Monogatari Series Short Stories Book - First Edition - Print Version

maxdefolsch & bluex present
MONOGATARI SERIES
SHORT STORIES
Fan translation project
NISIOISIN
Art by VOFAN
and others
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface 5
Introduction 7
Hitagi Buffet 13
Mayoi Room 21
Suruga Court 29
Nadeko Pool 37
Tsubasa Song 45
You and Nadekko ch.1 53
Tsukihi Eternal 65
Karen Arm-Leg 71
Hitagi Neck 77
Shinobu House 83
Cat Sign Astrology 89
Tsubasa Board 97
Mayoi Castle 101
Hitagi Coin 107
Nadeko Mirror 115
Shinobu Science 121
Challenge to the Readers 127
Hitagi Figure 133
Hitagi Salamander 139
Hitagi Throwing 145
Suruga Palace 159
Yotsugi Future 175
Ougi Travel 181
Suruga Neat 187
Rouka God 193
Shinobu Figure 201
The Stray Snail 207
Karen Brushing 217
Tsukihi Brushing 235
Koyomi History 253
Yotsugi Stress 257
Princess Beauty 263
As a Human 269
Something Wrong 275
And Then 279
Why 285
With Caution 289
Hitagi Dish 305
Hitagi Hermit Crab 309
Sodachi Mirror 315
Mayoi Name 317
PREFACE
This translation project started in November 2015, when I

discovered the existence of the short stories. I was eager to read more
Monogatari while waiting for the anime to continue, but I was very
disappointed when I saw that almost none of the stories had been
translated into English. Surely, for a series as successful as
Monogatari, the community must have done everything already, right?
It turned out that it hadn’t, and the existence of the short stories itself
wasn’t something widely known.
That’s when I had the idea to directly ask the /r/araragi subreddit
if people would be interested in translating these stories to share them
with the English-speaking community. And fortunately, they were,
and a couple of talented people joined me in this project! They are the
people I want to publicly thank, because my only role here was to
coordinate everything, send messages and find raws, and the real hard
work was their doing! Their names are listed at the end of this book.
5
In addition, I would like to extend my heartfelt gratitude to
Haremless who single-handedly translated or proofread half of the
stories and has always been extremely reliable, and to bluex who
helped me put this whole book together with superb editing skills.
Without them, work on this project would not have come nearly this
far, and making this book would not have been possible. I can’t thank
them enough for their efforts.
And of course, thank you everyone else for the support!
With that out of the way, let’s start with the real content of this book.
maxdefolsch
Monogatari Series Short Stories

First edition
6
INTRODUCTION
So… what are these short stories?

As you may know, the Monogatari Series is a light novel series
written by the talented author Nisio Isin starting from 2006. When it
received an anime adaptation by Shaft in 2009, it quickly contributed
to the series becoming immensely popular, and many kinds of
merchandise, such as supplementary books, Blu-ray/DVD sets or
figures, have been released ever since. With those are often included
short story arcs written by Nisio Isin, in the same style as the light
novels and usually named according to the same naming scheme
([first name] [word]), sometimes as a way to expand on certain plot
points that were only alluded to in the novels and anime, but more
generally just to give extra interactions and fun conversations between
the characters as usual.
7
Are all the stories there?
I sort of arbitrarily divide the stories into three main categories:
 The main short stories, the largest bulk of short arcs written in
the same style as the novels. Until recently, it always followed the
classic [first name] [word] naming scheme, but now it also
includes a set of five stories that don’t follow this naming scheme
but still adhere to a short story format and are visibly related to
the main plot, as they directly tie into Kizumonogatari.
 The crossover stories, which for the time being comprise
Mazemonogatari, a set of 15 longer stories (of which 12 have been
released so far) where Araragi meets various characters from
other series written by Nisio Isin, and Tsubasa Lion, a crossover
with Umino Chika’s manga series March Comes in Like a Lion,
featuring Kiriyama Rei as the narrator.
 Additional material, everything that doesn’t follow a normal
short story format, but is written by or told from the perspective
of a character.
This tome contains every main short story, except Mayoi Welcome
which I haven’t been able to find anywhere, and of course except the
stories that have been published after this book’s release, or that
haven’t been translated yet.
The crossover stories aren’t included here, both due to a lack of
translations and because they’re long enough that they could fill an
entire second book on their own.
Finally, while this book contains most of the additional material
(interspersed through the main short stories), it omits the transcript
of the Bakemonogatari Drama CD, Hyakumonogatari, for similar
concerns of length.
8
Are they canon?
Unless someone can prove me wrong, I firmly believe that all the
main short stories are canon. Some of them are plot-related and
referenced in the light novels. For example, the short story Mayoi Room
explains why Hachikuji forgot her backpack at Araragi’s house on
August 20; in Shinobu Time, Araragi actually tells the reader to check
out the Bakemonogatari Anime Complete Guidebook for more
information.
The crossover stories might be different, like taking place in a
“what-if” alternate universe. The current lack of translations makes
it impossible to say for sure at the moment, but I’ve read that some of
these stories also reference the main plot and so would have a place in
the timeline. For the time being, my judgment on their canonicity is
reserved.
So my answer is that yes, the main short stories are canon; and
maybe the crossover stories are too.
9
I don’t want to read 40 stories, which ones are important?
None of them is truly crucial to understand the series, but some of
them are indeed related to the plot in some way and are not just funny
conversations between our beloved characters. If you must choose,
here are the ones that you really should read:
 Mayoi Room: while not really important in itself, it does explain
why Hachikuji was in Araragi’s room and forgot her backpack
here shortly before the events of Mayoi Jiangshi.
 Tsukihi Eternal, Karen Arm-Leg, Hitagi Neck, Shinobu House: the four
stories of the “Gahara Summit”, or what happened when Araragi
introduced his girlfriend to his sisters after Tsukihi Phoenix.
 Rouka God: when Kaiki came to talk to Rouka about her activities,
leading to the events in Suruga Devil.
 Yotsugi Stress: in Tsubasa Tiger, there is a timeskip after Black
Hanekawa and Shinobu arrive at the cram school that just burned
down. It’s then hinted in Shinobu Mail that they met an oddity and
fought against it. This story starts at the end of this fight.
 Princess Beauty: presented as a fairy tale, but it’s the true origin
story of the child who later became Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion
Heart-Under-Blade.
 As a Human, Something Wrong, And Then, Why, With Caution: a set of
Kizumonogatari-related stories, each told in the perspective of a
different character.
 Karen Brushing, Tsukihi Brushing: amazingly, it’s even worse than
the toothbrushing scene in Nisemonogatari. And by worse I mean
better. So much better.
10
What’s the reading order?
If you’re up to date with the anime, you should have enough
context for most of the stories. Some of the plot-related stories need
you to have read/watched until a certain arc to understand (for
example, Rouka God is a prequel to the events in Suruga Devil, and
Yotsugi Stress expands upon something that’s only mentioned in
Shinobu Mail), but other than that, you should be fine. If you’re not
sure, just catch up with the anime before getting to the short stories.
You can read them in any order you want since they’re almost all
independent. Currently, the only exception is the set of four
Nisemonogatari Guidebook stories (Tsukihi Eternal, Karen Arm-Leg, Hitagi
Neck, Shinobu House) organized in chronological order.
What’s the chronological order?

As usual with Monogatari, the short stories are all over the
timeline. Unfortunately, most of the stories don’t have enough
indications to deduce the exact date, but some of them are known due
to their relation with other plot elements. I have attempted to
construct a full timeline of the series before, but it will be omitted in
this book as it’s mostly irrelevant.
Excluding Hitagi Throwing (where Kanbaru explains how she met
Senjougahara in middle school), the earliest known story is With
Caution on March 26 (towards the beginning of Koyomi Vamp), and the
latest known story is Tsukihi Brushing, that takes place after Araragi’s
graduation.
What’s next for this project?

As more stories will likely be released in the future (Nisio can’t
stop writing, after all), and since we’d like to try and improve
everything we can, we’re planning on publishing future editions of
this book at some point. Look forward to it!
11
HITAGI BUFFET
BAKEMONOGATARI ANIME COMPLETE GUIDEBOOK
27 October 2010
TRANSLATION: UNKNOWN
Usually I can easily see Senjougahara at school, but seldom do I have

time to meet her on Sundays. But shockingly, we met up that day.
Having said that, it’s just that she got a free coupon from her father
for a cake buffet that is for limited use on Sunday and she suddenly
wanted to use it. It’s a dessert café that is too expensive for civilians,
so in order for the shop to maintain its style, it usually does not take
up such pirate-like behavior as buffets, but it seemed to be the shop’s
anniversary that day.
Speaking of freely eating cakes, when I am standing in front of a
counter full of donuts, I can’t promise that Shinobu won’t appear from
my shadow. Of course, she has never come out in front of
Senjougahara, and she has also never been moved by anything other
than the donuts from Mister Donut (she basically doesn’t eat human
food), so I can tentatively relax.
13
If there was any concern, it would be the store’s exterior. Boys seem
to need a certain degree of courage in order to go in, which made me
so angry I stiffened, but I needed to tolerate it.
Senjougahara’s mockery doesn’t bother me anymore, and the cakes
themselves are rich and varied; also the taste is by far the best I have
ever eaten, so I don’t care about anything else.
Hmm, delicious.
Even bigger things are trivial in front of all this food. The fact that
humans are animals dominated by food—I suddenly felt I experienced
that truth deeply.
No, it’s the same even for vampires.
“Senjougahara. Did you get fat?” I said.
Taking a break, I inadvertently said it.
Although I haven’t watched any comedy shows recently, I could
still describe the image in the next instant, like throwing a party, a
fancy cake flew towards my face.
I don’t know if it’s for the guests’ convenience in eating it or if it
was just designed that way, but this piece of fancy cake was much
smaller than imagined, it could be said that it was mini-sized, so very
luckily, my face and clothes were not dirtied: the cake was directly
enveloped by my mouth.
It was a very direct method of eating.
“Huh? You said something that you shouldn’t have said? Araragi-
kun.”
Senjougahara’s eyes opened very wide.
Her deadpan look was very frightening.
“Girls don’t get fat.”
“Oh…… Is that so?”
“Yes. Girls only grow.”
Senjougahara placed the fork in her hand and started
exaggeratingly eating sections of the cake one after another.
“This is not getting fat, this is just growing.”
“……”
14
What an amazing explanation.
“If I keep eating lots and lots like this, then soon I will become two
people.”
“Scary in many ways.”
That explanation is scary, having two of you is even more scary.
“Say, you were too thin before, so if you were to add a little bit of
weight now, the extra flesh would be very obvious.”
“Don’t say the flesh will be very obvious.”
Senjougahara was poised, holding the fork.
In front of me, her boyfriend.
…… Something worth mentioning, if it were the Senjougahara from
some time ago, then certainly, instead of throwing cake from the
beginning, she would have mercilessly attacked me by directly
throwing the fork at me. Realizing this point, I felt that she has calmed
a lot from before.
But certainly I can’t say that she has become very gentle.
“Speaking to the end, Araragi-kun, talking about things like weight
in front of a girl, those things are just too sensitive.”
“Ah.”
Actually that is right.
But seeing Senjougahara eating so happily, I was shocked even as I
was drinking black tea, so I wanted to pull her down a notch.
On this steel-skin face, or rather steel-shell face, I wanted to reveal
a little flaw in that face.
Basically, I wanted some mischief.
“Although I didn’t want to say it, but recently I have gained a little
weight.”
“Hmm. So it’s actually true.”
I’d thought it was an illusion.
“Specifically about five kilograms.”
“By that much, what!?”
Five kilos!
15
Isn’t that the same as her weight when she was possessed by the
crab?!
In this sense, it’s the addition of one person’s worth.
“What is wrong? It’s a popular scenario that’s been coming out
lately.”
“No, that’s not the case. If it is the flesh that was coming out then
it’s really frightening.”
“You’re really annoying. Be careful of me making your internal
organs fly out.”
The visceral fats coming out.
I hate this kind of 3D effect.
Ah.
I can’t actually tell that she got fat…… But, ah, she gained a lot.
“So would it really be better if you returned to the track and field
team? That way you can also stay in shape.”
“Well.”
Senjougahara really hates things about the past, especially things
from middle school, but this time she didn’t refute, as if she were
thinking deeply about something.
“Let me explain something.”
Senjougahara said, while eating cake.
“Being able to eat what you love like this, and also being able to eat
until you’re full… Until a while ago this was unimaginable. That’s why
I’m really happy.”
“Ah?”
“Think about it. Back then, because of the crab, I—didn’t have any
weight. So, just like limiting the weight of my clothing, I also had to
limit food intake.”
Eat too much—you’ll get heavy.
Senjougahara said.
“Ah……”
I nodded.
I see.
16
Because being overly thin—because of this kind of reason.
Ultimately, Senjougahara is considered tall among girls (she’s even
taller than me). Even though she gained five kilograms, it actually
probably is still far from reaching the standard weight.
“Being able to eat what you love until you’re full is great. Having a
real sense of that love.”
Senjougahara repeated that continuously.
“When I love something, I will get a small feeling of being saved.
Although, of course, I may be a person who has committed a lot of
mistakes—but at least when I see something good is still something
good, I still have this kind of emotion, so I am able to forgive myself a
little.”
“Forgive—”
Being saved.
No—I can understand this point.
Saying I understood… It is better to say I have personally
experienced it.
Perhaps, the opposite.
Only after you love something, can you feel like you’re being saved,
or being forgiven. Only people like me and Senjougahara would have
this kind of feeling—
“I like the me who is liking something, or you can say, in love with
a girl in love. So, of course, this short phase has a denied meaning—
but is there anything wrong?”
This is something from someone who has never hated herself—she
said.
“That may be true…… But that can’t be a reason for overeating
cake. Everything must have a limit.”
“That’s right.”
Senjougahara nodded, but her hands didn’t stop.
In the end, Senjougahara’s family’s economic condition has not
recovered, so maybe there’s very little opportunity for her to eat this
much.
17
But even if you say I’m crazy, I actually feel, slightly, that girls with
a bit of meat are cuter; you can even say that I even want her to gain
two more kilograms.
“So are you going to start jogging with Kanbaru?”
“Forget it. That weight loss method can’t be followed by ordinary
people.”
“However, while talking, I found that Araragi-kun can really eat.
I’m telling you in advance, Araragi-kun, if your BMI goes over 20, I
will ruthlessly break up with you.”
“That benchmark is too strict.”
20. That is even stricter than the metabolic syndrome.
“Ah, but that should be no problem.”
“You seem very confident. Why?”
“No, I only recently discovered it, but this can be regarded as one
of the few physical advantages of vampires. A vampire’s specialty is
the body being able to maintain a sound condition. If it goes over a
certain value, it will naturally return to the optimum body weight. That
is to say, I won’t get fat.”
Kala.
Senjougahara’s fork fell to the ground.
She bore a stunned expression—by the way, this kind of
expression, I have never seen it before.
The expressionless attribute collapsed.
“No, but, this is just a side effect. Not as tight as like Kanbaru. So I
can still get a bit fat. So, I’m still very jealous of that person—hmm,
Senjougahara-san?”
“How enviable……”
I was harshly glared at.
“This kind of rule-breaking tactic, I will never accept it…… You
have this kind of body, and also use this condescending view to judge
my weight gain……”
“No, no, I’m not judging you.”
18
“OK, you will see. Araragi-kun who relies on oddities, I’ll let you
see the possibility of human beings. The parts that I grew, I’ll lose it
in an instant—I declare it here, Senjougahara weight loss plan
activate.”
“Weight, weight loss plan……”
So it’s not losing fat? A gross exaggeration.
“Ah. I’ll start the fight immediately after I finish this meal!”
Senjougahara said, and used her hands to grab the cake, eating it
mouthful by mouthful (because the fork just fell on the ground). Then,
at an alarming rate she started eating the cake on my plate.
In short, initially, I even worried that she was going to finish up all
the cake in that place, but seeing the expressionless her enjoying the
mood of liking something, I did not want to pull her down anymore.
As long as Senjougahara is happy, even if I don’t eat cake, I will
also feel happy.
I thought today was the best day.
…… By the way, as a follow-up story, after that Senjougahara really
began training with Kanbaru together, and just like a joke, in a short
amount of time she successfully lost weight.
Sure enough, you can not underestimate her perseverance.
19
MAYOI ROOM
27 October 2010
TRANSLATION: POLARIS TRANSLATIONS
That Sunday, I was in my room at my wits’ end.

“This is bad. What am I going to do? For it to turn out like this…
Aah. I can’t recover from this. I thought I was an idiot, an idiot, but to
think that I could be this much of an idiot… I can’t even follow up on
this.”
Muttering these words of regret almost deliriously, I nervously
raised my head and glanced at the bed.
What I thought from that glance was, of course, “it would be nice
if this was a hallucination~”.
That’s right, I wonder if this was just a dream.
Something like this couldn’t possibly occur in reality.
“Akirame-san.”1
It said.
The hallucination sitting on top of the bed spoke to me.
1 諦め (akirame, “resignation”)
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“No matter how much you pray to be rescued, I’m not going to
disappear, and you aren’t going to wake up, Akirame-san.”
The hallucination.
Rather, Hachikuji Mayoi said.
“… No, it’s true that right now there isn’t a more appropriate name
for me, and I have no choice but to resign myself to the fact that right
now it’s a perfect example of how names and natures do often agree,
but Hachikuji, my name is Araragi.”
“Sorry, I stuttered.”2
“Wrong. It was on purpose…”
“I stutteted!”3
“Oh, so it wasn’t on purpose? …”
“I stuttired.”4
“Well of course you’re tired with how many times you’ve stuttered
now…”
I wasn’t even in the mood to do the usual exchange.
Well, of course.
At any rate, right now, to an extent that couldn’t even be compared
to Spring Break or Golden Week, my life had been raised to a critical
moment of unprecedented scale.
It made me want to bury my face in my lap.
Hachikuji was in my room.
A fifth-grade girl was in my room.
Of all things.
Now then, for the sake of explaining the current situation, it is
necessary to turn back the hands of the clock just a little bit—yes, it
was just one hour ago (it’s really just a little bit).
2 噛みました (kamimashita, “I bit”, implied “I bit my tongue”)

3 噛みまみた (kamimamita, mispronunciation of kamimashita)
4 噛みあきた (kamiakita) with あきた (akita, “bored”)
22
I had just taken a break from studying and gone out cycling when,
in the middle of the road, I discovered the backpack-laden figure of a
twintailed, fifth-grade girl.
“Oh, isn’t it Hachikuji? It’s been a while.”
I can only remember up until I thought that.
That is, I was conscious up until that point.
But, immediately after, as if suddenly overcome by something, I
rushed up to Hachikuji, grabbed her petite figure, tied her onto the
bicycle behind me, and took her all the way home like that.
“… This is abduction, isn’t it.”
I had become a criminal.
Not to mention it was abduction of a minor.
As far as I know, isn’t this one of the worst crimes that humanity
is capable of?
“The word ‘abduction’, it’s really easy to stumble over, huh…
Ahaha.”
Already my thoughts had turned towards escaping from reality.
My mentality was surprisingly fragile.
“No, it’s not my fault… It’s because Hachikuji was just too cute…
Really, I’m the victim here.”
“That’s the worst thing to say, Araragi-san.”
Wearing that backpack on her back, on top of the bed, with those
eyes that said “I always thought you would commit some sort of crime,
but you finally went and did it, didn’t you”, Hachikuji went “haah”
with an exaggerated sigh.
“You’re being extremely nonsensical as usual, you know~”
She said.
“To think that you would take me, a ghost who haunts the streets,
and bring me back to your home. Moreover that you would drag me
into your room! You’re completely disregarding the rules of oddities.
Oshino would be astonished at you, not me.”
23
“Eh? But, since you were promoted two ranks up from a ghost that
haunts a specific place to a wandering ghost, can’t you freely go
wherever you want now?”
That was what I had thought.
“The basis for myself doesn’t change like that. Like humans, I’m
not at that level of freedom. It’s just that the idea of ‘I won’t be able
to arrive anywhere’, the binding of the Lost Cow is what’s gone. I’m
just not a lost child anymore.”
“Hmm.”
“They say that vampires can’t enter the homes of others, right?
Without the permission of one of the residents, they can’t even open
the door—well, it’s something along those lines. In my case, the
streets are my place of residence.”
“Hmm… The streets, huh?”
Like a guardian deity for travelers?
I never really thought of it like that, but for Hachikuji, even after
the Lost Cow incident, I’ve only met her on the roads.
“For this kind of spoilery conversation to happen, it’s good that
we’re in a special extra story, right?”
“Don’t say something so meta. Er, don’t say something so
careless.5 Just try being me, who may very well get arrested because of
this extra story!”
“It’s fine, you know. I’m only just saying this, but since you only
abducted and confined a ghost that’s been dead for over ten years, it
won’t become a crime.”
“These days, you never know if it might be a crime…”
After all, there’s been trends to protect the rights of characters that
don’t even exist that have been rising day after day.
Araragi first says メタ (meta, “meta”) before correcting himself and saying
5
滅多 (metta, “careless”).
24
“Well, isn’t it alright? Let’s just move on from the fact that it
happened like this and leave fortune to the heavens. It’s also the first
time I get to visit the room of a boy, so let’s just call it a room date.”
“A room date?”
Hm.
Well, alright.
No use crying over spilled milk, so I’ll resign myself to it.
I really am Akirame-san.
“Shall we play cards? Like Rich Man, Poor Man?”
“Oh, sounds good. I’ll get my two little sisters, too.”
“It’s alright to play with the ambulance rule, right?”
“I don’t know any local rules like that!”
Rather, Karen and Tsukihi probably won’t be able to see Hachikuji
(and even if they did, how would I introduce her to them) so I guess
we can’t play Rich Man, Poor Man.
Hachikuji probably already knew that, anyway.
“But really, Araragi-san, your room is very tasteless, isn’t it.
Instead of keeping things tidy… How should I say it. I think calling it
savage would get to the point.”
“Don’t say such rude things.”
“So, where did you hide your porn?”
“Don’t say the same things as Kanbaru!”
“Don’t tell me it’s under this bed… If you were getting aroused
from the fact that you made me sit above your porn, you’d become an
exceptional pervert!”
“I’m not that exceptional!”
I’m exceptionally normal!
Not to mention, since my little sisters can invade this room at any
time, I would never hide such treasured books in such a standard
location.
“Heh. Then, where have you hidden them?”
When Hachikuji asked me, I triumphantly answered while grinning
and sticking out my chest.
25
“This is a little unexpected but allow me to teach you where they
are, Hachikuji… Currently, my porn is inside… my sisters’ room!”
“……”
I had been completely led on by Hachikuji.
Hachikuji, who had always accepted me while smiling (even after
being abducted), now looked at me if I was a genuine pervert.
“Then it’s expected that even Kanbaru-san wasn’t able to find
them… Er, Araragi-san. Um, how should I put it… Could you not come
any closer to me, please?”
“Please stop shaking with fear on top of my bed.”
This would be terrible in picture form.
“I had heard rumors of a second season or a movie, but if Araragi-
san doesn’t change his character then something like that will be a
mere dream of a dream.”
“Hmph. Sorry, but I won’t throw away what makes me, me.”
“You see, what makes you, you, is basically a crime. … Well, if
there’s nothing weird under this bed, then I guess I’m fine.”
“? Fine with what?”
“That is, getting into bed.”
With a heave-ho, she changed her sitting position.
For the first time as far as I could remember, Hachikuji took off her
backpack (though she took it off before in the anime), opened it, and
began to dig around inside.
“Excuse me, Araragi-san. I’d like to change clothes so could you
please turn the other way?”
“Eh, what? Are you joking?”
“I am not.”
She told me so firmly.
I reluctantly obeyed.
But changing clothes? Into what? Why?
Speaking of which, earlier when Sengoku came to my room there
was the same sort of situation. When I turned around, I thought
Hachikuji would be bra-less and in bloomers and got excited, or rather
26
my heart pounded (even if I correct myself it’s amazing how the
impression doesn’t change), but no matter how long I stood she never
said “It’s alright now”.
Feeling like the old man and woman from Tsuru no Ongaeshi,6 the
story of the crane’s return of a favor, I turned around, unable to wait
any longer.
“……”
Hachikuji, having untied her hair and changed into pajamas, was
sleeping soundly.
Her backpack off and her hair untied, Hachikuji was—
She didn’t look like a snail at all.
She was a very cute girl that suited her age.
“Ah, that’s right, she was on the way to her mother’s house, wasn’t
she… That’s why she had nightclothes in her backpack.”
And she—had walked the whole way.
Ten years ago.
And even since then, she had been walking this whole time.
If that was the case then surely she’d be tired.
“In that case, just rest for a while. Sleep tight, OK.”
Because I’ll let you sleep whenever you want.
The face of Hachikuji sleeping so peacefully, so happily.
That sleeping face makes me completely happy.
It seemed today was the best day.
…… By the way, later on this crime was discovered by Hanekawa,
and I was treated very cruelly after that.
I felt like I could just sleep forever.
6 鶴の恩返し (tsuru no ongaeshi, “crane’s return of a favor”) is a story from
Japanese folklore which, as the name and Araragi indicate, is about a crane who
returns a favor to a man.
27
SURUGA COURT
27 October 2010
When the day to settle things with Kanbaru finally arrived, it fell on a
Sunday. Well, since I don’t have a lot of space I won’t go into detail,
but recently, that girl had ascended to a practically intolerable level.
Aside from me, when I learned that even Senjougahara was bothered,
I finally decided that the situation had gotten serious. It would be the
right thing to scold her as her senior while it wasn’t too late.
If I don’t show my dignity as her senior at this point, I would be
setting a bad example.
And, with that, we had a duel.
I wrote a letter of challenge to Kanbaru.
I really did write it.
With a brush.
For times like these it was important to set the mood and
everything, so I even went to a DIY store and assembled all the
equipment, and for the first time in a while I rubbed out ink from an
inkstone. I wasn’t able to write out the characters quite as well as I had
29
planned, and doing so took just about the entirety of my Saturday, but
I’d say it went alright.
The designated location for our showdown was a sports center on
the outskirts of town, and the event of our showdown was basketball,
i.e. Kanbaru’s field of expertise.
No, rather than a field of expertise, considering that she’s in a class
of the national level, you could very well call it her stronghold—heheh,
are you saying that I would have had a chance if I had just challenged
her in mathematics?
Well.
I will defeat Kanbaru in a one-on-one!
“… Huh, Araragi-senpai, you’ve come looking awfully sporty.”
I, who had come to the meeting place enthusiastically and talking
big, was greeted by Kanbaru-san, wearing heels and a frilly skirt and
a lacy blouse, her hair arranged with a pink ribbon, and though I don’t
know if it could accurately be called gothic lolita she nevertheless
seemed to be wrapped up in a very gothic lolita-like fashion that
seemed excessively decorated.
It was a perfect mismatch with her bandaged left arm.
“……”
It certainly contrasted with me, wearing basketball shoes chosen
for me by Karen, with shorts and a tank top and even a towel wrapped
around my head, but when the two of us were lined up like this, we
ended up looking like a cosplay combination.
No no no no.
I myself was fine.
“Er, well, Kanbaru-san. This may be a foolish question, and
perhaps it may be a rather absurd question, but whatever might that
unusual appearance be?”
Was my thoughtless, clumsy response.
“Were you the type of person that wore skirts and stuff?”
“? I’m always in a skirt, right? For my school uniform.”
“You could say that, but…”
30
“Well, it’s true that I did try to be conscious of my fashion, for once.
After all, it’s my second date with Araragi-senpai.”
“……”
The letter of challenge had failed to convey its intentions.
This girl was the kind of person who didn’t just not listen to what
people said, she also didn’t read what people wrote to her.
And, my battle with the ink yesterday had been on the level of
playing badminton with my sisters, too.
I should’ve just settled it with a text message.
“But that’s my Araragi-senpai. If I were to talk about how
sleeveless clothes suited you, I’d probably say they don’t. There’s a
proverb that goes ‘you can’t shake an empty sleeve’,7 but Araragi-
senpai would end up shaking even empty sleeves.”
“Is that really supposed to be praising me? Also, I don’t remember
becoming yours at all!”
“ ‘The Araragi-senpai that has my respect’, was what I was
abbreviating.”
“Don’t abbreviate it!”
“I did praise you, Araragi-senpai, by saying you were stylish, but I
didn’t do so out of complete honesty; conversely, I was only able to say
it since I knew you wouldn’t misunderstand by thinking I was saying
it to compliment or flatter you, but really, there isn’t anyone else like
it. A person who looks cool with a towel wrapped around his head.”
“Then you really weren’t praising me, were you!?”
“But coming here all the way from your house in that style takes a
lot of courage, so I’m seriously in admiration.”
Kanbaru said so with a smile.
To her, she might seriously be trying to praise me, but it also had
the effect of punishing me.
7
無い袖は振れない (nai sode wa furenai, “you can’t shake an empty
sleeve”) is a Japanese proverb that originates from the old habit of keeping one’s
wallet in the kimono’s sleeve, since they didn’t have pockets. Therefore, the
phrase means something along the lines of “you can’t use what you don’t have”.
31
“So, what kind of date is it today? That is, what kind of date are we
going on, Araragi-senpai?”
“Please, read at least a single line of the letter before coming. Did
you think we were going to do anything other than basketball at this
sports center?”
“Though I think there are other things that we could do… But ah, I
see.”
Kanbaru nodded.
“I thought something like this could happen so it’s a good thing I
brought a basketball with me.”
“It wasn’t on purpose!?”
She really didn’t read to the end.
So we went to the reception desk and paid for two hours (since it
wasn’t a date we split the cost) to borrow a half court. Even with the
two of us it was still a bit too wide.
There was a place to rent sportswear, but Kanbaru said “it’s alright
like this”. If I were to tell the truth I would have told her I didn’t think
that gothic lolita fashion really suited her all that much, but it seemed
that she liked it and didn’t want to take it off.
Well.
I felt like I was being looked down on with someone with that
fashion as my opponent, but I wasn’t going to be too strict about it.
First of all, wasn’t it awfully unusual that Kanbaru didn’t want to
take off her clothes?—Though I don’t know if it was going to last.
It’ll be too late to say that you want to take them off when my score
is double yours, OK?
“Let’s see. Since it’s a half court, we won’t decide offense and
defense, and for scoring, shall we go with streetball rules, Araragi-
senpai?”
“Go with whatever you want. I’ll at least let you decide the rules.
Since I’m not going to let you decide to shoot.”
“That wasn’t very good.”
From Kanbaru came an unexpected criticism.
32
Well, since I was going to be in a position of overwhelming victory
soon enough, I should at least be tolerant and allow this much.
Incidentally, as for why I have so much confidence despite the fact
that we were battling it out in Kanbaru’s field of basketball, you might
be thinking it’s a bit strange.
Well, I don’t need to tell you too much about it, but for one, just
after I went to deliver the letter of challenge to Kanbaru’s home
yesterday, by chance! Really by chance, though I didn’t have any
special reason to, in exchange for a snack I had Shinobu drink some of
my blood, so my body’s capabilities had been raised to beyond
ordinary, and since it’s not unrelated, I guess I’ll mention it.
Unfair?
Perhaps.
However, I decided to think that I had simply descended into the
evil ways for the sake of my junior, and made the question of fairness
become rather ambiguous.
“Now, Kanbaru! Let’s go!”
“Yeah!”
And with a dribble, I attacked Kanbaru—and I can’t really
remember what happened after that.
It was that chronic disease that would overcome me like what
happened when I spotted Hachikuji, i.e. that memory loss thing that’s
been going around recently.
Eh, you mean it’s not going around anymore?
Well, I forgot about that too.
What I was certain of was, after two hours, the scoreboard read 120
to 0, and far from a double score, it was showing a skunk.
A basketball skunk, that is.
Was that possible?
“Well, if you called it a whitewash, then somehow it feels like you
didn’t lose…”
“Araragi-senpai, you’re being surprisingly positive, huh?”
33
Sweating profusely after having moved around so much, Kanbaru
spoke to me hanging my head in shame on the court. If you looked
closely she was only holding the ball with her left hand. What kind of
a grip does she have.
“But really, it’s amazing that you were able to play for two hours
straight. Although, that might sound like I’m consoling you.”
“… If you think that way then you should’ve gone a little easier on
me.”
120 to 0.
She had scored one point every minute—if I said it like that, I
wonder if it would sound like I had fought bravely to some extent. But
even that sounds hopelessly positive, doesn’t it. My mind was
spinning. As was my vision.
“What do you mean, going easy?”
Kanbaru laughed.
“It’s been so long since I could play basketball at my full power, so
why would I do something like that?”
“……”
“With my left arm like this, the only one who could be my opponent
would be Araragi-senpai, who has the power of a vampire.”
Thanks, Kanbaru said.
While she was carrying the basketball in one hand—I hung my head
deeply.
I didn’t say anything.
Jeez.
Really, she interprets anything and everything to be good for
herself, this junior does—the truth is, after being separated from
basketball for so long recently you were looking down, and yet you
were acting like you were energetic as usual and it was intolerable, and
Senjougahara had started worrying, though I only worried for a little
bit.
But I was able to see the basketball club’s ace play from the nearest
of the nearest special seats. I was able to see that dunk that had no
34
forgiveness for her opponent who was a senior, and that vivid, blissful
smile that she wore—
Even I was able to feel happy because of it.
Well, to be honest, I really did want to win, but, even so, I suppose
today was the best day.
…… By the way, she had so audaciously moved around the court
that I had ended up seeing what was beneath her skirt.
Let’s just keep that our little secret.
35
NADEKO POOL
27 October 2010
TRANSLATION: EAGLE TRANSLATIONS
Sengoku said that she wanted me to teach her how to swim, so we

went to the public pool that Sunday. I can’t even remember the last
time I went to a public pool. The pool was a little too far to go by
bicycle, so we ended up taking the bus.
“But Sengoku, if you want to learn how to swim, couldn’t you just
ask Karen or Kanbaru to teach you?” I asked as we rode side by side on
the bus.
“I—I guess so.” Sengoku faltered slightly. “I would feel bad
wasting their time on something so silly.”
What’s with the lowly attitude? And more importantly, is she
saying she doesn’t mind wasting my time? I may not look like it, but I
am aiming to get into college. I have to study for entrance exams, you
know. Time is studies.
“Also, aren’t you a good swimmer, Koyomi-oniichan? You said so
before, right?”
“Well, I don’t want to brag about it, but I’m not too bad.”
37
That was not me trying to show off to a girl in middle school. I am
actually pretty good.
“When we were kids my sisters and I would go swimming in the
river. They were so impressed by the way I was swimming up and
down the river they called me a kappa.”8
“That’s so cool!” Sengoku nodded with an uncharacteristic vigor.
“I hope someone takes my glass ball!”9
This girl’s sense of humor is really peculiar sometimes… Case in
point being that she thinks it’s cool to be nicknamed “Kappa.”
(Actually, I was hoping she would riff on that.) Maybe she is getting it
from Kanbaru. If so, I’m going to have to have a little talk with that
junior of mine.
“Can you not swim, Sengoku?”
“If you’re going to show me how to do it, Koyomi-oniichan… No,
Nadeko can’t swim.”
“What sort of reason is that?” Her reasoning seemed backwards to
me.
“I use a kickboard at school for swimming class.”
“That imagery barely gets by the censors.”
Imagery of Nadeko in general is always risky.
In any case, at some point during our inane conversation, we had
arrived at our destination.
While the pool was fairly out of the way, it’s not like the bus was
taking dirt roads to get there. I don’t remember the ride being
particularly bumpy, but Sengoku kept bumping into me and leaning
on me, and now my shoulder was bothering me. (An unexpected
8
A kappa (河童, “river child”) is a demon found in traditional Japanese
folklore, said to be the size of a child and inhabiting ponds and rivers.
9
In the folklore surrounding the kappas, it is said that they try to lure victims
and drown them. One of their goals in doing so is to gain power by taking their
shirikodama (尻子玉), a mythical ball said to contain the soul and located inside
the anus.
38
shoulder tackle!) Well, I don’t think it will be enough to affect my
swimming.
After we bought our tickets, we went to our separate changing
rooms.
The scent of chlorine that lingered outside of the locker room
became even stronger upon entering the changing area. I suppose it
was a fondly nostalgic smell. Swimming in the river aside, it had been
a really long time since I had been in a pool, let alone a public pool.
Naoetsu High School is really only focused on getting students into
college, so I don’t even have a school pool to go to. Now that I think
about it, I haven’t gone swimming since I entered high school.
Remembering this, I was now blanking on how to swim. While I
wasn’t 100% confident, I figure swimming is just like riding a bike;
I’m sure it will come back to me when I get in the water.
I’ll have to show Sengoku my stellar flip turns.
While I don’t want to be a show-off, I don’t see the harm in
flaunting one’s skills every now and then. Sengoku is one of the few
people who look up to me (by the way, Kanbaru is not one of those
people), so I need to take full advantage of chances like this.
I changed into the new boardshorts that Tsukihi helped me to pick
out at the mall yesterday. I then put my stuff in a coin locker, (the kind
that will return your 100-yen coin when put the key back in), strapped
the key to my wrist, and headed towards the pool.
There was a shower you walk through to get to the pool area.
When I went through showers like this in elementary school I
would pretend to be a monk meditating under a waterfall.
Remembering such an embarrassing thing was slightly traumatizing.
In front of me was an eight-lane, fifty-meter swimming pool.
Talk about overkill. What a waste of tax-payer money.
There were surprisingly few people for the weekend. However,
despite the patrons being spread out all over the pool, their collective
attention was focused on one spot. Naturally, my attention was pulled
39
in that direction. To be precise, my attention was drawn to the girl
standing there, drawn to Sengoku Nadeko.
It was really impressive that she was able to change quicker than
me, being a girl and all. From looking at her, I would have guessed she
would be a bit on the slow side, but maybe she is a bit quicker than she
looks. Ah, maybe she was wearing her suit under her clothes the whole
time. Before I had time to give the matter any more thought, all of my
attention was now fixated on what was in front of me.
“……”
If I had to say what I would picture for a scene titled, “Together
with Nadeko at the pool,” I would have definitely imagined Sengoku
wearing her school swimsuit. The fact that this was the first thing I
thought of probably means that Kanbaru is rubbing off on me. Well,
then again, it wouldn’t be that strange to expect a middle schooler to
wear her school swimsuit to the pool.
But Sengoku’s outfit blew my expectations out of the water. She
was not wearing her school swimsuit.
Let me be a little more precise: the suit she was wearing was not a
school swimsuit, but rather an extremely revealing string bikini that
left very, very little to the imagination. I had never seen a bikini this
extreme, even on gravure swimsuit models.
She was practically naked.
Ultra-low friction bodysuits that cover as much of the body as
possible to reduce drag are all the rage in the competitive swimming
world right now. Whether these bodysuits should be considered legal
swimwear was for a big topic for discussion. Whether or not Sengoku’s
outfit could be considered legal swimwear was also debatable, but for
the opposite reason. You might say the design was making big waves
in the swimming world. It might be a little mean, but maybe I’ll coin
40
the phrase, “A single pebble makes a pond ripple; a Sengoku makes a
big splash.”10
“Um… Koyomi-oniichan.”
Sengoku’s trademark bangs were tied up and out of the way,
probably to make it easier to swim. She was averting eye contact and
looking at the ground, as usual. She stood there idly, looking rather
suspicious. As soon as she saw me standing there frozen midstride I
could see relief wash over her face as she shuffled up to me.
The words “Stay away from me!” were dangerously close to
slipping out of my mouth, but I managed to hold them back.
“Whoa, Koyomi-oniichan. You’re so muscular! How wonderful.”
“Ah, oh, yeah.” I didn’t know how to respond to Sengoku
commenting on my body.
Slightly off topic, but this svelte body of mine is a side-effect of
being a vampire, so I can’t really take any pride in it. It’s like I’m
doping.
“… And your swim trunks are really cool.”
“Ah… I feel bad they’re so normal, er, well, they’re just something
I picked up yesterday.”
“Really? Me too. I bought mine yesterday too. What do you think?
How is it? I thought I’d try to be a little more adventurous.”
“Hmm… Well, it is pretty adventurous.”
At a loss for words, I ended up sounding like the captain from Go
Go Sentai Boukenger.11 Actually, her swimsuit was way more
adventurous than any of their adventures. Where on Earth did she get
her hands on such a suit anyways? I don’t think you could find
something like that at a department store. Moreover, who the hell sold
this to a kid in middle school, anyways?
10
He is making a pun using the phrase, “A stone (一石, isseki) dropped in a
pond causes ripples”, saying “A Sengoku (千石, “a thousand stones”) drop make
a big splash.”
11
A sentai series (like Power Rangers) where the heroes carry a title
containing the word “Adventurer”.
41
Unable to look her in the eye, I had to look away from her entirely.
A minute ago I said something that made it sound like everyone at
the pool was looking at Sengoku, but in fact nobody was actually
looking. Rather, everyone was purposely avoiding looking at her. It
was like their eyes were swimming around in their sockets to find
something else to look at. How appropriate for a pool.
The public pool is the kind of place where parents bring their kids,
so maybe this was like watching TV at the dinner table with your
family when a sex scene comes on. No, it was more than just the
awkward eroticism, it was like you were committing a crime by
looking, and no one wanted anything to do with it. There was an air of
discomfort floating around the pool.
Sengoku was still in the middle of puberty, so her body hadn’t quite
filled out. You could tell by her visible ribcage and hipbones that the
faint outline of her abs was probably not the result of hard work, but
rather a lack of meat on her bones. It was hard to look at.
If asked for my honest opinion, I would have to say, “pitiable”.
“So what do you think?” Sengoku asked again, this time with a
slightly uneasy look in her eyes.
No. There is no way I could say “kind of pitiful”.
By the look in her eyes, I could clearly see that she was starting to
worry that her huge adventure was turning out to be huge failure. She
looked like she was on the verge of tears.
This isn’t good. At this rate, this episode is going to end up a dark
chapter in Sengoku’s middle school diary. Telling a girl her outfit is a
fashion disaster is definitely going to leave some damage. I’m such an
idiot. Why couldn’t I understand a timid girl’s desire to transform
herself into a daring extrovert? Think properly.
I remembered the incident where she was bound by invisible
snakes. Maybe it was a good thing that she is able to show off so much
skin. In that case, I should praise her. I should compliment her. This
isn’t the time to be worried about what society thinks of me. I don’t
42
care anymore. At this point I wish I would have worn a banana
hammock in anticipation of Sengoku’s actions.
“Uhhh, it looks really good, Sengoku. You really hit it out of the
park. You’ll be on the leading edge of summer fashion this year. You
could even wear it to your school’s pool.”
“Hmm. OK, If Koyomi-oniichan says so.” Sengoku said beaming.
Her smiling face made me happy too. It seemed today was the best
day.
…… By the way, after that—at the pool that seemed to be getting
less and less crowded—I made a huge fool of myself in front of the
middle school girl that admired me so much.
You see… Vampires can’t swim.
43
TSUBASA SONG
27 October 2010
That Sunday, instead of being woken up by my two little sisters Karen

