The room suddenly plunged into pitch darkness, and from here and there came the sound of indrawn breath. I was startled, too, and instinctively grabbed the edge of the table.
Tiny specks of light appeared on the ceiling. They spread in an instant to cover the space overhead, and a night sky was born.
A planetarium. Now that I recall, black machinery of some sort had been installed in the four corners of the room. That must have been what it was.
"Oh, how pretty."
It was Madame’s voice.
It certainly was pretty. But what on earth was the point of showing us something like this?
Among the stars shining on the ceiling, faint green line drawings appeared. They were in the shapes of animals and other things I recognized. Above them, their names were displayed in white letters.
Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, Pisces.
The twelve signs of the zodiac. Across a universe shaped like a long horizontal ellipse, stretching from right to left, the twelve constellations were lined up.
From somewhere, Zodiac’s voice could be heard.
*“Lined up here are the constellations named after each of you. The reason they do not appear in a straight line, but rather in a wavy pattern, is because the central line is the celestial equator, crossed by the ecliptic at two points: the vernal and autumnal equinoxes.”*
As supplementary visuals, a red line extending straight horizontally to split the center of the universe appeared on the planetarium dome, accompanied by a yellow line following the twelve constellations swaying above and below it.
It was a diagram I had seen somewhere before.
Then, green lines were drawn again. They were quite large. Spanning across Cancer, Leo, Virgo, and Libra, a long, slender creature appeared. It looked like a giant monster.
*“This is Hydra. It is the constellation with the largest area. In English, it is called the Hydra. No doubt you have heard the name somewhere before. In the familiar ancient Greek, it is pronounced ‘Hydra.’ It is a very famous monster from Greek mythology.”*
Hydra. At the corner of my memory, I had the sensation of something heavy and deeply unpleasant welling up. That was back during the still-sweltering summer.
Looking up at the planetarium, I listened to Zodiac’s flat, uninflected voice.
*“Hydra is known for possessing extremely potent poison. It was sent by the Demon King of Angmore to ravage the earth, but was eventually slain by the hero Lykeios. It is said that Lykeios used Hydra's poison to defeat many other monsters.”*
At that moment, the starlight on the ceiling dimmed, and instead, light began to concentrate upon the table surrounding us.
Like a hologram seen in a science fiction movie, an image materialized above the bare table. Gasps of "Oh!" rose from those around me. It looked like a magnificent, ornate cup, seemingly filled to the brim with liquid.
*“That is the poison of Hydra. The virulent poison of myth that slaughtered countless monsters. Even those of you with a deep knowledge of poisons have likely never laid eyes on the real thing.”*
He gave a dry laugh—ha, ha, ha. Was it the gentleman?
*“That is because it is a poison found only within the realm of myth. A product of human imagination. However, human imagination at times preserves things that never truly existed far longer into posterity than things that actually did. That is not strange. Within the world of mythology, which continues endlessly from past to future, this thing actually existed. A terrifying poison that felled the Erymanthian Boar and defeated Cetus. The poison inside this cup, which has now appeared before our very eyes, may well exist—not as a projected image, but as a reality—within the records written by someone in a world yet to come. This world is made of parallel universes holding infinite possibilities. For human beings, who are the determiners and observers of those parallel universes, the laws of this universe are constructed with supreme convenience; they lie within the Anthropic Landscape, defined by the paradoxical reason that no observer could exist otherwise.”*
Zodiac’s impassive words, striking a strange rhythm, scrambled my thoughts. What is this? I had a feeling Kyoko had said something similar before.
I had a bad premonition. A creeping, restless anxiety raced through my body.
*“Behold. This sacred cup of poison. Imagination, interchangeable with observation, determines countless worlds of possibility. Your brain is locked within the secluded chamber of the skull. Inside a room where no light reaches, the brain captures signals sent from the optic nerves and shows you illusions. From the olfactory receptors, it receives smells via action potentials; from the vestibulocochlear nerve, excitement yields sound; from the skin receptors, pressure and vibration; and from the taste receptors, the activation of membrane potentials brings the five basic tastes. With these, it reconstructs the world inside that secluded chamber.”*
The world tilted and swayed. All the stars in the heavens vanished, and only the cup before my eyes remained there as a certainty.
