Vol. 1 Ch. 3 Ep. 6: Sales Contract

What do you mean? Written...by Yume?

Yes. It states here that the Abydos Student Council purchased from Nephthys the rights to use some facilities created during the Trans-Desert Railway project.

From Nephthys...?

...When a district falls apart, contracts like these get sold left and right.

The Trans-Desert Railway was a joint project by the Abydos Student Council and Nephthys. But technically, the rights belonged to the student council, who put in the original order for the project.

The student council sold those rights to Nephthys to repay their debt, and it seems the previous president, Kuchinashi Yume, attempted to repurchase the rights later down the road.

...Which essentially sums up the contents of the contract.

G-Give me that.

Sales Contract... Abydos Student Council agrees to purchase the rights to...Trans-Desert Railway facilities from Nephthys...for one million yen...upon signing this contract, the buyer shall pay a contract fee of ten thousand yen...

The buyer shall be responsible for paying the remaining balance to the seller within the two-year period specified in this contract...

The compensation for the delayed payment of the remaining balance will be...

Signed... Abydos Student Council President... Kuchinashi Yume...

...

...Mm.

That's Yume's handwriting. I'd know it anywhere.

Precisely. The contract states that the Abydos Student Council purchased Trans-Desert Railway facilities from Nephthys for one million yen.

When did she do this? And I didn't have a clue?

I've read and re-read every scrap Yume left behind. Every sheet of paper, memo, discarded notes... Everything.

But I've never heard of this contract... I'd understand if it was from the previous student council, but there's no way I would miss any sign of Yume...

That's likely because the contract has not been completed yet.

It was a time-based contract, and the originally agreed-upon payment has not been delivered as of yet.

So the contract is still in progress?

Yes. That's correct. The contract has indeed been signed and notarized, but the payment itself has not been delivered, two years later.

No one considered the contract to be of much importance, especially after the one managing it quit the company.

So it was forgotten in a storage room until it was...accidentally discovered.

Accidentally...

Mm.

It's created quite the conundrum for us. It would've been best if this contract had stayed buried.

This single piece of paper has prevented us from acquiring all rights to the Trans-Desert Railway, as these affiliated facilities couldn't be included in our purchase.

The rights to those facilities currently belong to the Abydos Student Council.

And so...?

So, how would you like to proceed? Do you intend to uphold your end of the contract?

Excuse me? You came all this way to ask us that?

It's a rather significant matter.

We will be holding a general creditors' meeting in two days' time to discuss the shares for the project, but we can't move forward until this is sorted out.

General creditors' meeting...?

Like a big meeting for all the creditors?

Correct. All of the investors of the private equity fund will gather to discuss our plans moving forward.

Now, Hoshino. As the representative of the Abydos Student Council, do you intend to pay the remaining balance stated in the contract to Nephthys?

...

This is all really sudden. You come barging in here and ask us to fulfill a contract we didn't even know about...

And furthermore, purchasing those kinds of rights...

You said the remaining balance was one million yen? We're already swimming in debt.

Excellent, that's precisely what we wanted to hear! Who in their right mind would pay one million yen to acquire some abandoned scrap metal?

To my understanding, you children are already struggling to pay off your current debt. It wouldn't be wise to dig that hole deeper, now would it?

I'll take that as confirmation you're no longer interested in upholding your end of the contract!

In that case, why don't you just sign right here on this waiver, Hoshino? It's just a little paper that says you'll hand over any rights you have to the private equity fund.

G-Gimme a sec here... I'm not all that keen on randomly signing contracts anymore...

"Stop pressuring my students."

Hm?

Hm...

That's a problem for us...

Did we get ahead of ourselves...?

Regardless of your decision right now, this contract is set to expire in two days time.

Just two days...?

In two days, it'll be exactly two years since the contract was signed. You can check the date for yourself. Once those two days are up, it's done and dusted.

Which is why we scheduled that general creditors' meeting in exactly two days. We wanted to get a jump on things, but...we can wait.

Let me spell it out for you.

We're hosting the private equity fund's general creditors' meeting in two days, at the Abydos Central Station District Office.

