My youth story cannot be a knight war

"So, you have to promise me."

After pulling back her fingers, Hiratsuka Shizuka's eyes had never been so serious.

"You, this time you must... defeat Number Zero, okay?"

"...Ah, don't worry, teacher."

His palms clenched at that moment, then slowly loosened, and Zaimokuza said with a smile.

"I certainly will."

……

Zaimokuza left, and after saying that, he turned and walked towards the door in front of Hiratsuka Shizuka, opened the door, and then closed it again. Then the sound of footsteps could be heard clearly in the corridor.

Looking at the door and listening to the footsteps gradually fading away, Shizuka Hiratsuka just stood there without moving, the expression on her face as if it was glued together.

But when the last footsteps were heard and no more sound was heard, Shizuka Hiratsuka collapsed.

She leaned her back against the blackboard covered with her memories of this school, slowly slid down, and finally sat down on the ground, looking up at the ceiling without saying a word.

After a short silence, Shizuka Hiratsuka reached out without even looking and opened the bottom shelf of the desk cabinet next to her, then took out the only picture album inside.

She reached out and opened the first page of the album. The color of the paper had turned yellow due to oxidation, and it was obvious that it had been in existence for quite a long time.

On the first page of the album, there was a large Q-version portrait wearing glasses that appeared in her eyes. The portrait was of a boy with two lines of drawn tear marks on his face. He didn't look sad at all, but rather a little funny.

Shizuka Hiratsuka slowly flipped through the painting book. Looking at the contents depicted on each page, the corners of her mouth slowly curled up, and there was a faint gleam in her eyes. Countless memories flooded into her mind at this moment, washing over her heart.

When she turned to the last page, Shizuka Hiratsuka's smile gradually disappeared. She looked at the content on the page and bit her lower lip.

On this last page, there is a Q-version portrait of five people together, Yukinoshita Yukino, Hiratsuka Shizuka, Yuigahama Yui, Zaimokuza Yoshiki, Hikigaya Hachiman, all the original members of the Service Club are included.

She pinched the last piece of drawing paper with her fingers and turned to the back, where two lines of text immediately came into view.

—I like Hachiman! I like Buchou! I like Yuigahama! I like Hiratsuka-sensei! I like everyone in the Service Club!!!

——by Ashikaga Yoshiteru II, Zaimokuza Yoshiteru (?o??o?)?????!

"...!"

The slender fingers rubbed the two lines of text, suddenly clenched into fists, and began to tremble slightly uncontrollably.

Isn't it beautiful? Those memories shimmer like autumn wheat fields, and every memory of those people is like golden rice paddies undulating.

But everyone left, everyone left in the end, leaving behind this album that represents the memories, recording the warmth that they don't want to be forgotten.

Everyone is leaving, about to leave.

Hoarse sobs echoed in the air. Shizuka Hiratsuka pressed her forehead against the drawing paper. Even though she didn't shed a single tear last night when she watched her beloved grandmother leave, she was now crying silently in the empty classroom.

Outside the window, a pair of pitch-black eyes watched all this quietly, and the irises reflected the crying Shizuka Hiratsuka.

There was no emotion in those eyes that were as dark as the abyss.

10. Curse of the Revenant (5k)

"Komachi!!!"

Hikigaya Hachiman suddenly opened the classroom door with both hands and rushed in without hesitation. In an instant, a large number of astonished eyes were cast at him.

"Hello, hello! Could that person be..."

"That's him. He was Mr. Zaimokuza's best friend before he met Mr. Kousaka. He looks exactly like the one in the light curtain before."

"Why would he...wait, he has the same last name as Hikigaya-san? Could it be that..."

The classroom that used to be packed with students now only had less than ten people in it, six of them girls and three boys. One of them was unconscious, lying on a folding stretcher that must have been brought from the infirmary in the middle of the classroom, which had been cleared of desks and chairs.

At this moment, all the remaining people in the classroom were looking at Hikigaya who suddenly broke in with strange eyes, and the one who was most surprised by his arrival was Hikigaya Komachi.

"elder brother???"

Squatting beside the unconscious boy, Hikigaya Komachi, holding a wet and wrung-out towel in one hand, stared blankly at Hikigaya Hachiman who suddenly appeared in front of her. For a moment, she even wondered if she was dreaming.

But the rapid panting sound immediately brought her back from her dazed state. Looking at Hikigaya Hachiman limping towards her, surging joy and grievance surged in her heart at the same time, and Hikigaya Komachi's eyes were suddenly filled with mist.

"--elder brother!!!"

"Komachi..."

She stood up and rushed towards her brother. Hikigaya Hachiman opened his arms and hugged his sister who was rushing towards him. Inertia made him take a few steps back before he stopped.

