The following morning was free activity time.
The elementary school children played in the open clearing, their laughter and chatter carrying far into the air. Hayato naturally blended in with Yumiko and the others, organizing a ball game. His smile in the sunlight looked flawless and without blemish.
Only one girl was the exception.
Tsurumi Rumi.
She sat alone on the corner steps of the hall, hugging her knees with her face buried in her arms, looking like a small animal that had been abandoned by the world. Whenever anyone tried to approach, she would radiate an aura of "don't come near me," sending them away feeling annoyed.
"Goodness, that child really has no social skills at all." Yumiko muttered with a sigh.
Hayato smiled gently. "Don't say that—she might just be a little reserved. I'll try talking to her."
He walked over to Rumi, crouched down, and spoke in the softest voice he could manage. "Hey, do you want to play with the others?"
Rumi didn't even lift her head.
Hayato felt a little awkward but tried again. "It'll get really boring being alone here, you know."
The girl curled in even further.
Hayato sighed in resignation, stood up, and returned shaking his head.
Yukino and Yui had both witnessed the exchange.
"Poor thing..." Yui whispered.
Yukino furrowed her brow without saying a word. She could see a faint shadow of her own past in that small figure. But she also understood that walls of self-isolation like that were very difficult to break down from the outside.
At that very moment, a figure in full gear walked past them.
Darius.
He still had his white rubber gloves on, his face covered by a standard triple-layered medical mask, and his tactical goggles perched on his forehead. He wasn't carrying anything—except that, as he passed through a shrub, he snapped off a tree branch well over a meter long.
He walked in a straight line toward Rumi in her corner. Every pair of eyes followed him.
"What is he trying to do?" Hachiman's dead-fish eyes widened slightly, which was unusual.
Darius didn't approach the way Hayato had. He stopped at a distance of roughly three meters from Rumi. This was the "social safe distance" he had calculated.
Then, under the stunned gazes of everyone watching, he extended the long tree branch. With extreme care—as though he were defusing a bomb—he gently prodded the back of the curled-up Rumi.
Once. Twice.
Rumi suddenly raised her head, revealing a face full of fury and humiliation.
"Are you out of your mind?!"
Her voice wasn't loud, but it was laced with sharp hostility.
Darius pulled back his branch, his face showing an expression of satisfaction. He nodded, as though recording observational data.
"Good—consciousness clear, language function normal, still capable of producing an effective aggressive response," He murmured quietly, then raised his voice toward Rumi. "Confirmed: early-stage symptoms of infection."
Rumi was dumbstruck.
She had seen people who mocked her, ignored her, and pitied her—but she had never seen a strange person who prodded her with a tree branch and then declared she was infected.
"You... what are you talking about?"
"What I'm saying is, your method of handling this is correct." Darius said in the tone of someone commending a model employee. "Actively maintaining physical isolation from potential transmission sources is the most effective method for preventing mass spread of the virus within a group."
He pointed his branch toward the crowd of children playing in the distance.
"Look at them—exchanging bodily fluids and air without a shred of vigilance. A genuine breeding ground for pathogens. Stupidity is contagious, and its transmission rate is extremely high. Your choice to keep your distance from them proves that your brain has not yet been fully eroded and still retains basic biological instincts."
Rumi was completely frozen.
She stared open-mouthed at the strange person in front of her, who was saying utter nonsense with a perfectly serious face. Her mind had gone blank.
All this time, everyone had told her that she was the one who "couldn't socialize," that she was the one who was "the problem," and that she was the one who needed to "blend in with everyone else."
This was the first time.
The very first time anyone had told her that what she was doing was "correct." Even if the reasoning behind it was... extraordinarily bizarre.
"Keep it up." Darius drew a circle on the ground with his branch, enclosing Rumi inside it. "Until an official isolation zone is formally established, this three-meter radius is your safe zone. Don't let anyone in, and don't leave of your own accord."
Having said that, he produced a brand-new sealed gas mask filter canister from his pocket and placed it at the edge of the circle.
"This is a backup supply. If you feel short of breath, or begin to feel an irrational sense of familiarity toward the people around you, replace it with this immediately."
Having done all of that, Darius turned and walked away without looking back, as though he had just finished distributing a routine health protocol.
The entire hall fell completely silent. Everyone stared at the scene with their mouths hanging open.
Yukino pressed a hand to her forehead. She felt her worldview collapsing at a speed she had never experienced before. Comforting an antisocial child using the methods of a lunatic—and the result seemed to be... somewhat effective?
Rumi sat where she was, staring at the filter canister on the ground, then staring at Darius's retreating back. The fury and humiliation in her eyes were, without her realizing it, replaced by something more complex.
Confusion. Absurdity. And a little... curiosity.
This person seemed to be even stranger than she herself was.
She looked down at the circle drawn by the tree branch—the symbol of her "safe zone"—and the corner of her mouth, without her noticing, curved ever so slightly upward.
Perhaps this boring joint camp was going to become just a little bit interesting after all.
"Alright, everyone!" Shizuka clapped her hands, breaking the strange silence. "Free activity time is over! Time for dinner! Tonight's menu is—we're all making curry together!"