The sea seemed too calm for the amount of hidden threat in the world.

The beach was bathed in a bright, almost offensive light, as if the sun completely ignored the fact that there was a girl marked for death and three sorcerers trying to feign normalcy for a few hours. Riko ran near the water with a borrowed freedom, leaving brief tracks in the sand. It was the kind of afternoon that seemed stolen from fate—short, fragile, suspended by a thread.

Satoru, beside her, tried to maintain the pose of someone who didn't care about anything. His hands in the pockets of his beach shorts, his usual insolent expression, the wind ruffling his white hair, touching the exposed skin of his abdomen and shaking his orange jacket.

But as soon as you appeared in a bikini, his calmness began to crack visibly. Small, but enough.

Suguru was the first to truly look at you.

Not with the haste of someone measuring a body. With that serene and elegant attention that makes any compliment seem more dangerous than it should be. His gaze drifted up and down silently, savoring the moment with the same composure he applied to almost everything. Then he smiled, a slight smile, too beautiful to be innocent.

“It looks great on you.”

The words hung in the air like a warm drop in icy water.

Satoru turned his face too slowly.

You didn't need to say anything to notice the change. The air around him grew thicker. The smile, which had previously been merely sharp, now seemed to sink into white venom. He looked from you to Suguru and then back, as if calculating the exact distance between a casual comment and an intolerable provocation.

“See this?” he said, his voice drawn out, almost lazy. “There are people here who don't know how to respect other people's relationships.”

Suguru raised an eyebrow, without losing his composure. “I was just complimenting you.”

“Exactly. You complimented me too much.”

Riko, a few steps ahead, looked back with the curiosity of someone who had already understood half and found the other half amusing. The sea lapped low against the sand. A plane crossed the sky. Everything continued to happen as if the world wasn't about to exact a price for that tranquility.

Satoru approached you from behind, his presence invading your space as if it were the most natural thing in the world. There was no spectacle in the gesture; there was territory. His arm slid around your waist with irritating ease, quick enough to seem casual, firm enough to let any doubt die there. When he spoke, his voice was low, reserved only for you.

"I didn't like it."

It was ridiculous. It was completely him.

It was a childish complaint, uttered by someone who had enough power to destroy mountains and yet chose to nitpick a compliment.