If you want to keep that contract alive, you'll need show up to the meeting before noon, state your intentions, and get it notarized.

If you can, that is.

...?

If...we can...?

...

Two days, District Office, noon. Don't forget. Miss it by even a millisecond, and the contract is null and void.

That was the message we came to deliver. Thank you for your time.

Very well then.

Let's go.

...?

C'mon, Highlander overseer! Aren't you our escort?

...Now then.

Um...

...

Um... In other words...

Hell no! Forget this! I'm not listening to those scam artists!

Serika...?!

They think they can just throw fancy pieces of paper around and demand we give them all this money?

Who do they think they are? They're acting like they're royalty over some abandoned scraps of metal!

Wait, yeah! Why're they making such a big deal over a pile of junk? What're they hiding?!

D-Don't look at me like that, Shiroko... You look way too proud of me right now...

I agree with everything she said. And if even Serika can pick up on their suspicious intentions, we know there's something there.

Hey! I'm not THAT gullible!

Yes, I believe so as well. What's buried beneath that failed project...

...Understood.

...Understood.

Hoshino... What lies at the heart of this issue is the previous student council president, Kuchinashi Yume.

We know this is a sensitive topic and that's why we've never broached it. But we need a full picture of the situation. So...just what happened while you and Yume served on the student council together?

A-Ayane...?

Please, Hoshino. We need to know what happened to the Abydos Student Council. I don't think we can solve this predicament without that.

You know too, don't you? Nonomi?

Th-That's...

I've always wondered why the Foreclosure Task Force operates out of the School Festival Headquarters, rather than the student council room.

And then there's the locked classroom on the first floor. Why seal shut a classroom in this abandoned building?

That room is the original student council room, isn't it, Hoshino?

I have questions too. Why did the previous president sign a contract putting the school in even more debt?

Huh? I thought Shiroko would've known these things, at least.

I never pressed for details.

Well... They did wrangle Shiroko off the streets...

That's... That's not what happened at all.

Wait, everyone. We shouldn't pressure Hoshino like this. When she's ready...

Thanks, Nonomi. But it's okay.

Our old student council pres... She was a walking danger sign, if I'm gonna be honest.

She was...so naive. Always running headfirst into trouble and getting taken advantage of left and right.

And she still managed to graduate somehow?!

...No. No, she didn't.

...Yume went missing before she had the chance to graduate.

...!!

Missing...?

She went missing?! How does that happen??

Who knows. She went missing, and she was...found thirty-three days later in the Abydos desert.

She was found with her halo destroyed.

Her halo...?

H-How?!

An accident, probably. I think she got lost in the desert.

Probably?! But how? What happened to her?

...I don't know.

What?!

Weren't you the vice president then?

That's... Well...

It's because...I had left, three days before Yume went missing.

So I can't tell you what happened in the sixty hours before she was lost.

It wasn't until later that I found out she went missing... But why she went that deep into the desert? Why she got lost? I don't know.

What was she doing? What could have happened?

What... What was she thinking?

I hunted down the answers to those questions for a long time. I scoured every last remnant of Yume left on this planet looking for a clue. But nothing.

And I was so sure everything would've been written down in that damn notebook. Hah.

What notebook?

Yume had this silly little notebook she wrote everything down in. Even the most inconsequential things.

So finding a trace of her like this, after all that searching...

It's suspicious as heck, isn't it? Like why was this contract aborted halfway?

And it suddenly shows up, two years after the contract was written? The signed date here, by this time, Yume was...

...

...Ah.

?!

The date... It's...

H-Hoshino...?!

Hoshino?!

A-Are you okay? Here, sit down!

This date... The date written on this contract...

This date is...

It's the exact date Yume went missing.

...!!

"Hoshino?!"

Wait, Hoshino! Come back!

I'm going after her.

Shiroko! Wait!

Gah! Why are they like this? Should we go after them?

...It's okay. No one stands a chance of keeping up with Hoshino besides Shiroko anyway.

I suppose, but still...

Ayane, if this contract was written the day Yume went missing...

That can only mean...

Yes. President Yume's disappearance and this contract...

They could be related...