Kiyosumi

  None of this made any sense.

  Does that mean the Lord of Darkness came from the underground?

  Or did Medicine—the founder of the Church of Medicine—descend from the surface?

  Akisumi and I exchanged glances.

  “Can I finally show you the place where I fell?”

  Tsurubami asked, rising to his feet.

  “I’m interested in Mr. White’s story too… but we’re running out of time.”

  Akisumi and the owner followed him without hesitation.

  Sure, he was right—but there were too many things bothering me.

  I stood up a bit later, then turned to Mr. White, who was still beside me.

  “Where did you come from? I mean… when you came to the surface.”

  Mr. White looked up at me with wide, innocent eyes.

  “I thought you already knew.

  It was through the wall of the owner’s café.”

  “The wall…?”

  Just then, the owner turned toward us, so I shut my mouth.

  From the way he’d told it, it sounded like Mr. White had run into the café while being chased by the Health Bureau.

  Did he frame it that way on purpose?

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  The owner’s face, voice, and movements made it impossible to guess his age. He could be thirty or sixty, and I’d believe either.

  And I couldn’t shake the feeling that he was hiding something.

  Surveillance—yes, that’s what it felt like.

  Maybe he wasn’t helping Mr. White at all.

  Maybe he was after the book.

  Maybe he was a spy—for the underground, or for the surface.

  “This way.”

  Tsurubami glided ahead toward a spiral staircase at the far back of the massive cathedral.

  Compared to the scale of the building, the staircase was suspiciously narrow.

  We followed him, ascending slowly.

  I leaned toward Mr. White and said:

  “Don’t trust anyone else. Only me.”

  Mr. White had just started climbing.

  He paused mid-step and turned back.

  I thought he’d give me a look that said What are you even talking about?

  But instead, he answered seriously—with a single word.

  “Yes.”

  “Come on, Kiyosumi!”

  Akisumi called from above.

  I picked up the pace.

  Just as I stepped onto the final stair, I heard the owner’s voice echoing down from ahead:

  “This is amazing…”

  Everything about him was starting to feel like an act.

  Still—could Tsurubami really have fallen into the underground from here?

  He looked like the last person who’d be connected to a place like this.

  “Were you doing cleaning duty here or something?

  Did a teacher ask you to come?”

  “No. I came here for my own reasons.”

  Akisumi glanced at Tsurubami with a strange look.

  His own reasons.

  Was he here for… confession?

  What could he possibly have been repenting for?

  We had just entered what was called the Chamber of Confession,

  a place to surrender the sins too heavy to carry—to the Lord of Darkness.

  I’d never seen it used during my school years.

  Maybe it had been used a few times without me knowing,

  but it was certainly rare.

  And the enormous stone in the center—

  the one the owner kept touching, mumbling “This is amazing…”—

  I’d never seen it up close until now.

  It stood alone in the center of the otherwise empty room.

  A black, rectangular monolith, roughly the size of a park bench.

  The longer I stared at it, the more it felt like it was… breathing.

  Its smooth, polished surface shimmered in the darkness

  like living skin—

  moist, alive, almost indecent.

  It was said to be the stone that connects to the Lord of Darkness.

  That’s what we’d been taught.