My youth story cannot be a knight war

Others are hell.

The original meaning of this sentence is that everyone treats everything with his or her own desires and perspectives. Therefore, anyone will be affected by the desires and perspectives of others and become painful and unfree. This is "others are hell."

At this moment, Hikigaya remembered the little story in the book that was used to support this statement.

The story is about three imprisoned ghosts who are waiting to go to hell.

But in the process of waiting, the three ghosts kept deceiving and torturing each other. In the end, they were severely damaged both physically and mentally and found that there was no need to wait for hell anymore because they were already in hell.

Perhaps something has been wrong all along.

Holding Kamakura in his arms, Hikigaya felt the fur where his face was pressed against Kamakura suddenly become wet, but he was too immersed in his memories to care.

All the memories since birth were replayed in his mind over and over again. Hikigaya suddenly discovered that when the person who existed in these memories disappeared, the tone of these memories completely changed.

It became dim, dark, and depressing...and this is probably the true appearance of these memories. Someone just used their own colors to cover these memories with a warm veil.

——However, a "fake" covered with a veil can never become the "real thing".

But why did I realize this only now?

"Hahaha……"

A low laugh seemed to sound from his throat, and Hikigaya raised his head from Kamakura's neck and covered his face deeply with his right hand.

Even he himself didn't know why, anyway, he just wanted to laugh, regardless of whether there was a reason or not.

He finally realized where the real mistake lay.

Perhaps since birth, there has been no sunshine in my world from the beginning, but then a ray of light suddenly descended from the dim sky, and I have been bathing in this light, and gradually I have forgotten where I was born.

This is the human world, which is a level above hell. People have always hated the evil spirits that exist in the depths of hell, but they forget that the evil spirits were originally created by humans who fell into depravity after losing their status in the human world.

Therefore, without the human world, there would be no hell.

Therefore, everyone may be a breeding ground for evil spirits, and I am no exception.

And now that light has disappeared... the real world that had been obscured by the light before finally appeared before him.

So, Hikigaya found that he could no longer deceive himself.

This world itself exists above hell. There is an evil ghost lurking in the deepest part of everyone's heart, so it is possible to fall into hell at any time. Therefore, they have to put on human masks to maintain their existence in the world.

Everything in this world is just a carefully dressed up fake.

Others are hell, others are "fakes", and others are the external world. Countless "others" constitute the entire human world.

and so……

The world is hell.

1. Postmodern Hero Story (7K)

"...Finally, any last words?"

Wearing a glove made of paper and painted white with chalk, a little girl in a white dress holds a long branch and raises it. She strokes the branch stained with red paint and breaks it with her tender palm.

Then the little girl threw away the painted branch and reached out to take a "sword" handed to her from behind. It was made of a pile of waste paper tied together and fixed with tape, and was also painted with a layer of white paint. As a result, because the "sword" was too heavy, she lost balance and swayed a few times after taking it.

Finally, the little girl had no choice but to hold the paper sword in both hands. She tensed her face and raised the paper sword unsteadily in front of her. After covering half of her face, she spoke in a deliberately suppressed and indifferent tone.

It can be seen that she really wants to pretend to have a mature and sexy tone of voice, but unfortunately her young age means that her vocal cords are not fully developed. The childish and immature emphasis on her voice does not sound majestic at all. Instead, she sounds like a kitten baring its teeth in front of a stranger. Even when she is angry, she only makes people feel cute rather than afraid.

"It seems... it's gone."

A little boy was kneeling on the beach in front of the little girl. He was wearing a black windbreaker that was hand-cut and looked very cheap, especially the patches all over the windbreaker, which showed that it was a work that was hurriedly made.

The boy lowered his head and spoke in a deliberately low and suppressed tone, then reached back to take a handkerchief stained with red paint, wiped his face a few times, threw the handkerchief aside, and then looked up to reveal his paint-covered face.

"Really? Then go to hell!"

"it hurts!"

The little girl shouted angrily, and shakily raised the paper sword to chop at the kneeling boy's head. The paper sword brushed past the boy's outstretched palm and hit his head with a loud crisp sound, making the boy scream in pain.

Judging from the force of the little girl's attack, it is hard to say whether she was taking advantage of this opportunity to settle a personal grudge. After all, when she saw the paper sword hitting the boy's head, her eyes were clearly filled with joy.

"Cough cough cough~!"

When the little boy screamed in pain, another little girl holding a script next to him coughed a few times as a reminder. However, when she saw the little boy holding his head and screaming, it was obvious that she was trying to hold back a smile.

Seeing this, a little boy holding a basket nearby quickly reached out and took out a handful of white confetti from the basket in his arms, and threw it at the two people standing in the middle of the beach from a distance, artificially creating an extremely cheap snowfall scene.