*“The brain is lonely. Therefore, it loves illusions. It believes in them. So that the world may be as it desires. How utterly simple.”*
*Ziiiiiiin…………*
A metallic sound rang out, tightening like a vise around my head.
All light was extinguished, and eventually, the sound faded away as well.
I was left behind in nothingness, in pitch darkness.
Dark.
Cold.
Nothing.
The moment I thought that, a beautiful golden cup appeared.
Not before my eyes.
Where? Where was it?
I knew it was there, yet I could not grasp its position. I was not looking at it with my eyes. It was not in any physical space, but rather somewhere I couldn't quite fathom. The only thing certain was that it was right in the middle—at the very center of my world.
Inside… my head?
"Ah—!"
Blinded by the glare, I squinted.
The lights in the shop had come back on. My eyes, adjusted to the darkness, reacted with rejection to the illumination. Covering my face with my hands, I groaned.
"What the hell is this?"
An angry voice rang out. It was Pisces.
"I've had enough of this farce."
The sound of a chair crashing over echoed. Peeking through my fingers with half-closed eyes, I saw Pisces stand up and stride toward the counter.
"You bastard."
I saw Pisces lunge at Zodiac, who was standing in front of the counter.
"Stop it!"
I cried out instinctively.
The cup inside my head had not disappeared. Just as you can superimpose an imaginary object onto the scene before your eyes, the golden cup was truly right here.
Yet, it possessed a reality far removed from any ordinary mental image, and a stubborn existence that refused to bow to my own will.
And, troublesome thing that it was, it was a cup filled with terrifying poison.
Paying no heed to my attempt to stop her, Pisces twisted the front of Zodiac’s cloak and shouted.
"I heard you formed some shady organization holding meetings to drink poison and running human experiment-like stuff, so I snuck in! You know Sasahara Yuma, don't you? A guy who used to be a member here. Sasahara, the man you made drink poison and killed two years ago!"
As she yelled, she violently shoved Zodiac’s body against the counter.
*“You would be wise not to do that,”* came the disguised voice from beneath the mask, sounding entirely composed even with his collar grabbed. *“Shaking your head in that manner.”*
"What did you say, you bastard? Is this hypnosis, you charlatan? Fraud or whatever it is, what you're doing is a serious crime!"
"Stop it!" I shouted again.
Pisces slammed her face close to the mask as if to headbutt him, radiating a fierce intensity despite being a woman. The other members had stood up in fluster, simply watching how it played out.
It happened in the next instant.
"Ugh!" Pisces groaned.
"Argh… gah…"
I could see the strength leaving her hands as they gripped Zodiac’s cloak.
Remaining in that posture, only her head tilted back to stare at the ceiling.
"…You son… of a… what did you… do…?"
I saw blood trickling out from the eye holes of the mask. The blood traced down her cheek, dripping patter-patter onto the floor.
The next moment, Pisces collapsed to the floor. A splash of blood was visible.
I instinctively closed my eyes. But I couldn't bow my head away.
Because the cup filled with poison was inside my head. Pisces had tipped it, spilling the poison into her own mind. I knew that without needing to look with my eyes.
"Sakura-san!"
Her companion, Capricorn, cried out and rushed over.
"You bastard, even Sakura-san!"
*“Even?”* Zodiac tilted his head. A chill ran through me involuntarily. Did the organizer himself not have that cup in his head?
"I'm Sasahara Yuma's, y-younger brother! The cruel… cr… cruel way you used him as material for your human experiments and dissolved him together with concrete—"
The end of his sentence dissolved into unintelligible sobbing.
Ah.
There was no time to stop him. Capricorn turned around, crouched down to try and raise Pisces, who had fallen face-down and was convulsing.
Then, the moment he let out a strangled groan, clutching his face and head alternately, he screamed, "Aaaaaah!" And with blood dripping from the corners of his eyes and mouth, he collapsed.
Inside the shop, only the faint, intermittent groans of "uuu…" from the fallen humans echoed.
I approached Kyoko, who was standing frozen near the wall, and grabbed her hand.
"Are you okay?"
"…Yes." Kyoko's pale face looked paler than ever.
"Quite a commotion we've had, but this is marvelous," the gentleman said in a relaxed tone.
