What should I do? How can I protect Ai in this situation?
First... no, second... no, third isn't it either... fourth, fifth, sixth...
In that short moment, dozens, hundreds of thoughts swirled in my head, and when none of them seemed to work...
[Are you going to give up?]
I don't want to give up.
[Then what will you do?]
I'm thinking about it right now.
[Do you really think the answer will come from just thinking in your head?]
.................
[It's impossible, because there's no way both you and Ai can get through this unhurt.]
Then...
[You know, right? You've decided to change fate. So show me that resolve.]
Ah, of course. I had forgotten. To change Ai's fate, I would...
[Even if it costs my life, I will save Hoshino Ai.]
Even if this life ends, I will protect Hoshino Ai.
[That's me.]
That's my resolve.
Grabbing Ai by the back of her neck and pulling her back, I looked at her surprised face and
"It might hurt a bit, Ai."
I showed her a bright smile, not in a performance setting, but in everyday life for the first time.
"Yume!?"
Ai fell backward as if rolling, and as a result,
'Stab!?'
"Cough!?"
I felt a kitchen knife stabbing into my stomach, and it ended up embedded there.
It's painful. It hurts. No matter how excellent my physical abilities are, I'm still human.
If you get stabbed by a knife, of course it hurts, and if it hits wrong, it's fatal. And if I'm not careful, I could die too.
After seeing me in pain, the hooded man, without even thinking of pulling out the knife stuck in my stomach, stepped back and
"Puhaha... hahahaha!!! Does it hurt!!! I was in more pain!! I suffered!! An idol having a child... bet... betraying your fans...!!!"
Don't make me laugh... No matter how you see this world, idols are living humans too...!!
If chasing your own happiness is impossible, then you're no longer human, just a doll...!!!!
"Ignoring your fans! You probably thought we were idiots behind our backs!!"
She's not the kind of girl to think such rude thoughts, you idiot...!!
"You liar!!!!"
No one... no one has the right to call Ai a liar...
"No one does, you hear meaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
As if startled by my shout, he stepped back, but I grabbed his wrist and pulled him toward me, then
"Listen up, you idiot!! Being an idol is a job of selling dreams!!!!"
"It's a job of singing about love with a pure, innocent, and upright heart, cuter than anyone else!!!"
"Ai isn't a liar! She's just a bit awkward at expressing emotions like love, but she's a girl who wants to love and be loved more than anyone else!!!!"
"Right now, she just fills the way she shows dreams to everyone with lies because she can't be honest with her own feelings, but I believe those lies are sincere too!!"
I kept shouting while tightly holding the wrist of the man trying to escape, but the hooded man brazenly said,
"Ha... haha!! You say you love us, but it's all lies!!!"
"I told you to shut up!!!!!!"
"Guh!?"
I grabbed his neck and lifted him up. He struggled painfully, going 'Kek... kehk...!?', but I only tightened my grip, and
"Ki... kill..........."
"Guh...!!"
With him resisting and thrashing, normally it wouldn't have been a problem, but with a kitchen knife stuck in my abdomen and bleeding continuously, I couldn't even muster half my usual strength, and I ended up losing my grip on him.
"I've been irresponsible from the start..."
"........Ai?"
The door was open, with Aqua and Ruby on either side of Ai, and Ai was looking at the fallen man...
************
Third-person Hoshino Ai
"It might hurt a bit, Ai."
Seeing Yume hurriedly coming out of the bathroom, Hoshino Ai wondered why he was so flustered, but that question was immediately answered by the man's actions in front of her.
"Ai... congratulations on the solo performance. Are the twins doing well?"
Seeing the man pull a kitchen knife from a bouquet and approach, Ai thought in that instant.
'Ah, this is the karma for all the lies I've told until now.'
Ai instinctively sensed her own death, but feeling herself being thrown back, she looked at Hoshino Yume who had thrown her and called his name.