and Tsukihi, I awoke from the ringtone that sounded out when
Hanekawa’s text message arrived. Usually I would boast of my ability
to completely ignore the melody of my cell phone, but there was some
merit in waking up at the time, and if I do say so myself I was very
shrewd for doing so, because the sender was Hanekawa. Well, as
always her message was incredibly formal, and furthermore the length
was by no means short, and it needed some time to be deciphered, but
if I translated it into a style that anyone could understand,
“Let’s go on a date ♥”
was the impression I got.
… No, I’m not kidding.
Don’t worry, I haven’t gone insane.
So I canceled all the plans I had for that day (this time I’m kidding,
since I didn’t have any plans anyway) and pedaled my bike towards
the designated meeting place.
45
Hanekawa had, as usual, arrived earlier than I did (and, as usual,
was wearing her school uniform. Well, school uniform dates have
recently been pretty common).
“He~y! Then, shall we go?”
Like that, with a very comfortable way of smiling, she led the way.
Following along while thinking such thoughts as I wonder where
we’re going, it’ll probably end with us at the library again, but wasn’t
the library closed on Sundays? But to my surprise, on the way we
boarded a train (I left my bicycle at the station), and when we finally
arrived, it was a karaoke box that was open in the morning.
“… Karaoke?”
“Yep!”
While I was unable to reply, Hanekawa said “Just the two of us.
Three hours, please” and promptly got us through the reception desk.
What’s with this coercive skill? Rather than a date, it seemed as if she
were following a quite boyish date plan, where the guy would be like
“Be quiet and just follow me” with a pace that didn’t even ask for
confirmation or consent, and the girl would be enchanted. I seriously
want to follow her example.
And then there was the singing.
Hanekawa-san sang with enthusiasm.
As embarrassing as it is to say, my experience in regards to karaoke
was rather slim, or perhaps I should say my body was resistant to the
very act of singing a song in front of Hanekawa, so when she got tired
of me fiddling with the remote control, she said,
“Then, I’ll start.”,
and took the mic in hand and began to sing. Because I never input
my own song due to hesitation and embarrassment,
“Then, I’ll sing again, OK?” “I’ll sing again, OK?” “Again, OK?”
And with that, it was eternally Hanekawa’s turn.
I may as well call it a solo live show.
46
Though it was a situation that couldn’t be helped even if some
outsider came and told me “What the hell are you doing?”, well, I
wanted to hear one more time.
I wanted to hear Hanekawa’s singing one more time.
She was so good I thought I would die.
If taking the skill level of singing and adding “I thought I would
die” as a modifier doesn’t make any sense to you, then let’s amend it
to “she was so good I thought I would be revived”. For me, the vampire
who was revived no matter how many times he died, this was certainly
the perfect metaphor.
It appears that Hanekawa thought that it was a breach of etiquette
to sing songs that other people in the room did not know, because each
and every song she sang was a famous pop song that even someone
like me would know, even though they were all songs filled with major
keys that anyone would get tired of hearing, so I was impressed by
Hanekawa’s admirable performance.
Therefore, with me listening in ecstasy, there was not a moment
for me to even turn the pages of the song book.
I instinctively fixed my posture.
“Thank you very much. Huh? Eh? Araragi-kun, have you still not
chosen a song yet? In that case, I’ll go again.”
“Wait a second wait a second wait a second, Hanekawa-san. Even
though it’s fantastic that you’re in such high spirits, just wait for a
second.”
I stopped Hanekawa’s arm reaching for the remote control. If she
sang for me any longer, I would be so moved I might actually cry.
That would be bad, right?
“Intermission. Let’s have an intermission. Let’s calm down for a
moment, let’s go back to our initial state of mind.”
“? Although I’m fine with that.”
At last she set down the mic and sat down.
She had been standing while singing.
She was the class rep that would dance while singing.
47
“But I’m surprised… I didn’t think karaoke was part of your image,
Hanekawa. How many times have you come here, to be able to let out
your voice like that?”
“Eh? No, but this is my first time at karaoke.”
“……”
At Hanekawa’s puzzled response, I too became puzzled.
“Your first time? Eh, but it’s like you’re really used to using the
remote control, though.”
“For this, you can just figure it out just by looking at it, right?”
Hanekawa said so quite matter-of-factly.
Looking at Hanekawa like this, she was probably the type of person
that didn’t read manuals, either.
Or should I say, a person that didn’t even need to read manuals.
“Eeh… But, but, your singing, I thought it was good, but even
without something so opinionated, everything on the screen has been
100 points, hasn’t it?”
“I don’t know, even if you say that. Isn’t it made so that it shows
100 points no matter who sings? Like a fortune that only has ‘great
luck’ in it.”
“Is that so…?”
I don’t really know about it, but I heard that the grading standard
for karaoke had incredibly severe judgement… At any rate, this girl,
she can only get 100 points even when it’s not a school test, huh.
That’s unreasonable.
“It’s the first time I’ve sung by myself in front of others since
music class in elementary school, so I don’t think I’m singing that
well. Really, Araragi-kun, stop flattering me.”
“Like I said, it’s not like that. What kind of person are you, anyway.
Just say that you confined yourself in here yesterday for six hours of
intensive training for today’s sake and be praised obediently!”
By speaking my mind like this, I was really calming myself down.
Emotion that has gone too far can only come out as fear.
48
“To begin with, Hanekawa, you weren’t looking at the screen while
singing, huh.”
“Hm? Because, I had the lyrics memorized.”
“I’m not trying to find fault in you, but why can’t you be normal
even at karaoke?”
After I said that, I sighed and fell silent.
Why can’t she be normal.
As a matter of fact, for Hanekawa, that was a serious worry she had,
and that’s why, as a result, it was twice that a cat had rampaged—on
Golden Week and just a couple of days ago, twice that nothing could
be done to stop the story of the cat from occurring. Why did I say
something so careless—but, Hanekawa did not even grant me the time
to regret like that, saying,
“That’s a good question~”
and nodded normally.
“But I thought hard about what happened recently, and I realized
that trying to be normal in itself isn’t really normal, right?”
“……”
“Right. There are no dreams in the objective of trying to become
normal.”
And that’s why I ended up seeing nightmares not once but twice—
said Hanekawa, as if telling herself that rather than me.
“Also, normal people wish that they weren’t normal, don’t they?
I’ve realized now that striving to become normal in itself is something
that isn’t normal. And now in that matter I’ve gotten all mixed up,
huh. And with that, Araragi-kun, I’m sorry for troubling you with all
these things.”
Though she seemed like she was joking, for Hanekawa, it seemed
like she truly thought so from the bottom of her heart as well. “Though
I don’t think I’ve done anything wrong up until now—but I don’t think
that was a good thing. Being nothing but right all the time isn’t really
the right thing. I don’t want to shut myself out anymore, and as it is,
49
if I don’t demonstrate more of my individuality, then one day I may
fall prey to the cat again.”
“… That’s true.”
Yes, it could happen.
After all—the cat was like another Hanekawa, and to go further the
cat was Hanekawa herself, and no matter how many times we
borrowed Shinobu’s power to repel it, it will never disappear from
within Hanekawa.
Oshino had said that 20 years old was the standard—but Hanekawa
couldn’t just wait until then.
All the way until then—and all the way after that.
Hanekawa definitely had to face the cat inside of her. Not shutting
it out—but accepting it as part of herself.
“So it’s something like that, OK? From now on, instead of storing
up all this stress and resentment, I’d like to try various ways of stress
relief from time to time. And today’s the first for that.”
“Hm. Ah, that’s why.”
That’s why we came to karaoke.
Singing out in such a loud voice could certainly serve as stress
relief.
“What, so it was just that? You should’ve just told me that. I was
so sure that this was supposed to be a date, so I was feeling really
happy.”
“I never wrote anything like that in the text message, though.”
“Is that so.”
“You were reading too much in between the lines. I wouldn’t do
anything like that when you have Senjougahara-san.”
said Hanekawa, smiling.
“But, you’re right. I probably should have just told you earlier. I
mean, I could have just come on my own, but really since it was my
first time it was a little scary.”
50
“Oh, so you do get nervous. So it’s the same for Hanekawa, huh.
Well, I get what’s going on now. Whenever you want a distraction for
some stress relief, just call me. Like today, I’ll come along any time.”
“Really? Is it OK?”
“Of course. Would I ever turn down a request from Hanekawa?”
“Then, I wonder if I should request something right now?”
And saying that, from a cute pouch (that didn’t really match her
school uniform) that hung from her shoulders, Hanekawa took out a
pair of scissors used to cut hair.
“This has absolutely nothing to do with Araragi-kun, but recently
my heart was broken. So in order to get over that,”
She spoke with a smile.
“These braids, could you cut them off in a single stroke for me?”
“………”
It appears that that was the main point of today.
Incidentally, you could say that the source of Hanekawa’s stress
could be me, as well.
For the sake of stress relief you’d need to do some severe action,
and I guess this could also be revenge for my harassment, but anyway,
the impish, catlike smile that Hanekawa gave as she handed me the
scissors seemed, though not completely, just a little bit like she was
enjoying herself, and that she was happy.
Because she made me happy as well, I couldn’t help it.
Today was, as I thought, the best day.
…… By the way, it wasn’t just some temporary joke: Hanekawa
really had me cut her two braids. She forced me to give her a bob cut.
I couldn’t believe it. So as to not bother the shop, she had even
prepared a hand cleaner in advance, so this was clearly premeditated.
Although Hanekawa of course went to a proper hairdresser afterwards
to straighten things out.
But those two braids are still in my room now.
51
YOU AND NADEKKO CH.1
HEROINE BOOK 4: NADEKO SENGOKU
30 January 2014
TRANSLATION: KIZUNEVER SCANLATIONS
Here it is
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TSUKIHI ETERNAL
NISEMONOGATARI ANIME COMPLETE GUIDEBOOK
27 September 2012
TRANSLATION: HAREMLESS
It seems like I had forgotten about what kind of personality Araragi

Tsukihi had. Even if I had, let’s see, gotten careless after winning (?)
against Kagenui-san and Yotsugi-chan in our battle, as everyone
who’s listened to the anime CD dramas must know,
“At the end of the summer holiday, I want to introduce my
girlfriend to you.”
is something I should never have said no matter what to my little
sister with her personality. Especially knowing there’s no way she’d
wait until the end of the summer holiday if I told her anyway.
“How long.”
Tsukihi said.
She had me kneeling on the floor of her room as she asked me. More
importantly, she had her arms crossed in a terrifying pose looking over
me.
“How long were you planning to wait to tell me that.”
“Well, how long…”
She was terrifying.
65
As to what exactly was so terrifying, my little sister was already
holding an awl in one hand. You better hurry up and put that back in
the toolbox or they’ll start selling it in a set with your figurine.
Of course, that awl may as well have been a toy after fighting
against Kagenui-san. The problem wasn’t the awl, but the fact that
my little sister was holding it and standing over me with her arms
crossed itself was terrifying.
And the fact that Tsukihi was poking her own arm with the sharp
end of the awl also was a bit scary. She was just scraping against the
skin so there was no blood, but I could feel the pressure radiating from
her just looking at her “Can you tell that I’m annoyed now” sort of
pose.
“You had a girlfriend? The hell were you thinking taking my first
kiss when you had a girlfriend?”
“You should watch your language Tsukihi-chan. You’re a girl so
you should be a bit gentler with your words or people will look at you
funny.”
“O brother of mine, how durst you have been to place your lips
against mine and take my first kiss, when there is already another
woman who waits for you.”
“…”
Durst you have been? That doesn’t quite sound right.
I wanted to tell her that, but I would probably end up with an awl
stuck in my eyeball if I did. No choice, I decided to ignore it.
“I’m not sure that really counts as ‘gentle’…”
“You takie my fiwst kish?”
“Fiwst kish.”
Hearing her trying to sound cute made me even more afraid of the
awl… Wow, awls sure are something.
It seems like they can just take any sort of character and completely
overwrite it… Of course awls should only be used the way they were
supposed to.
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“Let me think, are you supposed to use them to chip off ice to put
in your whiskey?”
“That’s an icepick. Don’t mix them up.”
“They look almost the same though…”
Don’t mix them up with a gimlet either.
“About the same as somen and cold noodles.”
“How long.”
Tsukihi must have realized I was intentionally saying something
she could easily comment on to try and change the flow of the
conversation, so she forced it back.
“How long were you planning to wait to tell me that.”
“W—Well, you see, I was planning to tell you by the end of summer
holiday… I mean, tomorrow! I was going to tell you tomorrow. Come
on, Tsukihi-chan, you just had to ask about it. You ruined the surprise
party I was planning.”
“You were going to have a surprise party to tell us you had a
girlfriend… Do you think you’re some celebrity? Oniichan.”
Ha, Tsukihi-chan mocked me.
That wasn’t cute.
“I bet you just told me because it happened to slip out or you just
felt like it and by tomorrow you won’t even remember you promised
to tell me.”
“I—Isn’t that a bit prejudiced… Have I ever broken a promise with
you?”
“I don’t think you’ve ever kept one of your promises. Or kept your
little sister safe.”
“I have kept you safe before!”
I just did today!
I did everything I could today to protect you, I even died a few
times… But it would be hard to tell her that here and now.
“Have you? When was it? When was it? What time, what minute,
what second, whatchamacallit, how many times did the Earth spin?”
“Guh…”
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It’s so frustrating!
Why can’t I even win an argument against her!
“When did you even start dating? And when did you start keeping
that a secret from me? Didn’t we decide we wouldn’t keep any secrets
between us anymore?”
“I’m pretty sure we aren’t two kids who made that promise while
supporting each other as the only people we have left to depend on
after our parents died…”
After putting that out there, I said
“Since Mother’s Day.”
“Mother’s Day? Hahahahahahahaha!”
Tsukihi burst into laughter.
Because it’s Mother’s Day, so “hahahahahahaha”.12
That wasn’t even funny, and that laugh made me shudder.
“I see, I see. So after you had that fight with Karen-chan you ran
out of the house, and while the whole Araragi family couldn’t even
look each other in the eye, you were out there picking up some chick?”
“ ‘Picking up a chick’…”
Couldn’t you have put it in a nicer way?
Actually, why are you saying “the whole Araragi family”?
I’m part of the family too you know.
“What? That’s what you were doing isn’t it? On Mother’s Day of all
days, on that day of celebration that only comes around once a year,
when we were supposed to be showing our mom our gratitude, you
were flirting with some girl weren’t you? You chose some young girl
over your family.”
“I can’t believe what a bad kid you turned out to be…”
‘Some young girl’? Well she is young.
She’s in the same grade as me so she’d be 18.
“I bet Karen-chan’s going to be so disappointed when she hears
this. She was so happy because she thought you’d actually grown up a
12 The Japanese word for “mother” (母) is pronounced haha.
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little after you apologized to her, but it turns out you were so careless
because you were happy you got yourself a girlfriend.”
“How would you know I didn’t care? Don’t just decide that for me!”
“It was a celebration but you turned it into a carelebration
instead.”13
“Damn it…”
She thinks she can just say whatever pops into her head because
she’s holding an awl.
“So since then you’ve been keeping us in the dark about it the
whole time? During breakfast and dinner, you never told me that you
had a girlfriend. You were just thinking about how much better the
food tasted knowing that I was completely in the dark about your
girlfriend and secretly laughing at me in your head weren’t you.”
“Do you really think that there’s an older brother out there who
would do that?”
“You! You nonexistent big brother! How could you keep a secret
from me! I knew it, you haven’t been wrestling with us when we fight
because you’re saving yourself for your girlfriend!”
“It’s not like I wrestle with her anyway… And besides, even if I was
just careless because I was happy, it’s because I met a fifth-grade girl,
not because I got a girlfriend.”
“How long!”
Was the gist of the conversation as Tsukihi kept asking me about
my girlfriend all the way until the morning.
13
Tsukihi previously called Koyomi “careless” (おざなり, ozanari). Here, she
says オザーナリー (ozaanarii) to make it sound like アニバーサリー
(anibaasarii, “anniversary”).
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KAREN ARM-LEG
27 September 2012
Araragi Karen is quite tall. In the sense that she was simply tall,
without needing any sort of explanation or sidenote added such as “for
a girl”, or “for someone in ninth grade” or even “compared to her
brother”, she was just tall. And even scarier than the most terrifying
ghost stories is the fact that even now she’s still growing. Setting aside
these feelings of terror and fear, these emotional problems, and
investigating the “condition” of her height, logically thinking it
follows that both her legs and arms are quite long as well.
Like the two youkai, Tenaga and Ashinaga.14
I was a bit traumatized when I saw a program about old legends in
Japan as a kid. And Araragi Karen could be called a physical
embodiment of the two youkai in one. You could say it boils down to
14 A pair of monsters in Japanese folklore. Ashinaga (足長, “long legs”) has
really long legs and short arms, while Tenaga (手長, “long arms”) has long arms
and short legs. Tenaga often sits on Ashinaga’s shoulders.
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her having long arms and legs, but now she was swinging those rather
long arms and legs around wildly.
“Uwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”
She shouted and cried out.
Spread out on the floor like she was making a snow angel.
She swung her limbs around to their fullest extent and writhed on
the floor. “Writhed” might have been a more eloquent way of putting
it, but in fact it sounded more like “bang” or “crush” or “snap snap
snap”, sounds of various things being broken. With every flailing of
her arms and every kick of her legs, something else would break.
It was like the coming of a great god of destruction.
I assure you that I’m not exaggerating at all, but if it still feels like
this is all an exaggeration, I would dare to put it this way even if it
isn’t quite true. Simply speaking.
Araragi Karen.
My little sister was having a temper tantrum now.
And a huge one at that.
“S—Stop it already, Karen-chan! Karen-chan, calm down!”
But my words would never reach her.
Actually, they probably did, but they had the opposite of the
intended effect of calming her down, and she in fact began shouting
and worked herself into a greater rage as if to block out my voice.
“You’re lying to meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! You have
to be lying to meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!”
Bang.
Crush.
Snap snap snap.
This was all taking place in the living room of the Araragi house, in
other words one of the most important facilities of a house. However,
Karen paid no attention to that and went on breaking things, and more
things, and more things.
Those long arms and legs like a youkai weren’t to be taken lightly.
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I could still look on the bright side and say that at least this hadn’t
happened a bit earlier, or else the living room would have faced the
added destruction of her ponytail as well.
“C—Calm down Karen-chan. Come on, stop crying, stop shouting,
stop throwing things around. You’re already in your last year of middle
school, next year you’ll be in high school. You’re acting like a kid
crying over some dropped ice crea—guha”
I was thrown back by Karen’s fist, more accurately her backhand,
as I tried my best to stop her from struggling.
That punch might have been fatal if I didn’t have the increased
healing factor from my vampirism. I was pretty lucky that I had just
let Shinobu suck some of my blood too.
Man, being immortal really is convenient.
I won’t even die from my little sister’s tantrums.
“Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa”
“ ‘Waaaaaaaaaa’? Have you ever heard anyone cry like that outside
a manga?”
“It’s a lie!”
She hadn’t exactly calmed down, but since the start of her tantrum
it was the first time anything resembling speech had come out of
Karen’s mouth.
“It’s a lie! There’s no way you have a girlfriend, oniichan! I don’t
believe it! I’m never believing it! You’d never get a girlfriend!”
“……”
“You’re my oniichan! You don’t need a girlfriend! You were just
going to live alone for the rest of your life!”
Wait a second.
What do you mean alone for the rest of my life.
“Waaaaaaaaaa! You betrayed me! You were my oniichan and only
mine! It was just the two of us, brother and sister!”
Karen quickly brushed off Tsukihi’s very existence.
I’d like you to understand that’s how agitated she was right now.
And I think you understand the situation now.
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Near the end of summer holiday.
I turned to Karen and, like I told Tsukihi, told her
“You know there’s actually this girl I’ve been dating since a little
while ago.”
And before I could say “I’ll introduce her to you when we get a
chance” Karen crushed (!?) the dumbbell she had been training with
up until a moment ago with a bored look on her face, opened her eyes
as wide as they would go and immediately flipped over the sofa she
was sitting on as if to crush it to bits.
And with those two arms and legs.
She unleashed her two arms and legs which were long like the
Amazon river and started throwing a tantrum.
“Break up with her! Break up with her! Break up with her right
now!”
“You sure ask for a lot…”
“Call her right now and break up with her! I’ll call her if you can’t!
I’ll tell her you can’t go out with her anymore because you love your
little sister so much!”
“Damn she’s scary…”
I’d never seen this kind of little sister character before.
Araragi Karen used to be the classic example of the “real life little
sisters aren’t that cute” character. And that had now reached its peak.
What kind of crazy fantasy has a little sister who would make her
brother break up with his girlfriend.
“Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! How could you get
a girlfriend, oniichan! And you kept it a secret from me!”
“This reaction was way more than I expected…”
I guess for all how much she’s trained her body, she completely
neglected to train her mind… So she kept on destroying the floor of the
Araragi household.
I was ready to get punched, but I never expected her to cry and
throw a tantrum…
“Tell me what I’m doing wrong!”
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Karen sat up suddenly and glared at me. Her face was covered in
tears.
“If it was something to do with sex why didn’t you just do it with
me!”
“What the hell, that’s scary! What she says and what she thinks!”
“I can’t believe you already had a girlfriend when you were
brushing my teeth like that!”
“I know how people bring that up a lot, but if you really think about
it, it was perfectly wholesome, just a brother helping his little sister
brush her teeth!”
“Let me see her! Let me see your girlfriend!”
Karen said, choking back her tears.
While still wildly flailing her limbs around.
“I’m going to brush her teeth! I’m going to brush them till they’re
sparkling clean! I’m going to make sure she knows that I’m the only
one allowed to have her teeth brushed by you!”
“…”
Whatever.
You are actually the only person whose teeth I’ve brushed—in any
case.
That was how I became the mediator between Senjougahara and
Karen. I don’t care what happens afterwards, whether they bring a
building down or cause a landslide, although considering they are the
Fire Sisters, it’s more like whether they burn a building down or start
a forest fire.
Karen’s tantrums continued on after that.
And all there was to do was patiently wait for them to end.
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HITAGI NECK
27 September 2012
Apparently Senjougahara Hitagi had been waiting eagerly for this day
to come. As to what “this day” means, it would be the day when I
introduced her as my girlfriend to my two sisters, Araragi Karen and
Araragi Tsukihi.
“Why were you so excited about today anyway… Are you actually a
big fan of the Fire Sisters?”
Now that I think about it, Senjougahara did know about my sisters
before she met me. Of course, at the time, I was just terrified that
someone I didn’t know knew everything about my family.
“You could say that, Koyokoyo.”
said Senjougahara.
Apparently “Koyokoyo” was referring to me.
I was absolutely opposed to that nickname. Actually, it was more
than just being opposed to it, I hated it, but she stubbornly refused to
stop calling me it.
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Well if I just told myself that her stubbornness is just another part
of her rehabilitation, if I just forced myself to think of it that way, I
could just barely put up with it.
Or maybe it was her way of getting back at me for when I call her
“Gahara-san” once in a while.
If that’s the case, I guess it’s a pretty cute way of getting back at
me, I hope that I’m not just rambling on about our lovey-dovey couple
moments.
“When I hear the rumors about them it reminds me of me and
Kanbaru back in middle school.”
“Hmm, the Valhalla Combo.”
“But it’s not just that, I’m really happy that you’re introducing me
to your family, Koyokoyo. I feel like I’m finally being accepted as your
girlfriend.”
“ ‘Accepted as your girlfriend’…”
Did she really say that?
She’s gotten a lot gentler than I expected, even after her
rehabilitation.
I wouldn’t say that I really want the old snappy Senjougahara back,
but this really makes it feel like time flies.
“Weren’t you happy when I introduced you to my father,
Koyokoyo?”
“Yeah, I was.”
I answered so quickly it might have sounded suspicious.
Senjougahara’s father.
Mr. Senjougahara.
How would I describe my meeting with that man who was aging
quite well, memorable? A bit traumatic? It really had been
unendurable, which was probably why I answered so quickly.
Although now, when I think that Senjougahara trusted me enough
to introduce me to her father even before her rehabilitation, it does
make me quite happy.
I’d be lying if I said it didn’t.
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But I’d also be lying if I said it was all just happy times…
“That’s why I’m so happy that I’ll get to meet Karen-san and
Tsukihi-san. Although I still felt like it was pretty out of the blue when
you called me up right after I got home from Bon.”15
“Well there are some pretty complicated reasons behind that,
mysterious reasons you could say, in any case I didn’t really have any
other choice so…”
I really didn’t have any other choice.
If you want to read more about that, you can refer to the other short
stories in the booklet, but it was a bit hard to explain to Senjougahara.
“To be honest, my sisters forced me to.”
“Forced you…”
“You better watch out, Senjougahara. They seem sort of opposed to
you. I never introduced you to them before because I was afraid that
you’d try to hurt them. Well I’m not worried about that anymore, but
now I’m worried the opposite might happen.”
“…”
“Just for today, Senjougahara. I authorize you to arm yourself with
your stationery.”
Senjougahara shook her head.
“Stationery is for studying, not for hurting people.”
“… Well you’re right but.”
“I’ll never write ‘stationery’ as ‘stationary’ like a ‘stationary
turret’ again.”16
“I’ve never seen you do that before…”
And actually that’s a really good pun.
Why didn’t I think of that?
“You know, Araragi-kun,”
Senjougahara paused, then said
15 Bon (盆) is a festival that starts on August 15 where people honor their
ancestors’ spirit.
16 The original pun is Senjougahara replacing the character 房 (bou) in the
word 文房具 (bunbougu, “stationery”) with 防 (bou, “defense”).
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“I’ve always wanted a little sister.”
“… I can’t give you one you know?”
“I don’t mean in real life, it was just a wish for me. Maybe that’s
why I always liked the juniors like Kanbaru so much. But with my
parents ending up the way they did, that’s not possible. But I still think
about it, maybe if I had a little sister my family wouldn’t have been
torn apart.”
“…”
“Maybe if that was true, I could’ve introduced you to my mother.
Well just introducing you isn’t really the point…”
“I get what you’re saying.”
Actually, maybe I don’t.
Just because she’s my girlfriend, because we’re boyfriend and
girlfriend, doesn’t mean that we can understand all of each other’s
feelings. But I know for sure that Senjougahara must have always
wanted to have that sort of normal conversation.
To be normal.
To Senjougahara, who had to go through her youth never being
allowed to be normal, maybe just spending our days like this is enough
to make her happy. But that doesn’t mean she’ll be able to take back
the things she’s lost.
Exactly because they’re things that she’s lost.
She’ll always keep thinking of them.
“I know that just a little while ago I never would’ve thought that
introducing people to my family or being introduced to someone else’s
family would make me so happy. I’m sure I would’ve thought that even
if I had a boyfriend, I’d want that to be just a private relationship
between the two of us.”
“I know…”
Honestly, I would consider myself one of those people.
But now I guess I’m laid back enough to just go along with what
Senjougahara wants. The Araragi Koyomi who used to say “I don’t
want friends, I’ll get weaker as a person” is gone.
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And I’m sure who I am now.
One day he’ll be gone too.
“I just wanted to ask you, Koyokoyo. Both of your sisters have
boyfriends, right?”
“That’s the first time I’ve heard of it.”
“Come on, there’s no way you wouldn’t know… Besides you’re the
one who told me after all. You haven’t met them before?”
“Yeah, I always run right away.”
“Why do you sound so proud when you say that. You should just
agree to meet them, next time it’ll be you meeting your sisters’
boyfriends.”
“Well if I get the chance…”
I pray that I never do.
Honestly I hope that they break up before I ever have to meet them.
I know I’m being close-minded, but that’s just how an older brother
feels about his little sisters’ boyfriends.
Well if I think of it that way.
No matter how hostile Karen and Tsukihi are to meeting
Senjougahara, they’re way more mature than me.
“Oh, seems like we’re here.”
“It’ll be my first time going inside.”
After a fifteen-minute walk from where we agreed to meet.
Senjougahara and I had arrived at the Araragi house.
Let the Summit begin.
I steeled myself for the worst.
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SHINOBU HOUSE
27 September 2012
It was only on the night after the meeting held in the living room of
the Araragi house between the couple; Araragi Koyomi and
Senjougahara Hitagi, and the Fire Sisters; Araragi Karen and Araragi
Tsukihi, later to be known as “Gahara Summit” had ended, that
Oshino Shinobu appeared, seeming rather displeased.
Shinobu, who despite being nocturnal by no means would always
appear at night, did in fact appear as if it were the most normal thing.
Almost as if waiting for the exact moment when I decided to fall
onto my bed with a sense of relief after more or less successfully
making it through the actually extremely difficult meeting.
“Aaaah”
The tired-sounding voice came out of her mouth as she crawled out
from the shadows.
What’s with that voice.
It’s like she wants me to pay attention to her.
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“I could barely watch that. Pretending to be friends, pretending to
be family. I hate that stuff the most.”
“Uuugh.”
Oh boy.
I’ve got another young lady with a “charming” personality on my
hands now.
I never would have guessed that there’d be a bonus level after
completing that serious discussion of ours.
“You can pretend it was so much trouble for you, but I saw you with
that grin on your face trying to get the conversation going between
your girlfriend and your sisters. Aaah, I can’t stand it, I simply can’t.”
Shinobu said, criticizing me not directly, but indirectly, disguising
her rant as her talking to herself by shrugging and stretching out both
of her arms in an overexaggerated motion.
Mumbling on and on, complaining on and on.
“To see the warrior who drove me so close to the edge grow so soft.
Why don’t you just get your own soap opera already. You don’t belong
in any youkai stories anymore. Go on spouting that tepid crap to those
girls all you like.”
“You sure say some feisty things…”
And even during spring break I didn’t even do that much to her.
Now she’s starting to make stuff up just to get at me.
“Aaah, I don’t even know anymoooore. I guess in the end your
family and your girlfriend or whatever is more important to you after
aaaall.”
Shinobu continued without even glancing my way. It almost
seemed like she was just talking to herself, but loud enough that I
would definitely be able to hear her. Like she was trying to implicitly
say “Can you even call yourself a vampire doing all this?”.
“What was that again, I remember you saying something. That’s
right, I remember you saying some really cool line. Man, that made
my heart beat sooo fast. I can’t imagine someone who’d say they cared
84
about their girlfriend or their family saying something that would get
my heart beating sooo fast.”
“W—What are you talking about?”
“ ‘If you die tomorrow, I’m fine with my life ending tomorrow too’
or something, or were you just trying to sweet-talk me.”
Since she had answered my question, it seemed like she wasn’t just
talking to herself after all. But still Shinobu refused to look my way.
“But from what I heard at that meeting you just had, it won’t
matter whether I die. You’ll just go on living your normal life. I’m sure.
100%.”
“Well, actually Shinobu-san. That’s not true really…”
“Then die right here right now. I’m already dying from a disease
right now so hurry up and die. You can’t? You can’t, can you. There
you go, liar.”
“…”
Just like the 8-year-old she looked like.
But actually, this is kinda cute in its own way.
“Just listen to me, Shinobu. That’s not how it is. I know that maybe
I was hard to watch today, but I wasn’t trying to ignore you.”
For some reason I started to try and cheer up Shinobu. I was forced
to. Why did it end up like this.
“I thought it was obvious, your bond with me is the most precious
thing in the world to me—”
“Ha, that’s what all men say when they’re cheating. Well fine! You
must be the modern version of the main character in Life of an Amorous
Man”17
“There’s no way you’ve heard of that book before. I bet you’re just
guessing based on the name.”
Actually.
17 A novel written in 1682 detailing the numerous sexual exploits of a man
named Yonosuke in several short stories.
85
Even if you don’t know about the book, the title already tells you
enough anyway.
I actually found it pretty interesting that Shinobu in her blond little
girl state would know about the famous works of Ihara Saikaku.18 I
wonder where all her knowledge even comes from.
Normally Shinobu just spends her time inside my shadow, and
apparently it’s a pretty large space so she spends her time reading or
playing games… I’m starting to wonder what kinds of books Shinobu
reads.
“How about this, my master. If I, your girlfriend, your giant sister
and your minuscule sister were all hanging from the side of a cliff and
you could only save one of us, who would you save?”
“…”
She’s so goddamn annoying!
This little brat’s so goddamn annoying!
I felt myself straining under the weight of how annoying she was
and said
“I don’t think I could make that choice. Everyone’s life is equal so
there’s no way I could choose between them!”
trying to act cool while dodging the question by giving her lip
service.
“Stop trying to act cool while dodging the question by giving me
lip service.”
said Shinobu, evidently unsatisfied with my answer.
I don’t even know what to say after she just saw completely
through my plan and threw it right back at my face…
“Answer me. Who would you pick? I might have to leave your
shadow depending on your answer.”
“Can you even leave it…?”
18 Famous Japanese poet from the 17th century. He created the “floating
world” genre of Japanese prose.
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“Of course I can. I just so happened to stumble into your shadow
and started living there anyway. You could say I’m like Odysseus in
Circe’s mansion.”19
“I guess that explains why you have all those books…”
In reality, those were just books she took from my bookshelf. But if
there really was a bookshelf you could just keep taking from and there
would always be more books, that would really be heaven to any
bookworm. Anyway…
Hmm.
What should I do about this.
In any case, I should just tell her “Shinobu, obviously I’d save you
even if I had to leave Senjougahara and Karen-chan and Tsukihi-chan
behind, even if I had to use them as a shield, obviously I’d save you!”
and get myself out of this question for now… But really.
When I’m already talking to someone with this kind of mindset, I’d
really just be giving her lip service, or trying to act cool, or dodging
the question… and then she’d see right through me—I mean throw a
bunch of false accusations at me and say “Ha! You’re trying to sweet-
talk me again!”
So, where does this leave me.
Well, there is only one model answer.
“I would reach out to”
I said.
I said with a posed look on my face.
“Hanekawa. Hanekawa Tsubasa. If I really was in that kind of
situation, I’d reach out to Hanekawa—and ask for her help.”
“…”
Shinobu looked at me with an astounded look on her face for a little
while, then afterwards
19 The original line compares it to a mayoiga (迷家), a house which was said
to bring good fortune to travelers who visited it. Circe is a sorceress who
provides for all of Odysseus’ worldly desires during a year he spends feasting
and drinking before he resumes his journey back home after the Trojan War.
87
“Ka ka”
She began to laugh.
She finally laughed.
“Well if you mention her I guess I have to agree. It really is
convenient for you to just pull out her name.”
But really that was just another way of getting myself out of the
question, and in terms of who I save or don’t save, even if I get
someone else’s help, in the end people can only save themselves, and
people can never save other people. Maybe I wouldn’t be able to save
any of the four, or five, of them, but at least for the time being I
managed to stop Shinobu from leaving—and from then on just like
before,
Shinobu would keep living in my shadow.
88
Black Hanekawa’s
CAT SIGN ASTROLOGY

HEROINE BOOK 1: HANEKAWA TSUBASA
19 September 2013
ART: HAJIME UEDA

Today we’ll be having Black Hanekawa tell us the horoscopes for not
the twelve zodiac signs, but the twelve cat zodiac signs.
First off, pick your favorite story from Bakemonogatari I to
Koimonogatari. That’ll be your cat zodiac sign, once you’ve got it, sit
back, relax and let off all that stress that you’ve been building up!!
89
If you picked
Nekomonogatari Kuro
Cat
You got some pretty good
luck. Cats tend to stay close to
humans, but keep a certain
distance so they’re not very
consistent. However, if dogs
are man’s best friend, cats If you picked
simply exist alongside Bakemonogatari II
humanity. Staying close but
not too close is Lion
a purrfectly
fine way to live. Apparently, some people
like to point out that Aries and
Taurus are particularly
masculine signs. But what’s
the point of that? For lions, the
males have majestic manes
while lionesses have sleek
bodies. You’re cool the way you
are so you should just stay that
way. Did something good
happen to mew
recently?
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If you picked
Nisemonogatari II
Lynx
There are endangered
species of wildcats out there.
They’re in big trouble so you
better help them out. Don’t
think you can selfishly live
your own life! I will say that If you picked
“lynx” has a nice ring to it and Hanamonogatari
I’m super jealous. Nyaturally, I
expect you to be Cheetah
cool enough to
live up to such a Everyone thinks cheetahs
name. are the fastest ever, but that
may not be the case. They can
go all out for a split second, but
they tire quickly. Well, no one
does it better than the king of
instant speed at least. So make
sure mew make the most out of
that speed. Be quick and
decisive. People mostly deal
with the short
term so take
advantage of
that.
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If you picked
Otorimonogatari
Liger
Half lion and half tiger.
They are a human creation so I
find that a bit troubling if you
ask me. Then again, dogs and
cats are products of selective
breeding. Well, I’ll make sure If you picked
you have good luck with money Nisemonogatari I
so think of it like I’m praying
for you. Just don’t go thinking Rose-gold pussy willow
that’ll be
So you’re a plant. Quite a
enough meow.
few plants take their names
from cats but purrsonally I
think the way willows softly
sway in the wind makes them
most like them. Now, I want
you to face the rough waves of
society with the same
flexibility. Or let them flow
past you even. As long as your
will doesn’t
break, you can
get through
anything, no
matter what.
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If you picked
Nekomonogatari Shiro
Tiger
Watch out for fire! Be
careful around it! It’s hot!
You’ll get burned! And beware
of a certain katana, too! You’ll
have no idea when it’ll come
slicing down from the sky! By If you picked
the way, white tigers are tigers, Bakemonogatari I
but black tigers
are a kind of Black-tailed gull
shrimp. The
more mew I know gulls are birds, but
know. they “meow” like cats so it’s
close enough. How amewsing
is it that while wildcats are
cats, “sea cats” are actually
birds? Why not call them “sky
cats” then? Anyway, make sure
people don’t get your name
wrong. There’s never a time to
let others mess up your name.
On the other
paw, don’t be
getting other
people’s names
wrong yourself.
93
If you picked
Koimonogatari
Cougar
When it comes down to
cougars, they have a
“womanly” vibe, don’t you
think? Having picked such a
sexy cat, you must be in love.
Nyot that I’m in any pawsition If you picked
to even talk Kabukimonogatari
about love. I
guess I’ll just Panda
keep an eye on
you. Before you go thinking
what pandas have to do with
cats, bears are also part of
Carnivora. So that means
panda bears are part of the
same order. And get this, they
are one of the few species that
are herbivores. All they snack
on are bamboo. This makes me
more worried about them
going extinct over wildcats.
But, like, don’t they have the
coolest camouflage? It’s the
purrfect ratio of
black and
white.
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If you picked
Kizumonogatari
Fishing cat
This may seem obvious If you picked
from their name, and this is Onimonogatari
really a minor point, but
fishing cats hunt fur fish. The Leopard seal
belief that all cats are fish
lovers is a little misleading Anyather one for the
really. The only cats that go out Carnivora order. Purretty
of their way to catch fish are broad, huh? They’re called
these guys. Watch yourself “leopard seals”. Who do you
around water now. In the end, think would win in a fight
despite their between leopard of the sea and
name, fishing leopard of the land?
really isn’t that Nyaturally, the leopard seal
big of a deal. would if it was in water and the
leopard on the ground. But
don’t you think “sea leopard”
sounds cool? Like a terrifying
beast of the sea. Anyway, these
horoscopes are just excuses
and have no
bearing on your
fortune. Your
fate is all up to
you.
95
TSUBASA BOARD
YOMIURI SHIMBUN
6 July 2013
ONIMONOGATARI BD/DVD VOL. 1
23 April 2014
I’m the other side to the cute cat.
Flexible like a cat,
Stiff like a human, a story of struggle and suffering.
TRANSLATION: RYOUKUGAN
In the final volume of his four-part Odyssey Series, 3001: The Final
Odyssey, Arthur C. Clarke defines an “intellectual” as such: “someone
who has been educated beyond their intelligence”. As someone who
has lived her entire life cramming knowledge and information into her
body just as someone who is starving seeks to live, when I read this
definition for the first time, it felt as if my own name were called out.
Without a doubt.
Receiving an education isn’t necessarily a good thing, nor is having
knowledge. Only “knowing” something is exactly the same as not
knowing it.
“No, sometimes knowing too much might be a far greater
disadvantage, Hanekawa-san. Hanekawa Tsubasa-san. When you’re
bound by superficial knowledge, you can’t do anything. That doesn’t
happen to most people”, Senjougahara said in response to my lead-in.
97
“That said, we live in an information-overloaded society. If you try
asking one thing you’ll be taught ten;20 you’ll be taught things you
don’t even want to know. These days, the right to teach others is
valued even more than the right to learn, and we have a system where
no one is allowed to live in ignorance and indifference. No one even
cares about me personally, the information just keeps flooding in. I
can’t stand all the little tips the world feels like it has to give.”
Senjougahara continued, seemingly overwhelmed.
Once a schemer fell for his own scheme, but I think these days
intellectuals fall for knowledge.21 There’s no need to even make
schemes, knowledge jumbles together just like them.
“You’re right, but even so, you probably can’t cut off information
entirely, Senjougahara-san. Of course, all we can do is keep a mental
kickboard to keep ourselves from drowning in knowledge.”
“A kickboard… Grasping at straws when you’re drowning is
certainly unreliable,22 but I don’t know… For someone like me, it seems
like carrying a kickboard full of teeth marks.”
Senjougahara said something I don’t understand very well—I
wonder if it means something like “being impatient” and “grinding
your teeth”? Or, it could be that Senjougahara wants to say that the
“breaks” should be put on the influx—the torrent of knowledge. She
has the strength to shut the world out. It’s a dangerous strength, but
it is a strength. There’s no room for doubt about that.
“Speaking of boards, Hanekawa-san, the monolith that appears
in 3001: The Final Odyssey gave intelligence to humanity, didn’t it? It
gave us intelligence and made us evolve.”
20 Hanekawa is playing off of the Japanese expression 一を聞いて十を知る
(ichi wo kiite juu wo shiru, “ask one (thing) and know ten”).
21 Hanekawa is referring to the Japanese expression 策士、策に溺れる
(sakushi, saku ni oboreru, “a schemer falls for his own schemes”).

