Was it only a few days after the last mission ended that Dante started fiddling with the terminal they carried around?
Or rather, should I say they were 'writing' something?
For a few days I just watched, and then one day I couldn't hold back and asked about it.
"Dante, did a new function get added to the terminal or something?"
" Hm? Why do you ask all of a sudden?"
"You've been handling it a lot lately, so I was curious."
"Ah, a function for writing notes was added recently."
"...That function didn't exist until now?"
"Surprisingly, no."
That was pretty shocking.
The terminal issued by Limbus Company headquarters, the so-called "LCB-PDA" Faust mentioned, had a great many functions.
From the simple ability to converse in sync with the prisoners' identities, to the strange function that operated the screening room at the front of the bus, and even the function that could briefly overlay an identity by linking with Dante's head.
I'd never even heard of a machine in the City that could perform so many remarkable functions at once, so that terminal was probably a rather high-end piece of equipment, possibly even tied to a Singularity.
And yet it didn't even have something as basic as a note-taking function. It felt a bit like a phone without the calling feature.
Anyway, the important thing was...
"So what are you writing so diligently?"
"Nothing special. Information about the City. As you know, my head looks like this now."
Ah, I see. Information really is important.
Dante didn't have many memories of the City, so writing that sort of thing down was probably a sensible thing to do.
"Since it came up, would you help me a little too?"
"Hmm... sure?"
It was time spent talking about the City, so in the otherwise boring bus life, it seemed like a surprisingly interesting way to pass the time.
And so I talked with Dante for quite a long while.
Maybe because we'd been talking about the City for so long, I suddenly found myself thinking back to when we were still in the back alleys.
Some older memory started coming back to me. When was it again? A little while after I'd joined the bus, maybe.
Right, there had been an incident like that back then too.
-Kreeeeeeeek!! Bang!
"?! W-what was that?!"
The bus, which had been driving smoothly through the back alleys, suddenly came to a stop.
After watching for a long, long time, I'd learned it wasn't all that rare. It seemed to happen fairly often when traveling through the back alleys.
I don't know about the others, but at least for the bus driver, Charon.
Come to think of it, that woman's reactions were always the same. Didn't she ever get tired of it?
"We'll stop here today."
I'd heard that line a few times before too. Then naturally...
"Charon, we seem to be a little short of the scheduled position."
Yes, Faust had to step in.
"We're about 15% short of the target. For the schedule that follows, advancing at least 3% farther would be ideal."
...You were calculating that? What exactly is Meursault?
"Charon sleepy. Good bus driver no drive sleepy."
Well, despite the two of them trying to stop her, Charon showed no intention of changing her mind and firmly refused.
"I get it, so stop slamming the brakes all of a sudden!! Do you know how many times this has happened already?"
"Mm-hm, this is already the fourth time Heathcliff's shoved his nose into the front seat, so this must be the fourth time this has happened too!"
Don Quixote sure knew that sort of thing well. She'd seemed so airheaded, too.
"Once you start getting sleepy, you must leave the wheel. The radio said so."
"That may be true, but... shouldn't we also be a little flexible about it?"
...Ishmael said that?
"Heh heh, depending on who says it, even ordinary words can become this witty~"
"Hah, so the young master agrees with me too. It's funny when the least flexible person says something like that."
"...Are you done? By that logic, that old fossil over there who still thinks he's a wartime officer—"
Ah, I'd better step in.
"Now, now! Both of you, stop it. It was a reasonable situation, wasn't it? There's no need to fight over it, right? Right?"
"No—"
"That bastard—!"
Then, from behind us, came a familiar. And unbearably heavy. Presence.
"Hah."
A short, low sigh. Just that one word was enough to freeze the bus interior all at once.
It had been days since I'd boarded the bus, but I still couldn't get used to that man's weight.
The Color Fixer, Red Gaze. Vergilius.
Even people who had no interest in Fixers usually knew him, since he inherited the color of the Red Mist. If you had even a little interest in Fixers, he was the sort of celebrity you'd naturally know about.
And then he spoke again, heavily.
"...What is it? You were all chattering away just fine. Why don't you keep wagging those mouths?"
"Wasn't it you who sighed because you were about to make a scene?"
Nice one, Heathcliff! Just a little more!
