The daily life of Suguru Tenshi unfolded no differently from anyone else's.
The same streets.
The same sky.
The same faces drifting past without ever truly being seen.
Each morning bled seamlessly into the next, separated only by details too insignificant to matter—variations so faint they hardly qualified as change. Days did not move forward; they looped. Moments layered themselves atop one another like frozen frames, identical at a glance, distinguishable only by the subtle shift of dust settling where it hadn't before.
Life continued in motion, Suguru followed his routine without thought. The walk to school passed in fragments he no longer tried to remember—footsteps echoing down familiar streets, the low hum of traffic, the weight of his bag pulling at one shoulder. The school gates greeted him the same way they always had, their paint chipped in places he could have mapped with his eyes closed.
The classroom was unchanged.
Rows of desks. Faded posters. The lingering scent of chalk dust and disinfectant.
Suguru slid into his seat and rested his arms on the desk's surface. It was cold—always cold—seeping through his sleeves and into his skin. The smell of the room wrapped around him, sterile and faintly metallic, identical to yesterday… and the day before that.
Voices droned on. Pages turned. Chairs scraped against the floor.
All of it blended into a dull, familiar noise.
Without realizing it, Suguru closed his eyes.
Sleep came easily. It always did.
When he opened them again, the cold was gone.
The desk beneath his arms no longer existed. The air felt wrong—too open, too vast—and the familiar scent of the classroom had been replaced by something ancient and heavy, like damp earth and distant rain.
Suguru looked around no one to be seen in the area around him
To be continued…