I am only one world away from Yukinoshita.

..................................................................

Asuka, standing at the door, pressed her ear against the door and could faintly hear intimate sounds coming from inside. She withdrew her hand from the doorknob. Although she had just tried to break in, the door was locked, and the people inside seemed not to have noticed at all.

So Kiyoshi has reached this age...

Chapter 19 A Weekend Where Sanity Drops Like Crazy (Part 7)

While Eriri was engrossed in her own world, Yukinoshita escaped from her room. Her legs went weak as she walked to the living room, filled a glass of cold water with the matching mug, and brought it to her lips.

"It's over already? So fast?"

"Cough cough—!"

Hearing a third sound that shouldn't have been in the house, Yukinoshita, who was terrified today, spat out the water she hadn't swallowed yet. She covered her mouth and coughed violently, her eyes reddening slightly.

Yukino looked toward the source of the sound and saw someone familiar but someone she couldn't possibly remember being here—Tanaka Asuka.

Is she dreaming, or does she just look exactly the same?

The other person was dressed in simple casual clothes, holding a mug in both hands. The pattern on the mug was obviously a pair with the one in my hand. If you put the two mugs together, you could see a pair of black and white cats playing.

"I'm sorry for opening your door without permission, but don't worry, I'm not so wicked as to open Kiyoyori's door to find out what's going on!"

Asuka made a gun gesture with her hand and aimed it at Yukinoshita, her face full of mischief.

"Oh my, I didn't expect that Kiyotaka would step into the adult world first. It's so good to be young."

Yukinoshita, unable to bear it any longer, interrupted the other person's self-talk.

“Tada—,” considering the form of address, the other person might be acquainted with Kiyoyori, “Asuka, what are you doing here?”

Shouldn't it be in Chiba?

"Hmm, Kiyori is being rather cold today. Is it because I interrupted your good time?" Before Yukinoshita could get completely angry, Asuka put away her joking expression. "Since I have nowhere to go back for the time being, I came to Kiyori's place to take refuge."

She spoke lightly, her eyes, hidden behind her shiny glasses, flickered with an unreadable expression. She lowered her head, took another sip of water, and sat on the sofa, ignoring Yukinoshita's scrutiny.

Although they look alike and have the same voice, based on the two people Yukinoshita has met, she cannot be sure that this is the second-year senior she encountered at Soubu High School.

It's Saturday, and she bumped into her at school yesterday. It's hard to believe she would have traveled all the way from Chiba to Uji just to "seek refuge." Looking closer, she noticed the upperclassman was still wearing long sleeves. July in Uji is already sweltering summer; even the cicadas outside the window are chirping in the heat. Yet Asuka is going against the grain, wearing long sleeves that reveal her dark undergarments underneath, and strands of hair are stuck to her neck.

What happened?

Since the other party is someone who has the ability to freely enter and leave this house, then she should not only be Kiyoyori's friend, but should have a closer relationship, close enough that Kiyoyori's parents would trust her enough to hand over the key to their house.

Given this relationship, it's not surprising that Yukino asked this question.

"Xiao Qinglai, is it alright in the room? Why leave that girl alone?"

Asuka couldn't be serious for more than three seconds before she revealed a malicious smile again, but to Yukinoshita it seemed like she was just making excuses for herself.

"She was happy on her own; I was just reciting my lines."

"Reciting lines?" Asuka blinked in surprise. "Kiyori has a hobby of role-playing?"

Although I wasn't quite sure what the other person meant, I said, "No."

Asuka curled up on the sofa, chuckled to herself, and said, "Do I really have to ask?"

"If you'd like to say it."

Asuka felt her arm through her sleeve. "That's it, I can never beat Kiyoshi because of you."

"But I never intended to hide it from you anyway, so I'm counting on you today!"

also……?

Asuka walked into the kitchen with practiced ease, opened the cupboard, looked around, and then pulled out a small white handbag. "Can we go to the practice room?"

Yukino nodded and followed her down into the ground.

She was a little confused as to why she suddenly wanted to ask Asuka. Just like Asuka said, even if she didn't ask, Asuka would tell her. But she asked first. Did this mean that she was curious about Tachibana Kiyoyori's life? Did she want to know what the people around him were like, how they treated Tachibana Kiyoyori, and wanted to use their eyes and words to create a three-dimensional Tachibana Kiyoyori?

Was it really because I was unconsciously comparing the two of them? They had similar backgrounds, yet led completely different lives.

As Asuka pushed open the heavy soundproof door of the practice room, Yukinoshita saw her oboe, which she hadn't had time to put away yet.

"Were you practicing just now?"

"Ah."

Yukino stepped forward and put away the sheet music and instrument; she was prepared to play as Kiyori in front of other professionals. Asuka was definitely someone who understood music; anyone with keen observation could deduce that.

Although it was supposed to be the Tachibana family's practice room, there was a black box about half the size of Tachibana herself sitting in the corner. Tachibana and her daughter were oboists, so their boxes wouldn't be this big. While there were other instruments here, they were more common ones, like a piano, violin, and guitar. Along with miscellaneous items and some tools were placed on a table against the wall, along with a row of mouthpieces. Woodwind instruments don't use mouthpieces like these; only brass instruments do.

Moreover, next to the queue number was a photo of a young Kiyoyori and a girl who looked like Asuka, dressed in formal attire, with Touko holding an oboe.

They must have been childhood sweethearts.

"Aren't you going to practice today?" Asuka asked, watching Yukino's movements.

"It's not too late to practice at night."

"You seem quite confident." Asuka straddled the chair, hugging the backrest with both hands, and smiled at Yukinoshita as she rested her head on it. "But today is just right."

