Chapter 292 - 292: Tonight I Shall Surely Die at the Hands of a Woman!

And just how popular was The Little Prince?

In his previous life, it had been called "the best-selling book with the second-highest readership after the Bible"—and, just like J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter, it had swept the globe, selling over a hundred million copies.

The story of The Little Prince was made up of six short parts, each covering the little prince's visit to one of six different planets.

Though this short children's novel was wildly popular, it wasn't actually that difficult to write.

Tsushima Kagami didn't need to sketch out a worldview, character designs, or a plot outline first.

Once he'd worked through some of the finer details in his mind, slowly turning them over,

Tsushima Kagami immediately uncapped his pen and began writing quickly, the nib scratching across the manuscript paper.

His pen moved swiftly across the page.

He didn't write out the complete text of The Little Prince right away. Instead, he first drafted a rough outline of the story.

He knew perfectly well that the hardest part of recreating The Little Prince wasn't the prose itself, but that distinctive tone.

That tone hovering somewhere between innocence and depth—speaking like a child, yet leaving adults speechless.

He needed time to recapture that feeling.

Since he was writing this version in Japanese, he also had to preserve as much of the original French linguistic context as possible.

The first chapter took about forty minutes—the part where the pilot, as a boy, drew a boa constrictor that had swallowed an elephant, only for the adults to say it was a hat and tell him to stop drawing.

At this point, Tsushima Kagami set down his pen and picked up the manuscript to read it over.

Then he frowned.

Something was off.

The original had that faint tone—a touch of melancholy mixed with a touch of innocence.

The version he'd written felt too adult.

It read like a grown-up imitating a child's speech, rather than a genuine narration from a child's point of view.

Only then did he realize he'd underestimated how tricky this would be.

He set the pages down, thought for a moment, and decided not to rush into the main text.

Instead, he would first write a creative outline for The Little Prince.

Writing pure literature relied more on feel and accumulated experience—an outline would only shackle the flow of inspiration.

But The Little Prince was different.

It didn't move readers through twisting plots or intense emotion, but through a distinctive quality running through the whole work.

He needed to fully grasp that quality before he even started writing, or the result would end up neither one thing nor another.

Tsushima Kagami took a fresh sheet of manuscript paper and wrote a few keywords at the top.

[Loneliness], [Childlike Innocence], [Taming], [Responsibility], [The Absurdity of the Adult World].

Then, beneath each of the five words, he wrote out the corresponding scenes and dialogue from The Little Prince.

When he got to [Taming], he thought of the words the fox had once spoken.

[To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy, just like a hundred thousand other little boys. I have no need of you, and you have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world.]

In his previous life, this passage had been quoted to the point of cliché—but that very overuse proved something.

It really had moved countless people.

As Tsushima Kagami wrote down this line, he suddenly realized something.

The reason The Little Prince could transcend age and borders was that, on its surface, it was a fantastical story about travel.

That was the level at which children could understand it; but on a deeper level, it was really about the essence of [relationships]—

how people form connections with one another, and what it means once that connection is made.

This theme was one adults needed to understand even more than children did.

He kept writing the outline, and it flowed more and more smoothly.

The memories and understanding that had once been hazy grew clearer and clearer as he wrote.

By one in the morning, the outline had already filled seven pages.

The six planets the little prince had visited.

The king, the conceited man, the drunkard, the businessman, the lamplighter, the geographer.

He noted down each one's character and dialogue.

And on Earth: the snake, the fox, the rose garden, the switchman, the merchant.

All of it sat in his mind like a completed puzzle—he just needed the time to move it, piece by piece, onto the page.

Tsushima Kagami set down his pen and rolled his wrist.

Looking at the thick stack of pages before him, the corners of his mouth curled up slightly.

With his thoughts and the story's context fully sorted out, he could pick up his pen and write at any time.

But before that, he still needed to decide what style of illustration would best match the content of the story.

In the original, the watercolor illustrations had been painted by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry himself.

Their style was distinctive, blending seamlessly with the text.

But given the Japanese context this time, he felt Sayuri's picture-book style—the one he'd seen that afternoon—would actually suit it better.

So he decided to hand the illustration work over to Sayuri after all.

