Chapter 36
Within unseen darkness.
Kanf felt a shiver of tension.
Gulp-.
Fear stems from the unknown.
That was true even for Kanf, who had been unable to see properly since birth.
Though an incident had left her somewhat better off than other ordinary blind people.
Of course, that didn't mean her fear of the unknown had completely disappeared.
The iron gate separating the slums from the inside of the building was quite thick.
‘…The entrance now.’
Even though she shouldn't have been able to hear the approaching person's footsteps, Kanf immediately noticed that her companion—and the other person—had arrived near the building's entrance.
As Kanf rubbed her slender wrist, trying to ease her tension.
“Why is everyone gathered here?”
“Hey…! Keep it down!”
“Shh, shh!! They'll hear us!”
The noisy voices of the children continued,
Kanf felt the heavy tension weighing down her body vanish in an instant.
A slight headache.
She muttered as she felt a faint ache behind her invisible eyes.
“Everyone.”
At Kanf's cold voice, as if someone had poured a whole bucket of ice water over them,
“See? We got caught!”
“I-I don't know anything!”
The children scattered and ran.
Their movements were remarkably practiced and swift.
Although it was an enclosed space with few places to run, it wasn't particularly cramped, and the children vanished from sight in an instant.
Ultimately, only Kanf, who was pressing a hand to her forehead because of her headache, and the little child who had failed to read the mood at first remained there.
The child fidgeted with her fingers before asking Kanf, who was waiting in front of the door.
“Kanf, are you all right? You don't look well….”
“I'm fine, so you should go inside too.”
“Okay!”
With that innocent reply, the child scampered into the room.
Kanf steadied herself and exhaled.
‘That's right. My precious younger siblings.’
And her big sister, too.
They were all people she had to protect.
Though they might think the opposite.
Kanf straightened her posture a little more and waited for the guest who was coming to their hideout.
Eventually.
Clatter….
The lock on the iron gate slowly turned.
Runrun's familiar face popped out first.
“Welcome.”
“Y-yes, Captain. I just got back….”
But her attitude was strangely odd.
It was almost a suspicious reaction.
She wore an oddly sour expression, more so than usual.
“…And this is, yes, the rumored person Captain Kanf wanted to meet.”
For the record.
The man who followed Runrun into the building didn't look particularly well either.
“…….”
“…….”
A quiet silence settled between the two of them.
The man's towering height, like one of the enormous balloon figures commonly seen on the streets, was enough to awaken a sense of unease in her.
Even Runrun, the tallest person in the family, couldn't overcome the absolute barrier of 160 centimeters.
(No one even broke past the mid-150-centimeter mark.)
Only after lifting her head very high could Kanf look directly at the fearsome man─Hotdog Man.
‘Is he called Hotdog Man because his body is so long?’
It felt like a fairly plausible guess.
She thought she could vaguely understand why he treated Rivera like a little child.
Kanf unconsciously hunched her shoulders.
A memory etched into her like a scar surfaced.
A fear of adults….
Though a great deal of time had passed and everyone in the family was old enough to be called an adult, she had never grown accustomed to the gaze of someone looking down at her so blatantly.
But there were still many children behind Kanf who had yet to mature mentally.
That was why Kanf straightened her back and introduced herself as calmly as possible.
“Welcome to our home, Hotdog Man. My name is Kanf…. I've heard a lot about you from my older sister, Rivera.”
But then.
“……!!”
The man's body shook violently.
As though lightning had struck him right over the head.
Noticing the man's strange state, Kanf subtly focused her senses in Runrun's direction.
After living together for so long, they could convey their intentions without having to say anything.
‘Why is he acting like this again?’
‘…Well, you see.’
Runrun awkwardly scratched her head.
It was because of the brief exchange that could be called either a mistake or a deliberate ploy.
Right before coming here.
The man and Runrun had exchanged a few simple personal details.
- Come to think of it, how old are you, little Runrun?
- I'm twenty-three.
