The reasoning board quietly looked down at 雨宮藍子. Corpo Mikage, Room 206. Just past midnight. The six-mat room was sparse to the point of desolation—a map of Mikage Town spread across one wall, threads of scrawled notes extending from it. That was all that spoke to who lived here. 藍子 sat in her desk chair, staring at those notes. "Three nights · Every night 22:47 · Fried chicken bento · Special sauce——Who received it?" One sheet she'd pinned to the reasoning board last night. Next to the red seal marking Sylphide Mansion 704, that memo existed almost apologetically. Tonight it felt strangely heavy. She'd checked the delivery logs. Three days of history. The completion confirmations processed normally in the app each time. But who actually received it—that detail was stuck like a fishbone in her throat, immovable. She tapped the ballpoint pen cap with her finger. Tap, tap. A thinking habit. (Faked being home, that's what I thought. But the same menu at the same time every night for three days——is that a habit, or was someone else ordering it?) Two branches split in her mind. No certainty either way. Then the intercom rang. Once. 藍子 didn't move. The correct response to a late-night unexpected intercom was usually to ignore it. She had delivery set to leave-at-door. If the landlord 日暮 needed something, she'd come at a more reasonable hour. Again. And a third time. Fourth. Fifth... By the tenth ring, 藍子 picked up her smartphone. She opened the Fresh Line app——and there was a new message notification waiting. From the account "ねこたみな☆". "Amamiya-san!! Are you there!? 🆘" "Um sorry!! Something terrible happened!! 😭" "I'm ringing the intercom!! Please open the door!! 🙏🙏🙏" ...Three or more emojis. This account really did express panic through emoji volume. 藍子 stared at the screen for a moment. Reply or not. Open the door or not. Reason whispered that ignoring was optimal. But "something terrible happened" caught her attention——curiosity about the mystery and discomfort with people balanced exactly even. The next message broke that equilibrium. "I delivered to the wrong customer by mistake... My area rating's gonna drop... 💦" 藍子 sighed. Air escaped her mouth. A simple act. But it carried something close to "can't be helped." A drop in area rating could affect 藍子's own work rate. She was handling the late-night deliveries in Mikage Town tonight. A rookie's basic mistake rippling into that——logically, she couldn't overlook it. For that reason alone, 藍子 opened the door. Just five centimeters. "...猫田." "Ah!" 猫田ミナ standing at the door lit up the moment she saw 藍子's face through the gap. Her pale mint-green twin tails bounced. Golden eyes held undisguised relief mixed with slight guilt. "[gentle]Um... Amamiya-san. Sorry for the late hour." "Explain the situation." "I'll write it all in chat! On the app!" "You can speak now." "Oh, right. Um——" ミナ's explanation, organized: An order from "Okame Diner"——large fried chicken bento——delivered to the wrong room due to misreading the address. She realized after hitting the completion button. The wrong recipient said "this isn't ours," the actual customer messaged "still waiting," and when she contacted app support the response was slow. She'd been near Corpo Mikage, so she thought to ask 雨宮. 藍子 listened to the whole story through the five-centimeter gap. "Is the food still with them?" "Probably... I think they're still holding it." "The correct address is." "Mikage Town, Block 3... um——" "Send the address in chat." 藍子 closed the door once. She put on her coat, grabbed her bike keys. Then opened it again——all the way this time. ミナ looked slightly surprised. "...You're going?" "Complaint handling. It's an area rating issue." "But it's not your mistake." "If another courier in the same area screws up, it affects the whole area's rating." "...Thank you." "I'll take payment later." 　　　＊ The complaint handling went smoother than expected. The resident who'd mistakenly received the food was a good-natured middle-aged man who laughed and said "it got cold but I didn't eat it, so it's fine" as he handed it back. The actual customer——a young woman living alone——just said "I'm glad it arrived" and closed the door. That was it. ミナ stood slightly behind 藍子 the whole time, bowing deeply. Repeatedly. She apologized three times over. "[serious]猫田." "Yes!" "The app's address display sometimes mixes kanji and Arabic numerals. Next time, read it aloud to confirm." "...That's actually really practical advice." "The goal is preventing the mistake from happening again." ミナ smiled. A genuine smile, relieved. "Thank you, Amamiya-san. Really." "Just follow the app's instructions from here." "Huh? You're not going home?" 藍子 shifted her grip on the bike handlebars awkwardly. Honestly, going back to the room meant circling the same thoughts in front of that memo. Sometimes moving the body loosened mental knots. "——I have another delivery." Half true. 　　　＊ Kagerou Street wore a different face at night. The daytime shutter street felt "closed." But deep night was different——not closed, but "sleeping." The rust patterns on shutters, the light-and-shadow stripes from burnt-out streetlamps, the night sky peeking through the aged arcade roof——all equally quiet, equally honest. 藍子 pushed her bike. ミナ walked beside her. "[excited]I really like this shopping street, you know?" "...Kagerou Street?" "Especially late at night." 藍子 glanced sideways. ミナ walked looking up at the arcade. Star-fragment sky visible through the holes in the roof. "Why do you like it?" "——Because the loneliness feels honest." "..." "The daytime street has people and voices, kind of pretending to be 'a lively place.' But at night it's all stripped away. Honestly lonely. And I——like that." ミナ spoke without malice. The words fell into 藍子's thoughts and sank deeper than expected. Honestly lonely, then. 