By the time they came out of the manga café, the sky had gone completely dark.
In late-November Tokyo, night fell remarkably early.
The neon lights on both sides of the street were already lit, bathing the whole street in a riot of colors.
In the distance, the high-rises glowed a warm orange, like giant lanterns floating in the night sky.
The air carried the aroma of roasted sweet potatoes from the street stalls, along with the sweetness of sugar-roasted chestnuts.
Tsushima Kagami tucked his hands into his coat pockets and walked home side by side with Yukinoshita Shizuku.
"It was pretty warm during the day."
"Didn't expect it to get this cold the moment the sun went down."
"Yeah."
Yukinoshita Shizuku shrank her neck down into her collar, the white puffs of her breath clearly visible under the streetlights as she spoke.
Today she wore a cream-white sweater under a navy-blue coat.
"Are you cold?"
Yukinoshita Shizuku looked at Tsushima Kagami.
"I'm fine."
Tsushima Kagami stuffed both hands into his pockets.
Yukinoshita Shizuku glanced at him, drew her hand out of her own pocket, and took hold of his.
"Your hands are freezing, and you still say you're not cold."
"Your hands aren't warm either."
Tsushima Kagami said with a laugh, feeling the warmth of Yukinoshita Shizuku's hand.
And so the two of them walked slowly along the sidewalk, hand in hand.
There weren't many people out. Now and then an office worker heading home from work hurried past, briefcase in hand, necktie hanging loose around the collar.
As they passed a manga shop, Tsushima Kagami suddenly stopped.
"What is it?"
"Look."
He jutted his chin toward the display window.
On the magazine rack at the manga shop's entrance, the latest issue of Eternal Maiden was stacked in neat rows.
On the cover, an exquisite doll-girl sat quietly by a window, sunlight streaming in from outside and casting dappled light and shadow across her.
Her gaze was gentle and hollow, the corners of her mouth slightly upturned, as if she were waiting for someone.
"You drew this issue's cover, didn't you?"
Yukinoshita Shizuku leaned in for a closer look.
"Mm."
"This girl... she looks kind of familiar."
"It's the issue you helped me apply the screentone on."
"Oh, that one."
Yukinoshita Shizuku thought for a moment.
"TinyEvil?" "Right."
Tsushima Kagami pushed open the convenience store door and stepped inside.
The heating inside was cranked up, a stark contrast to the cold air outside.
A young clerk sat behind the register and, hearing the door, cheerfully called out a welcome.
Tsushima Kagami walked over to the magazine rack, picked up a copy of Eternal Maiden, and flipped through it.
This issue was considerably thicker than the last.
Akane Shinsha clearly had high hopes for this new run of Eternal Maiden. Not only had they brought in several well-known artists, they'd even splashed the slogan "Inaugural Issue Commemoration · Deluxe Author Lineup" across the cover.
Tsushima Kagami's work was placed right at the front, taking up nearly thirty pages.
He turned to his own piece, TinyEvil.
This was also the last time Tsushima Kagami would be handling submissions and cover design for Eternal Maiden.
After this, he planned to return to Kairakuten.
"It's a little creepy to look at."
Yukinoshita Shizuku said.
Tsushima Kagami smiled.
"That just means I drew it well."
Yukinoshita Shizuku shot him a look but didn't argue.
"Kagami, look at that."
Tsushima Kagami followed her gaze.
On the counter, inside a transparent acrylic display case, sat a doll, perfectly still.
About one-third life-size, roughly fifty centimeters tall. She wore a cream-white dress, its layered skirts overlapping like an inverted rose.
Lace trim peeked out from the cuffs and collar, as delicate as the ornamentation in a wedding photo.
Her hair was golden, falling all the way to her waist.
On her head perched a tiny top hat, its brim adorned with a silk flower of the same color.
But what drew the eye most was her face.
Porcelain skin, fair to the point of translucence, with a faint sheen.
