As I absent-mindedly gazed at the schoolyard’s cherry trees from the classroom’s window, I almost started laughing from getting reminded of my dad’s funny faces.
When I was little and saw cherry trees with green leaves for the first time, my dad went “Oh no, Mana! The cherry trees turned all green!” to try to mess with me.
But for some reason I got sad and broke into tears, to which my dad panicked and tried to make me laugh by making funny faces.
He always tried to make sure I had a good time.
I loved him for that…
Class 2-A instantly filled with noise once the bell rang and the teacher left the classroom.
I could see several groups of friends gathering up here and there.
It’s barely May and it looks like everyone in class has already found their groups.
There were only a few people like me that were by themselves.
It’s not like I’m lonely or anything. I’m fine with this… I think.
My seat was next to the window in the back row. Right when I set my chin on my hands and looked back outside the window, I heard the voices of two girls who had walked up to me.
One had healthy-looking light brown skin, while the other looked mild-mannered with braided hair.
Sorry… I can’t remember your names…
“You’re not part of any club, right? You should join the girls tennis club.”
The brown-skinned girl got straight to the point.
Why are you inviting me out of all people? Do I look like a stray dog that needs to be saved…?
“I’ve never played tennis before…”
“We welcome beginners, too!”
“I’m not really athletic, either…”
“She always fails P.E.”
She spoke with a smile while pointing at the braided girl.
I made a troubled face.
“But…”
“To be honest, you’d give our club a lot more publicity if you joined. You might not know this, but the guys actually talk about you a lot.”
“No way, no way.”
I waved my hand in front of my face, denying her statement.
There’s no way a boring girl like me who looks like she smells like a hospital would be popular.
My face isn’t even that cute, either.
The only people that’d like me would probably be guys that are into flat chests.
“It’s true, though.”
The braided girl spoke with a laid-back tone.
“The boys always talk about how mysterious you are~”
Oh… so that’s what they think of me…
I suppose anybody would get curious if someone barely talked in class and just stared out the window all day…
“Yeah, they say you have like 26 mysteries or something. If a rare character like you joined us, the girls tennis club would be the talk of the school.”
“Still, though…”
I was fidgeting and having a hard time turning them down, but then the bell saved me.
That ding-dong sound was like music to my ears.
“Well, think about it.”
The brown-skinned girl spoke excitedly and the two of them headed back to their seats.
Throughout class I looked out the window while legitimately thinking about whether or not I should join the girls tennis club or not.
In the end, I decided to turn them down.
I really did feel bad for them.
I honestly was interested in the club.
And in making friends.
But… I…
The last morning bell rang and lunch break started.
I grabbed my bag and rushed out of the classroom and up onto the roof.
As usual, there was no one here.
I tucked my hair, fluttering in the wind, behind my ear.
I then sat along the side of the rooftop and opened my bag.
“Oh…”
I screwed up…
The image of my lunchbox left on the kitchen table came up in my head.
This just isn’t my day…
Should I go buy lunch? …No, I’m not even that hungry.
I leaned outwards against the edge of the rooftop with my cheek against my hand.
There were 5 or 6 boys out in the school yard playing soccer, maybe they had an early lunch or something.
After watching them for a while, another person showed up.
Coming in from the school entrance, he cut through the boys playing soccer and ran towards the school building.
Upon paying closer attention, I noticed he was carrying a lunchbox.
Now understanding the situation, I took a deep breath and shouted out as loud as I could while waving my hand.
“Heeeey! Shouichiiiii!”
Shouichi began spinning around while looking around.
“I’m up here!”
…Oh, he figured it out.
After not even a minute had passed, Shouichi opened the door to the rooftop.
I greeted him with a smile and gratefully took the lunchbox he brought.
“I’m glad I made it on time.”
The out-of-breath Shouichi spoke with a relieved face.
I stopped him as he was about to head back.
Then….
“Here, some veggies.”
“Ahhhhh”
I picked up some stir-fried vegetables with my chopsticks and planted them inside Shouichi’s wide-open mouth.
His jaw and cheeks took their time moving about before I heard him swallow.
“Yep, they’re nice and crispy.”
Shouichi spoke with a smile.
“What do you want next?”
“Um, the simmered carrots.”
“All right, here you go.”
“Yeah, the konbu dashi really brings out the flavor.”
Shouichi flashed another smile.
This was kinda fun.