22 Senjougahara is playing off of the expression 溺れる者はわらをもつかむ
(oboreru mono ha wara wo mo katsumu, “a drowning man will even grasp at

straws”).
98
“Yep. But the monolith itself isn’t either good or bad. It seems
neither intelligence nor information have any meaning for it, either.”
“In the long run, it’s a problem, isn’t it, Hanekawa-san. Once we
know something, it means that that we can’t not know it. Living things
can’t run against evolution. We can’t expel the intelligence that we’ve
been infused with from our bodies. We’d burst if we tried.”
The wish, “I want to live without knowing”, won’t be realized.
For better or for worse.
We’re forced to grow to that extent.
“Well… There’s nothing convenient like if you could eliminate the
knowledge and information you thought you didn’t need from your
memory once and for all. But, I think you’re right. Rather than running
against or flowing against something, it’s proactive degeneration, and
rather than being a recession it’s a decline.”
“…”
“What’s wrong, Senjougahara-san? You suddenly clammed up.”
“No, nothing’s wrong. There’s nothing wrong. Nothing at all. But
without a doubt, that body of yours might be too stuffed with
knowledge”, Senjougahara said.
Without even trying to hide her genuine amazement.
“Most people wouldn’t even know that 2001: A Space Odyssey has
three sequels. Hanekawa-san, you really do know everything, don’t
you.”
Taking Senjougahara’s cue, I answered like I always do.
“I don’t know everything; I just know what I know.”
99
MAYOI CASTLE
YOMIURI SHIMBUN
17 August 2013
23 April 2014
Innocence, innocence, fly away!23

Run against the winds on the path of fate
Lucy Maud Montgomery is well known as the author of Anne of Green

Gables, but this morning let’s talk about something “blue” instead of
something “red” like Anne’s hair.24 In other words, we’ll be talking
about the story starring Valancy Stirling, The Blue Castle.
“Have you read it before? Araragi-san.”
“The Blue Castle? Actually Hachikuji, I’m sorry for being a bad
student, but I’ve never even heard of this book until just now.”
Araragi-san replied after thinking for a few moments. Anne of Green
Gables is just so famous that not many people would recognize The Blue
Castle here in Japan in any case.
“I’m a bit embarrassed to admit it, but out of Montgomery’s works
I’ve only read Anne of Green Gables. I think Senjougahara’s only
23 Play on the popular saying “Pain, pain, fly away” that parents say to little
kids, with “pain” (いたいの, itai no) replaced with “innocence” (いたいけ, itaike).
24 Anne of Green Gables in Japanese is 赤毛のアン (akage no an, “Red
Haired Anne”).
101
read Chronicles of Avonlea even with her habit of reading anything and
everything.”
“What kind of reader is she?”
I guess there are all sorts of weird indiscriminate readers out there.
I began to explain the plot of The Blue Castle to Araragi-san.
“So the protagonist is a 29-year-old woman named Valancy
Stirling with a power of imagination you could say rivals even Anne
Shirley.”
“Wouldn’t it be pretty bad to have an imagination like Anne Shirley
at 29…?”
“One day Miss Stirling is told by her doctor that she only has one
year left to live, and the story follows how a woman who has been
oppressed by her family and relatives for her entire life chooses to live
out the remainder of her life.”
I ignored Araragi-san’s comment. (It would be quite bad though,
in reality.) Anyway, this isn’t a book review so I’ll stop there for the
introduction. (I also won’t explain why the title of the book is The Blue
Castle.) I decided to ask Araragi-san a question.
“What would you do if you were told that you only had one year left
to live, Araragi-san?”
“What? What do you mean?”
“I suppose you’re always one wrong move from dying tomorrow,
but what I’m asking is what you would do if you could survive for an
entire year.”
“That has a completely different gist to it. Hmm”
I wonder—Araragi-san said with his arms crossed. One of the nice
things about him is that he’ll always at least consider any question I
ask him. Being so very impressed by his laudable actions (that was a
lie, just in case) I gave him a few suggestions.
“Like travelling around the world, or going on a shopping spree, or
confessing to someone who you’ve always loved, there are lots of
things you could say.”
102
“I do definitely get that feeling of not wanting to leave with any
regrets but hmm… Actually, I might not do anything.”
“You wouldn’t do anything?”
I wasn’t expecting that answer. I wonder if he was just trying to
say something different to get attention. I hate that sort of mentality
of always wanting to show off one’s appeal with a burning passion, so
I immediately cut in.
“Doesn’t that just mean you’ve given up on everything? Does that
mean if all you’ve got left is one year, and no matter what you do it’s
all pointless, that in a way you’ve fallen into complete despair? You
really are too self-conscious.”
“That’s not what I mean. Like, when you’re alive it’s just all things
that you need to do. I mean as long as you’re alive there’s always going
to be some activities you can’t avoid.”
“Activities. Do you mean doing work?”
“Not just work, even ‘playing’ or ‘resting’ are just activities you
have to do to live. In order to live tomorrow you have to eat a nice meal
and sleep well, but if I only had one year left to live I’d be free from all
those sorts of responsibilities.”
“Hmm”
In the end there’s not much of a difference from just falling into
despair and giving up, in my opinion. That’s what I would say, but he
does have a point. And even a journey of a thousand miles has to start
from a point.25 And like he said, being able to do nothing at all might
be the greatest luxury to an organism. Chasing your dreams. Looking
for hope. Shooting for your targets. Those might seem like nice and
positive examples of self-actualization but they all require quite an
amount of hard work and effort in exchange.
25 Hachikuji quotes a slightly different version of the saying “A journey of a
thousand miles starts with a single step” where “a single step” is replaced by “a
single mile”. She makes a pun with 一理 (ichiri, “one point”) and 一里 (ichiri, “one
mile”).
103
But in fact because of the little time remaining in your life, you
wouldn’t have to travel the world, you wouldn’t have to go on a
shopping spree, you wouldn’t have to confess to that person you’ve
always loved. That line of thought could warrant some consideration.
“As long as we’re alive, we must try to bring ourselves the greatest
amount of pleasure possible, so wouldn’t it be nice to be free from that
burden on our lives, at least at the end? Wouldn’t it be nice to not have
to do all the things that we want? You get tired after a while. You get
tired of having to enjoy every moment of your life in this world all the
time.
He sure talks like he knows everything there is to know. But it is
like him to say that with all the deaths he’s experienced.
I felt a little warm on the inside.
“By the way Hachikuji. I know you said that this morning we’d be
talking about something ‘blue’ instead of something ‘red’, but if we’re
talking about Anne of Green Gables wouldn’t that be ‘green’?”
Says the person who apologized for being a bad student.
I feel like that warm feeling inside me was all for nothing.
“You know in Japanese sometimes we use the word ‘blue’ instead
of ‘green’,26 but in the end it’s talking about the same thing. I think
you should apologize and correct yourself.”
I wanted to punch him.
26 Japanese, like many other languages, traditionally did not distinguish

between the colors we know as “green” and “blue” and used a single term (青,
ao) to refer to both. There is a word (緑, midori) that means specifically “green”
but is not generally used in situations where this distinction is not needed. “Go”
traffic signals and vegetables are 青 but green paint is 緑.
104
“Come on… It’s not a big deal really, you could say that the future
for a company looks ‘black’ if they’re ‘in the red’.27 You’re always like
this, getting all worked up over the little details, 1/f yuragi-san.”28
“Don’t talk about someone like a healing wave29 or something.
Apologize for that and correct it too. My name is Araragi.”
I see.
I guess I’ll have you live for a bit longer, or quite a while longer,
and enjoy life without complaining. So I, Hachikuji Mayoi, prayed that
you, Araragi-san, would have a long life, then returned to our usual
exchange.
“Sorry, I stuttered.”
27 The original compares two words for a baby: 赤ちゃん (akachan) with the
word for “red” (赤, aka) in it, and 嬰児 (midorigo) with the word for “green” (嬰,
midori).
28 The gi in yuragi is written the same as in Araragi (阿良々木) as 木 as
opposed to the normal ぎ. See also the next note.

29 1/f ゆらぎ (1/f yuragi) or “1/f noise”, also known as “pink noise”, is often
(unscientifically) thought to have calming effects in Japan and is marketed as

such in a variety of household electronics.
105
HITAGI COIN
BAKEMONOGATARI [INTRODUCTION]
12 September 2013
TRANSLATION: TRAUBEN SAFT
Senjougahara Hitagi had been deceiving. As for what she’d been

deceiving, the answer would be everything—everything and everyone
around her, for two years. She had been hiding the curse that had
befallen her, the condition she had been suffering from, all that time.
I can’t help but think about what that must have been like. Of course,
I’m not an especially honest person either. I’m an adolescent high
schooler who lives his life lying just like anybody else, somehow
managing to get along. But I end up wondering precisely because I’m
that kind of person, what it must be like to deceive, to continue to trick
everything and everyone, to keep on lying no matter what.
“If anything, won’t you have to do that from now on, Araragi-kun?
After all, you’ll have to hide the fact that you’re a vampire—not just
for two years, but the rest of your life.” Senjougahara answered.
Class had already ended and there was no one but us in the
classroom.
107
The classroom was deserted—I’d forgotten how I’d come to ask
that question. Anyhow, Senjougahara had, quite unusually, neither
dodged the question nor resorted to her usual verbal abuse.
“Well, you’re right… That’s why I wanted to ask you about this.”
“You wanted to ask. Me. About how to lie?”
“Ummm…”
That was essentially what it was when you broke it down but
putting it that way would mean calling Senjougahara Hitagi a liar, and
that was just too blunt.
“I don’t think humans are very honest creatures,” I answered,
doing my best to mince my words.
“But it’s clear that you build up stress by lying in any kind of
relationship, right? I don’t know how to say it, you feel guilty, you
have a nagging conscience… What I want to ask is, how do you put up
with those sorts of feelings? Don’t people fundamentally not want to
lie? Isn’t that why they phrase things so they just barely don’t count
as lies, or lie as little as possible?”
“If there’s anything I can teach you as a master of lies—it’s that
tricking people and deceiving people are similar, but not identical
things. You shouldn’t lump those two words together, or say them in
the same breath.” Senjougahara said.
Even though I had just changed the topic to something anyone
could agree with, Senjougahara threw my consideration completely
out the window. It seemed like she was in a good mood today. Well,
seeing as this was what she was like when she was in a good mood, she
was pretty hard to deal with as a classmate, but…
“Araragi-kun, do you have some small change?”
“Small change?”
Senjougahara sighed.
“You might even consider a 1000-yen bill small change coming
from your family background, but I’m talking about coins.”
“My family isn’t that rich…”
108
Well, I knew I had some coins in my coin purse at least… I took out
my wallet and gave Senjougahara a 100-yen coin.
“Thanks.”
“……………”
“……………”
“……………”
“……………”
“Hey. I’m not letting you have it! Give it back, OK? Didn’t you want
to use it for something?”
“Let’s make a bet, Araragi-kun.” said Senjougahara nonchalantly,
her fingers playing with my 100-yen coin.
“Heads or tails—front or back. A coin toss. If heads comes up, I get
the 100 yen. If tails comes up, I’ll become your slave for the rest of my
life.”
“Why are the stakes so high!?”
I don’t want to do that!
I don’t want to gamble with someone who’d bet their freedom over
their body on a coin toss, let alone only for 100 yen!
“Are you Two-Face or something? Don’t stake your life on the side
of a coin.”
“Two-Face. Quite an admirable villain.”
She spoke like she was a villain herself. What kind of heroine is she?
“Don’t worry about it. I just want to trick you, as an example… You
better use this as reference for your pitiful life.”
“My pitiful life…”
Why do I have to be spoken to like this? Or was this her strategy, to
goad me into taking the bet? Well, no, Senjougahara is always like this,
so it’s not like she’s provoking me here in particular… Maybe because
she’s in a good mood today, she really does think my life is pitiful.
“Trick me, huh?”
That means she’s clearly trying to cheat in this gamble of a coin
toss, right? But how does she expect to trick me in such a simple bet
when the coin isn’t even weighted? Since she’s pretty good with
109
handling stationery, I’d expect Senjougahara to be rather dexterous…
But I doubt she could manipulate the sides of the coin like a magician.
Hm. I’m a little intrigued.
“OK, I’m in.”
“Ha. What a pervert. You exposed your rotten nature.”
“No, wait, what I’m interested in is just how you’re going to
deceive me, OK? I’m not interested in you wanting to become a slave
or anything!”
“The maggots in your brain seem interested.”30
Senjougahara quickly prepared the coin toss. I checked one more
time—drawing up some defenses against her, her having almost
announced that she’s going to pull some trick, probably is something
like good manners in this kind of situation.
“You’re not going to switch out the coin I gave you with another
one, are you?”
“Hmph. I don’t have any 100-yen coins I could exchange it with.
Don’t underestimate my poverty.”
Those were heavy words.
“Let’s decide this so that we don’t argue about it later. The side
with the numbers is the front. Is that alright?”
“Yeah, that’s OK.”
Strictly speaking, there is supposed to be a properly defined front
and back for coins, but I didn’t know which was which. I don’t really
remember which was the front and which was the back of a postcard,
either… If I had to recall it, with both coins and postcards, it was the
exact opposite of what you’d normally think. Well, the probability is
fifty-fifty, so it doesn’t really matter.
30 Both when Araragi speaks about his interest in the gamble and
Senjougahara talks about the “maggots in his brain”, the verb 湧く (waku) is
used, which has the meanings “to rise up, to well up, to appear” among others.
So, while Araragi talks about his arising interest in the subject, Senjougahara
talks about metaphorical maggots emerging from his “rotten mind”.
110
“Well then, let’s start.” said Senjougahara before flipping the coin
with her thumb—the coin which her life (meaninglessly) depended
on, all too easily. I really don’t know what kind of nerves she has—at
least judging from the way she flipped the coin, there was no apparent
scheme or intention behind it.
Senjougahara Hitagi didn’t stop the 100 yen with her hands. She let
the coin fly straight up then drop on the desk. If there was any way to
cheat in a truly innocent coin toss, it would be to manipulate the
position of the coin inside your hand after catching it. But at least
Senjougahara didn’t do that.
The 100-yen coin lost its momentum and dropped flat on the table
after spinning on it for a short time.
In other words, it didn’t come to the unlikely kind of conclusion
that’d be expected in this kind of situation—the coin not falling over,
standing on its rim. But in the end, an unexpected side did show itself.
The side with the picture of cherry blossoms was up.
In short, it was the back side.
“… Wait, what”
I shook my head, even though I was the winner.
What was up with this sloppy, meaningless unfolding of events?
“What were you trying to do, Senjougahara? Didn’t you just lose?”
“What are you talking about? I won, didn’t I?”
Senjougahara said that, confidently, unconcerned, without
changing her expression.
She didn’t at all appear to be intimidated—that wasn’t the face of
someone who had come to be my slave for the rest of her life. Rather,
she acted like a queen.
“Look. Isn’t the front side up? We decided before that if heads
comes up I win, right?”
“What?”
I looked at it again. Was I mistaken? I thought that, being a well-
meaning person, but it was still the same side as before, the side with
the cherry blossoms.
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“What? What? Do you want to turn this into an argument about
whether you did or didn’t say it? ‘I said that the side with the cherry
blossoms was the front’, something like that? You don’t really mean
to say that was your trick, right? I don’t accept that. You did say that
the side with the numbers was the front.”
“That’s right. I said the side with numbers on it is the front—and
that’s why I won, Araragi-kun.”
Then, Senjougahara… brought her index finger close to the 100 yen
on the table, as if beginning some kind of séance.31 But she didn’t touch
it. Her finger stopped just above it. While holding her finger there, she
said:
“Don’t you see them? The numbers, I mean.”
“……………”
Looking again, there really were numbers written there—beneath
the cherry blossom motif. “100 Yen”, written in small letters.
Of course it was not handwritten. Just like “Japan” was written
above the blossoms—it was impressed there.
“On coins, there are numbers on both sides. So if you bet on the
side with the numbers in a coin toss, you’ll always win.” Senjougahara
said, then quickly picked up the 100 yen.
I was dumbfounded. Well, that was a blind spot. To be honest, I
hadn’t really been aware of the fact that there were numbers there.
But thinking about it now—the face value was impressed not only on
the 100-yen coin, but also on the 1, 10, and 500-yen—in large font on
one side, and small font on the other side. Even the 5-yen coin, which
only has the face value impressed on one side, has the year it was
minted impressed on the other side.
31 In Japanese, the term こっくりさん (kokkuri-san) is used here. It’s

something close to table-turning where you put a coin on a sheet of paper with
numbers and answers like “yes” and “no” written on it. Then everyone puts their
index finger on the coin and recites the phrase “Kokkuri-san, Kokkuri-san,
please come here”. After that, the coin is supposed to “move on its own” by some
spiritual influence and show the answer to some question.
112
But…
Can she really say she deceived me with this?
“Isn’t it obvious? It didn’t come to an argument of whether you
said one thing or the other, but it’s clear as day that you tricked!”
“I’m fine with that. That’s what it means to trick, not to deceive.”
After talking about how it was convenient that the cherry blossoms
had come up on the first try—she really didn’t know if she should
consider herself lucky or not—Senjougahara said:
“In the end, my trick when it comes to lying skillfully, Araragi-
kun… is to not care if the lie gets exposed.”
Everyone wants to become a good person.
Everyone wants to be a good person.
Because of that, they patch things up so that the lie doesn’t come
to light. But if you give up on that…
Humans can lie as much as they want.
“The goal of lying is to make yourself feel good, not to deceive
others.
That’s why in order to make yourself feel good, no matter what the
other person feels, no matter how he may think about you, you just
don’t care. If you don’t decide clearly whether you want to be a good
person or you want to feel good, then you end up somewhere in
between. What do you think? Was that helpful?” said Senjougahara,
flipping the coin one more time.
Not up in the air, but at me.
I caught it.
“Well, it helped me, but…”
I looked at the 100-yen coin in my hand, while thinking “Well,
there’s no way I could live like that”—that is, while saying that it
didn’t help me at all, I asked her. Wondering about how she had
learned how to lie this way by 18 and whether she’d been taught by
anybody.
“Are you fine with giving me this back?”
113
“Yes. In front of you, Araragi-kun, I think I feel better when I’m a
good person. With you, Araragi-kun” she said toneless, without any
emotion whatsoever, like always,
“I want to build a relationship without front or back side.”
No.
She may have put emotion into that.
114
NADEKO MIRROR
YOMIURI SHIMBUN
21 September 2013
Constrict, bite, lie. 28 May 2014
That is just what snakes do.
An unrequited love, tenacious like a snake.32
The story will now bear its fangs.
TRANSLATION: TARABLE TRANSLATIONS
Let’s talk about Robert Louis Stevenson’s Jekyll & Hyde. Why yes,
I did read it just to make myself look good, sorry. Whenever a middle
school student like me (I’m Sengoku Nadeko, by the way, hello) reads
a book, especially foreign literature, they’re almost always doing it just
to show off (100% fact). To tell you the truth, this book is one of the
ones I added to my shelf to make myself look smarter back when
Koyomi-oniichan came over to play. Some time after that, I picked it
off the bookshelf while I was cleaning up my room. I’m not used to
reading, so the very manageable page count was probably the biggest
reason I chose this one. But, in any case, reading is an encounter. I
thought it was a very interesting book. It’s a very famous work, so I
already knew some of the details, but it turned out to be a masterpiece
that differed from my expectations in a good way.
32
The word used here is written 失恋 (shitsuren, “unrequited love”), but has
an indicated pronunciation that reads しつこい (shitsukoi, “persistent”).
115
Alrighty then. It’s human nature to want to brag a little after you
read a classic. So after finishing it, the first thing I do is call up my
friend, Tsukihi-chan.
“Jekyll & Hyde? Oh, are you talking about The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll
and Mr. Hyde? Yeah, I read that, too! That really takes me back… I read
it back when I was in elementary school, so I’m a little hazy on the
details, but the premise was pretty interesting. Hmm, so you just
finished reading it, Nadeko-chan?”
… She’s already read it.
When you read something beyond your level, but it turns out the
person you’re bragging to about it has already read it, the blow to your
pride is nothing to shake a stick at. Tsukihi-chan’s perfect
pronunciation of the English title was nothing to shake a stick at,
either.
It feels like the wind has been taken out of my sails, but the fighter
in me won’t let me quit here. If she’s already read it, then that’s that.
There are still things we can discuss about it. So I ask her opinion.
“What did you think about it, Tsukihi-chan? Err, I mean… You
know, about Dr. Henry Jekyll and Mr. Edward Hyde’s relationship. I
guess they were kinda symmetrical, like mirrored reflections of each
other…”
I choose my words carefully. It would be embarrassing to say
something off the mark, after all. Saying something stupid would give
Tsukihi-chan a reason to get all excited. I’m a total beginner when it
comes to reading, so there’s a very good chance that I misread or
misinterpreted something.
“Mr. Hyde, who’s ‘only’ wicked, might seem like a totally different
personality… The complete opposite of Dr. Jekyll, who’s ‘only’ upright,
but they didn’t hate each other at all. If anything, they really needed
each other…”
I sound like I’m reciting a crummy book report, more of a summary
than an analysis, but Tsukihi-chan seems to understand what I’m
getting at.
116
“That’s true. While you couldn’t really call them friends, they
certainly made something of an odd couple. Just like how the north
and south poles of a magnet attract each other, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
were drawn to one another. It’s comparatively easy to see why Mr.
Hyde needed Dr. Jekyll, but looking at it from an outside perspective,
it might be harder to understand why Dr. Jekyll needed Mr. Hyde,” she
says, agreeing with me.
Tsukihi-chan seems to be in a good mood today. I hit the jackpot
(days where I go broke are more common).
“Dr. Jekyll’s friends couldn’t understand why he tried to defend Mr.
Hyde, either. And when he left the lawyer, Gabriel John Utterson, a will
that entrusted everything he had to Mr. Hyde, it went past strange and
straight into suspicious. It was a complete mystery why he would want
to do that.”
Even though she said that she was hazy on the details, she’s able
to touch pretty deeply on the content of the story. That’s Tsukihi-chan
for you. It’s enough to leave me the one feeling overwhelmed, since
I’ve only just finished reading it. But I have to fight on. I have to keep
trying until it’s obvious how hard I’m trying.
“If you think about it that way, Dr. Jekyll might have relied on Mr.
Hyde more than the other way around… I guess it’s hard to follow the
logic that pure good could seek out evil, though.”
But even if it doesn’t make sense logically, I can understand it on
an emotional level. At the very least, in the context of the story, I think
it’s very convincing that Dr. Jekyll would be fascinated by his bad
friend.
Good hates evil, and evil hates good… That’s a very one-sided way
of looking at it. There’s room for the perspective that good can envy
evil, and evil can envy good, too.
“Well, when it comes down to it, people tend to seek out the things
they don’t have within other people. See, for example, you may look
up to me, but it’s not like I don’t have anything at all to learn from you,
either.”
117
Tsukihi-chan went and decided that I look up to her… Well, she
isn’t wrong. As someone who tends towards self-hatred, I really
respect the way Tsukihi-chan loves herself so much.
“I’d never want to be like that myself, but your earnest, one-track
mind can seem almost stunning to me.”
“So you’d never want to be like me…”
The first part is so depressing that it’s hard to hear the compliment.
“But,” Tsukihi-chan speaks, suddenly changing the mood. “To
answer your question of what I thought of their relationship, I’d have
to say that I don’t think it was a very healthy one. Being together with
their polar opposite made them both go bad. It hardly seemed like a
very constructive relationship. It was a destructive bond, in which
neither of them could become happy…”
A destructive bond, in which neither of them could become happy.
A destructive bond that the people around them couldn’t understand.
Still, looking at the world around us, I don’t think that sort of
relationship is so uncommon. You could end the argument by saying
that relationships between people can’t be clearly explained, and that
only the people in question can really understand them, but Dr. Jekyll
and Mr. Hyde had some reason that they didn’t want to put an end to
things between them. From her blunt criticism of the two, Tsukihi-
chan probably had a similar impression after reading it… I think.
“What about you, Nadeko-chan? If a girl who was your complete
opposite suddenly showed up, do you think you could grow to like
her?”
“Huh…? What do you mean?”
“Exactly what I said. If you met your polar opposite—if you met
Anti-Nadeko-chan, do you think you’d get along with her? Do you
think you could see eye-to-eye?”
“Hmmm…”
118
I’m a little taken with the clever nickname of “Anti-Nadeko,”33 but
it’s hard for me to picture a girl with a personality the exact opposite
of mine. A cheerful, lively, sociable girl who reads lots of books, looks
people straight in the eye, and works hard… Maybe? Thinking about it
that way, she sounds totally flawless, and I’m sure I couldn’t help but
like her… Still, no matter how I might feel about her, I bet someone
like that would hate me. She’d hate me, or maybe I’d just make her
mad…
“We might not get along… and we might not see eye-to-eye, but
I’d still like to meet her.”
“Even if she hates you? Even if she gets mad at you?”
“Yeah.”
I want to meet her, and I want to see what she’s like. It feels like,
through meeting her, I’d be able to encounter a brand new “Sengoku
Nadeko.” It’s sort of like the reason you’d look in a mirror—but I’m
sure she’d reflect my image even more vividly than a mirror, so I’d
have to be careful not to turn to stone upon seeing her.
“If she gets mad at me,” I say, while thinking to myself that Anti-
Nadeko-chan would probably hate this about me, too, “then she’ll get
mad, and that’ll be that.”
33
逆撫子 (sakanadeko, “Anti-Nadeko”) is made from the combination of 逆
(gyaku, “reverse”) and 撫子 (nadeko). 逆 is read as saka when next to 撫, and
so the nickname is pronounced similarly to 逆撫で(sakanade, “to rub someone
the wrong way”).
119
SHINOBU SCIENCE
YOMIURI SHIMBUN
26 October 2013
23 April 2014
The demon cries at the stories of the past.34
Long ago there was a place where both
humans and monsters lived.
The legend of a solitary demon.
In the opening of Isaac Asimov’s I, Robot, are his famous Three Laws
of Robotics. The book itself is a collection of short stories, but all of
them involve the relationship between humans and robots who are
ensnared by the Laws. The story that I, Oshino Shinobu, was most
excited about was the sixth story, Little Lost Robot. The sorrow of a
robot enslaved to those inferior to it, and the determination to stand
up to the humans by taking advantage of the small loopholes in the
rules that govern its life was quite thrilling, even to me as a vampire
having lived five hundred years.
“Hmm… Now that you mention it, I remember that you were a big
science fiction fan, Shinobu-oneechan. I guess a monster that just
lives for a long time would be quite fascinated with future
civilizations.”
34
It says 往年の話をすれば鬼が泣く (ounen no hanashi o sureba oni ga
naku), which is a play on the expression 来年のことを言えば鬼が笑う (rainen
no koto o ieba oni ga warau, “the devil laughs at talk of the future”) meaning you
can’t rely on the future.
121
The Doll Girl, shikigami of that violent exorcist, Ononoki Yotsugi,
nodded without a hint of expression or emotion.
“Unfortunately, the only science fiction I’ve read is Diaspora.”
“Don’t lie.”
Are you trying to brag?
Seeing as this little girl is both a doll and a shikigami, she is
essentially a robot, but possibly due to the violent exorcist’s principles,
she doesn’t seem to have the Three Laws installed.
“The Three Laws? You mean cyan, magenta and yellow?”35
“Those are the three primary colors. Also I don’t remember ever
allowing you to call me by that ridiculous name ‘Shinobu-oneechan’.”
“But you still get mad at me when I call you Shinobu-oneechan.”
“Are you asking me not to?”
“Well, the only science fiction I’ve read is Diaspora.”
It seems she’s still quite proud of that.
Her stubbornness is quite the sight however.
“I find myself quite interested in the theme of humans being used
as tools for the convenience of civilization. Don’t you think humans,
not in science fiction or robots, actual humans, fundamentally have a
tendency towards self-destruction along with the advancement of
civilization? Don’t you think that instead of advancing, they’re
degenerating? Instead of getting more refined, they’re simply being
weeded out? I always think ‘All of the products of scientific
advancement we have are supposed to make our lives easier, but we
can never really rein them in.’ ”
“Well, when you lump all humans together, it seems like the people
who ‘create’ those tools of convenience for society and those who ‘use’
them are often different people.”
In fact, with all of the diverse “products of scientific advancement”
there are, you can’t just lump them up all together. That said, I do
35Yotsugi mistakes The Three Laws (三原則, sangensoku) for The Three
Primary colors (三原色, sangenshoku).
122
understand what the Doll Girl was trying to say to some extent. I did
find the world “self-destruction” a bit too strong.
“You thought the word was a bit too strong? Sorry about that. I
wasn’t trying to take a dig at you, Shinobu-oneechan, what with your
familiar rebelling against you and leaving you a pitiful shadow of your
former self.”
“What an earsore.”
I don’t want to hear that from some shikigami no one can even
control. But I wonder, if a tool used by our civilization, like a car, or a
cellphone, or a game console, or a weapon, anything really, were
conscious, would it want to be used by humans?”
Assuming that being controlled by a lesser being would be a
disgrace to it and assuming that accepting this control itself would be
a fundamentally painful experience, would being controlled by a
perfect being, one that would allow it to use its functions to its fullest
capability, one that could open up its vast bank of knowledge, would it
still be reluctant to be controlled by such a being?
“That’s a meaningless pretense assumption. In the real world, if
we were to give machines consciousness we’d be talking about fantasy,
not science fiction, Shinobu-oneechan.”
“Stop being such an earsore again.”
That’s another thing I don’t want a tsukumogami like you telling
me.
Actually, should you really be saying that?
“In the first place,” the Doll Girl continued expressionlessly and
emotionlessly, paying no heed to my critical glare. Is that all there is
to this girl?
“That ‘perfect being’ would be part of fantasy anyway. There’s no
way it could really exist. People’s desire for it to exist has actually left
human society worse off to a greater or lesser extent.”
“Hmm…”
Says the person who’s never even read the books.
123
“Why bother using a big and fancy-sounding phrase like ‘to a
greater or lesser extent’, couldn’t you just say ‘more or less’ ” was
what I was about to say, but I was interested enough to generously
remain silent.
“That sounds rather interesting. Continue.”
“There’s not much for me to ‘continue’ on to. I was just saying
what I thought of off the top of my head. But if you really want me to,
I would say that that ‘perfect being’ would probably be the controlled
rather than the controller, or the used rather than the user. Of course,
if you look at it from the controller’s point of view, there’d be no point
in controlling a useless being.”
“Ka ka, a useless master with a capable slave. I suppose the both of
us know quite well that it’s not always the strong that control the
weak.”
“Right. ‘Survival of the fittest’ is easy to understand, but the
relationship between the strong and weak isn’t always that simple.
You could say that situations like ‘David and Goliath’ aren’t
uncommon in our society.”
The trick to clawing your way to the top of society is to know how
to throw those above you down below you. That’s the way it is and
that’s how it’s always been—the Doll Girl said with an all-knowing
tone.
Are you some vassal planning to overthrow their lord?
And “clawing your way to the top” was quite a strong choice of
words again.
The “Humanity Association” that appears in I, Robot was acting in
anticipation of a robot rebellion I remember, but I suppose I shouldn’t
bring that up with the Doll Girl never having read it before. She’s not
just being controlled by the violent exorcist, and she doesn’t seem to
be conscious of the fact that she’s stuck below the humans… Actually,
does she even have a consciousness in the first place?
124
Although, I find it quite interesting that even without a
consciousness, she seems to be able to think of things. I get the feeling
this has quite a few implications.
“Hmm, I feel like I’m starting to lose track of this conversation that
I was on top of at the beginning.”
“I suppose you know what it’s like now to have been at the top in
the beginning only to fall to the very bottom.”
“Who said I’m at the very bottom now.”
“Now that I think about it, being a controller doesn’t seem like a
stroll in the park anymore, it seems more troublesome than I thought
to rule over those greater than oneself. I almost want to throw it all
away and just fall to the bottom. That’s what you did isn’t it?
“…”
“Let’s go back to our original topic, maybe losing grasp of the reins
on something you created by yourself in the beginning is just part of
nature. Humans developed their civilization in order to do the things
that they couldn’t do themselves. It was just too much for them all
along.”
“Even so, we can’t just go back to living in caves. All we can do is
fall into ruin along with civilization.”
“I hope that civilization is all that’s left.”
She said without a hint of a smile on her face, some sort of joke that
no one would find funny. She probably would have added “I said with
a posed look” a while ago. Although, she was right, in the real world
without the Three Laws, not like the future Asimov envisioned in I,
Robot, humanity and science may not be able to coexist forever.
I started imagining.
I imagined a world where humans had all disappeared, where
everyone had long disappeared, a world fallen into an annihilation
brought on by itself. A world that would fall into ruin even without me.
And indeed, it seemed like a place that would be dominated by the
complex and bizarre tools of civilization rather than wicked spirits and
125
monsters. And so I would simply stare in horror at such a world and
say
“… Not bad.”36
36
One of Shinobu’s catchphrases, ぱないの (panaino), is a contraction of
半端じゃないの (hanpa ja nai no, literally “it’s not half-bad”). According to
Araragi’s suspicions, at some point she lost sight of the original meaning and
started using it as a greeting.
126
CHALLENGE TO
THE READERS
BESSATSU SHONEN MAGAZINE
9 October 2013
ART: SHAFT
TRANSLATION: MAXDEFOLSCH
Hai hai, hello to all readers of this Shonen Magazine

supplement. Oshino Ougi here. “Arslan Senki” is interesting,
isn’t it! I enjoyed reading both the first and the second
episode very much. I really like feeling excited when I read
manga. It was so much fun, I thought about reading the
original work on occasion. The feeling that reading is
chained like this is really fun. I could keep reading books
forever. It’s a perpetual reading mechanism. Anyway, what
kind of developments is awaiting in the third episode
published this month? I want to get out of the classroom soon
and return to reading.
So, this is the “challenge to the readers”. Please stop
reading the novel here, and deduce the truth of the case that
Araragi-senpai encountered in first year. As I declared in
the work, everything needed to identify the true culprit has
been given. To say it in the style of old game books: “Please,
solve the mystery to free us of this locked room!”. Well, even
127
if I say it this way, most people don’t know about old game
books. Actually, I don’t know either. I don’t know anything.
By the way, the one who invented this “challenge to the
readers” is a great mystery writer called Ellery Queen. If you
put this sentence before the solution, the reader is forced to
narrow down the answer to one, and after reading, he goes “Ah,
I knew the criminal from the beginning”. Mystery writers
seem to be able to masterfully avoid those who boast about
finding a certain part of the novel suspicious. Well, when I
read a mystery novel I basically find everyone suspicious, so
when someone isn’t, it’s definitely the criminal. In the end
it’s just guessing, isn’t it. When I heard that story, I thought
that the experts who leave their name in history were too
smart.
Experts aside, as far as realistic things are concerned,
it’s impossible to eliminate the possibility of a
coincidence, or an outsider. Also, since this case happened
in a world with oddities, I can’t rule out that it’s “the act of
a ghost” that transcends the laws of physics, but well, saying
it in mathematical terms, that’s probability theory. Let’s go
with what is possible, or has the highest probability—when
you can’t remove all the options that are logically
impossible, the truth is the one that’s logically most likely.
Please identify who created the incomprehensible situation
faced by class 1-3, whether it’s someone who attended the
study group organized by Oikura-senpai, or someone who
didn’t attend the study group with a different approach.
For the sake of clarity, I inserted a list of characters on
the next page, with a simplified profile attached. This is
common in foreign mystery novels—it’s not in order of
appearance but in alphabetical order, but well, please
consider that the culprit is someone in this list. You could
say it’s a multiple-choice question. Although I don’t know if
a question with so many options can be considered a
multiple-choice question, if you can guess, you can feel
something unnatural even from this table alone.
128
I must claim here that I, Oshino Ougi, am not the culprit
(of course, it’s alright not to suspect Kanbaru-senpai as
well). Please keep in mind the possibility of the narrator
Araragi-senpai or the poor Oikura-senpai being the
perpetrator. If Araragi-senpai was the culprit, I would
throw my own character away and burst into laughter. That’s
hilarious—wait, is this Episode-san’s character?
One hint.
As I pointed out, Araragi-senpai hides some information
when retelling the story of his past. However, he is not lying.
In front of me, even if you have secrets, you can’t lie—
basically. This time, it’s within the basics.
By the way, this story is one of the arcs included in
“Owarimonogatari”, scheduled to be released in October, but
this “challenge to the readers” will not be included in that
case. This is Ougi-chan service limited to this Shonen
Magazine supplement. The character table will also be cut, so
everyone, you were lucky!
The time limit is, let’s see, only five minutes—is what I’d
like to say, but I feel sorry for taking five minutes of
everyone’s precious time, so let’s say two minutes. It’s two
minutes from 5:58 where the clock’s hands stopped, until the
school bell rings. If you can’t answer within two minutes,
please pick someone from the suspect list on the next page,
depending on your intuition (needless to say, you don’t have
to think about any accomplice). Of course, you can follow your
intuition and get the right answer. Even mathematics, like
other subjects, is an academic field that can’t be established
without intuition. But please don’t just decide by majority
vote. For the sake of this foolish Araragi-senpai.
Well then, I wish you scrutiny and good luck.
Oshino Ougi
P.S.
Hint 2.
Common multiple.
129
Study
Name Club Notes
group
Keiri Ashine Yes “Handsome Man”.
Class president.
Koyomi Araragi No The only full mark.
Biwa Arikure No Ill-tempered.
Michisada Igami Yes 68 points.