"Yume!?"
Hoshino Ai fell backward as if rolling, and as a result,
'Stab!?'
"Cough!?"
With the sound of flesh tearing, Hoshino Yume's back came into Ai's view, but what was different from usual was the red blood spreading on the floor.
Seeing Yume groaning in pain yet preventing the man from approaching her, Ai felt something in her chest shatter, and
"Puhaha... hahahaha!!! Does it hurt!!! I was in more pain!! I suffered!! An idol having a child... bet... betraying your fans...!!!"
To the words of the man calling himself a fan,
'Ah, the world probably sees it that way.'
'But idols are living humans too.'
'Am I not allowed to chase my own happiness?'
"Ignoring your fans! You probably thought we were idiots behind our backs!!"
'I didn't go that far, though.'
"You liar!!!!"
Ai was about to speak out in that instant when
"No one does, you hear meaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
A huge shout, something that would never come out normally, burst from Hoshino Yume's mouth, and Ai watched in surprise.
Seeing him continue to bleed from his mouth yet speaking about her, Ai thought.
"Listen up, you idiot!! Being an idol is a job of selling dreams!!!!"
That's right, being an idol is a job of selling dreams.
"It's a job of singing about love with a pure, innocent, and upright heart, cuter than anyone else!!!"
Always singing about love cutely, purely, innocently, and uprightly.
"Ai isn't a liar! She's just a bit awkward at expressing emotions like love, but she's a girl who wants to love and be loved more than anyone else!!!!"
But... but I'm not pure, I'm despicable and dirty...
"Right now, she just fills the way she shows dreams to everyone with lies because she can't be honest with her own feelings, but I believe those lies are sincere too!!"
Even though I'm the kind of person who doesn't really understand loving others, Yume keeps believing in me.
"Ha... haha!! You say you love us, but it's all lies!!!"
"I told you to shut up!!!!!!"
I don't get it, things like love... but still...
"Guh!?"
Hoshino Yume grabbed the man's neck with one hand and lifted him, but
"Ki... kill..........."
"Guh...!!"
Hoshino Yume lost his grip on the man, and the man fell to the floor, grabbing his neck and thrashing in pain, when
"I've been irresponsible and hopeless from the start, and I don't really understand what it means to love someone..."
Hoshino Ai brought out the words she had been hiding and enduring all this time.
******
First-person Hoshino Yume
"Ai...?"
"I've been irresponsible and hopeless from the start, and I don't really understand what it means to love someone..."
What are you talking about.......
"Instead, I've been telling pretty lies that would make everyone happy."
Ah, I see. The person who will give you the chance to change is...
"Hoping that someday these lies would become true, I worked hard and told lies with all my might. For me, lies are love. In my own way, I conveyed love to everyone."
It was me.
"I don't know if I love you all, but I thought about wanting to love while singing love songs, hoping that someday it would become real love."
So that's how it is, Ai. You... were loving more than anyone else all along. Even if it's lies, so that love could reach everyone.
"See, even now, I think about wanting to love you."
Ai slowly approached and stood right next to me, reaching her hand toward the man in front. But the man said,
"Li... lies... I can't even remember. After this man in front, it's you... I... I want to kill...!!"
That's right, Ai is poor at remembering people, so remembering itself would be a miracle.
"It's Ryosuke, right? You often came to handshake events. Huh? No? Sorry, I'm not good at remembering names. The star sand you gave as a gift, I was happy. I still have it decorated in the living room."
No wonder there was strange sand added to the living room, so that's what it was.
"What... that... something like that... Waaaaaaah!!!!!!!!!"
The man ran off, but I couldn't let him go, so as I was about to chase after him,
"No."
"Ai... let go... cough!?"
"Yume!?"
Ai grabbed my hand to stop me, and in response, I forced my body, which was about to collapse while coughing up blood again, to turn away from Ai.
Because I didn't want Ai to see me like this.
