Vol 2 Chapter 12 (2/2)
“But it’s not as if Ranta stays in one place all the time either,” Mary pointed out
Though Mary probably intended to support Haruhiro’s argu made Haruhiro tilt his head to one side in uncertainty
“Yeah, that’s true But I think Ranta intentionally tries to keep one eneht When we offered to help hiet pissed at us Sure, that’s stupid sometimes, but if we just let him do it, he does keep one enemy off our backs I just realized how much of a difference that makes And he’s also…”
Haruhiro didn’t want to admit it, but it would be unfair of hiated
He took a deep breath and said, “The reality is he’s also gotten hts than before I don’t know, maybe it’s because he uses his skills sohis techniques with ours Without a doubt, he’s become a real asset”
Maybe even ht and was about to say it too, but stopped hi himself now
“M-zo started, then fell silent
“Everyone knows Yume hates Ranta,” Yulued to the ceiling “Whenever Ranta calls Yume flat-chested, it hurts Yume’s feelin’s ‘n no matter how much Yume hollers at him to knock it off, he doesn’t So even if people tell Yume there’s reasons to like a person like that, Yume can’t do it”
“Yeah,” Haruhiro nodded, encouraging her to continue
“But even so,” Yuaze fell to the floor and puffed both her cheeks out “But even though Yuuts, the teah he’s just one person When Yume thinks about what it zo, shi+horu, Mary, Yuh it must be on him to lose all of us at once”
“Yu her around the shoulders
“When Yume thinks about it…” Yume seemed close to tears “If it were Yu place, Yume would be so lonely and disheartened that she wouldn’t be able to do anything at all What’s it like for Ranta, Yume wonders…”
“First of all, he…” Haruhiro began to say, then clah his nose
It completely and utterly sucked to have to think seriously now It felt as if he was hanging off a ledge on Mt Crazy, but he had to soical decision Could he do it? Could he rise to the occasion?
To be honest, he wouldn’t know until he tried And even if he tried, ht noould he even know if he was? By asking souys, do I look calm and collected to you? What the hell, no way
Everyone was looking at hi to hear what he had to say next Everyone was looking to himent call
“We can’t be sure whether or not Ranta’s still alive,” Haruhiro said “But I want to believe that he is And I want to move on the assumption that he is If we don’t believe, then there’s no point in doing anything Yes, Ranta’s still alive And if he’s still alive, I want to go after him”
He couldn’t force anyone else toaside and run away from the responsibility either That was the reality of it
“We’ll head down to the fourth stratum first, then see if we can make it back to the fifth But I don’t want to take any risks Ranta stayed to give us the chance to get away We’d be ignoring everything he was trying to do for us if we got ourselves killed trying to save him”
I’m such a horrible person, Haruhiro couldn’t help but think He didn’t say anything out loud, but if it was any one of his companions other than Ranta, he probably would have made this same decision, but with reversed priorities and less cautionRanta…that sort of rash decision
“Our own safety will be our top priority We’re not going to force ourselves and if things look too dangerous, we’ll turn back and head towards the surface If that’s what happens, we can figure out our next ainst my proposal?”
He didn’t believe in the slightest that anyone would raise their hand And no one did
But Haruhiro was the one who reed He would have thought that the weight of the responsibility, the heaviness of the all the fear and doubt suddenly laid onto his shoulders, would have crippled him; yet that wasn’t the case at all For some reason, he felt oddly relieved
The decision to go had been ht even have a chance of pulling it off
“Alright,” Haruhiro said “Let’s go Ranta’s waiting for us”