◈ Mistaken for a Masked Monster
──────
Going to Steal Something
[S#.61 Blood-Stained Street (Night)]
School uniforms draped over lumps of flesh, scattered thick enough to trip on.
Playing cards. Crowns. Blood-soaked bodies, torn apart, strewn across the ground.
Alice sits collapsed in the center of it all.
Alice: No... please, make it stop...
A girl, murmuring to herself.
A shackle is bound around her ankle.The chain leads to something just ahead.
Shriek!
A horrible cry.
The color drains from the girl's face.
Alice: Because of me... all of this, it's my fault...
Alice: From the very beginning, someone like me should have died.
A shadow falls over her.
She doesn't resist. She's already given up.
She stares at the player, past the camera.
Alice: Run.
Close-up on her trembling blue eyes.
Shadows writhe in her pupils.
Alice: Before I... become a monster.
Crack. She dies before she can finish the words.
Her upper body is torn away. Only the lower half remains, crumpled on the ground.
The academy collapses after.
The screen zooms out. A blurred subtitle appears.
[Save me.]
A nightmare.
The footage ends.
***
"I-I'm so sorry for spying on you...!"
Face-down on the ground, a girl apologizing over and over.
That combination of black hair and blue eyes was striking. A face I'd seen countless times, the original's illustrations, the character PVs, the cutscenes.
My favorite supporting character.
'Alice.'
Familiar, and gladly so. But there was no room to show it.
Because right then, the girl started crying.
The wet sound of sniffling. A nose being rubbed.
"Ugh, u-ugh... I'm so sorry. It, it wasn't on purpose..."
Eyes brimming over.
Exactly as she was in the original. A girl who would shrink and panic even when the other person hadn't said a word.
Alice, always alone.
"Please forgive me..."
"......"
Something was off.
Even accounting for me jumping out behind her, this was disproportionate. I knew Alice was a crybaby by nature, but...
Was it this bad? Enough that running into a person sent her into a breakdown?
I was still sitting with both feelings when it happened.
"I-I don't want to be made to sprint laps on my hands for five hours..."
"Hm?"
"Sniff... doing headspins while shouting three-two-one go-shoot and crashing into each other, th, that strange game..."
"What."
"I don't want to spend the whole day moving around only by forward rolling either..."
"......"
Genuinely strange sentences.
A chill ran up my spine.
'This...'
The Reverse Sprint Game.
The Beyblade Game.
The Sonic Game.
'...That's me, isn't it?'
The games I'd been gleefully running with my classmates just yesterday. Technically I'd only served as referee, but still.
Standing there in a daze, the bat on my chest stirred.
[She appears to have witnessed you tormenting those children.]
"No..."
[I told you to ease up on them. Anyone watching that would be frightened.]
"......"
Nothing to say to that.
Alice showed no sign of calming down. I couldn't bring myself to approach, just stood there scratching the back of my head.
The princess, apparently curious, peeked out from the pocket.
[Hmm... but this is strange.]
'What is, Your Highness?'
[That child... Alice, was it? She's clearly been absent from the classroom these past few days, and yet she seems to know everything that went on inside. Doesn't she?]
'Ah, that would be thanks to her ability.'
Alice's ability.
Nightmare.
One among hundreds of its variants.
The Dream Sight.
'Within a limited range, she can see the world through the eyes of whoever she chooses.'
The third collapse route in the original.
Every time that ending played out, the casualties were beyond counting.
Alice, running wild.
The seed of calamity, finally in bloom.
In the original, she'd known the exact location and situation of every last person in the surrounding area. Which meant hiding had been impossible. Fleeing had been impossible. Everyone was killed at incomprehensible speed.
One of the most punishing stages in the whole game.
'She looks so fragile right now, and yet...'
A quiet thought.
She was, after all, the disaster at the center of perhaps the cruelest arc the story had.
[What a remarkable ability. Just hearing the description, I can't understand why she's sitting last in the lowest-ranked class.]
'It's not quite so simple. The duration is short, and the people she can apply it to are limited. To share someone's field of vision, she has to hold goodwill toward that person, and they must hold goodwill toward her in return. There's also a condition that they have to have made physical contact at least once in reality.'
Of course, even those restrictions ceased to matter once she awakened as the Queen.
A power capable of threatening not just the academy, but the peace of the entire continent.
That was the nature of Alice's potential.
[Hmm... so she's been watching the classroom through someone else's eyes these past few days. But whose? It was the very first day of enrollment. Was there really time to meet all those conditions?]
'Most likely Professor Javert.'
[That stiff one?]
'Yes. The two of them have a connection. Javert is the headmaster's adopted daughter, and Alice was a student the headmaster personally scouted. They've probably crossed paths more than a few times because of it.'
[Scouted... still, how does Viktor know all of this?]
'I can read people's hearts a little.'
[Truly?!]
'No.'
A short joke. The bat wriggled.
She swatted at my chest in protest, then went right back to stealing glances at Alice, still face-down on the ground.
[...Still. It isn't a particularly pleasant energy.]
'I see you're picking up on something. The pureblood instinct, I suppose.'
[It isn't that I can read the source of her power or anything like that.]
'I'd recommend not trying. Reading it carelessly could leave lasting effects.'
Instinct, maybe.
Carmilla seemed wary of Alice. Being a pureblood, she was probably sensing more than I could.
I soothed the princess gently.
'Well... there's no reason to treat her as an enemy.'
One step toward Alice. I extended my hand, an open invitation to take it and stand.
My voice came out as soft as I could manage.
"Why don't we calm down first? I understand you had quite a fright."
"...Eh?"
She hadn't expected kindness, apparently.
A hand appeared in front of her, and she just blinked at it, dazed.
What did she even think I was going to do to her. When someone's fallen over, you help them up, plain and simple.
