The Girl of Undecipherable Codes

Stories

## Illustrations

## Character Introductions

Scans: Yoko (ようこ)

Nishimura Takumi

A second-year high school student. A transfer student from Tokyo, a boy whose only strong point is a memory a little better than it needs to be. He has accumulated several personal aliases, among them "the man who really does cry when it is time to cry," "Male Student Z," and "the gloomy, light-shunning bean-sprout baron."

Sawatari Haruka

A second-year high school student. Class representative of Nishimura's class, a cipher girl who loves codes with all her heart.

Nonozaki Misaki

A first-year high school student. A petite girl who loves mystery novels. Fooled by her small-animal looks, reach out a hand and you will pay for it.

Nishimura Tomoko

A second-year junior high student. Takumi's younger sister, nicknamed Little Chi. Cheerful and unrestrained, a thoroughly typical junior-high girl of today, whose favorite toy to play with is her brother.

Nakase Kazuki

A second-year high school student. A track girl, frank by nature and quick to get into arguments. In the past she was something like a boss to Takumi. The four-character idiom she likes is "grilled-meat set meal."

## Question One: The First and Last Q Book

They say that, statistically, nearly ninety percent of the impression a person holds of someone else is in fact already fixed at the first meeting.

Which is to say it is no exaggeration that the greater part of whether a relationship succeeds or fails is formed in the moment of that first encounter.

Let me try an example. There is a boy who transfers into a certain class at a certain high school.

On the first day of the transfer, uneasy in mood, arriving at school for the first time, his chest stirring with excitement for the new life about to begin from this moment on—at the point when the homeroom teacher says to him, "Please introduce yourself," and he stands facing his classmates head-on.

If, at that moment, he delivers a fine self-introduction with an unhurried, open, easy manner, his new school life can already be called basically a success. Afterward, everyone looking up at him will hold friendly impressions of the sort "a steady fellow," "looks pretty reliable," "I ought to be able to make friends with him," and then, in silence, friend-volunteers will come walking over from the other side.

So, the other way around: if this boy "fails to bring the first meeting off nicely," what sort of situation does it become?

...Well. What do you think it becomes?

Actually letting you see that scene would probably get you to the answer faster.

And so, then—thud.

""Hubbub, hubbub..."" (Centered on my desk, in a zone with a radius of exactly twenty centimeters, a crowd forms like a low wall)

""Whisper, whisper..."" (Classmates with astonished faces...

## Question Two: Lord HUIWEN, All Alone

"That will be all for homeroom. Those of you without club activities, be careful on the way home."

A week has passed since that stimulating first day as a transfer student. With the homeroom teacher's words as the signal, the whole day's classes are over.

The school life I had worried, at the start, might turn into who-knows-what was, once it had gone by, a thing of a single blink. I am already used to the new campus, and the subjects whose pace differs from my previous school have linked up as well.

"See you, Zipper Village," "I'm heading out, Nishimura," "See you tomorrow, Zipper Village" (Note: Nishimura's nickname is read Fasu-mura, while zipper is read Fasunaa—a way of teasing the fool he made of himself in the previous chapter.)

And, unlike Tokyo schools that are cold toward strangers, everyone in Mahiru-no-Saki, where I grew up, has taken me in since then as if nothing at all had happened. Even after that incident, they still let me feel warmth.

The lonely days I had lived through until now feel, when I look back, like a dream. To an outsider there still remain trivial problems, such as fewer than half of the names my classmates use for me having settled into Zipper Village—but if anything, I am nearly happy enough on my side to change my name to Zipper Village.

After twists and turns of that sort, the everyday life I had thought at first might turn into something terrible is, unexpectedly, proceeding smoothly.

The classroom is full of cheerful noise after school. I straighten my back a little and let the fatigue gathered on both shoulders go free.

All right. Time to go home. Today at four-thirty there is still...

## Question Three: The Young N-Heart That Walks Upside Down

A date.

In English, date.

The original meaning is a day on the calendar.

