Chapter 0: Prologue

Once, I was unable to believe in a certain girl to the very end.

Tossed about in a storm, I couldn’t keep holding her hand.

Driven by impatience and fear, I thought I was fighting desperately, but in the end, I was merely running away in a panic.

However, even if the me from back then was simply fleeing, my inability to keep a firm grip on the hand of the person I had decided to walk with was a different issue entirely.

At the critical moment, I lost sight of who I should trust, what I should protect, and what was truly important.

Courage, it seems, isn’t something that makes you fearless; it is grace under pressure.

I had no courage. I didn’t have a shred of grace. Wetting myself, praying to a god who wasn’t even there, the hand that should have been holding the hand of someone precious was instead grasping the easy, obvious hand of the Grim Reaper.

No matter the endeavor, you never know whether the result will be a success or a failure. Of course, it is always better to succeed, but there are certain failures you absolutely must not commit.

Even now, four years later, there are still times when I wake up in my bed in the dead of night, reaching out to grasp a hazy white light that remains out of reach no matter how far I chase it.

There are things in this world that you simply must not let slip away.

That realization has remained pierced into my chest forever, like a pin holding an insect specimen in place.