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Disclaimer Under no circumstances would you be allowed to take this work for commercial activities or for personal gain. Baka-Tsuki does not and will not condone any activities of such, including but not limited to rent, sell, print, auction. Utsuro no Hako to Zero no Maria 2 Artist Tetsuo Author Eiji Mikage Translator EusthEnoptEron Editors grrarr, Kadi Project http://www.baka-tsuki.org/project/ page index.php?title=Utsuro no Hako to Zero no Maria PDF creation 2014/10/06 date I am surrounded by scenery that I can only remember in my dreams. I already know who the person facing me is, but without a box, I cannot deliberately recall this place except in my dreams. For that matter, I can’t remember when this conversation occurred. “Do you remember that I told you that I can see you as an individual even though your kind doesn’t have any distinguishing features?” I don’t know. It feels like I have heard this before, but it also feels like I haven’t. “Thanks to what happened this time around, I am beginning to recognize why I can distinguish you from the others. It might be that, while rejecting nothing, you also don’t accept anything.” This all sounds like mere semantics to me. “First off, the everyday life that you never tire of mentioning is different from the everyday life perceived by others. You include the loss of things in your perception of everyday life, am I right? This is, in fact, different from the common definition of everyday life. Other humans are unable to take things as they come,” he says with a smile. “All humans are distorted, and their everyday lives are twisted by their individual values. You could say that a box forces such distortion upon others. You are sensitive to these intentional distortions of everyday life by others’ boxes—and you find them repulsive. Am I wrong?” 8 I really haven’t the slightest idea of what he’s talking about. Leave me alone already... “This time around, your body was attacked directly, but even so, you managed to retain your ‘self’ without being affected by the values of the owner. That is because you intuitively recognize the distortions of others. And when you know that something is distorted, you naturally wouldn’t accept it, would you? However, your ability to detect those distortions is orders of magnitude greater than that of an ordinary person, and because of that—you cannot accept anything.” I can’t help but frown, but he insistently continues. “Your field of vision is terribly small compared to mine. But those abilities... Aah, I see. You might... resemble me.” Please stop. You are disgusting. When I say that to him, he laughs and changes his ever-malleable appearance to that of someone quite familiar. Mirroring my very own appearance, O says: “May I interpret this as distaste for the same thing?” That’s not it! We don’t resemble each other at all! 9