Chapter 5
November 6th, AD 2095 / Yotsuba Main House - Reception Room
——Hee-hee—
At the sudden sound of Miyuki’s giggling voice, Tatsuya, who had been looking out the window, turned his eyes to the interior of the room.
In contrast to the eastern style of the architecture, the big room was done in western style. There were even paintings of landscapes adorning the brightly hued walls, not reproductions either; according to the signatures of the celebrated modern artists on the canvases, these were original oil paintings. And the stately natural wood table was of a size that could easily seat over ten people.
Nonetheless, this room gave an impression of emptiness. This was possibly due to the fact that, instead of the space being occupied by the legs of over ten chairs, there was only the four legs of a sofa placed by the table; also, aside from the table and sofa, there were almost no furnishings, which appeared to leave all too much space leftover in the room. Making the room feel unnecessarily vast was probably for the purpose of psychologically inducing a feeling of oppression.
Naturally, such things had been beneath Tatsuya’s notice for a long time now. His gaze went straight to his younger sister.
Upon receiving his puzzled look, Miyuki, who was seated on the sofa with the carved ball and claw legs, bashfully ducked her head.
"…..Pardon me, Onii-sama. I was merely remembering something that happened in the past."
"Something amusing?"
Tatsuya also smiled in response to the smile on Miyuki’s face when she answered.
"No…… I was so foolish in the past, I found that humorous."
Tatsuya’s smile vanished, a feat that occurred in the blink of an eye in response to the thoughtless self depreciating remark. But he was unable to find anything negative in the content of the words, the tone of the voice, or the expression on her face.
"Come to think of it, Onii-sama back then was kind to Ayako-san and Fumiya-kun……. I was quite shocked by that?"
From what she said, Tatsuya formed an impression of the general period Miyuki was remembering and broke out a smile.
"Well….I was just a child back then, give me a break."
"That is absurd. I am the one who was a foolish child."
The two of them were still at an age where the world could still call them "children". And the siblings themselves also didn't think of themselves as adults.
Despite that, the two of them experienced no feelings of inconsistency or hesitation when they labeled the people they had been three years prior as mere "children".
"Back then, even though I am your sister, I did not understand one thing about Onii-sama. No….I did not even want to understand you."
Tatsuya wanted to say something to refute that, but aside from a brief smile bestowed on the bowed head of his sister, unfortunately he had no other response to give.
Even if he could refute her words, it was not necessary to do so.
Although both of them had been wrong, neither of them were responsible; Tatsuya and Miyuki were both aware of this.
If Miyuki was no longer in the mood to continue speaking of the past, Tatsuya was not going to bring it up again.
Tatsuya returned his gaze to the window.
While appearing to blankly gaze outside, his five senses were fully operational, looking for signs of unusual activity and missing nothing. His extra sense perceived more than his five senses, so he was always ready to access the information dimension at a moment's notice.
This was all for the sake of protecting Miyuki.
If something came into existence that looked like it would harm Miyuki, Tatsuya would destroy it first to prevent that.
This had not changed between now and back then.
But back then, she had been unaware of it.
But back then, she had been kept from being aware of it by him.
No Comments Yet
Post a new comment
Register or Login