’d have been dragged away by something warped and died as a child, or at the very least lost a limb.

The only reason that didn’t happen is because I had the power to fight back. Knowing that I could erase them if it came down to it is why I was never overly afraid, and why I’ve lived this far.

That said, it’s not like I can erase anything and everything. Even among these strange beings, there are levels—dangerous, godlike entities, or ones that have fallen so far they’ve become sludge. Things you absolutely shouldn’t mess with can harm you just by being perceived, even before you think about erasing them. My power probably wouldn’t work on those. I’ve never tried, though.

Conversely, as long as it’s not one of those… I can manage. Even so, interacting with them can make you feel sick or make your wavelength align more easily with other strange things, so it’s not a move I want to make if I can avoid it.

So, how strong are these black somethings?

To be blunt, they’re weak. Really weak. Honestly, I doubt they could even negatively affect me if I tried to erase them.

That’s why I thought that if they bore malice, or if they ever became a danger to me, my brother, or the Uma Musume, then I could just erase them when that time came.

But those black things weren’t harmful. Even when they were there, even when I looked straight at them, even when I blatantly approached them, there was no strong reaction.

Given that, I had no real reason to actively erase them. "A wise person avoids danger," and all that. Up to now, I’d just been leaving them alone, dragging things out.

…However.

When that goes on for a full month, the situation changes a bit.

And so, reluctantly, I decided to take action toward them.

"…What a pain."

I muttered to myself in the empty trainer’s room.

Today was the Tracen Academy Spring Thanksgiving Festival. Mihono Bourbon-san had gone out to have fun with her friend, Sakurabaku Shin O-san, and Hoshino Wilm-san and my brother were out preparing for an event they’d be participating in today. Meanwhile, I’d declared that I was staying holed up in the trainer’s room until I finished the work I’d been forced to leave undone yesterday due to an accident.

…In short.

Today, no one but me was going to come to this trainer’s room.

Which made it the perfect opportunity to take action against those black things.

"Hey. You there. You weird things."

As I spoke, I set the documents down on the desk and walked closer to them.

"Can you hear me? I’m talking to you. Do you understand words?"

There was… a reaction.

They twisted slightly—just a little. It didn’t seem accidental; it looked like they were responding to my words.

…But that was all.

So which is it, I wondered. Did they not understand what I said, but at least realize they were being addressed and react? Or was it that my wavelength still didn’t line up well enough for me to understand their words?

The one thing I was certain of was that my words were reaching them. When I tested this the day before yesterday, even getting this close hadn’t drawn a single reaction. Now, when I spoke, they reacted properly. That meant that even if communication wasn’t mutual, my words were definitely getting through.

Then there was a way to communicate.

"So you can hear me, at least. You can’t talk back or anything?"

At my words, they swayed again. They could hear me, and they reacted quickly to the pauses in my speech. They didn’t seem able to speak, but they might be able to understand what I was saying.

In that case, I might as well ask what I wanted to know.

"So. Then… is it okay for you to be here?"

…No reaction.

I couldn’t believe they didn’t understand. I’d probably spent a good six months—no small amount of time—aligning my wavelength with theirs. Once it matched that closely, it wasn’t going to slip out of alignment on a whim. My words should have been getting through just fine.

Which meant the reason they didn’t react was simple—they couldn’t respond right away.

"…Hey. Do you really think that’s okay?"

Even to my exasperated words, there was no response.

…Ah. Now I’m getting irritated.

Do they really think this is fine? Do they honestly believe that just staying like this, in this situation, is the correct answer?

There’s no way that’s true.

The end result of doing nothing but running away isn’t even a bad ending. …No, for beings that have already "ended," maybe they exist beyond even a bad ending.

What happens to things that are already over is none of my business, but… seeing them continue to run away even after death was enough to make my blood boil.

I’m the only one who can perceive them. I’m the only one who can talk to them, the only one who can learn their intentions.

If that’s the case, then what I should do is…

Make them face things properly.

"…Come with me. If you don’t want to repeat the same thing again, then properly look at her."

At those words—

The two black somethings trembled more violently than they ever had before.

This spirit-sensitivity-like thing I have.

To perceive something that doesn’t belong to this world, I have to align wavelengths.

There are two broad conditions for that.

