Chapter 42: The Justice I Believe In

Dear Father and Mother,
With the lingering summer heat finally fading and a gentle autumn chill settling in, I hope you are both doing well.

〈Don’t forgive Misono Mika for harming Lady Seia!!〉

You may already know from the news, but the Eden Treaty—the peace agreement between Trinity and Gehenna—was completely derailed when the signing ceremony was attacked by unknown forces.

〈Bring divine punishment upon the traitor who invited Arius into Trinity and wrecked the Eden Treaty!!〉

I was present as a member of the Tea Party, but I am safe, so please don’t worry. Until recently, I had been in charge of handling the aftermath… but that has finally settled down.

〈Condemn the sinner!!〉

This doesn’t concern me directly, but it seems there were issues involving the Valkyrie Police School, and the D.U. district is apparently quite chaotic. I heard the Valkyries, of all people, conspired with that scum—excuse me, with the Kaiser Group—and became involved in corruption. Truly unforgivable.

〈Expel the treacherous witch!!〉

Well, enough of these complicated topics. They call it the “autumn of sports,” and indeed, the skies are clear and the weather pleasantly cool—perfect for exercise. I’ve been practicing for the grand, all-Kivotos sports festival, the “Halo Festival,” which is coming up in just half a month.

〈Drag out the witch who deceived Trinity, who deceived us!!〉

“…Ugh, seriously!?”

I had finally found a quiet study room with hardly anyone around, planning to relax and write a letter, and now this noise won’t stop. Could they at least not use megaphones?

“Quit your damn yelling already!! You want me to knock some sense into you or what!?”

〈Eh, what was that just now…!?〉
〈I didn’t understand a word, but she’s definitely furious…〉

When I threw open the window and shouted at the protesters, they scattered like startled spiders. Probably another “Punish Mika” demonstration. Seriously, it’s such a nuisance.

The next day, while heading to the cafeteria with Maiha and Masa, we noticed a small plaza that was normally empty. But today, several students had gathered around something.

“Is that…?”

Peering in beside Maiha, we saw clothing, accessories, an album, and decorated boxes piled haphazardly on top of firewood. One of the students held a gas burner, and beside them was a plastic fuel tank—surely filled with kerosene. This was…

“…I’ll be right back.”

“Masa…?”

Before either of us could react, Masa stepped into the crowd and planted herself in front of the items, which were clearly Mika’s belongings.

“Oh? A campfire in broad daylight? How very entertaining.”

“Honotani… Masa…”

The student holding the burner stepped back as Masa approached and questioned her.

“So, jokes aside… whose belongings are these? They don’t look like trash awaiting disposal.”

“…You must already know, don’t you?”

Of course Masa already understood. These were Mika’s personal belongings—and these students were about to burn them as an act of bullying.

“In that case, all the more reason I cannot allow this.”

“Why not? That witch—Misono Mika—conspired with Arius and ruined the Eden Treaty! Because of her, we in the Patel sub-faction are being judged just for belonging to her faction! It’s all her fault, even though we had nothing to do with it! So this much is justified… You’re Patel too, aren’t you? You should understand!”

No, you all definitely tried to stage a coup in the chaos and even attempted to declare war on Gehenna, remember? Then you dragged Mika out of prison to use her as a puppet, only for her to shut you down because she didn’t care.

“What you’re doing has no legitimacy whatsoever. It isn’t even vigilante justice. It’s pettier than that—it’s simple misdirected anger.”

“So what!?”

The enraged girl grabbed Masa by the collar. Masa looked at her with pity, replying in an icy, steady voice. If a fight broke out, Maiha and I were already prepared to help her.

“What Mika did certainly cannot be dismissed. In the end, she is indeed responsible for destroying the signing ceremony with Gehenna.”

“Exactly, so—”

Masa forcibly removed the girl’s hand, sending her stumbling backward onto the ground. Looking down at her expressionlessly, Masa continued:

“So that means you can do whatever you want to her? Even criminals are guaranteed basic human rights—that is the foundation of the rule of law. If someone is a criminal, does that make it acceptable to kill them?”

“That’s… not…”

“It is the same thing. Mika may have done something inexcusable, but does that allow you to steal her belongings? To break them? To burn them? Is that behavior permitted under Trinity law?”

With that, Masa raised her gun. It was loaded not with training rounds, but with live ammunition. In a voice colder than I had ever heard, she declared:

“Begone, disgrace of the Patel faction.”

“…You’ll regret this.”