Her features were as delicate as a figure stepped out of a fine-brush painting—a dainty little nose.
Lips slightly pursed, and then those eyes.
Eyes made of glass beads, their irises a deep emerald, reflecting a gorgeous luster under the lights.
Those eyes gazed quietly ahead, their look clear yet hollow.
The corners of her mouth turned up faintly, carrying a barely-there smile.
As if waiting for someone.
And as if she had already waited a long, long time, her eyes straining for a glimpse.
Tsushima Kagami walked over and bent down to examine it closely.
Beside the display case stood a small placard.
"Limited to 100 units · Comes with three additional dresses and a tea set."
"Is this the mascot girl you designed for Akane Shinsha before?"
Yukinoshita Shizuku came over too.
"Probably."
"I thought the merch would just be a regular figure."
"Didn't expect them to make it straight into a doll based on the original design."
Unlike those little plastic figures.
These dolls were more like the kind of Western dolls you'd normally see—or rather, things like hina dolls or ichimatsu dolls.
And this was precisely the mascot girl Tsushima Kagami had originally designed for Akane Shinsha.
The prototype was the heroine of this issue's manga, TinyEvil—who was also an abandoned doll.
He recalled drawing this for the issue, and using the heroine as the mascot girl.
Mainly it was because this manga wasn't just pure love—the heroine actually being a doll let it sidestep a lot of unnecessary legal and moral risks, and it was perfectly suited for merchandise, too.
He just hadn't expected Akane Shinsha to go straight for a doll instead of the usual little plastic figure.
And it seemed they'd even played up the limited-edition gimmick; the price wasn't cheap, but the craftsmanship really was exquisite.
In fact, this manga had an anime adaptation, but the plot differed somewhat from the manga's.
This manga wasn't just pure love—the heartwarming yet heart-wrenching little story at the very end elevated the whole theme to another level.
That part wasn't in the anime.
It was sure to make both a man and his "little brother" weep tears of emotion together.
At the thought of fans reaching the end and not knowing whether they should cry or cry, Tsushima Kagami couldn't help letting out a soft chuckle.
Yukinoshita Shizuku also stepped closer to look at the price tag beside it.
¥128,888.
"So expensive!"
"Will it even sell?"
Yukinoshita Shizuku was startled by the price too.
"It's a limited edition, after all."
Tsushima Kagami, for his part, wasn't surprised.
For a limited-edition doll like this, the mold-making cost alone wasn't low; add in hand-painting, costume production, accessory design... selling at this price, the profit margin might not even be that high.
And it also came with three extra outfits to swap and a tea set.
The craftsmanship was quite fine, too—looked at that way, it didn't seem so expensive after all.
Tsushima Kagami thought again of the kimono dolls of Kaname Madoka and Akemi Homura from back then.
At their priciest, the pair together had sold for 400,000 yen.
When he'd finished looking and was about to leave.
"Are you going to buy it?"
Yukinoshita Shizuku asked.
Tsushima Kagami shook his head.
"Having it at home would just feel weird."
"I'd be a little scared of it, too."
"Besides, Akane Shinsha said long ago they'd give me one."
"I turned them all down."
Yukinoshita Shizuku glanced at him and smiled too.
"Come on, let's go home."
The two walked side by side into the night, the convenience store's lights gradually receding behind them.
Left behind was only the doll in the display window, standing there quietly, smiling, as if waiting for someone.
At the same time, in another manga shop in Shinjuku.
The moment Yamada Kenta walked in, he first pretended to wander a few laps around the general-audience section, making sure there was no one he knew nearby.
Only then did he sneak furtively into the R18 section.
The shelves were neatly stacked with all sorts of magazines and tankōbon.
The air held a faint smell of printing ink, along with a certain indescribable sense of taboo.
Yamada Kenta first picked up Kairakuten and swept a quick glance over the cover.
No sign of Xuanyaye-sensei's name.