Worst score among the
Kyuusu Ukitobi No girls.
Chairwoman.
Sodachi Oikura Yes Study group
organizer.
Enji Kikigoe Yes Mischievous.
Hoka Kijikiri Yes Absent-minded.

Library committee
Aizu Kube Yes (nickname).
Nageki Gekizaka Yes Secretary in charge.
Volleyball Enthusiastic
about
Sousho Koudou Yes
club activities.
Goes to cram school.
Okitada Kouma No 97 points without the
study group.
Ayazute
Shinaniwa No Track Elitist.
Tsuuma Shuui Yes Vice-president.
Juudo Shuzawa Yes Always wants to teach

you.
Kokuchi Shuuchi Yes Reserved.
Ruise Sunahama No Day duty the next day.

Weak constitution.
Hitagi No 98 points without the
Senjougahara study group.
Kiichigo Daino Yes Eloquent.
130
Study
Name Club Notes
group
Komichi Tetsujou No Softball Mediator.
Jiku Toune No “Icing”.
Suisen Toishima No Laughs easily.
Chouka Nagagutsu Yes Frivolous.
Roka Haga Yes Track Gamer.

92 points without the
Seiko Hayamachi No
study group.
Sekirou Higuma Yes Former student
council president.
Jouro Hishigata Yes Softball Quarrelsome.
Shimono Fukadou No Acts cute.
Tenko Fukuishi No Shy.
Shijima Fudou Yes Swimming Liar?

Sakaatsu No Volleyball Short.
Funuyami
Kabe Madomura Yes Light music Bed hair.
Hyoui Marizumi No Distrustful.
Meibi Mizaki No Art Artist spirit.

Kansai accent.
Miawa Mebe No 95 points without the
study group.
Aggressive attitude.
Shokunori Yuba No Baseball Submitted a blank
sheet.
Shoukei Yoki Yes Old-fashioned.
Shitsue Waritori No Practices kendo.
The name of the culprit is...
131
HITAGI FIGURE
BAKEMONOGATARI PREMIUM ITEM BOX
21 November 2013
TRANSLATION: KAVITHA
I feel that this is a situation which for those who have come here
through the anime is quite obvious, while those who have come here
only through the figure will feel that nothing makes sense. It was soon
after my weird coexistence with the violent specialist, Kagenui
Yozuru’s shikigami, Ononoki Yotsugi had begun; Senjougahara Hitagi
came to visit the Araragi residence.
As to why she came, more than saying that it was to see how my
preparations for my university entrance exams were going, it would
be more accurate to say that she came to ask “Araragi-kun, you are
not slacking off on your studies, are you?”
But, actually, she did not ask me that question. Because she was
struck speechless on seeing the plush doll that was in my room.
For someone like Senjougahara who is quite used to using sharp
words, a situation where she couldn’t put two words together has to
be quite something. Still, she is not someone who would become
133
speechless at something on the level of seeing a plush doll in the room
of a male high school student.
The reason Senjougahara became speechless was that the plush
was actually Ononoki Yotsugi.
“Of course, irrespective of what a plush’s true form is, if I had come
across a life-sized doll of a girl in my boyfriend’s room, I would be
speechless too…”
I want to believe that when she looked back for a second, she was
not thinking that she should go back.
“What is this? What is this about? As your girlfriend, I want an
explanation.”
“Ahhhh well, so many things happened… And even if I try to
explain it, it will be too difficult and inconvenient…”
More than an inconvenience, it will be a spoiler.
Though I did swear that I wouldn’t keep secrets about the
supernatural from Senjougahara, it’s not like I wanted to keep it a
secret. It was just that it would be very difficult to explain it.
In the end, how do I logically explain the fact that a former
opponent of mine with whom I fought to the death is now in my house
as a plush doll?
“…… Well, it doesn’t matter as long as it doesn’t hinder Araragi-
kun’s exam preparations. Still… Hasn’t your house become like a
haunted house?”
“A haunted house…?”
That’s quite a harsh way of saying it.
Still, when I’m myself something of an oddity, it is quite possible
that the place I live in is like a haunted house, I suppose. As Ononoki
was behaving perfectly like a doll in front of people, there was no
reaction even when she was poked, had her hair stroked or kissed on
the cheek by Senjougahara.
Actually, she really is a doll—
“You! What are you doing? It’s my plush. Isn’t it weird for you to
be kissing it on the cheek?”
134
“It is making me curious. Also you may have forgotten, Araragi-
kun, but I love cute girls.”
“Isn’t that Kanbaru’s setting…?”
Now the situation of the Valhalla Combination where supposedly
Kanbaru included Senjougahara by herself has become quite
suspicious.
“Can I take this home with me?”
“No. Obviously you cannot take it home with you.”
“Why not?”
“Why is that in katakana now?”
“I can’t take it, no matter what?”
“Like I said, what is the use of saying it in katakana?”37
Ononoki-chan did not even react to our conversation.
The way she was pretending to be an inanimate thing was so good,
that even I, who was watching her move and talk till the moment
Senjougahara rang the intercom, almost believed that she was a real
doll—yeah, of course Ononoki-chan is a real doll and is really not
alive.
Still, when I think about the fact that she is actually made from a
human dead body, I cannot believe how horrifying a thing is there in
my room.
And Senjougahara, who is now stroking such a doll, is also like a
witch.
“Hmm, so I can’t take her home no matter what, right? I did expect
Araragi-kun’s ‘no’, though”
I thought “Don’t think of it as ‘Araragi-kun’s ‘no’; instead think
of it as being for Araragi-kun’s sake.”
“So, how do you have to think of me for the topic to become
whether you can take Ononoki-chan home?”
37 The “not” and “no matter what” are in katakana, which is used for
emphasis.
135
“Well, if you are being stared at by such a cute plush, while you are
studying for your entrance exams, won’t it be distracting? Wouldn’t it
become difficult to concentrate?”
“Difficult to…?
What are you? My wife?
Still, it was a sharp observation.
Strictly speaking, Ononoki-chan belongs to my younger sister,
Tsukihi. So it’s not like she’ll always be in my room. Still, it’s not a
very good feeling to study with someone watching you and without
being distracted by the cuteness.
“Fufu, it is alright, Araragi-kun. I thought something like this
might happen. So there is something that I brought for such a
situation.”
“If you say that you expected something like this to happen, it’s
not in-line with how you were speechless in the beginning, is it?”
“My brilliant idea to divide Araragi-kun’s light and dark parts… Do
you want to hear it?”
“I don’t want to hear it, but…”
It cannot be avoided.
“In order to cancel out the effect of a cute figure, all you have to do
is use a cuter figure. JAAANNNNN!!!”
With that sound effect, Senjougahara pulled “that” out of her bag.
“A product of Good Smile Company, ‘Nendoroid Senjougahara
Hitagi’. If you have this on your desk, no matter what distractions are
around you, you will not get any thoughts of slacking off.”
Look at her, doing such things as if she were a really honest type of
girl…!
Brilliant idea or not, it just feels like the number of eyes looking at
me has just doubled. In the end, I was the one who became speechless.
“The Hitagi Figure to watch over your home from morning till
night. Note: the hair will not grow.”
“Though it can be changed with another style.”
136
“In order to keep you company during your exam time, how about
two per household?”
“Stop trying to make them buy one more.”
137
HITAGI SALAMANDER
YOMIURI SHIMBUN
23 November 2013
28 May 2014
Wicked ways vs. wicked tongue.38
Our love story, love-hate edition.
Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 is a book about a world in which

publication regulations, oppression of the freedom of speech and
censorship are strengthened whenever those issues cause discord in
society; a book about book burning, but you could also read it from a
completely different point of view and see that it’s an outstanding
piece of entertainment written with a playful mood, and yet it still
makes a sly bastard like me enjoy it. Surprisingly, it may be more
interesting to read this book without any preconceived notions. To
start with, the protagonist, Guy Montag, is one of the people who burn
the books. He’s a book burner who dresses like a firefighter, douses
books with kerosene and burns them to ashes. Almost sounds like a
rock star, doesn’t he. Well, eventually, he meets a 17-year-old girl
named Clarisse and slowly begins to change. You could even take it as
38
Literally “poison fang” (毒牙, dokuga), meaning sinister ways, vs. “poison
tongue” (毒舌, dokuzetsu), meaning harsh.
139
a very well written “boy meets girl” story, although Montag isn’t
exactly a boy at his age.
“I’ve read Fahrenheit 451 before, if that’s what you wanted to talk
about,” Senjougahara said in a cold voice; she has an attitude like she
doesn’t even want to chat with me. Though in the case of an
indiscriminate reader like Senjougahara, she may not like that I talked
about a masterpiece in that way. Sort of like how a mystery fan would
hate for Sherlock Holmes to be talked about like it’s a character-driven
story and not a piece of detective fiction. But how I read a book is my
choice. All the different ways of reading a book are equal, and there are
no better or worse ways. If you set out to limit that, it’s probably no
different than suppressing the freedom of speech.
I knew Senjougahara would feel uncomfortable if I brought that up,
so I pointed it out right away, and once I did she seemed even more
displeased than before… Naturally.
“Don’t play games with me, that wasn’t what I was thinking at all.
My memory is just a bit fuzzy since I’ve read it four times, and my
impression of it was different each time. Since the first time was when
I was in second grade, I read ‘Fahrenheit’ as ‘Farrah N. Heit’ and
thought, ‘who’s that?’”39
“How can you expect me not to make fun of you after hearing that?
If I can’t make fun of you, who am I going to make fun of?”
As soon as the words left my mouth, I thought “crap”. I should
have just ignored her little anecdote and continued the conversation.
The moment I accidentally replied like that, I was caught up in her
clever rhetoric—I was careless. My arbitrarily criticizing her slip-up
has changed this from a simple exchange into a rally. This
melodramatic girl has a sense for turning the person she’s talking to
into her audience by making a fool of herself. It’s an unsuitable style
of deception for me, personally.
In the original text, Senjougahara misreads 華氏 (kashi, “Fahrenheit”) as

39
はな氏 (hana-shi, “Mr. Hana”).
140
“The second time was around the end of elementary school. I
thought ‘Isn’t 451 degrees the temperature paper burns at? Wouldn’t
a person burn before it even got that hot?’ ”
“You were a twisted little brat, weren’t you.”
“I can’t help it, I was inhospitable for a while.”
“Inhospitable?”
“My tongue slipped. I meant that I was in the hospital for a
while.”40
“…”
Senjougahara continued, ignoring my silence, “The third time…
was when I was in middle school; I read it for my summer homework.
I wrote quite the exemplary book report on it. I even singed the edges
of the paper a bit for some added effect. The teacher got quite mad at
me though.”
“That’s what I’d call a good teacher. What about the fourth time?”
“The fourth time was when I was in the first year of high—”
Senjougahara began and, as if suddenly remembering something
unpleasant, she bit down on her lower lip, forcibly stopping herself
from speaking. She bit it so hard she might even have bit her tongue.
I wonder, what could it be that she would go so far to stop herself from
saying?
Well, it may not have anything to do with her impressions or the
contents of the book. She probably just doesn’t want to tell me about
the time that she read it, that is to say, she doesn’t want to talk about
when she was a first-year in high school. It’s almost certainly because
back then was when I met this girl, although that could hardly be
called “boy meets girl”.
“… Anyway, I read it four times, but I never got the impression that
it was the kind of story you were saying it is. I guess you could say that
40
In the original text, Senjougahara says she was in the sodium oxide (酸化
ナトリウム, sanka natoriumu) instead of the sanatorium (サナトリウム,
sanatoriumu).
141
the fact that the interpretation of a novel depends on the reader is what
makes them one of the best ways to tell a story.”
“I’m just shocked that there’s someone out there who’d read the
same book four times.”
“I wonder how book burning is going to happen once digital books
have become more widespread. I don’t think most electronics would
burn at 451 degrees.”
“It’d still be hot enough to destroy them.”
More importantly, if you want to erase digital data there are more
efficient ways of doing it than burning the device it’s on.
“I see,” said Senjougahara. “No matter what it was like in the 1950s
when Fahrenheit 451 was published, with all the other different types
of media there are these days, it may not even be worth it to cover
books in kerosene and burn them now.”
“Are you saying that humanity’s two greatest inventions, fire and
paper, are already out of date? I wonder about that, I don’t really feel
like that’s the case.”
They say that people aren’t interested in literature anymore.
Apparently, the number of people who read books is dwindling.
Apparently, you barely even find people reading books on the train
anymore. Is that really the case? From my personal experience, you’d
rarely ever get on a train and not see at least one person reading a
book.
“Well, even if it’s not exactly ‘boy meets girl’, our book burner,
Montag, does eventually start having different thoughts and ideas
once he meets Clarisse. What do you think about that?”
“Hmm?”
Considering she seems to want to end this conversation with me
quickly, Senjougahara brought up a question likely to expand the
topic—even though it would be fine if I lied, I decided to answer
honestly.
142
“I was very moved, of course. He’s a book burner who has a change
of heart when he learns the beauty of books and is influenced by them;
I couldn’t help but think of myself.”
“…”
Senjougahara fell silent for a while, then sighed disappointedly and
said “Actually…”
“I, of all people, almost foolishly thought, ‘even a person like you
sometimes has a change of heart someday, right?’ ”
“Didn’t you do that, have a change of heart?”
“Yes, but that was…”
“Not a change of heart, but falling in love,” she murmured, and for
the first time today, she smiled.
I wanted to say that there must have been something more behind
her words, but just this once, they didn’t seem to be part of some
carefully-planned statement, so I decided to just ignore it.
I didn’t really feel like touching upon the topic.
I’d probably get burned if I brought it up; she’s fairly hot-blooded.
The lesson I should take away from this is, even though there’s that
old saying that “you can count yourself among the friends of the wise
men of old by reading books”, you can only call yourself someone’s
lover by living in the present with them.
143
HITAGI THROWING
HEROINE BOOK 5: SENJOUGAHARA HITAGI
1 April 2014
As someone who has known Senjougahara Hitagi for many years and
who continues to believe in her, saying something like this feels like a
special kind of betrayal; but, when I first met her during the first year
of middle school, the impression I had of her was not a good one.
Or rather, sorry for saying it as it is.
I thought, what is this person?
If I can say it a bit more informally, I thought that “a very
dangerous person has come”—just bear with me a little, this is all
from very long ago, and back then I had just graduated elementary
school and I was just a 12-year-old whose interior and exterior
appearance, intelligence and character were all very suitable to be
called a brat.
But if you say that Senjougahara-senpai had no responsibility in
what happened, I would like to assert that it was not so—I want to
emphasize that.
145
To begin with, when the ace of the track and field club marched,
like a raid, into the gymnasium where the basketball club was training,
every member of the basketball club seemed to flinch. Along with her
followers (not only second- and third-year students, but also some
first-year students were mixed in), they were looking like a daimyo41
procession. That's why it stands to reason that Senjougahara had some
responsibility.
It is as though when I was about to slam dunk, Michi appeared.42
Though she was smiling kindly and had a gentle demeanor, it was
actually more frightening that way—and the vigor of the followers was
as usual.
“You are Kanbaru-san? I heard the rumor that you are very fast on
your feet—if I’m not being a hindrance, would you please allow me to
observe and study you?”
What is she, a lady?
Though I wanted to retort back like that, in those days
Senjougahara-senpai was really someone like a rich, young lady—she
had a behavior that was as though she had just stepped out of a novel
for young ladies.
I shivered on realizing that such a person actually existed.
I want to make it clear that at this time, the “shivering” was not a
very good feeling—when I think back on it now, it felt like her way of
speech and conduct was driving me away.
I understood that what she required from me was something
different.
And that this person was different.
And so this was in fact my first impression of her—of course,
Senjougahara-senpai was a famous person, and so, I had been hearing
41
A daimyo (大名) is an old Japanese title for powerful feudal lords.
42
Michi (ミッチー) is the nickname of Michiko Shouda, the wife of Akihito,
the Emperor of Japan. Her popularity was so high that it led to a movement
called the michi-boom, where every Japanese young girl wanted to look like her.
146
about her since the entrance ceremony and even before joining the
basketball club.
Along with Hanekawa Tsubasa, the two of them were the star
players—if you wanted to continue in this middle school, I was told
(by my teachers during the entrance ceremony) that you cannot afford
to go against these two (I was wondering what sorts of people those
two were; but it looks like the things I was told were not wrong).
But, as you can see, for various reasons, I was a 12-year-old with
an extraordinary obsession with the speed of my legs and speed of
running—and for “various reasons” I couldn’t become a member of
the track and field club. When I went to the ground in April, it wasn’t
for a trial period in a club, but I had become interested in the ace of
track and field club, Senjougahara Hitagi-senpai, and wanted to see
her run.
Can a person run so beautifully like this?
It took my breath away.
I haven’t received any special guidance in my running—and even
now I haven’t received any professional training in sprinting; so my
running style is mostly self-taught.
But one can say that self-learning is also a style in itself; and so I
don’t have any complex on that point. Still, compared to my reckless
style of running, Senjougahara-senpai’s running style was completely
opposite and very beautiful.
It was the perfect form of a person running.
Truly, I became interested.
Still, I felt that I couldn’t imitate that style—this person is not the
same as me, and I’m also different from her.
I thought that the track and field club’s uniform was a bit erotic,
but this time it became irrelevant.
Though I never had any plans to join the track and field club—I
think that on seeing that perfect running style, I gave up completely.
I was set free.
147
It could also be said that the reason I existed as a basketball player
afterwards is because of Senjougahara-senpai’s running style—of
course nowadays I’m so enthusiastic about basketball that I had
almost forgotten about that impulse that brought me here; but I will
talk about “we don’t really know what will become the crossroads in
our lives” at some other time.
If I have to say, as far as my life goes, whether it was that
surprisingly I was in the public gaze, or that the contact had been
initiated by Senjougahara-senpai who actively tries to avoid getting
involved with others; just that fact was enough to leave me
dumbstruck. But training while being observed by the aristocratic
Senjougahara-senpai (and party) was not easy.
“Is it OK? Kanbaru-san?”
In that way, I was called out by Senjougahara-senpai—just hearing
those words “is it OK” made me feel absolutely not OK, but even
leaving that, it still shocked me.
When I looked closer, I could see that she was a senior with features
that made me feel like she was one step higher than me,
“Like the rumors said, you are really fast, aren’t you—how about
it? Won’t you join the track and field club now? And spend your youth
with me and grow?”
…… An excellent and magnificent scouting.
By the way, at that place, though the captain of the basketball club
(a third-year student) was there, she was behaving as though
Senjougahara-senpai’s (a second-year student) recruitment activity
was of no concern to her and didn’t say anything.
What are you doing checking the balls now?
No matter how many times you look, it’s not like any holes are
going to appear, is it?
Though there was my disappointment towards my captain, setting
that aside, there was also a little happiness—no matter what the
circumstances, and no matter the tone of the words, “my speed”
148
which was something that I was proud of was being praised and
recognized, and this made me feel pleasantly surprised.
Such simplicity hasn’t changed even now.
It is a foolish trait of mine.
Still, I was not an idiot who would yield to such a scouting without
thinking. I was an idiot who thinks.
While taking care not to destroy senpai’s reputation, taking care to
be very prudent, I politely refused her.
“Please come back again sometime.”
Uh?
What is this memory?
Who is this cheeky brat? It is me.
I wonder if it was the age to go against authority or whether it was
because I was afraid that if I did not refuse her so stubbornly I would
be swayed by her—anyway, the phrasing may have been a little
different (I want to believe it was), in this manner, I turned down
Senjougahara-senpai’s invitation completely.
“Oh my. It is very good that you are so energetic. I’m becoming
more and more charmed.”
Although Senjougahara-senpai large-heartedly accepted what I
said (when I think back on it now, wondering “who was that” was not
the complete thing), the eyes of the followers who were standing
behind Senjougahara-senpai were giving me piercing looks.
This is bad, I’m dead.
As you would expect I thought so, but stopping the followers who
were starting forward with both her hands and without even looking
back at them, Senjougahara-senpai said, “It is alright. Taming such
cute girls is incredibly enjoyable to me.”
Who are you talking about?
The images in my head are too strong and the Senjougahara-senpai
that I remember might be a little different from the actual second-
year middle school student, Senjougahara-senpai; but generally, there
149
is no mistake in my memories of the first contact with her which was
like a stress-interview.
Saying, “Well, take care” Senjougahara-senpai left.
Leaving the way of speaking, she did not even concern herself with
my rude response; surely she must have been hurt a little; still, I
thought it was OK this way.
At least, this way is better than making her wait for my reply—of
course as I have so bluntly turned down the invitation from the
school’s most popular person, I will probably encounter obstacles in
my middle school life; still, even if I tried to falsely agree with her, I
possibly couldn’t pull it off well.
If you are coming, come; I will take you up—or something like that.
When I thought that, it really came.
But when I went back to the gymnasium on Sunday, it was not the
followers-army, who wanted to punish me for not knowing my place
and being rude, who was there; it was Senjougahara Hitagi. And that
too, this time she was alone.
“Everyone, the weather is good today, isn’t it? It is OK if I observe
you today too?”
The seniors of the basketball club became flustered—it felt like it
was a different sort of commotion from yesterday; when I asked them
later, it seemed it was a very rare thing to happen.
Instead of saying that she likes attention, it is more correct to say
that she had a personality that draws people to her wherever she is—
like the fact that Senjougahara-senpai came here alone means that she
purposefully sent everyone away before coming to the gymnasium.
Why?
There must be some reason for accepting my reckless remark of
“come back again” and really coming back again and that to choosing
a place away from her “home ground”…
Smiling and accepting the chair prepared by the members of the
basketball club, Senjougahara-senpai watched over our, or more
150
precisely my practice; but I couldn’t guess anything about what she
was thinking.
After all, I had joined the basketball club on the strength of my legs
and I was used to having spectators; still, when watched so bluntly it
is somewhat difficult.
On that day there were too many missed shots and many misses in
the dribbles—the only thing I managed to exhibit without mistakes
was my legs.
But I suppose that was what she wanted to see, so Senjougahara-
senpai must have been satisfied.
“Hey, Kanbaru-san, have you changed your mind about what I
asked you yesterday?”
“No, not at all…”
Without even thinking, I answered.
Of course, it is difficult to be rude to someone who has come to see
me for two days in a row.
“Hmm. Why don’t we do this? Let us have a 100-meter race. If I
win, you are to transfer to the track and field club. Isn’t this a
wonderful idea?”
“Eh?”
She tilted her head.
Don’t be saying “eh”.
It’s not like you don’t understand what she means, right?
“I will not be doing that.”
I turned her down clearly.
“But doing that will stop me from coming to the gymnasium daily
without a break.”
“You are planning to come every day…”
I said no.
I took care not to be rude like yesterday, but still I conveyed it to
her.
“Oh.”
Senjougahara-senpai covered her mouth as if she was surprised.
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“That is strange, was it my miscalculation?”
“What is?”
“I expected that people like you, once challenged, cannot stop till
they see it through to the end.”
“……”
That expectation—was correct.
But, leaving that be, I cannot compete in a race with anyone.
Of course, if I rise to her provocation here, accept the challenge and
win, it may all come to an end here; but the damage that would be
caused if I lose cannot even be imagined.
No, it is not sure that Senjougahara-senpai will back down if I
win—so it is disadvantageous to take such a risk.
“OK.”
She said that she understood.
Leaving me dumbstruck, Senjougahara-senpai left first—before
going she put away the snacks she was eating and the chair that she
was sitting on, thus not betraying the way she was brought up.
If she has really understood I’m also good with that, but what
exactly Senjougahara-senpai has understood is a complete mystery.
And that mystery was solved the next day.
Senjougahara Hitagi who came to the gymnasium for the third time
was not wearing her uniform like she was till yesterday—it was not
the erotic and stylish uniform of the track and field club either; so if
you ask what she was wearing, she was wearing the uniform of our
basketball club.
The number on the back was 4.
The number was written on the front too, so it is not correct to call
it “back number” (athlete’s number?), anyway, it was our captain’s
number.
When I looked back, for some reason our captain was in her gym
clothes—in her gym clothes, she was polishing the balls as if none of
this concerned her.
That is the ball that I just polished.
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How shiny do you want to make it?
If you polish it any longer, it will become smooth.
It seems, on being requested by her junior, she has lent the
uniform, which could be called as the symbol of our team.
You can say that all the authority that she had held has in this
moment disappeared completely.
Once this matter is resolved, it will be a coup d’état.
“If you say you won’t compete with me on the track, let’s compete
in your field, basketball? Is that OK?”
“Ha, haa…”
At this point it was more of hesitation, and when someone calls me
to participate in a competition, as a first-year student, I really do not
have much of a choice.
Just for the sake of it, getting permission from the captain (the sad
reality is the “just for the sake of it” being attached to “captain”),
taking half of the court, it was decided that Senjougahara-senpai and
I would have our basketball showdown.
Showdown.
Dueling.
Still, if you ask whether it was a dramatic battle like the ones the
words “showdown” and “duel” call to mind, it was not so—of course
it was not too quick, and there was a lot of tension; but when the main
event is a free throw contest the tension does go down a little.
We received the warning that physical contact would not be allowed
from the “just for the sake of it” captain, er, “captain”—I was only
the newest member of the club, and though Senjougahara-senpai was
not specialized in basketball, there is a small chance of something
happening—for those reasons, I did not object to that restriction.
The one who got 10 points first wins.
A contest with no handicaps—as it was a simple contest of deciding
the order and then shooting one after the other, it was not going to be
an intense contest; starting it properly, shooting in order and it will be
over in thirty minutes.
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10 to 9.
In such a close contest, it was Senjougahara-senpai’s victory.
While both of us did miss targets, and the score went back and
forth, the first one to reach the 10 points was Senjougahara-senpai.
“It was a good match.”, said Senjougahara-senpai, while elegantly
flipping her long hair.
“Kanbaru-san, it seems that basketball suits you more than track
and field—from now on too, continue in this same way.”
She continued—and with that she turned on her feet and left the
gymnasium.
I was thinking, now that I have lost I have no choice but to join the
track and field club; I should shift to something other than running
(like high jump or long jump); even while deciding make-shift
solutions like that I had prepared myself. So when Senjougahara-
senpai withdrew so suddenly, it left me stunned for an instant.
But, it was just for an instant.
I immediately chased after Senjougahara-senpai—I ran after her
at my maximum speed and soon caught up to her as she walked away
elegantly and grabbed her wrist.
The way I grabbed her wrist was maybe too violent or wild, and
though Senjougahara-senpai looked back at me puzzled it was very
like me.
Has she gone back to her usual self? It was a straight strong gaze.
While accepting that gaze, I…
I asked, “Is this what you had in mind from the start?”
I—my tone becoming like I was cross-questioning her is also very
like “me”.
“Was it all a game to compete with me and win and then let me off
the hook?”
“… What are you talking about? Why do I have to be doing
something like that?”
Senjougahara-senpai answered so without trying to avoid
anything. To her, I…
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“In order to protect me.”
I said.
It was a simple plot—it was not a mistake to think that
Senjougahara approached me, who was making a name for myself in
the basketball club, for scouting.
Senjougahara-senpai must surely have been previously prepared
for the scout not being a certain success.
And if that happens, though Senjougahara-senpai would mediate
it somehow; well, it would not have been a case of bad news spreading
like wildfire, but rumor that that the a first-year student who had just
entered the school had gone against the famous Senjougahara Hitagi
would surely spread—and if that happens, my school-life would
certainly become dark.
If that happens, when that happens, it was my way of thinking,
but—it was my foolish idea.
But Senjougahara-senpai prevented such a situation, before it
happened.
Though she might have been able to control her followers who
could be considered her close associates, she would not be able to make
everyone understand—though people are good, each and every one is
also full of ill-will.
That’s why, it was necessary for Senjougahara-senpai herself to
take the initiative and settle things with me—with her winning, the
matter ended.
No, just winning would not have been enough, it had to be a close
contest with the new member on whom the basketball team had high
hopes and to stand in front of me after.
On top of that, it was a free-throw contest.
… If I think back, the captain, who usually listened to what
Senjougahara-senpai, deciding the rules of the match at that time
strongly was strange… For example, an exhibition-like match of
shooting in order, keeping score, a free-throw contest that can be
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controlled, all of this could have been informally conveyed while
borrowing the uniform (I’ve changed my views).
If I had accepted the challenge on the second day—of course, for
Senjougahara-senpai this was the best plan—at that time by adjusting
her running speed, she would have created a close contest.
Someone who can say “I will make it a close contest and win”
whether it be a race or a free-throw contest must be someone with
great self-confidence—of course as long as you win, nothing can be
said against it.
By challenging me clearly and by clearly recognizing me in front of
everyone, it was like me being awarded the license to go on continuing
in the basketball club by Senjougahara-senpai. And so, her fans who
wish me ill will not appear.
“… Just for example, even if I was thinking about something like
that.”
Senjougahara-senpai said in a serious voice—very suddenly the
mood was different from just before, it was a flat voice.
“If you said that to me, don’t you think everything would be
ruined? Don’t you think you would reverse my consideration for you,
now?”
One shouldn’t recognize the casual considerations shown,
Senjougahara-senpai was admonishing me saying that—and I let go
of her wrist gently.
And then I took her hand again before the wrist.
This time, gently.
Following the example of Senjougahara-senpai’s behavior, softly,
gently—Senjougahara-senpai probably must have been expecting a
handshake to become friends again, but doing something completely
surprising, I kissed the back of her hand.
“Ha…… Haaa!?”
Senjougahara-senpai said in a surprised voice, it was almost a
scream. Facing her I declared,
“I don’t think so.”
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“Because, I have decided that I am going to accept your
consideration towards me more than it is necessary, Senjougahara-
senpai.”
From now on, I am your dog.
I said so.
Senjougahara Hitagi and Kanbaru Suruga.
For the two people who would later on be referred to as “The
Valhalla Combination”, this was the starting point—
“Are you an idiot?”
Even now, I think that, the acceptance that came like that with a
scornful laugh from Senjougahara Hitagi probably came from her
impartiality.
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SURUGA PALACE
23 April 2014
An uncanny relationship formed by a quirk of fate43

Pray for a good match.
Read The Red House Mystery by A. A. Milne, Kanbaru Suruga. When it

comes to Milne, he is, without it needing to be said, most famous for
being the children’s author who wrote Winnie the Pooh, but apparently
the only full-length mystery he ever wrote was this book, The Red
House Mystery. So that’s why I read it. What? The guy who wrote Winnie
the Pooh wrote a mystery novel? I want to read it! I want to read it!—
that was pretty much my train of thought. There are probably people
who would say that I’m not a real appreciator of literature if they saw
me like that, but I don’t particularly like having my eating habits, let
alone my reading habits criticized by other people.
“I’m sure they’re right though, I’m pretty indiscriminate in my
choice of books. Kanbaru, what mood you configure your bookshelves
43
This expression is usually written 合縁奇縁 (aien kien). Here, the kanjis 縁
have been replaced with 猿 (“monkey”) which is usually pronounced さる (saru)
but in this case has an indicated alternate reading of えん (en) to make the
expression work.
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to is what one may call your prerogative, but a selection from such an
eccentric direction is not something I can very well approve of. The Red
House Mystery?”
“No, I haven’t read it yet.”—said Senjougahara-senpai as she
appeared to trace back her memories. She is a person who can look like
a god no matter what pose she takes—I’m jealous.
“But, well, I think I just might have heard the plot somewhere. Ah,
oh no! If I recall any more, I might remember the main plot twist.”
It seems that somewhere along the way she had heard the plot of
the story up to a crucial point. I suppose that’s just the fate of old
classics. Let’s say it’s hard to avoid spoilers in this day and age.
“On the other hand, I have no idea about the plot of Winnie the Pooh.
Let me see… Was it something like Pooh is actually a doll?”
“That was the premise from the beginning, Senjougahara-senpai.”
“Oh, is that so.”
Her range of expressions had become much wider recently and now
there were some faces she would only show me, but she would still act
all displeased when someone pointed out her mistakes. That was one
thing that hadn’t changed about Senjougahara-senpai since middle
school.
“I wonder which one came first?”
“Hmm?”
“I wonder whether Milne wrote The Red House Mystery or Winnie the
Pooh first.”
“I think Winnie the Pooh came after.”
“Hmm. Somehow I always had the impression that The Red House
Mystery came first… I don’t mean he didn’t make it big writing mystery
novels so he switched over to children’s books or something.”
“Hmm. I don’t know much about Milne, but apparently he was the
type of author who didn’t like writing the things that people wanted.”
I suppose that wording would be my usual not quite correct spin on
it, but even without considering my natural tendency to be somewhat
160
impolite, the foreword of The Red House Mystery certainly gave off that
impression.
“In the beginning he made a name for himself as a humor
playwright, but when people started wanting him to write those sorts
of works, he started writing murder mystery novels, and when those
started becoming popular, in other words when people started wanting
him to write them, for some reason he started writing Winnie the
Pooh.”
“You could say he was the type of author who didn’t want to be
stuck with a specific label, but I can sympathize with the feeling as a
human of not wanting to do something because someone else wants
you to.”
A bit of Senjougahara’s character from before her rebirth was
coming back, and you could just take that as a cute sort of humanness,
hearing a high school girl saying that. But there would be quite a few
troubled people if a popular author were to say that (their editor, or in
Milne’s case his agent).
“But out of all the people in the writing industry, there has to be a
certain number of them who can’t work under someone else’s
requests. You could say they’re artists exactly because of that.”
It’s quite a difficult position. If you let a genius run wild it wouldn’t
produce a very entertaining piece of work, so in the end some amount
of restrictions is needed, but in my personal opinion as an individual
not gifted with artistic genius, trying to impose control as opposed to
restrictions upon the inborn nature of an artist wouldn’t allow them
to create anything you could call “entertainment” either. You’d just
end up with something completely ridiculous. Milne wrote this in his
foreword: “I could take pride in even a trite and bland phone book if I
wrote it with passion, but I would find it against my conscience to
write even a refined blank verse tragedy if I did so under someone
else’s command.” I’m the type of person who enjoys obeying the
commands of those I respect, so to be honest I don’t understand this
sort of artistic sense very well. I would say fulfilling people’s
161
expectations is the greatest joy, but if I were Milne, the famous Winnie
the Pooh would never have been written… But considering the
possibility that more masterpieces of mystery fiction might have
followed The Red House Mystery, I would say that no matter how it
turned out it would simply be a matter of taste.
“But in the end, don’t you think there’s a nice balance to it? The
fight between the publishers and readers who want the authors to
write works that they enjoy and the rebellious authors. Did you know,
the thing that troubles authors the most is when people ask them to
write however they like.”
“I can understand that… Sort of.”
Even outside of basketball, it isn’t quite as interesting without that
bit of strategy when people tell you to just do whatever you want. That
said, if an author just continued to write whatever the readers wanted,
there’s no guarantee that the readers would always respond how the
author wanted. Being told to just do whatever you want can be quite
troubling, but that certainly doesn’t mean that doing whatever
someone else wants will be easy.
“In the end the happiest outcome would be for the authors to write
whatever they want and the readers to read whatever they want but…
Wait. I wonder if this would just be approving of your wild style of
choosing books.”
That would be quite troubling—Senjougahara-senpai said.
“Now that you mention it,” she said with a clap of her hands.
“I had a conversation like this with Araragi-kun a while ago.
Something about how we read books. Oh that silly Araragi-kun,44 do
you know what he said?”
I was a bit annoyed at the sight of my senior I respected so much
speaking like some character out of a movie, but since I had gotten
interested, I listened just like that.
44 Senjougahara refers to Araragi in a very endearing but old-fashioned and
almost melodramatic way here.
162
“ ‘In this day and age, I would say just reading paper books itself is
already pretty good, and I’m sure any author would be happy to see
that too.’ Well that’s true.”
Indeed. Indeed, and realizing that being praised by Araragi-senpai
wasn’t something that happened all the time, I was so happy I lost
control of myself for a moment with all my emotions pouring in at
once, and I said
“… That’s Araragi-senpai for you.”
163
164
ARIA MAGAZINE
28 June 2014
Here it is again
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174
YOTSUGI FUTURE
28 May 2014
A doll, like the shell of an evil spirit.

An expressionless ornament.
“Momo by Michael Ende.”

