Last night, Aki couldn't sleep, gripping the charm in his hand. Shun could tell. The reason was simple. This morning, the moment he saw Aki changing into his shoes at the entrance of Hozumi-ga-oka High School, he instinctively thought, "Ah, he didn't sleep." It wasn't the color under his eyes. His laugh was just slightly too smooth compared to usual. A prepared smile always has that particular texture to it. "Yo, Shun. Akari too." Aki caught up with the two of them just outside the school gate. His uniform necktie was loosely tied as always, his bag slung over his shoulder, walking with an air of ease. "We're going to Kuresomi Alley today, right? Can I come too?" Akari turned around. Her pale chestnut-colored medium-length hair swayed in the evening light. "Huh? Again?" "Again, what. I've only been twice," "You couldn't get in last time," "I feel like I can get in today," It was the way someone speaks with baseless conviction. But Shun sensed what lay beneath those words—"I feel like." When someone who spent last night gripping a charm says "I feel like" the next morning, it's not quite the same as having no basis. They're simply expressing something they can't quite put into words in that form. The three of them headed toward Kuresomi Alley. Aki walked slightly ahead. "Last time I couldn't see the door, but honestly I'm not worried about it at all," The word "at all" carried just a hint of force for a moment. His voice was slightly higher. Shun said nothing. Akari replied briefly beside him, "I see." She said nothing more. As they entered the old town district, the air changed. The bustle from the station faded as if it were a lie, and wooden buildings unchanged since the early Showa period lined both sides. The stone pavement was subtly uneven, and the evening light slanted in, deepening the shadows of the buildings. The scent of chestnuts drifted from the eaves of the Japanese confectionery shop "Yuzuki." It was the heavy, sweet smell of steamed yokan. The end of Kuresomi Alley drew near. Aki's feet stopped. "...It's just there normally," His voice cracked for just one beat. A sign hand-carved into a copper plate—"=Le Double="—glimmered faintly on the flax-colored, discolored copper surface, catching the twilight. It was certainly visible in Aki's field of vision. "I guess I was prepared for it, huh," He began analyzing himself. "If you're aware of your resolve, it might not be resolve anymore," He replied with complete seriousness. Aki stumbled backward dramatically. "Philosophy, seriously?" "No, I really think so," "Then show it more with your expression!" Akari let out a small laugh. A soft giggle. Dimples appeared on both cheeks. That exchange released the tension of the three standing at the end of the alley—just for one beat. —— When they opened the door to Le Double, the sound changed immediately. The evening atmosphere from outside disappeared, leaving only the low rotating sound of a coffee mill and the ticking of seven clocks hanging on the wall. The seven clocks each moved at different speeds, their second hands' sounds slightly out of sync, layering over each other. It was an unfamiliar layer of sound. Aki lost his words. Shun could tell. The voice that had been talking continuously outside went quiet the moment they crossed the threshold. Rather than being swallowed by the space's gravity, it felt as though the space had changed his pace. Eight counter seats. Four tables. Lantern-style indirect lighting. Shun vaguely thought that the faint glow of the wood grain's growth rings might be the influence of chronolayer liquid—a liquid concentrated with possibility, born from paths humans didn't choose. Lizette looked toward the three from behind the counter with a quiet gaze. Her flax-colored long hair was loosely tied back, white blouse and apron. Her sharp jade-colored eyes lingered slightly longer on Aki. It was a measuring gaze. "Three seats, please," Her voice was calm, with little inflection. Nothing unnecessary, only the minimum words. The three sat at the counter. "Today, I don't think Akari and I will be drinking," Akari nodded slightly beside him. Lizette raised no objection. She simply said, "Understood," and began preparing coffee for Aki alone. The coffee mill made a low sound. The grinding of beans echoed as if filling the gaps between the clock's second hand ticks. Hot water for dripping was poured in a thin stream, and the aroma of coffee spread quietly. Aki gazed at the wood grain of the counter during all this. Eventually, a cup was placed before him. A colorless transparent liquid was mixed into the coffee, with just a hint of amber fluorescence drifting through it—chronolayer liquid. "...What happens if I drink this," His voice was low. Not his usual "don't worry about it" tone. "You will come to know through your own body what you did not choose," Aki laughed slightly. "I shouldn't have asked," He murmured and reached for the cup. Just before— "Any allergies?" "We have yet to encounter anyone who shows an allergic reaction to chronolayer liquid," She answered immediately, deadpan. "Who answers like that? Normally?" "I cannot speak to what is normal, but it is fact," "...Well, whatever," Aki lifted the cup. He took a sip. —— During the retroactive experience, Aki remained perfectly still. His back was straight, both hands resting on the counter. His eyes were open but seeing nothing. Akari gripped her hands in her lap at the counter, her fingertips turning white. Shun kept his gaze fixed on a single point in the wood grain while keeping Aki's motionless back at the edge of his vision. The only sounds were the clock's second hand and the coffee mill. Chronolayer liquid—drinking it allows you to retroactively experience the scenes of a life you didn't choose, from a first-person perspective, for approximately fifteen to thirty minutes. What was Aki seeing right now? Shun could only