01x08 - She Who Spins Fiction

[bunniefuu]

The first time I met her, I knew

instantly this woman must havebeen Kuro's first love.

She seems nice, girl. Thisis my girlfriend, Sagamihara.

We go to the same college.It's nice to meet you.

Well, I'm headingto the cafe downstairs. Huh?

I think I'm in the way here.

I just wanted a chanceto say hello.

So you can take your time.Okay. Excuse me.

She's important to Curro.

But she felt off.

Like she was somehowsilently corrupting those

around her.That's how she seemed.

I heard Miss Sakuragawawas taken to the operating

room again yesterday. Really?She tried su1c1de again.

Even if it was another attemptto take her own life.

She's not dead,but I'd say it's doubtful.

She has very long to live.

She was tying you downand you couldn't see it.

But if goingout with Iwanaga will

help you break free of that,

I think it's a good thing,despite conflicted feelings.

Look, Saki, I do love Rika.Of course.

And I might be tied down.

But sometimes I also wishshe wasn't around. Huh.

What are you saying?I thought Rika had passed away.

Rika hasn't passed away? No.That simply isn't possible.

After all,Rica is my flesh and blood.

Huh? Don't tell meshe's also like Kuro.

You get guys. So she's like.Look at the good guys.

I screwed up. I can't believeI messed up so bad.

How could I be dumbenough to create

time for Caro and Sakieto be alone together?

What in the world happened?Why are

things so awkwardbetween them now?

Iwanagahere in case you need to refuel.

It's about time for steel LadyNanase to make her appearance.

If I'm here,the ayakashi that come

to tell you about Steel LadyNanase might get scared away.

Saki I'll be waitingover here by the exit.

All right, then.I guess I'll be waiting

for newsin the car with Iwanaga.

Someone Saki was friendswith has been m*rder*d.

And now she and Kuro, who.Who's such a nice guy?

They are a manand woman who planned

to get married at one point.I was fast asleep in the hotel

for about an hour and a half, minutes.

You could do a lotin minutes.

And I mean a lot.Especially when they're young.

Iwanaga. Have you evermet Rika by chance?

Oh, yeah. I've met her before.The hospital

where Rieko wasadmitted was also where

I was staying for a time.I see. So you know that she

also ate the fleshof a kudan and a mermaid.

Kuru mentioned that Rika'scondition was something

he never wanted Sakito have to worry about.

Is she trying to get me to spillsomething? Oh, very well.

Yes, that I know. Because Rikais also terrifying to themonsters,

though neither she nor Kurohave told me the details.

She was apparently hospitalizedlong term so that her

body and abilities could bethoroughly examined. Huh.

That's what it was.And how was she lately?

Rika had beenliving in my mansion

up until about a month ago.

Huh. She was discharged rathersuddenly at the beginning of theyear.

But why would she goto your house..

As his girlfriend?I'd have to be out

of my mind to let Rikaand Kuro live together.

A new director was appointed.Enrico was soon discharged.

The political climateof the new administration

did not work in her favor.

After all,the hospital really didn't know

what to do withher in the long run.

I'm sure there were many therewho were happy to see her go.

For whatever reason,perhaps because of that general

sense of relieffrom her leaving,

there were rumors that Rikadidn't have long to live.

So what do you say?Exciting, huh?

How do you feelabout leaving the hospital?

Do you think it's wise to say

it that way?What if she resists?

Then I'm afraid we'llbe left without a choice.

All right. I understand. Well,I'd like

to thank youfor all you've done.

I still need to getmy things together.

So could youcall my cousin Kuro?

Rika. Given the suddennessof your discharge,

have you found a placeto stay yet? Not as of.. Yet.

What do you think? I couldstay at your place for a while.

No, you can't. My placeis really small, so. No.

What if I promiseto do housework? What?

Welcome home, Kuro.

Your bath is ready. Curro.Good night. Sweet dreams.

What's wrong?Did I say something strange?

No, but it's just.I only have the one bed.

Well, yeah.You live on your own, right?

Which is why I've got it.I'll talk to Iwanaga about it.

Iwanaga. As folks know,a lot of people.

So they might be ableto come up with something.

You don't have to gothrough all that.

If I can't stay with you,I could always sleep in a park.

Hey, Iwanaga. There's somethingI wanted to run by you.

Okura, what's up?It's unusual for you

to turn to me for help.So hold on.

Mm hmm. I'll need to chargea consultation fee.

The goddess of wisdomis charging for consultations.

Indeed. But dependingupon the client, I'd

much prefer favorsor offerings over cash.

Don't worry,I won't ask for much.

But what if the.. Discussionwere to involve you as well?

Tell me,where are you right now?

The special lecture.The one you wanted

to attend at the university.It's happening right now.

Yeah.You've chosen to call me instead

and ask me for a favor of some

kind.This is no ordinary matter.

Pardon the interruption.In that very familiar

recording I hearover the phone tells

me you're at the hospitalright now,

which means that whatever you'reabout to ask

me has to do with Rika.