“Don’t push yourself Ononoki-chan!”
“Shouted some devilish-looking boy whose name I don’t even
know with all his might.”
“What do you mean you don’t know my name. I’m Araragi Koyomi.
You totally know me. And don’t say stuff like ‘said so and so’, I thought
you wanted to leave that past behind you.”
“Come on, we’ve already got a lot of these short stories so I have to
try to change up the style a bit. Change is important, you know.”
“You’re an oddity and you’re saying that?”
“Shinobu and Mayoi already broke the rule that oddities can’t be
the narrator, so at least I want to follow it.”
“Why get serious about the rules only there? You should show right
here, now, the rule that there are more exceptions to the rules. Also
don’t call Shinobu and Hachikuji just ‘Shinobu’ and ‘Mayoi’.”
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“Ah, who cares about all that. On that note, let me hear about it
until the conclusion, that famous piece of children’s literature.”
“I told you not to push yourself, you’re not up for it seriously, it’s
too much for me to talk to you about Momo. Remember,
wasn’t Momo one of those? One of the two most famous books that a
lot of kids read when they’re little, but they get traumatized from it
because they can’t understand what it’s about.”
“That’s not a very nice way to put it. By the way, what was the
other one?”
“The Little Prince.”
“I see. I get the feeling that’s more of your own experiences than
an actual statistic, Devilish Big Brother.”
“It’s not just Momo and The Little Prince, a lot of kids have people
tell them to read famous books that are too sensitive or mature for
them when they’re little, and they feel frustrated because they think
they ‘have bad taste’ and stop reading books while they’re still young.”
“I guess that just means that books each have a right age to read
them at.”
“Yeah. People like Hanekawa are the exception I guess, but
honestly I’m not confident that I’m even at the right age to
read Momo or The Little Prince yet.”
“Unlike me.”
“It’s just like you. Ononoki-chan, whether you can even read is
something I find doubtful.”
“And that doubt would be spot-on.”
“You can’t read?”
“That’s how my character is supposed to be now.”
“Your character changes too much! At least get that straight.
You’ve got way too much freedom as a character.”
“It’s fine, I got oneechan to read it to me so I know what it’s about.
Sometimes you get a better understanding of a story from listening to
it instead of reading it.”
176
“What are you getting Kagenui-san to do for you? That person,
isn’t she your master? … But maybe if one gets to her level, they’d
understand Momo.”
“Devilish Big Brother, don’t try to be so modest, I’m pretty sure it
wouldn’t be too hard for you to read now. Couldn’t you actually have
fun reading it?”
“Well you can say that because you’ve already read it… But it’s not
like I’ve never read it, I read it and I gave up… I’m a bit hesitant about
trying it a second time.”
“Just remember that the main character Momo is a little girl whose
age is off limits and I’m sure you’ll enjoy it, Devilish Big Brother.”
“Listen now, never tell me that ‘I’m sure you’ll enjoy it if you just
think of her as a little girl’ again. Even if I don’t get the book, I’m not
so low that I would look at a great piece of literature like that.”
“That doesn’t sound like something someone who got all worked
up by Marilla reading Anne of Green Gables would say.”
“How did you know that!”
“Still, I guess you have a point, Devilish Big Brother. It might not
be the case for Momo but children in children’s literature are all really
children from an adult’s point of view, the same way how the adults
that children talk about are all adults from a child’s point of view.
Maybe the reason children have trouble reading Momo or The Little
Prince is because they know that they aren’t Momo or the Little
Prince.”
“That might be the case… yeah. But what was Momo about again? I
at least remember something about a mystery that comes up. What
else was there, time thieves or something?”
“The Men in Grey from the Timesavings Bank. I would say that
having read it, as a dead body who time is meaningless for, I can
empathize more with the Men in Grey than the people getting their
time stolen.”
“Don’t say ‘having read it’, Kagenui-san was the person who read
it.”
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“In it, there was a line like this: ‘If people knew what death was,
they would stop being afraid of it.’ If you really think about what time
is, ultimately it’s just slowly going towards death. That’s why
everyone values time so much. But if you ask me, as someone who’s
already dead, it all seems so stupid. Devilish Big Devil,45 what about
you?”
“Don’t call me a devil twice, how much of a devil do you think I
am? Either ‘Devilish Big Brother’46 or ‘Big Devil’,47 pick one. Actually,
don’t call me either of those.”
“You want me to just call you ‘Big Brother’? You pervert…”
“I never said that. So you’re saying that all the future holds is
death? That seems a bit too pessimistic for me, though I am following
you so far. I know Momo was by no means a very cheerful book, but it
wasn’t that dark, was it?”
“That’s right, but it’s not about treasuring your time either. I was
actually expecting the book to be about that when I heard the phrase
‘Time Thief’, but it turned out to almost encourage you to waste your
time. When you think of it like that, instead of a children’s book, I
figured it was more like a book written by an adult for adults who had
their time stolen from them. So, it makes sense why adults would
recommend it to children. They’re telling them to read this book and
not make the same mistakes.”
“I don’t really agree with recommending a book for that kind of a
reason… Don’t you think that reading is more about empathizing with
the characters than learning some lesson?”
“I wonder. You sound sort of like Kaiki-oniichan when you start
talking about lessons. That’s just what I think. When you read or see
or hear a story and you feel moved by it, when you feel excited by it,
45 Yotsugi usually calls him 鬼のお兄ちゃん (oni no oniichan) where the first
oni means “devil” and the second means “big brother”. Here, she uses 鬼の鬼ち
ゃん (oni no oni-chan), where the second oni is another “devil”.
46 Her normal way of addressing him, 鬼のお兄ちゃん (oni no oniichan).
47 Shortened form, 鬼ちゃん (oni-chan) with only one oni meaning “devil”.
178
that means that it’s a story that you wouldn’t normally experience, a
story that you wouldn’t find near you. The more you’re moved by a
story, the more you realize that it’s not something that could exist in
the real world. When you think of it that way, reading books is
something to think about, huh. They are a waste of time.”
“Don’t mess with me. Don’t read Momo and take that kind of
feeling away from it.”
“But that waste of time is exactly what makes it seem beautiful.”
“Don’t think that just by saying ‘but’ you managed to change your
image at all.”
“By the way, I don’t have a cool line or a cool pose anymore, so how
should I finish up this story?”
“You never had a cool pose in the first place.”
“Ononoki Yotsugi here, a stoic who never smiles no matter what
good things happen.”
“And I’m Araragi Koyomi… Wait, don’t end it like we’re
commentators or something!”
179
OUGI TRAVEL
28 May 2014
We don’t know what lies ahead.48

But still
I’d say “no” is the best answer.
TRANSLATION: TARABLE TRANSLATIONS
I’m sure you’ve read Jules Verne’s Around the World in Eighty Days,
haven’t you? Although today’s society, filled with all sorts of fun and
recreation to be found outside of books, has slowly but surely drifted
away from literature, there are still certain classics that everyone
should read. I think that Around the World in Eighty Days is inarguably
one of those classics. Don’t you agree, Hanekawa-senpai?
“I do… But I find it hard to believe that you honestly think that,
Ougi-chan,” Hanekawa-senpai answers, looking irritated by my
friendly inquiry.
Hanekawa-senpai is friendly towards everyone and always has a
smile on her face, yet somehow she never seems to show me that
angelic smile of hers. It’s quite disheartening. *Sob*.
48
A play on the phrase 一寸先は闇 (issun saki wa yami, “even a inch ahead
is darkness”),which means that no one knows what the future holds. Here, 闇
(yami, “darkness”) is replaced with 私 (watashi, “me”). The overall meaning is
that because the future is uncertain, you should just say “no” or do nothing.
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“What do you mean, ‘*sob*’…? You’re the one who’s always
smiling.”
“Oh, that’s true.”
I wouldn’t call it angelic, though.
Still, I’m often told that I have a lovely smile.
“I know that you have plans to travel the world after graduating…
So how about it? At what age did you finish reading Around the World in
Eighty Days? I’m certain that Hanekawa-senpai, the person Araragi-
senpai admires so much, has already read such a prestigious work. If
you tell me that you haven’t read it, I’ll be thoroughly dejected. Even
more dejected than the time I bought a book based on its title, only to
find that the title was actually the editor’s idea.”
Of course, that’s often the case with books.
At any rate, the truth is that there’s an infinite number of classics
out there, enough that a person couldn’t hope to read all of them
within their own lifetime. If Hanekawa-senpai hadn’t read Jules
Verne’s novel yet, it wouldn’t be particularly surprising.
“I’ve read it. I think I finished it when I was in second grade.”
But, well. You know how this person is.
As a hedge between keeps antipathy green, out of courtesy, I
offered, “You know everything, Hanekawa-senpai.” But as expected,
she didn’t respond with her usual catchphrase. It would seem she truly
isn’t fond of me. Well, I suppose my goal here isn’t to endear myself
to Hanekawa-senpai, so—with a heavy heart—I must simply press on
with the conversation.
“What were your impressions? Either at the time, or looking back
on it now.”
“My impressions…? It was an enjoyable read, I suppose,”
Hanekawa-senpai answers, looking wary.
Oh dear, you don’t have to be so guarded. Right now, I’m just trying
to have a light-hearted book discussion. It’s not like I’m planning to
lure you into some sort of trap.
182
“Hmm, how to put it? I remember the fact that he went through
Japan on his trip around the world made me really happy. Now I’m
steering the conversation away from Around the World in Eighty
Days specifically, but whenever Japan is mentioned in an old foreign
classic, it’s a bit of a shock. I know it should be obvious, but it really
drives home that Japan was actually around hundreds and thousands
of years ago.”
“Oh?”
That’s a rather peculiar view. It doesn’t appear to be as simple as
feeling happy to stumble across a familiar name in a foreign land… As
an avid consumer of all sorts of stories, I’d like to delve a little further
into this.
“Do you mean to say that it’s objective proof of Japan’s existence,
like an endorsement from a guarantor? And thus, upon catching a
glimpse of the foreign perspective of Japan through printed media, you
felt a sense of relief…”
“No, no, I was only in second grade, so of course I didn’t have such
complex thoughts about it… It’s closer to the feeling of reading a story
you thought was fiction, only to suddenly find out that it’s actually
non-fiction, or that it was based on real events or people. … Though, I
suppose someone whose whole existence feels like it belongs in fiction
wouldn’t really understand that.”
“Oh my, that was harsh… Well, I’m a rather shallow reader, so I
simply enjoyed the heart-pounding romanticism of a handsome
British man traveling the world, while elegantly evading all the perils
that face him.”
“… Can you even comprehend the concept of romanticism?”
“Come now, Hanekawa-senpai. To say that my true identity is
romanticism itself would be an absolute exaggeration.”
“So it would be an exaggeration…”
“But considering how you’re planning to go location scouting soon,
I suppose that traveling the world is no longer in the realm of
romanticism, but a simple reality for you. Before long, I’m sure
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fictional stories won’t be enough to satisfy you… You could say that
it’s Throw Away Your Books, Rally in the Streets in practice.”49
“Hmm… I’m not sure about that.”
“? What is it? You appear to have objections. Do you mean to
disregard the opinion of someone whose uncle is a traveler—or rather,
a wanderer—as not worth listening to?”
“Do you really have to put it like that…?” Hanekawa-senpai
mutters, shrugging her shoulders in frustration. “Your uncle travels
all over the country as part of his work… But I hardly think that means
he threw away his books. In fact, doesn’t he travel around to collect
stories?”
I see, that’s sensible logic. It’s not like Oshino Meme is wandering
from place to place in order to write up a novel… But it’s also true that
novels aren’t the only form a story can take.
“The protagonist of Around the World in Eighty Days, Fogg, started
out on his journey because of a bet he made with his friends. So, when
you think about it, just the idea that ‘a person can travel around the
world’ can become the basis for a full novel. In that sense, traveling
could be considered a way of looking for stories, as well as a way of
creating them.”
“Hmm. That’s something I understand quite well, as someone
who’s lived a long life as a transfer student. It’s true that no matter
how many times you transfer from school to school, you never quite
get used to it—just like a story that always has a continuation.”
“I wonder about that,” Hanekawa-senpai responds, completely
distrustful of my words.
Hehehe, I suppose we really can’t get along with each other. Don’t
worry, I’ll happily see you off on your trip. Unlike the detective Fix, I
49
A Japanese experimental drama film from 1971, that follows a young
man's disillusionment with the world around him and his determination to
achieve something in life while his family members are content with their poor
social and economic standing.
184
don’t intend to stand in the way of your journey—your story.50 In fact,
I’d prefer that you start out on it as soon as possible.
“By the way, if we consider that it was possible to travel the world
in eighty days back in 1873, when Around the World in Eighty Days was
first published, how many days do you think it would take now? If you
take an airplane, I believe it’s possible to do it in a mere matter of
days… But I suppose that would be a bit lacking in drama.”
“Who knows? But no matter how many days it takes, no matter
how short a trip it is, I’ll always bring a couple of books with me. The
books you read on a trip are the most exciting,” Hanekawa-senpai
says.
“Don’t throw away your books, and go on a journey”—is that your
intention?
Always learning, but never losing your sense of fun, hm?
I really hate that about you.
With a smile on my face, I say:
“You’re such a fool.”
50
Detective Fix is a character from Around the World in Eighty Days who
continually chases after Phileas Fogg from country to country because he
believes him to be the perpetrator of a bank robbery.
185
SURUGA NEAT
YOMIURI SHIMBUN
16 August 2014
Good medicine tastes bitter51

Good poison is even more painful
Let's make the flowers bloom in the future.
A young maiden and an evil spirit double team52
“Have you heard of Mary Hastings Bradley’s Alice in Jungleland, my

beloved daughter, Kanbaru Suruga-chan?”
“I doubt you have”, my awful mother, Kanbaru Tooe-san,
continued with a malicious, smirking laugh. Of course, although I
unfortunately didn’t know anything about that book, not being very
well read, what I wanted to know is why she, who should have passed
away long ago in a traffic accident, now seemed to have come back to
mock me like this.
Well, I suppose this is a dream.
That we can’t choose the dreams we have might be the greatest
flaw of the creatures known as humans—is that something like how a
child can’t choose the parents that they’re born to?
51
A saying meaning that the hard, bitter truth is the best medicine.
52
二輪挿し (nirinzashi) means penetration of one hole with two objects
which relates to Kanbaru's affinity for BL.
187
“…… I wonder, is Alice in Jungleland a variation on Lewis
Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland? I was sure that that book had a sequel
called Through the Looking Glass……”53
“No, no, that’s why I said that the author of Alice in Jungleland was
Mary Hastings Bradley—she was an American author and an explorer
at the same time. It’s a record of when she went on an adventure with
her family into the interior of Africa.”
“I see. So it’s a true story?”
“Yes, but although I say it’s a true story, since it was written nearly
a century ago, naturally you’ll feel a bit of the period coming through
in its depictions. The title is Alice in Jungleland because Bradley’s 6-
year-old daughter who came with them was named Alice, and the book
is written from her point of view.”
“Oh……”
I couldn’t give a clear answer because I’ve never read anything by
Mary Hastings Bradley, much less her daughter, so I really don’t have
much interest in either of them. Still, my mother is quite the eccentric.
She should have just brought up Lewis Carroll.
“Hahaha. No, no, when I was a girl, Lewis Carroll was my favorite
thing to read. I read The Hunting of the Snark54 so many times!”
“Why The Hunting of the Snark? I’d expect Alice in Wonderland to be
first.”
53 The Japanese titles literally translate to Alice of the Jungle Country, Alice
of the Strange Country, and Alice of the Mirror Country respectively, which
explains a bit more of Kanbaru’s confusion.
54 The Hunting of the Snark is a nonsense poem published by Lewis Carroll
in 1876, five years after Through the Looking Glass.
188
“I read Alice in Wonderland quite a few times, too. Although, the one
I read was Alice Monogatari, which was translated in collaboration by
Akutagawa Ryuunosuke55 and Kikuchi Kan.”56
“Please read Alice in Wonderland normally…”
At least read The Nursery “Alice”.57
I read The Red House Mystery just because it was the only mystery
written by the author of Winnie the Pooh, and while substance is
important, even I’m drawn to the events surrounding this book. I don’t
plan on insisting that I’m a serious reader myself, but to hear the story
like this leads me to believe that, without a doubt, it’s because of my
mother’s influence that I read it—after all, don’t they say that children
grow up watching their parents’ backs?
“Humph. Children watch their parents’ backs… In other words,
parents turn their backs on their children—if that’s the case, Suruga,
in order to get your interest, I’ll disclose some valuable information. I
was surprised to find this out later myself, but the Alice whose point
of view this story is told from, the 6-year-old girl who’s shown riding
on the back of a baby elephant at the beginning of the book, went on
to become James Tiptree Jr,58 the giant of the sci-fi novel world who
wrote The Only Neat Thing to Do.”
“J—junior!?”
No.
I shouldn’t be focusing on the “junior”.
55 Akutagawa Ryuunosuke (1892-1927) was a famous short story author,
best known in the West for his 1915 short story, 羅生門 (Rashoumon).
56 Kikuchi Kan (1888-1948) was the pen name of Kikuchi Hiroshi (written
using the same kanji, 菊池寛), a well-known author and playwright who focused
his stories on the hardships and daily lives of common people.
57 The Nursery “Alice” is a shortened and revised version of Alice in
Wonderland written by Lewis Carroll in 1890 for children under the age of five.
58 James Tiptree Jr (1915-1987) is the pen name of science fiction author
Alice Bradley Sheldon (née Hastings Bradley), daughter of Mary Hastings

Bradley. To avoid confusion, I’m using female pronouns to refer to her while
talking about Tiptree even though James is a male name, since Sheldon herself
was a woman.
189
James Tiptree Jr. Naturally, even I know her—she’s an author
whose books I’ve read. Instead, I want to know if there’s anyone who
hasn’t read her books. The Only Neat Thing to Do was a book
Senjougahara-senpai and I were quite fond of in middle school.
“Ha, in any case, people like you probably read it because it was a
temporary title for the series finale of Neon Genesis Evangelion.”
“You’re right but, if you say that, doesn’t it mean that you only
read Alice in Jungleland because James Tiptree Jr appears in it as a child?
Why say ‘I was surprised to find out later’? Please stop lying.”
“Incidentally, I’ve read the version of The Only Neat Thing to Do that
was illustrated by Kawahara Yumiko.59 Aren’t you jealous?”
Even though you’re innocently bragging……
That might just be a difference of the times, though.
“So that means that both mother and daughter were authors, huh?
In fact, wasn’t it kept a secret for a long time that James Tiptree Jr was
a woman?”
“Yes. Well, sometimes choosing the same career as your mother
leads to conflict. How much do you know, Suruga, about Tiptree’s
heroic life as an author?”
“To an extent, but I couldn’t give details.”
The fact that she was having adventures in Africa at the age of 6
already seems too amazing to call it just an anecdote, but even without
knowing that, the story of James Tiptree Jr’s life is breathtaking. My
mother said her “life as an author”, but I think it would be more
accurate to say her life in general. She was the kind of author an
eccentric reader like myself, interested not only in an author’s books,
but also the little anecdotes regarding their life, couldn’t talk about
59 Kawahara Yumiko (1960-?) is a shoujo manga artist best known for her
Dolls (観用少女, Kan You Shoujo) series.
190
without going on and on. Specifically, as far as her death goes, it’d be
best to quietly keep my mouth shut.60
“But, it feels odd. No, if you say it’s natural then it’s natural, but…
Well… Even the great authors in science fiction history, and, well,
literary history, were children once, and they had parents, too.”
Everyone was a child once.
And everyone is someone’s child.
Never mind being “natural”, it’s life’s major premise—but, if it’s
unexpected, you’re liable to lose sight of it, like something totally
ordinary. So, it’s a story that’s not just limited to “great authors”.
Oneself—myself.
I don’t think that I can really remember what it was like when I
was that young, and it’s hard to say that I’m constantly focusing on
whose child I am.
“What was important to you as a child becomes less and less
important. The things that you used to think were amazing become
ordinary clichés. Family should be everything, but becomes just
another part of the world. A mother’s love that envelops you like a vast
sea is a narrow well—in all honesty, if that’s what it means to grow
up, there’s something really lonely in that.”
“…… I don’t have any memory at all of you ‘enveloping me in a
mother’s love’……”
“That’s because you’ve forgotten.”
“………”
I wonder if that’s true…
“Just like you, I was once a child too, and I also forgot the time
when my parents were raising me. All I remember is the books I read.”
“The Hunting of the Snark?”
60 On May 19, 1987 Sheldon (Tiptree) committed suicide. She had been
suffering from health issues caused by a lifetime of smoking and her husband
was nearly blind, invalid, and no longer able to care for himself. She shot and
killed her husband in his sleep before turning the gun on herself.
191
“Among others. Which books you’ve read and at what age, it’s very
important, don’t you think? With people and with books, in the end,
the time you encounter them is everything.”
“… But there are times when we forget the books that we’ve read.”
I didn’t like the feeling of her lecturing me without saying anything
back, so as a token effort, I made a rebuttal—although, it is the truth
in its own way. Indiscriminate readers like Senjougahara-senpai and
I, who read books like drinking water, completely forget the books we
read a long time ago and end up reading the same ones two or even
three times.
“It’s fine if that’s the case, isn’t it? While the things that were
important to you as a child might become less important—those books
that you used to think were neither good nor bad might become
interesting when you’ve grown up.”
“I wonder. That might be true, but I wonder if that means that I’ve
matured as a reader.”
I guess if you say that the timing of the encounter is important, it
will be. Then, my mother shrugged her shoulders.
“Well, perhaps, the books might be the ones maturing—in this
case, maybe it should be ‘aging’ rather than ‘maturing’.”
“Aging…?”
“The radical travel diary written one hundred years ago, as a result
of the author’s daughter becoming a great author afterwards, now
shines in a different light. You need to follow that example, too. It
might be The Only Neat Thing to Do for you.
In short.
My mother, Kanbaru Tooe, laughed with a grin and said,
“If you can’t be medicine, be poison. Otherwise, you’re just plain
water.”
192
ROUKA GOD
HEROINE BOOK 6: KANBARU SURUGA
18 September 2014
The reason I decided to purge the Swamp God, as you may all have
guessed, was that it was interfering with my wholesome and sound
business ventures. What a despicable god, destroying without a second
thought all the sincere and faithful hard work I had been humbly doing
in good conscience over the years as a productive member of society. I
had no choice but to proactively engage in some defensive measures
against the Swamp God in order to protect my rights. Of course, that
sincerity and faith was in money and the rights I was protecting were
my rights to deception. And of course, none of this was done on my
nonexistent good conscience. Though none of this changes the fact
that claiming so in my good conscience is perfectly within my sincere
and faithful rights.
But no, even if that weren’t the case, even if one of the lies in the
web of lies that were the charms I had been spreading with all my
might, my storm of wild rumors, once they had all completely
193
disappeared, I would have to start fresh, having neither gained nor lost
anything.
“Don’t worry about it”, “Just leave it be”, “Pretend you don’t know
anything about it”, “What will be will be”, “Forget about it”, “It’s not
like you’re going to die or something”
… The Swamp God had used these words to render my charms
useless, so I had something to say back to her.
“Hey there, Kaiki-san.”
The Swamp God said as she welcomed me. Surprisingly enough,
although you could hardly say she was very serious about it, the person
revered as a god and who bathed in the adoration of all the middle
school students in the area was a kid with bleached brown hair wearing
sweatpants. Her bleached hair seemed more like a way to torment her
body rather than a fashion-conscious decision61 about her appearance.
“? How do you know my name. I don’t remember knowing any kids
as rotten as you.”
“Hahaha, you see, I’ve been having lots of talks with the kids
who’ve been getting involved with you, Kaiki Deishuu-san. ‘Kai’ like
a heap of shells and ‘ki’ like a dead tree. Deishuu like ‘dorobune’, a
boat stuck in the mud. I always thought they were just exaggerating
when they said you were like bad luck grew a pair of arms and legs.
Seems pretty spot on to me.”
The Swamp God said with a little chuckle, then took a pack of gum
out of the pockets of her sweatpants. Then, still with that frivolous
smirk on her face but a sharp tone, she said, not taking a single step
back,
“You must be a pretty horrible adult, tricking kids like that.”
“What we’re doing is practically the same. Although unlike me, you
might say that you’re tricking people but only an idiot would fall for
your tricks.”
61 Bleached hair used to be, and still is, a sort of youthful and rebellious
hairstyle in Japan.
194
“I’m just throwing stuff against the wall and seeing what sticks,
still ironing out the kinks you know? I didn’t grow up tricking people
or getting conned myself so I’m still a beginner. I know you’re a pro
and all so give me a break if I’m not exactly a master con artist yet.
I’m really sorry if my little child’s play is getting in the way of your
con scheme. I really am.”
I’ve never heard less sincere words. And that’s coming from
someone without a speck of a conscience. On a whim or maybe because
I was getting a bit annoyed, I decided to flatter the kid a little.
“Don’t be so humble, you’re actually not bad. You even managed to
weed out all the rumors I’ve been spreading around. I learned a thing
or two I might use in the future.”
I had said that on a whim to have her think I was really
complimenting her, but that might not actually be a bad idea. A
conman’s repertoire only grows by incorporating young new ideas. But
I guess an elementary school kid’s would still be too young.
“I’m not in elementary school. I actually graduated middle school
a while ago.”
“Is that so, all you kids look the same when you get to my age.”
“A lot of people tell me I’m hard to approach because I act like an
adult.”
“I think that just means they don’t like you. I know someone quite
like that.”
“Hmm… Someone like that, eh? Whatever.”
The Swamp God popped five pieces of gum out of the package she
had been playing with in her hand all at once and threw them into her
mouth. Kids these days, no manners, but I guess chewing gum is her
way of getting herself fired up.
“Want one?”
“I don’t like candy. I’m an adult. A grown-up. The only thing adults
want is money, or promises. I’ll be fine if you promise me you won’t
get in the way of my business anymore.”
“Sure thing. Got it. I won’t get in your way anymore.”
195
On the surface she promised me right away. But as a professional
in telling lies, I’ve never seen a more obvious lie. It was more like she
had just come to ask me to maintain the status quo between us going
forward into the future.
What else would it be.
From my point of view, the Swamp God’s silly “life counseling” is
starting to be a real problem for my business. But from her point of
view, the lovely little con I’ve been spreading around like the plague is
the only reason she can still go around doing her misfortune collection.
Our goals are completely different.
Like they say, the doctor’s only in business because people get sick.
Although the only way the Swamp God can treat her patients is with
the placebo effect.
“Unfortunately, it appears negotiations have broken down. My only
option now is to crush you so mercilessly you’ll never be able to do
business here again.”
“You aren’t very mature for an adult are you.”
She didn’t flinch an inch from my threat. I suppose this is what
they mean by “bending but never breaking”. Or maybe she thinks I’m
not serious. If so, that would be correct. Really, even I have no idea
when I’m being serious. Maybe I never am.
“No need to be so forward, Kaiki Deishuu-san. Want to give my ‘life
counseling’ a try? See what it’s like to throw all of your troubles into
my deep swamp.”
“Throw my troubles into your deep swamp? Are you trying to act
like a ghost or something?”
“ ‘Get outta my swamp!’, I guess that’s more like a swamp
monster.62 Deishuu, like a boat stuck in the mud… Mud and swamp.
Muddy swamp, muddy swamp.”
62 She’s pretending to be Dorotabou (泥田坊), a monster in an old folktale
who would appear night after night from a rice paddy (which are very muddy at
the bottom) and scream “Give me back my field!”. His name literally means
“Muddy Field Boy”.
196
The Swamp God laughed at her own incomprehensible joke. She
really did look like she was still in elementary school when she
laughed. Did she say she already graduated from middle school? Now
that I think about it, she looks like she could be in high school…
Actually, no she doesn’t. I have no reason to give her the benefit of the
doubt, but even with it she looks like she’s in middle school at best. I
suppose looks don’t count for much.
“No matter what you drop in, I can’t give you back a golden axe63 or
a silver axe or something. I’m not cut out for being a goddess. All I am
is a Swamp God.”
“Are you offering to take my misfortune then?”
The Swamp God listens to people’s tales of their misfortune then
quietly takes them away. It doesn’t accept any compensation in return,
which I don’t particularly agree with but long story short, misfortune
itself is what it takes as its compensation. Or so the story goes.
“Interesting.”
I said, because it wasn’t interesting at all.
“Alright, so hear me out. Right now I’ve actually got something on
my mind that’s really troubling me. It keeps me up all night and it’s
making me miserable. So just until a while ago I’ve been dating this
girl in high school, but she found out I was only in it for the money
and I’ve been on the lam ever since. I’m going crazy looking over my
shoulder all day thinking she’s going to come and stab me or
something, which is why I started doing all these bad things I never
wanted to. It takes the edge off my nerves, you know. What do you
think I should do?”
I had just thought that story up on the spot and I realized what an
unrealistic situation it was to be asking for advice about. But the
Swamp God paid no attention to my painfully obvious lie.
63 She’s referencing one of Aesop’s Fables called The Honest Woodman,
where a man drops his axe into a river and the god Hermes pulls a golden axe
then a silver axe out of the river, and asks the man whether they are his to test
his honesty.
197
“Don’t worry about it.”
She said.
“Just leave it be, pretend you don’t know anything about it, what
will be will be, forget about it, it’s not like you’re going to die or
something. Got it?”
“… I’m sure that’s what you tell everyone, but she actually told me
she’s going to kill me, you know?”
I was hoping to put some pressure on the Swamp God with a serious
request, something a kid couldn’t just brush off with some clever
words. And so I told lie after lie.
“Even if I forget about it, she’s never going to let me off the hook
for the rest of her life.”
“Not really, you’re not really all that important to her. You’re right
that she might really want to kill you now, but eventually some nice
guy is going to come along and heal the wounds you gave her.”
“…”
“She’s not even as hurt as you think. You’ll be a memory in the past
in no time. So, don’t worry about it.”
She had no proof for anything she was saying. All she was doing
was going along with her usual plan, I could tell. She was certainly an
inexperienced beginner and not exactly very eloquent in her speech,
but she was still running a fine con. I was just flattering her before,
but this kid could probably trick most adults too.
But not me, obviously.
I doubt there’s really some “nice guy” out there who’d make a good
couple with her, and “she” doesn’t even exist in the first place. She
doesn’t exist.
That said, having seen her techniques, I couldn’t just leave without
showing her anything in return. I may love money, but I don’t like
being in debt.
“Swamp God. Since we’re both here, why don’t I show you some of
my techniques.”
“No thanks, I’m fine. I’m not interested in any charms.”
198
“Come on, it doesn’t have to be right away or anything. I’m
thinking we might have a long way to go with each other in the
future.”
“I’m glad you think so, let’s hope the both of us do well. So, what
are you going to do?”
“Relax, it’s nothing dangerous. I was just thinking of introducing
a customer to you that I think you’d be able to help sometime not too
long from now. I think you’ve got a lot of potential, that’s all.”
“A customer? You want to set up a barter agreement with me or
something?”
I said nothing in reply to the Swamp God’s question.
In place of a response, I said
“It’s really something I should be doing, but I get tired of things
quickly and I’m not really cut out for collection. So I’m letting you take
the job, I’m trusting you with it.”
“Swamp God, one day all the misfortune that’s been sitting at the
bottom in you is going to pile up and appear on the surface. And you’ll
run into some friends you forgot about. That’s the lesson you should
learn from meeting me. So when that time comes,”
Make sure you don’t miss it.
The Swamp God had a suspicious look on her face. She was probably
bracing herself not to be tricked, but in reality that was completely
useless.
She had already tricked herself into thinking her life wasn’t full of
misfortune.
By taking in other people’s misfortune.
I didn’t have to do a thing to trick her.
Not to mention I have no duty to open up her eyes. But because one
day I will have to take on that duty.
Swamp God.
Let me give you a devil.
199
SHINOBU FIGURE
NISEMONOGATARI PREMIUM ITEM BOX
21 November 2014
To me, Oshino Shinobu is a special existence.

So very special that she is more like a part of my body—of course,
it is not that she is a part of my body; it is more like I’m a part of her
body; no matter which, we are one in body and soul, and as inseparable
as two sides of a coin, with advantages and disadvantages to it; we
have a bond that will not be broken.
Leaving out all the details of how it came to be that way, it will
suffice to say that for Araragi Koyomi, the little blond girl, the little
girl yet an enchantress, Oshino Shinobu is in various ways and in every
way more important than his own heart. That much is certain.
Still, no matter how indispensable a presence she may be, it cannot
be said that it would be good if there was suddenly more than one of
her—so, what I want to say is, one day, suddenly, there were two
Shinobus.
Standing next to each other, quietly, in the same pose.
201
This silent atmosphere where she is just looking at me is making
me think fondly that, if only that hat she’s wearing was a helmet, it
would be like how she used to sit quietly in the corner of that cram
school hugging her knees—though having said that, this is not the
time to be thinking fondly about the past.
“Huh, the number of Shinobus has increased to two? What is this
situation?”
“Calm down, Devilish Big Brother. One of them is just an image of
the other—as one of them is the Nendoroid made by Good Smile
Company.”
Ononoki-chan was by my side as though it was normal, the
shikigami girl Ononoki Yotsugi-chan, said that in an expressionless
intonation.
“Wha—WHHAAAATTTT? One of them is a Nendoroid made by
Good Smile Company!?”
It can’t be, no matter how much I compare them I can’t spot any
differences.
Even I, who is a “Oshino Shinobu professional”, cannot tell which
is the real one and which is the figure.
No matter how much I narrow my eyes and look at them, I cannot
say anything but that they are exactly the same.
Though I had heard rumors of it, what a fearsome Nendoroid, what
a frightening reproduction!
“If such goods are being sold, people will be compelled to buy it… I
told that to Good Smile”
“This is fine, Devilish Big Brother. If it’s you, you can surely tell
which is the real one.”
Ononoki-chan patted me on the back with all her strength, to
encourage me—the heartless way she used so much strength to hit me
in the back might be an expression of anger due to the olden ways of
speaking she has been used to.
202
“For you, Devilish Big Brother, the former Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion
Heart-Under-Blade, that is, Oshino Shinobu is a special loli existence,
right?”64
“Special! What is a special loli? Don’t notice the fact that ‘loli’ is
included in ‘special’.65 It will make it difficult to use the word ‘special’
from now on, won’t it? How frequently used a word do you think it is?
Will saying ‘it doesn’t matter’ now become ‘loli doesn’t matter’? Will
‘extraordinary’ become ‘every loli’?66 What does it mean?”
Hmm, I looked at the two Shinobus again—the identical Shinobus
just stayed silent and didn’t move a muscle.
It’s really like her early character.
I see, they truly are the splitting image of each other—still, for each
situation there is a different approach to use.
Anyhow, as this is only a short story; as more than twenty volumes
of the story have passed, this story’s setting will also fit into that so
that it can be read with it.
“Ku ku ku…”
I laughed fearlessly like that.
Perhaps, all of this is a bad trick being played on me by Ononoki-
chan and Shinobu together (though the vampire and the zombie have
a bad relationship with each other, when the goal is to play a trick on
me they become little girls who join hands), and it’s all the worse for
their opponent.
Maybe it is that kind of setting, or an obligatory dramaturgy—in a
story like this, there is a possibility that both Shinobus are dolls.
And while I’m trying to guess correctly, the real one will appear
behind me. I’m sure this is the setting, but unfortunately for them,
I’m one step ahead of them.
64 Instead of saying 特別 (tokubetsu, “special”), Ononoki says 特ロリ
(tokuloli) which Araragi runs with.