I wanted to show her only bright things from now on and do so much more for her, and if this is the result of that desire, it wasn't such a bad feeling.
But........
"Ai."
"Yume, don't die... no... no, I hate being alone again...!!"
Ai held onto my leg, continuously shouting 'No... no...!', and Aqua hurriedly came to my front, looked at the wound, and
"B... bleeding...!! Did he aim for the abdominal aorta!? Fo... fortunately it missed, but the bleeding...!!!"
As expected of Aqua... no, is that knowledge from Goro in his past life?
"Yu... Yume? What's happening.. why is the floor red.....? Huh?"
Ah, Ruby, I didn't want to show you this side either.....
Am I going to die like this after all?
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Don't make me laugh. Do you think I'll die like this?
I haven't shown Hoshino Ai so much more yet.
I haven't done so much more for Hoshino Ai yet.
I haven't seen Hoshino Ai truly happy yet.
Just now, the 'sincerity' Hoshino Ai spoke of reached me, and with that sincerity as a trigger, Ai will surely have grown one step further.
I want to see Ai growing even more.
I want to see Ai conveying sincere love to Aqua and Ruby.
I want to tell Aqua to walk the path of an actor.
I want to see Aqua acting.
I want to create a path for Ruby to become an idol.
I want to see Ruby becoming an idol and being loved by everyone.
Even if it's a story of the distant future, I want to see Ai, Aqua, and Ruby all appearing on the same show.
.............Well, this is something.
Hoshino Ai, because of you, even I seem to have become greedy.
"Hehe... hahahaha... cough!?"
"Yume!?"
As I let out a hollow laugh and coughed up blood, Ai hurriedly tried to lay me down, but
"Ai."
"Yume, it's okay, you can still live...!"
"I won't die, so listen to me now."
"Huh......?"
I executed a method I had seen in an old manga, and the result was a success.
Using all the nerves and muscles in my stabbed abdomen, I tried to stop the blood from flowing out further, and the result was a great success.
I don't know what manga it was, but it seems that manga saved me.
"Ai, you said it yourself with your own mouth. That you're irresponsible, hopeless, and don't really understand what it means to love someone."
"Those words are a lie, Ai. You're a girl with more sense of responsibility than anyone else."
"You don't know what love is? That's just because you're not being honest with your feelings yet."
"As I said before, I didn't wish for you to change quickly."
"Just seeing you slowly, step by step, moving forward is enough for me."
"The lies you speak of will surely become truth. Of course, the Hoshino Ai I know is a girl who loves to love and be loved more than anyone else."
"You said you wanted to have both Hoshino Ai as a mother and Hoshino Ai as an idol, that you're greedy, right?"
"I'm the same. I want to see you loving both."
"I haven't shown you so much more yet.
I haven't done so much more for you yet, and
I haven't seen you truly happy yet.
I still want to see you growing even more.
I want to see you conveying sincere love to Aqua and Ruby.
I want to see Aqua walking the path of an actor.
I want to see Aqua acting.
I want to create a path for Ruby to become an idol, too.
I want to see Ruby becoming an idol and being loved by everyone.
And... and if possible, even if it's a story of the distant future, I want to see you, Ai, and Aqua and Ruby, all three of you, appearing on the same show."
Speaking all the sincerity I had thought inside, keeping my body still, I turned only my head to look at the faces of Ai, Aqua, and Ruby watching me, and
"I, Hoshino Yume, seem to have become greedy, so until all these things are achieved... I guess I can't die."
Saying that, I saw our company's staff members running over, and the moment I looked at the man being held by one of them, I instantly recognized who it was, and
"Haha... you're quick to respond, senior... I'll leave the rest to you... d..."
Thinking that if it's 'the doctor', she's a renowned physician who can save even dying people, so treating me with just a kitchen knife stuck in my stomach should be quick, my consciousness faded.
Please read the notice just once~
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