Editing My Vampire Older Sister and Zombie Little Sister:Volume9 Chapter 4

Our daily routine was broken even further.

It was the afternoon but still not late enough for school to be out, yet we left the school grounds and entered the city.

“…”

The Class Rep was still shaky from shock, but that was exactly why I didn’t want to leave her back at the school. Yeah, I’ll admit it. It was half my fear of the moral hazard there, but half my own selfishness. So I took her hand and had her come with me.

Even though I normally wouldn’t physically be capable of that or even able to work up the courage to try.

“Maxwell.”

“Sure. I am still in contact.”

However, there was no way of reaching Erika since she was asleep. I instead called Ayumi while searching around the area, but there was no sign of Umikaze anywhere.

“The microplastic snow is still falling and will have covered up any footprints, but this is more than that,” said Maxwell. “As a Scylla, Umikaze Speechia can use those special legs and a fish tail. That means she can distribute her weight to not leave footprints and maybe even swim through a river or through the sewer down a manhole. Using a 2D map app to look for possible escape routes will not be enough to track her down.”

A silent missile had already been launched.

Our job was to get ahead of it and shoot it down before it hit.

Unfortunately, we didn’t know who exactly Umikaze was going to attack.

“Wh-what do we do? What can we do?”

After we left the school grounds, Itou Helen’s previous courage seemed to vanish. She looked about ready to gnaw on her thumbnail if left to her own devices.

But this situation left us with no choice.

“Itou-san, we need to split up.”

“Eh?”

“We don’t know where the ‘missile’ is going to hit, so staying together will only slow us down. You go ensure your own family is safe.”

It might look like I was abandoning her, but this was actually the right thing to do. She could defeat the Scylla on her own without a scratch. The Class Rep and I would only weigh her down and having to check on a stranger’s family or my sisters would be too much of a burden when her own family was at risk.

“But if Umikaze got there first and took your family hostage, make sure to contact us. We’ll sneak in and save you. No matter what she threatens to do, do not get rid of your phone.”

“B-but what if she’s gone after one of your families!? You’re human, so you can’t protect them!”

“I’ve contacted Ayumi and she’s an Archenemy, so things will change once I meet up with her. Doing it like this is the only way that makes sense.”

“…”

“And if we split up, it’s impossible for her to wipe us all out at once. If Umikaze shows up at our place, I’ll contact you. I’d really appreciate it if you came to rescue me.”

“Don’t do anything rash before I get there.”

She looked terribly conflicted.

But she had to be worried about her family.

“I mean it, Senpai.”

She probably wasn’t going to leave me herself, so I raised a hand to say goodbye and made my way down a separate street.

The Class Rep was with me.

While we naturally took the same route, that childhood friend spoke to me.

“Hey, Satori-kun. I’m sure that girl noticed what you were doing.”

“I know she did.”

Umikaze Speechia was a villain.

But she was also a coward, so she was more aware of the hierarchy of power than anyone. She would never choose the option that would force a battle with someone she couldn’t beat.

If she could choose between a human and an Archenemy, she was bound to aim for the human who she could beat.

And if she knew enough about my family, she would know the only presence in my house during the day was my Vampire sister who couldn’t leave her coffin.

But.

“To be honest, I’ve had her do too much already. She fought a few times before saving you, Class Rep. She was even crushed beneath a collapsed ceiling.”

I had no guarantee of success.

Itou-san had bailed me out every step of the way. I had failed miserably already, so I couldn’t continue relying on her. If I kept going to her since she was an Archenemy, how could I ever make up for it if something happened to her?

“But that underclassman might not appreciate this, you know?”

“…”

“Then again, it might be how you actually worry about these things that leads so many Archenemies to open up to you.”

This was the usual route home, but my feet felt so heavy. The weight in my gut seemed to grow with every step I took.

And.

“Fugu?”

I heard a familiar voice once we arrived in front of my house.

Ayumi was impatiently hopping up and down on the road in front of the small gate next to the newspaper box.

“I ran all the way home since you said to hurry back, so why did you leave me waiting here?”

…?

Ayumi’s question suggested she had not found any trouble yet.

“Where’s Umikaze? Do you mean nothing happened after all???”

“Don’t ask me.”

Umikaze Speechia was an Archenemy.

A Scylla was an ocean monster, so she would have a different range of movement than humans like us. Had she not been after a hostage after all and instead dived into the ocean to swim away from Kukyou City while all ordinary transportation routes were sealed off?

“I wonder what’s happening with, um, that girl?”

“Her name is Itou-san.”

I called my cute underclassman just to be safe.

“No, there’s no trouble here,” she said. “Well, other than the trouble I’m in with my mom for returning from school so early.”

Based on the normal routine, that made sense.

Our school had partially devolved into a fight for our lives, but none of it would sound real to anyone outside the school. Social media was so full of misinformation that no one would be taking anything there seriously.

So.

“Um, Senpai, what are we going to do now?”

“Hm?”

Umikaze hadn’t shown up.

