"I suppose that's true," Seishin said, though he did not entirely agree. Then again, maybe the nurses had never really bothered checking whether this man's bandages were still in place because they assumed he was prone to self-destructive behaviour. But that was not the man's fault, was it?

"...I'm from a small village in Japan," the novelist responded after a small delay, purposely excluding the village's name. His breakfast companion wouldn't have heard of it, regardless -- Sotoba had been isolated from the rest of the world, after all.

"What about you?" he asked, moving the subject away from himself by returning the question.