Kai sat alone on the rooftop, legs crossed, the cold wind brushing against his neck. From up here, the school looked normal — symmetrical buildings, students below laughing, the scent of cafeteria curry drifting up.
But it was a lie.
He knew that now.
The textbook. The hidden room. The USB. The photo.
Everything screamed that something was deeply wrong — but no one else seemed to hear it.
He tried to connect the dots, but they didn't line up like a puzzle. They writhed like veins, pulsing beneath the surface of normal life.
"What if this place isn't broken?" he whispered to himself."What if it's working exactly the way it's meant to?"
That was when the wind stopped.
And the sky — for just a second — shimmered, like a reflection on rippling water.
That evening, Kai visited someone he hadn't seen in weeks: Uncle Masaru — his late father's brother, a quiet man with a limp and eyes that never quite met yours.
He'd once taught at a school. Not this one. But one like it.
The moment Kai stepped into the old apartment, Masaru looked up from his books and said without preamble:
"You've started seeing it, haven't you?"
Kai froze.
"Seeing what?"
Masaru poured tea, silent for a long moment.Then:
"The world behind the windows. The one that watches back."
They sat on the tatami floor, steam curling from their cups.
Kai told him about the photo, the symbol in the book, Mr. Suda, the USB video.
Masaru didn't flinch. Didn't interrupt.
Only stared into the steam like it held the shape of an answer.
Then he said:
"Your father knew, too. That's why he stopped teaching. That's why he drank himself into silence."
Kai clenched his fists. "What is it? Why me?"
Masaru's lips thinned.
"Because you're not the first. And you won't be the last.
The school isn't a place. It's a filter. A pattern machine. It separates the 'fixed' from the 'fluid.' You've been marked as fluid."
Kai blinked. "That doesn't make sense."
Masaru smiled sadly.
"It's not supposed to. Not yet."Masaru stood and opened a cabinet, pulling out a small wooden box with rusted latches. He held it for a moment, then offered it to Kai.
"I'm not supposed to give you this."
Inside was a stack of yellowed papers, bound with string.
Old schematics. Surveillance logs. A partial map of Morino High School, overlaid with non-Euclidean annotations — corridors that looped impossibly, rooms that moved.
And on the last page:
SUBJECT 9: KAI. CURRENT STATUS — DRIFTING. OBSERVE FOR PATTERN FORMATION. INTERFERENCE MINIMUM.
Kai's heart felt like it stopped.
"I was in this… before I even came here?"
Masaru didn't answer.
He simply said:
"They watch when you're awake.They write when you sleep.
Don't let them decide who you are."
Kai walked home that night under flickering streetlights. For the first time in days, the paranoia faded — not because things made sense, but because he finally understood:
The school wasn't changing.He was.
Not broken. Not insane.
Just... aware.
And in that moment of terrifying clarity, he felt a strange peace.
Until he reached his front door.
There was a package waiting on the step. No label. Just a single black envelope.
Inside:
A photo of his conversation with Masaru. Taken from outside the apartment window.
On the back, scrawled in red ink:
"Do not speak to him again."