After the quake blind willow, sleeping woman dance dance dance

be
news to her. 
“I don’t have to tell you that having two moons in the sky is the same as the world 
of 
Air Chrysalis
,” Tengo said. “And the new moon looks exactly as I described it—
the same size and color.” 
Fuka-Eri had nothing to say. She never answered questions that needed no 
answers. 
“Why do you think such a thing has happened? How 
could
such a thing have 
happened?” 
Still no answer. 
Tengo decided to ask her directly, “Could this mean that we have entered into the 
world depicted in 
Air Chrysalis
?” 
Fuka-Eri spent several moments carefully examining the shapes of her fingernails. 
Then she said, “Because we wrote the book together.” 

---

495
Tengo set his wineglass on the table. Then he asked Fuka-Eri, “We wrote 
Air 
Chrysalis
and published it. It was a joint effort. Then the book became a bestseller, 
and information regarding the Little People and 
mazas
and 
dohtas
was revealed to the 
world. As a result of that, you and I together entered into this newly altered world. Is 
that what it means?” 
“You are acting as a Receiver.” 
“I’m acting as a Receiver,” Tengo said, echoing her words. “True, I wrote about 
Receivers in 
Air Chrysalis
, but I didn’t understand any of that. What does a Receiver 
do, specifically?” 
Fuka-Eri gave her head a little shake, meaning she could not explain it. 
“If you can’t understand it without an explanation, you can’t understand it with an 
explanation,” Tengo’s father had said. 
“We had better stay together,” Fuka-Eri said, “until you find her.” 
Tengo looked at Fuka-Eri for a time, trying to read her expression, but as always, 
there was no expression on her face to read. Unconsciously, he turned aside to look 
out the window, but there were no moons to be seen, only an ugly, twisted mass of 
electric lines. 
“Does it take some special talent to act as a Receiver?” 
Fuka-Eri moved her chin slightly up and down, meaning that some talent was 
required. 
“But 
Air Chrysalis
was originally 
your
story, a story 
you
wrote from scratch. It 
came from inside of 
you
. All I did was take on the job of fixing the style. I was just a 
technician.” 
“Because we wrote the book together,” Fuka-Eri said as before. 
Tengo unconsciously brought his fingertips to his temple. “Are you saying I was 
acting as a Receiver from then on without even knowing it?” 
“From before that,” Fuka-Eri said. She pointed her right index finger at herself and 
then at Tengo. “I’m a Perceiver, and you’re a Receiver.” 
“In other words, you ‘perceive’ things and I ‘receive’ them?” 
Fuka-Eri gave a short nod. 
Tengo frowned slightly. “So you knew that I was a Receiver or had a Receiver’s 
special talent, and that’s why you let me rewrite 
Air Chrysalis
. Through me, you 
turned what you had perceived into a book. Is that it?” 
No answer. 
Tengo undid his frown. Then, looking into Fuka-Eri’s eyes, he said, “I still can’t 
pinpoint the exact moment, but I’m guessing that around that time, I had already 
entered this world with two moons. I’ve just overlooked that fact until now. I never 
had occasion to look up at the night sky, so I never noticed that the number of moons 
had increased. That’s it, isn’t it?” 
Fuka-Eri kept silent. Her silence floated up and hung in the air like fine dust. This 
was dust that had been scattered there only moments before by a swarm of moths 
from a special space. For a while, Tengo looked at the shapes the dust had made in the 
air. He felt he had become a two-day-old evening paper. New information was 
coming out day after day, but he was the only one who knew none of it. 

---

496
“Cause and effect seem to be all mixed up,” Tengo said, recovering his presence of 
mind. “I don’t know which came before and which came after. In any case, though, 
we are now inside this new world.” 
Fuka-Eri raised her face and peered into Tengo’s eyes. He might have been 
imagining it, but he thought he caught a hint of an affectionate gleam in her eyes. 
“In any case, the original world no longer exists,” Tengo said. 
Fuka-Eri gave a little shrug. “We will go on living here.” 
“In the world with two moons?” 
Fuka-Eri did not reply to this. The beautiful seventeen-year-old girl tensed her lips 
into a perfectly straight line and looked directly into Tengo’s eyes—exactly the way 
Aomame had looked into the ten-year-old Tengo’s eyes in the empty classroom, with 
strong, deep mental concentration. Under Fuka-Eri’s intense gaze, Tengo felt he 
might turn into stone, transforming into the new moon—the lopsided little moon. A 
moment later, Fuka-Eri finally relaxed her gaze. She raised her right hand and pressed 
her fingertips to her temple as if she were trying to read her own secret thoughts. 
“You were looking for someone,” the girl asked. 
“Yes.” 
“But you didn’t find her.” 
“No, I didn’t find her,” Tengo said. 
He had not found Aomame, but instead he had discovered the two moons. This 
was because he had followed Fuka-Eri’s suggestion to dig deep into his memory, as a 
result of which he had thought to look at the moon. 
The girl softened her gaze somewhat and picked up her wineglass. She held a 
mouthful of wine for a while and then swallowed it carefully, like an insect sipping 
dew. 
Tengo said, “You say she’s hiding somewhere. If that’s the case, it won’t be easy 
to find her.” 
“You don’t have to worry,” the girl said. 
“I don’t have to worry,” Tengo echoed her words. 
Fuka-Eri nodded deeply. 
“You mean, I’m going to find her?” 
“She is going to find you,” Fuka-Eri said in a voice like a breeze passing over a 
field of soft grass. 
“Here, in Koenji?” 
Fuka-Eri inclined her head to one side, meaning she did not know. “Somewhere,” 
she said. 
“Somewhere 
in this world
,” Tengo said. 
Fuka-Eri gave him a little nod. “As long as there are two moons in the sky.” 
Tengo thought about this for a moment and said with some resignation, “I guess I 
have no choice but to believe you.” 
“I perceive and you receive,” Fuka-Eri said thoughtfully. 
“You perceive and I receive,” Tengo said. 
Fuka-Eri nodded. 
And is that why we joined our bodies?
Tengo wanted to ask Fuka-Eri. 
In that wild 
storm last night. What did that mean?
But he did not ask those questions, which might 
have been inappropriate, and which he knew she never would have answered. 

---

497
If you can’t understand it without an explanation, you can’t understand it with an 
explanation
, Tengo’s father said somewhere. 
“You perceive and I receive,” Tengo repeated once again. “The same as when I 
rewrote 
Air Chrysalis
.” 
Fuka-Eri shook her head. Then she pushed her hair back, revealing one beautiful, 
little ear as though raising a transmitter’s antenna. 
“It is not the same,” Fuka-Eri said. “You changed.” 
“I changed,” Tengo repeated. 
Fuka-Eri nodded. 
“How have I changed?” 
Fuka-Eri stared for a long time into the wineglass she was holding, as if she could 
see something important inside. 
“You will find out when you go to the cat town,” the beautiful girl said. Then, with 
her ear still showing, she took a sip of white wine. 

---

498