Chapter 3: The Game Begins

“Alright, first roll.”
Mihiro clasped the two dice between both hands, shook them, and rolled them into the center of the board.
The result was 6 on the large die and 1 on the small die.

“Huh, that happens too. Then I’ll place a plush and move 5 spaces.”
Mihiro said proudly as she moved her piece forward.

“This isn’t very fun if no one moves. One step forward.”
The moment Yuta picked up his piece, a sharp pain shot through his head, and he felt as if he had heard something.
He must have stopped moving without realizing it, because Mihiro asked, “What’s wrong?” and the voice brought him back to himself.

“No, I just felt like I heard a voice. And there was a pain in my head… maybe I imagined it.”
Still feeling that strange sensation, he moved the piece he was holding.

After that, the voice and the pain continued to come intermittently, but he endured it and continued playing the game. Around the time both of them had gone about halfway around the board, something strange happened to the roll.

“Uh… what is this…?”
Mihiro managed to say in a trembling voice.

“My head…”
At the same time, Yuta clutched his head and began to groan in pain.
A grimace of agony streaked with cold sweat.
With trembling hands, he pressed against his face and head.
As if searching for a spot where the pain might ease, even a little.

Mihiro’s face had gone pale.
She was worried about Yuta’s condition, but something even stranger was happening.

The dice in Mihiro’s view both read “Die.”
They were the same dice they had been rolling again and again, ordinary six-sided dice that should have had numbers from 1 to 6.
And the faces visible to Mihiro also had the word “Die” written on them.

“Yuta, for now, let’s get you lying down. Do you want some medicine?”
Mihiro said in a trembling voice as she supported him and helped him over to bed.
She made him swallow some headache medicine with water, not even knowing whether it would work.

Listening to the sounds of Yuta in pain in bed, Mihiro stared at Ghost’s Sugoroku on the kotatsu.

According to Yuta, the owner of the antique shop apparently played this game once a week.
Even on the day Yuta bought it, he had been playing it.
But nothing must have happened.
If something had ever happened, it would be impossible to imagine him playing it once every week.

Mihiro formed a hypothesis.
But it was an absurd one.
So absurd that even she muttered, “No way…”

She didn’t even know how reliable a hypothesis based only on what she had heard would be.
There was a high chance it was off the mark.

But—if she was going to test it, the sooner the better.

Thinking this, Mihiro sat down in front of the board.