Chapter 27: What Comes Back
"…What?"
I stared at the pistol in my hand.
A moment ago, it had been lying on the table.
Now I was holding it.
I had not consciously reached for it. My arm had moved before I even understood that something was crossing the room.
Footsteps passed through the hallway outside.
I looked at the half-open door.
Then back at the weapon.
The water could wait a few minutes.
I shut the door.
The safety was still engaged.
At least whatever had happened had not changed that.
I returned the pistol to the table and stepped away.
It remained where I placed it.
No movement.
No reaction.
I raised one hand toward it.
"Come here."
Nothing happened.
I waited.
Still nothing.
Apparently, dramatic verbal commands were unnecessary.
I stopped and think for a second.
The first time, I had not tried to activate anything.
I had simply remembered the pistol and decided I needed it.
No concentration.
No deliberate command.
Just... intent.
I looked at the weapon again.
And focused on one specific thought that was surfacing in my mind.
I... needed the gun.
Then—
A sharp scrape cut through the room.
Something blurred across my vision.
Before I could react, my fingers had already closed around the grip.
The pistol rested naturally in my hand.
No impact.
No jolt.
It had crossed the room almost instantly, yet catching it felt no different from accepting something carefully passed to me.
"That's... useful."
Understatement felt safer.
This had to be my Sigil.
Knowing that did not tell me what else it could do.
I placed the pistol back on the table and moved behind the couch.
The furniture blocked it from view.
Yet I still knew where it was.
Not because I remembered leaving it there.
The awareness felt different.
A quiet certainty beneath ordinary thought.
The pistol was several meters behind me.
Near the right edge of the table.
Its barrel pointed toward the window.
The safety remained engaged.
I had not consciously memorized any of that.
I simply knew.
Come back.
A sharp sound came from the other side of the couch.
A blur passed above the furniture.
My hand closed.
The pistol was already there.
It had avoided the couch and standing lamp without requiring any direction from me.
Clean.
Precise.
Natural.
The ability did not merely pull the weapon toward me.
It returned it.
A word surfaced alongside that realization.
Not something I invented.
Not a title I consciously selected.
It was simply there, attached to the Sigil with the same instinctive certainty as the pistol's location.
Reclaimer.
I looked down at the weapon.
"Reclaimer."
A little dramatic.
But it felt correct.
I carried the pistol into the bedroom and placed it beneath a folded shirt on the bed.
Then I returned to the living room.
The wall between us did not interrupt the connection.
Neither did the fabric covering it.
I knew exactly where the pistol was.
I called it again.
A faint rustle came from the bedroom.
Before I could turn toward the doorway, the weapon had already settled into my hand.
The shirt remained on the bed.
Nothing had struck the wall or doorframe.
Whatever limitations Reclaimer possessed, basic retrieval was not one of them.
"Okay..."
An idea came up to me as I placed the pistol down and picked up the keys I had intended to take outside.
Nothing.
No connection.
I turned them over in my palm.
They belonged to the apartment.
The apartment belonged to Hiro Takahashi.
Which apparently meant... they belonged to me.
My keys.
Something faint settled into place.
It was weaker than the connection to the pistol, but unmistakable.
I placed the keyring beside the gun and stepped back.
Come back.
Metal clicked against the tabletop.
The next instant, the keys were resting neatly in my palm.
"Interesting."
The pistol had already been connected to me when I arrived.
The keys had not.
Something had changed when I accepted them as mine.
Recognized them.
Claimed them.
I tried the wallet next.
The connection formed after several seconds.
The phone worked too.
Both returned as naturally as the pistol.
The wallet landed flat across my palm.
The phone arrived screen-up.
Reclaimer apparently knew more about catching than I did.
The ability was not limited to weapons.
It worked on possessions.
Once something was connected to me, I could sense it and call it back.
Whether the objects responded because they legally belonged to this body or because I had personally accepted them as mine remained unclear.
So did almost everything else.
Range.
Weight.
How many objects I could claim.
Whether another person could prevent something from returning.
Those questions required more space and probably several objects I did not mind damaging.
The apartment was not the place for that.
A faint pressure had begun forming behind my eyes.
Barely noticeable.
Not pain.
More like the strain left after concentrating on something for too long.
"So it wasn't entirely free."
I had used Reclaimer only a handful of times. The ability itself could not have taken much from me.
But even a little strain was being added to everything else.
Dying.
The dark corridor.
Waking in another body.
Darwin's Game.
The people I had left behind.
My mind had not received the same fresh start as the rest of me.
I looked toward the door.
The convenience store was still there.
So was my thirst.
I found a small shoulder bag near the bedroom closet and placed the pistol inside, leaving it easy to reach.
The connection remained clear through the fabric.
I added the wallet and phone.
Then I headed outside.
—
The apartment building had four floors.
I lived on the third.
A television played behind one closed door.
Someone nearby was cooking.
A child complained downstairs about having to finish homework before dinner.
Normal sounds.
I descended cautiously, half expecting something to ruin the first peaceful evening I had experienced in a while.
To my surprise, nothing did.
No armed player waited in the lobby.
No attack began the moment I stepped outside.
The city continued behaving as though supernatural death matches were not taking place beneath its surface.
Late-afternoon sunlight reflected from the windows.
Students walked past in small groups.
An office worker stood outside a café, staring at his phone with the exhausted expression of someone already regretting tomorrow.
A delivery driver unloaded boxes near the intersection.
Nobody looked at me twice.
My body did not understand that.
For the past several days, every unfamiliar figure had represented either a potential corpse or a possible killer.
Now people passed close enough to touch without acknowledging me.