That way he could slack off a little himself while also giving Sayuri a side job to support herself—wasn't that killing two birds with one stone?

Once he'd worked all this out in his mind, turning it over slowly,

Tsushima Kagami crumpled up the pages he'd just written and tossed them into the wastebasket beside him, prompting Yukino to pounce at the ball of paper.

Only then did he pick his pen back up and begin writing quickly on a fresh sheet.

[When I was six years old, I once saw a magnificent picture in a book about the primeval forest called True Stories. It showed a boa constrictor swallowing a wild beast. I remember the book said: "These boa constrictors swallow their prey whole, without chewing, and afterward cannot move at all. They spend the next six months of sleep digesting it." At the time, I imagined all sorts of adventures in the jungle, and so I made my first drawing with a colored pencil. My drawing Number One looked like this:

(A boa constrictor that has swallowed an elephant, its belly shaped like a hat.)

Here, Tsushima Kagami deliberately left a note, meaning to leave room for Sayuri to add the illustration later.

I showed my masterpiece to the grown-ups, and asked them whether my drawing frightened them. But they answered: "Why would a hat be frightening?" I told them that what I'd drawn wasn't a hat, but a boa constrictor digesting an elephant. So I drew what was inside the boa constrictor, so the grown-ups could understand. Grown-ups always need everything explained. My drawing Number Two looked like this...]

Once again, in place of where the picture should be, Tsushima Kagami wrote out a description.

As Tsushima Kagami wrote on and on, he found himself gaining an entirely new understanding and appreciation for the novel's plot and language.

"What are you writing?"

Yukinoshita Shizuku's voice sounded beside his ear.

He set down his pen and turned around with a smile.

Only then did he see that Yukinoshita Shizuku, Hiratsuka Shizuka, and Nayotake had all finished bathing and changed into their pajamas.

The three of them stood beside him now, craning their necks to look at the pages on his desk.

"Nothing much."

"I just chatted with Sayuri about children's literature this afternoon, and some ideas suddenly came to me."

"So I tried writing a bit."

"Children's literature?"

Hiratsuka Shizuka gave Tsushima Kagami a puzzled look, but her hand was already picking up the pages from his desk.

She waved Yukinoshita Shizuku and Nayotake over to look together, then glanced back at Tsushima Kagami.

"Are you giving up on your pure literature and switching to children's books?"

"Yes and no."

"Pure literature can get too heavy sometimes. There's nothing wrong with switching things up once in a while."

Tsushima Kagami looked at the three of them and explained with a smile.

"Besides, don't underestimate children's literature."

"It's not just a form of entertainment for children—it's also a teacher that shapes their values."

"That makes it extremely important."

The three of them nodded together, finding this reasonable.

"And a great piece of children's literature also serves as a bridge connecting children and their parents."

"So children's literature is a truly great thing."

"Pa-pa-pa~"

By now the three of them had settled onto the edge of the bed, clapping together as they looked at Tsushima Kagami.

"So does that mean Kagami is already prepared to become a good father who can communicate with children as equals and truly understand them?"

Tsushima Kagami blinked, then scratched his head, a little embarrassed.

"It's too early to talk about being a father."

"Let alone a proper father that children actually like."

"Well, you'd better work hard then, Kagami Papa~"

Yukinoshita Shizuku said with a smile.

Beside her, Nayotake let out a soft snort of laughter behind her hand.

"All right, that's enough teasing."

"Let's see what kind of story Kagami Papa's children's book has written so far."

Hiratsuka Shizuka held the pages up in front of the three of them.

Then the three began reading through them slowly.

The Little Prince's language was simple and its story gripping, and it soon had all three of them thoroughly absorbed.

Though the drawings from the opening chapter hadn't actually been drawn, the vivid prose described their contents so well

that everyone could easily picture roughly what they looked like.

This approach—giving physical form to the "I" in the story, even showing "his" drawings—felt refreshingly unique.

But there was no denying that this style, so richly infused with a fairy-tale flavor, was genuinely captivating; young children would surely love it.

Because a story like this wasn't dense and difficult like a textbook.

Children first needed to be interested in a story before they could think about and discuss its content.

If you couldn't even draw them in, what was the point of talking about education?