65
The characters for “loli” (ロリ) are included in the kanji for “special” (別).
66
Here, Araragi transforms 別 into ロリ in the phrases 別にいいです(betsuni
ii desu, “it doesn’t matter”) and 別格 (bekkaku, “extraordinary”).
203
“To think you’ve bought two Good Smile Company Nendoroids just
to surprise me… Well, the quality is such that it makes you think there
are two Shinobus, I won’t deny that.”
“The sales talk has gone for too long now, Devilish Big Brother.”
“Which is it?”
Saying that, I reached out with both my hands towards both the
figures—no matter how similar they look, there’s no way that they
could have reproduced how Shinobu’s skin feels.
That is, if I touch and see, I’ll be able to find the answer—really,
this is too easy that I feel I’m being teased.
Well, for a student who’s preparing for his entrance exams, this
has been a stimulating event—as it was fun for me, as a reward I might
even buy some of her favorite donuts.
And while thinking such generous thoughts, I struck my hand into
their one-piece dress from the back…
“Uhyauu!?”
“Uhyauu!?”
The both of them screamed at the same time.
“What?”
What?
Can a figure yell?
“How are you touching me, you idiot? Don’t rub my back!”
“How are you touching me, you idiot? Don’t rub my back!”
“Vampire Punch!”
“Vampire Punch!”
I received two vampire punches at the same time.
An uppercut to the jaw, which is one of the five vital points in the
human body, has a quite fatal destructive force by itself; to take two of
those punches is not a simple thing—unable to bear it, I was blown
back.
With minimal movement, Ononoki-chan moved out of the way as I
was blown back. Why are you moving away, you should support me as
I fall!
204
“Wha—what…?”
As I was rubbing my head and descending into total confusion, I
noticed that both figures were teary-eyed in battle mode, breathing
heavily and glaring at me.
It was not only the shout, but also the feeling under my two palms
right before that, and the spines that I felt through their skin!
“You got caught, didn’t you, Devilish Big Brother? The punch line
of the trick this time was that both are real.”
“As if someone could understand something like that!”
“She became two using her vampire powers.”
“Can she do something like that?!”
This vampire power, it’s just too powerful, isn’t it?
“Ka ka.”
“Ka ka.”
Maybe it was the disgraceful sight of me panicking—the two
Shinobus dropped their fighting stances and laughed together.
“It is a simple thing. If you are an iron-blooded, hot-blooded, cold-
blooded vampire like me.”
“It is a simple thing. If you are an iron-blooded, hot-blooded, cold-
blooded vampire like me.”
“A… Amazing.”
Hmmm… There’s nothing to do but admire her.
Wait, you can perform time-slips, you can multiply, though you say
it is a vampire power, right now you are not a vampire or anything.
If she can do all that, she could have used them in the problems we
faced… Why use it to play tricks?
Was she unwilling to use it or not…
“Ca—Can I also do something like that?”
“To have two of you, what sort of hell is that? Who wrote that sort
of a scene? Just die.”
While I was being scolded severely like that by Ononoki-chan (did
I say something so bad that I deserve to die for it?), the two Shinobus
205
changed the subject as a duo saying “by the way, you” “by the way,
you”—though it was as a duo, it was the exact same tone.
It seems like, in the near future, I will be feeling an inexpressible
and bottomless uneasiness.
“This… How do I go back to being one again?”
“This… How do I go back to being one again?”
“… So that’s the punch line.”
And so.
The little blond girl who is a very special existence to me; became
two—maybe the figure in your hands is also a real one who has become
unable to turn back.
206
THE STRAY SNAIL
HEROINE BOOK 2: HACHIKUJI MAYOI
29 October 2013
ART: HARITAMA HIROKI

207
Long, long ago, there lived a lost snail.
“I don’t have a home to go back to.

I want a home to go back to.”
The snail started on a long trip to find its home.
208
“I once used to reside in a stately mansion.
But that home is no longer there.
It is not there anywhere in this world.”
The snail knew that homes

do not last forever.
209
“Can’t I go back home.
I’ve done nothing but walk for a long time.
But I do not want to go back to that house at all.”
The snail knew that such homes also existed.
210
Strange houses and ruined mansions.
There were different kinds of homes.
But no matter how much it searched,

the snail couldn’t find its home.
211
“As you are a snail, isn’t what
you are carrying on your back
your home?”
“No, it is not like that.”
“The home I am searching for is a

place I can go back to.
A place where I feel reassured.
A place where I feel safe.
It is a happy place.”
212
“If that is the case, it is easy”
“From today, I am your home”
213
“When you want to be reassured”
“When you want to feel safe”
“When you want to be happy, come to me”
“I will always be looking forward to you coming back”
214
Though she did not find the home that she
was searching for, the snail found a family.
The End.
215
KAREN BRUSHING
HEROINE BOOK 7: FIRE SISTERS
8 July 2015
TRANSLATION: TRAUBEN SAFT
Brushing her teeth is a girl’s dedication, her daily ritual. But

something becoming a habit also means that you become oblivious to
changes. I, Araragi Karen, hadn’t been aware of that, not until that
day, that morning, and that time, when I felt it.
“Ow!”
“What is it, Karen-chan? My dear sister?”
My brother, hearing his sister’s scream, came rushing into the
bathroom. I pulled the toothbrush out of my mouth and explained
myself.
“I—It’s nothing! My back teeth don’t hurt at all. I don’t have a
cavity. So I don’t have to go to the dentist.”
“So your back teeth hurt, you have a cavity and have to go to the
dentist, huh…”
My brother looked at me compassionately.
To look at your sister with such sorrowful eyes…
217
“N—No! There’s no way I’m going! We don’t even know for sure
whether I have a cavity yet!”
“People with cavities always deny that they have them, for some
reason… Just face the reality. I mean, why is someone like you, who’s
brawling all the time, afraid of the dentist? Being punched in the face
is a lot more painful than a cavity, right?”
My brother was right, but, but this is just not something you can
rationalize.
If you don’t like something you don’t like it, and if you’re afraid of
something then you’re afraid of it. Dammit, how could I get a cavity
even though I brush my teeth every morning and evening? I feel like I
wasted some serious time and effort.
“Is that so… Well, if you really don’t want to go, then I’ll respect
that, as your brother.”
He shrugged, giving in.
Hm? What did he mean by that?
“You might be afraid of the dentist, but you’re not afraid of your
brother, right? I’ll examine you, so come with me.” my brother said,
grinning and turning his head beckoning me.
Wow, just as I’d expect of him! So reliable!
“OK, so undress your upper body and lie down on the bed.”
demanded my brother, equipping himself with a surgical mask and an
apron, just as he had taken me into his room.
What? Undress? Why would I have to do that when he’s not even
going to use a stethoscope?
“What are you saying, you moron. Spit and blood could fly out while
I’m examining your cavity. Your precious tracksuit could get dirty!”
“Oh, right! I see! Just as expected of my big bro, you’re so clever!”
Having heard that perfect explanation that left no room for any
further doubts, I quickly took my tracksuit, T-shirt and sports bra off
all at once and stretched out on the bed. I folded the pillow and used it
as a headrest.
However, this is still a bit embarrassing, after all…
218
Getting naked in front of my brother again…
“What are you talking about again, you moron. If you go to a real
dentist, they’ll take an X-ray. They won’t look at your naked body, but
right through you, down to your bones! If you think about that, what’s
the deal with exposing your upper body?”
He was right. I really had scales falling from my eyes.
I do get the feeling that maybe I should be wearing the apron he’s
wearing right now, and maybe it would’ve been better to be honest
with myself and go to a dentist rather than getting myself treated by
an amateur, but well, my big bro can’t do anything wrong!
… For some reason he was very smooth about that, but didn’t he
say something about blood flying out?
“Don’t worry. I’ve studied quite a bit about the oral cavity since the
last time I brushed your teeth.”
Why don’t you study for your entrance exams.
Even though you’re my brother, when you’re standing there beside
my bed, wearing a surgical mask, an apron and without a dental
license, your pervert level goes up significantly.
“Assistant!”
As the perverted quack snapped his fingers, a little girl in a white
lab coat appeared from somewhere. A little girl, about 6 years old. I
could see that she was blond from the few stray hairs peeking out from
behind the mask and cap she wore, but they otherwise made it
impossible to tell who she was at all. Quite unlike my brother, she
looked beautiful even with the mask on.
But hey, who even is that?
A stranger little girl in our house… She has to be quite the enfant
terrible!67
67
”Enfant terrible” (アンファンテリブル, anfan teriburu) is a French
expression (literally meaning “unruly child”) that originally refers to a child who
embarrasses his parents with candid remarks, but evolved to describe a
successful artist or creative “genius” who compromises his associates by acting
unconventionally or offensively.
219
“Don’t worry. This is my assistant I hired in exchange for three
French crullers.”
Now I’m worried! He hired this dental assistant for a shockingly
low wage which could be less than 300 yen, depending on the
circumstances!
The little girl, no, the assistant, silently pushed a cart in.
I couldn’t see very well lying down, but in the metal tray on top
were, unexpectedly, various dentist’s tools.
A dental mirror, a scraper, a pin set.
Also, some other tools I didn’t know the name of.
“Names? Those are surgical scissors, for example.”
“That sounds like a weapon already!”68
“You use it to cut the gums.”
“It’s a torturing tool, more or less!”
Ignoring my remarks, the assistant prepared different things
around the bed. She went about setting up electronic devices like an
ultrasonic scaler (the one that goes “screech”) a drill (the one that
goes “grrrrr”), surgical lights… Where on Earth had genuine medical
equipment like this been hiding around our house? It was almost as if
it were hidden inside of someone’s shadow.
There didn’t seem to be water-supplying equipment for gargling
after all, but in place of that, there was a wash bowl.
“You’re not going to pull out my teeth with things that look like
pliers, right?”
“Hmph. By the way, because ‘pulling teeth’ and ‘removing
stitches’ are homonyms in Japanese, the latter is referred to in a
slightly different way among dentists.” my brother said,
68 Koyomi uses a very technical term when referring to the tool, 歯肉剪刀
(shiniku sentou). Karen probably says that it sounds like a weapon because it
has 刀, the character for “sword” or “dagger” (among others), in it.
220
demonstrating knowledge that didn’t make it sound like he was
actually knowledgeable, but had just memorized something.69
“Well, I can’t tell you anything before I’ve had a look, but if I pull
out teeth I’m going to use an escalator, so it’s OK.”
“Escalator?”
Is that some kind of system like at the Tsuga-no-ki middle school
I’m going to, that lets you progress smoothly to high school? Does that
mean that you can pull out teeth just as smoothly?
“In Japanese, you write it ‘levver’. It’s something like a flathead
screwdriver.”
“So it’s just a screwdriver then!”
You read it as “lever”, normally!70
Don’t pull out your sister’s teeth using the lever principle!
“Really? Well, then I won’t pull your teeth. Even though I want to
aim for a complete cure while I’m at it anyway…”
Complete cure? Well, since he’s examining me anyway, I also want
to be cured completely, but…
“By the way, with ‘complete cure’ we mean a treatment with root
canal therapy. It’s a type of treatment where a thin needle is used to
scrape out the nerves from beneath the tooth’s roots.” muttered the
assistant in a strangely old-fashioned way.71
Technical dentist speech is so confusing!
“OK, open your mouth.”
“Aaah…”
69 The words used here in the original are 抜歯 (basshi, “pulling teeth”) and
抜糸 (basshi, “removing stitches”). In order to avoid confusion, the latter is also
pronounced batsuito.
70 This doesn’t make sense in English and other alphabetic languages,
where you can see how a word is written and pronounced when you look at it.
In Japanese, Koyomi wrongly pronounces the word 梃子 as teishi, when it is
really pronounced teko (which Karen points out).
71 When he brings up the “complete cure”, Koyomi uses the term 根治 (konji),
which means just that. Shinobu, however, subsequently says that 根治 is

actually an abbreviation for 根管治療 (konkan chiryou, “root canal therapy”).
221
I opened my mouth, doing as I was told.
Was I following my brother’s orders a bit too thoughtlessly?
“I said it before, but your teeth are really beautiful. If you look at
the backsides with a mirror, their beauty really stands out.”
I don’t get embarrassed easily, but even my sense of shame kicks
in when thinking of how the backsides of my teeth are being looked at
with a mirror. I have the feeling that, in a sense, having every part of
your mouth examined is even more embarrassing than exposing your
upper body…
“Hey, you have thirty-two teeth. Your third molars, they’re out, all
four of them.”
“Fhwat? Weally?”
I tilted my head, with my mouth still open.
I never stare at the inside of my mouth, so I hadn’t even realized
that.
“The third molars normally start coming out when you’re about
my age… But well, you’re growing fast here and there, I guess” my
brother said adoringly, softly stroking my breasts and continuing with
the examination. Wait, did my brother really just, without any
hesitation, grope his sister’s breasts?
“Speaking of which, the third molars are also called wisdom teeth.
Since you have already all four of them, aren’t you already a wise lady
for your age?”72
Being flattered like that made me feel better!
Because of that, I’m generously going to pretend the feeling of
having my breast groped was only my imagination.
“Assistant!”
The little girl, called upon by my brother, carelessly pulled at my
lips. Oh, my lips are turned inside out! Having the fingers of several
72 In Japan, wisdom teeth are generally called 親知らず (oyashirazu).
Directly translated, it means “[the teeth which] your parents don’t know about”.
222
people being stuffed into your mouth really feels like you’re being
messed around with.
Why do they seem to have some kind of telepathic connection,
these two?!
Really, who is this blond little girl?
Having not only my brother, but also a small girl of the same
gender tormenting me sets my alarm bells off. Because my chest is
out, they could see how fast my heart’s beating! Embarrassing! What
really may be embarrassing is that I’m exposing my chest in front of
a little girl I don’t even know, but…
“Wisdom teeth are hard to reach with a brush, so cavities can form
pretty quickly there. But yours are all grown out neatly, so it seems
like we don’t have to worry about that… Hmmm, Karen-chan, I can’t
find a single cavity on your back teeth, let alone your front teeth” said
my brother, after having fumbled around mercilessly in another
person’s mouth.
Eh? Really? I don’t have a cavity? Well, if that really was the case,
that’d be really good, but…
“From one to eight, they’re all As.”
Wait, teeth with cavities are called Cs, but you don’t really call teeth
without them As.
The amateur is exposing himself.
Hm, was it just a case of hypersensitivity, then?
I don’t know what kind of condition hypersensitivity is, but…
“Wait, wait, it’s too early to come to a conclusion already, Karen-
chan. Even if your teeth are fine, there could be a problem with your
gums.”
“My gums? So, you’re not going to use the surgical scissors you
talked about earlier, right?”
That really makes me shudder.
Having your gums cut open… I’d rather have my teeth pulled out…
“Sometimes, the gums swell up from the same bacteria that are
causing cavities. The gums are the flesh that holds the teeth, so
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normally, they are tight like this” said my brother, stroking my abs,
and then continued “and when they’re affected by the bacteria, they
swell up like this”, stroking my breasts.
He really groped them this time! And pretty firmly at that!
It had been hard to miss.
“Because of that, I’ll check your periodontal pockets. Assistant!”
Doesn’t he just want to say “assistant”…?
However, the little girl assistant, as if a reward of three donuts were
something very desirable, brought the medicine my brother had
silently requested.
Medicine? He’s going to use medicine? An amateur?
“Come on, it’s just wax. I’ll put it on your lips so that they don’t
get hurt.”
Is he going to do something that would hurt my lips? To his sister?
Without worrying about that, my brother spread the wax on my lips
with his little finger. Because he had scooped it up with his little finger,
he way he spread it felt really fetishistic.
“Assistant! No, no, not that, that’s the bone file.”
Don’t mistake something for a tool with that dangerous of a name!
You could understand each other just fine without words up to this
moment, why now?
However, the tool that was handed over to my brother instead
didn’t look very safe either… Well, most dentist tools are pointy.
“This is called a probe. It’s a tool that measures the depth of your
periodontal pockets. I’m going to check your gums by poking them
with the tip of this.”
Why does he say it like that…
Are you really going to poke at something that could be swollen up
with a sharp object like this?
“If it hurts, please scream.”
“You mean I should raise my right hand or something, right!?”
“Well then, I’ll start with the front teeth. Here we go.”
“Ah! Oh! A—A—Ah!”
224
I didn’t let out a scream, but weird sounds.
Having an unknown area—somewhere where nobody had ever
touched me, even deeper and further inside than the inside of my
mouth—poked at, made my delicate pride fall apart.
I’m being played with.
But, that feeling of having given up everything defenselessly…
doesn’t feel necessarily bad at all!
“Hmmm, I could get used to this…” my brother was also opening
up to some weird feelings… If it went on like this, an accident from the
past could repeat itself. Because there are three people (one of them a
little girl) and an assortment of special tools this time, it feels
significantly worse.
“I have to practice this for the day I’ll do this to a beloved person.”
Don’t use the mouth of your sister as something to practice on!
And don’t do this to a beloved person.
“Assistant, the cotton rolls, please. I’ll stuff those into Karen-
chan’s mouth.”
This time, my brother properly named what he wanted so the
assistant wouldn’t make a mistake again, but what is a cotton roll?
Don’t stuff some dubious stuff into my mouth, OK?
My heart had been fluttering, but cotton rolls were just those
cylinder-shaped pieces of cotton after all.73 Those things that you use
to create spaces inside of the mouth so that it becomes easier to
examine it. Having my lips pulled apart by the little girl assistant had
become pretty painful, so I was happy to have those.
“Fugou!”
The voice I let out this time wasn’t even weird, but just ugly… If
you just go by the words, you’d think of some wealthy guy, but if you
73 Sounds strange in English, but Koyomi first uses the term ロールワッテ
(rouru watte) here. Because watte is a foreign word (it comes from German,
meaning “cotton”), you don’t immediately know what it is in Japanese.
225
had five pieces of cotton stuffed in your mouth all at once, everyone
would react that way.74
That quack doctor (even though he’s a false doctor!)
Looking at myself in the mirror attached to the surgical light, I saw
my face was all deformed and it looked like I was being prepared for
some mysterious kind of role!
Then it came.
The pain that had been suppressed by being ogled and pricked by
my brother grew stronger again. At that pain that really felt like my
nerves were being scraped out directly, I threw my head back on reflex.
I spit out all the cotton.
“A—Are you OK, Karen-chan? Assistant, do we have a syringe or
anesthetics?”
Stop.
Stop that, please.
I was more afraid of being given an injection by an amateur than
being punched or having a cavity!
… However, directly piercing the part where it hurts and injecting
anesthetics… Dentists do some crazy stuff.
“Eye doctors do stuff like injecting something into the back of the
eyelid. Even someone like me, who desperately wants to lick
Hanekawa’s eyes, thinks that that’s a bit too much.”
“……”
I shivered, having come to know that there was someone in my
family that had the egregious, no, repugnant desire to lick his
classmate’s eyes.
That fact became a mental anesthesia for me, and I was able to
forget the pain for a moment.
74 The sound Karen makes here, ふごうっ (fugou) sounds like 富豪 (fugou,
“wealthy person”).
226
Having patients forget their pains… This false doctor could,
surprisingly, be a genius!
Well, among doctors without a license, there are people like Black
Jack, after all… You could even say that judging from her appearance,
that little girl assistant looks like Pinoko dragging along scrubs.75
“Is that so. Well, then I don’t have to inject you with anesthetics I
guess…”
My brother looked a bit disappointed saying that.
Wanting to give your sister an anesthetic injection is a pretty
disgusting desire in itself… Why should the main character fall apart
just because the series ended?
“Hey, I just wanted to see my sister, unable to properly close her
mouth due to the injection, having drool and leftover food dribble from
the sides of her mouth.”
“Oh, so that’s what it was! I’m relieved!”
“But there also seems to be nothing wrong with your periodontal
pockets… Your gums are just as tight as those abs.”
As if to compare them to the texture of my gums, my brother
caressed my muscles. You know, just because they’re abs that doesn’t
mean you can touch them, OK?
“Hmm, so maybe it was hypersensitivity after all. That’s a problem
in and of itself, but…”
Diagnosing me like that, my brother poked the back of my palate
with the scraper.
“Ah, ah” I said, reacting overly sensitively. No, I don’t know the
real definition, but that’s not what hypersensitivity means, right?
Don’t get addicted to poking around in your sister’s mouth with a
needle.
“OK, so then let’s end the treatment for now and just make some
provisions.” said my brother like a real dentist.
75 Black Jack is an anime that revolves around an unlicensed surgeon named
Black Jack healing other people while charging high fees. He has an assistant
named Pinoko.
227
But wait, does provision mean that he’s going to brush my teeth
again, like that one time? Is he going to brush them?
He chuckled. “Even more than that!”
Even more than that!?
“Karen-chan, unlike that day, I’m a dentist today. I’m not going
to just brush your teeth!”
How reliable! Even though you’re not a dentist today either! Even
though you’re the same big brother, just like that day!
“When it comes to cavities, taking precautions is important. I’ve
prepared not only a normal toothbrush, but also an electric one,
interdental brushes and even floss. I’m going to make your teeth
sparkle, distal to medial!”
I’m going to be made sparkly!
My brother tightened the thread of floss like some kind of killer…
Overflowing with the healthy courage of wanting to brush his sister’s
teeth.
No, that’s not healthy.
But… Since he’s brushing my teeth, isn’t it healthy after all?76
“OK, open your mouth wide! Stick your tongue out!”
“Aaah”
“The backside of a tongue really kinda looks like exposed
intestines…”
Is that what you say to someone who just stuck out her tongue?
He says that like he has seen exposed intestines before…
“Squishy-squishy”
Don’t touch exposed intestines with a thread of floss!
76 Another wordplay based on homonyms. It has been translated here as
“healthy courage” to help this part make some sense, but in Japanese, the
expression used is 軒昂なる気概 (kenkou naru kigai, “high-spirited courage”).
軒昂 (kenkou, “high-spirited”) and 健康 (kenkou, “health”) are pronounced the
same, so Karen is able to make a sneaky remark about her own narration here.
228
I get the feeling my tongue’s going to be cut off, even though I
didn’t even lie to anyone!
… It’s pulled out if you’re a liar, and it’s cut off for… sparrows when
they’ve eaten glue? Was that it?77
“Screechy-screechy”
“Fwont himifate founs hike fhis! (Don’t imitate sounds like this!)”
I remarked with an expression in parentheses like in a manga, but my
brother was fully occupied with cleaning the inside of my mouth. I
didn’t say anything else because I didn’t want to be a hindrance… But
that screeching made it sound like my teeth were being cut off with a
saw…
Entrusting him with the spaces between my teeth, even harder to
reach than their back side even for a real dentist… That ultimate
passiveness let a feeling bloom in my bosom, a feeling I’d never
savored before, a feeling without a name… Just when I was about to
drown in that feeling…
“Blurgh! Blurghgurhulh!”
I literally drowned.
I wasn’t able to tell what happened to me.
I was just as shocked as the first time I had been on the receiving
end of a power move from my master or just as confused as when that
conman did something to me.
How could I drown if I was on land? I was really confused, but once
I noticed it, it was clear what was happening to my body.
The little girl assistant at the side of the bed had, without me
noticing it, put a strange electric apparatus in my mouth and was
releasing a torrent of water from it.
“Three-way syringe.”
77
Karen is referring to the traditional fable of the Tongue-Cut Sparrow (舌切
り雀, shita-kiri suzume), where a kind old man helps an injured sparrow, but his
avaricious wife cuts off the bird’s tongue after discovering it ate some glue that
was meant to repair a ladder even though she had no intention of feeding it.
229
The little girl uttered, in a noble voice, the name of the device that
sounded like a move in a fantasy battle—no, I was the one with that
thing in her mouth.78
So that’s what it was! I didn’t know its name, but it’s that tool
which can shoot out water, mist and air! But even then, the torrent is
way too strong! No, too much!
Don’t shower my mouth with a stream of water so strong that it’s
affecting the narrative parts of the story!
Does that assistant dislike me? Could it be that she tried to pass
that dangerous-sounding thing earlier on purpose?
“Hah… My sister is lying on the bed, with a foaming mouth and
drowning… I feel like drowning in that sight myself…”
This time, my brother looked like he was drowning in a nameless
emotion (what a terrible reciprocal effect!), but he didn’t forget his
duties as a doctor (even if he’s not really one) and issued an order
towards the little assistant.
“Aspirator!”
Great, finally I’ll be freed from this torrent of water… Hey, hwaaah!
My tongue is being sucked at! She really is doing this on purpose, this
little girl! What does this assistant even assist my brother in!?
“Electric toothbrush!”
Uwaaah! An amount of rotations that could never be reproduced by
humans!
“Ultrasonic scaler!”
Nooo! My plaque is being removed by an orchestra of blackboard-
scratching sounds resonating relentlessly in my skull!
“Inter-dental brush!”
Ow! The spaces between my teeth are cleaned vigorously, like test
tubes in a laboratory!
78 In Japanese, Shinobu saying the name of the device is written with the
verb 口にする (kuchi ni suru, literally “to take inside one’s mouth”, meaning “to
say something”). That’s why Karen adds that last bit of the sentence.
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“Dental impression!”
Stop it! Don’t test how I put my teeth together… Hm, this one
doesn’t really hurt or itch…
I just bit on a dry, thin piece of paper.
But then, as if to mock my short moment of carelessness, that pain
overcame me for the third time. I spit out all the water in my mouth
that the aspirator hadn’t removed.
Spitting out all the water left in my mouth until nothing was left…
In what seemed like a funny turn of events with a bit of rhetoric mixed
in resulted in my brother, the little assistant and my upper body
completely drenched.
Good thing I took off my jersey.
There also was a feeling of satisfaction that I had been able to strike
back at the little assistant, who had tormented me so much. But a
strong pain that I couldn’t suppress with those feelings ran along the
insides of my mouth.
Not able to lie on my back anymore, I did a somersault. But even
then I couldn’t get over the pain, it just grew.
“What is this, you don’t have any cavities, right? Hm? Wait,
maybe…”
Wiping of the water I had spit on him with a towel, my brother did
a eureka pose, like a doctor who had found a hidden lesion.
He’s really exaggerating it.
“Karen-chan, I’ll inspect you one more time.”
“N—No. It hurts, it hurts, it hurts. I don’t want to anymore. I don’t
want to because it hurts.”
“It’s OK, I’ll just poke your cheek a little.”
Is he going to palpate from the outside of my cheek? Maybe that’ll
hurt too, but if he doesn’t touch my teeth directly, I could deal with it,
maybe.
“O—OK, then go ahead.”
It was already hard to keep still for the palpation, but the little
assistant grabbed my shoulder—me still being a bit dizzy from the
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somersault—and forcibly pushed me down on my back. This little girl
is really strong for some reason!
“So—Softly, OK? Poke me softly, OK?”
I was out of character regarding my choice of words, but I just
feared the pain that much. My brother, smiling at his poor sister like
that, said “Yeah, I’ll do it softly” and poked my cheek.
From the inside.
“Uwaaaaaaaaah!”
I let out a scream and, before noticing it, bit my brother’s finger.
I tasted my brother’s finger, but compared to the lightning bolt of
pain that had run alongside the inside of my cheek, it had been nothing
special.
My brother growled, holding back the pain. As if he were used to
being bitten (what kind of life is that?) he quickly pulled his finger
from my mouth.
“Wha—Whatwhatwhat? What did you do? Did you use your
fingernails? Are you going to examine my scraped-off mucosal cells
under a microscope?”
Being poked from the inside had been unexpected, but even then,
why does having your cheek poked hurt so much?
“Karen-chan. You don’t have cavities.”
My brother presented his examination results, licking his finger
like a swordmaster licks his blade. I’m sure he’s doing that in order to
ease the pain, but that finger was in my mouth until just now…
“N—No cavity? What is it then?”
“Mouth ulcer. An inflammation of the mouth mucosa. You’re one
of the Fire Sisters, after all.”
Mouth ulcer? Because I’m one of the Fire Sisters?
Isn’t that last bit unnecessary?
So that’s why it hurt when I bit on the paper!
They say mouth ulcers tend to form where you’re likely to bite!
Of course, it also hurt when I had the cotton put in—after all, I had
it pressed on the affected part pretty hard.
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As I was grasping the situation, the tension also went away.
It hurts just as much as a cavity, but looking into the future, it’s
not as bad at all! Maybe it’ll even heal naturally.
I was happy that I didn’t have to go to the dentist, but I couldn’t
help but think about the meaning of the farce that had been happening
in this room.
“You have to properly care for the inside of the mouth, not only the
teeth, gums and tongue.” said my attending doctor, as if to wrap
things up. But thinking about it, if it really is mouth ulcer, couldn’t he
have seen it without having to poke my cheek?
Well, I’ll take that pain as punishment for not taking care of my
mouth properly…
I wanted to get up, but the little assistant didn’t let me go, keeping
me pinned onto the bed.
Hm? Was there more?
“Of course. Even though it’s just a mouth ulcer, you shouldn’t
underestimate it. If germs get in, it could become worse. As a finishing
touch, I’m going to sterilize your mouth.” said my brother and took
out a small bottle of one-time use mouth wash. Alright, he wants me
to gargle with that. That’s where the wash bowl comes in.
Because he had been right about the mouth ulcer, I was going to
obey him and stretched out my hand, but he didn’t pass me the mini-
bottle.
“?”
“Hey hey, Karen-chan, I don’t think someone like you, who just
spit out water like some kind of magician earlier, can properly gargle.”
Hmm.
Feeling like I was being laughed at for not even being able to gargle
was upsetting, but looking at my drenched body, I can’t really argue
against that.
It’d be unseemly to drool all over the place despite not even having
been anesthetized. As someone with all her third molars—that is, her
wisdom teeth—out, I should bow my head.
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“But, what are you going to do then? Tell me, big bro.”
“There’s only one way. I’ll sterilize your mouth…”
My brother stylishly flipped open the mouth wash’s cap with his
thumb and drank up the liquid in one go.
No, he only stored it in his cheeks.
“… by mouth-to-mouth feeding.”
“Whew! I managed to get my immortality-infused saliva all over

Karen-chan’s oral cavity. With that, no matter if it’s cavities or mouth
ulcers, there’s no doubt it’ll completely heal, right Shinobu?”
“You siblings are affected by something way worse.”
234
TSUKIHI BRUSHING
HEROINE BOOK 7: FIRE SISTERS
8 July 2015
Brushing her hair is a girl’s dedication, her daily ritual. But something
becoming a habit also means that you become oblivious to changes. I,
Araragi Tsukihi, hadn’t been aware of that, not until that day, that
morning, and that time, when I felt it.
“Ow!”
“What is it, Tsukihi-chan? My dear sister?”
My brother, hearing his sister’s scream, came rushing into the
bathroom. I pulled the hairbrush out of my hair and explained myself.
“I stepped on my hair.”
I began.
“It’s already past my tips of my toes, so I guess I have to cut it
now.”
My brother had graduated from high school, and Nadeko-chan
seemed to be on her way to recovering as well, so there was no point
letting my hair grow out to wish for good luck for them. I felt like
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lopping it all off, nice and short this time. Maybe I could even style it
like Nadeko-chan.
It was still early in the morning, more than enough time to make a
reservation for today at a hair salon. I was actually quite a regular as
well, so I could probably get some leeway. I hadn’t done anything with
my hair except for a few trims to keep the ends neat, so I could use a
real styling at a beauty salon.
“So, brother.”
“Yes?”
“Give me back my 30000 yen.”
My brother stared at my outstretched hand, then began to turn
around as if the monumentally important fact that his precious sister
had stepped on her own hair were nothing but a trifling matter. My
brother, who had also incidentally been growing out his hair with no
less gusto than myself, took hold of my shoulders with a stern look.
“Tsukihi-chan, you should treat the money you lend someone,
even your own family, as if you’re never getting it back. Money is
precious, and you should never give it out if you’re not prepared to not
get it back.”
“Wow, such wise words! Coming from the person I lent money to!”
So that means I’m related to some piece of trash.
You could call this a tragedy in two acts.
“Fine, just give me 10000 back, at least. I need it for the beauty
salon.”
“Hmm, I see. So that means that, on the other hand, if you didn’t
need to go to the beauty salon, you wouldn’t need the 10000 back.”
“No it doesn’t mean that at all.”
“Alright, it’s settled.”
“Nothing’s settled until you settle that debt.”
Why are we even related?
And somehow he still has the nerve to lecture his sisters.
“You know, you’re starting to remind me of a certain scam artist,
borrowing money from girls in middle school and never returning it.”
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“Ugh…”
It looked like I’d hit a sore spot and a bitter smile stretched across
his face.
“Alright, I think I get it now. I’ll draft up a loan repayment plan to
have the 30000 back to you by the end of the month, so how about we
settle for me being your stylist and cutting your hair today, Tsukihi-
kun?”
“Why are you acting like I’m the one—”
Whatever.
I couldn’t really blame him because I had nothing on myself either,
but I’m just the type of person who hates not being able to do the
things I decide to do on the day I decide to do them. I’d decided to get
a haircut today, so I wanted it done today.
“More importantly, you know how to cut hair?”
“I didn’t think you’d underestimate me like this. Do you even know
who cut off Hanekawa’s braids?”
And now I wish I could have lived my life not knowing.
But I guess it could be interesting to see how it turns out since he
does have experience. And if I don’t like it, I’ll just charge him an
outrageous interest rate far beyond legal limits, then demand that he
pay immediately.
“OK then, show me what you’ve got.”
“No problem, I was just thinking that I needed to practice in case I
ever have another chance to cut Hanekawa’s hair.”
He just told me I was practice out loud.
And I’m not sure he should be practicing for something like that…
“So, I’m going to need you to take all your clothes from your waist
up off and sit down on this chair.”
He said, strapping a scissor holster around his waist the moment
we arrived at his room. What? Take all my clothes off? Why did he need
me to take my clothes off if he wasn’t going to make me change into
something else?
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“What are you saying, you moron. What’s baring your upper body
in comparison to how the hair stylist bares every facet of his personal
life chatting with his customers?”
“Ooh! I see! It all makes sense now! You’re smarter than you look!
Is that what you were expecting me to say?”
You’d better come up with a better explanation if you want your
sister to take all her clothes off from the waist up.
“The little bits of hair will fall into your kimono and make you all
itchy. I couldn’t bear to watch your delicate skin being prickled like
that. Any brother would want to protect his little sister.”
“Don’t you have a barber cape or something?”
Don’t tell me the guy who had more than ten different kinds of
scissors in his scissor holster, and kept his long bangs in place with a
clip like he was some ultra-chic stylist, didn’t even have a barber cape.
I’m not sure I should even call him a stylist, more like a crazier
Edward Scissorhands on the loose.
I always wore kimonos around the house, so it was difficult to only
take the top off. Looking in the mirror, I saw a psychopath holding a
pair of thinning shears and a middle school student wearing a kimono
with the top half pulled open. What sort of brave new world was this
supposed to be? It’s not like the series is allowed to go anywhere it
likes just because it’s finished.
“Assistant!”
As the perverted sham hair stylist snapped his fingers, a little girl
in a white lab coat appeared from somewhere. A little girl, about 6
years old. I could see that she was blond from the few stray hairs
peeking out from behind the mask and cap she wore, but they
otherwise made it impossible to tell who she was at all. But really, I
don’t care how cute you think the mask makes you look, why is a hair
stylist’s assistant wearing a mask and a cap?
That had me confused before I started wondering who she even
was.
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“Don’t worry. This is my assistant I hired in exchange for three
golden chocolate donuts.”
“I should be worried about her shockingly low wage which,
depending on the circumstances, could be less than 300 yen, but could
you explain to me first why your assistant is dressed like a dentist’s
assistant?”
“That’s because I didn’t really know what a hair stylist’s assistant
looks like, so I just had her use an old costume.”
“You don’t even know that? Go figure it out!”
“You can’t expect me to go into a hair salon! The people in there
are all so stylish, it’s scary!”
Here I was, about to let a sham hair stylist, one who had never been
inside an actual hair salon because he was afraid of how stylish the
people inside were, cut my hair. I suppose this is why people call me
rash.
“Well they say barbers also used to work as surgeons, so it makes
perfect sense for my assistant to be wearing a surgeon’s outfit.”
“I have no idea how you think that makes ‘perfect sense’ at all,
there’s only so far you can stretch the truth, you know.”
The little girl, no, the assistant, silently pushed a cart in.
I couldn’t see very well because of the angle, but looking in the
mirror, there was a plastic tray on the cart, and on that tray were all
sorts of brushes and hair dryers. They were the sort you might expect
to find in a genuine beauty salon; all the tools needed for a haircut
assembled in a single set.
“Not that I’ve learned how to use them and their names…”
“Ahem, could you stop making your customers worry any more
than they have to?”
Not that I wouldn’t be worried if he hadn’t said that.
In any case I was already as worried as I possibly could be about my
brother’s hair cutting skills, but as for his assistant, she seemed to
have dyed her own hair blond (probably) and was quickly and
efficiently going through all the necessary preparations. She went
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about setting up various pieces of equipment around the chair,
including a shampoo unit which even had its own backwash basin, as
well as the far infrared light beam hair curling apparatus, with the
fluency of a seasoned veteran. I wondered where exactly in my house
this entire beauty set had been hidden. It was almost as if it were
hidden inside of someone’s shadow.
“So, learning from my past mistakes, the shampoo unit’s all set up
here so if you feel like throwing up, you know where to go.”
“Why would I feel like throwing up during a haircut…?”
The assistant placed a few magazines on my lap as I began
trembling. Maybe she was just a thoughtful person, but it almost
seemed like she felt sorry for me. Like she was doing all she could for
me.
I didn’t really get what was going on, but I knew something was
bound to be off if this little girl was feeling sorry for me.
“Don’t worry, Tsukihi-chan. I really have no sense at all for what
a hair stylist is supposed to do, but I know I won’t have any of that
pesky common sense standing between me and the way I treat my
customers.”
“Don’t you think you should?”
“Now, allow me to shave you.”
Said my brother, ever the avant-garde intellectual, as he began to
lather some shaving cream in a bowl.
“Hehehe, did you know that legally, only actual barbers’ shops and
not beauty salons are allowed to give a customer a shave with shaving
cream?”
“Haa! I can’t believe you’d actually try to throw out some random
trivia everyone knows like you’re a genius!”
“I’ll make sure you don’t have a single bit of fuzz left on your silky-
smooth face!”
“Wouldn’t you just call that ‘hair’ normally?”
Don’t talk about a person’s face like a fruit.
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He might seem like an idiot from the things he said, but the way he
lathered the cream really was something. It looked like he could beat
a cup of matcha better than me from the way he was frothing up the
soapy water, and I was in the tea club.79
I knew what a face shaving was, but they didn’t do it at beauty
salons, so I was somewhat interested.
“You know, the way you lather the cream makes a difference in how
good the shave feels. So as a professional, I feel a duty to make sure
this cream is thoroughly beat and fluffy. The bubbles should foam up
until they’re at least as full as your breasts.”
He said as he checked the curvature of the bubbles against my bare
breasts with a practiced dexterity.
Wait, that means only people with little sisters can be barbers!
“Come on, you’re touching your sister’s boobs too much!”
“I feel like you’ve been saying more than ‘I’m platinum mad’
recently…”
“Well the only reason for that I can think of would be that you’re
touching my boobs too much.”
“That makes me sound like a baby who can’t quite wean.”
“Just let go already, or do I have to put you on a weaning diet?”
You better get those hands and their practiced dexterity off already.
How can you even call yourself a professional?
“I’ll put mustard all over my boobs.”
“I think that’d end worse for you than me… Just to be sure, you
don’t have anything on your face right, like makeup?”
“Nope, and on top of that I don’t have anything on my upper body
either.”
“Alright, we’re good.”
“What’s good? There’s nothing good about your little sister being
naked from the waist up.”
79
Matcha (抹茶, matcha) is finely ground powder of specially grown and
processed green tea leaves, and is used in traditional Japanese tea ceremonies.
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“Here we go.”
Anyway, my brother tied my hair up with a hairband then began
applying the shaving cream to my bare face. Ooh, this feels sort of
warm but really nice! I looked into the mirror to see myself appearing
more like I had grown a luscious beard like Santa Claus, instead of
having been shaved.
Ho! Ho! Ho!
“Your face looks like a death mask when it’s all white.”
“…”
Us two siblings didn’t always see things the same way, evidently.
“Now, I’ll take this safety razor and… Haa, haa, haa, haa, haa—”
The hand holding the safety razor began to tremble, making it seem
not very safe at all. Hey, wait a second, you’re not going to point a
sharp object at me with your hand shaking like that, are you?
“Worry not, sister. I’m just trembling with excitement.”
“As your sister, that makes me even more worried.”
“I can barely keep my heart from beating out of my chest with
excitement when I think of how I’m just seconds away from putting
this blade against my little sister’s delicate skin.”
“You better keep your heart right where it is. For the rest of your
life.”
“It’ll be fine, I’ve wielded a katana a hundred times longer than
this razor in battle.”
“Every word I hear from you just makes me more worried.”
“Here I come!”
I’d rather he didn’t come at me at all, but he did, wielding the blade
with a surprising, almost timid, tenderness.
So this would be my first time being shaved.
My whole body felt immersed in a floating sensation, like I was
lying on a bed of bubbles, along with a physical sense of unease at
having my skin caressed by a razor-sharp blade, and a nagging
apprehension at the thought of the delicate part of my body that was
my face being at the complete mercy of another person.
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“Haa, haa, haa, haa, haa…”
My brother’s breathing grew more and more intense as he watched
me, unable to move a muscle and trying to take the shallowest breaths
I could. You know what, I’ll let you touch my boobs, but please don’t
let this be the experience that awakens something even weirder in you,
alright?
I don’t think I was nearly skilled enough of a narrator to convey
this series of strange events, let alone my brother.
The experience of being shaved was “thrilling” in so many
different meanings, but in the end, possibly due to my brother’s
powers of self-control, I emerged unscathed.
“Well you never had much hair in the first place, missed a spot, you
still have some shaving cream on your forehead.”
He said, as he bent down close to my face, licking the cream off of
the spot on my forehead close to my hairline. He seemed as excited as
he would be licking the frosting from a cake off my face, except for the
fact that the “cream” he had been licking was soap bubbles.
“Bleh!”
He fell onto the shampoo unit.
Are you going to throw up?!
“Cough, cough… Whew, I thought I was going to die for a second.”
“What kind of barber thinks they’re going to die during a haircut?
Get it together, would you?”
“I was holding the razor in one hand and the shaving cream
container in the other, what was I supposed to do?”
“I guess.”
“How about this, Tsukihi-chan, cough, cough, do you want me to
shave the back of your neck too?”
“The coughing doesn’t exactly make that sound very appealing. I
don’t think I’m brave enough to have a blade on the back of my neck,
though.”
“Well that’s frustrating. I’ll just have to wait for the next time.”
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I prayed from the bottom of my heart that this would be the first
and last time.
I just hope Hanekawa-san firmly shuts him down… Although we’ll
have no idea who his next victim will be, then.
“Now then, Tsukihi-chan, let’s get started on what we’re really
here for. It’s time to cut that hair nice and short.”
My brother put the razor down on the cart, then unsheathed a pair
of scissors and a comb from his scissor belt in one nimble motion.
“So, how do you want it?”
He was going all the way with playing the part.
But unfortunately, no matter how hard he tried, all he looked like
was a bad attempt at being a psychotic hair stylist. It wasn’t even a
question of his acting ability, his long and unkempt hair made
anything he tried to say completely unconvincing.
“Hmm, how do I want it?”
I thought that cutting it short like Nadeko-chan might be nice, but
since I’d already grown it out this long, I may as well swing by a
different style on the way there. There was also the fact that if my
brother messed up while cutting my hair that short, it would be beyond
saving.
Alright, how about a lob then?
“A lob? What’s that? Something like twintails? I’m pretty particular
when it comes to twintails.”
It seemed like our sham hair stylist had mistaken “lob” as a short
form of “lobster”.
He wasn’t being “particular”, just particularly annoying right now.
“It’s halfway between leaving it long and a bob, so you know, put
it together and you get a lob.”
“Ah, I see.”
Said my brother without a hint of shame, as he put another
completely unnecessary hairclip in his hair almost flauntingly, likely
to hide his embarrassment at the sad misunderstanding he had no
excuse for.
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“My apologies. I’m not very familiar with all this hair stuff, I don’t
even know the difference between conditioner, shampoo and hair
treatment.”
“…”
I was finding it hard to continue watching his “I’m not really
interested in all that fashion stuff, I’ll have you know” shtick any
more.
And by the way, those are barely different things anymore, so
you’re not too far off the mark.
“So, give me a lob, and a light, fluffy perm after. Seems like you
have all those expensive tools for it.”
“It’s a misunderstanding! I mean, understood. ‘It’s a
misunderstanding!’ has been my go-to line this past year because of
all the times I’ve had to use it, so it’s the first thing that comes out of
my mouth whenever something happens.”
“What sort of series have we been in this whole time? We hit
eighteen volumes you know?”
Snip, snip snip—went the scissors. I had no idea how or where he
managed to get these tools, but all of his tools, like the safety razor he
had just been using, were top of the line.
So this sham hair stylist started cutting my hair right away,
without even washing it first… Not that I mind, I already washed it,
anyway.
Clip, clip.
His scissors went along, cutting a girl’s hair with barely a hint of
hesitation. This actually left a good impression, resolutely doing his
business fearing neither my hair, nor gods.
I honestly get quite annoyed with people asking me why I changed
my hairstyle, especially with how often I do change it, and if not that,
being thought of not as a woman of affairs, but a woman of many
affairs. But as a staunch opponent of the view that a girl’s hair is her
most important possession in this world, I liked my brother’s way of
thinking, “it’s getting long so it’s time to cut it.”
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I guess that’s what it means to have some experience under your
belt… Although I never actually knew Hanekawa-san when she still
had long hair. And now that I think of it, I remember hearing that my
brother’s girlfriend, Senjougahara-san, used to have long hair too.
“Hehehe ♪”
My brother was spinning the pair of scissors around and around in
the palm of his hand to the rhythm of a song he was humming. It
seemed like he was getting into the groove. Looking more carefully in
the mirror, I saw that he was spinning the scissors not by the finger
hole, but only around the finger brace.
Don’t do anything dangerous like that above someone’s head!
Putting that aside, the haircut itself went along incredibly
smoothly; what wasn’t so smooth, however, was the feeling of the bits
of my hair that fell onto my bare skin, which was a bit uncomfortable.
I can see how stripping down from the waist up avoided the problem
of the bits of hair getting all over the inside of my kimono, but it didn’t
do anything to help the fact that the hair would still get all over my
body.
It’s like he was looking out for the kimono more than me.
“What? Really? It’s itchy?”
“Don’t talk to me while you’re spinning those scissors around! I’ll
be more than itchy if you keep doing that!”
“I see. Assistant!”
Said my brother.
And as soon as I turned around, there was his assistant, the little
girl, sweeping up my hair with a broom. She may have been dressed
like a surgeon’s assistant, but there was something unmistakably like
a beauty salon assistant who excelled at her job in the fluid grace of
her every movement.
She might actually be really good at what she does.
She might actually be quite famous.
It was a complete mystery to me why someone with a reputation
like her would be working for my brother, but in any case, she took the
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tool our resident sham stylist had asked for from the cart and handed
it to him, just as requested. It was a convenient little neck duster.
“Brush, brush, brush.”
“Kyaa!”
Stop gently caressing my naked upper body with the brush! Stop
tickling me! This is just turning into some perverted play!
“Is it? It might be quite a hassle, but how about this? I’ll
painstakingly pick up each and every single hair from your bare skin
with my hands, one by one.”
“Kyaa, kyaa, kyaa! You’re grabbing me so tenderly now! It’s even
more like some play now! The difficulty’s going up, it’s hard mode
now.”
“All the sweat on your skin is making this so hard… Getting one of
my sisters to strip from the waist up might have been a mistake this
time.”
You’d think that’d be a mistake no matter the situation.
Has it ever worked out for you?
“You sure sweat a lot since you have a good metabolism, Tsukihi-
chan.”
“Most of this is nervous sweat, though.”
“Hmm? Let me see.”
“Could you not try to check the temperature of my sweat? Nervous
sweat doesn’t necessarily mean it’s colder, you know? And could you
stop putting your hand under my armpit to feel the difference in
temperature between the sweat and my body?”
“Hmm. Well we’ll leave removing the little bits of hair clinging to
your body for another time…”
My brother looked down at my hair that had fallen to the ground,
setting the discussion of what to do with the brother clinging to my
body for another time aside, as well.
His assistant was still working as hectically as before, but she could
hardly keep up, seeing as the hairs were long enough to reach past my
toes.
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“It almost feels like a waste to throw out all this luscious and
voluminous hair. There must be some way to reuse it.”
Maybe there is.
I never had to worry about this when I went to the beauty salon,
but someone might wonder if something had happened in our house
if they saw this much hair being thrown out in the garbage one day.
“Assistant, put all the hair you collect into a plastic bag and store
it for safekeeping. We’ll see later whether we can use it as pillow
stuffing.”
“Pillow stuffing?!”
“With this much hair, we might even be able to make a whole futon
out of it, not just a pillow. There are futons stuffed with goose down
and sheep’s wool, so why not human hair? It’ll be so soft you won’t
believe.”
“I think it’ll be so heavy I can’t sleep.”
“Or how about making another one of these neck dusters using
your hair? I’d be cleaning the hair off your body with a human hair
duster. Dusting off hair with hair, ladies and gentlemen, I do believe
we have created a perpetual motion machine.”
The spark of environmentally sustainable brilliance that had struck
my brother seemed to have cheered him up, and he continued cleaning
up the ends of my hair ever more rhythmically than before. He
switched between his numerous types of scissors, cheekily layering my
hair into a lob.
But at least at this rate it doesn’t seem like I’ll need to go get it cut
again at a hair salon tomorrow.
“Alright, on to the bangs.”
“Sure. They’ve actually grown out a bit longer than how Nadeko-
chan used to wear them, so they’re starting to merge with the sides,
so could you just cut it so it has a nice defined front?”
“… Now that you mention it, didn’t you slice off a bit of her bangs
a while ago?”
“What? Did I?”
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“How could you forget about that?”
My brother began to clean up my bangs using a comb and a hairclip,
with a look on his face as if he were threatening to slice off a bit of my
bangs. I was worried that he might do a straight across princess cut
style80 because that was his personal preference, but it seemed like the
style he had chosen would require quite a bit more delicate styling, like
the back.
“Hehehe, maybe I’ll cut it just long enough that it’ll get into your
eyes.”
“That’s as creative as you can get trying to annoy me?”
“Or I could curl your eyelashes so they always poke into your
eyes…”
“Don’t try something that advanced, please.”
“Just kidding, just kidding. I would never do something like that as
someone who loves eyeballs.”
“I’d prefer if you brushed it off as a joke for a different reason. You
can’t just joke about these sorts of things.”
“Where do you want the parting?”
“Hmm, I guess I’ll go with right.”
“OK, so about 70-30.”
That’s fine, but could you not say it like that?
So, continuing along, after he had finished touching up my bangs,
his assistant the little girl brought a square mirror around to my back,
her little feet tapping the ground with each step. Now I had a 360-
degree view of my hair through the large mirror. Woah, it might not
be professional quality but this was better than I expected. I was
secretly preparing myself for the possibility that I might have to go
through the “Hey, you cut this part too short! Could you just cut this
80
A princess cut (姫カット, hime katto) is a hairstyle consisting of straight,
usually cheek-length sidelocks and frontal fringe. As the name suggests, the
style is thought to have originated, or at least become common, in the Imperial
court during the Heian Period of Japanese history.
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part a bit shorter to balance it out?! Oh my gosh you cut it too short
again!” routine, but my brother was actually pretty good.
“From the angle I’m at, the two mirrors are forming an infinity
mirror and it’s like my little sister’s boobs are going off into infinity,
this is the best.”
“Can’t you just let me be impressed with you for once?”
“My bad, I shouldn’t have said that. I almost lost my precious
sister’s trust. Why don’t we do a scalp massage next to improve your
circulation? Let your brother massage your head and your breasts until
you’re all nice and loose.”
“You’re getting obsessed with my boobs again.”
Your precious sister doesn’t have any trust in you left to lose.
“You see, you have to massage the scalp softly with the balls of
your fingers, like this.”
“Could you not show me your scalp massage technique on my
boobs? How long are you going to be obsessed with my boobs for?”
Why are you so obsessed with my boobs in the first place? I thought
to myself, commenting on my own comment (although I suppose it
was better than an obsession with safety razors), I reminded my
brother of one thing, just in case he had forgotten.
“Don’t forget the light and fluffy perm. I want it a bit wavy, OK?”
“I knew exactly what you were going to say. I’ll put such an
amazing perm in your hair, every student at your school’s hair will
start coiling up into waves the moment they see you at the beginning
of your new term.”
“I don’t want it that curled. That wouldn’t even be light or fluffy
anymore if it started coiling up.”
“Alright, let’s see this machine.”
My brother rolled the far infrared light beam hair curling apparatus
over himself, without the help of his assistant. I could already see
where this was going the moment he started with his “stylist” act, but
I hoped that I was just mistaken.
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I had managed to avoid the expected outcome of a sloppy haircut,
there was no way something like him turning the dial on the far
infrared light beam hair curling apparatus the wrong way and setting
my hair on fire would happen.
“Oh no! I turned the dial on the far infrared light beam hair curling
apparatus the wrong way and set your hair on fire! ‘Cause you’re one
of the Fire Sisters, get it?!”
“You didn’t need to tell me the last part!”
Hot! Hot! Hot! Hot!
And this was where the shampoo unit that my brother had brought
to serve as nothing more than a vomit bowl, seeing as I didn’t need
my hair washed, proved to be useful in the most unexpected of ways.
He forcefully shoved my flaming head into the backwash basin and
pressed the showerhead right up against my scalp, soaking it in water,
then immediately got to work putting out the fire.
“Glug, grgggle, cough, I’m drowning I’m drowning I’m
drowning!”
“My bad, that was close. I almost drowned my little sister again.”
“ ‘Again’?! You did something like this before?!”
“It’s OK, it’s OK. Everything’s alright. Assistant, remove the
mirror.”
He ordered his assistant, not wasting a second after shutting off
the shower. Hey wait, let me see what the perm looks like before you
take the mirror away!
He was way too used to covering things up.
“Calm down, Tsukihi-chan. Don’t panic, and don’t get up. Stay in
exactly the same position you’re in now. I’m just going to wash your
hair to finish off the haircut. It should still be repairable.”
“R—Really…?”
Finishing off with a hair wash, I guess he was leaning towards the
barber shop treatment more than the beauty salon course. It seemed
more and more like he was actually clueless about hair salons and not
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just acting that way. No surprise considering that the shampoo unit
was set up to use with the face down instead of the face up…
“Are you sure it’s going to be OK? I don’t want to see you carrying
a 300 trillion-yen debt.”
“Well I’m sure you could do something about that debt if you
wanted to… And isn’t that way too much interest for a 30000-yen
loan? I don’t think you could rack up that much even with compound
interest.”
“So how are you going to repair it? Do you have some sort of fancy
shampoo?”
“You betcha. This stuff will get that burnt hair looking luscious and
flowing down to the cuticles. However, as you can see, I burnt both of
my hands when I was trying to put out the raging inferno on your
head, so because of that—”
He turned away looking despondently, and after looking around as
if searching for some other solution that nonetheless eluded him,
hung his shoulders weakly.
“I’ll have to wash your hair with my mouth.”
“Whew! I managed to get my immortality-infused saliva all over

