On my walk back to the student gathering spot, I hurried through the unknown streets with only a general idea in mind. Walking past several interesting buildings, I even caught sight of the auditorium the school wanted us to visit. They wanted us to experience a drama through the form of a play inside.

I found the crowds of people and tried to ease my way without getting scolded by a teacher. Luckily, no one ever cared about where I was.

“Heya! Nwier!” The pin of a voice came from my partner and pierced my ear.

“Ow,” my hands want to shield my ears, although too late, “you’re so loud.”

“I know right? It’s such an endearing trait,” she got closer to me as she spoke.

“I beg to disagree, miss…” I remembered I didn’t know her name, so I tried to read her name tag, only to find it wasn’t there, “uh...”

“Hey, where do you think you’re looking?” She stepped back, making a misunderstanding fatal to me.

“Wait! No, that’s not what I was doing!” I tried desperately to correct her.

“If only for a little bit, I guess I could let you…” this girl was trying to get me socially killed.

“I just wanted to know your name!” If she continued with what she was going with, I could get in trouble, “And I couldn’t see your name tag…”

“My name, huh?” My partner went back to the position she was in before she stepped back, “why didn’t you just say so?”

“It… I guess I just…” I thought about it, but couldn't figure out why I took such a roundabout way, “I’m not sure myself…”

“Well, until you figure out why,” she put her index finger up to her lips, “it’ll remain a secret, okay?”

Her answer sucked. I couldn’t just call her “that girl,” so I needed to come up with an idea. Maybe I could just call her by her physical descriptions, like, jade eyes or brown, olive hair. “Fine, I’ll try and put up with it.”

“You’re not even going to give an effort to try and think about your feelings, Nwier?” She furrowed her thin eyebrows.

I guess I didn’t give an effort to think about my feelings, but more importantly. Olive hair still got my name wrong, though I guess I didn’t properly correct her…

“Actually, my name is Neuire,” I made sure to put more emphasis on sounding out the ‘eu’ as ‘oi; and ‘ire’ as ‘eyra,’ “it’s not a very common name, so I get how you wouldn’t get it at first.”

“That’s right, your name isn’t very common,” she then took my hand, “hurry up, we’re being called now.”

Olive hair brought me with her in line to get into the auditorium. As seating partners, we had to sit together in the auditorium. When Mr. Yellow laid eyes on her, he tilted his head.

“You’re not going to sit with your boyfriend this time?” Mr. Yellow marked her and me on his clipboard, “Gerald is going to be lonely without you, you know?”

“Yeah? Well so will Nwier,” she continued to mispronounce my name, “people like us can’t play favorites, right?”

“Hmph, I suppose you’re correct,” Mr. Yellow opened the gate, “go on in you two.”

The two of us entered. Though the scene with Mr. Yellow finished, I took a second to think. I got some really shocking information.

Gerald is this girl’s boyfriend!?

I never heard a single thing! Could the olive-haired girl be in danger?

Thinking this, I took a quick glance at her. Sure, she spoke loud and acted a little over familiar with people, but not enough to where I would consider her weird. She was normal, she was alive, and she was human. Could those inhuman monsters be threatening her? Mr. Yellow did seem to want her to sit next to Gerald…

“Hey Nwier, that’s our seat over there,” my partner pointed towards a set of seats, “come on, let’s hurry up.”

We sat down in our designated spots, and I decided to ask her straight out, “is there something going on between you and the six serial killers?”

She froze at that line, and the air became colder. Her eyes narrowed in on me, as she glared. “Hey… Nwier… tell me, how’d you figure me out?” She looked at me, her gaze were like guns aiming in my direction, “No, how’d you even know they existed?”

I froze. In the dark auditorium, I strained my eyes to watch her move. I guessed wrong. I didn’t find a victim of the six killers, I found the sixth killer. The person who acted familiar in front of me, the girl who so casually asked me to partner up with her…worked together with the insane group who killed my mother. She might even have done the skinning, or set up the acid bath.

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The reaction she gave me didn’t go as I imagined, but I felt the need to respond to her, “I… I guessed.” Hopefully, I didn’t sound like a liar. While I guessed wrong, I did guess she had some kind of involvement since she dated Gerald, one of the killers.

“You expect me to believe that you just guessed we existed?” She glared at me, “I guess that’s why you needed my name too, yeah?”

“Wh-what? No, I was… if you’re acting like this then you’re…” I felt my blabbering mouth let my thoughts slip, “you’re the sixth member?”

“Oh, so you didn’t figure it out then,” she kept her glare as she continued to speak, “then it’s my fault for letting it slip, how clumsy of me.”

“Y-yeah, it was pretty clumsy…” my heart was beating fast, like a train on tracks, “I thought you were actually a victim…”

“You don’t have to rub it in,” my partner, the sixth culprit, took out a shiny object from her pocket, “I might as well have you know my name.” She pointed a shiv at me, after finishing her sentence.