[The grown-ups urged me to set aside these drawings of boa constrictors, whether with their bellies open or closed, and suggested I focus instead on geography, history, arithmetic, and grammar, so that one day I could become someone useful to my family and to society.

So it was that, at six years old, I gave up what might have been a wonderful career as a painter. The failure of my drawing Number One and my drawing Number Two had discouraged me.

These grown-ups, their heads full of nothing but money and profit, always met dreams and hopes with rejection and refusal.

Explaining things to them wasted so much of my breath that it grew tiresome.

So afterward, I chose another profession that satisfied the grown-ups instead. I learned to fly airplanes, and I've flown to nearly every corner of the world.

Geography, it's true, has helped me a great deal in this.

I can tell China from Arizona at a single glance.

If I ever lost my bearings at night, that knowledge would become all the more useful—it might even save my life.

But none of this changed my opinion of grown-ups very much.

Whenever I met a grown-up who seemed a little clear-headed, I would test him with my drawing Number One, which I'd kept all this time.

I wanted to know whether he truly had the capacity to understand.

But the answer I always got was: "That's a hat."

So I wouldn't speak to him of boa constrictors, or primeval forests, or stars.

I would lower myself to his level, and talk instead of bridge, golf, politics, and neckties.

And the grown-ups would be delighted to have met such a sensible man.]

Wasn't this exactly the law of the jungle in modern society?

Grown-ups chased money and profit, only caring to talk about cars, watches, golf, and politics.

In their eyes, there was no longer a "boa constrictor that had swallowed an elephant"—only a hat worth a bit of money.

"What they've lost isn't the capacity to understand—it's the imagination they've had since childhood."

Hiratsuka Shizuka turned the page, sighing even as she kept reading.

Yukinoshita Shizuku and Nayotake nodded quietly along.

["Draw me a sheep." "Please, draw me a sheep." "It's fine, just draw me a sheep, please!"]

After the plane crash, the first time "I" saw the little prince, this was the phrase he kept repeating.

Since "I" had never drawn a sheep before, "I" redrew the only other picture "I" knew how to draw—the boa constrictor with its belly closed.

To "my" astonishment, the moment "I" handed over the drawing, the little prince cried out.

"No, no! I don't want a boa constrictor—it's got an elephant in its belly."

The little prince's words left "me" speechless.

For the first time in over twenty years, someone had seen it not as a black hat, but as a boa constrictor with an elephant in its belly!

In that moment, it felt as though the whole world had changed for "me."

Reading the simple prose, the three of them seemed to feel the same flutter of the heart that "I" had felt in that moment.

It was the feeling of finally being understood and recognized!

[The little prince went on to tell "me": "A boa constrictor is too dangerous, and an elephant takes up too much room. Where I live, everything is very small. I need a sheep. Draw me a sheep."]

Well then, draw the little prince a sheep!

The three of them, fully caught up in the story, silently cheered the same thought.

[So "I" drew several sheep, one after another, following the little prince's instructions. But no matter how "I" drew, the little prince was never satisfied.

Finally, "I" carelessly sketched a box and told him, "This is a box. The sheep you want is inside it."

At that, the little prince answered happily: "That's exactly what I wanted! Do you think this sheep will need a lot of grass?"

"Why do you ask that?" "I" couldn't quite understand.]

Sitting nearby, Nayotake could actually follow the little prince's line of thinking.

Because that was exactly how young children full of imagination and enthusiasm thought.

After all, she'd interacted with plenty of kids back when she worked part-time as a nursery aide.

In that sense, Kagami really did seem to understand how these children thought and felt.

So how had Kagami come to understand it?

Had he picked it up from playing with Little Nijika, or did he himself simply have a heart untouched by the world, still full of childlike wonder?

Lost in thought, Nayotake found herself glancing over at Tsushima Kagami.

Tsushima Kagami noticed her gaze and smiled back at her.

Nayotake quickly looked back down, turning her attention back to the story on the page.

Yukinoshita Shizuku, meanwhile, was thinking something similar.

Kagami had once said he wasn't particularly fond of children, but in truth his attention to and understanding of them ran remarkably deep.

It reminded her of Tsushima Kagami's character.

Whatever he set his mind to, he threw himself into it fully, leaving no regrets.

So maybe, someday, he really would make a good father.