The boy in black who received the reminder from outside the field could only glare at the little girl in front of him who was trying to hold back her laughter, then pinched the paper sword hanging above his head with his hands covered in paint, raised his head and said with a stern face.

"I haven't asked you before..."

As he spoke, the boy reached out from the side clip of a belt around his waist, which looked exactly like the G1 system but was obviously a child's size, and picked up a dark golden plastic crystal card. He looked at the little girl in front of him with eyes that seemed to be spitting fire as he spoke.

"Don't you have any last words? (I'll settle the score with you when we get back, but this time I'm going to give all your pretend toys to Nami next door)?"

"Things like that have never existed (brother, if you dare to do that, I'll sell all those broken models in your room to classmates at second-hand prices, including your most precious G1 limited edition CSM belt)."

While reciting the lines they had memorized before, the two enemies looked at each other with the same vicious eyes. At the same time, their gazes almost flew out of physical sparks, and a sinister atmosphere suddenly filled the entire small beach.

All I can say is that the atmosphere, which seemed like a fight of life and death, did not seem to be acted out. Seeing the brother and sister so "into the play", the little girl holding the script nodded with admiration, while the little boy holding the basket felt his scalp tingle, and he moved away step by step, for fear that he would be accidentally affected by the upcoming battle between the brother and sister.

"That's good, then let's... hit the road together."

Through years of experience in sibling struggles, the little boy understood the meaning of the other's eyes without any instruction. He looked at his sister with a slightly distorted expression and said with a held breath.

Then he raised the dark gold plastic crystal card and pulled it hard towards the brush slot of the belt around his waist.

The belt's display screen lights up as the plastic crystal card slides across it, and at the same time, the voice-changing sound effects of this transformation belt, voiced by the well-known Japanese voice actor, Fumihiko Tachiki, also sound.

『Complete liberation』.

Click.

"Ka! OK~!"

The sudden clashing of the pallets in her hands announced the end of this scene, and the little girl with glasses nodded with satisfaction.

"Great, let's follow this feeling when we perform. Especially that last conversation. It really resonates with the love-hate relationship between Mr. Kosaka and B1. It's absolutely perfect~!"

Unfortunately, no one heard what she said. However, when they heard the collision of pallets indicating that they were staying overnight, the brother and sister, who were showing an atmosphere of "the wind is whistling and the Yishui River is cold, the hero will never return once he leaves", changed their expressions at the same time, and immediately tore off their disguises and pounced on each other.

"Yumi, you were really serious when you hit me just now! You really went too far! It hurt!"

"No way! It was you who made the mistake first, brother! You actually secretly ate the honey yokan I put in the refrigerator ready to eat! That's my favorite!"

"Didn't you eat the dorayaki I hid in the drawer before?! Two of them!"

"No way to race, no way to race~!"

"Um—Ouch! You dialed the wrong number! Ah—"

The brother and sister were each pulling at each other's faces and rolling into a ball on the sand pile in the park. Sand and fists and feet flew everywhere. The little boy holding the basket just mustered up the courage to try to stop the fight, but he took one hand and pulled the boy in with the flying confetti. The brother and sister's fight ended with an extra sandbag amid a scream.

Ignoring the melee on the sand pile behind her, the little girl holding the script pretended to be mature as she pushed the anti-radiation glasses on her nose and looked forward with anticipation.

Sitting on the public bench in front of her was a man in black. From his slender and strong figure, one could roughly tell that he was a man.

As for why we can only roughly tell the other person's gender is male by their physique? Because other than that, there is no other visible features of the person.

Not only was he wearing a set of black trousers and a black top of the same style, but even the shoes on his feet and the gloves on his hands were black. What was even more extreme was that he wore a black velvet hat on his head, a pair of black sunglasses on the upper half of his face, and a black mask on the lower half of his face.

Except for a bit of fair skin exposed on the side of his face that was not covered by cloth, this person was dressed entirely in black. He was dressed so tightly that beads of sweat appeared on his forehead. But even so, he had no intention of taking off his clothes, which made people wonder whether he would eventually pass out due to the heat.

From the inside out, this person exudes the word weirdness. However, after the children mustered up the courage to talk to the person sitting there and ask for help because they were worried that no one could evaluate their performances, they found that the other person was unexpectedly very kind, and after hearing the reason, he agreed to watch and evaluate their performances without hesitation.

Overall, he seemed to be a suspicious but very nice older brother. The little girl made this judgment based on the youthful tone of his voice when he spoke before.

The little girl asked with great anticipation, her big eyes blinking like twinkling stars.

"Well, big brother, do you think our class's performance can get high scores at the school anniversary party?"

"Uh...compared to this, are they okay? That classmate seems to be dizzy?"

