Chapter 0 - Joy of Cigarettes

The cigarette she held in her hand was nearly finished. She had only a two puffs left to complete her morning smoke. A question flickered through her mind:

"Why did I even start smoking so much?"

But just as quickly as the thought appeared, it vanished—after all, she had to hurry to her university in Kyoto. Today, they were finally discussing the Great Thermonuclear War. Just thinking about it made her take a deeper inhale and lean back more firmly against the fence near her apartment. After exhaling the smoke, the corners of her mouth turned up slightly—barely a millimeter.

"I really need to hurry," she muttered in a tired voice.

She pulled out her phone, and selecting the transport options in the "GLATRANS" app, she chose her university in Kyoto.

"It's a shame there's no job where you can make more than twenty dollars a day," she sighed again.

"One dollar for automated transport, one dollar for food, one dollar for a pack of cigarettes… pretty much everything costs a dollar. I wonder if people forty years ago had the same issues," she muttered wearily and sighed.

A moment after confirming payment, an automated transport machine from the "GLATRANS" company appeared around the corner. To her, it looked like a "flattened cube," or at least that was her impression. As it drew nearer, she took a closer look.

"There's no doubt," she thought, gazing at the large inscription "Mikomi Hinome" in the pseudonym field.

At that moment, she took the last puff from her cigarette—one final inhale, then exhale. She’d have to be content with her morning companion from the pack. Then, she stepped onto the "flattened cube," and just as quickly as it had appeared around the corner, it disappeared, now carrying Mikomi with it.

"I hope you all had a great time during this break and experienced unforgettable moments. Alright, let’s move on to our first lesson of our third year... wow, how quickly time flies, HAHA. Oh, not long ago, you were asking me for advice about job hunting and you were excited about earning money... ahh, I really enjoy working with you and I'm glad I can witness your growth."

The lecturer gave an even more sincere smile than before. To Mikomi, it seemed almost unreal for someone to have such an aura or to enjoy life as Mr. Kobayashi did. It was like a river without a bridge for her—she couldn't imagine being on the other side or even see the other bank, so she considered it something too distant for her imagination. As quickly as she thought about change, she dismissed it just as fast. "There's no need to change; this is good," she thought, which she felt best summarized her internal monologue. She simply sighed.

"Uh... Did something happen to you, sir?" a slightly confused male voice came from the first row.

It was... unfortunately, Mikomi couldn’t remember his name. She never talked to anyone in class except Hanae, although she probably wouldn’t even converse with her if Hanae didn’t engage her in frequent interactions. "Maybe I should remember his name?" this thought crossed Mikomi's mind, but she was more concerned about the situation.

Mr. Kobayashi had a tear on his cheek...

Chaos spread through the classroom; no one understood where it had come from.

"Sir! Are you okay? Please sit down, everything is alright?" It was Hanae, her face looking concerned, and her speaking pace was much faster than usual.

"Please don't worry about me, Miss Yuzuriha. I just hit my knee on the desk," Mr. Kobayashi replied calmly, then stood up.

Mikomi thought this was "quite strange." After all, when everyone was heading to their seats, she and Hanae were still standing by the entrance. She saw Mr. Kobayashi walking calmly to his desk. If he had hit his knee, she would definitely have heard it from that distance—unless it happened after she took her seat in the fourth row. But could she really have missed it? The room was quite spacious, and the sound should have carried. Moreover, the boy in the front row only asked Mr. Kobayashi about his tears once he saw them; if he was in the front row, he must have heard it. "I'm thinking too much about unnecessary things; I should focus on the class," she sighed. This thought was the last one she had before she heard...

"Please forgive me for my incompetence; I'll step out for 5 minutes to walk off my knee, and then we can continue our first lesson. So please stay here for a moment, and I'll be right back," he said with a somewhat faded smile before leaving the room with a slight limp.

In the room, various conversations began—some about what everyone did during the break, and ordinary greetings. Since Mikomi hadn’t talked to anyone, she simply listened to what others were saying. Her attention was drawn to two boys in the row ahead of her; sometimes she liked to listen to them, even though she didn’t know their names. She enjoyed their peaceful demeanor.

"What a loser that Eagle is, right?" the first one snickered.

