Kyou kara Ma no Tsuku Jiyuugyou!

It’s better to have more life experience.

But can you call being surrounded by fully-armed soldiers, and having guns pointed at you, a good experience? I can’t help but wonder. After living twenty-odd years, from the perspective of a j.a.panese person’s normal life, this is a very rare sight indeed.

“N-n-now what do we do, Bob!”

The only person who can be relied on now is Bob, a person from the normal society, no, putting aside the question of whether that man quietly doing radio aerobics in the diving suit he took off halfway is normal or not, at least he’s a big name in the domestic world of finance, and he’s an even bigger player who can affect the world’s economy.

Completely lit up by the searchlights, s.h.i.+buya Shouri asks Bob with a face full of antic.i.p.ation. There are already a few seaplanes gathering on the surface of Bodensee Lake inside Swiss borders, and even a few helicopters whirring overhead. And we’re standing at gunpoint, even told to “Put your hands behind your head, keep your fingers crossed!” Wow! It feels just like those FBI shows on TV.

“You should have some connections with the military higher-ups, right?”

“Ha-ha-ha… To think I’ll get a chance to let the young ones rely on me, it really makes me exceptionally happy.”

“That’s great! Hey, we’re saved, Graves! Bob says he’ll do something…”

“But unfortunately, I don’t know a single person in the Swiss army.”

“What--!?” Shouri yells strangely, pus.h.i.+ng the gla.s.ses that almost slide off his nose back up,

“Then why are you still so carefree? ‘Ha-ha-ha’… What are you ‘ha-ha-ha’-ing about!? Ah! Hey, let go! No, sorry. Ah~~ Let go! Let go now! Don’t simply touch me like that!”

Shouri can’t help but make weird noises as his body is searched from top to bottom, and by a man, too. The other person just wants to check if he has any weapons on him, but the problem is he’s wearing a super tight diving suit, where could he hide a weapon? Without even his own handgun, Shouri is just a harmless goat.

He peeks at Abigail Graves beside him, only to see that although she’s being given the full body search just like Shouri, no matter how the soldiers search her she’s still unmoving as a rock, how manly.

Only the Frenchman who grew up in the Caribbean, Francois, for some reason requires three people to search him. At first he thought it was for safety purposes, who would have guessed those three people are caressing his pecs, their expressions reveling in it. It just proves that anyone would want to touch a beautiful body.

According to the personal info they heard along the journey, Francois’ birthday seems to be on the 29th of November. As expected, it’s a day of quality meat[1], and very close to Shouri’s birthday as well.

Was this ... the lower part of Naniwa[2]? Anyway, the self-proclaimed ‘TOP GUN’ brat DTJ is sulking in a corner of the little boat because everyone ignored him, looks like he’s completely disregarded as a threat.

Come to think of it, why do we have to suffer such treatment?

A gun against the back of his head, kneeling on the swaying deck, s.h.i.+buya Shouri can’t help but curse everything that happened today.

Why must an older brother who loves his little brother like me face such harsh treatment? It’s not like I’m here to uncover Switzerland’s national secrets, or to steal a super secret cheese recipe. I’m just here to find the ‘Box’ that has something to do with my beloved little brother’s whereabouts, that’s the only reason I’m here at this lake.

He doesn’t know who to take this anger out on, so he decides to curse his brother’s friend,

“d.a.m.n, that stupid Murata! d.a.m.ned stupid Murata!”

Abigail brings her face closer to the muttering Shouri, and whispers in j.a.panese,

“We have no choice. Shouri, prepare to carry out Plan B.”

“Plan B? What’s that, is it Burappi’s[3] manager company?”

“NONONO, it’s the plan where Shouri grabbing the enemy’s machine gun as I pretend to do my shoelaces, and shoots with everything you got. I call it… ‘Yamato[4] Trickster Woman’.”

“That’s not called Yamato Trickster Woman, it’s more like Yakus.h.i.+maru Hiroko[5], right? And how could I possibly do something so dangerous!

“Anyway, something as scary as sweeping with a machine gun, I can’t possibly do it. Don’t be fooled by how I look, I’m a born and bred j.a.panese, don’t you look down on the world-famous peace idiots.”

“True—When you mention j.a.panese people, you think of Smith & Wesson[6] and j.a.panese swords—”

Abigail’s intel seems to be slightly outdated.

