Saikyou Series Volume 2 S1chapter 7

Jinrui Saikyou no Jun'ai – Nisioisin
p. 33-37

Of course, this isn’t to say that the true ident.i.ty of the infamous Doctor Kitsuregawa, the researcher of humans who doesn’t give a flute about anyone, is a five-year-old girl; that would be stupid. No matter how you slice it, the timeline wouldn’t make sense. When I first heard his name, that mad scientist was already over seventy years old. And the full name I heard wasn’t even “Hotsure Kitsuregawa” to begin with, but rather “Motsure Kitsuregawa”. Hotsure and Motsure. I wouldn’t go so far as to say those two names are completely unrelated to each other, but there’s still no way I’d believe something so idiotic as Doctor Kitsuregawa being a little baby girl.

“Give me a break, Jun Aikawa. We’re not trying to pull your leg here—let me explain the situation. Let’s go inside and have a nice talk over some coffee.”

As s.h.i.+megiwa urged, I entered the Kitsuregawas’ house. Part of me expected that a bizarre sight would await me inside, but I was wrong again; it was no different from an ordinary home. There was even a wood-carved bear on top of the shoe shelf. Is this one of those semi-affluent European-style houses? Hey, s.h.i.+megiwa-kun, I’d just like to ask; is Doctor Kitsuregawa trying to disguise the fact he’s doing research by using this normal-looking house?

“No, there’s no point in disguising anything. No one can copy Doctor Kitsuregawa’s research anyway, and no one can interfere with it either.”

I see. …Come to think of it, he called Doctor Kitsuregawa “Hotsure-sama” earlier, didn’t he. Hmm? I get that he’d want to pay respect to the man who developed him (though, to be honest, if it were me whose arm got remade into flames, there would be h.e.l.l to pay, not respect)(1), but I have a hard time understanding why he’d use “sama” to refer to one of Doctor Kitsuregawa’s relatives (grandchildren?), especially a little girl. It’s not like she’s a child of a n.o.ble family or something… Could this kid really be Doctor Kitsuregawa? No, there’s no way… While I was thinking, I was shown to the dining room. Needless to say, it was an ordinary dining room. If you lead a life like mine, it’s actually more unusual to be inside a normal home, so this run-of-the-mill stuff was quite fresh for me. But, where does the research happen?

“The second floor, generally. I hope to show it to you later—that is, if you accept my job.”

The little girl—Hotsure-chan—spoke falteringly, and sat down in one of the dining room chairs. s.h.i.+megiwa headed to the kitchen; it seemed he was really going to make me coffee. Maybe he’ll turn his arm into flames and boil the water in an instant. Imagining that, I sat down across from Hotsure-chan. So? Where’s Grandpa? Or Daddy or Mommy.

“Where should I begin…”

Hotsure-chan looked up at the ceiling, with a troubled expression most unbecoming of a little girl.

“I never had a daddy or a mommy. And just recently, Grandpa—”

She pointed at the ceiling.

“—Went up into the sky.”

Oh? The news itself was of little surprise, and I was able to accept it. I wouldn’t want to spout something pretentious like “life and death are just two sides of the same coin”. Those words would be as empty as the sky.(2) Even I’m not so immature as to tell a child something cynical like “I’m sure Doctor Kitsuregawa didn’t go up into the sky, he went deep under the ground”. So, how’d he die? He doesn’t seem like the type to die of old age. Hotsure-chan turned her gaze, her piercing gaze, toward me.

“A successful experiment.”

Now, that was an answer I had trouble processing. A successful experiment? Not a failed experiment?

“Yes, a success—Grandpa didn’t fail.”

What a thing to say. Makes him sound like an inventor like Edison. What was it, again; I have not failed, I have succeeded in finding a way in which it doesn’t work—right? Now that I think about it, Edison seems like a pretty eccentric man… I wonder what kind of person Doctor Kitsuregawa was.

“Sorry for the wait… black is fine, right?”

s.h.i.+megiwa placed a cup of coffee in front of me, then sat down next to Hotsure-chan. Even for a young seventeen-year-old, his demeanor seemed almost parental. It’s true that I can’t read interpersonal relations.h.i.+ps very well with my mind-reading technique, but I wonder. Judging from his work in the kitchen and how familiar he seemed with things, s.h.i.+megiwa must live here… But a teenage boy and a little girl in the single digits living alone in a house in a residential area makes me feel a bit uneasy. Maybe it’s a sense of incongruity—pondering that, I chugged the cup of coffee I’d been given. Yeah, that was good.

“We ought to give you a detailed explanation to start things off, right? Of course, what we say here is strictly confidential. Doctor Kitsuregawa’s honor is at stake.”

Honor? Honor, huh. I wouldn’t think a peerless mad scientist would possess anything so splendid as honor… Well, if you say so, I won’t tell anyone. Doctor Kitsuregawa’s death is a secret, right?

“Death… He’s dead in the physical sense. However, mentally, he’s still alive.”

As he was talking, s.h.i.+megiwa moved his gaze toward Hotsure-chan—Hotsure-chan looked fixedly at me.

“Hotsure-sama has taken over as Doctor Kitsuregawa.”

As his successor, you mean? Like, she’s taken over Doctor Kitsuregawa’s research? …No, there’s no way a five-year-old child could do something like that. Even I couldn’t have done that when I was five… When I was five, I’d already turned into a good-for-nothing kid, now that you mention it. In light of that, I guess I can’t categorically deny anything.

“I haven’t taken over in the way you’re thinking, Jun Aikawa. I said earlier that Grandpa went up into the sky, but to be precise, his spirit did not go into the sky.”

Hotsure-chan pointed at the ceiling once again. Obviously, she didn’t seem to mean that Doctor Kitsuregawa had gone to h.e.l.l—next, Hotsure-chan turned her finger toward her head. It was the pose you make when shooting yourself with a pistol.

“He’s inside my head.”

Even then, I still didn’t get it, so I have no choice but to admit that I was being dull. Inside her head. In a broad sense, that could still be a metaphor for taking over his research… However, the nuance seemed  rather different—Hotsure-chan’s way of speaking, as well as the dignity I could feel from her presence; I could even say it felt uncanny. I looked at s.h.i.+megiwa. You explain.

“It’s not that hard to understand. Well, in a way it is, but what happened is simple—you know that Doctor Kitsuregawa did research that involved tampering with the human mind as a physical object, right?”

I know. I nodded—I won’t make the reference out loud, but I don’t suppose s.h.i.+megiwa knows about the Niounomiya siblings. …Hm? So, what you’re saying is… Really, is that what you’re saying?

“That’s right. On the brink of death, Doctor Kitsuregawa inserted his mind into Hotsure-sama’s head—technically speaking, it was a transfer of memories and knowledge.”

Footnotes:
(1) In the j.a.panese there’s a play on words with 敬意を払う(to pay respect) and 薙ぎ払う(to mow down), since both incorporate the verb 払う (harau), to pay.
(2) In the j.a.panese she uses a word for “false/hypocritical” (空々しい) that comes from the character for “sky” (空).