"Yeah, and his 'forgive me, dear ones, for my incompetence'—how embarrassing," replied the second.

"Now I'm thinking that maybe it would be better to introduce doctors."

"But why?" the first one scoffed with laughter.

"So there aren't any losers who can’t protect themselves from injuries," they both started laughing.

The boys burst into completely ignorant laughter, but Mikomi had to agree on one point: it might be better to introduce doctors or change the system a bit because medical kits can cost even 3 dollars, and in serious accidents, it's rarely enough to just buy one. Although advertisements state that only about 100 people experience serious accidents each year, she shouldn’t have a reason to worry; just being careful should suffice.

"Anyway, did you see the program that Central Station released over the summer?" the first one said with pure fascination.

"Central Station? No, I don’t watch TV," replied the second with significant curiosity.

"Oh, you should listen! They made a total breakthrough; the program airs from 8 AM to a maximum of 12 PM and is made with W5D equipment."

"W5D? Those 5D glasses have already come out?"

"Yeah, they came out half a year ago! Thanks to them, we can feel temperature, precipitation, sound, light... everything! And what's most interesting is that we can even feel pain, but it’s toned down to barely noticeable stimuli so we can empathize with the person we're watching. So, you know, it’s transmitted through their facabrumpere vision. Thanks to this method, everything that person sees and feels, we understand—everything we see, we feel. And you can get it all for just 2 dollars! I can’t wait to get home and put them on. By the way, did you know they’ve been working on them for six months?"

"Okay, I know what they do. Tell me more about what Central Station released."

Mikomi remembered how her dad mentioned what her facabrumpere vision implant was like. He talked about how the machine introduced the diodes through her nose to her optic nerve, and then she cried nonstop for two hours afterward. Unfortunately, she didn’t remember that operation at all, but it was necessary to avoid health issues later. They were taught in elementary school that it essentially works like a camera—the image you see is transmitted to a monitoring system. Thanks to this method, doctors were no longer needed nowadays.

"So, um, ahem... ahem..."

"This intro and their whole conversation are a bit embarrassing," Mikomi thought, feeling a strong urge to leave and smoke to drown out the unnecessary information. But since Mr. Kobayashi was about to return, she decided there was nothing else to do, so she let it go and continued to listen.

"They released a program called 16H. The goal of the program is very simple: at the beginning, one person is selected, and thanks to the facabrumpere vision, we see through their eyes for the next 16 hours," the first one proudly announced.

"Sounds awesome! What does the person have to do?" the second one responded with total curiosity.

Mikomi regretted her decision; she felt like a participant in an embarrassing comedy duo, thinking the boys were competing to see who could sound more robotic. She sighed.

"So, listen to this: the selected participant has to survive, and then they win 100 million dollars. If they're killed, the person who kills them earns 100 dollars." The first one was very excited.

There was a moment of silence, then the second one spoke up.

"Well... I'm not convinced... somehow it seems to me that something like this is illegal," he replied calmly but slightly awkwardly.

"No, don’t worry! It’s legal; after all, it’s airing on the biggest TV station in the country. Plus, there are tons of interesting theories about this program online. You should read them; I personally like the one that claims it was created to eliminate harmful people." The first one was clearly invested in this topic.

"Well, you know what? If it's legal, I’ll give it a shot. But, I don’t know; it sounds pretty far-fetched. After all, TV probably wouldn’t hand out that much money to anyone... Besides, you're terrible at explaining things; I think you've watched too much anime," the second one laughed at the first.

"Shut up... Tune in to Central Station tomorrow at 7:50 AM they’ll explain everything in detail. I only had five minutes for this... Oh, look who’s coming!"

At that moment, the classroom door opened, and Mr. Kobayashi walked in. He wasn’t holding his knee anymore, but he looked quite pale.

Mikomi didn’t pay attention to anything at that moment; she focused solely on visualizing how much 100 dollars was, and it sounded like... "That's enough for a year’s supply of cigarettes." She sighed at this thought and rested her elbow on her thigh, laying her head on her hand. Her cheerful thoughts were interrupted by a familiar low male voice.

"I apologize, dear ones, for the inconvenience, but we can now start the first lesson."