And impossible for me, who responded to the horoscope read on the TV morning show—Virgo’s luck in love is up today. An unexpected person may profess their love to you—with the pathetic comment, “How are they going to profess it to me if I don’t leave my room all day? Huh? Let’s see them try it.”

A normal life within society was totally impossible for me.

Argh.

Maybe I should just die!

Maybe I should just die. No. I won’t die because I am a strong, capable soldier.

I was determined to live until the day I defeated the N.H.K., even if that meant I would have to crawl along the floor.

I would win or I would lose; I was still uncertain which. Anyway, what I required was a good amount of courage; thus, I needed to make efficient use of every ounce of courage in my body. For the time being, however, first I needed to make breakfast.

After slowly rising from my bed, I opened the cupboard and removed the cup of ramen I kept for emergencies. I poured hot water from the hot pot I stored on top of the refrigerator. And then I waited—listening to the faint notes of an anime song that echoed from room 202, the apartment next to mine, I waited patiently for three minutes.

Not that it was important or anything, but my next door neighbor, who had just moved in this spring, really seemed to like anime. While it didn’t really matter, school should have started already. Was it okay that he hadn’t left his apartment? I felt like warning him, “Morning is no time to be engrossed in the theme song to Ojamajo Doremi.[12] You’re going to be late!” Of course, I didn’t do any such thing. My next door neighbor’s lifestyle wasn’t my concern.

While these thoughts ran through my mind, three minutes passed in what felt like a matter of seconds.

My ramen was ready.

Just then, it happened.

At the very moment that I was about to thrust my disposable chopsticks into the noodles, my doorbell’s resounding “ding dong, ding dong” interrupted the entire process.

Who could it be?

Naturally, I didn’t panic. The unexpected visitor disturbing my breakfast was probably just a bill collector, coming to pick up my electric utility payment. As I would be in trouble were I to lose my lifeline, I obediently put down my chopsticks and headed toward the door, still clad in my pajamas.

I flung open the door and quickly said, “Oh, electricity! The electricity, right? I can pay you now. Um, I’ll pay right…”

My words trailed off. Alerted by the smile plastered across the visitor’s face and the subtle aura emanating from her entire body, I realized there was no way this middle-aged woman possibly could be the bill collector for the electricity company.