From the man's perspective, it was a conversation no different from shock and horror.
- ?
The man's mouth fell open with a snap-.
Just moments ago, Kanf had even explained that Rivera was more of an ‘older sister’ than she was.
That meant the youngest person here was an ‘adult woman’ named Runrun.
Represented with inequality signs, it looked roughly like this.
【Runrun < Kanf < Rivera】
…….
Having objectively sorted out his situation, Abel Anderson felt like he wanted to crawl into a mouse hole immediately.
* * *
- W-wait, twenty-three? Not thirteen?
- That's right.
Seriously, there had to be limits to looking young.
Even with an appearance that wouldn't have seemed strange if she put on a schoolbag and entered elementary school tomorrow, she was claiming to be an adult.
It was difficult for me to believe.
So at first, I thought she was lying.
That was, until Runrun took an identification card from inside her clothes.
- Ah, don't tell anyone. It's an ID that won't be useful anywhere here anyway, but still.
My next suspicion was that it had been forged.
Christine had made my own ID without my permission, too.
It wasn't an unlikely possibility.
- Geez, why would it be forged? If you put it that way, there'd be literally nothing trustworthy in this city. For the record, this was made by a megacorp, so unlike an ID issued by the city government, it's actually trustworthy. Do you want to get shot by someone from a corporation?
A world where corporations wielded more power than the city.
Finally, I asked about Rivera.
- Ah, Captain…. I mean, Big Sis…. Ugh, I don't really know either. Ask her yourself later.
At least.
Runrun's─no, Ms. Runrun's─words didn't sound like a lie.
I quietly rubbed my face.
It wasn't the feeling of having been deceived so much as a crushing wave of self-loathing.
I briefly recalled what I had said when I first met Rivera.
- What are you here to buy, kid? Running an errand for your mom?
Since I had acted like that from our very first meeting, it was only natural that Rivera had found it difficult to reveal the truth.
On top of that, Rivera had felt a heavy sense of indebtedness toward me.
From my perspective, it had been nothing more than a small act of goodwill, but to her, it had been her only salvation─the one thing that could fill the stomachs of her starving family.
It wasn't hard to understand why she had hidden her identity and pretended to be a child.
Only then did I realize the whole truth.
‘…No wonder.’
Michael and the other homeless people had all looked at me as though I were strange.
‘They were questioning my mental state.’
Yeah, so that's what it had been….
·
·
·
Honestly, I wasn't completely without an excuse.
I had lived my entire life at 176 centimeters, so after growing to over 190 centimeters, everything in the world seemed small to me.
That's why I thought she was a real child.
Besides, there was Runrun, and the woman who had introduced herself as Kanf.
And Rivera, too.
They all had extremely faint presences.
It was almost like looking at a small puppy.
Unlike Rivera and Runrun, who grew their hair out messily to hide their faces, Kanf had her entire face exposed.
Perhaps because her eyes were gently closed, a mysterious atmosphere lingered around her.
Her ears were oddly pointed, too, to the point that I briefly thought, ‘How can a person be named Kanf….’
She was openly giving me a wary look, but
even so, she couldn't surpass the level of a fierce Chihuahua or a growling Pomeranian.
I wanted to pat her head─.
“…Excuse me?”
“Ah.”
That voice snapped me back to reality.
I shouldn't be doing this.
I gave a small cough and calmly straightened my clothes.
‘Phew, calm down. Calm down….’
I looked down at Kanf, whose sulky expression was on full display.
Ah, I hadn't introduced myself yet.
“My name is Hotdog─no, Abel Anderson. …You're Rivera's younger sister?”
“Yes, that's right. First, you must have been surprised by the sudden invitation, so thank you for accepting it so readily.”
Despite her youthful appearance, her manner was unmistakably that of an adult.
I had thought she was merely squinting, but now I realized that her eyes were completely closed.
…Was she blind?
“And we always gratefully eat the food you give us…. It can't have been an easy choice for you, Hotdog Man. We sincerely thank you for that as well.”