I swallowed the thought before it could slip out as another stimulus.
"I apologize for appearing so suddenly. That was rude of me. I suppose I acted before thinking because I sensed someone watching."
"Ah, um...?"
"Are you hurt anywhere?"
"N-no... th, thank you."
I got in ahead of her with an apology, and a visible question mark seemed to float over her head.
Alice hesitated, then finally took my hand and got to her feet.
The tears had stopped, but her eyes were still red.
I rummaged through my robe and produced something with a flourish.
"Ta-da. Use this to dry your tears."
"...A handkerchief and, a-a balloon flower?"
"The flower is a gift."
"Oh... I-I'll gratefully accept."
With a trembling voice, Alice took both things.
I raised both hands, an open show of harmlessness.
"Please don't be so on guard. I have absolutely no intention of hurting you."
"S-sorry... it was just such a shock, I-I couldn't help it..."
"It's fine. I think very fondly of you, Alice-yang."
"Hm? How do you know my name...?"
"Could I ask why you were back there, by the way?"
"Ah, that..."
Good.
A small slip, but the momentum of conversation carried it through.
Alice fidgeted, then answered in a shaky voice.
"Um... I lost something and was looking for it... and then I spotted someone passing by, so, before I even realized it..."
"You hid behind the tree."
"Yes..."
Thoroughly spooked.
She kept stealing glances at me, like she didn't know how to handle being near another person. There was something that tugged at you, watching her.
"S-sorry... I'm just, a little scared of people..."
"I see."
"So I've been skipping school for a few days..."
Alice's fall happened right after the start of her third year.
Two years of breathing room, just as the status window had shown.
To stop the nightmare from spreading its roots, the first thing I needed was...
'Goodwill. Her goodwill, first.'
Only by breaking through Alice's guard could I get anywhere near her nightmare. An essential step toward stopping the manifestation, toward keeping Wonderland from becoming real.
The problem, though.
'If she's this frightened, there's nothing to buy goodwill with...'
How do you win someone over?
Mid-thought, something occurred to me.
'Ah.'
That's it.
I reached straight into my pocket and pulled out a crystal orb. The portable kind distributed to students during their stay at the academy.
"Could I ask what you lost?"
"Oh, it's... a necklace..."
"I see."
Tap, tap.
A few clicks on the small screen. I selected a few names and sent a short message.
"Don't worry, Alice-yang."
"Hm...?"
"Viktor and his friends will help you find it."
Right then.
Errand Boy Squad. Assemble.
***
A little while later.
Alice's necklace was safely recovered from within the bushes.
"Found it."
"Oh...!"
When I held it out, color rushed back into her face.
Those anxious blue eyes lit up for the first time.
"Th, thank you so much...!"
"Think nothing of it."
Found in just under thirty minutes. Seven people besides Alice and me had helped search. Through the bushes, the errand boys sat with exhausted eyes.
"But... I never told you what the necklace looked like. How did you find it?"
"Well."
A necklace with a blue crystal set into it. I gave a vague non-answer, I'd seen it more than a few times while playing the original. An item that would eventually become central to one of the later episodes.
"That's a secret."
A fairly suspicious deflection, but Alice didn't seem to mind.
She was just happy to have her precious thing back.
"How can I ever thank you..."
"It's fine. I helped because I wanted to."
"Still..."
"You said we're in the same class. We crossed paths like this, so how could I not help?"
Alice kept watching me from the corner of her eye.
She bowed her head again and again.
"Still, I need to do something in return..."
"Then how about this, be my friend from now on?"
"Hm...?"
"The semester just started, and as it happens I don't really have a close classmate yet either. I was actually looking for someone to spend the year with."
"Fr, friends... that's really all it takes?"
"Yes. Unless you don't like me, Alice-yang?"
"N-no...! I didn't mean it that way..."
"I'm joking."
Light words, passing easily back and forth.
The atmosphere had loosened considerably from when we'd first met.
After that, Alice said her thanks a few more times before finally taking her leave.
"Thank you again!"
"See you tomorrow, Alice-yang."
"Ah... th, thank you to everyone else as well!"
Bow, bow.
Even to the exhausted errand boys, she bowed as she left.
She didn't need to do that. But she was a thoughtful kid, as ever.
I watched her go.
"Hmm..."
Not bad for a first meeting, was it?
She was still wary, but this felt like decent progress all the same.
"Nice work. Everyone's dismissed."
I turned to the tired errand boys.
A very productive day.
***
That night.
I slipped out of the dormitory.
[Mmm... Viktor, where are you going at this hour...]
Carmilla, bleary-eyed and murmuring.
Half-asleep, she rubbed her cheek against the inside of the uniform pocket.
I kept my footsteps light so she could rest.
"The freshmen welcome exam is in two days."
[It is...]
"There's something I want to have on hand before the academy schedule really gets going."
[Something you want to have...]
"A special item."
Something I'd always gone to pick up early in each run.
"It's in the academy's underground dungeon."
[Dungeon... there's a dungeon under the academy?]
"Yes. Managed by the school."
[Hmm...?]
Carmilla tilted her head, puzzled.
[That's strange. If the school manages it, there would be staff on guard and all sorts of complicated procedures... did you get permission? At this hour?]
"Of course not."
She was right. A student entering the dungeon alone required an enormous amount of procedure. Approval from the supervising professor, second-year standing or above, a class ranking of at least 50th.
On top of that, the only passage leading to the dungeon required a dedicated key. No unauthorized students were getting through.
[Then how were you planning to get in...?]
"There are ways."
Come now.
I'd forced my way through this place bare-handed hundreds of times.
"Your Highness."
A smile, from beneath the mask.
"Have you ever heard of a wall clip?"
Once more.
It was time for bug play.