It felt as though she’d walked a very long way before she finally reached the suburb where the Ryōgi house stood.
Sakura pressed a hand to her chest and breathed out softly.
The aftereffects of the witch’s drugging incense hadn’t quite finished leaving her body.
Her legs were still a little weak, a little soft.
And—when she stepped, the tender skin of her inner thighs brushed lightly together, and a strange feeling Sakura didn’t understand crept from the base of her spine outward, all the way to her fingertips and toes.
A soft, melting weakness in which she could barely put strength into her limbs.
Sakura began to regret not having let Shigure-nee come along to see her over.
The maid had business to attend to—she’d gone to the office at the corner of the shopping street to find that old hag.
Sakura bent forward, palms braced on her knees, and breathed.
Her eyes drifted, a little vacant, toward the Ryōgi estate.
The clear blue of her irises wavered.
Sakura had figured a few things out.
Aozaki Touko was a woman with absolutely no restraint on her spending.
Once, she had swiped a credit card for a string of digits Sakura wouldn’t have dared even imagine, just to buy a gemstone and gift it to her.
Sakura had quietly slipped the gem back under Touko’s pillow—and the next day Touko had flipped up her skirt and spanked her.
It was only because Ryōgi Shiki had arrived to save the day that Sakura had been spared having to sleep on her stomach that night.
But… it still hurt.
Sakura had wondered, more than once, where someone that idle—whose office hardly ever saw a single client walk in—got the kind of money to spend like that.
Was she going out and… ahem.
Did her family have a mine or something?
Now that she thought of it, that old hag’s younger sister did seem to be very well-off.
But the old hag and her sister didn’t get along at all.
Sakura had seen it with her own eyes: Aozaki Touko and that red-haired big sister were bitterly at each other’s throats.
Still, thinking about it now—that old hag had to be someone tied up in the hidden world too.
Demon-hunter families, Dead Apostles, that sort of thing.
Maybe she could turn stones into gold or something.
Sakura climbed the long slope at her leisure, the sun filtering through the tree cover and dappling shadows across the road.
The street was empty.
Only a few people lingered outside the convenience store.
The sound of a passing train echoed down the hollow street.
The rumor had already begun to spread through Tokyo—they said yet another killer had drifted into the city, that more and more people had gone inexplicably missing and never been seen again.
Sakura walked with her head lowered, one hand pressed against her chest through the thin chiffon of her blouse.
The outline of the knife was firm against her palm.
To an ordinary person, a Dead Apostle was a monster they could scarcely hope to resist.
Sakura caught sight of the bamboo grove that ringed the Ryōgi estate.
Before she could even draw breath, she stopped dead.
In front of her stretched a great swath of yellow.
The wind moved gently through it, and the bamboo whispered.
“The bamboo… withered?”
A bad feeling rose in Sakura’s chest.
Before she could press the bell, the gates of the estate were drawn open slowly from within.
A man whose face was used to gloom forced his features into a smile that came out looking rather worse for the effort.
“Miss Asagami.” Akitaka Suzurigi smiled at Sakura.
Shiki was still in the dōjō.
Akitaka led Sakura straight to Shiki’s private rooms.
That was a privilege only Sakura was ever granted.
The door was eased shut.
Sakura sat on the firm bed and stared out the window at the withered bamboo, her thoughts drifting.
Ryōgi Shiki’s room was austere.
A few books at the head of the bed, pale-toned furniture aligned with quiet precision—none of the warmth one would expect of a girl’s room.
The only ornament was the Kuji Kanesada hung on the wall—though Sakura had seen that blade drawn.
A cold, bright gleam.
Ryōgi Shiki with that sword in her hand was more captivating than any rōnin swordsman in the trendy idol dramas.
It’d be so nice if Big Sis Shiki had been a boy, Sakura thought, cheek propped on her small fist.
But~
She supposed a girl was rather nice too.
Sakura sat on the edge of the bed, kicking her legs back and forth, and waited.
And waited.
Big Sis Shiki still didn’t come back.