Suddenly they realize DTJ, who was sulking in the corner, is now staring into the sky. His gaze looks just behind the helicopter hovering in mid-air. And then he suddenly starts waving his right hand non-stop, telling Bob, Abigail and Francois in English,

“Get down!”

The moment she heard the warning, Abigail grabs Shouri’s neck, and presses him down onto the deck in one smooth movement.

“That hurts—What are you doing, Graves!”

“NO—Call me Abby~~”

“You’re a real pain, Gai…”

Just as he’s about to say ‘-l’, the threat the TOP GUN predicted came true. A small jet approaches with a roar at extremely low alt.i.tude, flying so low it just about touches their heads. Although it can’t actually fly that low, to a layman like Shouri, it’s enough for him to feel as though the hair on top of his head is almost being shaved off.

The jet may be small, but the air pressure still throws up huge waves on the water surface, the military seaplane swaying violently as well. Faced with the engine of a jet, the little boat Shouri’s on is no match at all.

The Swiss soldiers standing on the boat fall down one by one, all thrown into the water, caught in the waves and sinking to the bottom of the lake.

Shouri immediately grabs Abigail’s hand. Because she’s younger, a girl and a Bostonian, he can’t let her drown in a lake so far away from her homeland.

But he instantly remembers that Abigail has scuba training, and the one really in danger is him. Although he’s wearing a diving suit, he has no oxygen tank on his bank, and the most important thing now is breathing, if they don’t float to the surface immediately they won’t be able to breathe.

Although it’s a moonless night, the searchlights still brighten up the water. The clear lakewater is dotted with white and blue, until even the faces underwater are all sparkling, the little bubbles from their mouth floating upwards slowly.

Someone pulls his hand, and Shouri looks behind him, only to see Abigail hand him an oxygen tank the size of a hair gel bottle. The expression on her face is less of a gentle smile, and more of a creepy grin. Accepting the oxygen tank, Shouri takes a deep breath and returns it to her.

She points at the bottom of the lake where the color is darker, and keeps swimming downwards while pulling Shouri’s hand. Her brown hair floats without gravity, all he movements becoming slow.

She keeps gesturing ‘over here over here’—Is that depth somewhere you can dive to without any equipment?

He closes the mouth that nearly opens, because it’s no use talking in the water. With Abigail pulling his hand, Shouri looks in the direction of the darkness, even if she’s a brave cheerleader c.u.m rash treasure hunter, it’s still impossible for her to simply dive to the bottom of the lake with such a small oxygen tank, right?

The change occurs at a not-so-deep depth.

A violent current suddenly appears beside them, light and bubbles both disappearing from the surface of the water. Shouri’s so panicked he wants to yell, but regains his senses after drinking a lot of water, realizing that his limbs can’t move normally, and his body is ten times heavier than usual too.

The reason he can’t move his heavy limbs freely, is because Abigail is hugging him tightly. She’s not scared or panicked, but trying to push the oxygen into Shouri’s mouth, only they keep swinging about in the water, so she can’t manage it.

What’s happening here!?

The same words repeat in his head three times, and there’s still not a hint of an answer.

Shouri starts moaning in pain—the pain of his limbs being grabbed, pulled, and his body twisted around. Abigail’s in the same boat, but she’s a lot calmer than Shouri, even trying desperately to move her neck, contemplating the surface and the bottom of the lake alternatively.

Cursing “d.a.m.n!” and releasing a ton of bubbles, Shouri pushes the oxygen in his mouth to Abigail. That feeling is a lot like getting tossed into the center of a tornado.

Must get to the surface. Swim upwards, must figure out a way to swim upwards. But first we must change direction, because we’re sinking to the bottom of the lake head-first. His neck being grabbed, Shouri slowly sinks downwards.

Before he can find it hard to breathe, Shouri’s throat, having swallowed quite a lot of water, and his temple are already starting to throb. His skin sinks into his ribs under the pressure, his lungs with just remnants of air left bordering on exploding, Shouri clenches hard on his teeth and can’t help but close his eyes. The strangeness his body feels from the water pressure, must mean he’s already in the depths of the lake.

“What…”

Just as he’s about to open his mouth and say “What is this”, his surroundings become bright.

Water flows out of his nose and mouth, the brightness and temperature of his surroundings obviously different from before.

He’s no longer looking at the lake in the middle of the night.