But feeling the petite body in his arms, and the familiar body temperature and smell, his tense heart finally relaxed completely at this moment. The intense fatigue that had been suppressed by adrenaline overflowed at this moment, and he almost collapsed to the ground on the spot.

Hikigaya Hachiman hugged his sister tightly in his arms, protecting her and also using her as a support to maintain his physical and mental stability.

The one who was happier than his brother was naturally his younger sister Hikigaya Komachi. After the incident, she managed to remain calm and was even able to rely on her usual popularity to unite many classmates who were left alone and in a panic, and use the classroom as a base to work together to find a way to survive this disaster.

Many women, not to mention many adult men, are not as capable of these kinds of things at this age. But Hikigaya Komachi is just a girl after all, a fourteen-year-old junior high school girl at that. Most of her peers only know how to play and act coquettishly in their boyfriends' arms.

But she has accomplished so many things on her own, and one can imagine how much pressure she must have been under. As a girl with an older brother, when she is in the most difficult times, she never thinks of her parents, but of her brother.

Then her brother really came, crossing the long and dangerous road that had seemed so long since the turmoil began, and came to her side when she needed help and support the most.

"I'm glad you're okay... uh."

"elder brother???"

Hikigaya Hachiman said this while panting, and sensing something was wrong in his weak voice, Hikigaya Komachi raised her head, and the person she saw made her eyes widen immediately.

"Brother! Why, why are you..."

"Don't worry, it's just a little bump from rushing in, nothing else is serious."

Facing his sister's worried gaze, Hikigaya Hachiman calmly wiped the blood from the cut on his forehead and spoke softly.

"More than that, hurry up and leave with me. We have to find a safe place to hide."

"How can you be okay! Brother, your forehead is bleeding."

Seeing her brother trying hard to endure the pain from his wound, Hikigaya Komachi couldn't help but scream out loud, clutching her skirt tightly with both hands.

"You obviously look very tired, and...we can't just leave like this."

She looked back at the classmates behind her and pursed her lips.

"If you want to leave, you have to take everyone with you! Otherwise, it would be meaningless. During the riots, we all helped each other and waited for you, brother, to come. So if we have to leave, we have to leave together."

"...Okay, I'll listen to you, Komachi. We'll find a way to get everyone away together."

Looking at the determination in his sister's eyes, Hikigaya Hachiman silently glanced at the other students who were looking at him curiously. Knowing that his sister was stubborn beneath her well-behaved appearance, he could only sigh helplessly in the end.

He reached out and rubbed the soft hair on Hikigaya Komachi's head. In addition to doting, there was also indescribable relief in his eyes.

"I can't believe my Komachi has become a little adult without me noticing. With what I just said, Komachi scored very high points~"

"Stop rubbing my head! You won't grow taller if you do that..."

With an expression of a little humiliation and anger, she stretched out her hand to slap away her brother's evil hand, but seeing Hikigaya Hachiman's weak face, Hikigaya Komachi couldn't help but speak with a bit of worry.

"Brother, are you really okay now? Because you look like Kamakura slept on your head all night long."

"Although your analogy immediately caused me to experience phantom pain both physically and mentally... it's true that I, your brother, need to rest and take care of my injuries."

The corner of his eye twitched violently, and Hikigaya Hachiman stood against the wall with a dejected look on his face, covering the wound on his forehead with one hand, and spoke weakly.

"Komachi, is it still possible to go to the infirmary? Take me to find some medicine and bandage it."

"Mo~ I really don't understand, brother, are you here to save me, or are you here to save me?"

"Hahaha~ Of course I came to ask my lovely sister for help."

Hikigaya Komachi silently supported Hikigaya Hachiman as they walked towards the door. Listening to her brother's nonsense, she rolled her eyes and said:

"Brother, you really are—"

hiss--

A strange sound like silk being cut flowed through the air, making those who heard it think of the hissing sound of a cobra, with its upper body raised and tongue sticking out, as it stares at its prey. At the same time, it also interrupted the words that Hikigaya Komachi was about to say.

In the pitch-black pupils, water-like ripples spread across the irises, and in the center of the waves, a cold, flickering star rapidly expanded in the field of vision.

Her vision suddenly spun, and Hikigaya Komachi felt a huge impact coming from both behind and in front of her. Unable to react for a moment, she felt a stuffy sensation in her chest, and her whole face turned red.

"ah!!!!!!"

A female scream broke the momentary silence and brought Hikigaya Komachi back to her senses. She stared blankly at the classroom ceiling, which was half covered by a shoulder. Red blood dripped onto her face, creating a small splash of blood, and a faint smell of rust irritated her nose.

"Well--"

“Brother!???”

Her trembling fingers touched the blood on her cheek. Hikigaya Komachi turned her head in panic. Hikigaya Hachiman's face covered in cold sweat was right next to her.

