Estrangement Syndrome (Estrangement Syndrome 1) ✅

Chapter Twelve

When they arrived back at Kōsaten, Shuei was stunned to see many people wandering the property and loitering about. He counted at least twenty. "What—Who are these people?!" he exclaimed, looking at San.

"All of the Seishin who live on Earth," San said. "There's less than one hundred Seishin left, and they have to have special permission from Ten'nō to move here. If they do, they have to be on-call to come back to Seirei-Kai at any time to report to Ten'nō."

"You all can't leave Japan?"

"We can," San said as he pulled into the garage. The door was wide open, but Shuei wasn't concerned with how many Seishin were milling about. "But because we have to report back to Ten'nō at his command, it's more convenient to simply live in Japan. Also since Japanese is the only Earth language all Seishin speak fluently it's easier living here. Those who live in Seirei-Kai however are required by law to live in the capital. As Seirei-Kai is otherwise an empty world this ensures the safety of the remaining population."

Shuei shuddered. "I can't imagine the entire population of Earth being reduced to one hundred people in one place..."

"Well Seirei-Kai itself is not as big as Earth," San said. "If you were to do a planetary size comparison between the two, Seirei-Kai would be roughly the size of Earth's Moon, and most of the acreage is mountains. And the population of Seirei-Kai has never been as big as the population of Earth. The highest population Seirei-Kai ever experienced was 20,000 people, and that was when we still had women."

"Hmm." They both climbed out of the car. "We'll leave your bags for now," San said. "Otou-san wants to see you straight away."

"Fantastic," Shuei grumbled, slamming the car door shut.

"Monbon-san!"

Shuei looked up to see a man who appeared to be in his mid-twenties hurry around the car to him. He had dark hair, but his dark eyes had the familiar blue halos. "Monbon-san," the man said. He offered Shuei a business card. "I'm glad to have finally met you. I'm Kaneda Nakada. You probably know my father—"

"Yes, Kento-ishi," Shuei said. "He—did a lot of healing for me. Sorry, I don't have a card—"

"No, it's fine," Kaneda said. "I just wanted to introduce myself to you. And to let you know how sorry I am about your father."

Shuei stiffened, and he stared at Kaneda in shock. He—He's the first Seishin who offered me condolences for my dad!

"And your grandfather," Kaneda added and Shuei couldn't help but roll his eyes. "But I know that you didn't really have a relationship with Hogo-sama so I mentioned your father first, Monbon-san."

I didn't have a relationship with my grandfather because he was an asshole, Shuei thought snidely. "Thank you, Nakada-san," he said aloud.

"Call me Kaneda," Kaneda quickly corrected him. "I don't care about honorifics, I'll be heading back to school in a few days anyways—"

"Kaneda," San spoke up suddenly, and Kaneda flinched at his voice. "We need to go see Ouji-sama."

"Ah, of course San-sama," Kaneda said respectfully, bowing stiffly. "I apologize for not introducing myself—"

"It's fine." San grabbed Shuei's arm. "Let's go."

Shuei didn't protest as San pulled him towards the front door, but his breathing stilted as they crossed the front courtyard. There was no lingering sign that three people had been killed there. No blood stained the ground and the earth looked undisturbed. But his eyes fell on the area of ground where he had knelt with a gun pointing at his head and he stopped in his tracks.