He set it down at once.
He moved over to the other side.
Picked up Eternal Maiden and scanned the cover.
There it was!
He let out a sigh of relief, and when he looked the cover over carefully, he noticed that the center spot of this cover was held by a doll quietly smiling as it looked back at you.
He looked again at the title TinyEvil written beside it.
Without thinking, he tried sounding it out: Little Devil?
Only then did he notice that on the counter to the side, a one-third life-size doll was also displayed in a transparent acrylic case.
And the doll's appearance was exactly the heroine Xuanyayi-sensei had drawn on this manga cover.
The doll inside the case sat quietly.
A cream-white dress, long golden hair, emerald eyes.
She's looking at me!
Without realizing it, Yamada Kenta walked over and bent down, meeting the doll at eye level.
Yamada Kenta couldn't shake the feeling that those innocent, guileless eyes had been fixed on him the whole time—and that she had begun to smile at him.
She watched him just like that.
And he watched her the same way.
Inside the shop seemed to grow quiet—the footsteps of the crowd, the hum of the air conditioning, the sound of checkout from the distant register.
The sounds seemed to drift away from him, little by little.
He suddenly felt that, in this space, only he and she remained.
He had no idea how much time had passed before Yamada Kenta finally came back to himself.
The clamor of before returned all around him.
He couldn't help giving a shiver.
Then he stepped closer to look at the price tag.
¥128,888.
His fingers lightly brushed the glass of the display case.
The icy sensation pulled him back to reality.
This price was even higher than many of the master-crafted ningyō dolls he'd seen on his school trip to Kyoto.
At least those dolls had the backing of the title "traditional folk craft."
This doll was merely merchandise for a character from an adult manga.
He stood there, staring at the price tag for a long while.
Then he let go, took the magazine, and headed for the register.
After paying, he went straight home.
The whole way, he kept feeling as if something behind him was watching him.
By the time he got home, his parents had already eaten dinner.
His mother was washing dishes in the kitchen; his father sat in the living room watching TV.
"Kenta, have you eaten?"
"I ate on the way back."
Yamada Kenta brushed off the question and hurried upstairs, slipping into his own room.
He shut the door and locked it.
Drew the curtains.
Took some tissues out of the drawer and set them on the desk.
Then he sat down and took out Eternal Maiden.
He took a deep breath and turned to the first piece, TinyEvil.
Page one: an empty room. Cardboard boxes piled in the corner, curtains not yet hung.
Moonlight streamed in through the window, drawing a ghastly pale square on the floor.
Page two: the male lead wakes, rubs his eyes, and sees a doll that has appeared beside him.
It was looking down at the male lead, a faint smile barely held at the corners of its mouth.
Yamada Kenta's finger froze on the page.
That gaze, that smile.
Exactly the same as what he'd seen in the shop.
He kept turning the pages.
The male lead was afraid of the doll and wanted to get rid of it.
But he didn't dare just throw it away, afraid of drawing something bad to him.
So he found a shrine and brought the doll there to be enshrined.
On the way back, he got into a car accident.
After being taken to the hospital, he found that the hospital was right next to that shrine, and his ward window faced it directly.
From the window he could see the very doll he'd brought there, set on the offering rack outside the shrine.
And then, their eyes met!
Reading this, Yamada Kenta shivered again.
He couldn't help muttering to himself.
Was Xuanyayi-sensei no longer content to torment readers with pure-love moral dilemmas, and now preparing to try scaring them outright with a crude, ham-fisted ghost story?
What an utterly rotten personality!
With that thought, he kept reading.
Then the male lead had the same dream every night.
He dreamed that he had brought the doll back home.
Nothing else frightening happened, but that in itself was scary enough.
So it counted as a nightmare, more or less.
So after being discharged, the first thing he did was bring the doll back from the shrine and enshrine it properly.
Later, the male lead told his girlfriend about it.
