“Clack-clack, clack-clack…”
The wheels of the old green train ground over the rails, keeping their steady, rhythmic beat.
Inside the carriage, Shido Makoto leaned against the window, his fingers absently tracing the surface of a black mobile phone.
He had turned it up while sorting through his luggage from the top shelf — he remembered it was a keepsake left behind by the Kasugano couple.
Outside, the scenery was rushing past in reverse.
The low-slung rooftops of Okizome Town had long since given way to sweeping stretches of farmland; the young green shoots swayed in the breeze, a perfect mirror of the tangled feelings inside him.
He did not belong to this world.
He had crossed over sixteen years ago, been taken in by the Kasugano family twelve years ago after losing his birth parents, and then three years ago his foster parents too had died in an accident — leaving only him and his sickly, nominally younger sister, Kasugano Sora, to depend on each other.
For Sora’s sake — to care for her more properly, to give her access to better medical treatment — he had finally made the decision to take her away from their hometown and head to Tokyo.
“Makoto.”
A voice carrying a quiet note of reliance drifted toward him from across the seat, breaking through his thoughts.
He turned, meeting the girl’s gaze.
Kasugano Sora sat opposite him, arms wrapped around a black rabbit plushie.
The pure-white dress she wore only made her slender frame seem more delicate — her waist looked as though a single gust of wind might snap it, and the pale, smooth length of calf that showed beneath the hem drew the eye without being the least bit showy.
Most striking of all was the silver-white hair that cascaded over her shoulders and down her back, a few wayward strands clinging to her cheeks.
Her eyes always seemed to hold a faint, misty veil of emotion — a fragility that was uniquely, essentially girlish.
She was tapping one slender finger lightly against the canvas bag by Makoto’s side, her gaze direct and tinged with mild impatience.
“Oh.”
Makoto gave a sheepish laugh, slapped his forehead, and fished a half-eaten box of Pocky from the bag.
“Almost forgot — there’s still half a box left.
Want some?”
Before he even finished speaking, the girl had already reached over and snatched it from his hand.
She tore open the wrapper and began eating in small, careful bites, her cheeks puffing out faintly as she mumbled, “Too slow.”
“Save me a few, will you,” Makoto sighed.
The girl turned her head away without answering.
The near-empty carriage settled back into silence, broken only by the unceasing clack-clack of the train in motion.
Makoto stopped watching the window.
Without quite meaning to, his gaze drifted to the girl across from him.
Sora ate with total concentration — long lashes lowered, casting a faint shadow below her eyes, her nose small and neatly upturned, her lips pressed slightly together around the biscuit.
Sensing his stare, the girl suddenly stilled, lifted her eyes to look at him, and asked with a blank expression, “What?”
Her tone was as cool as ever, yet Makoto could clearly see the tips of her ears quietly flushing a faint, pale red.
“Nothing.”
He looked away, closed his eyes with a smile, let his head fall back against the seat.
“Getting a bit sleepy.
Going to doze off for a while — wake me when we get there.”
The gentle rocking of the carriage carried a lulling rhythm, and Makoto drifted off to a light sleep before long.
Across from him, Kasugano Sora waited until his eyes were shut — then quietly raised her head.
Her gaze settled, careful and unhurried, on the boy’s softly defined profile: the clean line of his jaw, the lips free of any stubble, the faint furrow of his brows.
She looked with unusual thoroughness.
Afraid of disturbing him, she even eased her breathing, stealing quick glances at his eyes every now and then to make sure he had not woken.
After quite some time, the girl extended one hand, hovering it a few centimetres above his lips — then gently pressed the air, once, as though touching something.
The next instant she snatched her hand back as if burned.
She lowered her head and stared at her own fingertip in a daze, her cheeks now faintly dusted with pink.
She stayed like that, motionless, for a long while.
The train kept on, clack-clack, clack-clack, pressing steadily forward.
…
…
“Sora… why didn’t you wake me?”
After some unknowable stretch of time, Makoto stirred groggily and opened his eyes.
He noticed the vibration of the train was gone, and mumbled the words without thinking.
But in the next instant, he knew something was wrong.
Everywhere he looked — the paintings hung on the walls to either side, the dim chandelier overhead — not a single thing bore any resemblance to a train.
The place looked more like a long-abandoned manor from nineteenth-century Europe.
And aside from himself, five other people lay sprawled across the carpet in various directions.
Two men, three women.
All in modern clothing.
“…”
What on earth was going on?
