Our Voice's

23. Trouble Maker Podium

...—Hiro Sato—...

A simple week has come. Earlier, on the night of my last conversation with Yuna at the station, she showed me a photo of a large, multi-storey library in the city, and if not mistaken, it was the Narukami Library. Now we put ourselves in there, maybe for some time.

“Yuna,” call me.

“Yes, Hiro?” Yuna answered me warmly, like a flower blooming in spring.

For an hour, we walked around the hallways on the fifth floor of the library. I don't understand how, but Yuna prefers to climb the stairs instead of using the elevator. A sense of disgust and joy also stirred in my heart, like contradicting each other.

“If use it ...” I pointed at the elevator door, and by chance it opened. Some young people came out from inside, then spread to some parts of the corridor in an irregular pattern. “... We will definitely save more time, I guess.”

“I want to exercise, anyway, so all those stairs will definitely drain the sweat,” Yuna said, her voice sounded like a child. “This time I also use a tighter jacket, so it will definitely sweat faster.” The girl then cheered, and from here I could feel that she was very excited.

I let out a breath. Then it's better that we exercise in the morning, Yuna, I grumbled in my heart, trying to adjust myself to one of the library's rules. Don't be noisy and make a noise in it, or you'll be dishonorably ejected, as I recall, the writing was cruelly attached to the library lobby board.

“But it seems free ...” Yuna lowered the hood of her jacket, and her face was barely visible

“Why?”

Yuna then approached me, then whispered, “How many times should I tell you, Hiro?” His voice sounded like it was hitting me.

“A–I understand, Yuna.” Maybe it was the tiredness of climbing the stairs that made me forget. However, other than that, I thought of something that had never been imagined before.

If it should be spelled out in more detail, maybe the air currents that were inside Yuna's body worked like an invisible turbine, and continued to spin endlessly. Such a mechanism can happen, the probability is not zero.

On the other hand, I stared at the neatly arranged and shimmering books on each seven-foot-high shelf. Not only that. Behind one of the shelves, there were voices of several young men talking, on topics that were not relative to where they were at the moment.

“I've shot the girl, and you want to know the answer?” The voice of one of the young men was extremely confident, sounding arrogant, and it seemed like he wanted to show off that mortal moment to his friends.

“Ah, when I first wanted to do it, Kimimaru. It's so sad; my heart is breaking right now.” I could hear the voice of one of her friends very deeply, it sincerely expressed her heartbreak.

“Don't worry, Arata, you will definitely be fine; you can still reap a lot of corn in the vast fields, so keep getting excited, okay?” This one is definitely one of the tranquilizers that has always been in his group, but his voice sounds disdainful. He was no different from the showman.

“Hiro, why are you silent?” Yuna pulled my jacket from next door, the touch was very delicate.

“No, let's continue; you want to find the book, right?”

“But we've been looking for him since on the ground floor earlier,” Yuna said, her gaze slowly falling to the floor. “... and to date we still do not find it.”

For a while, after thinking about it, a drop of idea entered my head, like a light bulb coming back on. “We can try that!” I patted both of my hands, beaming as I couldn't wait to show it to her.

“Try what?” ask Yuna.

I don't know why, but now I dare to do it. “Cute me!” I said, and this time I held Yuna's hand.

⠀

In front of us was a large podium. At the top, there is a touch screen screen that displays animated images of a pair of children holding a book. As Yuna touches it, they slowly vanish and are replaced with the title Welcome To Narukami Library. Solid text information also appears below it, one by one subtly. Not long after, Yuna's gaze turned puzzled.

“Eh, this ... what, Hiro?” he asked, with his mouth slightly open.

The girl then glanced at me. He looked a little sullen, like cursing his ignorance. “Yes, I rarely go to the library, anyway. But so far, I have never seen anything like this,” grumbled, while throwing my face away.

I pushed myself, acting as a guide that would light his way. “Alright, then I'll be the one who will—“

“Not”—Yuna directly covered the podium with her body, tried to block me—“you should also teach me, Hiro,” grunya, while frowning.

Because that was his request, I was forced to miss this opportunity. “Alright, but can you go a little to ...”

“Oh, sorry, please.” Yuna slowly shifted her body to the side, and her gaze was always fixated on me.

I pressed my finger against the screen panel, then started to explain the machine that was working in front of us.

“This is usually used when you want to find a book in this library,”, I said, pointing to the search box in the middle of the screen. “In this section, you will fill in the keyword of the book you want, and”—My finger points to the paired lens icon next to it—“after you press this one button, then the system will search for the book based on the keywords you entered earlier. If the search is successfully found, then they will show the location of the specific corridor of the book, understand?” When I looked back at the girl, her gaze was blank, like being in another world.

“Hmm, are you okay, Yuna?” I faced my palm in front of Yuna, then raised and lowered it several times to wake her up.

Yuna's gaze slowly glazed over, and I was stunned by it. “You just came to this city, right?” he asked, with a voice as if holding back a cry.

“I–iya, I told you a while ago.”

“That's a real lie, it's impossible to get this far.”

“Huh?”

Suddenly Yuna placed both her hands on my shoulders, her face started to turn red, and she took a strong breath.

“That's great knowledge, Hiro; I don't understand at all what you're saying!” he shouted, with a sobbing cry.

Huh uh? How do I not understand, huh? ask me in my heart, while pondering my previous explanation.

“About keywords; also with a search box; or a specific corridor problem, why can't you explain it more simply? You it—” He wiggles my body, very strong—and it feels like soon I will fall.

“So just because of that?” Even I could barely hear my own voice, as if it was sinking from her screams.

The unique thing that also happened here was that none of the library attendants came, but only a few young men were moving past us.

“It looks like there is a couple who are in a fuss, it is a pity, yes.”

“I'm sure such things will not happen to you, Kimimaru, I'm sure you and your girlfriend will always be harmonious until the end of your life.”

“May you quickly break up with him, Kimimaru!” One of his friends said so, but the look in his eyes was also filled with malice.

The rant was clearly thrown at us. Only I realized that, and Yuna remained busy with her cries, even though she let go of me (bit by bit ). However, as they disappeared between the corridors filled with standing shelves, I realized that those people who were behind the shelves earlier, were not wrong anymore.

Not long after Yuna stopped crying. He wiped his tears, and looked back at the screen on the podium with a astonished look. I think he's still curious about the machine, only I've decided not to give him more.

⠀

...... Connect ......