But we had to qualify that with the word “yet”. Since we didn’t know where she was, we would have to stay on our guard. Taking a hostage was the simplest and most effective method for Umikaze, so things might be peaceful now, but that could change in the very near future.

Which meant…

“Any home or workplace she could have looked up in the school’s database is too risky. We’ll have to move our entire families elsewhere until we settle things with her.”

“Um, but how?”

“We’ll have to find a room for them, so maybe a weekly apartment or a business hotel. And if all of those are full up…given the state of the city, sleeping in a car would be too dangerous. In the worst case, we might have to use a manga café or spa.”

“No, um, I don’t mean that.”

My underclassman wasn’t sure what to say, but I finally realized what she meant.

She hadn’t asked where we would go.

She had asked how.

“Umikaze-san is your classmate and she hasn’t actually broken into anyone’s house yet.”

“Are you for real?”

The Class Rep and I exchanged a glance.

Reality had suddenly rushed in at us.

Her family was not going to act until a crime had actually been committed.

This felt like dealing with a cop who only did the bare minimum to continue taking home a paycheck.

“H-how am I supposed to convince my parents? Asking them to leave home and live outside with the microplastic snow falling isn’t going to go over well. I feel like they might just get mad without really hearing me out.”

If this were a movie or a drama and we knew a great enemy or disaster was approaching our home, we could throw a bag full of clothes to our family and shout “Get in the car, now!”

But what were you supposed to do in reality?

“Fuguu.”

On that front, I was fairly lucky.

My parents were stuck outside the city and thus relatively safe, so I didn’t have to convince them. That left Erika and Ayumi, but neither of them was normal. They were weirdly used to this sort of thing, so that “now!” would actually work with them.

This would be more of a problem for…

“Oh, no. Is that Class Rep having to argue with her mom? It’s been half an hour since she went in, but she still hasn’t contacted us.”

My little sister was as impatient as ever.

“Here, Ayumi, you’ve got snow on your head.”

“Fugu. That’s microplastic, so it won’t come off if you brush at it with your hand.”

I had thought the Class Rep would be out soon, but snow had accumulated on our heads out here. We should have brought an umbrella.

We hadn’t solved the Umikaze Speechia problem.

Itou-san had pumped her full of venom, so she was as good as defeated already and she would pass out sooner or later. But at the same time, the Circe Witch and the Scylla were related Archenemies, so that venom wouldn’t work as well against her.

So there was no guarantee.

Even if she was barely clinging to life, if Umikaze refused to give up and managed to attack someone in their sleep, that was that. We couldn’t abandon our families until we were 100% certain of their safety.

Everything outside was covered in the microplastic snow.

Its flammability had already been proven yesterday. Some malicious person could start a great conflagration like a single spark starting a wildfire.

“What do we do if that Class Rep comes crying to us?” asked Ayumi.

“We’ll have to go convince her mom ourselves.”

“But how do we do that???”

Ayumi had been like this the whole time.

I doubt she had any real problem with the Class Rep’s mom, so it felt more like she had seen a ghost and was wondering how to avoid being sent to a mental hospital after trying to explain what she saw to someone who stubbornly denied the existence of ghosts.

To be clear, the Class Rep’s mom was a normal person.

She was not a special or rare sort of person like my biological mom Magatsu Taori who had modified her own body for use against Archenemies or like my stepmom Amatsu Yurina who was in fact the ancient Demon Lord Lilith.

She was an adult woman who was fairly pretty for her age. Unlike my mom, she was a fulltime housewife. She did not have a part-time job or job she worked from home. Despite having glasses in common with the Class Rep, she had a gentleness to her that her daughter lacked, but she was also not some weak-willed person who would let her child tell her what to do. She had enough sense to not just accept the things said on talk shows and in tabloids, but she could be convinced to purchase the latest fad health foods or diet products advertised on midday infomercials. If I remembered correctly, she had a weakness for ads that emphasized time saving and efficiency.

Yes.

For better or for worse, she was an ordinary person.

Before Ayumi and the others became a part of my life, back when my original parents had turned my home into warzone where things could get bad at the drop of a hat, that normalcy had looked so bright when I saw it through the window.

“Fugu, I think you would have the best chance of convincing her, Onii-chan.”

“Don’t be silly. She isn’t some naïve person who will believe anything I say.”

I had taken shelter at the neighbor’s during that “war”, so she knew my tastes in food and what kind of pillow and toothbrush I liked. She had done so much more for me than she had to for a simple neighbor, so I was forever thankful. In that sense, she was like a third mother to me after both Magatsu Taori and Amatsu Yurina. Man, a chart of my relationships would be a real mess, wouldn’t it?

“Maxwell, create a conversational flowchart.”

“Will something like a phone scam guide work? Although I doubt it will be very effective.”

I had to offer the Class Rep some help before long.

I felt like it would break my spirit to ask something so seemingly absurd while looking the woman in the eye, so I decided to call her instead. I could tell I was getting cold feet before even starting, but that was because Maxwell had likened this to a scam. That made me feel like maybe this would work even with an adult.

So I called up the Class Rep’s phone.

I made an actual phone call instead of sending an email or leaving a message.