"Yes. I've never seen anything like this," Madame said, her gaze wandering aimlessly into empty space as if unsure where to look.
"Man, that scared me," a large young man said, pressing his chest as if trying to calm his palpitations.
The bald man said dismissively, "Still, there's no way we can drink now." He waved his hands about as if searching the air above his head.
What the hell are these people?
I felt like I was looking at something unbelievable. Two human beings had just collapsed, vomiting blood right before our eyes. How could they remain so calm?
Kyoko squeezed my hand back and opened her mouth.
"Isn't this violating the rules of the club? 'Rule 2: Participants in this club shall use their own free will to decide whether or not to ingest what is provided.' Wasn't that it? They didn't ingest it by free will."
To Kyoko's protest, Zodiac replied impassively.
*“The poison is in the cup. It is not something that evaporates, and it is safe. Whatever mistakes someone might make in spilling it elsewhere are of no concern of mine.”*
"That's sophistry."
"Sophistry or not, it's certain we can't drink in this state," the gentleman said with a dissatisfied tone.
*“Then, let us clear things away shortly.”*
The moment Zodiac said that, the lights in the shop went out again.
In the pitch-black darkness, that metallic sound resounded once more.
*Ziiiiiiin…………*
I instinctively covered my ears.
When I realized it, the lights were on, revealing the unchanging interior of the shop.
The cup was gone.
From that place—which, now that it was gone, I could only describe as being inside my head.
I covered my temples with both hands.
What on earth was that? If someone told me it was a hallucination, maybe it was. But it had definitely existed just moments ago.
Looking at the floor, the two fallen figures remained just as they were. Not twitching a muscle, no more groans audible.
*“Well then, I must treat those who have collapsed. Today’s gathering will thus be brought to a close.”*
At Zodiac’s words, applause rose from the regulars.
"That ending was splendid. I hope you will research it further and show us something even better," the gentleman said, and the other three nodded.
They retrieved their coats from the cloakroom, bade farewell to Zodiac, and moved to leave the shop as if nothing had happened.
Kyoko hurled words at their backs.
"If you had managed to get your hands on that poison cup of Hydra, would you have drunk it?"
The bald man at the very back turned around and said, "Of course."
"It's a historical poison passed down in mythology. I’d want to taste-test it at least."
"And if you died?"
"Then I suppose it would have been my fate."
The bald man put on a flat cap, removed his mask, immediately put on sunglasses so the area around his eyes couldn't be seen, and gave a slight bow.
"Well then, farewell."
"That's no such thing as fate!"
I shouted at their departing backs. No one turned around anymore.
*“How was it? Your impressions of your first time participating?”*
Remaining were only me, Kyoko, and the organizer of this insane gathering.
Without answering, Kyoko slipped her hand beneath the body of Pisces, who lay face down. Easily and without resistance, she flipped her over. The figure was drenched in blood, and there was no sense of vitality in her face or skin.
Kyoko removed the blood-stained mask. The face revealed beneath it was one I felt I had certainly seen somewhere before.
"I knew it. She's a fortune-teller who used to appear on local TV shows. Tendo Sakura, or something like that. I haven't seen her lately, though."
Ah.
That made me remember.
I had caught a glimpse of her at the shop of an old fortune-teller aunt named Unda Asuoka, where I was learning astrology. She used to be an apprentice there, I think. They had talked in the back of the shop, but the atmosphere had felt somewhat distant. That was all I remembered.
She had said something incomprehensible earlier when she was pressing in on Zodiac. Something about a man named Sasahara Yuma being killed.
I pressed my forehead. It wasn't that the poison had reached me, but my head hurt. I’d had enough. Stuff like this.
"I'm calling an ambulance," I said briefly.
Zodiac shook his head.
*“It won't help unless you use the antidote I possess.”*
"Then hand it over to the paramedics immediately."
*“I do not have it here now.”*
"It's useless," Kyoko said. "She's already dead."
She spoke those words while touching the necks of the two fallen figures. My legs trembled.
What is this? People died right before my eyes?
The death mask of a little girl I’d seen in the summer floated into my mind. Her pale, ashen face had been peering out from inside a garbage bag.
"How have you managed to dispose of things like this until now?"