She started to regret it—she should’ve just gone straight to the dōjō to find her.
She pulled a book off the little shelf at the head of the bed and flipped it open.
To her surprise—it was a bestselling novel.
It was hard to picture someone like Big Sis Shiki reading some young-girl’s-perspective adventure novel.
There was even an author’s autograph on the title page.
But as Sakura turned page after page, she realized something was off.
The heroine… why did she look so much like Big Sis Shiki?
The only difference was that Big Sis Shiki had long hair, and the heroine in the story had a crisp, dashing short bob.
…No.
When Sakura had been younger, the Big Sis Shiki she’d known had had short hair, just covering the ears.
Sakura frowned, flipped to the back of the book, and committed the author’s name to memory with a puffed-cheek scowl.
—Seo Shizune.
This person was definitely an enemy.
When Ryōgi Shiki slid open the door, what she saw was the small girl sprawled on her stomach across the bed, bottom in the air, cheeks puffed out as she flipped through the novel.
The more she turned the pages the angrier she got, the angrier she got the more she turned.
Her bright, clear eyes were wide and round, and she looked like a little milk-cat with her fur all puffed up in offense.
“Sakura?”
Sakura’s body stiffened all at once.
She obediently tucked the book back, and sat up straight on the bed.
Ryōgi Shiki sat down gently beside her.
Sakura turned, threw her arms out, and Ryōgi Shiki gathered her close. You are reading on g.com, the official source.
“Ehe~” Sakura’s smile was sweet and silly.
Ryōgi Shiki was wearing a bathrobe—she looked as though she’d just stepped out of the bath, her long black hair still a little damp, draped down her back.
A strand of it clung to her cheek, turning the sharp handsomeness of her face into something softly alluring.
That beauty that belonged to neither gender, only to her—Sakura felt her heart skip, faintly.
Sakura’s mouth opened, closed.
She wanted to ask Big Sis Shiki what on earth that novel was about.
She cared.
But she didn’t know how to bring it up.
She didn’t want to bother Big Sis Shiki.
But a girl’s expression was easy enough to read.
Ryōgi Shiki glanced at the haphazardly re-shelved book and shifted Sakura into a more comfortable position in her arms.
“Seo?” She stroked Sakura’s hair.
“Has Sakura forgotten her?”
Then—as though Ryōgi Shiki had remembered something—the corners of her mouth lifted.
Sakura’s eyes went round.
Big Sis Shiki had just smiled.
“Sakura… will meet her one day.”
Ryōgi Shiki reached out and straightened the novel neatly back into place.
Sakura had almost forgotten why she’d come—had even forgotten she’d wanted to ask about the bamboo.
It felt like a kitten was clawing at her insides, and Big Sis Shiki was keeping a secret on purpose!
Akitaka Suzurigi pushed the door open and entered, carrying tea and sweets.
He bent to serve, his expression betraying nothing.
Miss Shiki’s indulgence of Miss Asagami was something the entire Ryōgi household had long since witnessed.
“That Fujino—has she told you everything?” Ryōgi Shiki lounged on one elbow and fed Sakura a piece.
“Mm.” Sakura nodded.
The relationship between Big Sis Shiki and her sister was a curious thing.
Whenever they met they called each other “Asagami”—but in private, it was always Fujino, Fujino.
Ryōgi Shiki pinched Sakura’s arm lightly, and Sakura ducked her head, a little embarrassed.
“Too thin.
No meat on you at all.” Ryōgi Shiki patted her shoulder.
“Starting next month—on the first of each month, come train here.”
“Miss Shiki!” Akitaka Suzurigi, who had been keeping his head bowed, looked up sharply, staring at Ryōgi Shiki.
“What is it, Akitaka?” Ryōgi Shiki returned his gaze.
“It’s only ordinary training.”
“…It’s nothing.” Akitaka Suzurigi lowered his head again.
By the tradition of the Ryōgi house—
On the first of every month, the current head of the family crossed live blades with the heir.
(Shiki)