I took a bite of the mushroom mixed rice and smiled as well.
“Hey, teach me how to cook some time.”
“You want to cook?!”
The surprised Shouichi coughed on the konjac that got stuck in his throat.
How rude.
“What, am I not supposed to?”
“It’s not that, it’s just…”
“I think it’d be better if I made my lunch on my own. I feel bad for having you make it for me every morning.”
“I actually enjoy making it all the time, but if you really want to make it on your own, then I’ll help you out.”
“Thanks.”
I bowed my head in courtesy.
“Here’s some teriyaki chicken.”
“Yeah, the sauce covered it well.”
Shouichi and I continued to empty out the lunchbox with smiles on our faces.
Homeroom ended and a sense of freedom washed over all the students in the room.
As usual, I immediately left the classroom.
I walked along the side of the schoolyard and headed straight for the school gate.
There were a couple students also on their way home in front of me.
I could hear the laughing voices of the students in the sport clubs coming from the schoolyard.
The baseball club was playing catch, the track club was stretching, the soccer club… had everyone lined up doing leg raising exercises.
There was a relaxed mood about them, since practice hasn’t entered full force yet.
On the tennis court across from the schoolyard were a few tennis club members running laps.
I saw the brown-skinned girl and the braided girl running to the club room next to the court.
How should I turn them down?
I grew a little melancholic as I thought about it.
I can’t tell them the real reason.
But I couldn’t think of any good excuses, either.
Maybe I could tell them I had a curfew…
No, it’s not like I’m some rich girl.
Maybe I could tell them I had a part-time job…
No, it wouldn’t take them long to expose me once they start asking me where I work.
What if I had a phobia of tennis balls…
No, that doesn’t even make any sense. What kind of backstory would give me a phobia like that?!
“Watch it!”
“Get away!”
I twitched from the sudden voices of the boys and turned towards their direction.
There was a baseball flying straight towards me.
I then remembered a certain dead ball during a baseball broadcast I saw on television.
After the pitcher threw the ball, it hit a player’s helmet and knocked him down for good, resulting in him having to be taken away on a stretcher.
I instinctively threw out my hands in front of me.
Several seconds later, I heard cheers of praise coming from the boys of the baseball club.
They probably thought I caught the ball with my bare hands.
But that wasn’t what really happened.
The ball stopped moving several millimeters away from the hands I put in front of me to protect my face.
In other words, it was floating in midair.
I ended up using my power…
I threw the ball and ran away.
I ran as far as I could until I was out of anyone’s sight.
By the time my feet stopped, I was at a secluded road far enough to where you couldn’t even see the school building anymore.
I was filled with a sense of regret as I looked down at the white line separating the sidewalk and the roadway with my shoulders heaving.
Even if it was for the sake of protecting myself, I made a mistake.
If people found out that I’m not a normal person, I’d lose my place in the world…
Uncle and Shouichi would get scared of me and leave me…
I don’t want that to happen!
I can’t break the promise I made with Dad…!
I then thought back to the day I made that promise with my dad…
On that day, my dad and I were driving to a shopping center in the city.
I was 5 years old at the time, and I had fun getting clothes and candy bought for me as well as getting to eat a kid’s lunch at a family restaurant.
I also got a cute stuffed bear and a balloon.
It was a white balloon.
While my dad was choosing a shirt to buy, I walked out of the men’s clothes store from boredom and made a careless mistake.
I forgot I was holding the balloon and let go of it to grab a fruit gummy from my can.
By the time I realized it, the balloon had already reached far above me.
As I looked up with my mouth open in dumbfoundedness, the balloon continued to float up and eventually reach the ceiling.
Not even an adult could get it at this point.
This fun day was about to be ruined just because of this one thing.
I was determined to get back the balloon no matter what.
For the sake of ensuring that my memories of this day would stay fun.
I stretched out my hand as far as I could.
And then screamed in my heart.
Please, come back to me!
Please!!
It’s not like I used any kind of special power.
I just couldn’t think of anything else I could do.
The white balloon began to slowly descend.
It was falling down at the same speed as when it went up.
It was like watching a rewinding video.
I gripped onto the balloon’s string.
That was when I awakened to my hidden power.
But I didn’t feel any interest or surprise towards it at the time.
I was just happy to get my balloon back.
As I tightly hugged the balloon like it was a stuffed animal, my dad approached me with a shocked face.
