| The Girl Who Travels Between Worlds | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Kanji | くぐる下髪 |
| Romaji | Kuguru Sakegami |
| Volume | 2 |
| Navigation | |
| ← Dubious Recollections | N/A → |
The Girl Who Travels Between Worlds (くぐる下髪 , Kuguru Sakegami) is the fifth chapter of Fushigi Yuugi: Byakko Senki.
Summary[]
Suzuno is in her school's library, with The Universe of the Four Gods at her feet. She realizes that the book is calling out to her and wonders if she can see her "companions" again, but hesitates when she remembers that she will be devoured by Byakko if she becomes the Priestess.
When Suzuno is still thinking, a younger girl named Sachi Kurita takes the book and says she wants to read it too. Suzuno screams at her that she can't and then runs away with the book, leaving Sachi there. Sachi thinks that Suzuno is a very strange girl, but also recalls and admires her artistic skills.
Suzuno runs back home, carrying the Universe with her. Its powers don't seem to react, so she hides it. She then finds out from Oikawa that Seiji fell down the stairs of their home while trying to keep himself active. Seiji explains that he doesn't want to stay put and that a classmate told him that he's atop of his class, so he wants to return to the academy, keep training there, and ultimately fight for the sake of his country.
Suzuno, who has just checked on a military newspaper that Seiji had been reading, tells him and Oikawa that she will NOT let Seiji go fight out there, that dying for his country is not glorious, and that she doesn't want to lose more loved ones. When Seiji insists and says that he'd fight for her too, Suzuno changes the theme and tells him that she's taken a decision: if Seiji will "take" her despite her clumsiness and lack of cooking skills, she will marry him. As Kenichi and Hidero appear and congratulate them, she thinks that it's time for her to cherish the life she already has.
A short time later, Seiji begins to properly recover. At some point, he hugs Suzuno and they begin to touch one another a little, but the Universe's magic reacts and the book rattles in her desk, making enough noise to interrupt them. Some of her sketches of Tatara fall to the floor and she bemoans having brought the book.
Suzuno decides to return the book to the school library, though she also wonders if it's the right thing to do since Sachi and other girls could find it and are taken inside. In her way there she's cornered by three military students, who turn out to be Seiji's underclassmen: they are jealous of him for having been the top student of the Academy and mistakenly believe that he intentionally threw everything away to marry Suzuno, while they're stuck as low-ranked soldiers instead. They throw Suzuno to the ground and get ready to strip and molest her, which reminds her of Neiran attacking her before she was sent back to Tokyo.
Seiji and Oikawa appear, and as Seiji attacks his former underclassmen for attacking Suzuno, the Universe fully activates its powers and, after ten years, sucks her into its pages and its world. There she finds an old companion in a very different "position" from when she saw them last, is stuck in a pretty risky situation, and is saved by a new ally that steps in her path...