Magic Ribbon

“Clothing has held religious meaning both in the East and the West since ancient times. You can see this in everything from ancient shrine maidens and priests to princesses’ dresses and nuns’ habits. But in most cases, purity was stressed with those clothes and the slightest stain was looked down on.”

The shop owner pulled something out of his pocket.

It looked like a thick marker, but it was not. It held business-use stain remover. It was meant to be rubbed on an especially bad stain, but it looked so powerful that it would  ruin the clothes if it were put straight into the washing machine.

He then drew a thick line at an arbitrary point along the steel ribbon.

“In other words, most clothes have a process with which they react to their own stains.

It’s similar to how it is difficult to see a drop of coffee spilled on the table but it stands out on a piece of white clothing.”

A great noise rang out.

As if the steel ribbon had become a runway, the clear stain remover slid unnaturally along it. It moved beyond the ribbon and into open air where it traveled in a large arc. It moved to the giant cube that was the Cape of Good Hope and traveled at high speed along it. It made a ninety degree turn and moved out of sight in no time at all.

The shop owner put the cap back on the stain removal pen and put it back in his pocket while he scratched at his head in annoyance.

“Now that will find any stains needing to be removed. If we investigate around any areas the chemical sticks to, we should find something.”

“I see. That really is convenient.”

“Yeah, but the situations it can be used in are pretty limited. You saw Kanzaki weaving together that ribbon, right? This only worked because she managed to weave the wires together in a way that corresponded to the patterns on the surface of the Cape of Good Hope.”

SS Kanzaki, Chapter 5, Part 3