chapter3 · 051-ep51

Episode 51: Been Waiting for You

The man slammed into the wall remained crumpled on the floor, unmoving.

His arm was bent at an unnatural angle.

Even through his clothes, his shoulder had sunk in unnaturally enough to see.

The instant they saw it, someone screamed.

As though that scream were a signal, the participants around them all broke at once.

"Wha— wha, whaaat!?"

"No, I can't! I can't do this!"

"We're going back! We're going back, so move!"

"Someone, somebody, outside—"

The voices overlapped until nobody could tell what anyone was saying.

Someone tried to run backward, collided with another participant, and fell to the floor.

Someone else nearly stepped on the fallen person's leg, and the person who nearly got stepped on screamed.

The man heading toward the entrance had his shoulder grabbed by one of the men in work clothes and was shoved back into the wall with the momentum.

"Let go of me!"

The work-clothes guy's fist sank into the stomach of the man who shouted that.

The man choked off his voice and dropped to his knees.

Seeing that, another participant tried to flee through a narrow gap to the side.

But it was a wall.

There was nowhere they could get through.

With his hand still against the stone wall, that participant seemed to realize he had nowhere to go. He made a strange sound and sank down where he stood.

Segawa couldn't move either.

I have to run.

If I don't run, I'll die.

He thought that, but he didn't know where he could run.

Kanzaki was in front of him.

The men in work clothes were behind him.

Stone walls stood to either side, and at his feet was the participant who had been punched and stopped moving.

No. Move.

Please move.

Get up.

He found himself thinking that.

It couldn't happen, but if the man got back up, maybe Segawa could believe this wasn't truly a situation where someone would die.

But the man didn't move.

The arm lying on the floor remained limp, and what had been a person until moments ago no longer looked shaped like something that could stand as a person.

Segawa's throat closed up.

He felt like he was going to throw up.

Something rose from the depths of his stomach, but nothing came out.

Only his breaths grew shallow, and his chest hurt strangely.

Why was this happening?

Wasn't this just supposed to be an explanation?

Wasn't it supposed to be near the entrance?

Hadn't they said they could go home if it got weird?

The words he'd said himself came back in a tangled mess inside his head.

None of them were any help now.

"Even between Awakeners, if there's enough of a Level gap, this is all it takes."

Kanzaki was laughing.

When he heard that voice, Segawa finally looked properly at Kanzaki's face.

No, rather than looking properly, he ended up seeing it.

He'd seen this man's face somewhere before.

Where?

Where had he seen it?

During the job explanation?

No. That wasn't it.

Before that.

On a smartphone screen.

A video.

Himuro.

Once those thoughts surfaced, Segawa finally remembered.

Right.

This was the man who had fought Himuro.

He was in that video that had gone viral.

Himuro had fought him.

When he'd watched it through a screen, he'd thought it was amazing.

Awakeners fighting each other.

Himuro facing down someone like that.

I want to enter a dungeon soon too.

If I get actual combat experience, maybe I can get a little closer.

He'd thought things like that.

But now Segawa stood before that man.

Not from some place where safety seemed assured, like inside a screen.

A person had just been crushed right in front of him.

And the man who had done it was now smiling normally, without a trace of remorse.

Himuro had fought someone like this?

He had stood in front of someone like this?

Segawa looked at his feet.

His knees were shaking.

They were shaking so clearly that even he could tell.

Pathetic.

But they wouldn't stop.

Even when he tried to put strength into his legs, they wouldn't move, as though they were stuck to the floor.

He couldn't breathe properly either.

And yet, just a little while ago, he'd envied Himuro.

He'd only thought about wanting to enter a dungeon soon, wanting to get stronger, how an Awakener needed real combat experience.

Did he have any right to say things like that as he was now?

Probably not.

At the very least, the current him—who could only shake in place after seeing someone get crushed in front of him, unable to run and unable even to think about fighting—definitely didn't.

"C'mon, who's next?"

Kanzaki took a step forward.

That step alone made the participants shove against one another as they retreated again.

But the men in work clothes were behind them.

If they backed up, they got pushed back.

If they tried to run, they got hit.

Someone was crying.

Someone kept saying, "I'm sorry."

Segawa didn't know who they were apologizing to.

He didn't know either.

But just hearing that voice made him want to apologize for something too.