One is, as mentioned earlier, my own state. Not something as simple as feeling good or bad, but fluctuations determined by dozens—maybe hundreds—of conditions, almost completely random. When those happen to mesh just right, I can perceive the other party.

In other words, from my side, I can’t intentionally align wavelengths. And even if they do align, they usually slip out of sync quickly, causing me to lose the ability to perceive them. So the fact that those black things were following behind me now wasn’t because we’d aligned wavelengths through that method.

The other method—the one that was probably responsible here—is staying close to someone who had a connection to them.

Just like how, after living together with my brother, my wavelength had grown very close to "her." Acquaintances, friends, close relatives, family. By spending time near someone who had such a connection, my wavelength gradually draws closer to theirs.

The deeper my relationship with the person I’m seeing, the faster my wavelength approaches… to the point that if I stay close for about half a year, I can start seeing even someone who used to be that Uma Musume’s family.

…The two black things radiate dark, painful emotions. Deep regret and despair. Common, ordinary… sad feelings, not at all unusual for the dead whose souls have surfaced like this.

And those feelings swell at a certain moment, at which point the two black things vanish as if fleeing.

That moment is…

When she enters the trainer’s room.

The instant Hoshino Wilm-san steps inside.

Putting all of that together…

It wasn’t hard to imagine what those two black things originally were.

…And that’s exactly why I was angry.

I’d heard about them directly from her the other day. About the mother who ignored her in a fit of jealousy, and the father who loved that mother too much to truly see his daughter.

"We didn’t mesh. When even one gear doesn’t align, a machine breaks easily. It’s not that I was wrong, or that they were wrong… it’s just that we weren’t compatible. That’s all there is to it."

She’d told me that quietly.

That was all.

It’s not like I actually witnessed those scenes myself. I don’t really have the right to sympathize with her. The Horino household I was born and raised in was warm. My father, a socially awkward try-hard; my eldest brother, a screw loose; my second brother, who claimed to remember a past life—there were plenty of problematic people.

Even so, it worked. Everyone was considerate in their own way, and we got along happily. By her definition, it was a household where the gears meshed perfectly.

And that’s exactly why—because I know that warmth, and have never known true cold—I can’t even bring myself to sympathize with her. I don’t know that feeling. I don’t share the same emotions.

…But surely, being angry is allowed.

They died, made things irreparable, and only then realized what they’d done. They regretted it, despaired at the fact that nothing could be taken back… and then, still clinging to those regrets, they even came out to a place like this—yet couldn’t bear to face it head-on, choosing instead to skirt around it.

Give me a break.

There’s no way something like that should be forgiven.

It’s nothing more than righteous indignation. Just an unrelated third party getting angry on her own. I don’t have the right to hurl that anger at anyone. I’m not a person good enough to pass proper judgment on others, and because of that, everything I do here is nothing but vigilante justice. There’s no correctness to be found anywhere in it. Whatever action I take now is probably wrong.

I know that.

I know all of it.

And yet… no matter how many times I told myself that, my feet wouldn’t stop.

And so, with the black things following behind me, I arrived at—

One section of Tracen Academy, bustling with the Spring Fan Thanksgiving Festival. …More precisely, a corner of a school building overlooking it.

"…There."

Spotting the two people I was looking for, I stopped walking.

I figured they’d be together, and sure enough, I was right. Hoshino Wilm-san usually radiates that open, unmistakable “I like you” aura, and my brother doesn’t exactly seem to hate it either. There was no way they wouldn’t be walking around together on a festival day.

"Look. They’re right there."

I spoke briefly to the black things behind me. They wriggled uneasily… then froze in place, as if hesitating.

Once stained by despair and regret, they were now dyed a deep, overwhelming color of fear.

That just made me even angrier.

"…Look. Look properly, and know how the girl you drove to the edge is living now. That’s the bare minimum responsibility of the perpetrators—no, of the parents who gave birth to her."

When I said it in a threatening tone, they stiffened… and finally moved toward the window.

…It’s a bit rich, getting angry on my own and lashing out like this.

To be honest, though, their fear wasn’t something I couldn’t understand.

The person whose life they’d destroyed through a moment of passion, a moment of loss. An innocent child who should have been loved, who should have loved them in return, who should have become their family.