Kyoko stood up and stared straight into the masked figure's eyes.
*“I have a very effective antidote.”*
Ignoring Kyoko’s statement that they were dead, Zodiac simply repeated himself.
"Kyoko, let's go home."
This guy was crazy. The black patterns decorating the edge of the mask seemed to have grown larger without me noticing. From deep within the small holes opened for the eyes, moist, dark pupils were looking right at me.
It was better not to have anything more to do with this guy.
So I thought, but my mouth opened against my will.
"The one who defeated Hydra in Greek mythology was Hercules! Not some hero named Lykeios like you said earlier. Besides, Hydra is a monster born between Echidna, the woman-viper, and Typhon the giant. I've never heard that nonsense about it being a minion of the Demon King of Angmore. Didn't the goddess Hera raise it specifically to defeat Hercules? Why is only that part made up?"
I had researched Hydra during the incident that happened this summer. In the first place, it was Kyoko who had taught me about it. Kyoko must have noticed that this guy was saying absurd things, too.
At this rate, I couldn't trust how much of his rambling about poison earlier was actually true. I couldn't even trust if the various poisons served today were really the ones described.
I was glad I hadn't tasted them. I thought that anew.
The mask lowered. It was trembling slightly.
It took me a moment to realize he was laughing.
*“No,”* Zodiac shook his head slightly while keeping his gaze down.
*“It was Lykeios who defeated Hydra. The son of King Amarios of Mycenae and Queen Yura. Such mythology remains. At least…”*
The moment the mask lifted its face, the shop lights went out again.
*“In the world I knew.”*
At that instant, stars appeared on the ceiling. The planetarium was operating once more. The tiny stars scattered across the sky twinkled.
Surrounding the stars around the ecliptic, shown in yellow lines, green lines projected pictures onto the sky.
Most of them were completely different from the twelve signs of the zodiac we’d seen just moments before.
What is this?
I caught my breath.
Before I knew it, Kyoko beside me was gripping my hand tightly.
*“Behold. From August’s Walnut constellation and the Great Cat constellation, stretching to around October’s Libra, the shape of the sea serpent. That is Hydra. The demon sent to earth by July’s constellation, the Demon King.”*
Numerous red stars gathered to draw an eerie, face-like pattern in the sky.
*“The one who defeated Hydra is December’s constellation, Lykeios of the Musketeer.”*
Kyoko’s grip tightened. I squeezed back.
*“Oh? Did you not know the name of the hero of the Musketeer constellation?”*
The voice from the mask sounded as if it were coming straight from the sky.
*“Lykeios used the poison of the Hydra he had slain to successively defeat the monsters sent by the Demon King Angmore. Cetus was one of those beasts, the final apostle. Cetus’s heart was pierced and felled by a poisoned harpoon. And so it ascended to the sky. As November’s constellation.”*
The planetarium briefly cut out, projecting only a portion of the sky instead of the entire celestial sphere. The fine stars now looked slightly larger. Green lines connected some of those stars, sparklingly projecting the giant, creepy body of a monster with a tail.
*“The theater company was named after that constellation, the Whale.”*
In the small world spreading out beneath the constellations, Zodiac was now speaking to Kyoko without showing his form.
Kyoko stared wide-eyed at the foreign stars.
Dangerous.
I thought that.
This guy was targeting Kyoko.
Yet, I couldn't move either. Kyoko had let go of the hand she was holding with mine. Even if I took her hand and tried to escape from here, Kyoko wouldn't move. I could easily imagine it.
*“You probably don't like the horoscopes of this world. Because your sign isn't listed. The same goes for someone born on November 31st. A constellation unlike any of your classmates, and a birthday unlike any other. Loneliness. Alienation. Being left out.”*
He was approaching.
Blending into the darkness, that thing was coming closer.
*“However, days like that will eventually end. When you learn your mission in this unfamiliar world.”*
When Zodiac’s formless voice drew near, a blue light spread out radially. At the same time, a whirring, high-pitched rotational sound rang out. It was coming from the front of Kyoko’s chest.
The heart of the Whale monster projected in the planetarium began to pulse in synchronization with it.
*“That’s it. That is what has been confusing you between the two overlapping worlds.”*
The mechanical voice sounded trembling.
At that moment—