All the more reasonI should be allowed

to be a bit forceful about this.

But don't you worry, Carol. Iwouldn't ask for anything toodifficult.

What are your conditions?You'll let me have

the spare key to your apartment?

Don't be stupid.What's so stupid about your

girlfriend asking for the sparekey to your apartment?

It's not like I'm planningto do anything.

Unacceptable.Wouldn't it be lovely to have

your girlfriend to do yourhousework and welcome you homeeach day?

Huh? What?

Welcome back home, Curro.

I didn't cutcorners preparing your meals

or your bed.Bathe together, bathe together.

Co sleep. Co sleep. No. I found

a nice place to stay. Huh?This place here. Uh.

Okay, fine. I'll give youmy keys. So just help me out.

This makes me so happy.After so much waiting,

I'm finally yourcommon law wife. Yeah. No.

And so I went to the hospitalto pick them up immediately,

and Rekha left the onlyhome she'd known for years.

So, anyway, we had plentyof vacant rooms available,

so we welcomedher into our home.

And since she wasa mysterious patient

who had been in the hospitalfor half a decade,

once she left, rumors spreadthat she had passed away..

And those rumors were somehowable to make their way to me.

In reality,she was doing rather well.

Not only is Rekha quitebeautiful, but she's also wellmannered.

So my aunt welcomedher with open arms.

So what,you mean Rekha didn't hate you?

Why do you just haveto assume that Rekha hated me?

I first met Rekha when shewas still in the hospital.

Kurau. I don't think she'sa good match for you. Oh.

I agree that's cringe worthy.I know

it was a personal low point.

The best part waswhen Rica scrambled

to remedy the situation. I mean.

She's not good for you,but she might

not be the worst for you either.

You actually made Ricafeel bad about something.

Oh, yeah, you bet I did.After that,

we quickly madeup and occasionally went

out, just the two of us.

We even threwbirthday parties for each

other with cake, of course.You and Rica.

Happy birthday.Thank you. Hooray. Well, then,

what is Rica up to now?

You said she was at yourplace until a month ago, right?

We're not sure where she is.Huh?

A month ago, she told my parents

that she had finally founda job in a new place to stay.

And she left immediatelythereafter. We couldn't contacther on her cell.

And the new address andworkplace she'd given us werefake.

And what did Kuro doafter he heard about it?

Kuro went berserkand pushed me down

onto the bed and used my young

body to vent his frustrations.Answer Seriously?

Nothing.At first he just said that Rica

probably had somethingvery different in mind.

But two weeks later,he started trying

to get a hold of her repeatedly.

Then he sent me a singlemessage before disappearing.

So tell me,Saki, what's bothering you?

What did you and Kuro talk about

at the hotel whileI was still sleeping?

It didn't takeyou long to realize

that Rica was behindState Lady Nanase.

Kuro didn't come to MakurazakiCity because you called for him.

He was here looking for Rica.

Something must have gotten Kuroand Saki talking about Rica.

Well, not like I really careif she found out about it,

but that must mean nothinghappened between them. Guess Ican relax.

Why did you keepthat information from me?

Because I stilldon't have any proof.

Even when she was stayingover at my place,

Rica would messwith the computer a lot,

but I never actually lookedat what she was doing.

I never would have assumedthat she was keeping

herself busy by creatinga wiki page

and bringing StealLady Nanase to life.

And I didn'treally know about Steal

Lady Nancy until the monsterscame to talk to me about her.

I only cameto the realization that Rica

was involved whenI was doing some research

and saw the pictureon the wiki page.

Wait. You mean the pictureon the main page?

Yes, precisely.That image was painted in

the same style that Rica uses.

I'd say it was about a year ago.

She suddenly became veryserious about painting.

Looking back on it now,I believe

Rica fully intendedto create a monster

of the imagination evenback then in order

to consolidate hundredsof thousands of fantasies

and give them a sharedvision of a monster.

Name and shape are key. The most

effective way to do so would beto illustrate the story.

Once it's visualized, everyonewould have the same specificimage in mind.

I'm sure CarrieNancy's accident gave her

the perfect materialto work with.

Karin was an idolin the public eye.

She was involvedin a dark scandal

and d*ed a very dramatic death.Goes to the mix, and it has

ample opportunity to evolveinto a yokai or an urban legend.

There might have alreadybeen rumors of the ghost

of Kari Nanase appearingin the city she d*ed in,

but the onewho amplified them and gave

them a unified vision was Rika.

I'm assuming the onewho gave her

the name SteelLady Nancy and made

up the accompanying storieswas also Rica.

Curro cameto this realization as well

while he was tryingto track Rica down,

he heard rumors aboutSteel Lady Nancy

and sent something after seeingthe picture on Steel LadyNancy's wiki,

he knew for sure and came here.

Saki You are someone who decidedto live your entire life,

seeing only the real world,knowing what lies in theshadows.

