In the bowels of the actually pretty harmless woods behind the dorm, in the armory attached to the House’s shooting range, our group reconvened for a second meeting.

  I, Carol, Sarasa, and Ririna gathered there again, and this time, we had Hecate join us too. We have important matters to discuss today… Unlike the silly swimsuit stuff from last time…

  “Whew… Yesterday was better than expected!” That was Sarasa, sitting down on some boxes with her arms spread. Like she owned the place. “I had forgotten how fun it was to play around in water.”

  “You can only say that because you weren’t there to see the ghost…” Ririna let out an awkward laugh as she sat on a box next to me. “I still feel sick just thinking about it…” There there…

  Our trip to the beach yesterday ended with our confrontation with a ghost haunting Carol. Well, a monster rather than a ghost. It turned into a keychain at the end, so even if it acted like a ghost, we were more or less convinced it was a monster by now.

  A day had passed since then. Ririna and Sarasa went back yesterday and were now wearing normal clothes since we weren’t planning on going anywhere.

  “When do I get my phone, Iroha? Can you give me two, actually? You promised…”

  “Are you still thinking about selling them…?” I sighed. “I didn’t promise anything, and I’m not giving you anything until you fix that attitude!”

  “Ehhh?!”

  “Katja needs to clean this place more often… It’s too dusty… How do I do this without dirtying my dress?” Hecate was the last one to sit. She was struggling to figure out how to join us. The crates could get caught on her dress, so she pulled up a chair and sat across from me. “This should work… What’s today’s topic?”

  “So… A lot has happened lately… I think we all have a lot to talk about.”

  “That’s true…” Carol agreed with a bored tone. “You went and did something with Sarasa and that Galene girl, didn’t you?”

  “Nyahahahaha! It was awful!” Ughh… Don’t remind me… Why is she even laughing?

  “Unfortunately, Sarasa’s right… We ran into some problems, and now she’s even more hostile than when we first met her. Long story short…” I explained how our quest with her went and ended. It seemed promising… We avoided killing what didn’t need to be killed, but at the end…

  “Bea, the princess, offered to help. She said she was going to try to clear up things with her, so for now… I think we just have to wait… and leave Galene alone for a while…”

  “I think that’s for the best.” Hecate nodded. “Sounds like there’s something at play beyond what’s visible on the surface.”

  “Yeah…” I appreciated her words, but… am I running away? “Not everything went wrong, I guess… She left so suddenly that she forgot to take these back.”

  I extended my hand.

  “Whistles?” Hecate tilted her head.

  “Wait! Are there…?!” Carol quickly grabbed one off my hand. “Are these the ones we used to summon those flying creatures?”

  “The gryphons, yeah… Now we can bring Hecate to Ebrilyon so she can fast-travel there in the future, and we might even be able to use them to get to the demon territory. Though, that would be a lot harder…” They have a maximum flight distance, apparently. “It’s not like we can get there directly. We’d get stranded in the Endless Silver.”

  “I see…” Carol returned the whistle.

  “Uhmm… Why would you want to go to the demon territory?” Sarasa was out of the loop and raised her head. “You wanna die?”

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  “Right… I haven’t explained that yet…” I gave her a quick rundown of what was happening between our worlds, what we had learned, and how we may be able to stop it.

  “But I think that will have to wait… Trying to go into the demon territory now is out of the question. We need to talk about yesterday’s monster and these monsters turning into objects, or rather, objects turned monsters.”

  “What do you mean?” Carol asked.

  “Oh… You mentioned something like that when Katja brought it up.” Hecate followed up. “You said it as an idea, but… That’s not really it, is it? You know something we don’t…” A thin smile formed on her lips.

  “I- I do…” Gives me the chills… “I’m pretty sure the monsters are objects that got turned into monsters, and not the other way around. More importantly, I’m pretty sure that it’s a person from our world who’s responsible for them. It’s not impossible that it’d be a monster making other monsters, but when you look at the things that got turned into objects so far…”

  “They’re all things from our world…” Hecate concluded. I told them about the painting without going into too much detail, but that didn’t change her opinion. “A mirror, a painting, a plastic cup, and a keychain… Save for the painting, they all seem like things one could just have at hand. Even the painting wouldn’t be inaccessible to the public…”

  “I want to get to the bottom of this… Katja was attacked the other day, and now Carol too… I want to stop this now!”

  “*Nod!* I’m with you! What should we do?” Ririna joined the conversation with an eager voice.

  “…” We looked at each other in silence, then Carol spoke up. “I don’t think there’s anything YOU can do… This may be something for us to solve…”

  “Gahhh…!” Ririna was shocked and dejected.

  “Nyahahah! Don’t feel bad. We have stuff to do in our world too. We need to get Galene on our side again.”

  “Ehhh…” I got a bit worried hearing her say that… “Can you really do something about it? Bea said she’d try to talk to her… Isn’t it better to leave it to her?”

  “She’ll do her thing and we’ll do ours.” She waved. “Don’t worry, okay? We’ll find a way to fix this!”