He picked me up without saying anything and got out of the shopping center as if he was running away.
He didn’t say anything in the car on our way back either.
I began to tremble in fear that he was angry at me.
But when we got back home, my dad spoke to me with a smile.
“Listen, Mana. You can’t use that power you used earlier in front of other people, no matter what. Can you promise me that?”
I was too young at the time to understand why he was saying that.
But I could tell that he was acting different than normal, even though he was smiling.
So I simply nodded obediently.
As Mana walked back home in the sunset, she made a vow.
A vow that she’d never break that promise again.
But that vow she made on her own would be broken in only a few seconds.
It had to be broken.
As she walked alone, the image of a scorpion-type Unknown, Scorpion Lord, showed up in her head. It was like an image that would suddenly float up in a fortune teller’s crystal ball.
The very next moment, the Scorpion Lord threw out a poison needle with its long tail, to which Mana turned around and knocked it away with her bag.
The Scorpion Lord slowly revealed itself from the shadows.
Mana’s body froze in place.
Meanwhile, a report was made to the police from a citizen stating that they had witnessed a creature resembling an Unknown. Hikawa equipped the G3 System and headed out from the G Trailer to take it on.
The Guard Chaser’s engine spun faster and faster.
He was approaching the area mentioned in the witness report.
But Hikawa caught his breath from the surprising scene he encountered.
Mana was running into a fenced-off construction site with the Scorpion Lord chasing after her.
Why was Mana being attacked by an Unknown…?!
As G3 found himself questioning the situation, he pulled out the high-frequency sword GS-03 from the rear left trunk of the Guard Chaser and his personalized handgun, now loaded with bullets far stronger than the ones from his previous battle, from the left cowl’s trunk.
He then entered the construction site with the sword equipped to his right arm and the handgun in his left hand.
Mana and the Scorpion Lord ran while dodging around the construction materials in the unmanned premises.
G3 aimed his handgun towards the Scorpion Lord’s back.
Then it happened.
Mana looked to her side as she ran and glared at a pile of steel frames.
Her eyes were filled with power.
The pile of steel frames then floated up in the air like balloons and fell upon the Scorpion Lord that was chasing after her.
After confirming what had happened, Mana disappeared through an exit.
Hikawa made a bewildered expression from behind his mask.
Those were psychic powers just now…!
The sound of the steel frames shaking about could be heard.
Upon looking towards its direction, the Scorpion Lord that should have been squashed by the steel frames once again stood up.
Without a moment’s delay, G3 aimed his handgun and fired one, two, three shots.
All three shots landed made their mark on the Scorpion Lord’s back, its body reeling from the impact.
It worked! I can beat it like this!
He began to continue to pull the trigger to shower the enemy with bullets.
However the Scorpion Lord began stepping back and drew out an axe and shield from a halo that had appeared over its head.
What?! That’s impossible…!
All the bullets bounced off its shield with not even a single one managing to inflict a wound.
“Damn it!”
G3 ran forward to attempt close-quarters combat.
At that moment, the Scorpion Lord let out a roar and threw its axe.
G3 turned his body to dodge it.
However, the axe’s trajectory curved like a boomerang and made a hit on G3’s right thigh area.
Sparks flew out as G3 lost his balance and fell on one knee.
The Scorpion Lord took this chance to charge in.
G3 desperately fired his handgun to stop its advance, but his attempts to break past its shield were futile.
The Scorpion Lord eventually closed the gap and swung down its axe.
“Urgh…!”
G3 crossed his arms above his head to protect himself.
A shrill crashing sound suddenly rang out in the construction site.
Agito had broken through the steel fence on his bike.
The Machine Tornador, a bike with a front cowl reminiscent of a dragon and a body colored with shining gold and vivid red.
It was Agito’s personalized vehicle, a form Shouichi’s bike took by taking in the power of Agito when he transformed.
“Agito…!”
G3 ended up shouting out that name upon recognizing that appearance.
As the Scorpion Lord was about to swing down its axe, Agito rammed his bike’s front cowl into it at full speed.
As the Scorpion Lord flew into the air and crashed into the steel frames of a building that was mid-construction, G3 took this chance to rush to his Guard Chaser.
After taking out the grenade unit, GG-02, that was stored in the right cowl and docking it together with his handgun, G3’s strongest weapon, the Grenade Launcher, was formed.
The Scorpion Lord got back on its feet, seething in anger.