Tsukihi-chan’s hair. With that, the damaged hair will be repaired and
there’s no doubt it’ll completely heal, right Shinobu?”
“I think her hair would have gone back to the way it was even
without your help…”
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KOYOMI HISTORY
MADOGATARI EXHIBITION PAMPHLET
27 November 2015
“Oh silly you, Araragi-kun. Are you studying history? Isn’t that nice.
I’m sure your personification of the unsightly beauty of pointless hard
work will be recorded for posterity.”
No holding back right from the beginning I see. Don’t you dare
record anything unsightly about me for posterity. But now that I think
about it, back when I first met Senjougahara Hitagi she was just like
this. And ever since then I’ve met so many different Senjougahara
Hitagis.
“Isn’t that nice. Actually, that’s wonderful. It’s important to look

back on the road you’ve been walking on to see how far you’ve come
every once in a while, Arasuji-san.”81
81 粗筋 (arasuji) means the plot or summary of a story that could be thought
of like a metaphorical “road”.
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That doesn’t mean you should talk about people like the road
you’ve been walking on. My name is Araragi. Don’t give me something
like “sorry, I was taking a nap”.82 Get yourself a good night’s sleep
Hachikuji, I’ll wake you up.
“What’s the problem Araragi-senpai? Leave that autobiography

you’ve been wanting to write to your loyal slave. There’s no one else
who can recount the tale of our beginning, how we took each other’s
hands and found true friendship in each other from the moment we
met with as great detail as yours truly.”
That wouldn’t be an autobiography if you wrote it… And don’t write
any lies about me, Kanbaru. I remember our “beginning” being quite
intense and rather unpleasant. Although we really did find true
friendship in each other afterwards. But could you please leave out the
part about taking each other’s hands.
“Koyomi-oniichan… Koyomi-oniichan. Do you still remember me?

It’s Nadeko.”
Of course… I still remember you. The things I did to Sengoku. The
things I didn’t do for Sengoku. The path of the snake that she went on.
There’s no way I can say that I never did any of that. And I can’t say
sorry anymore either.
“That’s exactly right. But you shouldn’t just be satisfied with

yourself because you learned your lesson, Araragi-kun. You have to
think about what could come next and apply it to whatever you face
from now on.”
That’s right. And I’m sure it is coming from you. Coming from
someone who could bravely walk towards their future all alone. But
Hanekawa, try to remember how it was back then every once in a
while.
82仮眠しました (kamin shimashita, “I was taking a nap”) sounds very similar

to Hachikuji’s usual gag 噛みました (kamimashita, “I stuttered”).
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“………”
… Aah, I know. I know. There’s no way I would forget you. The
wounds that you gave me… and the wounds that I gave you. Actually
I’d be in trouble if you forgot about me. Because you were the start of
it all, and the end of it all.
And then we’ll start again.

We keep coming and going like the seasons. We’ll keep walking
down our road while things unfold around us and we look to the future.
And we’ll keep turning the pages on our dazzlingly bright calendar.83
83 Araragi’s first name, 暦 (koyomi), means “calendar”.
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YOTSUGI STRESS
HEROINE BOOK 8: ONONOKI YOTSUGI
22 December 2015
“Unlimited Rulebook”
Ononoki Yotsugi said, as she unleashed whatever that move or
more like that brute force attack was called, blowing away half of the
monkey oddity that I, the Curse Cat and that little girl vampire were
barely holding our own against.
In other words, that Corpse Doll exterminyated the oddity that the
vampire and I were having so much trouble with, just like swatting a
fly. Ah—I guess just saying that would’ve been simpler, nyan?
Essentially, the two of us were saved from the brink of death by
that emotionless little girl, but I still had a little trouble wrapping my
head around it. Maybe it’s because I’m just stupid.
No, that’s nyot it.
The vampire looked just as out of it as me. I knyew that the two of
them weren’t on very good terms from the little bit of their
conversation I heard (I guess I’m more sensitive to what goes on
between people because I’m a cat), but regardless of that, it was
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written all over the vampire’s face that she nyever thought she’d see
the day when she’d be saved by that Corpse Doll.
In actuality.
She… didn’t really save us.
“That’s right. I was just doing my job.”
Ononoki Yotsugi said. That doll, or whatever she was, it was always
a mystery to me, said without batting an eye after driving off the
monkey oddity, wearing a raincoat, that seemed to be able to control
the rain.
I wasn’t sure whether the nyame she told us upon arriving was her
real nyame or nyot.
“I wasn’t planning at all to save you Curse Cat, or you mysterious
vampire.”
“Who are you calling ‘mysterious vampire’. You know who I am.
Just the other day, me, you and that girl who’s always lost, the three
of us teamed up on my lord.”
The Corpse Doll seemed completely unconcerned, simply turned
her head to the side and said, “Did we actually do that?”
“Well, like Oshino-oniichan always said, ‘People can only save
themselves’. Though I guess there aren’t actually any ‘people’ here.”
“…”
“…”
Right.
She could quote that Hawaiian shirt-wearing man all she wanted,
but right nyow there was only a Curse Cat oddity, a vampire oddity and
a Corpse Doll oddity here. I guess that monkey that ran off was also an
oddity, nyan.
“More importantly, like I just explained, mysterious vampire, we
should head for that park as soon as possible, that lolicon’s waiting for
us.”
If a lolicon was waiting there, I wouldn’t want to go that kind of
park nyo matter the reason, but I guess it was a code of some kind.
“Ka ka. Well then, sounds good.”
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The vampire said with a quiet nyod, then quickly left. I could tell
that there was something urgent going on, but how could she drag me
out here then leave without even saying thanks, and on top of that
leave me here alone with this emotionless girl, nyaa.
“… And we may as well get rid of that monkey too.”
That doesn’t sound very safe, nyan.
From what the vampire told me during our fight with the monkey,
it was an oddity that killed oddities; a specialist of sorts. It could
destroy a stray cat, or rather a stray oddity like me, on a whim if it felt
like it.
Even if her goal wasn’t to save us, that Corpse Doll had driven off
the raincoat monkey before it crushed us to pieces, so there’s nyo way
she would save us from the frying pan just to throw us into to the fire.
Please don’t, nyan.
“Curse Cats aren’t my area of expertise, so I’ll leave things where
they are… Good thing I wasn’t here with oneechan.”
“…”
“Hmm? What’s with the face? I said I’ll let you go this time, so
hurry up and get out of here. You seem like you’ve got a lot to deal
with anyway.”
“…”
I mean.
I guess I should be pretty happy that she just let me go. I am a little
angry being ignyored like that, but I really do have a lot to deal with
nyow.
Nyeither of us have time to deal with each other.
But there was still one thing that I wanted to ask this rather
professionyal oddity before leaving.
Maybe it’d be better to ask “Oshino-oniichan” or “oneechan” but
I ended up asking this familiar (a shikigami I think).
“… You don’t really seem stressed out do you.”
“Hmm?”
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“It seems like you never get stressed out or lost or conflicted about
anything. That must be nice. Do you just decide to do everything and
nyever regret any of it?”
I got that kind of impression watching her blow away half of the
monkey oddity. Nyot trying to save us, but with nyo hate towards the
monkey oddity either.
It seemed like she was just doing it because she decided to.
With a professionyal sense and businyess ethics.
Just like a proud professionyal straightening their tie before a long
day in the office.
Saying “It’s just business”.
I felt jealous of how she could cut off all of her emotions and just
act.
Actually.
I guess it’s nyot quite the same as being “jealous”.
Actually it’s completely different.
Like hell I’m feeling jealous.
I am those emotions, that stress.
I’m her innyocence.
Like a beautiful white kimonyo, her stress.
“Actually, I guess I’ve never regretted anything before.”
The Corpse Doll replied right away.
But to me it just sounded like she was following the instruction
manyual, reading out of a manyual of all the answers to the questions
she imagined she’d be asked.
“In reality, it’s probably the same whether I’ve regretted anything
before or not. Emotions are just another tool to me. But I guess that’s
the same for humans too.”
“… Hmm? What do you mean?”
“By feeling stress that they aren’t really feeling or don’t have to
feel, humans play and the like, don’t they? To me they’re like tools of
my trade, and to humans they’re like tools to play with, but in the end
emotions are just tools.”
260
“… What’s this. Are you saying that humans need stress in order to
mature? Or that humans feel like they can keep going because of some
random stress?”
“Both yes and no. People always say ‘Other people’s sadness is
sweet like honey’. But really, a person’s own sadness is also sweet like
honey.”
Just like how when honey is too thick you get heartburn.
The Corpse Doll continyued just like she was reading words off a
page.
Being nyeither “other people” or “a person” herself, only just as a
corpse.
“So,” she reluctantly continyued.
“I feel sorry for your master from the bottom of my heart. She’s
had all the fun we call ‘stress’ stolen from her by you. Though, you
could call my sympathy more playing too.”
“… Hmm.”
That’s a pro for you. She knyew exactly what I wanted to say. She
saw through the question I was going to ask before I even really
understood what it meant.
I guess so.
You could say that my master feels quite guilty about pushing all of
her stress off onto me—an oddity that she created herself. But I don’t
think that my position is anything to be sad about at all.
We’re nyot pitiful.
In fact “The people you should pity are”, I said as I looked up at the
Corpse Doll.
But she had already disappeared.
Without a word of farewell, she had headed off to continyue her job.
It just showed with a sort of boredom, completely different from
the way that Hawaiian shirt guy hated goodbyes, just how little stress
I presented to her, even as a manifestation of stress itself.
She was an oddity that even a Curse Cat couldn’t curse. I wasn’t
even a threat to her.
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That Corpse Doll.
If humans are just supposed to play and being stressed out is
playing, I guess it makes sense that nyot feeling any stress at all is the
same as being dead.
Meaning that, you could say my master has come back to life nyow
that she’s begun to feel my presence.
The vampire to her “lord”.
The Corpse Doll to her “oneechan”.
The Curse Cat to her “master”.
The three oddities that had fought together for just a moment
ended their brief moment—in which they passed by each other—and
their brief misunderstanding, and each went their different ways each
for their own “bosses”.
The vampire for her bond.
The Corpse Doll for her work.
And then, what do I go for, nyan?
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Princess Beauty
HEROINE BOOK 3: OSHINO SHINOBU
19 December 2013
TRANSLATION: MIRRORED TRANSLATIONS
The following is a true story from six hundred years ago. However, I
would prefer you think of it as fiction. Why? It is too old a story to have
much measure of authenticity, and it has neither lessons nor morals—
I am sure such a story would be better taken as a lie.
Around six hundred years ago, in a country whose name has been
lost to time, there was a very beautiful girl. The only daughter of an
affluent noble, her portrait adorned the homes of every family in the
nation—there were none who did not know of her beauty.
Her smooth blond hair, her large eyes, her small head, her bright
red lips, her delicate neck, her gossamer skin, her fingers like slender
icefish, and her slender, long legs, flowing down from her thin, high
waist.
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Men and women, young and old, regardless of status were all
mesmerized. Simply for her beauty, she was honored with a title by
His Majesty the Emperor; the whole nation called her “Princess
Beauty”, and loved her. The rumors spread, and the citizens formed a
great line before her castle, trying to catch a glimpse of her. And so,
the rare charm of Princess Beauty far exceeding their expectations,
they brought her gifts. Day after day, the mountain of presents before
the castle grew larger.
The musician said, “I have made Your Highness’ beauty into a
song. Please accept it,” and played his violin.
The poet said, “I have made Your Highness’ beauty into a poem.
Please accept it,” and his voice resounded in recitation.
The artist said, “I have made Your Highness’ beauty into a
sculpture. Please accept it,” and carved a hundred statues.
But none of their gifts made the princess smile. In deep melancholy
she gazed at the mountain of presents, and yet, the way that sorrow
tinged her face was so beautiful that nobody noticed she was not
smiling.
“Nobody will look at me,” the princess lamented, alone in her
room. “They extol me as beautiful, beautiful, but they say nothing
more. They know nothing of what kind of person I am. They do not
know how I am on the inside.”
That was Princess Beauty’s distress.
Everyone, certainly, was charmed by her beauty. They praised her.
Above all else, they looked at her. However, they simply looked at her
outward appearance, and no matter what she did or what she said,
they paid no attention to her behavior or her actions.
Nobody knew how she was on the inside; nor did they try to learn.
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Whatever she did, whatever she said, they thought of nothing but
the phrase “Princess Beauty”. Whether she succeeded or failed,
whether she did right or wrong, their evaluation was always the same.
Whatever she did was beautiful. Beautiful asleep and beautiful awake.
“Princess Beauty” was the perfect name for her.
Is such beauty as that not rather devilish in nature?
“It hardly seems to matter whether or not I have a will of my own.
But I am not a slave to my appearance. This beauty with which I so
happened to be born has proved nothing but a nuisance. I want them
to see how I am on the inside, not just on the outside.”
To not rely on her own beauty.
An old witch who had lived in the country since ancient times was
moved by her magnificent strength of will.
She stole into the castle at night, originally simply curious about
the rumors she had heard; however, she decided to grant the princess’
wish.
“Princess Beauty. I will render your beauty transparent, such that
nobody will be able to see it. Instead, I will make it so everyone around
you can see your inner heart. From now on, it will be a matter of how
you are on the inside.”
The old witch chanted a spell and waved her wand, the princess’
gossamer skin became truly transparent.
“Thank you. Thank you.”
“Princess Beauty” was grateful from the bottom of her heart.
A heart now in plain sight of all.
Her exterior beauty cleared away, the princess’ exposed heart was
unparalleled in its beauty. Her true nature, which until then was
concealed by her resplendent appearance, had been made visible by
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the old witch—even while she remained inside the castle, its radiance
spread through all the corners of the nation.
Ashamed of never being able to see the utter beauty of his
daughter’s heart, the moment after saying his morning greetings, the
princess’ father jumped off the balcony to punish himself. Proud of
giving birth to a daughter of such magnificent disposition, as if in so
doing she had completed the role for which she had been born into the
world, the princess’ mother peacefully passed away after eating
breakfast.
The musician, believing Princess Beauty’s kindness to be
altogether inexpressible through song, instead offered her his most
precious belonging, more precious than his life—cutting off the hands
he used to play his instruments, he offered them to the princess as a
suitable gift. The poet, believing Princess Beauty’s wisdom to be
altogether inexpressible through poetry, instead offered her his most
precious belonging, more precious than his life—tearing out the
tongue he used to recite his poems, he offered it to the princess as a
suitable gift. The artist, believing Princess Beauty’s bravery to be
altogether inexpressible through sculpture, instead offered her his
most precious belonging, more precious than his life—gouging out the
eyes he used to inspect his materials, he offered them to the princess
as a suitable gift.
All the nation’s citizens burned the portraits of the princess which,
until then, they had treasured. They wondered why they had been so
dedicated to such a pointless decoration. More importantly, they
thought, look at the purity of “Princess Beauty”. Look at her
righteousness. Who could have imagined such a meritorious heart
existed in the world? Is that not true beauty?
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But not everyone owned things more precious than their lives. So,
reluctantly, begrudgingly, thinking that such trifles could never be
suitable for the princess, they offered her their lives. They offered up
their own lives, their relatives’ lives, their children’s lives, their
grandchildren’s lives. The mountain of gifts before the castle became
a mountain of corpses, and it did not take much time for it to grow
taller than the castle walls.
“Ah! Such tragedy! To think it would come to this!”
Despairing at the mountain of bodies and river of blood that had
been sacrificed for her sake, the princess went to the old witch to try
to lift the magic spell. But it was too late: the old witch was the very
first to behold the princess’ inner beauty, and had long since offered
up what was more precious to her than her life—the head in which she
had cultivated many long years’ worth of knowledge. The princess
broke down crying before the old witch’s severed head.
That pitiable form, that beautiful heart which sheds tears for
others, bewitched the nation more and more. They scrambled and
competed to offer the princess their lives, or what was more precious
than their lives. To console the princess, they threw their lives away
one after another, smiling all the while. They seemed so very happy to
be able to behold her beautiful heart without being deceived by her
appearance, and to die for her sake.
The ill repute of the growing mountain of corpses—or rather, the
castle of corpses—naturally became well-known in the imperial
capital and neighboring countries; however, whenever the latest
armies would come rushing in, they would succumb to Princess
Beauty’s power. Their preconceptions and prejudices swept away,
their hearts washed clean, happily and of their own desire, they
became part of the mountain of corpses.
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“Enough. Everyone is dying. Everyone is dying for me. I cannot
save any of them. The more I do, the more I speak, people die. I wish
only to die.”
But she was unable to die. The strength of her heart would not
permit it. She could not even go mad.
“In that case, go on a journey.”
The old witch’s severed head spoke. The tears the princess had
spilled caused a miracle. For just one moment, the old woman had
come back to life.
“Someday, you may be able to help those who die the sake of your
accursed beauty. Until then, distance yourself from people. Live alone,
and do not grow close with anyone. You mustn’t stay in one place for
too long. If you do, people will soon come to sacrifice their lives to
you.”
With that, the old woman breathed her last once again.
Thus, “Princess Beauty” departed the castle that had been stained
bright red with the color of blood and the great mountain of corpses
beside it, and set off on an unending journey. In order to prevent any
more people from dying, she followed the old witch’s curse-like
advice. It was a lonesome flight, one in which nobody could accompany
her. It was some time after this that she became a vampire, but these
were the circumstances in which the princess—Kiss-Shot Acerola-
Orion Heart-Under-Blade’s bloodstained, vampiric legend began.
And six hundred years later, for the first time, she
was able to save one tiny life that had been sacrificed
to her pure heart.
268
AS A HUMAN
KIZUMONOGATARI MOVIE VISUAL BOOK PART 2
13 January 2017
ART: SUZUKA ODA

At nearly the same time that my servant went off to fetch the braided
rations,84 as calmly as if they had only just missed each other, and as
suddenly as slipping through a gap, Guillotine Cutter made his
appearance.
“What is this? Were thou not to wait for us?”
“I was astonished—astonished with the foolish exchanges of a
demon and a human.”
So he said, and then as if thinking better, “though both were
demons”, and shrugged his shoulders.
Apparently he really was astonished.
“I suppose even the boy’s barrier is not something capable of
containing me at my full power, ka ka. Of course that is only natural.
84
三つ編みの携帯食 (mittsu ami no keitai shoku, “braided portable meal”) is
how Kiss-Shot calls Hanekawa at the time of Kizumonogatari.
269
So then, what hast thou come to do? Or, hast thou come to die?85 Thou
hast suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of my servant and were
utterly routed, were thou not?”
“I dare say as far as God is concerned, I was defeated; as far as
humans are concerned, I have not lost. Not to you. And not to you. Or
perhaps not to you. And while I’m at it, not to you.”86
Guillotine Cutter quickly drew close to me.
I like his fearlessness.
“Of course… Not to that child either.”
“… Dost thou intend revenge? Stop, stop, after all, ‘tis but a game.
That’s right. It is as thou hast said, it is not appropriate to decide
victory in this matter with such games.”
If I presume to say, Guillotine Cutter did lose to the boy.
I suppose Dramaturgy, Episode, and Guillotine Cutter were taken
in by the boy’s arrangements… Hmm.
Though I’m not one to talk about other people’s affairs. “People’s”
affairs.
“I’m not after something like revenge. It’s mere extermination. I’ll
be properly curing you; you monsters which will not even follow the
simple rules of this mere game.”
Rules? … Ah, I see.
This man, he is not astonished, he is truly angry.
Human emotions are difficult to understand.
“Wait just a bit longer, Guillotine Cutter. After that, in accordance
with this game’s rules, I shall return my servant to humanity. In doing
so, two demons will cease to exist at once; one shall die and one shall
become human. Surely that will please thee? Will that not accomplish
thine important mission? See reason and withdraw.”
85
She says 何をしに来た (nani wo shi ni kita) followed by 何を死にに来た
(nani wo shini ni kita), it’s a pun in Japanese but doesn’t really translate as one.
86
In order, he used あなた (anata, “you”), お前 (omae, “you”), きみ (kimi,
“you”) and 貴様 (kisama, “you”).
270
This vampire hunter should have entered into that sort of
agreement with the specialist. Otherwise, this would-be man of God
Guillotine Cutter has no reason to acknowledge defeat. He will not
withdraw from the battlefield.
“I won’t patiently wait, because nothing like that will be
happening. You won’t be returning that child to humanity like that,
such a thing isn’t possible.”
“Huh?”
I was reflexively annoyed with that scolding tone, but, no, what
was it he just said? I don’t really understand, although I get the feeling
I’ve just been insulted. Though, on the other hand, perhaps I’ve been
praised? I had those sorts of suspicions.
Surely—exchanges between a demon and a human.
If he’s saying that he has the impression it was the exchanges
between a demon and a demon…
“Art thou saying that I cannot be killed by him? Dost thou believe
that, as my servant’s master, I do not possess that level of ability?”
“No. You could surely be killed by anyone—by Dramaturgy-san, by
Episode-san, and by me as well. After all, you are someone who wishes
to die, ohime-sama.”
“…………”
“I am, that is to say that God is, saying87 that that child cannot kill
you. How is it that you say that this child who could not even kill me
will be able to kill you?”
That—was certainly a problem.
To kill the master who drank his blood—the sole method for a
demon to regain his humanity.
Betrayal, rebellion, revolution, insurrection.
Regardless of what is said, what could be done to enable that foolish
servant to do such a thing?
87
He uses the verb 宣う (notamau, “saying”), which is more like “saying with
hints of sarcasm or smugness”.
271
Is he capable of dominicide?
Because next time, I will be telling the person who saved me when
I was near death to kill me.
I tried to buy time in order to think up some way to ask during our
last conversation, but if this is only an aggravation to the vampire
hunters then this has become an extremely complicated situation.
“Leave.”
At any rate, I told Guillotine Cutter to leave. It was rather generous
of me.
“As thou hast surmised, I am in a good mood at the moment. Just
this once—no, for just this moment, I shall overlook this. Thou hast
shown the strength to snatch away mine arms when I had lost my
heart, and so I shall do so in respect of thy skills88—I do not care to do
it for the sake of the world. Nor do I do it for the sake of humans or
out of respect for God. Allow the Oddity Killer to continue on like this.
Leave this vampire who would destroy herself to her fate.”
“Destroy yourself? What you describe is not the same as suicide. If
you intend to die, please do so alone. Do not bring that child into this.”
The man who tried childishly winning the game without choosing
a strategy puts it well.
How sly.
That way of doing things, so that “no one gets hurt”, is a fine talent
for a pro. Even a child could understand that logic.
“Somehow or other, the moment has passed. Dost thou wish to die
alone?”
“There’s a good way to go about this.”
Ignoring my kind advice, Guillotine Cutter once again drew near.
88
She uses 手腕 (shuwan) here for her arms and for his skills; it means
“ability” or “power”, but she’s also using it as a pun for Guillotine Cutter having
stolen her abilities with her arms. The two kanji that make 手腕 are 手 (te, “hand”)
and 腕 (ude, “arm”) respectively – you stole my power (arms) so I will respect
yours.
272
Though it is a game, having lost to my servant, it is only natural
that he should have taken not only mental damage, but physical as
well. How resolute.
Knowing no fear—knowing no limits.
That he is the way that he is, I do not like it at all; quite to the
contrary—I despise it.
For I who refused to become a god, it is the complete opposite.
A good way?
“It would be best for me to be killed while seeking revenge against
you. If that happens, the child will kill you and auspiciously become a
human once again. If you do this, I can eliminate two vampires—it’s
a plan that will make everyone happy.”
“Huh? Why would my servant kill me if I kill thee?”
What reason could my servant have to get revenge for his hated
enemy?
Hast thou already forgotten what thou hast done to him?
“I won’t choose the method. As far as I’m concerned, even my life
is just another means. My life is the easiest tool to use; it is a blade
with which to pierce a demon.”
“Is that so? To the very end, thou art a man that I do not
understand.”
“You don’t need to understand because that child surely will.”
“I understand thee less and less. Thou art a man I do not
understand, a man I cannot understand. But, hmm, competing for all
these years with a man I doubly cannot understand has been—”
I nearly said fun. That was too close.
I withdrew the demon sword “Kokorowatari” from within my body.
It is a sword that can kill only demons, but he is practically like an
oddity himself.
We shall test the blade that pierces demons against the sword
which kills them, literally.
273
“Now, I shall go, Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade. The
iron-blooded, hot-blooded, cold-blooded vampire—the Oddity Killer.
Allow me to show my earnestness. Don’t hold anything back!”
“Let us make it a feast, Guillotine Cutter! Vampire hunter! Rejoice,
for I too shall show thee my earnestness as thou hast gone so far to
claim thy prize! I shall fly in the sky. I shall sink within shadows. I
shall become mist. I shall make myself disappear and I shall alter my
form. I shall use my insight. I shall materialize that which I need—eat
a full course! I shall hold none of this immortal body back!”
“Bon appétit!”
“Bon appétit!”
…… I do not intend to relate what happened afterwards.
I was victorious and he did not yield.
I was cut and he was broken.
I ate and he was not able to.
Until the very end, Guillotine Cutter was a man who I did not
understand, and he fought back until the moment he died—as a
human.
274
SOMETHING WRONG
13 January 2017
ART: HAJIME UEDA

“Ah, that’s good.”

