The city is what people call a concrete jungle.
The endless cycle of accidents, the cold indifference of strangers, the exhaust fumes of cars, and the stifling heat trapped between towering buildings—all of it slowly gnaws away at a person's body and mind.
To live here without a second thought is like wandering through a jungle, never realizing you've been stranded.
That is why we occasionally need to soothe our exhausted souls.
We leave the concrete jungle behind in search of freedom.
Mountains lush with greenery and cool, flowing streams are wonderful, as are beaches with soft sand and the gentle rhythm of the waves.
A vacation. A getaway.
For those worn down by society, it is an essential form of healing.
Having dealt with a string of recent incidents, I suggested a vacation shortly after being discharged from the hospital.
Since he felt he owed Eto, Hitokawa reluctantly agreed.
However...
“I distinctly remember saying we should go on a vacation.”
“Shut up. Just getting here was pushing it.”
Leading Eto by the hand, the place we arrived at was neither a natural forest nor a beach.
It was a water park, reachable by taking the train from near our house for about ten stops.
It was quite famous in the area and packed with attractions, but the lingering sense of disappointment wouldn't fade.
Staring at the sign featuring a cheerful, leaping dolphin, I groaned.
“I wanted the ocean! I wanted to run wild in the vast sea, away from this suffocating city! Eto even bought a cute swimsuit for the occasion, and I got a brand-new camera to capture the memories!”
“You haven’t forgotten whose money bought that camera, have you!? You bought an absurdly high-end model!! Sure, I lent you my card as a thank-you for helping in that last fight, but you used it without any restraint! The bonus we got for taking down the Artist is completely gone!!”
And so, because the budget had been decimated, we were forced to settle for the local water park. Still, I had my say.
“You idiot. You don’t understand. Children grow up in the blink of an eye. We won't have many chances to see her like this! Do you expect me to preserve Eto’s childhood memories with some cheap, low-resolution camera?!”
“What are you bragging about, you daughter-obsessed freak?!”
“Um... could you two stop fighting and just go inside? Everyone is staring at us.”
Eto stepped in to mediate, tugging on my hand and Hitokawa’s sleeve.
Just as she said, the other guests at the water park were all stealing glances at our little comedy routine.
“Besides, I like water parks too! There are water slides, a wave pool... it feels just like being at an amusement park!”
Eto spoke with a bright expression, trying her best to show that she was happy with the choice.
Seeing her, Hitokawa and I finally cooled down and looked at each other.
“The fact that Eto is the most mature one here means we really need to reflect on ourselves.”
“Hmph. That's because I raised her.”
“Yeah, yeah. You're great.”
Ultimately, we agreed to make the most of the water park and headed through the front gates.
***
Men are creatures who retain the heart of a boy no matter how old they get.
I realized that the words my mother once spoke applied to me as well.
Though we had come to the water park for Eto's sake, and she was certainly enjoying herself... I was having just as much fun, my excitement reaching a fever pitch.
“Yee-haw!!”
“Dad, you’re so cool!”
“How did you get up there!? Teach me!!”
“Hey!! Stop messing around, it’s dangerous!!”
Surfing on a swim board in the wave pool and getting scolded by the lifeguard was a given.
I shoved Hitokawa into the waterfall pool, only for the crashing torrent to strip his swimsuit right off. In retaliation, Hitokawa slammed me into the pool with a German suplex.
Then, an excited Eto landed a kick on Hitokawa, and we all ended up submerged in the pool together.
It was wonderful.
It felt as if I had returned to my childhood, and it was a relief to momentarily forget the reality where life and death are in constant conflict.
I wished days like this could last forever... but it was a fleeting dream.
We were merely animals of the jungle pausing at the water's edge to quench our thirst before returning to the wild.
So, for today, let's forget everything. Let's soothe our parched hearts here.
Let this be the driving force that keeps us moving forward.
For that reason, I intended to play hard, eat everything in sight, and take plenty of photos to keep as memories... ah.
“Hey, Hitokawa. Come to think of it, where’s my camera?”
I asked Hitokawa as we climbed out of the pool after our three-way crash.
I was sure I had left it with him when I went to buy drinks.
But Hitokawa looked at me as if I were speaking a foreign language.
“What? I gave it back to you the moment you returned with the drinks. You said you were going to the water slide. Your hands were full, so I put it on the table next to us.”
