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(**Kirara’s POV**)
“No, she’s not here either… What should I do…?”
I ran out of the house to look for Momoi, but no matter how hard I searched, I just couldn’t find her.
It’s been two hours since then.
Should I try to contact Kaito?
…No, Kaito’s in a lot of trouble right now, and I don’t want to worry him.
Besides, Alice contacted me, saying that both of them are in the US right now.
There’s nothing those two can do right now to help me.
It will only make them worry.
Let’s just calm down for a moment and think about what I can do for now.
First, let’s see if Momoi has gone back to her grandmother’s house.
No, there’s no point in checking there.
As long as that cousin of hers is there, I don’t think Momoi will come back. (TLN: Rin-chan)
If she was going to come back to that place after this, she wouldn’t have followed Alice to the villa in the first place.
So I don’t think Momoi is going back to her grandmother’s house.
I think it would be a good idea to tell Momoi’s family that she’s missing, but when I was left in charge of Momoi’s well being, Alice had contacted Kaito’s father.
I didn’t contact him myself, and I don’t have his contact information to begin with.
So I’ll just give up on contacting Momoi’s family.
Instead, I need to think of a way to find Momoi…
……………… I guess, this is the only way huh…
It’s a move I really don’t want to use, but Momoi’s safety is my priority.
So I took out my phone and dialed a certain number.
“Hello, Dad? I’m sorry to call so late at night, but this is Kirara. Yes, I understand my position. But I really need to ask you for something―”
I hung up the phone after a short exchange with my father, and immediately called another contact.
The call was answered immediately.
“Hello―”
“Oi, Kirara!? Do you have any idea what time it is!?”
The voice from the phone was so loud that I pulled the phone away from my ear.
I could hear her screaming for a while, but she seemed to have calmed down, so I moved the phone closer to my ear.
“Long time no talk, Aria.”
I called out the name of the person I probably can’t get along with in this world.
“Don’t you have any common sense!?”
Aria started rambling again, as if she was having a bad day.
Well, it’s true that I’m calling during midnight, which may be absurd… but I didn’t expect her to lecture me about common sense…
“Sorry, sorry, but you see, I need you to do me a favor.”
“Huh!? Why should I listen to what you have to say!?”
From the looks of it, I don’t think she’s going to do me any favors…
Well, I knew that…
I take a deep breath.
Then I made a sincere request.
“Please… I really need your help…”
“…….”
When I asked for help, Aria responded with silence.
But soon the words came back to me.
“You owe me a debt, and I’ll pretend that you’ve paid it back already…. So, what on earth happened to you?”
To be honest, I didn’t think it was likely, but Aria told me that I owed her for pretending that I hadn’t won the game with her before, and that she would help me pay it back by helping me.
[TLN: I really don’t understand this part.]
“Thank you…!”
I sincerely thanked Aria.
“It’s fine, I don’t owe you anything anymore! Rather, just tell me what’s going on!”
“Well, actually―”
I told Aria that Momoi had disappeared from the house that we’re currently staying in and she was nowhere to be found.
But since Aria herself had never met Momoi, I only gave a brief description of her.
“―But Okayama Prefecture is pretty big, you know? And there are a lot of mountains… You’ll have to narrow down your target to a certain extent to find her.”
Aria, who completely understood the situation, advised me.
“Yes, I know that. But even though it’s been a few hours, we know how far it is to walk around the town, so Aria needs to find out if the girl who fits Momoi’s description didn’t take a cab. The trains and buses have already stopped, so I don’t think she’s going to take that. Besides, I just asked my dad to get the Self-Defense Force and the police involved.”
“Oh, you’re so quick. Okay, I’ll have Byodoin’s family contact all the cab companies in Okayama Prefecture. I’ll also have someone from Byodoin visit Okayama Prefecture to expand their business, and I’m pretty sure they’re still there, so I’ll send someone to search for them. I’m in Tokyo right now, so I won’t be heading to Okayama myself because that would take too long, but I’ll do what I can from here. And if the police are already on it, then the GPS tracker is good, right?”
“Yeah, it’s fine. But is there anything else we can use to locate her? You know that system company Aria has?”
“No, you should ask that to Kai instead of me.”
“Wait, you didn’t know? Kaito is in America right now with Alice, you know?”
I thought that Alice’s twin sister, Aria, had been told about Alice’s recent activities, so I slipped it up in surprise.
“Haaaaaaaaaaa!? W-What’s the meaning of this!? Why are Onee-chan and Kai…!?”
From my phone, I could hear Aria’s distraught voice.
She was shocked to hear that Alice was with Kaito.
“Ah, sorry… I’m running out of time, so I’ll hang up for now. Please take care of the arrangements.”
Thinking that explaining it to her would be more trouble than it was worth, I quickly hung up the phone.
“Oy, wai―!”
I heard Aria’s voice calling out to me, but I ignored it.
Now I’ve done what I can do.
The only thing left to do was to run and look for Momoi again.
But― where the heck did she go…?
Just as I was thinking this, the full moon that had been hiding in the clouds seemed to come out, and I saw a familiar mountain illuminated by its light.
That was the place where Kaito had snapped and went rampaging.
As I ran around looking for Momoi, I couldn’t believe I had come to such a place…
“Could it be…?”
I thought that maybe Momoi had arrived at this mountain the same way I had, so I made up my mind to go into the dark mountain―.