The mysterious man scratched his velvet hat with his leather-gloved right hand and looked at the little boy who was thrown onto the beach in the melee. He had fainted with foam at the mouth.

"It's okay. They've always been like this, so just get used to it."

The mysterious man felt a little ashamed when the little girl said casually that she turned a blind eye to the miserable plight of her friend. The way these children got along with each other always gave him an indescribable sense of déjà vu.

"Compared to this, big brother, how about it? Our performance!"

"Hmm~ Are you sure you want to perform the scene where Mr. Kousaka fights B1 at the elementary school anniversary party?"

He held his chin in thought for a while, and then, under the anxious gaze of the little girl, the mysterious man spoke.

"It's not that it's bad, but why did you think of performing this? Wouldn't it be nice to perform some adapted fables like the other classes? The school usually has props left over from previous performances like this, so at least this way we can save the effort of making props ourselves."

“It’s different because everyone wants to perform this time.”

The little girl's answer made the mysterious man freeze in his chin stroking movement and tilt his head. The mysterious man held it in for a long time before uttering a word.

"……what?"

"I've already told you, big brother, this time no one wants to perform those old-fashioned plays! Everyone wants to perform the story about Zaimokuza-san and Kousaka-san."

The little girl suddenly raised her fist and said with an indignant expression.

"Several classes' performances even had conflicts because of this. In the end, the teachers had to break down all the events into forty-nine chapters and then come up with a lottery system, letting each class choose a plot. And our class got the scene where Mr. Kousaka fights B1... It was so disappointing! My favorite scene, where Mr. Zaimokuza transforms, was snatched away by another class!"

"...Is that so?"

The mysterious man said embarrassedly, and then his tone suddenly became high-spirited. The little girl could vaguely feel from his voice that he seemed very happy now.

"By the way! Is your favorite person w-Zai-Zaimokuza-san?"

The other person's tone was suddenly filled with joy and shyness. Although the little girl didn't know why he reacted this way, it didn't matter. For children, people who are willing to talk to them about their favorite characters are good people.

"Yeah! I like Kousaka-san too! But after all, my favorite is still Zaimokuza-san~!"

The little girl nodded heavily, clasped her hands together in front of her chest, and there seemed to be thousands of stars twinkling in her sparkling eyes.

"From his handsome looks to his gentle personality, his unwavering commitment to his promises, and his tireless efforts in pursuing his dreams, I love him so much! He's my biggest idol!"

"Hey hey hey..."

Touching the back of his head with his hand, the mysterious man couldn't help but smirk as he listened to what the little girl said.

This made the latter look at the former strangely again, but he continued speaking.

"But my favorite is, as expected, the time when Zaimokuza-san said he would protect everyone's smile. Zaimokuza-san was the most handsome back then!"

The little girl spoke excitedly, then touched the script in her arms, her eyes suddenly becoming slightly depressed.

"But my favorite character is Zaimokuza-san, but I was so unlucky when I drew the lots. Each class has three chances, but I couldn't draw a lot related to Zaimokuza-san even once..."

"Although it may sound presumptuous to say this, if it's truly possible... I hope Mr. Zaimokuza can see my performance."

As she said this, the little girl looked up at the mysterious man who was staring at her and said shyly.

"Big Brother, don't you think that his idea is too far-fetched? After all, there are so many people who admire Mr. Zaimokuza, how could he possibly come to watch our class's performance—"

"Yes~"

The mysterious man suddenly interrupted the little girl before she finished speaking, and his tone instantly changed 180 degrees from before, becoming extremely serious.

"As long as you believe, Mr. Zaimokuza will definitely be able to see your class's performance, I promise~!"

"Ugh?"

Even through the sunglasses, the little girl could feel the mysterious man's extremely serious eyes. Subconsciously, she felt that the other party did not seem to be lying, so she was stunned. Then she felt the touch of smooth leather on her head.

"Practice your performance well. As long as you continue to perform seriously, Mr. Zaimokuza will definitely come to watch your class performance on your school's anniversary."

Touching the little girl's hair, the mysterious man spoke in a kind tone.

"After all, Zaimokuza-san loves children the most~! So he will never break his promise to them—"

Click.

A crisp sound accompanied by a cold touch came from the wrist. Looking at the silver bracelet that suddenly appeared on the hand that was stroking the little girl's hair, the mysterious man's eyes behind the sunglasses suddenly became dull.

"--well?"

"That's it! You're a social scum who has evil intentions towards children!"

A handsome man in patrol police uniform suddenly emerged from the bushes behind the seat. He stared at the mysterious man handcuffed by him, his tone cold but filled with indignation.

"Get your hands off this child's head! You are under arrest for suspected child molestation and kidnapping!"