Chapter 6: A Symbol of National Health (Second Half)

Part 3

The screen went black as Erika terminated the video feed, opting for the merciful anonymity of voice chat. The abyss was immediately replaced by Olivia’s static profile picture—a low-poly "Tentacle-chan" avatar wearing a cape that defied every known law of physics. Erika leaned back against her vanity, the loud, mechanical whine of her blow-dryer filling the room as she aimed the nozzle at her damp roots.

"Can you hear me?" Olivia’s voice crackled through the speakers, accompanied by the chaotic rustle of heavy fabric and the rhythmic, hollow thud-thud-thud of her hopping across her bedroom on her one good foot.

"I can hear you," Erika shouted over the roar of the dryer. "And I'm assuming you’re at least fifty-percent covered by now?"

"I'm in a towel! It’s a temporary toga!" Olivia chirped. On the other end, the groan of a wardrobe door echoed. "You know, Erika, I was just looking in the mirror. Being a girl is like having a character creator menu that never ends. Do I want to be 'Soft Pastels Library Girl' today? Or 'Vengeful Gothic Lace Queen'? The options are paralyzing. It’s too much power for one person."

Erika flicked the dryer off. The sudden silence in her room felt heavy, almost physical. "You’re rambling to avoid the subject again."

"I’m reflecting!" Olivia countered, her voice muffled as if she were pulling a shirt over her head. "I realized something while I was looking at my dresses. Back in the Old World, I was... well, I was kind of a jerk. I used to stand by the castle gates in full plate armor, screaming for my female party to hurry up. I didn't understand why they needed forty minutes to 'apply protective wards.' Now I realize those 'wards' involved intricate braiding and precisely winged eyeliner. I’ve been a toxic male party leader, Erika. I feel the weight of my past sins."

Erika rubbed her temples, her fingers catching on the drying patches of toner. "Olivia, please. No more Isekai metaphors. My brain is already at maximum capacity for the day."

There was a long pause on the line. The sound of hangers sliding across a metal bar—shhh-shhh-shhh—stopped abruptly.

"Erika," Olivia said, her voice dropping an octave, losing its manic, royal brightness. "Did she ever... you know. Mention him?"

Erika sat down on her bed, the sheets crisp and cool beneath her. She reached out and touched the perfectly fluffed pillow, as if checking its reality. "No. Not once. Just think about it. We’ve been friends with Sera since the first week of high school. I have her emergency contact info in my phone, and it’s always been her mother’s number. I honestly didn't think she had a brother."

"He looked so... solid," Olivia whispered. "Not like us. He looked like he actually lived in the real world. And the way he looked at her... it wasn't a 'Level 1' misunderstanding, was it?"

"No," Erika said, her gaze drifting to her vanity mirror. She caught her own reflection—her hair was a mess, and she still had a smudge of lotion on her cheek. "That was real resentment. And that word... Homewrecker... it’s a specific kind of poison. You don't throw that at your sister unless the house is already burnt to the ground."

"I want to ask her," Olivia said, a hint of her old impulsiveness returning. "I want to march over there, break down her door, and demand to know who we have to fight to fix this. My 'Hero Instinct' is screaming, Erika!"

"No," Erika snapped, her tone clinical. "Absolutely not. This isn't a quest, Olivia. This is family. We are her friends, which means we are the people she comes to when she wants to forget that part of her life. If we start digging, we're just more people she has to hide from."

Olivia let out a long, depressed sigh. Erika could hear her flopping onto her bed. "Girl feelings are so complex. In my past life, if a man called you a name, you challenged him to a duel in the mud. You’d punch each other, you’d bleed a little, you’d have a good cry, and then you’d be best friends by sunrise. Everything was solved with a hug and a pint of ale."

Erika closed her eyes, and for a split second, a vivid image flashed in her mind: two shirtless, muscular men covered in sludge, the sharp scent of rain and testosterone wafting in the wind as they reconciled in a dramatic, slow-motion downpour.

Suddenly, Erika realized her breathing had shifted. She was taking quick, shallow, rhythmic gulps of air.

Heff. Heff. Heff.

"Erika? Is that you?" Olivia’s voice was suspicious. "What is that sound? It sounds like... is your Pomeranian, Sakura, in the room with you? She sounds like she’s having a minor cardiac event."