Yukino took out a chair and sat down next to Asuka, only to see that the other had rolled up her sleeve, revealing a clear red mark on her fair skin. It seemed that someone had gripped her arm very tightly, leaving a clear finger mark on it. The fingers were slender and long, suggesting it was a woman.

Yukinoshita frowned. She suddenly remembered the red mark that had inadvertently appeared on Senior Nakashiko's wrist that day. At the time, she did not ask about it. Senior did not bring it up, and she had no right to ask.

But today is different; Asuka has given her the right to ask questions.

"This is……?"

Asuka looked indifferent. "This is nothing to worry about. It will go away in a few days." She continued to roll up her sleeves.

That's not what I was asking.

Asuka paused, turning her head slightly, her loose black hair obscuring Yukinoshita's view. "It's not the first time, and Kiyori has seen it before too. Is there any need to be so surprised?"

"It's just that person had another hysterical outburst today; you'll get used to it."

The other person spoke lightly, but after learning that she might have been a victim of violence, Yukinoshita found everything about her actions strange. For example, the way she drank water just now—it would have been easier to raise her hand to drink, but she insisted on lowering her head to drink. Yukinoshita originally thought it was a matter of personal habit, but now she realized that she might have an injury on her shoulder, and any movement of raising her hand might have aggravated the injury.

That white handbag is a first-aid kit.

“The bruise on my shoulder is a bit of a problem,” Asuka realized that simply rolling up her sleeves wouldn’t expose the entire bruise, so she decided to take off her entire shirt. “Kiyoshi, give me a hand.”

Since she couldn't lift her hand, she could only ask Yukino for help. As if noticing the other's awkwardness and discomfort, Asuka deliberately joked, "Although I know I have a great figure, Kiyori can't be so fickle! I won't like someone like that."

"Please shut up." Yukinoshita's words were ruthless, but her movements were gentle; she didn't look at Asuka's tender eyes.

This is even more awkward than the current movements.

That wasn't a gaze directed at me; that person wouldn't look at me like that.

Yukinoshita, her thoughts inexplicably disturbed by two words, wondered.

After removing her long sleeves, what came into view under the snow was Asuka's back, a mixture of bluish-purple and fair skin, as if she had been whipped by something long and thin. The bluish-purple streaks stretched across Asuka's once smooth back, quite jarring.

There was even some bleeding next to the bruise on her left shoulder. Yukinoshita sat behind Asuka and disinfected the wound with an alcohol swab.

The silence seemed somewhat suffocating, so Asuka spoke up, "I was practicing at home today when that person saw me. I was probably under a lot of work pressure, and it suddenly exploded today. I just grabbed the broom from the yard."

Asuka's arm twitched, and blood stained the alcohol swab.

"Luckily, they were all hit in places that could be covered by clothes, otherwise it would have been a bit difficult." Asuka's tone was still relaxed, as if she had gotten used to it all. "However, I couldn't help myself today and had a fight with her before running away. Kiyori, please take me in for a while. I'll go back and apologize to that person tonight."

Yukinoshita exerted force with her hand.

"Hiss—! What happened?" Asuka turned her head and saw Yukinoshita, who was tending to her wound with her head down. It seemed that what had just happened was just an illusion.

"Why are you apologizing?" Yukinoshita threw away a cotton ball and picked up another one to wipe the sore skin.

"Hmm..." Asuka flinched a little, feeling ticklish. "Because that person is, after all, my mother. She raised me to adulthood. I know she didn't do it on purpose."

"So you can just forgive her like that?"

Yukino took out a blood-activating and stasis-removing medicine and applied it to the bruised area, skillfully massaging it in to help the other person break it up.

Asuka remained silent, not only because of the belated pain, but also because she didn't want to give the answer to the question too directly.

No matter how the other person answers, or even if they remain silent, Yukinoshita can guess the answer.

How can she forgive, and how can she let go? Asuka's way of referring to her mother from beginning to end is always "that person".

Why not rebel?

"Kiyoshi!" Asuka's voice, tinged with pain, escaped through her teeth. "That's enough. You shouldn't touch any more of that area."

Yukino swallowed back the other words that were on the tip of her tongue. She now felt that the person in front of her was quite similar to that senior.

They only show others what they want others to see; no one has the right to touch anything deeper, at least not Yukino Yukinoshita.

Neither of them said anything more; one simply did his duty as a "medical worker," while the other swallowed all his pain and suffering.

"Kiyo! Kiyo-!"

Through the door, it seemed like someone was calling Yukinoshita, but the soundproofing in the practice room was really good, and the two of them, each immersed in their own world, didn't hear Eriri's hoarse calls.

Then, with the sound of hurried and increasingly close footsteps, the door to the practice room was opened in response:

"Kiyoshi! Look closely, this is mine—!"

Eriri held up the painting, intending to surprise Kiyora, but she never expected that he would give her such a big surprise instead:

My cousin is doing *that* with a woman I don't know in the practice room while I'm at work?!

Perhaps because her mind was filled with nothing but yellow waste, Ms. Kashiwagi Eri selectively ignored the medical kit and the blood-stained cotton balls at the feet of the two. She could only see Asuka, who was half-naked, and Yukinoshita, who was slightly out of breath because she needed a lot of strength and energy to take effect from the blood-activating and stasis-removing medicine.

"You...you people...! How could you do such a shameless thing in your own home! And you didn't even lock the door!"

Eriri covered her face with her hands, but her fingers were wide enough to reveal her eyes.

"Is your brain filled with nothing but useless drivel?! You loser!"

"Varied--!"

Seeing the two suddenly start bickering, Asuka quickly suppressed her momentary surprise and then adopted a gossipy expression.

"Oh my, this is getting more and more interesting."

Chapter 20 A Weekend Where Sanity Dropped Like Crazy (The End)

Opening his eyes, Qinglai stared groggily at the unfamiliar ceiling.