"Whoa...... I ate so much, that was totally a solid meal," Shirakawa sighed contentedly, rubbing her stomach.
After swiping some food from the kitchen, I moved to a balcony overlooking the city, reshaped my Item Box1 into a table and chairs, and had myself a fancy dinner.
The area around the castle has lights on to keep intruders away, but beyond that glow, everything's swallowed up in pitch-black darkness.
The direction where the city is has some light, but it's not the glaring brightness of Japan - more like little flickering flames.
"It's so quiet...... we're literally the only two people left in the whole world.....," she murmured softly.
Shirakawa, sitting right next to me, wrapped her arm around mine and rested her head on my shoulder.
"What are you trying to set the mood for? You drunk off that little bit of fruit wine?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Wait...... huh......?" she blinked.
"Don't 'huh' me. When we're done eating, we clean up. Come on, Clean, Clean," I teased, motioning toward the plates.
"O-okay, fine, I'll do it. Clean!" she pouted.
"Whoa...... the plates are sparkling. Where does all that grime even go?" I marveled, examining the clean dishes.
"I don't even know...... hmph," she muttered, turning away.
Shirakawa puffed out her cheeks, looking annoyed, but this is for the best.
Probably...... probably, if I wanted, Shirakawa would let me have her body, but I'm not interested.
Once the lid on desire comes off, I'd probably go wild without any self-control.
And if you do it, you get pregnant - that's just how the world works.
Right now, there's no clear way back to Japan, and even though we're getting by, it's only inside the Item Box.
If Shirakawa got pregnant and her health took a turn, there's no way to get her to a doctor.
And if a kid were born on top of that, there'd be no way to handle it.
Use with caution...... otherwise life falls apart.
Besides, if we did it, feelings would get involved.
If something went wrong, I wouldn't be able to cut Shirakawa loose.
Knowing that queen, the whole "we can go back to our original world" thing is probably fishy too.
If that's the case, I need to survive to get back to Japan.
For that, I have to stay cold-hearted.
"Alright, Shirakawa, we're going to the Soldiers' Barracks," I announced, breaking the silence.
"Wait...... huh......? You're gonna rescue someone?" she asked, looking up in surprise.
"No, that's impossible. My Item Box is still this size, and if I rescued them, it'd cause drama, wouldn't it?" I answered plainly.
"Drama......?" she repeated, confused.
"I mean, Shirakawa was fine, but those guys.....," I began, trailing off.
"Right.....," she whispered, lowering her eyes.
Shirakawa herself barely made it out, and she saw her classmates getting violated. Even if I rescued them now, they'd probably just blame me for not saving them back then.
"But letting things stay like that forever is.....," she protested softly.
"That's why I'm going to scare them. Tonight, I'll kill one soldier and leave a threat letter. If they don't improve how the classmates are treated, I'll kill one every night...... something like that," I explained calmly.
"But wouldn't that totally backfire? They'd do even worse things.....," she worried.
"There are six people captured total. I don't know how many soldiers there are, but there's gotta be more than six. If they kill all six of them, I'll just kill even more soldiers," I stated firmly.
"Right...... okay," she conceded softly.
"If you're scared, I can split the Item Box, and you can wait somewhere else," I offered.
"No, I'm going with you," she insisted, clutching my sleeve.
"Alright.....," I acquiesced with a slight nod.
I stored the stolen dishes in a split-off Item Box and headed to the Soldiers' Barracks with Shirakawa.
Dinner had just ended, so I figured there was no way anything was happening yet...... but when we got to the barracks, we heard screaming.
Not just women - men's screams were mixed in too.
Shirakawa squeezed my left arm tight and started trembling.
She must've remembered what almost happened to her.
"Sorry...... I seriously can't do this after all," Shirakawa whimpered.
"Got it, let's go back," I replied immediately.
We left the Soldiers' Barracks and moved to a lit garden.
Flowers that looked a lot like roses were blooming, and when I opened a window in the Item Box, a sweet scent drifted in.
"You'll be stuck with the luggage, but wait here," I told her.
"You're actually going?" she asked nervously.
"I can't just leave it like that," I said.
"I know, but.....," she trailed off.
"Don't worry. As long as I'm inside the Item Box, I won't be found, so I won't mess up," I reassured her.
"Promise me. You have to come back, okay?" she pleaded.
"I got it," I promised.
Leaving Shirakawa, who looked like an abandoned puppy, in the split-off Item Box, I took a gauntlet and one stiletto and went back to the Soldiers' Barracks.
The screams were quieter than before, but it wasn't because the assaults had stopped - it was because the classmates had lost the strength to scream.
In the hallway, soldiers in nothing but their boxers were hanging around waiting their turn.
Inside the rooms, male and female classmates were being violated by two or three guys at a time.
I went through a few rooms and picked a big soldier who'd just finished dumping his desires on a small girl, then followed him.
The girl who'd been forced to take it was rolling her eyes back and convulsing - was she gonna be okay?
The big soldier washed off his sweat in a bathroom with a large water jug, then went back to his own room.
The room was probably about six tatami mats - simple, with just a bed, a desk, and a built-in dresser, but the soldier was so big it felt cramped.
The soldier pulled a bottle of booze from his desk drawer and drank straight from it.
He let out a big breath and showed a nasty grin.
He was probably remembering what he'd just done, and just watching made murderous intent bubble up inside me.
When the soldier put the bottle away, his eyes landed on some notes on the desk, but after thinking for a moment, he crawled into bed and immediately started snoring loudly.
The notes on the desk looked like patrol reports, and thanks to the language ability I got when I was summoned, I could read them - and it seemed like I could write too. Rewrite it... Okay, how about this-
I approached the soldier sprawled out on the bed and gripped the stiletto reverse-handed.
One stab to the heart...... I thought, but even if you poke a hole in someone's heart, they don't lose motor function right away.
If I pulled my hand back into the Item Box right away, I probably wouldn't get caught, but causing a commotion and alerting other soldiers would be a pain.
Using the Item Box ability, I slipped under the bed, then drove the stiletto in from the back of his neck toward the top of his skull and twisted hard.
The soldier didn't make a sound - his body just jerked once, hard, and then he stopped moving.
To make sure he was really dead, I confirmed he'd stopped breathing for about five minutes, then stabbed the stiletto I was holding reverse-handed straight into his heart.
I made the gauntlet I'd brought grip the stiletto, buried all the way to the base.
On the back of the papers on the desk, I wrote a threat letter using the soldier's blood, then left the room.
In the hallway, soldiers with desire-clouded eyes were still waiting their turn.
I'd left a threat letter demanding better treatment for the classmates, but I swore in my heart that every last soldier here would die someday, and left the barracks behind.
Trivia:
- The protagonist's refusal to sleep with Shirakawa isn't just about pregnancy fear — he admits that if he crossed that line, he wouldn't be able to abandon her later, which means his coldness is a survival strategy for a scenario where he might have to leave her behind.
- The detail about killing via brain stem instead of heart shows the protagonist has thought through the mechanics of assassination — a heart stab doesn't instantly disable someone, so he targets the brain to prevent noise and alerts.
- The protagonist leaves a threat letter but privately resolves to kill every soldier regardless — meaning the letter isn't a genuine negotiation, just a stalling tactic to buy time while he plans total elimination.
Translation Notes:
1 ↩ A special ability the protagonist possesses that creates a pocket dimension for storage and can be reshaped into objects like furniture. The name is kept in English to preserve its identity as a game-like mechanic rather than a generic magical term.
Notes:
• Shirakawa - Family name of Shirakawa Kiyoka, the dark-skinned gyaru and classmate of the protagonist who was summoned alongside him to another world.