Thinking this, Yukinoshita Shizuku pressed her lips together and smiled.

["Because where I live, everything is very small," the little prince answered.

"The sheep I drew for you is a very small one; it'll have enough to eat no matter how small the space."

The little prince leaned his head close to the drawing, as though he could see the nonexistent sheep through the box.

He smiled and said, "It's not as small as you think—look! It's fallen asleep."

And that was how "I" came to know the little prince.]

Reading this far, everyone realized the story had come to an abrupt stop.

It was indeed short, yet endlessly enjoyable to read.

What happens next?

The three of them turned curious, expectant looks on him.

"Well, this is as far as I've gotten."

"I haven't written any further yet."

Tsushima Kagami spread his hands and smiled at them.

"Then hurry up and write it."

"It's a short story, isn't it? You should be able to finish it quickly."

Yukinoshita Shizuku set the pages back on the desk, then picked Yukino up from under the desk and set her right on top of the pages.

Finally, she pressed the pen into Tsushima Kagami's hand.

"...I was thinking of continuing tomorrow."

"I'm feeling a bit tired."

Tsushima Kagami said, looking at Yukinoshita Shizuku.

"I'll go make you some hot cocoa."

Hiratsuka Shizuka said, quickly getting to her feet.

"Then I'll give you a shoulder rub."

Nayotake also got up, pushing Tsushima Kagami—who'd been about to stand—back down into his seat, and began kneading his shoulders.

Yukinoshita Shizuku crossed her arms and laughed.

"Am I some fan who's dragged you into a dark little room and won't stop hounding you for updates?"

Tsushima Kagami sat there enjoying Nayotake's shoulder rub, giving Yukinoshita Shizuku a helpless smile.

"You could put it another way, you know."

"Like, three beautiful girls keeping you company as you write, adding a touch of romance to your work."

"Isn't that exactly what you love?"

Yukinoshita Shizuku said, rephrasing it with a laugh.

"I guess that's true, actually."

Tsushima Kagami talked himself into it, and his mood instantly lifted.

Though being held captive by beautiful girls and forced to keep writing did feel a bit more thrilling, somehow?

Just as Tsushima Kagami's mind began to wander, the scent of hot cocoa reached his nose.

Hiratsuka Shizuka brought over the freshly made hot cocoa for Tsushima Kagami.

"Thanks."

Tsushima Kagami took the cup and sipped it slowly.

"Once you finish that, hurry up and get writing."

Hiratsuka Shizuka added.

Suddenly, his favorite hot cocoa didn't taste quite as good anymore.

So he looked at the three of them.

"Well, you three go on to bed first."

"You can read it tomorrow morning once I'm done."

The three of them nodded together obediently, smiling.

Only then did Tsushima Kagami turn back around with a smile, picking up his pen to keep writing.

But before he'd written more than a few words, he felt three pairs of eyes fixed on his back.

His hand paused. After a moment's hesitation, he turned around again.

There sat the three of them, once again perched obediently on the edge of the bed, watching him.

"You... why haven't you gone to bed yet?"

"It's fine, we'll wait until you finish."

Hiratsuka Shizuka said with a smile.

"Don't worry about us. Just hurry up and write."

Yukinoshita Shizuku added.

"But with you all staring at me like this, I feel so uncomfortable."

"Then we just won't look at you."

The three of them said in unison.

"It's still weird, though."

Tsushima Kagami insisted.

"But we really do want to see what happens next."

Hiratsuka Shizuka suddenly said, pouting.

"Well... once you're done, how about we make it up to you as an apology?"

Yukinoshita Shizuku said with a smile, glancing at Tsushima Kagami and then at Nayotake and Hiratsuka Shizuka beside her.

Nayotake's face immediately flushed red, and she ducked her head.

Hiratsuka Shizuka said with a smile.

"We should also check whether Kagami's really got what it takes to be ready for fatherhood~"

Then the three of them called out to Tsushima Kagami together.

"Kagami Papa~"

Their voices suddenly turned syrupy sweet.

Tsushima Kagami shivered and immediately spun back around to face his desk.

Something was off—had this talk of children and parenting stirred up their maternal instincts, and through that, indirectly, something else entirely repressed?

Uh oh. Tonight, he was surely going to die at the hands of these women!

____

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