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What would your idea of justice be in a situation like this then?

I think it was right we worked to find out who did it. Michiru needed to know the truth. But you can't just go around executing people! Especially when we don't know why something like that happened to Nikki. We could have kept her locked in that cage for now and tried to find medicine to cure her. Or if it wasn't a sickness, if she actually committed murder on purpose, then she should go to jail.

That's what I believe.

...Mr. Thymos, we don't exactly have a jail nearby. [She blinks a little like she's surprised nobody else has actually said that before.] I understand your concerns, but for the safety of the other guests we couldn't afford time to look for a solution that wouldn't come.

...besides. What's better for the benefit of the guest? Being locked up and tortured, or relieved from the monster inside of her?

Tch. You can lock her up without torturing her. It seemed like it was holding her pretty well. And I'd say being dead isn't exactly a big relief.

In a sense, you're right. [How to explain...]

Have you ever been sick or really badly injured?

Not really. I broke some bones once? And another time, my arm was set on fire. But nah, not really.

You seem very nonchalant for someone who was set on fire...[No, not the time to get distracted!] But let's say it's like this. What if it was like you broke your bones, and those bones didn't heal. Instead, even more of your bones broke until all of your bones were broken. That doesn't seem like a good thing, right? Wouldn't you want to fix the broken bones?

Yeah, but if I broke a bunch of bones and wanted to fix those bones, I wouldn't want to be killed with a trident.

That wasn't the right part of the analogy to focus on. It was either take care of this now, or leave Nikki to suffer a worse fate. You saw what happened when we released her from the cage. And if something like this happens again, we have to be prepared.

[To use the cage again? We just don't know.]

Who's the one telling you that something worse will happen? Is it Master Blue?

[She shakes her head a little.]

On Friday when we were preparing for the trial, we looked at a bunch of options for what we could do. After discovering what happened and observing Nikki ourselves we realized it was going to get worse.

Where'd you find these options? And...observed Nikki? When, after we caught her?

Research mostly. You've noticed there're lots of worlds besides your own, haven't you? There were a lot of places we looked. It took all of Friday to narrow it down. When we realized that the monster still had a hold of her and started to change her permanently, we knew we really couldn't avoid rule seven.

[He definitely has not realized that, but it sounds boring and he doesn't care, so moving right along...]

So why make us do a trial at all? Why not just tell us, hey, Nikki turned into a wererat and we have to kill her? It's not like we could stop you.

[Next time she'll illustrate in crayon for him..]

The rules don't work like that. And anyway do you really think all of you would have agree to kill her without proof?

But you made the rules! And of course we wouldn't agree, but we also didn't want to kill her with proof, and you still made us!

Something is fishy here!

We didn't make the rules. We follow them and enforce them.

[But she's pretty sure that's not a good enough answer.]

If you think something suspicious is happening in this house, might I suggest starting to investigate more?

That's what I'm trying to do! But you're leading me around in circles. You said you three researched the rules, didn't you?

We researched our options because of the rules. There's a difference. [Sorry Galo.]

[He's too stupid and impatient for this!!!]

Then whose rules are they!

[There, there...Peach pauses to think this through.]

They don't really belong to anyone? They're just rules to help with the house. [She's not explaining herself well.] You can't punch an answer out of this if that's what you're hoping to do.

I'm not planning to punch you, sheesh. I'm just lost!

[Like that was an unreasonable assumption.]

Is there somebody who can change the rules? If they're not working, or not helping enough?

I meant whoever was responsible for the rules! [She's pouting.] Last weekend a lot of fights broke out and people were throwing furniture even before Haruka's death. It's hard to say what people will do now.

But well...we do always have the last rule in place that the rules may be amended at any time. If we find that rule six doesn't occur and rule seven isn't necessary, they could in theory be removed.

Okay. So you guys can change the rules. But for right now, you don't want to, 'cause it seems like they're a good idea because of the things happening, like with Nikki.

Is that what you're saying?

More or less, yes. If it seems that the house is no longer in need of those rules, they can be removed. But for right now, they're in place and we can't remove them.

I hope that makes a little more sense.

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