Editing Kaze no Stigma:Volume3 Chapter 1 (section)

===Part 4===

“You still haven’t found ''that'', Yuuji?”

Tsuwabuki Mayumi lost her temper at the man kneeling in front of her. The man – Yuuji lowered his head even more, letting the tyrant’s anger go past.

“Until now, that thing has not once put up resistance! What the heck is Kayano doing, unable to catch it?”

“I’m very sorry, my lady. It seems that thing made a Kannagi practitioner ally –  ”

“Kannagi? Why are the Kannagi intruding on us?”

“No, it doesn’t seem the family consensus. The practitioner was involved by chance, without knowing its circumstance.”
While Mayumi folded her arms in irritation, she listened carefully to Yuuji’s report.

“Kannagi Ren? Although a child, he’s not the head of the family. He was properly seduced by that thing, huh?”

“That only speaks of my lady’s beauty.”

Yuuji’s words, intended to emulate, helped only to bring Mayumi’s wrath upon him.

“Don’t put me together with that thing!”

“P-Pardon me, it was inexcusable!”

Flattening under the abuse thrown at him, Yuuji deeply prostrated himself before her. The man, in the middle of his twenties deprecated in front of a girl, who was heads shorter. Maybe funny, also unsightly but the man himself was extremely serious.  

Mayumi ordered in a rough tone:

“Try putting me in the same class as that thing, one more time! I will never ever exchange words with you again!”

“P-Please, permit me at least that much!”

While rubbing his forehead against the tatami mat, Yuuji begged for forgiveness in an exaggerated tone.

“I will, without fail capture that thing myself! Therefore please, please –  ”

“...................”

Mayumi placed her foot oh Yuuji’s head. She mercilessly pressed her body weight against it.

“I wonder if you really understand. If we lose that thing, I will....”

“I won’t allow it!”

While his head was trampled down by Mayumi, Yuuji strongly pledged. 

“I – I will protect my lady! I swear I won’t let anything hurt you.”

“..............humph?”

Bestowing upon Yuuji the same smile she would have given to a faithful dog, Mayumi removed her foot from his head.

“However imposing your determination, can you win? Although young, your opponent is a direct descendant of Kannagi – the top ranking Enjutsushi, you know?”

Yuuji quietly raised his face. Those eyes, looking up at his master, carrying an absolute self-confidence, replied to that.

“To those conceited fools thinking Enjutsushi are the strongest, let’s instruct them about reality.”

“Live up to my expectations.”

Lightly bowing her head, Mayumi’s wavy black hair softly flickered. 







“ – Fuun”

Approximately at the same time Juugo hung up the receiver, from the other side of the sliding door Ayano's voice got through.

“Father?”

“Enter.”

Without introduction, Juugo asked his daughter upon entering the room:

“Did Ren return home?”

“Not yet,” Ayano immediately replied.

“Even though it’s already past nine o’clock; I wonder what is he doing? Aunt Miyuki is worried. She said his phone is turned off and she can’t call him.”

“.........I see”

“But I can’t understand aunt Miyuki. When Kazuma left home, she didn’t show any sign of being worried.”

“........well, it’s because Ren is still very young.”

Vaguely dodging the question, Juugo returned to the real issue at hand.

“I was contacted by the Tsuwabuki, you know.”

“Tsuwabuki, you say? Those Chijutsushi?”

With a grave nod, he informed her point blank of the shocking truth.

“It seems Ren plundered the Tsuwabuki household’s treasure and escaped.”

“Ha!? What is this!?”

“I don’t know the details but the other party says so.”

“.........................”

After a few seconds of silence, Ayano slowly opened her mouth:

“...................were the Tsuwabuki deceived or are the Tsuwabuki trying to deceive us – that ascertainment is essential.”

“We have too little information. It’s too early for a judgment.”

Although his response was reserved, Juugo didn’t reject Ayano's thoughts. For both of them, who knew Ren’s character very well, the report received from the Tsuwabuki didn’t appear to have any value, only nonsense. 

For all that, in a certain way, the truth was just like that.

“So, what about those guys? They told you to take responsibility and that we should search for him too?”

“No, it seems they didn’t want us to get involved. Worst case, if Ren gets killed, we should consent to it, or so I was told.”
Upon hearing those remarks serving their own convenience, Ayano raised her eyebrows.

"What is that? Don’t tell me you accepted this?”

“Don’t be absurd!” Juugo promptly denied.

“Because I didn’t understand the circumstance with that alone, when I pressed them for a more detailed explanation they became evasive and cut the conversation.”

“What the heck is that!?”

Toward the exceedingly rude behavior, Ayano too revealed her anger.

“Generally, they were always a meaninglessly self-important bunch. Because they shoulder the protection of Mt. Fuji, I can’t believe they have the nerve to imagine themselves more excellent than other people.”