Now that he mentioned it, I did recall something like that.
The problem was that Eto had started choking on her drink at that exact moment. While I was fussing over her, I completely blanked on Hitokawa's comment about the table.
Then where was the camera...?
We looked at the table we had been using.
It was gone.
The tabletop was completely empty.
The three of us turned pale in an instant.
“It’s goneeeee!! My 880,000 yen camera!!”
“What!? 880,000!? You told me it was 900,000!! Where the hell did you skim off 20,000 yen, you bastard!?”
“We can argue about that later! We have to find the camera first! I’m going to the lost and found!”
“Damn it! I’ll search the area! Just you wait until I find it!”
“Then I’ll try to find it by Dad’s scent! It might have been washed away since there's so much water, but it's better than doing nothing!”
And so, the three of us split up to search for the missing camera.
I pinned my hopes on the idea that a kind stranger had turned it in, but the trip to the lost and found was a waste of time.
The staff informed me that no cameras had been turned in today.
I left the center with the gait of a zombie.
I had used every ounce of my silver tongue to bargain that price down by 20,000 yen! And I'd lost it like a complete idiot!
Cursing my own stupidity, I slammed my forehead against the outer wall. Perhaps because they were mindful of children falling, the wall was made of a soft, cushiony material. It was just... soft.
I had been thudding against the wall for a while when someone suddenly spoke to me.
“Is this the camera you’re looking for?”
“Huh?”
I turned toward the voice, and there it was—the camera I had been desperately searching for.
“Oh! Thank you! I was so heartbroken thinking I’d lost... it...”
My voice trailed off as I took the camera.
It was because of the woman who had handed it to me.
She wore a voluptuous black bikini covered by a loose white shirt. Long black hair. A perfectly curved jawline.
I knew this look. I knew this voice!
“You...! You...!”
As I struggled to form words, she simply lifted her sunglasses, revealing her face as if providing the answer herself.
With an infuriatingly innocent expression, she beamed at me.
“Long time no see, Koma-kun~♡”
“Why the hell are you here, Shinaoto Minami!?”
It was Minami—the very woman who had put me, Eto, and Hitokawa through absolute hell a few months ago.
***
This was a disaster. A remnant of that psychotic group—the ones who dismembered people and arranged them like art pieces—was standing right in front of me.
The terrifying thing about this woman was that her behavior was completely unpredictable and incomprehensible. She was the type of person who could dump poison into the pool on a whim and think nothing of it.
If Eto or Hitokawa were here, we could subdue her instantly, but since I was alone, I had to figure something out...!
“Don’t be so scared~. I quit that job. I’m just living a leisurely life now and happened to run into you~.”
“Leisurely, my ass. Do you even realize you're a wanted criminal?”
I was speechless. A wanted fugitive should be hiding in a hole, yet here she was, boldly enjoying a day at the water park.
“I’m just enjoying a leisurely life on the run~.”
“I could grab you right now and hand you over to the police.”
“Oh, would you? I don’t really want to be hostile toward you~. But if you’re going to try and catch me, I’ll have to take you seriously~.”
Minami’s gaze sharpened. She was making it clear that she was more than ready to fight if I pushed her.
I instinctively tensed up.
“What exactly are you planning to do?”
“I’ll collapse and scream like a pitiful tragic heroine. Then I’ll point at you and scream that you’re a molester. You’ll try to tell everyone I’m a wanted criminal, but people don’t memorize every face on a wanted poster. In the end, your voice will be ignored, and the crowd will believe a helpless woman and swarm you. While that's happening, I’ll just slip away~.”
“Damn this presumption of guilt!!”
The worst part was that, knowing her, it would actually happen. If that were the case, it would be nearly impossible for me to touch her. What was I supposed to do?
“Just pretend you didn’t see me~. People spend their whole lives ignoring injustices every single day~.”
“Even so, I can’t just ignore a homicidal psycho.”
“My, how brave! You’re a candidate for a Brave Citizen Award~. I’ll even congratulate you. Yay~!”
Clap, clap, clap!
Minami began to applaud as if I had done something admirable. I had no idea what her goal was.
As I scanned her for any opening, my eyes stopped at her knee.
On the inside of her thigh was a scar, about the size of a palm, looking old and faded.
It wasn’t a bite mark from a Ghoul; the edges were too clean.
It looked as though she had carved the flesh out herself with a blade.