The sheer strangeness of the scene snapped Makoto fully awake.
Out of reflex, he bit down on the knuckle of his right thumb and began to think.
It was a habit he had carried over from before the crossing — whenever he needed to think deeply, his thumb would find its way to his mouth on its own.
‘Is this a dream?’
He pinched his thigh hard.
It hurt.
‘Not a dream.’
Makoto got to his feet at once, scanning his surroundings with sharp attention.
The place appeared to be the entrance hall of some Western-style manor or villa, though it felt strangely sparse.
The walls were panelled in deep brown solid wood, the edges carved with acanthus scroll-work, though cracks had opened in many places and the lacquer had peeled away to reveal bare timber beneath.
Several portraits hung on either side — the canvas yellowed and warped, the subjects’ eyes somehow even more unsettling in the dim light.
A large crystal chandelier hung from the centre of the ceiling; the crystals were coated in dust, giving off only a feeble glow that made the whole hall feel more oppressive.
Directly ahead stood a set of double oak doors, their carved relief worn smooth with age; they were firmly shut, the outside invisible.
In the middle section of the right-hand wall was a single door of the same material, also tightly closed.
After a few seconds, Makoto reached a conclusion: there was no question about it — he had been pulled into some bizarre incident.
An unknown force had dragged him from the train and deposited him here.
The people lying around him looked to be in the same situation — caught completely off guard and swept up along with him.
An infinite loop?
A Main God Space?
Or something else entirely?
Makoto’s thumb found his mouth again as he turned the possibilities over in his mind.
He had read plenty of novels like this in his previous life, but reading about something and living it were entirely different matters.
‘So it seems there’s another set of rules lurking beneath the surface of this seemingly ordinary world.’
He had worried about this before — whether he had crossed into a world that was not quite normal — and had searched online, but the conclusion he’d reached was that it was just a regular, slice-of-life anime-composite world.
There were familiar institutions — Shuchiin Academy, Toyosaki Academy, Soubu High — but no information had ever surfaced about superhumans, mechs, kaiju, magic potions, the Yotsuba Clan, the Zatsugado, or anything of that sort.
And yet…
What was happening to him now made it clear this world was not ordinary.
Those things simply had been hidden well — or perhaps some force had been filtering out all related information.
‘Either way, I need to find a way out of here first…’
Makoto furrowed his brow and forced himself to stay calm.
Rather than immediately waking the others, he first rolled out the stiffness in his neck, then began a methodical inspection of the hall.
The walls, the ceiling, the seams between floor panels, the details of each painting — his gaze swept across every corner.
‘The only exit is probably that front door, but outside…’
He glanced at the double doors.
No light leaked in beneath them.
Before long, the man closest to him let out a groan and slowly came to.
“I… where is this?”
The man looked to be around thirty, dressed in a crumpled grey suit, his tie askew.
He sat up and looked around in bewilderment, fingers unconsciously pushing his glasses up his nose.
“Wasn’t I just working late at the office?
Is this… a prank?”
His voice woke the others.
“Ow…”
A girl with chestnut-dyed hair, dressed in a trendy hoodie and mini-skirt, rubbed the back of her head and sat up — she looked like a university student.
When she took in her surroundings, her eyes went wide with terror and she screamed, “Where is this?!
Am I being kidnapped?!”
Her shriek immediately ratcheted the tension up several notches.
“Stop shouting.” A cool, clear voice cut through the noise.
Makoto followed the sound.
The speaker was a girl who seemed to have woken only moments ago, sitting on the floor with her knees drawn up.
She looked no older than fourteen or fifteen — precisely the age at which a girl’s beauty is at its most untouched.
It was a purity that had nothing to do with surgery or cosmetics — more like a willow branch just putting out its first green shoot, a flower bud still beaded with dew, a thread of jade-green stream running through the valley floor.
A single glance was enough to feel the quiet pleasure of it.
Like Sora, she had a rare head of silver-white hair, not yet reaching her waist, bound with a black-and-white striped headband dotted with small white flowers.
This was… Shirogane Kei?
The name surfaced in Makoto’s mind at once.
Treasurer of the Shuchiin Academy junior high student council — and Shirogane Miyuki’s younger sister.
After crossing over, he had once browsed Shuchiin Academy’s campus website and seen her photo.
She was known for outstanding grades and a cold demeanour, and had quite a reputation in the junior high division.
Shirogane Kei stood, brushed nonexistent dust from her uniform skirt, and glanced at Makoto — who had been staring at her — for only a moment before her gaze moved on, sweeping back over the surroundings without lingering.