What will you do now?Kuro probably

didn't tell youbecause he didn't want

to get youany further involved in

this mess than you already were.

I see.That's because Rica was pulling

the strings with the samekudan ability that Kuro uses,

thus allowing Steel LadyNancy to mature more quickly.

Most likely Ricamay have d*ed over

and over againto find the future

where the internet wouldn'tstop talking about

the steel Ladyand then Rica resurrected.

But why would she do that? What

good comes out of creating amonster that killsindiscriminately?

Rica has the powerto determine the future,

but it's not as impressiveas it sounds.

Curro always saysthe same thing. He can

only choose futures that areavailable and within the scope

of his own talents,potential and effort.

Which means he's not all thatdifferent from a normal person.

But she's successfully created amonster. She's probably testingher limits,

trying to find out just how far

she can go with her abilityto decide the future.

She stacks possibility uponpossibility and chosen futureand chosen future.

If you takea phenomenon that has

a chance and makeit happen ten times in a row,

you get something that hasa probability of in .

You can toss a coin and have

it come up heads, times in a row.

Normally the steel lady wouldhave little chance of coming tolife,

but she's one of thosepossible variations.

Oh, it's not like you can getanywhere by creating a monster.

My lady. That infernalSteel lady has appeared.

Please do allowme to guide you there.

It's just a little goblin cat.There's

no reason to be afraid.It's time to go, Saki.

So weird.We'll have to put Rika's

goals aside for now andconcentrate on defeating LadyNanase.

Whatever Rekha's goal may be,it doesn't change anything.

This world is not uncertain.It may be full of yokai,

monsters, specters and demons,but there is

a reasonthat can't be overturned.

And it's my sacredduty to protect that.

Tonight? Definitely.It's time. I need to have more.

I'm counting on you. Bestof luck. Yeah, thanks. You too.

We won't be bothered by anyonehere and Kuro should be able

to fight steal LadyNanase all night..

Just because he hasthe power to come

back to life doesn't mean I want

to watch my boyfriendget k*lled over and over again.

I've just connectedto the wiki page.

All the poststhat had settled down

for a while are starting to pick

up again after what happenedto the detective.

I'm sure people want moreinformation and to provide theirown theories.

But if the person managingthe site is Rica,

couldn't she simply censor whatyou post or even delete itoutright?

I really don't thinkshe'd do that.

If she censors or deletes anyposts concerning doubts aboutthe story,

that'll give the impressionthat the admin

has some kind of problemwith those types of statements.

Which would force manyusers to believe

that these posts are beingcensored because the ghostdoesn't actually exist.

That would be disadvantageousfor someone who is trying

to make Steel Lady Nanasay manifest into our reality.

So she hasno choice but to leave

all the postson the wiki page alone.

Fair enough.At the hotel, you'd mentioned

that you cameup with four solutions.

But doesn't it allcome down to numbers?

Sometimes that's allyou need for lies

to break through the truth andcreate a new reality altogether.

The discussion. We're aboutto start on the Steel

Lady Nancy Wiki pagemight resemble a committee

to discuss a proposedbill in a parliament,

a company's board of directorsor a foundation's board oftrustees.

The matter being raisedfor discussion is if the ghost

named Steel Lady Nancytruly exists or doesn't.

Rekha's work has alreadygained majority support

and she is enoughdata and a well

grounded argument to supporther creation's existence.

So will I be able to overturn

the majority opinionand win the vote?

This is where my trueskills start to really shine.

If she's already wonover most opinions,

won't it be nearly impossibleto reverse? Yes.

If this was a normal parliamentor board of directors,

those with voting rights wouldhave banded together, formingalliances.

And there are toomany risks in declaring

the opposite opinion atthe th hour.

Instead,the ones who have the voting

rights in this committee arethe people viewing the site.

Tens of thousandsof people who have

almost no relation to eachother. Their opinions areeverything.

Irresponsible judges who haveno idea they're involved.

That's scary in and of itself,certainly.

But if you look at it another

way, this assembly bearsno responsibility.

Nothing will hold them back.Not the law

or justice or eventhe truth itself.

Even if the solutionarrived at is

unjust or simply untrue, we win.

As long as the majority of the

, plus siteviewers support it.

If we present a plausiblestory that fits

with enough of the factsand is interesting enough,

the masses will irresponsiblysupport it and vote for ourside.

Which means with this committee,anything goes.

We can obscure and hidethe real data,

make claims that blackis white as well

as present several contradictoryanswers so that at a glance

the argument can seem totallyreasonable as well as ratherentertaining.

Then we cantransform fiction into fact.

We can actually getaway with that here.

Okay. I will stop at nothingto win this battle

and I will pour everythingI have into these lies.

The Committee to Conquer.Lady Nancy is now in session.

Dusty Lady Nancy actually exist,or is she

nothing more than anurban legend that someone

made up a battleof truth and lies

is about to begin overher very existence.

Next time, the committeeto conquer steal Lady Nancy.