You say this is a love game?

You know what, this speculation makes a lot of sense. It perfectly explains the changes in roles and mentality of the foursome, and convinces everyone.

So, observing everything this guy has, this guy is simply...Matsushita Kei's ideal self.

But he is not Makoto Mizutani.

He doesn't have that many beautiful girls around him, nor does he have the talent and temperament to convince everyone.

All he has is "swimming".

He actually didn't know whether he liked swimming or not, but he felt a strange sense of exhilaration when swimming. He liked this feeling since his first swimming class in junior high school. He even joined the swimming club without hesitation when he entered high school. He told his parents that he wanted to achieve some results in swimming, but in fact he just wanted to stay in the swimming pool for a while longer.

This is similar to running.

When swimming, don't think about anything, just swim forward as hard as you can, swim as far as you can, until everyone is left behind, until you are the only one left in the world.

However, even the right to swim was taken away that night.

Just after school on Monday, everyone left the swimming pool, but he regarded this brief silence as peace, jumped into the water alone, and swam in the empty swimming pool.

Matsushita Kei never expected that he would encounter such a terrifying existence in the swimming pool where he was immersed.

Just as he was concentrating on it, his calf was grabbed. He was horrified to find that the swimming pool had been filled with bloated drowned corpses since some point. The gray bodies of the dead pulled him into the water, and water poured into his nostrils. He felt the feeling of drowning for the first time.

Fear, despair, pain...

Hallucinations appeared before his eyes. His parents and sister appeared...

When he thought he was going to die, the corpses started talking.

"Life...in exchange for life..."

The sound was dull and like sobbing.

He had no power to refuse, and he didn't even have time to think. His struggling desire to survive made him accept the contract.

Exchange the life of your classmates for your own life.

And today, he must sacrifice his classmates to those drowned bodies.

If his classmates didn't die, he would have to die.

"Does it have to be this way?"

Matsushita Kai hugged his knees, but then he heard a noise coming from the side.

It's Mizutani Makoto.

For some reason, this influential figure was also resting here with him. It seemed that he had some problem with his ankle and could not go into the water. So he just watched the teenagers' passionate swimming class with him on the shore.

Matsushita Kei didn't know what Mizutani Makoto was trying to do, but when he noticed Mizutani Makoto approaching, he subconsciously moved.

"Matsushita--"

He didn't stop until Mizutani Makoto called him.

He was stunned for a moment, nodded subconsciously, and replied "Mizutani", but he didn't know why Mizutani Makoto called his name.

It seems that the two of them are not familiar with each other...

But Mizutani Makoto got straight to the point and asked, "Is there anything you want to do?"

"Uh?"

Panasonic started, and the sound was stuck for a moment.

He looked at Mizutani Makoto in confusion, not even quite understanding what Mizutani Makoto meant - what did he mean by what he wanted to do?

Mizutani Makoto wasn't surprised. He patted him on the shoulder and said, "If this is the last hour of our lives, and a meteorite falls from the sky and smashes us into pieces in an hour, what regrets will you have for not being able to fulfill your dreams?"

Perhaps the topic of "death" was too sensitive, which aroused Matsushita Kei's association with drowned corpses.

The boy's expression suddenly became uneasy. He adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose, as if he suddenly made countless small movements.

He asked in panic: "Why are you asking this suddenly?"

Mizutani Makoto was very patient: "I was browsing an interesting forum recently, and there was a post there that was about the topic I just talked about. I thought about it for a long time but couldn't come up with a touching answer, so I wanted to look for clues around me."

In other words - is it the second-year syndrome, or is it the hipster syndrome?

Matsushita Kei was already panicking and felt a strong sense of guilt, fearing that someone would know that he had made a contract with the drowned corpses to kill other people.

When Makoto Mizutani first came over, he was really afraid that Makoto Mizutani had discovered something... Thinking about it, it was actually unlikely. After all, the drowned corpses were monsters. How could Makoto Mizutani, a normal person, possibly discover them?

Now, hearing Mizutani Makoto bring up irrelevant topics, I felt a little relieved.

Perhaps diverting his attention would help alleviate the guilt in his heart, he smoothed down his limp hair and actually started chatting with Mizutani Makoto.

"Regrets? I think there are quite a lot."

"Wouldn't it seem cheap if I said too much?"

"Greed is what people are supposed to be thinking about, isn't it? Mizutani, are you only thinking about one single wish? Normally, people have many distracting thoughts. A greedy person who wants everything is a normal person."

"But you also said that those were greedy thoughts, right? They stem from desire. So, if we discard greed, is there nothing left that must be done?"

Mizutani Makoto's words made Matsushita Kei fall into deep thought.

They looked at the swimming pool in front of them. The water was clean and the boys were very lively, swimming from one end of the pool to the other, with waves splashing, looking very happy.

Matsushita Kai finally said after some hesitation: "Have you found my sister?"

"younger sister?"

Mizutani Makoto was stunned.

"My sister, she disappeared last year."

I don’t know what the mentality is.

It could be that Makoto Mizutani's personality was really outgoing, or it could be that under the pressure of life and death, Matsushita Kei was nervous and in urgent need of someone to listen to him... Of course, it could also be that the topic of death raised by Makoto Mizutani resonated with him and he was inadvertently put into the topic, so he and Makoto Mizutani actually got along very well, and there was even a strange desire to share, which made him say some things in his heart.

"I have a younger sister. She's very dumb and terrible at studying, so my parents don't like her very much. But she and I have a very good relationship, and she always follows me around."