They lost their lives and separated from their bodies, and only then did they probably regain their composure. Only then did they face reality and understand what they’d done.

To see the future of the child they left behind would be the same as continuing to face their own sin head-on. And if she were running as if throwing her life away, wearing a face that looked ready to die at any moment…

That would surely be a sight that would shatter them.

That’s why they’re afraid. Afraid of facing reality to the same extent as they fear disappearing and dying completely.

I can’t empathize with that feeling—but I can understand it.

…But still.

To come halfway, only to refuse to look because you lack resolve—that kind of choice can’t possibly be right.

That’s why I forced them to look at her… and why they, surely with desperate resolve, peered out the window.

…And then.

They saw it.

Their daughter, smiling from ear to ear as she wandered the festival together with a dumb-faced, hopelessly clueless trainer.

The black things in front of me froze. Confused by a reality they couldn’t comprehend, stunned by a present overflowing with hope.

To those shadows that had bound Hoshino Wilm-san’s past, I spoke quietly.

"…No matter how much you regret it, no matter how much you despair, the past will never change."

That’s right. The past can’t be overturned.

Someone I know accepted a past tragedy and overcame it. Someone I know buried a painful tragedy together with themselves and entrusted the future to others. Someone I know forgot a tragedy they couldn’t accept and moved forward.

Each of them moved on in their own way. But not a single one of them was able to change that harrowing past.

People don’t possess the axis of time. We can only live in the present, and no matter how painful it is, once we’ve experienced the past, we can never undo it.

It feels cruel—sad and hollow—as if to say that if “what came before” was ruined, then “what comes after” must be cast in shadow as well.

…But.

Living in the present doesn’t only point toward despair—for people, or for Uma Musume.

"While you hesitate like this, while you lazily waste time, the present becomes the past, and the future becomes the present. …And then, a future you could never have imagined arrives. Of course, there might have been a future like the one you imagined—where Hoshino Wilm-san fell apart. A bleak future where she met no one and simply withered away might have existed too.

But that didn’t happen.

The girl she is now, through good encounters, is enjoying running—enjoying living in the present."

Just as the future contains the possibility of tragedy, it also carries bright possibilities within it.

There are futures where one obsesses over not losing, lets their heart freeze over, and eventually rots away… and there are also futures where one is surrounded by trainers, juniors, rivals, and fans—by countless lights of warmth—and finds the greatest joy in running and competing.

That kind of future can happen, too.

Hoshino Wilm-san claimed this present through good fortune—and more than anything, through her own strength and resolve.

Who she is now is dazzlingly bright: an undefeated Triple Crown Uma Musume who radiates warmth to everyone around her as if giving it back in return, sparkling at her absolute best.

She is surely a single maiden standing beyond a happy ending, happier than anyone else.

"Whether you do anything or not doesn’t matter. That girl overcame her past on her own, and she’ll keep moving forward into the future from here on out. …Let me put it more clearly. In that girl’s future, you’re no longer needed."

The dead—

Those who have already lost their lives should not interfere with those who still live. Surely that is why most people cannot perceive them at all.

To have one’s life cut short is to have one’s connection to the present of this world severed. Having already become beings of the past—dwellers in shadow—they should not come into contact with her, who stands now in the light.

"Your sins won’t disappear. For all eternity, they will never be forgiven. No matter how late you try to act like parents, no matter how much you think you’re caring about her now, neither your regret nor your despair will ever be cleared away."

Hearing my words…

They simply stood there, frozen.

Just staring—through a single pane of glass—at their own daughter, bathed in warm happiness on the other side.

…If, instead of regret or despair, you can feel even the slightest sense of “thank goodness” at that sight,

Then perhaps you do have the right to be punished.

"…So watch. Watch the girl becoming happy, without even a sliver of room for your involvement. Without ever being noticed, without ever touching her, without ever being rewarded… carry the responsibility of having brought her into this world, and keep watching her until your final moment. That is the last responsibility you can fulfill. The final punishment you are allowed to receive."

Whether that will be a punishment—being forced to witness a miracle you yourselves could never achieve—

Or whether it will be salvation—simply watching your only daughter find happiness—

That’s something I can’t judge.

In the end, until I went to get lunch…

Those two continued to watch over their only beloved daughter, happy as she was.