“N-no, it's nothing….”
I kept nearly slipping into informal speech without realizing it, so I lightly bit my tongue.
She continued to look like a little child.
To an almost strange degree.
While I was pondering several questions,
“But.”
Kanf's eyes slowly opened.
A white glow shone from her eyes in the darkness.
Her eyes weren't properly focused.
She really did seem to have no vision.
Runrun, who had been watching from beside her while eating popcorn she had secretly gotten from somewhere, hurriedly raised her voice.
“…Kanf! What are you—”
“Quiet.”
With a single word, Kanf silenced the noisy Runrun, then fixed her gaze on me.
It was a strange sensation, one I had never experienced before….
It was both unpleasant and refreshing.
“What is your true purpose in approaching us?”
“…Purpose?”
“Yes.”
I scratched my head.
I hadn't understood the intent behind her question.
“Just because I felt sorry for you?”
My informal speech slipped out in my confusion.
Kanf frowned.
“…Because you felt sorry for us?”
“Does that sound a little bad when I put it that way? I heard you had a family going hungry, so I only gave you food because I felt sorry for you.”
It had been nothing more than cheap pity.
Of course, she could have taken that offensively.
- Please let me join this organization.
I vividly remembered Rivera kneeling before me and making that request.
The organization didn't actually exist, so that had been impossible,
but I could at least give her expired food that was otherwise going to be thrown away.
What do you mean, it wasn't an easy choice? It was an incredibly easy choice.
That incident had also led me to start looking after the other homeless people.
As I organized my thoughts, an expression of astonishment appeared on Kanf's face.
She looked as though she had witnessed something unbelievable.
“Is that really all? You didn't know our identities? You don't have some kind of deviant sexual preference? You just did it out of pure goodwill….”
So that's what she had been suspicious of.
There were perverts like Bogus in this world, after all.
And then.
Kanf bent at the waist until her upper body was perpendicular to the floor─no, she bowed so deeply that her head nearly touched the ground.
Her eyes, which had been open, were closed again before I knew it.
“…I'm sorry for asking such a strange question for no reason.”
“Well, I can understand why.”
I nodded as I answered.
Honestly, I didn't exactly look kind.
“No, I was extremely rude. …Please forgive me with a generous heart. And─.”
Kanf's gaze fixed directly on me.
At the same time.
The closed iron gate opened rapidly.
“If you bring Hotdog Man here…!!”
“Please continue to take good care of my sister.”
Rivera's flustered voice and Kanf's gentle voice overlapped for a moment.
As though time itself had stopped.
Everyone's movements froze.
“…Huh?”
Runrun eating popcorn from one side, the children's gazes visible through the slightly opened door, and Kanf with her head bowed.
Finally, Rivera's face, looking up at me with a flustered expression.
…….
What was I supposed to do with this atmosphere?
I let out a small sigh.
* * *
This was a world where goodwill couldn't be accepted as goodwill.
Kanf, who had barely survived being used as a corporate test subject, knew that better than anyone.
Animals with the greatest power naturally follow their instincts.
That was why she had risked it to confirm
what he truly felt.
- I only gave it to them because they seemed to need food, but what's this? I mean, I can see why she'd be offended. Ah, talking about food is making me hungry too. I just want to eat a hot dog without thinking about anything…. I should put chili sauce on it today.
For the first time, Kanf doubted her own ability.
This was….
Genuine, one-hundred-percent pure kindness.
There was no petty lust, desire, or ulterior motive.
Unlike certain androids, which could detect lies by calculating heart rate, pulse, and blood flow,
Kanf's ability could read the deepest parts of someone's mind─even thoughts the person themselves had never noticed.
…But.
He was a kind person with a mindset as though he had crossed over from another world.
Regardless of the ominous rumors surrounding him.
Kanf couldn't help bowing deeply.
The small request was merely a bonus.
“Please continue to take good care of my sister.”
However,
she failed to consider that the statement might cause a slight misunderstanding….