Erika’s eyes snapped open. Her face flushed a deep, mottled scarlet. "Yes!" she barked, her voice an octave too high. "Yes, it’s... it’s Sakura. She’s very excited about... a tennis ball. Obviously."

"She sounds really close to the mic," Olivia noted. "Give her a pat for me."

"I am!" Erika hissed. She leaned toward the phone and let out a sharp, high-pitched, and entirely unconvincing, "Woof! Bark! Good girl, Sakura!"

She then cleared her throat so violently she nearly choked. “Anyway! I was just… analyzing your primitive theory. Even if it were true, the world is too domestic for mud‑fights now. The only thing we can do is wait. We have to be the ‘Normal’ she can return to.”

"Patiently waiting," Olivia grumbled. "The hardest quest of all. Fine. I'll be the 'Normal.' I'll just be 'Normal' in a very cute skirt. Goodnight, Erika."

"Goodnight, Olivia."

The line went dead. Erika buried her face in her hands, the silence of the room mocking her.

Part 4

The silence in Sera’s room wasn’t peaceful. It was the kind of silence that pressed against the ribs—thick, airless, and heavy, like a vacuum that had swallowed all the oxygen and left only the weight of the atmosphere behind.

She sat on the edge of her bed, her spine a perfectly vertical line, her hands folded in her lap with the unnatural stillness of a doll.

Bzzz. Bzzz-bzzz.

The vibration was dull, muffled by the duvet. Sera didn't move for several seconds, her eyes tracking the faint, rhythmic pulse of light emanating from under the fabric. Slowly, she reached out and pulled the phone into the moonlight.

Her gaze stayed fixed on the nightstand.

[1 New Message: IDIOT]

She tapped the screen. It was a sticker of Tentacle-chan wearing a comically oversized crown, slumped over a pile of spilled juice boxes with the caption: SLAY IT MY QUEEN. Sera stared at the glowing pixels. A ghost of a dry, hollow laugh touched her throat, but didn't quite make it out.

“You’re so silly, Olivia,” she whispered. Her voice sounded thin, like brittle glass.

She traced the edge of the crown on the screen. “Why can’t you just stay away?” she murmured, her chest tightening. “Don't you know how foolish it is to be near someone like me?”

She let the screen time out, the darkness rushing back in. The distraction was over. Her gaze drifted toward the nightstand.

The silver-plated frame sat there, propped against a stack of textbooks. She usually kept it turned toward the wall. Tonight, it faced her like a dare. Her hand lifted, slow and disconnected, tilting the frame into the light.

“Don’t worry, Squirt,” the ghost of his voice whispered, warm and easy, from a decade ago. “Big brothers can do anything. If you’re stuck, I’ve got you.”

The photo was ten years old—oversaturated and impossibly bright. Her mother was laughing; the man who had called himself her father stood steady behind her. And Ken—sixteen, lanky, and grinning—had his arm hooked around a gap-toothed, younger Sera.

“Homewrecker.”

The word didn't just echo; it vibrated in the marrow of her bones. It turned the joyful smiles in the photograph into a cruel, elaborate lie.

She remembered the way he’d ruffled her hair when she cried over a scraped knee, promising that everything could be fixed.

“I only did what was right,” she told the boy in the photo, her voice rising with a jagged, defensive edge. “I followed the evidence. That's what you taught me, wasn't it? Truth over everything.”

“Sera, stop.”

The memory of Ken's voice shifted—colder, sharper, echoing from the night the light in the house died.

“Put it away.”

Her breath hitched. She wasn’t a hero. She was just the remainder left behind after a cold, calculated subtraction.

“I'm just the girl who couldn't keep her mouth shut,” she breathed. “The girl who traded a family for a fact.”

A single, hot tear escaped, hitting the glass of the frame with a tiny, crystalline tink. Slowly, deliberately, Sera held the frame an inch above the dark wood.

Her fingers opened.

The metal hit the nightstand with a sharp, final crack—a gavel closing a case she’d already lost.

“You think you’re so righteous,” Ken’s voice spat in her mind. “You didn’t save anyone. You only destroyed this family so you could prove that you were right.”

Her composure finally suffered a total system failure. She pulled her knees to her chest and folded in on herself, collapsing onto the mattress. She didn’t scream. She just wept into her pillow, the fabric soaking up the evidence of her guilt.

“I followed the logic,” she breathed, voice cracking. “I just… I didn’t know the cost would be our family.”