"But one day last year, I had an argument with my parents and was in a bad mood that day... I actually regret it, but I did make her angry and leave that day. She left home to go play with her friends, but later it was her friends who came to our house... They had made an appointment to go shopping together, but my sister didn't go."

"She disappeared, she disappeared on the way."

"I searched desperately but couldn't find my sister..."

"I don't know where she went, or whether she's dead or alive. I've always felt regretful, but what's the point of regretting? I probably just want to know where my sister is. I hope she's still alive and well somewhere in the world, healthy and happy."

Mizutani Makoto fell silent.

His fingers tapped lightly on the tiles.

"Is that all?"

"That should be it."

"This is truly a huge regret, but other than the regret, is there nothing else you desperately want to do?"

"If you say that..."

Matsushita Kei didn't know what he was thinking of, and suddenly laughed, "It seems that there really is one."

"A wish other than regret? I've imagined it before..."

"Do you like reading, Mizutani?"

"I really like reading. Actually, my favorite author is not from our country, but from a teacher in the country next door. I don't know if you have heard of him."

"He said something that left a deep impression on me. He said that when he was a child he thought the sea was yellow, but the textbooks said it was blue. So one day he decided to swim until the sea turned blue."

Mizutani Makoto nodded.

Matsushita Kei asked him: "Is the sea blue?"

"It's blue, but you have to swim far away to see it."

Mizutani Makoto replied.

Kei Matsushita: "I had never swum that far before, and I was so eager to follow the teacher's advice... But halfway through, I got scared and swam a little too far, afraid I'd be swept away by the waves."

"If there's a chance, I'd like to try it again."

“Swim forward until the water turns blue.”

It's amazing.

After chatting with Mizutani Makoto, Matsushita Kei suddenly felt much more relaxed, as if the resentment that had been lingering in his heart had quietly dissipated. He felt a rare sense of relief, and even the sense of urgency that he felt from being oppressed by the drowned corpses became much weaker.

Mizutani Makoto nodded in understanding: "Yes, I understand."

Matsushita Kai glanced at him curiously, and suddenly asked: "You just said you were looking for material, so would this be a good material?"

Mizutani Makoto pondered and said, "I guess so."

Mizutani Makoto stood up and stretched his muscles, but there was no sign of ankle injury.

Kei Matsushita was stunned for a moment, but when he realized that Makoto Mizutani seemed to be planning to jump into the swimming pool, he immediately became anxious.

He quickly reached out to Mizutani Makoto, grabbed him, and nervously shouted, "Mizutani, don't go down yet!"

Mizutani Makoto turned his head and asked, "What will happen if I go down?"

"me……"

Matsushita Kei was stunned.

Yes, if Mizutani Makoto goes down, what will become of him?

Matsushita Kai's gaze turned to the swimming pool, his pupils turned slightly white. From his perspective, strange colors began to emerge in the pool water, as if some existence was overlapping with the real world.

It's the group of drowned corpses.

He suddenly shuddered all over. His contract was finally going to take effect. The drowned corpses were crawling out of hell and dragging everyone into the abyss of death, fulfilling the contract he had promised.

Matsushita Kei was scared.

The suppressed panic surged in his heart, making him subconsciously look away as if to escape reality and turn to look at Mizutani Makoto.

It would be good if I could save even one person.

Even if it meant satisfying his ugly selfish desires, at least let Mizutani in front of him survive...

However, he found that Mizutani Makoto was looking at him.

There was a kind of pity in those eyes that he couldn't understand.

"Matsushita,"

He heard Mizutani Makoto say:

"You are already dead."

Chapter 123: Remove the fuel from under the cauldron, a small miracle waiting to happen.

Matsushita Kei is already dead.

Makoto Mizutani stared at him, his dark pupils filled with complex emotions, as if he was looking at a phantom that shouldn't exist.

Behind him, sunlight streamed through the glass roof of the swimming pool, refracting across the water, illuminating the figures of young people playing and laughing in the pool. Here, splashes of water and echoing laughter intertwined youth and vitality, creating a world of "being alive."

Full of noise, yet so beautiful.

And the Matsushita Kai in front of him stood out of place in this bustling scene, like a forgotten shadow.

Although neither Mizutani Makoto nor Matsushita Kei didn't need to enter the water, they had both changed into swimming trunks due to swimming lessons. Now, they stood at the edge of the pool. Though they hadn't been in the water, Matsushita Kei's hair was wet and plastered to his forehead, with tiny droplets of water clinging to his body, as if he had just emerged from the water. It seemed as if he could wash his face and then join the others in the locker room, change clothes, drink drinks, laugh, and chat.

But his eyes were empty and lifeless.

His skin was an unnatural pale blue, and his knuckles were slightly curled, as if he still had the painful memory of the moment of drowning, and his life had long since stopped at a certain point in time.

He didn't know he was dead.

He was still standing there, by the swimming pool, looking at the classmates who were playing, with a conflicted expression on his face, muttering something.

This is Mizutani Makoto's "clairvoyance".

From the moment he spoke to Matsushita Kei, he had already seen through Matsushita Kei's true self hidden beneath the living, the pale, swollen corpse that was extremely similar to a drowned corpse.

Matsushita Kei might have thought that he was discussing something lively just now, but to Mizutani Makoto, Matsushita Kei's voice was actually so soft that it was almost inaudible, and the sound of the corpse whispering was unclear, as if it was just a gust of wind floating through the corridor, leaving nothing behind.

It took him a lot of effort to understand what Matsushita Kei said.

"I am dead?"