People who live in English-speaking circles ought to hear this word far more than ordinarily often. If I had been born in Britain or America, my heartbeat would probably be steadier now. Why, of all things, are my parents purebred Japanese? Today my head is full of nothing but that question.

Who would have predicted that the word "date" would ever have a chance to be used on me in this sense? I, at least, never anticipated it.

Well, but—but, but still. First, calm down, me. Deep breaths. Once, twice, three times. In—in—out. This is the Lamaze breathing method. (Encyclopedia: The Lamaze (childbirth) breathing method, also called the psychoprophylactic method of preparation for delivery. This method of giving birth, from the seventh month of pregnancy all the way through labor, through the process of learning neuromuscular control, prenatal exercises, and breathing technique, effectively lets the mother in labor concentrate her attention on controlling her own breathing, thereby shifting the pain, moderately relaxing the muscles, and remaining composed with full confidence through labor pains and delivery, so as to speed the birth and let the baby be born smoothly.)

...Out.

I have simply had my composure thrown far too far off by the word "date." For a pure-hearted gentleman like me, that word is indeed a pink word a little too strong a stimulus, but have I let even a trifle like this cloud my eyes and make me forget something very important?

The other person is Sawatari-san.

That person is precisely an alien wearing an angel's skin. Bec...

## Question Four: The Saegusa Takeyama Memoirs

The summer of sixth grade, five years ago now. The matter of my moving to Tokyo had been decided, and this was one day among the few that remained before I would leave Mahiru-no-Saki.

The luggage was mostly packed, and I had finished explaining things to my main friends. Thinking, "Is there anything I still ought to do that I have not done?", I arrived at the sentimental conclusion, "I will leave proof that I existed in Mahiru-no-Saki," named the undertaking my personal time capsule, and went to a mountain nearby where I often played at the time.

Gripping tight the PVC Kamen Rider figure I had treated as a treasure then (it was my favorite tokusatsu program in those days: a story of an artificial human who had undergone modification surgery, striving to obtain a motorcycle license while fighting an evil organization on the side; average ratings, two percent), I walked all over the mountain considering where I would bury it next, and I met a girl I did not ordinarily see.

She was a cute child with a straw hat pulled down to her eyebrows, wearing a white dress. This child was not playing with anyone. She sat alone on the ground, seeming to write something with a twig.

On an ordinary day I would probably only have thought, "What a mysterious child," but that day my melancholy boy's heart exploded, and I took it upon myself to treat this encounter as something like fate.

"What are you doing in a place like this?"

I made up my mind and spoke to her. The moment the girl looked my way, her body gave a jolt, and she backed three steps on the spot. Plainly on her guard...

## Afterword

In a corner of Tokyo I kept making hamburgers and kept writing a novel, and last autumn I submitted this work. If I were to say what has changed since that time, it is probably that I have less hair and more weight, that sort of thing.

In any case, thank you very much for reading this far. My name is Niibo Shizunami.

A year on from then, I am still living by making hamburgers just the same, but being able, in this form, to deliver into people's hands a product other than hamburgers truly moves me in every sense of the word.

Because the price of the book is basically the same as the set meals customers usually order, thinking of it that way I am suddenly nervous.

If anyone can gain a satisfaction worth one lunch in exchange, I thank you, and I will keep working hard from here.

If anyone regrets it, and feels that for something of this degree they would rather have bought a hamburger, I am very sorry to you, and I will work harder and harder still... ...It does taste good, though, the M Burger (YJ: Lanlan Road?). I have worked here a long time, and I still like it best.

Next is the matter of writing this afterword. Just recently a new product was launched: a hamburger of one-hundred-percent domestic meat, with thick bacon, a very bold and splendid offering. It is very delicious!

If you happen to pass a shop nearby, please do come and try it. The entire staff waits with sincere hearts for your visit.

There was someone I liked, once. She was a junior at the place where I worked part-time then, a girl of proper manners, a quick mind, and a gentle nature. Her name, I'll just invent...