His girlfriend said she wanted to stay the night at his place to keep him company.
That night, the two lay together under the covers.
The male lead was nervous, constantly wondering whether he should make a move.
Just as he hesitated.
The doll moved.
It leapt down from its shelf, violated the male lead right in front of his girlfriend, and in the end even erased the girlfriend's memory.
Reaching this point, Yamada Kenta had finally gotten to the sex scene and grew excited.
Hahaha, scared me half to death—I really thought something frightening was coming.
Turns out it's a pure-love doll.
Yamada Kenta turned the pages eagerly, unable to wait.
Later, the male lead learned the doll's name was [Nina], and asked where she had been hiding all this time.
Because the male lead remembered there shouldn't have been any doll here when he first moved in.
Only then did Nina mention that the house had a basement.
Then the male lead found the basement entrance, and at the very back, there was an altar table.
On the table sat an urn of ashes, a photograph, and a cushion.
Nina must have been here all along.
It wasn't until the male lead moved in that she could suddenly move.
In the photo was a girl, looking very young, her face pale, but smiling happily.
Beside it lay a letter.
The letter had been written by that girl.
She said she'd been ill since childhood, unable to attend school, with no friends.
Her parents had bought her this doll to talk with her, to keep her company through those long days and nights.
Nina became her best—and only—friend.
Later her illness grew worse and worse.
She knew she didn't have long to live.
She was afraid Nina would be lonely all by herself.
At the end of the letter, she wrote:
So she begged her parents to place her ashes together with Nina, so the two could keep each other company forever.
Only then did the male lead understand that the former owner hadn't abandoned Nina at all—on the contrary, she had loved Nina deeply all along.
Yamada Kenta's eyes began to sting.
The male lead told Nina what the letter said.
Her former owner hadn't abandoned her; she had been loved the whole time.
But Nina resisted fiercely, insisting all along that she had been abandoned.
"She left me down in that basement and went off somewhere else."
"She must be living perfectly well."
"In some city, with friends, with a lover, with a normal life."
"She doesn't need me anymore."
The male lead suddenly understood.
Nina knew everything.
She simply didn't want to accept it.
She'd rather believe she'd been abandoned—that way, at least her former owner was still alive and well somewhere.
At this point the male lead also began to ponder what mission a doll is given from the moment it is born—it is a vessel onto which people project their longing to love and to be loved.
To go on living... to live, and live well...
This child...
That person never came back to me. I was the one cast aside. It's not that she truly believes it—she only wants to believe. Because... "I"... was the one who was thrown away...
Why was I made in the shape of a person? She threw me away... and yet, I suppose I want to love someone. But when all is said and done, even they have their own purpose.
So in the end, a doll is simply a vessel meant to become what people long to love.
Yamada Kenta closed the magazine.
He bowed his head, tears pattering down onto the cover.
"Why would you draw something like this..."
"I came here to look at the smut!"
"Not to hurt myself!"
"Xuanyaye!"
"You pure-love beast!"
Yamada Kenta clenched both fists and stood up, eyes nearly splitting with fury.
He yanked up the pants he hadn't even gotten the chance to finish in.
He thought of his failed relationships, of the girls who had betrayed him, of those late nights sitting alone in the dark.
He suddenly, desperately wanted a doll like this.
Someone who would never betray him, someone who would never leave him.
Just then, the doll he'd seen in the shop earlier surfaced in his mind.
The cream-white dress, the long golden hair, the emerald eyes.
She was smiling at him.
¥128,888.
He looked at his piggy bank.
He was already ready to start a part-time job tomorrow.
Ready to save up and buy that doll!
Just then, his mother's voice came from downstairs.
"Kenta! Phone!"
Yamada Kenta answered listlessly and trudged downstairs with heavy steps.
Seeing him, his mother smiled and handed him the receiver.
And added in a low voice:
"It's your classmate Hazuki~"
____
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