“Ah! Don’t kill me!” I brought my arms up to shield myself from the murderer.

“Quit overreacting,” the culprit grabbed my arm and pulled me closer to her, “look closer.”

Looking closer, as she told me to do, I noticed that the shiv was made out of a nametag. Doing my best to make out the words in the dark on the brass plate, I realized the her last name got shaved off when turned into a shiv.

“Te…sha…” I read the nametag aloud, “Your name is Tesha?”

“No, but you can call me that,” she put away the nametag, “my real name is Teshallah though, it was scraped off when I was sharpening the tag.”

Before going back to where she was sitting, she snatched my book away. That demon! How dare she touch my book! Who does she think she is, plucking my book away from me like that!?

“Hey! Give it back!” I attempted to reach for the book, “be careful with it!”

“Gladly, but first I want you to promise me something.”

“Why would I want to do that, huh?!” I continued to snatch it back, but my efforts were fruitless.

“Then it's fine if I just keep it?” Teshallah held the book away from me, with a smug face, “come on, you can do this one easily.”

“…” She was holding my book hostage, I had no choice but to steel myself, “fine, what’s the request.”

“Don’t reveal my identity to anyone,” she held the book in front of me, “or I’ll take more than just this book.”

Reaching for my book carefully, I decided not to endanger my Mushoku Tensei collection.

“Fine, I promise I won’t tell anyone about you, Teshallah.”

“You better keep that promise, Nwier,” she let me keep the book, “and I said you could call me Tesha.”

“…If you insist,” I settled back down and entered my seat, keeping my book safe with myself, “Tesha.”

“Good, and hey, pay attention now,” Tesha gestured towards the stage, “they’re starting the play.”

Still uneasy about the new information I found, I did my best to watch the play. Luckily, I only glanced at Teshallah forty-three times during the short play. Whenever she looked back at me, I immediately realigned my gaze. I had to be wary of Tesha’s name tag shiv.

The play told about a tragedy centering on the injustice of the world. Ben, the antagonist of the story, committed some murder, and the people of the city pinned the blame on the protagonist, Nathan.

While a pretty interesting story, I’d rather read Mushoku Tensei than rewatch the play. I found nothing to love, no characters to fall for. I mean, no characters to relate to. Though, if I could fall in love with one of the characters, I could let myself fall in love with the story. Loving a character leads to loving the story.

I ran into a few problems in the story though, “If only there were less blood.”

“Huh? What are you talking about?” Tesha turned to me, “I think it would actually be a lot better with more blood.”

“What? Why? If there was more, the people would hardly be able to blame Nathan for the murder,” I turned to defend my opinion against Tesha, “It would obviously be Ben at that point.”

“No, no, that’s not it, the people blamed Nathan, not because they weren’t sure, but because they didn’t want Ben to be the one who was guilty.”

“How does that even make sense?” I found myself unable to follow her reasoning.

“It makes sense because it,” Tesha paused, pondering an answer for me, “have you heard that one saying? ‘The one who says that it doesn’t matter what someone says, but who says it?’”

“I think so yeah,” I recalled the many occasions when I heard the phrase, “but I don’t think the quote has much to do with the play.”

“No, what do you think we’ve been watching, Nwier?” Tesha voiced her words to the foolish guy I was, “This show has everything to do with who not what.”

“Yeah well, I’m more focused on the tragedy, okay?” I gave up on the idea of ‘who not what’ as a part of the play, “Still, what does that have to do with more or less blood?”

“Think, Nwier, wouldn’t it be more tragic if that dead guy had a more gruesome death?”

“Well, I guess…” the more she spoke, the more she made sense. Tesha’s actually pretty smart.

Wait, what am I doing? Why am I casually talking with the person that killed my mother?

“That’s right, I’d definitely feel more heartbroken if someone accused me of genocide.” Tesha nodded, feeling pleased with herself, “Then again, that wouldn’t really be a false accusation, yeah?”

“Y-you’re right,” this wasn’t right, I should not be getting cozy with the one of the few who mutilated my mother, “but there’s still the chance of getting accused for someone else’s crime.”

“Finally, you’ve stumbled across something you’re right about,” Tesha’s attention shifted to the stage, “hey look, the next act is starting.”

Someone getting accused for someone else’s crime…was she alluding to something there?

We both diverted our attention from each other and towards the stage. After my little discussion with Tesha, I started to see the story in a new light. Really, I was getting too comfortable with her. At this rate, I think I might fall for her.

Or not.

She killed people, after all. As soon as I can, I should report my findings to my father. Only when I can completely secure my collection of books though. For now, I’ll try and play as a small and quiet person who can’t do anything against her.