G3 quickly took aim and fired the Grenade Launcher.
“Haah…!”
G3 yelled out as the Grenade Launcher made its mark and caused an explosion on the Scorpion Lord’s chest.
However the Scorpion Lord was still standing, seemingly unharmed, merely having been pushed back a slight bit by the impact.
It didn’t work…?!
But then the Scorpion Lord grasped at its chest with an expression of pain. The very next moment, its body blew up in a grand explosion and disappeared without leaving a trace.
I… I did it…! I defeated an Unknown!
The excitement towards his first victory raced through his body.
The doubts he had been holding towards his capabilities disappeared as his heart filled with confidence.
However he soon broke out of his victory fervor when the sound of the Tornador’s engine caught his attention.
Agito, who had been watching over G3’s battle, made a U-turn and sped off.
“Agito!”
Hikawa once again shouted out that name.
He cried out for him to stop.
“Agito! Who in the world are you?!”
No response was given.
Hikawa did nothing but stand and stare out at the empty space left behind by the Tornador.
At about the same time, Mana was standing in a back alley catching her breath.
She looked behind her to make sure the Unknown wasn’t still following her.
She then sat down in relief.
She thought about how her powers must have gotten stronger.
She was saved because her powers activated on their own, but she was frightened at the same time.
Mana once again turned around to make sure no one was there.
Was that one of those Unknowns that people have been talking about? Was it trying to attack me…? But why?
She then decided to hurry back home, only to have her way blocked by a jackal-type Unknown with sharp fangs, the Jackal Lord.
What were the chances of getting attacked by not one, but two Unknowns in the same day?
Mana took a deep breath and glared at the Jackal Lord in an attempt to blow it away.
Her eyes began to glow.
However the Jackal Lord didn’t even twitch.
Mana remembered that her powers were unstable.
She had tested out her powers in secluded areas in the past, but they didn’t always work.
After making a killing sign with its fingers, the Jackal Lord bent its legs close to the ground, getting ready to attack.
The next moment, it launched towards Mana.
Its sharp fangs aimed for her carotid artery.
Mana didn’t have the time to even be surprised, let alone dodge.
That’s just how fast it was.
It happened in the blink of an eye.
However, someone showed up and got in the way of the Jackal Lord.
Mana’s eyes rested on the back of that individual.
A strange creature with a dark green-colored body was standing in front of her with the Jackal Lord’s fangs embedded into its neck.
Green blood flowed out from where the fangs made contact.
Am I saved…?
As Mana stared at it with that thought, the strange creature looked up towards the sky and roared with its mouth opening as if it was tearing apart.
It was like a roar of a violent wild animal, but Mana could feel a certain sadness hidden within it.
Once it finished roaring, it immediately initiated its relentless counterattack.
The strange creature’s fangs bit into the Jackal Lord’s shoulder.
It was just like the actions of a wild beast.
The strange creature bit off a chunk of the Jackal Lord’s shoulder in an instant.
The Jackal Lord fell on its knee with jet-black blood trailing down its body.
The strange creature lifted its right arm and prepared to deal the finishing blow.
A sharp claw sprouted out from its right arm.
That right arm then swung upon its enemy in an arc-like motion.
Upon piercing its stomach, the Jackal Lord stopped moving as jet-black blood bursted out.
The Jackal Lord stepped back with a pained expression on its face, and then exploded with a shower of blood.
The strange creature stood still, its entire body covered with the blood of its victim.
Despite the fear she felt, Mana could not turn her eyes away from the creature.
Suddenly, the strange creature crumpled down onto the floor.
Mana’s eyes grew wide.
The strange creature’s body seemed to melt as it writhed in pain.
Its dark green flesh took on a human shade, its horns were replaced with hair, and its red-eyed face was now one of a young man’s.
It was Ryou Ashihara.
Mana found herself in shock over the strange creature’s true identity being a human.
Ryou looked at his hands which had been burning up in pain.
They were growing wrinkly from the effect of accelerated aging.
Ryou’s face filled with fear.
Mana didn’t hesitate to rush to Ryou’s side.
The moment she touched Ryou’s shoulder, something was born within her.
“Stay away from me!”
Ryou threw off Mana’s arm and shakily got back onto his feet.
Mana watched Ryou stumble away with his entire body in pain, occasionally supporting his body with his arm, as he eventually disappeared into the darkness of the alleyway.
Kamen Rider Novel Translations 