imagine. In the silence, he suddenly noticed the tension in Akari's hands. His own fingertips had also gone rigid without him noticing. They were locked the same way. The weight of worrying about Aki and the sensation of sharing the same air with Akari existed simultaneously in his chest. A mixed emotion that couldn't be separated into one or the other. How much time had passed? Aki took a deep breath. One second. Two seconds. Three seconds of silence— He collapsed to the floor, not the chair. Slowly, slowly. He knelt down and covered his face with both hands. He didn't move after that. Akari opened her mouth. She tried to say something. But the words wouldn't come. Shun was the same. He searched. He kept searching. He couldn't find the shape of words. Then sounds began leaking from Aki's mouth. Not so much a voice as something that leaked out. His father's business failing. The debt growing, which middle school Shun—no, Aki—had watched from beside him. The cost for taking the medical school entrance exam suddenly disappearing one morning. The reason he couldn't tell anyone. The real cause of his suspension. What he'd kept beneath his carefree smile for years. The voice broke but didn't stop. There were parts that didn't quite become words, yet Aki didn't stop. The act of speaking itself was a formless outpouring from someone experiencing it for the first time. Shun searched for words. He thought he should say something. He kept searching for what to say. It felt like he needed proper words. But the more he searched, the less they came. Before he knew it, his hand was moving. He placed his hand on Aki's shoulder. That was all. Lizette placed a glass of water on the floor near the counter from inside, without a sound. A long silence followed. The clock's second hands continued ringing, their sounds overlapping in discord. Aki slowly raised his face. His eyes were red. His lips tried to smile halfway and failed. "You're bad with words, but you're weirdly accurate at times like this," His voice was broken with laughter and tears. "I didn't say anything," He replied deadpan. "That's what makes it accurate," Aki spoke, his voice mixing laughter and tears. He slowly lowered the hand that had covered his face. Akari beside him let out a breath and relaxed. The fingertips that had turned white on her lap gradually regained their color. *So Shun doesn't use words in times like this—his hands move instead.* The thought took shape in Akari's mind. It connected with the memory from the night of the second episode, when Shun simply sat beside her after they left the cafe. That connection began to carry a small warmth in the depths of her chest. Akari herself didn't yet know the name of that change. —— Then the air changed. It wasn't a sound. It was a change like atmospheric pressure, like something was being compressed. Lizette quietly left the counter. Her gaze turned toward the entrance to the corridor—the hallway with seven doors lined up, beyond the door behind the counter in the back of the first-floor hall. The fourth of those doors. The door with a red brass handle called "The Red of Resolve" was trembling—so faintly that you'd need to strain to see it, yet unmistakably. Something appeared in Lizette's expression for the first time. The quiet tension of one who knows the end of a long age. Lizette turned back to the three. "There is something I must tell you," It wasn't an explanation. It was closer to a confession. Chronos Falx—Latin for "the scythe of time"—the organization targeting this place. How it sought to use chronolayer liquid as a different kind of power, and how it had once erased a human being. How that person's disciples still move today. And how they are now very close. The three listened in silence. The story that had begun with an inner question about their futures was now, in this very moment, overlapping with an outer question about protecting this place. It felt irreversible to Shun. It felt like there was no going back. "How close are we talking—" The moment Aki opened his mouth. The sound of footsteps on stone pavement came from the direction of Kuresomi Alley. Multiple footsteps. Leather shoes. Rhythmic, unhurried. Rather, they approached with the quietness of someone heading home after their business was done. The three quickly left the cafe. A man in a suit stood in the shadow of the latticed window of Kaiten-do—an antique shop. He appeared to be in his early thirties. Slim, with neatly arranged hair. He held a small terminal, checking the numbers on its display. It was the same silhouette they'd seen in front of Hozumi-ga-oka Station on the night of the third episode. The man didn't notice the three. He checked the terminal's numbers one last time, then turned on his heel. The sound of his leather shoes echoed rhythmically on the stone pavement and disappeared into the darkness of the alley. The three didn't move. Beyond the latticed window of Kaiten-do, candlesticks were lined up quietly. The scent of chestnuts from the confectionery shop "Yuzuki" still lingered in the air. Kuresomi Alley wore its usual evening face. It wore the face of something that had never happened. —— On the way home, the three were a bit quiet. When they reached the walking path along the Kuse River, the water surface swayed, catching the thin light of the entrance to night. The cherry blossoms had already fallen, with only a few petals floating on the river's surface. After walking for a while, Aki spoke. In a tone that could have been directed at someone or been a soliloquy. "This is the first time I've said I wanted to be a doctor," Akari waited a moment before speaking softly. "I think it was good that you said it," Shun said nothing. That silence functioned as agreement. Aki seemed to understand, and with his gaze still on the river, he smiled slightly. It was a genuine smile, not a laugh-cry. They parted way