"I was stretching. My body felt stiff..."
"What—"
"Ahem..."
...That's what it was?
"Your behavior is rather amusing. Like a dog drooling at the sound of a bell."
He was lying, wasn't he? That man was actually enjoying this, wasn't he?
"......"
Heathcliff scowled after hearing Vergilius's words, but what could he do? The difference in power was overwhelming.
"If you have complaints, come to my office in the rear car as always. I'll make time for a private talk... Faust, please handle the rest."
"Yes."
Handing the matter off to Faust, Vergilius crossed through the prisoners staring at him and Charon and headed to the very back of the bus as if nothing had happened.
"Open sesame, perilla."
"Charon, it's sesame."
"Charon knows. It's not opened with a spell like that anyway."
"...Right."
The more I looked at that man, the more I felt he was strangely kind only to Charon.
Was she in some sort of nanny position?
Anyway, while the pointless banter went back and forth, the door at the rear of the bus opened.
"It's been months already, but that still feels strange every time I see it..."
"It's bigger on the inside than it looks from outside, right?"
Months... had it really been that long? At most, hadn't it been one or two?
Was it because of when they joined?
As the rear door opened, the gloomy yet spacious interior beyond it came into view.
A long, long corridor that seemed to go on forever.
Beyond that, as if warning us not to go any farther, there was a no-entry sign marked by a luxurious pole, and endless red lights stretching into the distance.
It looked cozy, but there was something unsettling about it too.
"Come to think of it... is that a Wing Singularity too? Faust, do you know?"
"Of course I do. But you also know that I can't explain most things in detail, don't you, Gregor?"
"I think you could at least be a little more friendly about it..."
Then, an unexpected person joined the conversation.
"This is a corridor."
It was Ryoshu.
"That's right. It's a corridor."
...But why were Ryoshu and Faust both stating the obvious?
"Haa... yeah, it's a corridor, all right. It stretches out long and straight, with rooms packed in close, so I guess it is a corridor."
"N. O. P. E."
"What are you even saying...? Hah, forget it. I'm tired too..."
Dante, who had been staring blankly beyond the corridor, suddenly snapped to attention at those words.
"Ah, ah... right."
"Dante, it's something you do all the time, so you may not feel the need for it... but managerial approval is still an important procedure. Please understand."
"You don't have to say it that way, Faust..."
After saying that, Dante stood up and headed to the very front of the bus. And then...
"I approve the prisoners' end of work."
"Thank you. From this point, we will begin up to 12 hours of sleep and rest, subject to change. Have a good night."
Once Faust finished speaking, the prisoners each let out groans and shuffled toward the corridor. I wasn't much different.
"Ugh~ I'm tired..."
"Sinclair! Shall we play chess today as well?"
"N-no... Don Quixote, every time it looks like you're about to lose, you ask Yi Sang to coach you!"
Oh dear, so that devilish thing was happening whenever I wasn't involved in chess.
Not that it was really my concern.
"That is not true, Sinclair. It is... I cannot bear to watch a poor move..."
Ah.
"That's even worse!"
"Sinclair, but when I'm there, I at least help you, don't I?"
"...That... is true."
Maybe I should join chess more often from now on.
"Manager, thank you for your hard work. Tonight's watch duty is..."
"Ah, Meursault. Thanks. Yeah, I'm not really sleepy tonight..."
Then Otis suddenly cut in.
"Manager! As I always say, if you're tired, you can always assign me to night watch..."
"Now, now. Big sister deputy~ let's go in and sleep~"
"Manager! During work, I was hard at—"
"Come on~ let's go."
She seemed determined to flatter Dante somehow, but Otis was immediately restrained by Rodion and Ishmael and disappeared through the rear door.
What a pain.
Then I should probably head in too.
-Kreeeak...
As I opened the door, the far end of the corridor suddenly came into view.
...But what was at the end of that corridor?
I wasn't going to go farther just because they'd put up a fence telling us not to, but I couldn't stop my instinctive curiosity.
An endless-looking space... was it Singularity-level technology just from appearances? Well, technology like that usually had some flaw, so it was probably better not to go poking around.
I dismissed it that way and went into my room, but not long after, I learned what was at the end of the corridor.
...Unluckily, because some idiot went crawling in there.