Bookshelves lined each wall of the room, and each one of them was filled with fairy tales, leaving the room stuffed to the brim with fairy tales from every imaginable place and time period.

A woman was placed in the center of the room. She sat in a chair that was disproportionately large for her small frame, looking like some kind of nature spirit embedded into a tree deep in the forest.

It was difficult to guess her age from her appearance alone. She had a head of gray hair and gaunt, atrophied legs, but at the same time her face bore no noticeable wrinkles. There were no traces of any lines that would have been left from laughing or crying.

She was the Witch. Self-proclaimed.

He was in complete agreement with the title. After all, Witches were known to cast curses. And she had indeed cast a curse on the Administration Bureau, no, on all of Sakurada.

The Witch’s cheeks slowly lifted, her expression changing like some kind of computer animation. She formed a natural smile through a completely unnatural process.

Then she spoke. “Do you think you could fall in love with a stone?”

Smiling, the man answered, “What kind of question is that?”

The Witch tilted her head, looking like an innocent young girl. “It’s a question about your mother.”

“Ah.” That made sense. His mother had indeed fallen in love with a stone. Even when the one she loved became a stone, she continued to love that stone.

“Would you begrudge her for that?” the Witch asked.

“No. Absolutely not.”

“Do you think she is to be pitied?”

“Can’t deny that. If she was anything, she was pitiable.”

The Witch nodded. “Then it’s no wonder you hate abilities. Who could be expected to forgive the very thing that took their mother and father away?”

I see. So that’s how it looks to an outsider. “Well, that sums it up very simply, and is easy to explain and understand. I can’t forgive abilities for taking away my family. Yeah, you could sell that one.” With a small smile, he shook his head. “But that would be wrong.”

Completely wrong. Entirely unrelated, in fact.

“Then why would you say that you hate abilities?”

“Why?” A silly question. “It’s not one simple reason.”

Abilities were rife with problems, and each and every one was unforgivable. He could spend days listing detailed reasons. But even that wouldn’t reach the truth of the matter.

His feelings were more primal than that, more approaching a physiological disgust.

“I loathe these abilities with all that I am. I hate them… because I hate them.”

The Witch looked intently at him. “Is it truly possible to hate something for no reason?”

Of course it is. “You can try to pretty up the origins of emotions with prose, but you’re only fooling yourself.”

Trying to understand an emotion would only corrupt it.

Love, hate, it was all the same game. They were only natural. Illogical, selfish, and unfiltered. Nobody ever needed a reason to hate something.

He realized that the Witch’s face had lost all expression.

She spoke with her true face, the one that looked entirely emotionless. “To reject something for no reason is something a beast would do.”

A smile remained splayed on his face. “No. I’m a human. No matter where you look, I think you’ll find that I’m only human, at the end of the day.”

And as a simple human, he couldn’t possibly forgive the existence of abilities. It was only natural he should be terrified of those who lived through reliance on their abilities.

It was the ones who accepted abilities that were the real beasts. Anybody who could accept such power beyond human understanding had broken from the human chain.

The Witch looked towards him with sad eyes. He was uncertain if she had crafted that face or was making it naturally. “Masamune-kun… try not to hate the abilities that your parents loved so much.”

He– Urachi Masamune– shook his head. “Someone else loving them is no reason for me to love them.”

And of course it wasn’t.

Nobody else was allowed to determine how he felt.

✽

Evidently, he had fallen asleep at some point.

He forced his eyelids up as he registered the stiffness of his shoulders, noting that it would be better to avoid sleeping at his desk in the future.

Looking around with blurry eyes, he confirmed his situation. He was in an office building of the Administration Bureau, more specifically the Countermeasures Department. And he, of course, was the department head.

He made a few small stretches as a woman walked over. She had likely noticed him waking up.

The woman was known as The Index. He probably knew her real name at some point, but had since forgotten.

The Index gazed at him in amazement. “Good morning to you, Director.”

“Yeah. Morning.” Urachi glanced at the wall clock as he answered, discovering it was already past 2 PM.

“Did you have a good dream?”

“No.” It was certainly not good. It was a memory of having met the Witch, also known as the Nameless System. The dream had actually been a perfect reproduction of that memory. “Why do you ask?”

“You were smiling in your sleep.”

“Oh, that’s gross. I’ll have to take more care.” He wasn’t sure how he could possibly be more careful in that regard, but giving an appropriate enough answer was all that mattered. He was in no mood to waste time chatting with a subordinate. “Did you need something from me?”

“The second Witch has just contacted me.”

“Oh?” The second Witch, or in other words, the girl with the same ability of future sight as the Nameless System. “What did she say?”

“She wanted to meet in person with you for a conversation.”

“Wonderful. And what perfect timing, as well. Anything else?”

“That was all. She said she would contact us again before hanging up.”

“She didn’t go for any small talk at all? I mean literally anything.”

“None. She immediately ended the call.”

Urachi smiled. “I see.”

The Index had been instructed to report that he was not in during the next received call from the second Witch, as a rudimentary experiment of sorts.

I suppose that proves it.

The second Witch. The second ability user with future sight. Even with such a powerful ability, foresight and planning could effectively counter her.

There is time that she does not have access to.

She couldn’t have known the results of her phone call beforehand, as otherwise she wouldn’t have dialed while he was away.

Which meant there were no issues. Everything was proceeding as planned.

Urachi opened up the notebook laying on his desk, pulling up a ballpoint pen.

Messy handwriting filled each page.

• It is currently October 21st, 2:05 PM.
• The Witch contacted regarding an appointment.

He wrote down a few other things nagging at him before closing his eyes.

Then, he used his ability. He focused that absolutely infuriating ability onto himself.

He felt a mild dizziness, like he stood up too fast and got lightheaded. But it passed before long. By the time the sensation had faded, parts of his memories had been lost.

Like a forcefully deleted file, everything he had experienced in the past two hours was gone from his mind. The entire dream he had just had, alongside his prior conversation with The Index, were like they had never happened.

He discovered the notebook in his right hand. Reading the lines of messy characters, he acclimated to his situation.

There were no issues. The plan was going without a hitch.

“Thank you for your report,” he said, turning towards The Index. Of course, it would be a real bother for her to remember anything unnecessary. He would have to wait for the right opportunity to steal her memories away as well.

It’s almost over.

The twisted story of Sakurada would soon reach its end.

All of the preparations were in place.