Seeing that scar, I recalled the strange phenomenon that had occurred with Eto during the battle with the Artist.
Eto, despite her critical injuries, had recovered as if she had consumed human flesh. At the time, there was only one person at the scene capable of providing such a source.
“Did you feed that to Eto?”
Minami, noticing where my gaze had landed, answered casually.
“Ah, this? Yeah. She looked like she didn’t even have the strength to chew, so I cut a piece off and fed it to her myself~.”
“Why?”
Minami was an enigma, but I knew she didn't possess the kind of warmth that would drive her to save a dying stranger.
Then why?
Why did she save Eto?
“Hmm... I wonder why?”
Minami tilted her head. She didn't seem to be hiding the answer; she genuinely seemed not to know.
“At first, I was just going to leave. The boss was fighting, but I had no lingering attachment to the company. But then Eto grabbed my ankle. I don’t know if she recognized me or if it was just an unconscious reflex... but for some reason, I couldn’t just walk away.”
“So you carved out your own flesh to save Eto? You, of all people?”
“Strange, isn’t it? I find it strange too~. Maybe a tiny speck of that ‘human feeling’ you talked about was still left in me, Koma-kun~?”
“......”
I fell silent.
I had suspected it, but hearing it confirmed by her left me with a tangle of complex emotions.
“...You’re still a piece of work, and I can’t overlook the things you’ve done. But...”
I hated her, but there were things that needed to be said.
As a parent. As a human being.
“Thank you for saving Eto.”
“......”
This time, it was Minami who fell silent.
Her eyes widened, as if she were hearing the words 'thank you' for the first time in her life.
After a long moment, she let out a small chuckle.
“You really are fascinating. That’s why I like you. I’m almost tempted to become Eto’s new stepmother.”
“Please. Stop.”
I pleaded with the most desperate voice I had ever used.
Minami as Eto’s stepmother? The mere thought made my skin crawl. Our home would become a bloodbath.
“Well, I’ll be going now. I think Eto has caught my scent and is approaching.”
“Hey, wait!”
As Minami waved and turned to leave, I tried to grab her.
Regardless of any internal change, she was still far too dangerous to be left roaming free.
But Minami waved me off, blocking my reach with a faint smile.
“Don’t worry~. I don’t kill people anymore. Ordinary citizens, at least~.”
“What?”
“Listen, Koma-kun. You told me once that humans have empathy—that they feel sad when they see others suffer. But what about someone who isn't even worth empathizing with?”
The smile she wore now was less grotesque than before, yet it still carried a chilling edge that made my hair stand on end.
“What are you talking about?”
“Exactly what I said. Some people have no value. A final-boss-level villain, for instance. Someone who plunges countless people into the depths of despair. If I were to rip out that person's guts and make them scream, wouldn't that make many people happy?”
There she goes again with that 'happiness' talk.
But something was different. I didn't fully grasp her meaning, but the nuance of the 'happiness' she spoke of had shifted.
“A final-boss-level villain? Who is that?”
“As you know, my parents ran a cult. Because of that, they noticed certain things, and because of that, they were slaughtered. The world looks different from the perspective of a madman. They probably just wanted to shut those useless mouths.”
“Speak plainly for once! You’ve been talking in riddles this whole time!”
I shouted in frustration, and in response, all emotion vanished from her voice.
“I am going to make the one who created the ‘cage’ miserable. Then, and only then, will many people truly be happy.”
“...A cage?”
What was that? Some kind of code?
As I tried to decipher her cryptic words, she turned away and added,
“Oh, right. I was bored earlier, so I dunked a child in the water and took a photo with that camera~. If you don’t want the parents to suspect you, you should probably delete it~.”
“What the hell did you do, you insane bitch!?!?!?!!!”
Don't put some twisted photo like that on a memory card meant for precious family memories!!
Screaming curses at Minami, I frantically checked the camera's memory.
“...Huh?”
There was no photo of a drowning child. Instead, I stared in shock at a single image and looked back at Minami.
But she was already gone, vanished into the crowd.
What on earth is that woman...?
Hearing Eto and Hitokawa calling out from a distance, asking if I'd found the camera, I looked at the photo one last time.
“Her photography skills are annoyingly good.”
Captured in the frame were the three of us—me, Eto, and Hitokawa—splashing in the water with genuine, happy smiles on our faces.
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