Chapter 75: Is A Triangle Stable?
The next day at noon, Natsume Mio came again to bring food to Sakamoto Ken.
In return, Sakamoto Ken showed her the newly completed manuscript from that day.
After she went to work at the convenience store, seeing that it was about the same time, Sakamoto Ken lay down in the room, closed his eyes, and tried to enter that dream again.
However… it didn’t happen.
He napped for twenty-something minutes and woke up naturally, without dreaming at all about the things he had expected.
Leaning by the window, sunlight illuminated half of his body, feeling that the temperature was gradually rising now, and the sun was getting hotter.
Looking at the slightly rundown old residential area outside the window, Sakamoto Ken rubbed his temple, feeling a bit disappointed.
He had dreamed of Haruna, and also of Ai.
So next time, would it be Mio?
Speaking of which, a triangle is the most stable structure, and it should be that way.
Sakamoto Ken thought that the reason the previous life was unstable wasn’t because the triangle was unstable, but because a triangle hadn’t even formed at all.
If the relationship between each person is a line, then with him at the center, three lines radiate out, corresponding respectively to Mio, Haruna, and Ai.
But the problem is, there were no line segments connecting between them.
This couldn’t even be called a “shape”; it was just a few loose lines, of course a completely unstable state.
So… how to form a stable triangle?
With no ideas coming to him at once, Sakamoto Ken just buried his head in drawing.
Anyway, one thing was certain: this time, the manga was most important, grab a few hundred million in royalty fees first.
He had originally planned not to stay up late, but ended up drawing until three in the morning.
The manuscript in hand, Chainsaw Man had updated to chapter 6, scheduled to update chapter 7 tomorrow, and the manuscript given to Editor Kaji was up to chapter 16.
Look Back had completed page 117, with progress already over three-quarters.
After washing in the public bathroom, he returned to the room and lay on the bedding.
Looking at the night sky outside the window, he thought again of that particularly long dream in the afternoon.
The first time was Mikazuki Haruna, the second was Hoshihara Ai, both lucid dreams, everything in the dreams was exceptionally real, so real that he almost thought he had returned to some point in time in the previous life.
Why would he enter such dreams?
And both in the afternoon, about the same time.
At night when he sleeps, he rarely dreams, or rather, he forgets everything he dreamed upon waking, but only these two times were like reliving them again, remembered very clearly.
Afternoon…
Actually, he also had a deep memory of this time point.
That day, on the rooftop, he lay in a pool of blood as his body gradually grew cold; even if the midday sun was scorching, his strength was slowly fading, then he lost consciousness.
At that time, for him, the sensation of pain was already minimal; it was just his consciousness gradually blurring, like falling asleep.
Probably only someone like him who had truly died and been reborn could describe that feeling clearly.
Sakamoto Ken didn’t pay too much attention to it, after all, Natsume Mio said she always dreamed of things from the previous life, and Haruna had seen his manga in a dream before drawing Young Lady.
Since they dreamed of it, it was normal for him to dream of it too.
He turned over and lay face down on the pillow.
One thing Sakamoto Ken particularly envied about Hoshihara Ai was that she could fall asleep anytime, anywhere.
As she said, empty the mind, feel your consciousness floating in the void, floating and floating, and soon fall asleep.
But he had tried this method, and it didn’t work at all; one could only say she had exceptional talent.
Being able to sleep anytime with very good sleep quality was probably also why she had never lost in academics since childhood.
……
Sakamoto Ken tossed and turned on the bedding unable to sleep, while Hoshihara Ai had no intention of sleeping at all.
In the apartment’s study room, she sat at the computer desk, expression serious as she looked at the screen, hands flying quickly on the keyboard.
She was recording all her thoughts from today into a document.
She had only planned to nap for half an hour at noon, but ended up dreaming of him.
And the dream was particularly real; they were intimate for a long time, from the bedroom to the living room, then to the balcony.
She held the balcony’s railing, looking at the expansive cityscape before her; in that most transcendent moment, she felt like she was flying in the sky, that full-body tingling sensation was very captivating.
But at that time, she wasn’t… not just enjoying it; she was actually thinking too.
She thought there were two possibilities.
First, this was an information stream from 2025 delivered to the present.
But Ken’s reactions in the dream were different from the Ken in her memory from 2025.
Not like he was a different person, but his words, actions, um… even the intensity, had subtle differences.
When they were together back then, he would always chat with her about sci-fi, fantasy, and he knew Chinese, would read Chinese novels.
He told many interesting stories, but she didn’t know Chinese, so she had him tell them to her.
Like what, Dying on Mars, Hetero Hotel, From the Red Moon, … and Three-Body Problem that both had read; he read the Chinese version, she the English version, and later bought the Japanese version the moment it was released.
But in today’s dream, he seemed… to not proactively bring up these at all.
Most crucially, he mentioned “I’m a scumbag.”
His exact words were, “I was dating three women at the same time, then you all killed me together.”
Right, Ken from the previous life was indeed a scumbag.
But that was something they ultimately discovered, exposing him; he wouldn’t have said it proactively himself.
Thus, Hoshihara Ai considered the second possibility.
Could it be that the afternoon dream was just because she missed him, so she had a dream about him?
But would my subconscious stage that kind of scene in a dream…
From the bedroom to the living room is one thing, but even so unrestrained on the balcony.
I shouldn’t be someone who thinks only of lust, right?
Should… not be, right?
Hoshihara Ai leaned back in the chair, legs crossed, inexplicably feeling her body a bit hot.
Especially the air conditioner’s gentle breeze on her skin, reminding her of the feeling of his touch.
The hand gripping the mouse tightened, goosebumps rising on her arm.
Breathing quickened, heartbeat accelerated; the scenes from the afternoon dream played out in her mind.
Hoshihara Ai clamped her legs together, as if that sensation hadn’t yet faded from her body.
Slumped over the desk for a while, she suddenly stood up, strode to the bathroom, and directly turned on the faucet.
Ice-cold water poured down, rushing over her body; with a shiver, that hot feeling gradually receded.
“Phew…”
Hoshihara Ai leaned back against the bathroom wall, cold water slanting onto her flat abdomen, flowing down her legs, carrying away the heat from her body, to her soles.
“I’m not someone who thinks only of lust; it’s impossible for me to fantasize that man being so unrestrained with me, and me enjoying it quite a bit…”
“So, the dream definitely has a third possibility.”
