Yuiga Nariyuki wakes from a nightmare he can't shake—because it wasn't a nightmare. It was a memory. Five years from now, he died. And before he did, he watched every person he cared about slip away, one by one, into darkness he couldn't reach.
But when he opens his eyes, it's April of his third year of high school. He's been given a second chance.
Armed with a battered notebook recording the future he's desperate to prevent, Nariyuki accepts the role of education supervisor for three brillian
We Cannot Change Fate - Rewound Spring — Bearing the Ruin Five Years Later
I can't breathe.
My lungs. My throat. Burning. Everything burns. The world in front of me is dark. I can't see a thing. I reach out. Searching for someone. My fingertips find only the cold floor.
"...Is anyone there?"
No voice comes out. I try to scream, but only air escapes.
Beyond the darkness, someone is watching me. A girl with apricot-colored hair. Behind her glasses, her ultramarine eyes reflect nothing. She sits at a desk, laying out a board game alone. No rules. A board that will never be finished. She moves a piece. As if speaking to the empty seat across from her.
"...Yuiga-san."
A small voice. But it wasn't Nariyuki's name. Her eyes don't see anyone anymore.
Then, long navy-blue hair. Furuhashi Fumino. She doesn't turn around. Her back to me, she walks away. Growing distant. I try to chase her, but my legs won't move. Her figure dissolves into the darkness of night and vanishes.
"Don't go."
It doesn't become a voice.
Red-purple hair sways in the wind. Takemoto Uruka. She stands at the poolside. But she's not in a swimsuit. Still in her uniform, gazing at the water. At her feet, a pair of swimming goggles lies on the ground. She doesn't pick them up. She just turns away.
"Uruka...!"
This time, my voice comes out. But it doesn't reach her.
Finally, a woman with iris-colored hair stood there. Kirusu Mafuyu. She steps down from the podium and leaves the classroom. Nothing is written on the blackboard. Her back wasn't a teacher's back. Just the back of someone utterly exhausted.
"Teacher... I—"
The ground crumbles. I fall into dark water. Cold. Suffocating. No one there. I couldn't save anyone.
"I... couldn't save a single one of them."
The moment those words left my mouth—
"...!"
Yuiga Nariyuki shot upright.
His heart pounds against the inside of his chest. His breathing is ragged. With trembling hands, he pushes his sweat-soaked bangs off his forehead. His palms are wet. His back, his neck—soaked through.
"...A dream. Just a dream."
His voice was hoarse.
The dim room. His own small space, six tatami mats. Outside the window, it's still dark. Through a gap in the curtains, the white light of a streetlamp seeps in thin and faint. On the desk, a reference book left open. On the wall, a clumsy family drawing his little sister made in elementary school.
This is my room.
Third year of high school. April.
Nariyuki looked at his own hands. His fingers are still shaking. The sensation of the dream clings to his skin and won't let go. That cold water. That darkness. That helplessness of saving no one.
"It wasn't just a dream. I know that much."
Nariyuki reached toward his pillow. His fingertips touched a notebook. A battered, cheap thing—the kind you'd buy at a hundred-yen shop. Nothing written on the cover.
But inside—
Nariyuki opened it. In the dim room, his eyes traced the written words.
"April 7. Furuhashi Fumino, argument with father. Signs of running away."
"May 12. Ogata Rizu, on the verge of giving up on her grandmother's board game."
"June 20. Takemoto Uruka, receives study-abroad offer."
"July 3. Kirusu Mafuyu, lets slip words of regret about a student's future path."
"August 15. Rizu shuts down."
"September 30. Fumino disappears."
"October 18. Uruka quits swimming."
"November 5. Mafuyu-sensei submits resignation."
"And I—"
Beyond that, there were traces of rewriting, over and over. Erased with an eraser, written again, erased again. The final words that remained were trembling.
"Died."
Nariyuki closed the notebook.
"...No."
He said it aloud, to convince himself.
"This is a record of the future. But it hasn't happened yet. I'm going to change it."
Five years from now. I died in that future.
But when I woke up, I was back in the spring of my third year of high school. I don't know why. A whim of God, or some kind of bug. Doesn't matter.
What matters is that I get another chance.
Rizu. Fumino. Uruka. Mafuyu-sensei.
This time, I'll save them.
Nariyuki touched the braided bracelet around his left wrist. His little sister Hazuki made it in middle school—"so Onii-chan doesn't get into an accident." Faded, frayed in places.
"...It's okay."
He told himself.
It's okay. There's still time. Everything starts now.
Nariyuki put on his glasses with trembling fingers. His maroon eyes caught the light in the dark room. Short black hair, with a single cowlick sticking up. His uniform shirt, still rumpled from sleep, clung to his back with sweat.
He checked the clock. Six-thirty in the morning.
"...I have to go to school."
Nariyuki let out a deep breath and stood.
Ichinose Academy.
A private combined middle and high school in a residential district on the outskirts of Tokyo. About twelve hundred students. Above-average academic standing. Roughly sixty years since its founding. Its educational philosophy: "Independence and Self-Reliance."
Twelve minutes on foot from Hoshimizaka Station. Through the Hoshimizaka shopping arcade in front of the station, straight down the residential street, and the school gate appears—students in navy blazers funneling through it.
Nariyuki passed through that gate.
An April morning. The cherry blossoms have already fallen; the trees are green now. On the schoolyard, the morning-practice soccer club shouts at each other. The sound of balls being kicked echoes through the dry air.
"Morning, Yuiga."
A classmate calls out. Nariyuki gives a small nod.
"...Morning."
His voice is a little stiff.
He enters the classroom. Class 3-A. His seat is the very back by the window. Nariyuki sets down his bag and sits. Outside the window, the cherry tree in the courtyard sways in the wind.
