"Sakuraba!"
Hikigaya was the first to rush out, but then he froze.
Pale white bone wings shimred in the sunset, spreading out behind that person.
Sakuraba Ema was floating in mid-air.
Several people lay beneath her feet, blood seeping from under them. Their chests did not rise or fall; their eyes were wide open, motionless.
Hikigaya recognized them—they were Miura's friends.
Dead?
Hikigaya's stomach tightened violently. A chill surged up his back, making his fingers go numb. He instinctively took a half-step back, bumping into Nikaido beside him.
Nikaido had also frozen. Her face was deathly pale, her blood-red eyes were wide with shock, and her breathing had beco rapid.
The sound of a heavy object hitting the floor ca from behind them. Saeki had gone limp by the door and fainted outright. Miura was leaning against the wall, her legs shaking too hard to stand, her mouth open but unable to make a sound. Tobe was kneeling on the floor dry-heaving, though nothing ca out.
Hikigaya took a deep breath; the air slled of rust. He forced himself not to look at the people on the ground.
"Sakuraba."
He spoke, his voice sounding dry.
Sakuraba Ema lowered her head.
Those pink eyes had lost their focus, turning so pale they were almost transparent, as if covered by a layer of mist.
There were tear tracks on her face.
"Hikigaya-kun..." Her voice was soft, as if she were talking in her sleep. "You ca."
"Look." She pointed to the people on the ground, her tone carrying a hint of expectation, like she was seeking credit. "Now they are all my friends. The kind that will never leave."
Hikigaya's stomach churned. He fought to keep himself from vomiting.
"Aren't you happy?" She tilted her head, her bone wings shifting with the movent. "They won't call a monster anymore."
Hikigaya didn't know what to say.
Nikaido stepped forward from beside him, her legs still trembling slightly.
"Ema."
Ema looked at her, seemingly trying to rember who she was.
Nikaido didn't beat around the bush.
"That day on the rooftop, you fainted on purpose," she said.
Ema's expression froze.
"Miura hadn't even said anything and you just collapsed. I always thought it was strange," Nikaido worked to keep her voice calm. "Last night, I checked the school forums and found that the rumor threads about you and Hikigaya were all posted by the sa alt account. You probably spread them yourself, didn't you?
You must have seen Hikigaya on the rooftop that day," Nikaido continued. "You figured he would go soft if he saw you faint. You thought it would make him care more about you, make him unable to leave you, so you faked it—just like the countless tis you've made 'mistakes' on purpose before."
Hikigaya was still processing the information Nikaido was giving him.
Faked the faint?
She spread the news of her own bullying?
"You're lying!" Ema scread. "I didn't, I really was..."
"Really what? Really scared?" Nikaido interrupted her. "Of course you should be scared. After all, you stood on that rooftop and watched Yuki jump with your own eyes, yet you remained unmoved!"
Yuki?
Hearing that na, Hikigaya suddenly felt a sharp pain in his head.
"You've always been like this." Nikaido took a step forward. "From back then until now: intentionally making mistakes, playing dumb on purpose, acting weak on purpose—all to make others pity you, take care of you, and worry about you."
"I didn't, I just..."
"You just wanted him not to leave you," Hiro finished for her. "But the thods you used have hurt everyone. Because those rumors spread, your friend Saeki has been constantly worried about you, and Hikigaya—the person you wanted to be with—considered dropping out because of it. And now you've even killed people. Ema, how much longer are you going to keep lying to yourself?"
"...Dropping out?"
"Hikigaya-kun..." Ema's voice beca even softer, as if it might shatter at any mont. "Are you going to leave, too?"
The bone wings were trembling, every segnt of bone emitting a faint grinding sound, like sothing was snapping.
"Just like Hiro, just like Yuki, just like everyone else... are you going to leave too?"
Hikigaya opened his mouth. He couldn't answer directly right now; Sakuraba Ema couldn't handle any more provocation.
"I'm not going to leave," Hikigaya said, his voice calr than he expected. "I was just... thinking about so things."
"What things?" Ema floated forward half a step, her bone wings tilting slightly with her movent.
"Thinking about how to leave ?"
" I was thinking... if I had stopped those rumors sooner, maybe none of this would have happened. I'm thinking, if I had noticed sothing was wrong with you sooner, maybe it wouldn't have turned out like this. I was thinking..."
He paused.
"I was thinking about whether I did sothing wrong, too.
I clearly saw it, I clearly felt it, but I did nothing. I told myself it was none of my business, told myself I was just a bystander, told myself I couldn't help anyone."
He took a step forward.
The bloodstains beneath the people on the ground were still spreading. Hikigaya forced himself not to look, staring only at Sakuraba Ema.
"I've been running away, Ema. Running from responsibility, running from relationships, running from everything that requires to invest emotion. I thought it was safe that way—that I wouldn't get hurt, and I wouldn't let others get hurt.
But I was wrong. Running away doesn't make things better; it only makes things worse. Just like you. You're running away, too. Running from the mories of that day on the rooftop, running from the guilt of failing to save Yuki, running from the version of yourself that wasn't brave enough."
Ema's lips were trembling.
"I didn't..."
"We're the sa. We both run away in our own ways. You pretend to be cheerful, pretend to be clumsy, pretend to need others to look after you so you don't have to face the real you. I
pretend to be cold, pretend not to care, pretend to be indifferent to everything so I don't have to bear any responsibility."
He stopped just three steps away from Ema.
The tips of the bone wings could almost touch his face.
"You're just an ordinary girl who is terrified of being alone and tried desperately to make friends but used the wrong thods. A poor girl who couldn't save her friend and has lived in guilt ever since."
He took a deep breath.
"A person just like ."
Sakuraba Ema froze.
The bone wings stopped in mid-air, no longer trembling.
"Just like... you?"
There was confusion in her voice, and a sliver of expectation she hadn't even noticed herself.
"Yes," Hikigaya nodded.
He looked into Ema's eyes.
"A person who clearly wants to get close, but doesn't know how.
We're the sa. You use smiles and clumsiness to get close to people; I use coldness and distance to push them away. But at the core, we're both doing the sa thing: using the wrong thods to protect the 'self' that is afraid of being alone.
We both ssed up. We both did things wrong, and we both hurt others and ourselves. But this isn't the end, Ema. As long as we're still alive, there's still a chance to make ands, a chance to correct things, a chance to..."
"A chance to what?" Sakuraba Ema suddenly spoke.
Those misty pink eyes suddenly beca clear and sharp.
The corners of her mouth curled into a smile—a smile that didn't belong to Sakuraba Ema.
"A chance to start over?" the voice continued, coming from Ema's mouth.
"A chance to make up for mistakes? A chance to be forgiven?
Truly naive, isn't it, Hachiman-kun?"
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