The next person to wake was a well-built young man in a sports vest and shorts, clearly very tall, his muscles sharply defined.
He looked around with an expression of utter disbelief.
“I was literally just running on the treadmill… what the hell is this place?
A reality show?”
He was silently fuming: it better not be those guys from the gym messing with me.
Just because I out-benched them last time…
The last to wake was a girl with a neat, ear-length bob, wearing a plain linen dress.
She had a quietly composed air about her.
As soon as she sat up she pulled her knees to her chest and looked at the others with guarded eyes.
She was an art student; she had been copying a still-life in her studio before losing consciousness.
Once everyone was awake, the man in the suit attempted to take charge of the situation, his voice trembling.
“Everyone, please stay calm.”
“Let’s figure out what’s happening.
I’ll start — I’m a programmer.
Before I blacked out, I was at the office fixing a bug.”
“I’m a uni student… I was video-calling a friend in my dorm room…” the trendy girl in the chestnut hair said, her voice on the verge of tears.
The rest followed in turn, each giving their account.
Without exception, all of them had simply blacked out in the middle of their everyday lives.
Different cities, different times.
Panic began to spread.
“Is this some kind of mass kidnapping?
But none of us even know each other!”
“Call the police!
Someone call the police!”
The athletic guy was shouting about calling the police while his hand was already diving into his trouser pocket — then his expression changed.
“Wait — where’s my phone?!”
Seeing that, the others hurriedly checked their own pockets and belongings.
The result was the same across the board: phones, wallets, anything that could connect them to the outside world — all gone.
The atmosphere of panic thickened.
The suit-and-glasses man broke into a cold sweat, murmuring under his breath, “What… what is this…”
‘Phone?’
Something seemed to occur to Makoto.
He reached into his breast pocket and drew out a black mobile phone.
It was the keepsake Sora had mentioned — her late father’s, which he had slipped into his pocket without much thought earlier.
But his own phone — along with his wallet, keys, and everything else — was gone.
The only thing left on him was this one handset.
Makoto frowned, thought for a moment, then turned to the group.
“Everyone, check your pockets again.
Carefully.”
The others blinked and did as told.
“Huh?
What’s this?”
“There’s one in my pocket too!”
“This isn’t my phone…”
Within moments, every person was holding an identical black mobile phone.
The trendy girl hastily tried to switch it on.
The next second, the screen lit up.
The others followed suit, powering theirs on as well.
Makoto looked down at his own screen.
[Welcome to the Cycle Game]
[Scenario Name: Snowbound Manor (New Moon Rank)]
[Participants: 6]
[Objective: Survive inside the manor for 72 hours]
[Warning: Multiple anomalous entities are present within the manor.
Proceed with caution]
[Hint: Clues are scattered throughout the manor.
Seek them out yourself]
[Scenario Countdown: 71:59:59]
“Survive… 72 hours?” The trendy girl’s voice shook; she was on the verge of tears.
“Anomalous entities?
Is this some kind of prank show?!”
“Are you kidding me?!” The athletic guy’s volume shot up, a vein pulsing at his temple.
“Scenario?
Objective?
Is this a freaking game?!
Whoever’s behind this, show yourself!” He bellowed at the empty hall.
“I’m afraid it isn’t a prank.”
Shirogane Kei’s face had gone rather pale, but she forced herself to stay composed.
“If it were a prank, there’s no way to explain how we all got here from completely different places in an instant.”
“That doesn’t mean it’s impossible!” the athletic guy shot back, though his conviction was already wavering.
“W-what if some TV station went all out on a hidden-camera segment…”
“Then which TV station, exactly, has the ability to simultaneously snatch six strangers from Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, and other cities and bring them all to the same place?” The programmer pushed his glasses up and turned the question back on him.
“And this place…” — he gestured at the aged décor around them — “doesn’t look anything like Japan.”
The art girl added quietly, “I was in a studio in Kobe before I blacked out… and this is clearly European classical architecture.”
The trendy girl was crying now, tears running freely down her face.
“So what do we do?!
What even is this…”
“I don’t buy it!
I’m going home!”
The athletic guy, still highly agitated, strode in long steps toward the double doors at the end of the hall.
“There’s definitely something rigged behind that door!
Once we’re through we’ll see the crew!”
Makoto made no move to stop him.
Some things wouldn’t sink in unless you saw them for yourself — and besides, he needed to know what was on the other side too.