(What was I doing in this classroom, in the future?)
He searches his memory. But he can't recall the details. The memories of the future are fragments. Only the important things are written in the notebook.
"Yuiga-kun, good morning."
A bright voice from behind. He turns—Furuhashi Fumino is standing there.
Long navy hair. A headband. A mole under her left eye. Model-grade beauty. Top 0.5% nationwide in humanities subjects. A genius known as the "Sleeping Beauty of the Literary Forest."
But in the future, she disappears.
"...Ah. Morning."
Nariyuki couldn't look her straight in the face.
"What's wrong? You look pale."
Fumino tilts her head, concerned. Her amber eyes peer into his.
"No, I'm fine. Just a little short on sleep."
"Up all night studying again? You're such a hard worker, Yuiga-kun."
She laughed.
(I don't want to lose that smile.)
Nariyuki clenched his fist.
"...Furuhashi. Let's do our best today, too."
"Huh? Yeah, of course."
Fumino looked a little surprised, then broke into a soft smile.
That smile stabs at his chest.
Before first period, Nariyuki was summoned to the staff room.
"Yuiga, the principal wants to see you."
At the homeroom teacher's words, Nariyuki caught his breath.
(Here it comes.)
In the future too, on this day, at this hour, he was called.
The principal's office is on the fourth floor of the main building. He knocks on the heavy wooden door, and a calm voice answers from inside.
"Enter."
He opens the door.
Inside: a reception set, a wall of bookshelves. And a large window. Before it stood an old man.
Principal Ichinose Soichiro. In his seventies. White hair neatly combed back, wearing an elegant suit. He wears a gentle smile, but his eyes are sharp. The eyes of a strategist.
"Yuiga Nariyuki-kun, is it."
"Yes."
"No need to be nervous. Have a seat."
Nariyuki lowered himself onto the sofa across from the principal. His back straightens. Sweat beads on his palms.
"I'll get straight to the point."
The principal spoke while gazing out the window.
"I want you to take on the role of education supervisor."
Education supervisor.
A system unique to Ichinose Academy. For students struggling academically, a top student designated by the principal provides individual tutoring, unpaid. The compensation is a "letter of recommendation" and "getting into the principal's good graces."
Nariyuki waited silently for the principal's next words.
"Your charges will be Ogata Rizu, Furuhashi Fumino, and Takemoto Uruka. All three have standout strengths in their best subjects, but their weak subjects are catastrophic. As things stand, passing their university entrance exams will be difficult."
The principal turned and looked Nariyuki straight in the eye.
"Your grades are above eighty percent in every subject. You're a hardworking scholar. I want you to teach them how to work hard like you do."
"...Why me?"
"Your father was once a teacher at this academy. You know that, don't you?"
Nariyuki's chest ached, just a little.
"...Yes."
"Yuiga Teruaki. He never gave up on a student who couldn't keep up. I believe that blood runs in you."
The principal's voice was quiet.
"The term is one year. Tutoring required at least three times a week. Your quota: raise your assigned students' average test scores. If you fail, the letter of recommendation is revoked."
The letter of recommendation.
With that, he could get a recommendation to the university of his choice. Given his family's finances, going to university without a recommendation would be tough.
"...I'll do it."
Nariyuki said, meeting the principal's eyes.
"But I have one condition."
"Oh?"
"I will get them into their chosen universities. All three of them. Without fail."
The principal's eyes widened slightly.
"You're confident."
"I'm not."
Nariyuki said honestly.
"But I have no choice but to do it. I have a reason I have to."
In the future, I failed.
Rizu shut down. Fumino vanished. Uruka quit swimming. Mafuyu-sensei resigned.
All of it—I couldn't save any of it.
This time, for sure.
"...Those are good eyes."
The principal smiled quietly.
"I'm counting on you, Yuiga-kun."
When he left the principal's office, his legs were shaking.
(It's begun.)
Same as the future. The appointment as education supervisor. Rizu, Fumino, Uruka. Three fates placed in my hands.
But what's different from the future is that I "know."
What will happen. Who will be made unhappy, and how.
Nariyuki put his hand in his blazer pocket. His fingertips touched the corner of the future notebook.
(I'll change it. No matter what.)
But at the same time, the weight presses down on him.
He can't tell anyone about the future.
If he does, fate might twist even further.
Not Rizu. Not Fumino. Not Uruka. Not Mafuyu-sensei.
He can't tell anyone.
He has to carry it alone.
Nariyuki looked down at the courtyard from the hallway window.
(I'll do this by myself.)
That resolve was lonely, and heavy.
Evening.
Nariyuki was walking through the Hoshimizaka shopping arcade.
Four hundred meters from the station toward the academy. Forty-two shops line the local arcade. The greengrocer's auntie shouts with vigor; the smell of croquettes drifts from the butcher's. The evening light dyes the arcade roof orange.
Nariyuki stopped in front of a small cram school at the back of the arcade—"Minami Juku."
"Ah, Nariyuki-kun. You came again today."
The owner, Minami, was setting out the signboard at the entrance. A man in his fifties, a former teacher with a caring nature. Short salt-and-pepper hair, always in a worn-out tracksuit.
"Thanks for having me. The elementary class again today?"
"Yeah, I'm counting on you. Lots of kids stumbling on arithmetic lately."
Nariyuki works part-time at this cram school three times a week. A thousand yen an hour. An important source of income supporting the household.
"By the way, I heard the principal called you in?"
Minami said casually.
"...You're well informed."
"I've known the principal for ages. Was close with your old man, too."
Nariyuki fell silent.
"You took the education supervisor job, didn't you."
"Yes."
"It'll be tough, but you can do it. You're the spitting image of your father."
Minami clapped Nariyuki on the shoulder.
That hand was warm.
By the time he got home after work, it was pa
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