My shoulders refused to relax.
The convenience store's doors opened with a cheerful chime.
"Welcome," the clerk said.
Fluorescent lights.
Packed shelves.
Soft music.
A machine warming packaged food.
Painfully ordinary.
A young couple argued quietly near the snacks.
A man in a suit compared two cups of instant noodles with unreasonable seriousness.
An elderly woman counted coins near the register.
None of them knew what was installed on my phone.
Most of them probably never would.
I headed toward the refrigerators.
Bottled water occupied an entire shelf.
Plain.
Cold.
Beautiful.
I placed one large bottle into a basket.
Then another.
Then two more.
Partly because I was thirsty.
Partly because the refrigerator in the apartment had offended me.
I added tea, several rice balls, bread, microwave meals, soap, a toothbrush, and a small first-aid kit.
A notebook and several pens followed.
If I was going to test Reclaimer properly, recording the results seemed wiser than trusting memory.
Especially once those experiments involved heavier or more dangerous objects.
At the register, the clerk scanned everything without comment.
His eyes paused briefly on the four large bottles of water.
I looked back at him.
He continued scanning.
A professional.
I paid with cash from the wallet.
The remaining amount suggested this version of me had not been wealthy, but he had not been struggling either.
University student.
Small apartment.
Some savings.
Manageable.
Nothing attacked me on the walk home.
The absence of danger remained suspicious until I reached the building.
Then it became almost relaxing.
Perhaps the universe was capable of restraint.
Occasionally.
—
I locked the apartment door and placed the shopping bags on the kitchen counter.
One bottle opened immediately.
The first swallow was cold enough to hurt my teeth.
Perfect.
I drank nearly half before stopping.
"Worth it."
The pistol remained inside the shoulder bag.
I could sense it without looking.
The wallet and phone formed weaker points of awareness beside it.
Separate connections.
Distinct possessions.
I unpacked the groceries and placed the remaining water in the refrigerator.
Then I carried the phone to the couch.
My profile still listed me as D2 with thirty points.
I had already seen that much.
This time, I examined everything else.
The application contained sections for rankings, battles, events, clans, rewards, and challenges, all arranged with the polished design of an ordinary mobile game.
I opened the Sigil menu.
A single name appeared.
Reclaimer
I stared at it.
The same word that had surfaced in my mind.
So that part had not been imagination.
Below it sat a less useful message.
Detailed analysis unavailable.
"Of course."
The game knew what to call my ability.
Explaining it was apparently too much effort.
I moved to the point information.
Points could be gained through battles and events.
They could be transferred, spent on certain game functions, or exchanged for real money.
One point was worth one hundred thousand yen.
I looked at my balance again.
Thirty points.
Three million yen.
The murder app came with a signing bonus.
For several seconds, I considered converting some of it.
Better equipment.
More savings.
Enough money to avoid working while I investigated the game.
Then I read the section explaining that points also determined rank.
Reaching zero resulted in removal from Darwin's Game.
The wording was clean.
Almost polite.
I already understood what removal meant.
The money became much less attractive when withdrawing it might contribute to my death later.
I closed the exchange screen.
"Not today."
The remaining rules offered little comfort.
Players could challenge one another directly.
Some battles occurred through matching systems.
Events followed separate conditions.
Surrender was possible in certain situations.
Death was treated as an ordinary outcome.
Everything was written like the terms and conditions of a competitive sports application.
I checked the rankings.
Most names meant nothing to me.
Aliases.
Clan tags.
Profile pictures ranging from masked faces to anime characters.
Several clan names felt vaguely familiar, suggesting that the game had already existed for some time.
That did not tell me when the events I remembered would begin.
I checked the date.
Then searched for Kaname Sudou.
The results were useless.
Several people shared the name.
None appeared connected to anything I recognized.
He might not have joined yet.
He might still be an ordinary student without a meaningful online presence.
Or the story might already be happening somewhere outside my awareness.
My memory did not contain exact dates.
Canon probably had not started.
Probably.
That was the best answer available.
I set the phone aside and opened the notebook.
On the first page, I wrote:
Sigil: Reclaimer
Underneath:
Can claim possessions.
Claimed objects can be sensed.
Claimed objects can be recalled physically.
Recall places objects naturally into my grasp.
Pistol was already claimed upon arrival.
Keys, wallet, and phone required deliberate acceptance.
Exact claim conditions unknown.
Range unknown.
Weight limit unknown.
Number limit unknown.
I considered the list.
Then added:
Do not test firearms carelessly.
Practical wisdom.
The pressure behind my eyes had grown slightly stronger.
Still minor.
Nothing that would stop me if I needed to move.
But when I leaned back against the couch, my body sank into it with embarrassing enthusiasm.
The body was rested.
My mind was not.
I closed my eyes for what was supposed to be only a moment.
Alice appeared first.
Then Kohta.
Rei.
Saeko.
I opened my eyes before the memories could settle.
The apartment had grown darker.
Evening light stretched across the floor.
There were still dozens of things I needed to do.
Learn the surrounding area.
Research the clans.
Find better equipment.
Test Reclaimer properly.
Work out how to survive a game I remembered only in fragments.
All important.
None of it had to happen tonight.
I moved the pistol from the shoulder bag to the low table beside the couch.
For once, nothing was currently trying to kill me.
That would have to be enough.
I lay down without bothering to enter the bedroom.
The couch was comfortable.
Or I was exhausted enough not to care.
Tomorrow's Hiro could deal with the rest.
He had inherited worse.
My eyes closed.
The apartment remained quiet.
And sometime before I could think of another reason to stay awake, I fell asleep.
End of Chapter 27