Darkness.
An endless, boundless darkness.
Shimizu Nayotake felt herself drifting in a void — weightless, directionless, outside of ti.
Her body was light enough to dissolve, and yet heavy as if sunk to the bottom of the deep sea.
She didn't know where she was.
She didn't know where she was going.
She simply floated… and floated…
Then, a light appeared.
No — not one light. Many lights, gradually rging into a single expanse.
It was as though soone had unrolled a long strip of film reel before her eyes.
The scenes inside began to play in reverse, slowly at first, then faster and faster.
Until, as if hitting the bottom with a sudden jolt, it stopped.
It froze on the image of a little girl in a kindergarten uniform.
A small girl — perhaps three or four years old — wearing a kindergarten uniform washed so many tis it had gone pale, standing beside a group of children.
Those children were holding hands, spinning in a circle, singing a nursery rhy.
The little girl stood outside the ring, watching with longing eyes.
"Bastard child!"
A boy suddenly spun around and shouted it at her.
The other children burst out laughing too, laughing and chanting along.
"Bastard! Bastard! Bastard with no father!"
The little girl froze.
She didn't understand what the word ant, but she knew it was sothing bad.
Because every ti she heard that word, her mother's eyes would turn red.
The scene shifted.
The sa little girl, a little older now — five or six years old.
She sat on the edge of the bed, tilting her head up, watching her mother fold laundry.
"Mama," she said.
"Where is my daddy?"
Her mother's hands went still.
She kept her head bowed, and said nothing.
The little girl saw it — a single translucent drop falling, landing on the clothes in her mother's hands, spreading into a small, dark stain.
She didn't press any further.
She had learned: this question made her mother cry.
The scene shifted again.
The little girl was pressed against the window, watching the sunlight outside.
In the courtyard, other children were chasing each other and playing, waves of laughter drifting in.
"Mama."
She turned her head.
"Can I go outside to play?"
Her mother was packing up a lunchbox. She heard the question, walked over, crouched down, and gently stroked her daughter's hair.
"Nayotake's body isn't strong enough — you can't run too fast, okay?"
"Then I won't run. I'll just walk slowly."
Her mother fell silent.
She looked at her daughter's hopeful eyes, lips parting and closing, and in the end simply pulled the girl into her arms.
"Once Nayotake is feeling better, Mama will take you outside to play."
The little girl rested her chin on her mother's shoulder, watching the running figures outside the window, and said nothing.
She didn't understand why she couldn't run and laugh like the other children.
All she rembered was being taken frequently to a white place that reeked of disinfectant.
The people there wore white coats and blue masks, and they carried long needles that hurt terribly when they pierced her skin.
The scene cut again.
A classroom.
The little girl sat in the very back row, head lowered, pretending to read.
On the surface of her desk, soone had carved two characters with a knife.
"Go die!"
She heard laughter behind her — loud, unapologetic laughter.
"Look at her, pretending she didn't see it."
"What's she gonna do about it? She's too scared to tell the teacher."
"Wouldn't matter if she did. The teacher can't babysit her all day."
The little girl pressed her head even lower.
She forced her eyes wide open, refusing to let any tears fall.
She had learned.
As long as she didn't cry, they would get bored.
As long as she ignored them, they would eventually leave her alone.
The images began to accelerate, trailing into a blur.
Countless fragnts flickered past like a revolving lantern…
Her mother's face, growing paler and paler.
An empty, bare refrigerator.
Money that was never quite enough.
Neighbor uncles and aunties pressing rice balls into her hands with pity in their eyes.
White hospital sheets.
Her mother lying in a hospital bed, smiling weakly.
The images stopped on the day she entered middle school.
In a brand-new uniform, she had fixed her bangs in the mirror before heading out, full of hope that in this new chapter of her life — middle school — she might finally make a friend or two.
She had even prepared so small snacks to share.
And then.
On the very first day of school, her mother was hospitalized again.
She didn't attend the entrance ceremony. Instead she stayed at the hospital caring for her mother, until her mother was finally discharged.
By the ti she made it back to school, back to her class, everyone had already ford their own circles of friends. She was the only one sitting alone in a corner.
She had missed her chance to make friends. Again.
"I heard her mom is sick?"
"The hereditary kind, right?"
"Does that an she might be sick too?"
"Stay away from her. Don't want to catch it."
She kept her head down and pretended not to hear.
She was used to it by now.
On the day of her middle school graduation ceremony.
She stood alone in a corner, watching her classmates hug each other, take photos together, and exchange contact information.
No one ca to talk to her.
No one asked her for a photo.
No one asked for her contact information.
But she didn't mind anymore.
She stared quietly at the acceptance letter in her hands — Private Ousai High School.
A special admissions slot.
The scholarship would not only cover tuition and fees in full — there would even be money left over.
And once she started high school, she could begin working part-ti, which would finally let her contribute to the household.
That was what she told herself.
The images accelerated again.
Part-ti work. Part-ti work. Classes. School. More work. More studying.
And once again, another hospital paynt slip.
Her mother's hospitalizations growing more and more frequent.
Her stays growing longer and longer.
The debt growing larger and larger.
She stopped eating lunch to save money.
She learned how to fake sleeping through the lunch break.
She learned to smile with hollow eyes at the school counselor and say, "I'm fine. Nothing's wrong."
Because no one needed to know that she wasn't.
The image suddenly shook violently.
It was a night.
She had just gotten off her night shift and was walking ho when she received a call from the hospital.
She couldn't rember what the voice on the other end had said.
All she rembered was putting down the phone and standing there, completely blank, for a very long ti.
By the ti she reached the hospital, the light above the ergency room door had just gone out.
Her mother was wheeled out — her face as white as a corpse.
The doctor said she had been resuscitated.
Later, a nurse told her what had happened: her mother had stolen a bottle of sleeping pills from the patient in the neighboring bed and swallowed them in the middle of the night.
Fortunately, when a nurse ca to do her rounds for the shift change and noticed that Nayotake's mother hadn't taken her evening dication, she called out to wake her — and discovered she had swallowed the sleeping pills in preparation to die. The nurse imdiately called in the other nurses and doctors for an ergency stomach pumping.
After thanking the doctors and nurses, she looked at her mother's face on the hospital bed, her own expression utterly calm.
When her mother woke, she was so wracked with guilt she couldn't even et her daughter's eyes.
For the next several days, she stayed by her mother's bedside.
She didn't speak. She didn't cry.
It was as though the suicide attempt had never happened at all.
On the day of discharge, she brought her mother ho.
Then she closed every door and every window, and carried a charcoal brazier into the bedroom.
Her mother froze.
She crouched down and struck a match.
"If Mama has truly made up her mind to leave behind and go like this,"
she said, her voice perfectly calm,
"then I'll go with you."
"I won't let Mama leave here all alone."
The thumb and forefinger holding the lit match slowly released their grip, and the fla began to fall toward the brazier.
Her mother lunged forward and caught the burning match with her bare hand — ignoring the scorching heat, she clenched her palm shut and smothered the fla.
Only then did her mother pull into her arms the girl who had gone so numb she had reached a kind of stillness.
"Nayotake."
Her mother's voice was trembling.
"Nayotake, Mama was wrong…"
"Mama will never do it again… Mama will always be with you."
"Always, always with you…"
"So promise Mama — promise you'll live. Will you do that?"
____
👻🔥Seek: Walnut-chan🔥👻
🔥 New history: Danmachi: Summoning Ruri Gokou, And other Chuunibyou Brats
Let's hit these goals:
🎯 100 Powerstones = 1 extra chapter for the public!
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