55: A World to Choose From

It felt like a distant memory, and yet oddly close—images began to play in Tom’s mind.
A familiar place bathed in soft afternoon light.
It looked just like the usual park they always stopped by after school.

His heart was pounding faster than usual.

“Okay, Rena… close your eyes.”

“Huh!?”

“I mean, I can’t do it if you’re staring at me like that.
I-it’s already awkward enough… our faces are gonna be really close.”

“R-right… that’s true.
It’s my first time too.
But Tom, are you sure we should do this here, on a park bench?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean… if someone sees us, they might get the wrong idea…”

Rena fidgeted, glancing away shyly.

“Y-you’re the one who said you wanted to try it!
You bought iced coffee from the stand and said we should drink it with one of those skinny straws!”

“That’s because… I accidentally got two straws, and I just thought… you know?
It’s kind of cute, like a couple straw?”

“‘Couple straw’—what even is that?”

“I mean, you and I… together…”

“Aaagh, this is impossible! Fine, let’s just drink it together and get it over with!
Then we can head home!”

***

In the stillness of that moment—like time had briefly stopped—they exchanged a bashful smile.

For Tom, it was a moment where his simple, youthful emotions as a student and the complicated feelings shaped by his long journey of memories intertwined.
He knew he’d never forget it.

And yet, something still clung to the back of his mind—an indistinct, lingering thought.

“My memories… they’re still fragmented.
But even so, I know what I have to do.
We’ve finally reached it, haven’t we? The starting point.”

Rena, looking at him with affection, suddenly shifted her gaze behind him.
She pointed gently at something floating nearby.

“…It’s very important. I want you to have it.”

Tom turned around.
Something red—like a piece of cloth—drifted gently in the air.
As soon as he saw it, a memory surfaced: something floating on the surface of that big pond.
He asked her without thinking.

“Rena… there’s something I’ve been wondering.
What was it that we dropped into that pond we used to play by?”

Her expression instantly softened—like a child again.

“Huh? It was my white rice ball plushie!
You tried to get it back for me, remember?”

Tom was surprised at how suddenly she spoke with such childlike innocence.
But he figured it was just another ripple of the library’s memory influence. He pressed further.

“Wait, wasn’t it your favorite red cape you dropped?”

“Huh? Hmm… maybe? Yeah, that sounds right!”

A strange sensation filled Tom’s body—as if countless versions of himself were all coexisting inside him.
His thoughts sharpened under the strange sway of the space around him, and every lingering doubt began to unravel.

He reached out, catching the floating piece of red fabric in his hands, and smiled.

“I think… this library is a place where you can choose.
From all the worlds that haven’t been decided yet. Don’t you think so, Rena?”

Rena’s expression shifted again—regaining that dignified presence.

“You’re exactly right. The paths ahead are limitless.
And within these books… lie infinite blank pages, just waiting to be written.”

Her voice had returned to that calm, wise tone—the “older Rena” once more.

Tom responded with renewed hope.

“Then let’s fill those pages with fun memories—so many that there won’t be any room left for anything else.”

“Tom… your priorities were the right ones.
Now, from here on… we open the door to a new world.”

In that moment, Rena extended her hand toward a grand, ornate mirror that had appeared in the air, its surface glowing with a magical radiance.
Ancient secrets and forbidden knowledge shimmered faintly beyond the glass.

“Mixx-404-xx… acknowledged.
Beginning link to the Eternal Mirror.”

As her words resonated, the mirror’s surface began to ripple.
A high-pitched tone rang through Tom’s ears, and then—a thread of light formed between Rena’s body and the mirror, as if binding their consciousness together.

—The one who can be entrusted now… is you, Tom Hawthorne.

A faint silhouette appeared in the mirror’s reflection.

As Rena’s voice echoed, it was joined by another—feminine, mysterious, as though carried from far away and reflected through the glass.
It rang with a sacred clarity, almost ethereal.