I'm sorry I came here.

I'm sorry I got carried away.

I'm sorry I said we could just leave if it got weird.

Those meaningless words went round and round in his head.

Kanzaki's gaze moved across the participants.

It was a gaze only deciding who to crush first.

It didn't look as though he was looking at people. It looked as though he was choosing the order to move obstructions out of the way.

That gaze stopped on Aizawa.

Aizawa was right beside Segawa.

She was frozen in place without a sound, gripping Segawa's sleeve.

Her hand was shaking.

He could feel the trembling through his sleeve.

Her face was pale, and her lips had almost no color left in them.

Aizawa was lower Level than Segawa.

She hadn't been able to attend the Awakener Development Program that much either.

She had little combat experience.

The fear she felt here now had to be greater than Segawa's.

Anyone could see that.

And yet Aizawa couldn't move.

No, there was no way she could move.

Segawa couldn't move either.

"You."

Kanzaki moved toward Aizawa.

Aizawa's fingers clenched Segawa's sleeve harder.

She hadn't asked him to help her.

Aizawa hadn't said anything.

But the strength gripping his sleeve alone made Segawa understand, whether he wanted to or not, what kind of place he was in.

If he didn't move here, Aizawa would probably be killed.

Like that man just now.

Slammed into the wall, bent into a strange shape, and then eventually stop moving.

Segawa looked at his feet.

They were still shaking.

Shaking pathetically.

Protect Aizawa.

He wasn't strong enough to say something cool like that.

He didn't even think he had the power to protect her.

If Kanzaki swung his arm, that would be it.

He'd just seen it.

If he took that hit, he'd die.

He'd definitely die.

He knew that perfectly well, but if he stayed behind Aizawa and did nothing here, he didn't think he could go on living as an Awakener anymore.

He was terrified, honestly.

He wanted to run.

He didn't want to die.

But carrying the version of himself who did nothing here for the rest of his life felt just a little scarier now.

Segawa put strength into his shaking legs.

One step.

It was truly only one step.

But even so, he stepped in front of Aizawa.

"Segawa-kun...?"

Aizawa's voice shook.

Segawa couldn't turn around.

He felt as if he wouldn't be able to face forward again if he did.

"Stay back."

His voice came out hoarse.

Even he thought it sounded pathetic.

But he somehow got the words out.

Kanzaki stopped walking.

Then the corner of his mouth twisted with interest.

"Hah. That Enchanter, and now this guy too. Every damn man wants to look cool in front of a girl, huh? Well, all that's changing is the order you die in."

Kanzaki raised his arm.

To Segawa, that movement looked strangely slow.

No, there was no way it was actually slow.

His body was just making him feel that way.

——I'm going to die.

He thought that.

But he didn't step away from in front of Aizawa.

"...Die."

With Kanzaki's cold voice, his fist came rushing in.

In that instant, something wrapped around Segawa's body.

It wasn't warm.

It didn't shine either.

But in an instant, a sensation like several thick membranes being layered over the outside of his body spread through him.

Kanzaki's fist struck Segawa squarely in the torso.

A dull sound.

Then a massive impact.

"...!?"

Segawa's body lifted into the air.

His breath stopped.

His vision shook.

His body hit the floor, and every bit of air was forced from his lungs.

"Gah...!"

It hurt.

It hurt unimaginably badly.

But he wasn't crushed.

His arm and shoulder hadn't become like that man's.

He felt like he was about to pass out.

"Segawa-kun!"

Even so, he could hear Aizawa scream.

I'm not dead.

Segawa only vaguely understood that much.

"...Huh?"

He heard Kanzaki's voice.

"What was that?"

Segawa's vision was blurred, but he could tell Kanzaki was looking at his own arm.

The impact must have been different.

Different from when he crushed that man.

He should have struck him the same way, yet Segawa hadn't been crushed; he'd only been blown away.

Kanzaki's gaze slowly moved farther in.

Segawa shifted only his neck a little too.

Past even the men in work clothes.

A young man stood in the shadows of the passage.

Himuro Ren.

Segawa didn't know when he'd arrived.

He didn't even know why he was in a place like this.

He was simply there.

"Hah, been waiting for you, Enchanter."

Kanzaki's gaze had unmistakably caught Himuro, and the corner of his mouth slowly twisted upward.