“What is?”
As I let out a sigh of relief that I felt from the bottom of my heart,
Oshino-san asked,
“Having seen ‘that’, can you really feel that way? Having seen that
this sort of horrifying and terrible things exist in the world, can you
really say that you have no doubts? If that’s the case it’s—unusual.”
“…………”
It’s not as if I didn’t understand what he was saying.
Terrible things. The spectacle unfolding before us was terrible—
Araragi-kun has bitten the neck of Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-
Under-Blade.
The human is eating the demon. The demon is eating the demon.
The demon is eating the human.
Positioned in such a way that they appeared to be hugging, you
could say that they almost looked as if they were unifying to become
275
one, though in reality neither was the case—without either becoming
human, they both simply ceased to be demons.
“But isn’t this alright? After all it is the ‘bad end’ that you
suggested.”
“I’m at a loss, being told something like that as if it were obvious.
It wasn’t obvious; it was practical. I simply suggested a plan as a
professional. Even so, I’d intended to suggest other plans as well. Of
all of them, Araragi-kun picked the most uncertain one. It’s a bit
difficult for me to understand, frankly, but—as a pro it’s very
important that you don’t complain about your customer’s choices.”
It wasn’t as if I were trying to act tough and bad-mouth him.
Oshino-san probably really is confused by Araragi-kun’s decision,
and probably by Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade’s as
well—it is fairly difficult to understand.
I’m not in any position to decide how would be best to handle this
situation.
Even if I understood his feelings, I get the feeling that it wouldn’t
do any good. But if it were me, what would I do?
Not now, but earlier when there was still room to make a different
choice.
At the time that I went walking around faintly hoping that I might
run into a vampire, if I’d encountered one who’d had all four limbs
plucked off, what decision would I have made?
It’s not a question that seems like it’d lead to a pleasant conclusion.
Contrary to expectations, I might have promptly overlooked it…
I might’ve given up saying something like, “Well, it is the
providence of nature, so there’s nothing that can be done about it” as
I tossed away all of the stress that’s left a bad aftertaste in my mouth
all this time. I won’t even consider what might happen if some stray
cat were to eat that sort of illegally-dumped waste.
At the very least, the vampire that was near death, screaming and
crying, probably couldn’t even have been saved by kindness.
276
“I wonder what will become of Araragi-kun now,” Oshino-san said
in a cold tone.
“He made the choice not to exterminate a vampire—an enemy of
mankind. What will become of Araragi-kun now that he’s made that
choice. Won’t he just end up being abandoned by anyone and
everyone? Won’t everyone give up on him? Probably no one—will end
up helping him ever again.”
“…………”
They won’t help him; they’ll only lend their power.
People save themselves on their own—it seems that’s Oshino-
san’s motto.
But now, the topic at hand was Araragi-kun’s future.
A girl with no weight, a girl who’s lost, a girl who earnestly wishes,
a girl who’s a victim—Araragi-kun won’t be able to be saved by any
of them.
A girl, a girl, a girl, and a girl?
Who am I talking about anyway? Is it some sort of parable? Or a
metaphor?
Or maybe it’s Araragi-kun’s so-called “sort of thing you can see
through”.89
Right. Araragi-kun’s future as a person has been interrupted. With
a snap.
It seems that everyone will share the misery, and as expected the
one who will become most unhappy, without complaint, is Araragi-
kun—humanity has probably suffered the most harm and vampires
have taken the greatest loss, so why must Araragi-kun suffer the
greatest punishment?
Why, even though he’s done nothing wrong?
Even though he couldn’t have abandoned her.
Even though he couldn’t have given up on her.
89
The word used is 見透かす (misukasu) which means “to see through” in a
figurative sense, such as a person’s thoughts or motives.
277
Even though he only tried to help her—even though he wasn’t able
to help her.
“I don’t know what will happen to Araragi-kun from here on out,
but,”
I said, without a determined nuance.
I said it the same as I always do.
“I’ll do something. Somehow.”
“…… Something’s wrong with you,”
Oshino-san said as he returned his unlit cigarette to his mouth.
Did you know?
I don’t know everything, I only know what I know.
And that was something that I still didn’t know.
I might have something wrong with me. I might be in love.
278
AND THEN
13 January 2017
ART: AKIO WATANABE

Dramaturgy came to visit me almost exactly a year after that Spring

Break from hell. Dramaturgy—the vampire hunter who hunts his own
kind. Strictly speaking, it had been exactly 360 days since the night
that I fought with that muscular giant’s twin swords on the grounds
of Naoetsu High School.
It’s been a year, but it isn’t spring break, at least not for me, since
I’ve already graduated from that school.
It’s a series of events that I’ve gotten over a bit—though it mostly
just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
“It’s surprising to see that you’re still alive, boy,” he suddenly
greeted me.
Although, as I’d already decided that I’d never see him again if I
could help it, I was surprised by his sudden visit. Of course, even if it
weren’t sudden, like if we’d made an appointment to meet again a year
ago, having a giant man over two meters tall appear would probably
be surprising to anyone.
279
“Don’t take offense, I didn’t mean anything by it. It’s because you
seemed weak. I assumed that even if you managed to defeat the three
of us you’d probably commit suicide soon after, the same as Kiss-Shot
Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade’s first follower.”
“…… You say it as if I really did commit suicide… right away.”
I made that sort of bluff.
“So what? Since you aren’t dead, how would you feel if I said I came
to exterminate you?”
“No way. As a man important to Hanekawa Tsubasa, I don’t plan
to get involved.”
What sort of reasoning is that anyway?
Do you not think you lost our fight a year ago fair and square or
something?
On inquiry, it seems that somehow or other this bodybuilder-like
specialist had quite a few chances to work together exterminating
oddities overseas with Hanekawa during the last year—I knew that
she’d been overseas “studying abroad” ever since midway through last
semester, but what on Earth has she really been up to all this time?
Seriously, what kind of person is she anyway?
Don’t just go on getting along with everyone—though I think that
part of Hanekawa probably has to do with why she helped me during
spring break last year. Going so far as to wish that the girl who saved
me despite my deplorable state wouldn’t help out one of my enemies
seems a bit, well, selfish…
“It is. ‘To help my enemy is not to turn against me.’ ”
“Who said that?”
“Hanekawa Tsubasa.”
“I wonder if that’s really something Hanekawa would say…”
“She didn’t actually put it that way.”
“That makes sense. She doesn’t usually use harsh expressions like
that.”
“She said, ‘If mew help myi enemyi, it’s not like yourr purr-pose
is to turn against mye.’ ”
280
“Eh? Black Hanekawa didn’t come out, did she?”
The cat that possessed Hanekawa during Golden Week should’ve
already passed on… But I suppose there are probably circumstances
that I don’t know about.
Eh, oh well. It’s tiring to think about it.
Since Dramaturgy isn’t squaring up to fight and hasn’t turned his
hands into twin flamberges, it seems he really hasn’t come to
exterminate me. Unlike Guillotine Cutter, this specialist isn’t the type
to use that sort of deception.
“Oh, I gave up on exterminating you. What I haven’t given up on is
scouting you. Do you have any interest in becoming a pro specialist?”
…… Wow, he actually asked me.
He asked me whether I’d become a vampire-killing vampire during
Spring Break as well.
Killing your own kind seems a bit unprincipled to me, but I suppose
it’s the right attitude for a pro specialist to take.
“Gaen Izuko is probably in the same situation as well, but my
organization is facing a shortage of manpower. In this world of
scientific understanding, even if the number of oddities doesn’t
decrease, the amount of oddity exterminations will. You’ll be a perfect
fit for the job if it keeps going that way. At any rate, the way you are
now, you’ll have a hard time finding honest work.”
It had been difficult to tell where to up to this point, but at some
point Dramaturgy’s gaze shifted so that it seemed that he was looking
(down), rather consistently, at my shadow.
A shadow that belongs to a vampire—and a shadow that a human
wouldn’t have.
“You’re not at an age where you’d believe something like ‘If you
believe in them, your dreams are sure to be realized’. Putting it
correctly, it should be ‘If you can’t believe in your dreams then they
will never be realized’—and you, having experienced that Spring
Break and the year that’s elapsed since then, seem not to be able to
believe in your own future.”
281
“I’ll pass.”
His invitation was like a bad joke, but I suppose he isn’t exactly the
wittiest guy.
Consequently, as I was being scouted a second time, I refused the
offer once again.
“Even if I were to become a specialist, as I am now I wouldn’t even
be a vampire who kills his own kind. Even if you say that I’m of the
same line as the former Oddity Killer, I won’t take on that name
myself. Otherwise, I could end up making enemies of humans and
oddities alike.”
“Heh, you’re afraid of that? You really are sensitive. ‘If mew help
myi enemyi, it’s not like yourr purr-pose is to turn against mye’—and
all.”
Don’t quote Hanekawa’s words.
It really takes away from this serious atmosphere when you meow
while talking…
“Though I am a vampire that kills his own kind, it’s not something
I’ve ever been ashamed of. It’s not my job to become the enemy of
demons or humans, if anything I believe it’s to become their ally—
helping both demons and humans.”
“Is that so? Well, our intentions might be the same. Even so,”
I thought a bit about how to phrase it, but there was no choice but
to put it frankly just as I thought it.
“I’m turning down your offer because I still believe in my future.”
“You’re a man who doesn’t mince words even when you should,
aren’t you, though that might be a negative in terms of finding
work.”90
“No, I’m not that fun of a guy.”
“Humph.”
90
Dramaturgy makes a pun with 就職 (shuushoku, “work”) and 修飾
(shuushoku, “modifying, decorating”) that doesn’t really translate without ruining
the flow of the dialogue, so it’s been paraphrased here rather than trying to force
it in.
282
With that, Dramaturgy turned to leave.
At any rate, even though he only turned to leave, because his body
was so big it seemed like I, being so much smaller, might be knocked
over by the wind pressure—well, that was a bit of an exaggeration.
“I’ll be withdrawing for today, I’ve got a flight to catch. Next I’ll be
going with Hanekawa Tsubasa to exterminate oddities in Singapore.”
Why am I getting the feeling that it’s like you’ve become
Hanekawa’s partner?
Seriously, what the hell has been happening this last year anyway?
What if Hanekawa ends up developing a fetish for muscular giants
because she’s been spending so much time with him—come to think
of it, didn’t she say something like she sold her brain, but did she really
mean she sold it to Dramaturgy……?
“While you’re believing in your prospects, keep thinking about
your future. You’re a man who’s important to Hanekawa Tsubasa, and
you’re a man who’s beaten me—so I’ll give you that courtesy.”91
Then, meowing as a farewell, Dramaturgy went to leave.
Meow isn’t a local phrase at all, but anyway, he went to return to
work, and to the battlefield.
From the time he arrived until the moment he left, even though I
was just standing in the same place, I felt as if I’d been left behind—
like I’d been left behind to live a normal, everyday life.
But the one who was actually leaving was probably me.
Ever since that Spring Break I’ve been running away; even now it’s
like I’m still running—that’s why I couldn’t accept Dramaturgy’s
invitation.
Although, if it’s only thinking about it, that should be OK.
If I only consider it people won’t die, and demons won’t die either.
91
The phrase Dramaturgy uses is 三顧の礼 (sanko no rei), which means for
someone of a higher societal standing to beg for something from or apologize to
a person of a lower standing. He’s essentially saying that though he is “better”
than Araragi, he’ll be “kind enough” to offer him praise for the time being in a
sarcastic sense.
283
At most the wounds would only ache—the fresh and old wounds
alike, oozing.
Even I won’t be 18 forever, it’s high time that I worry about my
future. I, who didn’t become an adult just because I graduated from
high school, turned my eyes towards my shadow, averted them, closed
them, and thought.
And then.
284
WHY
NISIO ISIN MATSURI 2016 SPECIAL FANBOOK
3 March 2017
KIZUMONOGATARI MOVIE COMPLETE GUIDEBOOK
29 November 2017
ART: OH! GREAT

Is it alright if I tell one occasionally?

It’s a collector of monster stories telling stories about monsters.92
It happened on the first day of spring break… Hmm, although, since
it’s been so long since I became an adult, I don’t really have much of
a concept of “spring break” myself, and as someone who’s never really
worked, the concept of spring break is even more foreign. And so, what
I mean is that it was the first day of spring break for a certain high
school student in that town that I aimlessly stopped at.
I saw something strange. It’s my job to see strange things.
92
The word used for “collector” is 蒐集家 (shuushuuka). Normally, one would
write collector as 収集家 (shuushuuka). The version used in the story implies
that the collecting is done either out of interest or for research rather than simply
gathering things up as the normal writing would imply. Also, the kanji used
contains 鬼 (oni, “demon”) as a radical, making it a bit of a visual pun.
285
You asked why it was a vampire? Well that’s only half-right. Why
was it the iron-blooded, hot-blooded, cold-blooded vampire? Well
now that’s half-justice, isn’t it?
What I saw was the image of the iron-blooded, hot-blooded, cold-
blooded vampire in the form of a young child, dragging the body of a
certain high schooler. She was dragging that dead-looking boy like he
was a giant turnip or something. Ever since I met Gaen-senpai back
when I was a college student, which is to say well before seeing this,
I’d had spiritual experiences that had piled up like a sacred mountain,
but, well, seeing as strange a sight as that was totally unprecedented.
It was obviously hard work. Well, it was probably more like torture
than work.
That certain high schooler had a small build, but even so it was
obvious that it was fairly hopeless, as it was beyond the little girl’s
strength—seemingly unconscious, it looked as though his skin might
be grated off as he was being pulled along the surface of the road.
All the same, the girl seemed to have no intention of parting with
that certain high schooler. Gripping to him like life itself, as if he were
a part of her own body, she continued to stubbornly drag him along.
I more or less understood what happened.
However, I hadn’t at all anticipated that it would turn out like
this—Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade, whose heart I’d
pulled out for the sake of fairness, would likely either beat the alliance
of vampire extermination experts made up of Dramaturgy, Episode,
and Guillotine Cutter or lose to them.
The outcome would either be a future where she lived or one where
she died.
But to think that there would be a future where she was
shamelessly saved by a mere high schooler while on the verge of death,
and then go as far as transforming herself into a child to survive.
Honestly, I can’t think that she’s a demon who wants to live when
she went as far as taking that form—if anything, I think she’s a demon
that wants to die.
286
For that reason I removed her heart, and for that reason this
situation came about.
Obviously, on principle I can’t make any concessions about the fact
that I tried to create a balance in the fight between a single vampire
and three vampire hunters, but seizing Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion
Heart-Under-Blade’s heart was also in order to balance her between
life and death.
The suicidal desire shut up in the right ventricle, the survival
instinct sealed within the left ventricle, the death wish confined to the
right atrium, and the metabolism lurking in the left atrium, I reset
them all to zero in one go.
I’d intended to free her from the hundreds of years’ worth of ties
that had built up within her chest—naturally, out of kindness. Or out
of pity.
If there’s anything I pay respect to, it’s time. And if there’s
anywhere I aim my hostility, that would be time as well. This
legendary vampire, this historical vampire, I’d wanted her to draw
conclusions based on the present—even so, why did it turn out like
this?
Why?
There’s no reason. There’s no way it should have happened.
A dude just passing through removed her heart, but it was a passing
high schooler that pierced it.
For the sake of her benefactor, awkwardly and unreasonably, she’s
shamelessly trying to live—as a result, not knowing how he would
feel, seeking distress rather than ease and humiliation over dignity
from the benefactor who saved a vampire while not knowing her true
nature.
Haha, how foolish. Though I am moved.
I’m not lying, I’m being serious.
I’m not making this up, I’m telling you a true story.
As evidence, I approached the vampire dragging along a certain
high schooler—approached her and said.
287
Not in order to help her, but to keep things moving along.
Not so that she’d keep living, but so that she’d keep dying.
Not in order to exterminate her.
In order to cut off her retreat.
“Are you being chased, Heart-Under-Blade? If you are, I know of a
good place to hide.”
It’d be nice if, at least once, something nice could happen in her old
age for this princess who never lost her heart, even now when she’s
lost her heart.93
It’d be nice for her to face death without regrets.
93
For the first instance of “heart”, he says 心 (kokoro) which means “heart”
in a metaphorical sense (like “from the bottom of my heart”, “broke my heart”,
etc.). The second “heart” is 心臓 (shinzou), the actual organ itself.
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WITH CAUTION
KIZUMONOGATARI MOVIE COMPLETE GUIDEBOOK
29 November 2017
ART: SHAFT
TRANSLATION: NYOREM
A young boy with a white uniform and the left leg of a woman on his
shoulders states:
“At first, I wondered how it would turn out, but in the end, with
our combined effort, it went surprisingly well.”
A giant man holding the right leg of a woman says in response:
“It is not like that. We cornered her, but we let her go. We, as a
group, should rather feel ashamed.”
The next one to speak was a man with a spiky hairstyle, holding
the left and right arms of a woman as if they were shaking their hands.
“As always, I am the harsh one. I would not go as far as to say that
I’m modest but I get what you mean. But even then, I prefer to think
it was a success.”
The half-vampire, Episode.
The vampire that hunts his own kind, Dramaturgy.
The man that considers himself a god, Guillotine Cutter.
That is a conversation between specialists with three different
mentalities. The first one fights for his own self-interest, the second
289
one for work and the third one thinks it is his fate. This conversation
happens just after the iron-blooded, hot-blooded, cold-blooded
vampire, Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade, flew away.
She managed to escape from the hunters, but as you know, they
still snatched away her four limbs. It was already too late to kill her…
It was too late.
“Already” is where the opinions diverge.
Episode was optimistic, Dramaturgy was pessimistic.
And Guillotine Cutter was objective.
“You prefer to think it was a success. To be honest, I think that the
weakest of us should have been sacrificed. And yet, here we are, the
three of us, safe.”
“Someone should have been sacrificed? Forgive my question but it
is the first time I am hearing that, mister Guillotine Cutter.”
“That’s something I was prepared to do. When we were fighting
Heart-Under-Blade, I did not want to have regrets.”
“This is so like you, Dramaturgy. And it is the same with you,
Episode… And obviously, I am similar too. Our biggest merit during
the fight was that we faced this immortal oddity-killer vampire and
that two of us could have died but did not.”
Guillotine Cutter calmly analyzed the reality of what happened, but
there seemed to be fear in his words. While reviewing the
accomplishments of the team, he seemed to be worried.
“What are you saying, mister? No one died during the fight, right?
Are you not pleased with that? Are you saying that Heart-Under-Blade
went easy on us?”
“I wouldn’t say that she went easy on us, but during the fight, she
seemed distracted. Like there was something wrong with her body.”
“Something wrong? Like she lost her heart?”
Dramaturgy was obviously joking but Guillotine Cutter, instead of
refuting the argument, said that it was “a possibility”.
“I don’t understand. If it’s true that Heart-Under-Blade was
distracted like you said, then it’s a good thing for us, right? If we kept
290
chasing after her, then we could have easily finished her. We could
have killed her without risking anything.”
“I don’t get what you are saying, Episode. Even if there was
something wrong with her body, she could have easily dodged our
surprise attack. And, if she found out that something was wrong when
she was escaping, the situation would have been drastically different.”
“We tore off each one of her limbs. If something was indeed wrong
with Heart-Under-Blade, then surely, we couldn’t have defeated her,
right?”
Dramaturgy was more cautious on Guillotine Cutter’s argument but
Episode’s fighting spirit was the same as usual.
“It’s so stupid.” said the half-vampire, in response to Guillotine
Cutter’s argument.
“There was something ‘empty’ about her. An emptiness that can’t
be filled, that has no sense. Something she could not find. Something
like a sheath that perfectly fits its sword.”
“It’s not something, it’s probably someone.”
Still standing, Guillotine Cutter continued, expressing a similar
opinion:
“It’s just that we were very careful in our preparation. Yes, very
careful… Let us not be distracted and get prepared for what’s next.”
“Yes, let’s proceed with caution.”
Dramaturgy summed up the situation. Then, the three hunters,
while holding on their trophies, faded out in the darkness of the night.
291
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KOIMONOGATARI BD/DVD VOL. 2
23 July 2014
And here again
294
295
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297
298
299
300
301
302
303
HITAGI DISH
BAKEMONOGATARI MANGA VOL. 1 SPECIAL EDITION
15 June 2018
TRANSLATION: NYOREM
“Oshino-san probably already said something like that, but crab is

delicious mainly because it is difficult to eat, right?”
Senjougahara Hitagi told me that just after having gained back her
weight from the oddity known as the Heavy Stone Crab. Well, it is kind
of her habit, having this kind of idle talk.
A conversation about crabs or more precisely on crab-free dishes.
“It’s easy to understand if you think about it. If nude photos of a
beautiful guy who normally wears thick clothes were to suddenly
appear, what would you do, Araragi-kun?”
“You’re asking me what I would do if I were to see such pictures? I
would report them of course. That is my duty as a good citizen.”
While I’m at it, even if photos of a fully-clothed guy undressing a
high school girl were to appear, I would also report them. Without
hesitation.
There is no way I would not.
305
“And when you shell a crab, put it in a plate and you feel that
something is bothering you, isn’t that similar?”
“I see what you mean. Considering it’s coming from you, I should
have seen this coming. Do you want me to praise you?”
“You should be careful of what you say.”
“Well, as crabs are not something that you commonly find on
dining tables, if it was me, I would have chosen another example like
the kind of crayfish you find in rivers. It would have been easier to
understand.”
“You have such sturdy eating habits. You should come to my place
and I’ll feed you three meals a day.”
“Am I dreaming or did you plan all of this from the beginning just
to invite me? If we were talking about mobile games and if there was
a gacha94 you can get with a 1% probability. If you were told that you
can get it on the first try with any character you want, then where do
you think is the difference?”
“It’s your example that is different!”
I said “from the beginning” but when “Hitagi Crab” was published,
the iPhone was not even announced.
In any case, it must have been amazing.
The time when there were no smartphones.
But I get it. When you buy a lottery ticket, it’s like you are “buying
your dreams”. You justify it by saying that you wasted money to put
an end to your unproductive life. But in reality, the true reason might
be elsewhere: lottery is interesting only because the probability of
winning is low.
It’s not that you want to win millions of yen, it’s the fact that the
odds of winning are one in millions.
It’s worth taking the challenge because it’s difficult.
94
ガチャ (gacha, “capsule toy”) are similar to loot boxes in free-to-play
mobile games, which are very popular in Japan.
306
You might say that the way bananas are designed makes them easy
to eat or that there is no reason for watermelons to have such thick
skins or to be full of seeds, but even if soft-shell crabs had shells, you
would still want to eat them.
I also feel that it’s the same kind of question that would have arisen
if there was no poison in fugu.95 If fugu was tetrodotoxin-free, would
it still be this rare, four-star fish?
But it’s not about the difficulty of the task either. In recent gacha
games, you often have moments when you want to say something like
“I don’t know why but I know that I can get out of this situation!”
which seems to be the kind of thing that the protagonist of a shonen
manga would say. If you think about it, then it is clear that the
situation is far from hopeless. When you say that something is difficult
to eat, take into consideration that eating iron is also difficult to eat
and that it can even kill you.
“When you find something that looks delicious, even if it is
difficult, try not to eat it. When you eat something that is difficult to
eat, you are able to truly appreciate its flavor. For me, that is an
important precision. Nevertheless, I cannot deny that the tastier
something is, the more difficult it is to obtain. That is what people call
‘high class food’. It’s also strange that you tend to forget the value of
the food you are used to. Getting back to Oshino, he is a clumsy guy,
so it’s kind of normal for him to say things like ‘I really hate crabs’.”
“Oshino-san is for sure not good at eating so it would have been
unexpected that he could have enjoyed a tasty crab. People are
rewarded when, after having so many troubles, they finally succeed,
that is, in shelling crabs.”
Senjougahara answered before continuing.
“If you aren’t rewarded after having so much trouble, then you
learned nothing. But still, you should not give up so easily. See, you
95
フグ (fugu) is a pufferfish that can be lethally poisonous due to the
tetrodotoxin contained in its body.
307
too, Araragi-kun, you became friends with a difficult woman like me.
Shouldn’t you feel blessed?”
“I want to say that but when you stapled the interior of my mouth,
I was sure that I could not forgive you. So now that I have, give me a
proper reward.”
You are not a difficult woman.
You are just bad at having a normal life.
That is why you also have memories that you should take care of.
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HITAGI HERMIT CRAB
17 August 2018
TRANSLATION: NYOREM
“Even though I said ‘Let’s eat crabs’, you won’t be quite able to eat all
of them in one bite. There exists a huge variety of crabs, you know.
The swimming crab, the queen crab, the red frog crab, the Echizen
crab, the snow crab, the heikegani,96 or the Chinese crab. There are
even soft-shell crabs, whose softness equals mine. Since you can even
eat the inside, you can say that it’s the king of crabs but not quite the
red king crab.”97
Senjougahara said this with her usual, flat, monotonous tone, so I
thought that she wanted me to answer something. Without
particularly thinking, I wanted to say something like “But the red king
crab is not a crab, isn’t it?”. And just at this moment.
96
平家蟹 (heikegani, “Heike crab”) is a species of crab with a shell that bears
a pattern resembling an angry human face. They're locally believed to be the
reincarnations of the Heike warriors defeated at the Battle of Dan-no-ura as told
in The Tale of the Heike.
97
The red king crab is another species of crab.
309
“Ah?”
She looked at me for a second time. Like she was looking at
something dirty.
You can make this kind of facial expression?!
“Soft-shell crabs are not a species but rather a condition, an illness,
right?”
I said that, but in reality I wanted to comment on her alleged
“softness”.
“If they are not crabs, then what are these things?”
The way she said “things” is the same way you speak about an old
acquaintance who betrayed you.
“The red king crab is a hermit crab… You really didn’t know that?”
“I don’t know everything. I just know about crab soups.”
“Let’s not deviate too much, will you?”
Nevertheless, did she really not know? Damn it, it seems I stepped
on a landmine, or more precisely I should say that I fell in a hole
created by the lack of knowledge.
But that fact is something relatively known. I wouldn’t say that this
is part of general knowledge but I thought that it was a pretty famous
trivia. The kind of trivia you learn naturally when you waste time on
your smartphone.
“Sorry but I’m a normal high schooler. I adhere to the ‘I don’t touch
my smartphone after 9:00 pm’ rule. I even use a screen protection.”
“Don’t adhere to such rules so quickly. This is not the kind of thing
you should follow without thinking.”
“Even though Araragi-kun, you are always the one saying things
like ‘Paying bills is not something that is imposed on me in any way.
It is an investment in the future.’ ”
“You’re scary.”
“As for the name ‘red king crab’, looking only at its external
appearance, I would have said that it doesn’t look like a crab. Maybe
we need to consider it in a broader sense? You talked about a hermit
310
crab, right? Is it the kind that travels with its house on its back? I would
have found it more convincing if it was a cod.”
Well, it does indeed not look like a crab. In the same way that there
are octopuses with more than eight legs. When naming things, there
is no room for mistakes, even though I never named anything. There
are also cases when names are really close but mean completely
different things, like for “live sharksuckers” and “sharks”.
“You mean like the fact that dolphins and whales are of the same
species or the fact that the only difference between eagles and falcons
is the size. Am I wrong?”
“If you take the meaning of crustaceans to the letter, then yes, it is
the same thing. In reality the names we give to living things seem to
be random, but we give them names only for our convenience, to
differentiate them. When you find a still-unknown species, you pick a
temporary name that is not already taken, and then, after some time,
you wonder if changing its name is really worth it. I understand your
complaint, but in our world, this is how things are done. Rather than
being correct, rather than not making mistakes, correcting mistakes
is the most difficult thing to do, right?”
“Correct things must be ascertained.”98
I was about to take back what I said but, this proud like a devil high
school girl just checked my kanji usage. “Checked” or perhaps I should
say “verified”.99
“By the way, the kanji used to write ‘hermit crab’ kind of look like
the ones used to write ‘parasite’, right?”100
98
The verb “to correct” (正す, tadasu) is pronounced the same way as “to
ascertain” (糺す, tadasu).
99
The verb “to verify” is also pronounced the same but written differently
(質す, tadasu).
100
“Hermit crab” is written as 寄居虫 (yadokari) while “parasite” is written as
寄生虫 (kiseichuu).
311
I was about to take it back, I was about to take it back… I should
have done it and reoriented this conversation. It’s really difficult to
recognize our own mistakes.
Nonetheless, human society is based on a lot of misunderstandings.
I misunderstood a classmate, that is Senjougahara Hitagi, I
misunderstood a class president, that is Hanekawa Tsubasa, and I even
misunderstood a vampire, that is Oshino Shinobu.
And frankly, I also made mistakes on the true nature of oddities. If
I had identified more clearly the crab which took away Senjougahara
Hitagi’s weight, then maybe she would have avoided useless stress
causing her to lose some of her memories and to be this skinny.
“Who is this emaciated girl you’re talking about?”
“It’s not you and no need to use this sharp tongue of yours. As for
‘emaciated’, does this word really exist?”
“Farewell.”101
“What a comeback, something that only you could achieve with
such timing.”
“Good grief. I made a mistake. The fact that an admirable
Cinderella-like person like me made a mistake is unbelievable.”
“Well, seeing you as Cinderella is quite difficult for me.”
A misunderstanding that is not a misunderstanding.102
“This is not a mistake” is what I meant to say.
There are still misunderstandings that I have to ignore, even today.
I am afraid that after fixing things, chaos will ensue and I know
perfectly well that I won’t be able to fix things again.
I made mistakes… Sorry.
It is very hard for me to think that.
How comfortable it would be if only I could say it.
101
“Farewell” (然らば, saraba) and “emaciated” (さらばえる, sarabaeru)
start the same way in Japanese.
102
The first instance of “misunderstanding” is spelled correctly as 勘違う
(kanchigau). The second one is written 蟹違う (kanichigau), with the first
character having been replaced with 蟹 (kani, “crab”).
312
“The truth is it’s not the time to say goodbye, it’s the time to put
on airs and be rosy. Rosy not as in the name of the flower but as in its
smell. It’s the same with crabs. The red king crab is of course not a
crab but tastes like a crab, that’s what I understood. By the way,
Araragi-kun.”
“What do you want, Senjougahara?”
“Horseshoe crabs are crabs, right?”
“You want to eat horseshoe crabs?”
In that case, it is impossible to find such species even in Hokkaido,
so we have no option but to leave Japan. By the way, it’s true that crabs
are not part of the Chelicerata group103 but if you only look at the kanji,
then it is not that obvious.104 Even when making mistakes, this woman
does not give up. I had no choice but to accept my defeat.
“Tsk-tsk. Is this a joke on kabutos?”105
“Don’t misread only that part!”
103
Chelicerata is a subset of the anthropods and contains species such as
arachnids or sea spiders.
104
Chelicerata is written as 鋏角類 (kyoukakurui), with the kanji 鋏 (hasami,
“scissors”), 角 (tsuno, “horn”) and 類 (rui, “species”). Crabs seem to fit each one
of these characteristics.
105
In the previous sentence, “to accept my defeat” is written as 兜を脱ぐ
(kabuto o nugu, “to take off the kabuto”), where 兜 (kabuto) refers to the
traditional helmet worn by samurais. The same kanji is used in the word for
“horseshoe crab” (兜蟹, kabutogani).
313
SODACHI MIRROR
ZOKU OWARIMONOGATARI THEATER LEAFLET
10 November 2018
TRANSLATION: MIRRORED TRANSLATIONS
I hate mirrors. Every time I see one, I want to take a hammer and
mercilessly smash it to pieces. Three-sided mirrors, mirrors on
compact cases, full-length mirrors, houses of mirrors, endoscopes—
my heart strains with my desires to break them. I’d like to disassemble
a single-lens camera, smash the optical mirror, and reconstruct it as
a mirrorless camera. But the reason I don’t act on these desires is not
because I don’t carry a hammer around (well… I do, in a manner of
speaking); it’s because if you smash a mirror, all you do is multiply it
into so many little mirrors. Just like hatred. A while ago, I actually set
about testing how much I could hate a mirror; I used the pieces of a
mirror I really did smash up to make a kaleidoscope. Looking into it
was just awful. Like the worst kind of hatred. The broken mirrors
reflected each other in a timeless, infinite hellscape. That’s why, if you
want to destroy a mirror, you don’t smash it—you tear it off. You need
to peel it away from the other side of the glass, scratching it off,
scratching, scratching. Scratching, scratching, scratching. If you do
315
that, it will become beautifully transparent and clear. The other side is
the important side, and the other side is what I despise. I hate mirrors.
I hate other sides.
However, as a young mathematical genius, it’s my duty to prove
why I hate mirrors so much, right down to their other sides. Of course,
the reason is immediately apparent: it’s because mirrors reflect me.
Because when I look at one, I see myself. Because my eyes fix on my
eyes. When I look inside a kaleidoscope, an infinite number of my own
selves look back at me. Staring at my wounds—even in those
miraculous moments when I think my reflection looks cute. The more
I look, the more my mind is eroded, scratched off from the other side,
scratching, scratching, scratching. They say people’s reflections look
good to themselves, but conversely, that means that from the other
side’s perspective I look bad. I look like a hideous monster that ought
to be eliminated. So I’ve got to kill my reflection before it kills me. If I
don’t smash it before I get smashed, it will kill me from inside the
mirror. From the other side of the mirror. I’ll be shown for what I
really am. Proof complete—therefore, I hate mirrors.
Therefore, I hate myself.
Even so, I love myself more than I do Araragi.
316
MAYOI NAME
16 November 2018
TRANSLATION: NYOREM
“By the way, Kisaragi-san.”106

“How did you just call me? If you continue misreading my name,
we will have problems continuing this story. Hachikuji, you should not
make mistakes with the names of people you know. If you were to do
that in a short story of the special edition of a manga then people
would think that you are talking to a completely new character,
namely ‘Kisaragi-san’. Don’t make such a mistake again, please.”
“Sorry, I stuttered.”
“Don’t lie, that was on purpose.”
“I stutteted.”
“It wasn’t on purpose?!”
“It can’t be helped, I’m always misreading people’s names. What’s
important is that after making such a mistake, you should ask yourself
106
Kisaragi (如月) is the traditional Japanese name for February.
317
how to repair it. Do you want to make me look miserable? You don’t,
right? Furthermore, Kisaragi-san,107 you already made mistakes in
your life I suppose?”
“Repairing mistakes? You’re probably right. And don’t change the
kanji.”
“Kisaragi-san.”108
“That’s a character from another series.109 I don’t look like him at
all. Good grief. At the same time, I feel like it’s a miracle for the both
of us to still have this kind of exchange after ten years.”
“Nay, I’ve only started to know about you today. So please don’t
feel anything special because I hate you... Humm? What was it?
Minazuki-san?”110
“Don’t start changing the month! And Minazuki? For someone like
me who enjoys life to its fullest, this is really incorrect.111 You’re really
bad, you’re making mistakes on two characters that don’t remotely
represent my personality. You probably should leave such things to
your mother.”
“You should not put away the things that annoy you. Are you really
enjoying your life? By the way, this is not Mother’s Day, so you should
probably apologize to your mother for what you said.”
“That is impossible too. Unfortunately, I’ve never apologized to my
mother.”
107
Still the traditional name for February, but with another spelling (更衣).
108
This time, Kisaragi is written as 飢皿木, with the characters 飢 (ki,
“hungry”), 皿 (sara, “plate”) and 木 (gi, “tree”). The gi character is the same as
the one in Araragi.
109
Kisaragi is a character appearing in the Densetsu Series, which is another
light novel series written by Nisio Isin.
110
Minazuki (水無月) is the traditional Japanese name for June.
111
Minazuki is written as 水無月 with the characters 水 (mizu, “water”), 無
(mu, “nothing”) and 月 (tsuki, “month”), so it”s literally “the month without water”.
Here, “enjoys” is written as 潤う (uruou) which also means “to get wet”.
318
“And you’re wondering why your popularity rating kept dropping
until this short story that comes with the special edition?”
“Well, rest assured! After graduating from high school, I will
become a rapper so that I can express my gratitude to my mother by
singing.”
“Your future plans are not quite reassuring. You’re the kind of son
that’s always stirring up trouble.”
“I’ll sing Carrying You.”112
“But the ending song of Castle in the Sky is not a rap song.”
“In reality, I tried apologizing to my mother a lot of times. But if
we compare it to the number of times my mother apologized to me,
then it’s really nothing. I would even say that it’s relatively zero.”
“What you’re saying is the worst. What’s this ‘nothing’? Your life
as a human, Shiwasu-san,113 is nothing.”
“More and more things are falling apart. At least, get the correct
number of kanji! And use ‘ki’ or ‘gi’ as the last character! I will say the
last ones so that we’re even: Fumizuki, Shimotsuki, Nagatsuki and
anmaki.”114
“But anmaki is not in the Japanese calendar, it’s a specialty of
Nagoya, isn’t it?”
“Calendar? I see. Since my first name is Koyomi,115 you took the
opportunity to call me with such names.”
“I don’t care about your first name, idiot! I would rather remember
the number pi or count the rocks around here.”
112
君をのせて (Kimi wo Nosete, “Carrying You”), by Azumi Inoue, is the
ending song of the Ghibli movie Castle in the Sky.
113
Shiwasu (師走) is the traditional Japanese name for December.
114
Fumizuki (文月), Shimotsuki (霜月) and Nagatsuki (長月) are the
traditional Japanese names for July, November and September respectively.
However, anmaki (あんまき) is a Japanese sweet made in Nagoya.
115
Koyomi (暦) means “calendar” in Japanese.
319
“Why are you so violent suddenly? Is it one of your new
personalities?”
“Rest assured. My name is Hachikuji Mayoi. My parents chose that
name, it’s important to me. What do you think about that, February-
san?”116
“I don’t understand, when you say ‘February-san’, are you
referring to me?”
“Oops, I leaked your secret middle name.”
“My name is not Araragi February Koyomi! And I’m not the kind of
person who has a middle name. If I had one, then I would not hesitate
to go to the tribunal asking for a name change. My name was given by
my grandfather.”
“You must cherish it in this case. Your dying grandfather used his
last strength to give you such a name.”
“Don’t make it look like a tragedy. My grandfather was also the
godfather of my two little sisters.”
“Their names were... Karen-san and Tsukihi-san, right? Because
of their big brother, they may have been disappointed with their too
simple names. Because they both have ‘fire’ in their first names.”117
“That’s true but you shouldn’t say it. You can but you really
shouldn’t. It’s not like they filed a lawsuit against me but we were
indeed on bad terms. I remember them saying things like ‘Koyomi,
you bastard, your name is more difficult to remember than the number
pi and our names are too different, as siblings I mean’.”
“Your little sisters became quite like you, Kisaragi-san.”
“You can say that, but in the end, they seem quite pleased with how
it turned out. They even call themselves the ‘Fire Sisters’.”
116
This time, it’s written in katakana with フェブラリー (feburarii).
117
The ka in “Karen” (火憐) and the hi in “Tsukihi” (月火) are both written with
the kanji 火 (“fire”).
320
“I see, then your grandfather must have some regrets I presume.
Because he gave you such a strange name, his grandchildren became
strange kids.”
“Don’t say that my little sisters are strange. They will torture you
to death.”
“Torture me to death? That’s the kind of retort a middle schooler
would say, don’t you think?”
“There were times when I was uncomfortable with my name,
wondering why I was given such a stupid name.”
“The right for someone to name his children. On one hand, it’s
truly a powerful privilege. On the other hand, I think that trying to do
fortune-telling based on the writing of one’s name is kind of
excessive. Even if the fortune-telling turns out really bad.”
“In the end, it can happen that, after receiving your name, you
realize that it’s not the one you wanted. But any complaint you might
have is worthless. Nevertheless, there is something that I truly want
to say.”
“OK, let’s hear it.”
“It’s better when you decide by yourself. I have reached the age of
discretion and thus I want to be known from now on as Araragi
February Koyomi.”
“Isn’t your name Kisaragi-san?”
321
SPECIAL THANKS
For their contributions in translating and proofreading the stories

CarmaChameleon, Eagle Translations, gerrettheferrett, Google
Translate, Haremless, Kavitha, Kizunever Scanlations, Mirrored
Translations, nyorem, Polaris Translations, Ryoukugan, Shurim’s
3AM Translations, SirusRiddler, Sssciencemancer, Tarable
Translations, trauben_saft
For providing me with raws or useful information

araragiumi, atollintercomsystems, Boosmahn, dreamcankles, Erigu,
Errnor, Gianfrar, ksgu, kyon_geass, MickJerdream, nyaaaan,
RdNetwork, regulus_corneas, saruhikofushimi, Simok123, Socuta,
Spazzo965, SSScentipede, The_Makster, thejonion, WaifuForLaifu
For gathering all these stories into a professional-looking volume

bluex
For being a wonderful community full of people I enjoy talking to

The /r/araragi subreddit and Discord server
For reading this book until the very end

You

Monogatari Series Short Stories Book - First Edition - Print Version

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Monogatari Series Short Stories Book - First Edition - Print Version

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maxdefolsch & bluex present

This translation project started in November 2015, when I

Monogatari Series Short Stories

So… what are these short stories?

What’s the chronological order?

What’s next for this project?

Usually I can easily see Senjougahara at school, but seldom do I have

TRANSLATION: POLARIS TRANSLATIONS

That Sunday, I was in my room at my wits’ end.

2 噛みました (kamimashita, “I bit”, implied “I bit my tongue”)

6 鶴の恩返し (tsuru no ongaeshi, “crane’s return of a favor”) is a story from

TRANSLATION: POLARIS TRANSLATIONS

TRANSLATION: EAGLE TRANSLATIONS

Sengoku said that she wanted me to teach her how to swim, so we

TRANSLATION: POLARIS TRANSLATIONS

That Sunday, instead of being woken up by my two little sisters Karen

TRANSLATION: KIZUNEVER SCANLATIONS

It seems like I had forgotten about what kind of personality Araragi

12 The Japanese word for “mother” (母) is pronounced haha.

14 A pair of monsters in Japanese folklore. Ashinaga (足長, “long legs”) has

word 文房具 (bunbougu, “stationery”) with 防 (bou, “defense”).

17 A novel written in 1682 detailing the numerous sexual exploits of a man

named Yonosuke in several short stories.

world” genre of Japanese prose.

CAT SIGN ASTROLOGY

ART: HAJIME UEDA

20 Hanekawa is playing off of the Japanese expression 一を聞いて十を知る

(sakushi, saku ni oboreru, “a schemer falls for his own schemes”).

(oboreru mono ha wara wo mo katsumu, “a drowning man will even grasp at

Innocence, innocence, fly away!23

Lucy Maud Montgomery is well known as the author of Anne of Green

25 Hachikuji quotes a slightly different version of the saying “A journey of a

26 Japanese, like many other languages, traditionally did not distinguish

opposed to the normal ぎ. See also the next note.

(unscientifically) thought to have calming effects in Japan and is marketed as

TRANSLATION: TRAUBEN SAFT

Senjougahara Hitagi had been deceiving. As for what she’d been

31 In Japanese, the term こっくりさん (kokkuri-san) is used here. It’s

Hai hai, hello to all readers of this Shonen Magazine

Michisada Igami Yes 68 points.

Hoka Kijikiri Yes Absent-minded.

Tsuuma Shuui Yes Vice-president.

Juudo Shuzawa Yes Always wants to teach

Ruise Sunahama No Day duty the next day.

Jiku Toune No “Icing”.

Suisen Toishima No Laughs easily.

Chouka Nagagutsu Yes Frivolous.

Roka Haga Yes Track Gamer.

Shimono Fukadou No Acts cute.

Tenko Fukuishi No Shy.

Shijima Fudou Yes Swimming Liar?

Hyoui Marizumi No Distrustful.

Meibi Mizaki No Art Artist spirit.

Shitsue Waritori No Practices kendo.

The name of the culprit is...

Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 is a book about a world in which

In the original text, Senjougahara misreads 華氏 (kashi, “Fahrenheit”) as

はな氏 (hana-shi, “Mr. Hana”).

An uncanny relationship formed by a quirk of fate43