Mt. Fuji, by nature is an active volcano that didn’t erupt in the last three hundred years, being suppressed by the Tsuwabuki household. If the steamy mountain would have erupted – the capital and consequently Japan’s political and economic loss would have been extensive.

If you think about it this way, the achievements of the Tsuwabuki family are great.

However, using that as a foundation for looking down on people, the attitude with which they demand respect and admiration, Ayano cannot help but be irritated by it.

The power of the spirit technique users is only lent to them by the spirits. Thus, the spirits are assisting, expecting the practitioners to work in cooperation and the people granted a greater power, it’s only natural they must shoulder bigger responsibilities. 

“One by one they became condescending of that fact – they completely fell out of rhythm.”

“Well, the fact that their mission is significant is the truth.”

“Something like that. At least significant enough to sacrifice a member of their own family each and every time,” Ayano declared bitterly from the bottom of her heart. 

“In what way can you boast about offering human sacrifices for three hundred years? They had no intention of becoming a pagan group?”

“It’s because there was no other way.”

“Even so...” That prompt objection, Ayano kept it back with a tedious expression. Right now, that’s not what we ought to discuss.

“Anyway, it’s absolutely necessary to find Ren before those Tsuwabuki get to him. Did you get in touch with Kazuma?”

About the object being sought, there aren’t many superior Enjutsushi. To say nothing of the situation, Kazuma will unconditionally find Ren faster than the Tsuwabuki. Ayano had confidence in that fact.

“I can’t get in touch with him,” Juugo’s answer was ruthless. 

“He doesn’t answer his phone, he doesn’t seem to be home. I have people searching for them as we speak.”

With a meaningful gaze, Juugo fleetingly looked at Ayano.

“You worked together with Kazuma today. Do you know where he went afterwards?”

'''“No, I, don’t”'''

With a rusty tone, as if steel frames rubbed together, Ayano let out the answer, inserting power in each and every word. 

Although faltering underneath that strange intensity, Juugo asked again:

“Ugh.........are you sure?”

“The moment work ended we separated immediately. That is correct, without delay.”

“.................is that so?”

The strength of her tone, not permitting any objection, made Juugo give up on the investigation. Putting the Kazuma issue aside, he promotes the conversation.

“If it’s like that, I have to request a search from the Special Data Arrangement.”

“From that woman?”

Seeing Ayano arching her eyebrows in dissatisfaction, Juugo was surprised. 

“You don’t like Police Superintendent Tachibana? I thought such an independent woman would have gained your good will.”

“...........Well......I think she is splendid in that respect,” Ayano said with a bitter voice.

Tachibana Kirika. Leading the only public domestic demon repelling organization – the Special Data Arrangement belonging to the Metropolitan Police Department, a woman recognized by everyone as very capable.

Without flattery, Ayano thought it was a big deal. But, their first meeting was the worst.

Of all things, that woman, intimately linking her arm with Kazuma’s appeared from a love hotel (actually from the love hotel district).

From that moment, for Ayano, Kirika became the foe that cannot be allowed to live under the same canopy of heaven. She doesn’t really understand why, but anyway she dislikes that woman. Kirika’s figure, over-familiarly, coquettishly leaning against Kazuma and each time she thinks of Kazuma's stretched upper lip, she is furiously angry. 

Why that is she doesn’t know but she can’t help but feel irritated.

“Nevertheless, just because you dislike her, don’t cut the connection with the Reference Room.”

“I know that.”

In reply to Juugo's pointing out, Ayano puffed her cheeks. 

After the collapse of the Fuuga-Shu the Kannagi clan’s information network remained pretty much destroyed. Therefore Juugo had his eye on replacing the Fuuga-Shu with Metropolitan Police Department’s Special Data Arrangement.

The S.D.A had almost no practitioners with combat abilities but in exchange has a substantial sightseer system. Moreover, if you include the investigation ability of the normal police, their intelligence gathering faculty is without mistake the largest in Japan.

“I don’t mix personal feelings with work. Have you already made the request?”

“Uh. Make your preparations. You leave the moment you receive the information.”

“Understood.”

“Ah, and then – ” 

To Ayano, leaving the room, Juugo added a secondary task.

“If it’s possible, get in touch with Kazuma.”      

“........................Don’t ask for the impossible, Father.” 

Turning her head around Ayano showed her father an amazed expression.

“If it’s impossible for father, it’s also for me. Did you forget? His phone number I got from you, Father, not him.”

“That may be true, but...how many times have you worked together with Kazuma? Haven’t you decided on some manner of contact during emergencies?”

“No.”

Hearing that plain declaration, Juugo was visibly disappointed.

“................Is that so?”

Pretending not to see her father’s drooped shoulders, Ayano left the room. Closing the sliding door from behind, she said in a sulky voice:

“.............I don’t get him, that guy.”

The vanishing whisper reached nobody’s ears.

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