I don’t sleep for two days. Instead, I scour the hills around the outskirts of town searching for people who fled the area during the attack. With Himitsu’s keen eyes to guide me, the search-and-rescue teams save dozens of people. I talk with cats and dogs about owners gone missing and where we can find them, and I stand at the gravesides of people who didn’t make it more than a year on Yūsei. The only times I return to the estate to rest, I bathe and change my clothes, sit with Momo on my chest and cry to myself. My tears are only for me.
Then I receive a message from the police chief that Naomi and Yuka, Miura’s daughters who fled to Yamato for sanctuary, can’t be found anywhere, and we must presume they were kidnapped by their own father. Their mother, on the other hand, died while out for the evening with friends. Her friends report she left to head home after dinner and wasn’t heard from again. Police found her stabbed to death in an alley not far from the restaurant she was at. Her coroner’s report burns into my retinas, every detail, including photos.