As the Patel girl muttered and turned to leave, Masa raised the corner of her mouth in a provoking smile.

“…Oh? Do you plan to do to me what you did to Lady Mika? Let me remind you—I have no criminal record. If you intend to harm me, then that’s an act without even the basic excuse of ‘punishing a criminal.’ I’d be able to report you to the Justice Task Force without hesitation, you know?”

The student’s face turned bright red. With an angry stomp—thud, thud—she slammed her feet against the ground and stormed off. Judging by how quickly the rest scattered afterward, she must have been their ringleader. And so, only the three of us remained.

“…Honestly. Our faction really is full of idiots. How disgraceful.”

“These… are Lady Mika’s personal belongings, aren’t they? What should we do with them…?”

“If we give them straight back to her, they’ll just get stolen again.”

But it wasn’t realistic for us to store them ourselves either. As we hesitated, a small shadow appeared.

“Coming back for more, after all that? …Oh, wait. Koharu?”

Masa raised her gun at first, thinking it was the previous group returning, but quickly lowered it once she recognized the small, pink-haired girl in a Justice Task Force uniform.

“Um, um… um! Could I—could I hold on to those for now…?”

“You, Koharu-chan?”

Maiha asked, and Koharu responded with a flustered nod.

“Well, not me personally, but… the Justice Task Force as a whole. Even at SeigiJitsu, we’ve been trying to stop all this harassment toward Lady Mika…”

“Hm?”

“And, um… I handle evidence management. So I thought I could keep these in the Evidence Storage Room for a while.”

Hearing that, Maiha seemed to realize something and turned to Koharu.

“Yeah, that makes sense. Even those girls wouldn’t dare mess with the Task Force’s clubroom. Koharu-chan, great idea~”

Maiha reached out to pat Koharu’s head, but Koharu dodged with a quick step.

“Don’t treat me like a kid! Anyway, that’s the plan! Leave it to me!”

“…We’re counting on you, Koharu.”

Masa pulled the firewood away, gathered Mika’s belongings, and handed them to Koharu.

Of course, there was far too much for one person to carry, so the three of us helped her bring everything to the Evidence Storage Room.

“Still… Masa, you’re amazing.”

“?”

“You know… standing up to people who were literally about to set things on fire, and not even flinching.”

When Koharu murmured that, Masa let out a small, amused breath.

“Koharu, you did something similar not too long ago.”

“Eh—well, that was… yeah, maybe…”

Not too long ago—
I wasn’t there to see it myself, but she must mean the day of the Eden Treaty. When the hardline faction assaulted Mika for refusing to declare war on Gehenna… and Koharu stepped in to shield her.

“Mhm. Koharu is very strong. Ignoring these con-fi-sca-ted items would’ve been easier—less trouble, fewer headaches. But you didn’t turn a blind eye.”

“Yeah… because I couldn’t just ignore it…”

And so, after bringing Mika’s belongings to the Evidence Storage Room in secret, the girls stored everything inside a high-durability, fireproof container and sealed it under strict protection.

Some time had passed since the day of the Eden Treaty, and Nagisa—whose condition had finally begun to recover—was in her office, receiving a report from a Filius-faction administrator.

It concerned the incident in which Mika’s personal belongings were stolen by members of the Patel sub-faction, carried off to be burned, only for Masa and the others to intervene and stop them—and how, thanks to Koharu’s suggestion, the items were later secured in the Evidence Storage Room.

“Hm… we owe the trainee officers and Miss Koharu our gratitude.”

However, Nagisa knew this was only a temporary solution. Realistically, no one would be foolish enough to infiltrate the Evidence Storage Room, openly challenge the Justice Task Force, and steal or destroy Mika’s possessions…
But that didn’t stop the daily protests, nor the constant harassment directed at Mika herself.

“The condemnations against Miss Mika remain harsh, don’t they…”

What troubled Nagisa most was that Mika—someone she valued more than her own position or even her own life—was being harmed. She wanted to act. But as the host of the Tea Party, the more she tried to protect Mika, the more people would accuse her of abusing authority, claiming she was using her status as Mika’s childhood friend to shield her.

“What should I do…”

There were certainly a few students who had genuinely suffered because of Mika—but most were simply venting their frustrations or were just spectators swept up in the momentum. Perhaps time would resolve things.

“But at this rate… Miss Mika herself might reach her limit before then…”

The matter of the Eden Treaty still wasn’t fully resolved, and yet more problems continued to arise. After the administrator left, Nagisa sat alone in her office, holding her head in her hands.