  Was she confident or just blindly optimistic? Either way… “Well, I have no clue how to explain things to her, so if you have an idea, I’ll leave it up to you. Just don’t make things worse.”

  Sarasa smiled, but Ririna wasn’t convinced. “But you don’t need me for that… I wanted to help in some way too…”

  “Hmmm…” What’s something that Ririna could do…? “Why don’t you take this then?” I handed her the ghost keychain. “I’m not sure how much good it will do, but… If you wanna try…”

  Her face lit up. “Ahhh! Thank you! If I can have this, I… I swear I’ll find something! I won’t let you down!”

  “Good luck! I think our side will focus on getting to the bottom of this for a while, so we won’t be able to go to Balterra for a while.”

  “Oh… That’s a bit lonely…” Ririna’s wide smile faded.

  “Don’t make that face! I’ll make some time to go visit you if this drags on for too long… We need to take Hecate to Ebrilyon at some point so we can meet up then!”

  “Oh, using a lover as an excuse for a tryst with another lover? Never thought I’d experience this.” Hecate giggled.

  “It’s not like that! Are you trying to make me feel bad?” Everyone was smirking at me. Dammit… I tapped the crate and moved things along. “Either way, we’re settled, right? We’ll focus on finding who’s making the monsters and stopping them before trying to settle things with Galene, okay?”

  Everyone agreed, but I had the feeling they weren’t taking me seriously… “Let’s get to work then! I also have one more thing I wanna try…”

  …

  It’s time for my secret weapon… When in doubt, when you’re lost, with no path and goal in sight, just ask Miyuki! “I need information!”

  “You mean about yesterday? It was fun. Thanks for inviting me, Iroha.”

  “Hehehe… I’m glad you had fun… Wait, no!” I smacked her desk. “That’s not what I meant!”

  Another day had passed, and we were back in school. I didn’t want to start a commotion and become the center of attention, so I couldn’t get too carried away. Ayumu… I saw her at the mall when I was there with the others. Thankfully, she hasn’t said anything… Don’t need to change that.

  “Let’s go somewhere else… We need to talk.”

  “Sure. Anything for you.”

  I brought her outside, to the back of the school, where we could talk without interruptions under the shade. Picking this as the location for our talk let her know what this was about.

  “It’s serious today, huh? What is it? Wanna hear about my dreams? That’s the only reason you keep me around, isn’t it?”

  “That’s verifiably false…” Her tone sounded hurt, but I could easily tell she was faking it. “I literally spoke with you a few days ago and invited you to the beach just to hang out, didn’t I?”

  “Oh, yeah… Yep! Yes, you did! Thank you, Iroha! You’re the best!” She tapped me on the shoulder.

  “Stop messing around, okay?” I brushed her hand off… She knows I’m being serious today, so why is she messing around…? This girl… “Do you know anything about those monsters that turn into things after their deaths? They’re actually things being turned into monsters, but whatever.”

  “Like the painting. I know. But no. I don’t know much beyond what you already know…” She leaned against the wall with a calm smile on her face. From the way she worded that…

  “Not much, meaning there is something, right?”

  “Is there? Isn’t there? Even I’m not completely sure.” She giggled and looked off into the distance. “I definitely don’t have anything that could help you make a breakthrough…”

  “Why are you dancing around the issue so much? I’m grateful no matter how big or small your help is.” She can’t control what she sees. I’m not gonna blame her for that.

  “I don’t have any hints for you this time, but I know how you can get another lead.” She tensed her shoulders like she was in trouble. “It’s just that… there’s a bit of an issue…”

  “Really…?” I leaned against the wall next to her to put her at ease. “What’s the issue?”

  She turned her neck. “This time, it’s the type of thing that will go wrong if you’re aware of it. I don’t know how it will go wrong, but I know I shouldn’t tell you.”

  “Wh- what? That’s a new one…”

  “Sorry… I figured you’d ask me about it sooner or later. I was wondering if there was any way for me to explain it somehow, but I don’t think there is… But don’t worry, Iroha. That lead I told you about is not lost.”

  “How? If you can’t tell me about it…”

  “I can’t tell, but I can guide you to it. You just need to trust me…”

  “Blindly, you mean…” I said what she wasn’t going to say, and she smiled bitterly. I don’t really have a reason to doubt her… She got it wrong with the matching weapons… I was supposed to avoid matching with Endell, but I made it work out. Katja and Carol have been in trouble already… I don’t want my other girls getting targeted. “Fine… What do you want me to do?”

  “Let’s hang out after school! Everything will make sense then!”

  “Huh?” She was so casual about it… “This isn’t just a normal invitation, right? Are you messing with me again?”

  “I can’t say anything more.” She giggled. “Besides, summer break starts at the end of the week. Don’t you wanna make some memories while we still have time?”

  Will this really work out? I mean… if I’m not supposed to know, she’s doing a good job… “Alright… Let’s make some memories or whatever.”