Chapter 355 - 8: Where’s the Cat?

Chapter 355: Chapter 8: Where’s the Cat?

Yimi no longer had any spirit power. Takamiya Mio had reclaimed the Astral Dress of the First Sephira, and Adaptive Power had granted Yimi nothing new in this world.

Smack—

With no real technique to begin with, Yimi slammed her card down, but nothing so much as budged.

"Mm." Yimi frowned in concentration.

"Ha↓ha↑!"

The World!

The platinum Stand, invisible to ordinary people, appeared beside Yimi. It crouched down, pinched the tiny card between its thick fingers, and flipped it over.

"I won again."

Yimi stood proudly. "Small fry. Small fry."

"Shut up! What are you so proud of? That was obviously the wind just now!" The boy glared at Yimi in embarrassed fury, his face turning red.

What was with this girl? In only a month, her hair had grown so much longer, and she was wearing such a pretty skirt and had dressed herself up so nicely. Yet her habit of insulting people had not changed at all.

"Yimi."

Watching everything while carrying several things, Shiori felt rather helpless. Could that boy really not see the exceptionally tall, muscular man who had just crouched beside him?

"I’m not playing with you anymore, small fry."

Yimi collected the card she had just won, trotted over, and grabbed Shiori’s clothes. She looked up at the paper bag in Shiori’s hand.

She could not see what was inside, but Yimi recognized the packaging used for small cakes.

She ducked her witch-hatted head beneath Shiori’s right hand, making Shiori rest it on her head while she stared pointedly at the paper bag.

Shiori moved her hand away from Yimi’s head and took the child’s little hand. "Don’t be impatient. There is one for you, but you can only open it after we reach Origami’s house, understand?"

"Got it."

Yimi quieted down somewhat.

"Shin-kun, why are you blushing so much? Do you like her?"

"Shut up!"

The boys’ arguing could still be heard faintly behind them.

Now that change was possible—even if the only hope came from what had happened to Origami—everyone’s hostility toward Reine had eased considerably. Even Kurumi, who hated her most, had calmed down somewhat.

The devil would not easily let people reclaim what it had taken from them, facial hair excepted.

Thus, in the newly overwritten timeline, Origami’s family had gone bankrupt once. The world’s correction took the form of her father making a failed investment when Origami was twelve and falling deeply into debt. Both her parents were now working grueling jobs far from home.

Origami had also joined AST to repay the family’s debts, which were now almost fully cleared.

Compared with having nothing at all, this outcome was enough to satisfy her. In a sense, she herself had caused her family’s bankruptcy, so she inevitably felt guilty that her parents had to work themselves so hard because of it.

Discovering that she herself had killed her parents back then had been enough to drive Origami into despair and Inversion. But she had also been the one to save everything. That was why she could later set the matter aside enough to sit here calmly and make tea.

Had someone else been the one to save her, the fact that she had "killed her parents with her own hands" might have haunted her forever.

So that was why Yimi had refused to help Reine change her mistakes. Reine had to do it herself, both for everyone else’s sake and for her own.

Accepting the tea Origami had brewed, Shiori looked around the house, which was as simple and tidy as ever. The pet supplies that had once formed its only messy corner were gone, but opening the door to Origami’s bedroom would reveal that the child’s bed still stood beside her own.

"What is it, Shiori?" Origami asked.

Shiori looked down at the tea in her hands. "I just feel a strange sense of déjà vu from sitting across from Origami and drinking tea like this."

Origami nodded. She poured Yimi a cup as well and added some sugar. "Do not worry."

That was true. Yimi had drunk it too.

Shiori took a sip.

Origami continued, "GunGun is immune to every poison."

"Pfft!"

"It was a joke. Was it not funny?"

"You never change your expression when you talk!"

Shiori wiped her mouth and slid the gift she had brought across the table. "By the way, do your parents know about Yimi?"

"They do. We spoke on the phone yesterday." Origami glanced down at Yimi, who had climbed onto her lap to reach the snacks on the table, and stroked her head.

It did not feel as nice as her kitten form.

"I told them I had adopted a child. They said I should wait at home because they were coming back immediately, and they demanded to know where the money used to repay the debt had come from."

Shiori’s eyebrows twitched twice. "They didn’t think something strange had happened, did they...?"

Origami shook her head. "The misunderstanding was resolved. I told them Shiori is the only person I have any kind of relationship with."

"..."

Thank goodness Shiori was a girl.

"Kurumi said gathering more ’time’ would take enormous effort. If Reine truly wishes to change things, she must earn the Spirits’ recognition again and attempt to recover her power herself."

"I will not help."

Origami rejected the idea without hesitation. "Shiori was born because Takamiya Shinji died. If Takamiya Shinji survived, Shiori wouldn’t exist."

"That does seem to be true..."

Origami placed another bag of cat biscuits on the table. "GunGun said this brand tastes terrible. It is currently the most expensive brand on the market."

"You barely have any money, but you still bought the most expensive one..." Shiori muttered.

"The brand GunGun liked disappeared."

It had not been discontinued. It had never existed at all.

Because Origami’s father had survived and made that failed investment when she was twelve, the money had passed through numerous hands. Perhaps the person who had originally intended to produce cat biscuits gained funding and changed their mind to pursue another business, or perhaps something else had happened. Whatever the reason, the brand Yimi once loved did not exist in this timeline.

Even if the world line corrected events toward a particular outcome, the butterfly effect was real. It was as though the world were warning people not to cross a boundary.

Shiori also wanted to save Reine, but it was no exaggeration to say that so many girls’ lives now revolved around hers. Sacrificing herself would mean acting irresponsibly toward all of them.

She raised an index finger optimistically. "But Mio should count as my biological mother, right? If Takamiya Shinji survived, and then Mio... Um, what I mean is, could the two of them still have me...?"

Yimi did not understand what they were discussing. She climbed down from Origami’s lap, ran to the window, and stared at a little bird resting outside.

She did not understand the conversation, but she understood that Shiori might disappear. She should let The World touch Shiori.

This time, the kitty would not forget to say goodbye to Origami.

But it seemed she had still forgotten something.

"Come to think of it, the Spirits’ names happen to contain numbers from zero to ten. If we don’t count Mio, are there ten of them?" Shiori casually mentioned something Origami had noticed long ago.

Something was wrong. The Yamai sisters were twins, and excluding Mio and Yoshinon, there were ten in total.

...

"Hmm. This place... This street..."

Somewhere in Tengu City, Honjo Nia frowned as she kept flipping through the book in her hands.

Where was the cat?!