藍子 chewed on that phrase while watching the shutter rust. It took time to process. "...How long have you been in Mikage Town?" "Half a year. My parents transferred suddenly. I didn't get to say proper goodbye to my friends." "At university——" "...Nobody really talks to me. I don't fit in well either." "..." "I started Fresh Line because it's work I can do alone, mostly." ミナ kept her bright tone. No self-pity. That struck 藍子 as strange——talking about loneliness but her voice didn't sink. She smiled while speaking. Not crying. Not appealing. Just stating facts, simply. 藍子's loneliness turned inward. Shut in the room, distance from people, closed in her observation and reasoning world——that was her shape of solitude. But ミナ's was different. Facing outward. Going to university, registering for Fresh Line, doing it alone in an unfamiliar town——and still lonely. Same void, different direction. 藍子 couldn't quite put that difference into words. She looked ahead. The "Okame Diner" sign glowed faintly in the distance. During the delivery, as ミナ adjusted her food box, streetlight orange fell across her profile. 0.5 seconds. 藍子's gaze stopped. ——So brief she barely noticed. But it stopped. She immediately looked forward again. "Observation habit," she told herself. Usually that worked. Not tonight. Something in her chest moved slightly faster than calculation. Just slightly. When she tried to verify it, she stopped trying——not because the reading was unclear, but because she didn't want to know. ミナ didn't notice. "[gentle]Amamiya-san, have you been delivering here the whole time?" "About two years." "Do you like this town?" "...It's readable." "Readable?" "Few people at night, few moving things. Easy to observe." ミナ laughed softly. "That's so like you, Amamiya-san." "...Is it?" 　　　＊ The delivery to "Okame Diner" finished just before 1 AM. The owner, 三船トシ子, was seventy-two and called the living history of Kagerou Street. Small, white hair tied back in a round knot, deep wrinkles at her eyes when she smiled. Despite the late-night delivery, she was one of the few who greeted 藍子 with "thanks for your hard work" each time. Tonight, cleaning the kitchen, she said: "[serious]Say, 雨宮-chan. Heard someone died in a nearby apartment. You know about it?" ミナ flinched beside her. "Huh... which apartment?" "Sylphide. There was someone there who used Fresh Line a lot. My daughter said they ordered fried chicken bento almost every night——" Something connected quietly in 藍子. "——Every night, fried chicken bento." "That's right. Poor thing, living alone it seems." External testimony. From a direction 藍子 hadn't known. The delivery record's pattern——"three nights · every night 22:47 · fried chicken bento"——was now confirmed from the restaurant side. Her expression didn't change. But her grip on the food box tightened slightly. "...When did that person last order?" "Don't know without asking my daughter. But she said they stopped coming recently——" "[scared]That's... kind of scary." "That's how it goes sometimes. Living alone." They left the shop and started down the rest of Kagerou Street. 藍子's thoughts were already running. Last order date and time. Correlation with estimated time of death. Cross-referencing delivery records with external testimony. Possibility of faked occupancy——or the orderer themselves ordered, then afterward—— ミナ walked beside her, glancing at 藍子's profile. "[gentle]...Are you tired? Your eyes are half-closed." "They're open." "Oh, so that's your full open?" She said it matter-of-factly. Zero malice. Just observation. 藍子 searched for words for several seconds. She tried to object. But—— "...Maybe so." Quietly, she admitted it. Not laughing. Not apologizing. Just accepting it as fact, saying it aloud. ミナ laughed softly. A small laugh. Short enough to dissolve into the air. 藍子 looked ahead. For the next few seconds, she noticed for the first time that her thinking speed tonight——all night——hadn't slowed from normal. Not the speed of being absorbed in reasoning. But not slow either. Just different somehow. The footsteps beside her weren't unwelcome. That strange fact caught somewhere in her chest. 　　　＊ They reached Corpo Mikage just after 1 AM. "[excited]Let's go together tomorrow! I won't get lost this time!" ミナ declared it. Firmly, unapologetically. That "won't" carried mysterious confidence. "...You got lost tonight too." "I'm improving! Better than before!" "I guided you tonight." "That's proof of growth! I could ask for help with something I can't do alone!" She was about to say something. "That's not growth," she meant to say. But while searching for words, ミナ was already saying "okay, goodnight!" and running off. Her mint-green twin tails disappeared into the darkness. 藍子 set down her bike stand. ——She hadn't clearly refused. She realized that after ミナ's back was gone. 　　　＊ Back in her room, 藍子 stood before the reasoning board. She picked up the pen. Took out fresh memo paper. "Mimune testimony → fried chicken bento every night → external reinforcement of same order" She pinned it next to the seal. The habit pattern——internal data from delivery records, now reinforced by external testimony from the restaurant. That confirmed it wasn't coincidence. Next: verify final order date and time against estimated time of death—— She stopped the pen. Outside the window, Kagerou Street spread out. Fresh Line order lights dotted the darkness. One apartment there, a third-floor unit here, the top floor of a building beyond the shopping street——deep into night, someone was asking someone for food. Each had reasons for eating alone, each had their own temperature of solitude. 藍子 had always counted those lights by herself. Tonight, the way she counted them changed slightly. She tried to analyze what changed, how. Usually she could. But tonight——something hel