"I-I'm fine. Are you okay?"

Hikigaya Hachiman turned over and covered his right arm, whose tendons were cut, with his left hand. Blood gushed out from between his fingers like a fountain, and cold sweat flowed from his forehead at an increasingly rapid speed.

But he no longer had the time to pay attention to his own injuries. Hikigaya Hachiman stared at the direction of the classroom door. A sharp, blood-stained blade was tightly grasped in one hand. The cold light of steel shone through a layer of blood into his eyes, like a layer of red gauze swaying in the air.

And that hand - stretched out from the glass of the classroom sliding door, a faint ripple appeared between the arm and the base of the glass, and the hand just stretched out from the glass out of thin air.

Snap.

His palm loosened, and the murderous blade stained with Hikigaya Hachiman's blood fell to the ground. Then, strange fuzzy particles burst out and disappeared completely.

This strange scene caused the entire classroom to fall into silence again, and then a commotion far greater than before broke out. The students screamed one after another, and then pushed over the tables in panic and ran to the other side of the classroom.

"what is that!?"

"It's the evil spirit! It's the evil spirit! The evil spirit is coming for us!"

"Hikigaya-kun, back off quickly! Don't stay there! That hand will—Aa ...

A girl who ran to the window of the classroom was about to speak to ask the Hikigaya siblings who were still standing there to keep their distance, when two pale, blood-stained hands stretched out from both sides of her cheeks, and the fingers twisted and grabbed at her face.

This horrifying scene, comparable to that in a horror movie, immediately made the girl emit a sharp explosion like a water jet. She stretched out her hands like a madman to push away the two hands, and rolled on the floor with tears streaming down her face as she ran forward.

At the same time, the other students were almost frightened to death by this scene. Everyone once again moved away from the window and ran to the center of the classroom.

Hikigaya Hachiman also endured the pain and picked up his completely frightened sister with one hand, dragging her away from the classroom sliding door and the hand extending from the glass, and squeezed together with the other students back to back.

hum-

A distorted noise like fingernails scratching against a blackboard suddenly rang out in the classroom, and then quickly spread to the entire school in less than five seconds.

This sound was extremely harmful to the human auditory organs, and immediately caused everyone who was still taking shelter in the school to cover their ears in pain and look around in horror.

Except for the glass, all objects in the entire school that could reflect light, even the surface of the swimming pool that had not yet been drained, were now rippling violently. Within these ripples, countless pale arms were twisted and stretched outward.

These arms are of different sizes, and even the skin color and texture are very different. There are men and women, old and young.

The moment these arms appeared, countless wails and roars filled with hatred and resentment resounded throughout the entire campus. The sound was so loud that it was deafening. However, if someone took even one step out of the school gate at this time, they would find that there was no sound at all in the school.

At this moment, the entire school seemed to be cut off from the overall world, becoming an alien dimension outside the world. Its existence could be seen from the outside world, but its true evil and darkness could never be understood.

Countless blood-stained arms stretched out from the mirror reflecting the world, up and down, left and right, swaying like schools of garden eels sticking their heads out of the sand of a coral reef... It's very simple to describe this scene in words, but when the main subject is replaced by a part that is obviously a human limb, the horror that penetrates the bone marrow can only be felt by those who witness it with their own eyes.

“——W-What the hell is this!???”

Hikigaya Komachi curled up in her brother's arms, with the heart-wrenching cries of her classmates in her ears and blood-stained arms covering every inch of her vision, swaying together. They were the souls of the dead in hell reaching out to the world for help.

However, the souls did not implore or cry, but cursed and howled with evil. Her lips, which had completely lost their color, trembled, and she asked her brother in a voice that was about to cry.

"Th-These are—"

Hikigaya Hachiman's expression was distorted violently. He hugged his trembling sister tightly, and his pupils, which were staring at everything, were shrunk thinner than the tip of an embroidery needle.

He heard the groans from the owners of these arms... and the vicious accusations soaked in blood and aqua regia.

——"Why? I just wanted happiness, and I got it...but why did you take it away from me?!"

——"Damn it! I just took advantage of the feelings of the seniors for me! That's all! I didn't do anything else bad! And it was Eriri who betrayed me first! Why was I the one who got eaten? And not her!?"

——"You are unforgivable! Return my family's lives! You don't deserve happiness! You and your filthy sister don't deserve to live in this world! All this damned stuff started with you!"

——"There's no way I can lose! I'm obviously better than any of them! Why did you give me such a weak contract partner? This isn't fair! You deserve to die!!!"

——"You must die to atone for your sins. Anyone can live, but you must not live..."

——"Hikigaya Hachiman! You are an inhumane demon!!!"