But…

“She isn’t answering. Is she being lectured right now or something?”

“Really? It’s going that bad?”

Her mom had never seemed like the type to just give an angry lecture like that, though. She had been the type to cut off all escape with a merciless barrage of super reasonable arguments and to do it all in the gentlest tone of voice possible.

It rang a few times before the connection died.

…?

“What’s wrong, Onii-chan?”

“Maybe nothing…”

I tilted my head while staring at my phone that had returned to the home screen.

Didn’t her phone connect to the voicemail service after a bit? Why had she switched that off now of all times???

This was different from being unable to touch her phone while her mom lectured her or being told to power it off until afterwards.

So what was this?

“Ayumi, just to be absolutely certain, you didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary when you arrived ahead of us?”

“Fugu. I checked all around inside the house, but nothing was out of place. There was no sign of anyone hiding in there and I could hear Onee-chan breathing inside the drawer she uses as a coffin. Although I didn’t actually open it since it’s still daytime. Besides, you’re the only one with a key to that queen size bed. Even she can only open it using the internal lock within the drawer below the bed.”

“Then what about the neighbors?”

Ayumi did not answer.

And her face gradually grew pale.

Yes.

During the ordinary routine, you could not just enter the neighbor’s house to search around. She would only have looked at the exterior and noted that none of the windows or locks were broken.

Umikaze had to have done something, but she had not been at my house or Itou-san’s house.

And hadn’t I mentioned that she was a coward and thus more aware of the hierarchy of power than anyone? She would focus her attack on humans instead of Archenemies. She would go for the weakest target first.

Which meant…

What if this was an SOS from the Class Rep? What if she was in too pressing a situation to send an email or message? What if all she could do was hold her phone behind her back and change this one little setting, hoping I would notice?

Archenemy Scylla.

She did not make the attack herself. She waited for the ship to cross the strait to reach her.

“Dammit, she’s in the Class Rep’s house! Is that where she laid her trap!?”

Umikaze Speechia was waiting.

The Class Rep had sent an SOS from the silent neighbor’s house.

The most important point was to not allow the Scylla to realize we had realized the truth. Does that sound confusing? Basically, we didn’t want to provoke the hostage taker. We were already a step behind and things would only get worse if she grew more cautious.

“(Ayumi.)”

I started off by confirming the rules via the social network app on our phones.

Our real instructions would be passed through the phone and everything we said out loud would be fake.

“Ayumi, we should probably bring an umbrella after all.”

“Fugu. Do you think we need a brush too?”

I had my Zombie little sister head back into the house. Separating the human from the Archenemy was risky, but we had no choice here.

''She'' had to be watching.

She would be holding her breath and peering out through the gap in the curtains to spy on every little thing we did out front.

So we had to use that to our advantage.

We would fix her gaze on one of us.

Ayumi had gone back inside, but I was still out on the street. That would leave Umikaze Speechia feeling uneasy. Especially since the phone in my hand could call in Itou Helen.

“…”

I would be messing with my phone regardless since I needed it to contact Ayumi, so why not use it to scare Umikaze at the same time? I was powerless to do anything myself, but I could at least scare the Scylla into watching me. Just like someone running an ego search despite fearing what they would find.

She had broken into someone’s house, prevented anyone from going in or out, and taken the residents hostage, but now she would be peeking out through the curtains in paranoia.

You’re nothing more than a criminal, Scylla.

This is just sad.

What happened to the Umikaze who was a mysterious transfer student, who behaved politely but always kept a position of superiority, who was beautiful, and who had an inimitable talent as an Archenemy?

A social media message arrived on my phone, but it was not from Maxwell.

“I’m inside the house. What do I do now, Onii-chan?”

“You’re free to move around because the Scylla’s eyes are on me. But you only have as long as it takes to grab an umbrella, so at most 3 minutes. Any longer and she’ll get suspicious.”

“And what am I supposed to do?”

“Use the 2nd floor balcony to climb in through their window. Or if there’s snow blocking that up, jump over onto the roof.”

The 2nd floor jump between houses was scary, but a human like me had done it on occasion. Zombies had 10 times the strength of humans, so Ayumi wouldn’t have any trouble at all.

Umikaze may have thought she had tricked Itou Helen and me by staying a step ahead of us at every turn, but she had broken into my childhood friend’s house. I knew the layout like the back of my hand.

She had underestimated that decade of experience.

“Miss Ayumi appears to have jumped from one roof to the other,” said Maxwell.

“I can see that.”

“Are we going to continue waiting on the ground as a distraction?”

“Of course not. We need to get ready in case dumb Ayumi screws this up.”

“Fuguu! This is a group chat, so I can see everything you type, Onii-chan!!”

Ayumi used her phone’s camera to begin a video chat. She used the phone’s screen to display the social media chat while using the lens on the back to show us everything she was seeing. …Of course, that meant she was walking around while using her phone, so I was a little worried about how her vision and one of her hands were occupied.

That meant we were still communicating via text, but the messages now popped up at the top of the screen. The way the video wobbled a lot as she typed in her message made me feel a little queazy.

“There must be at least two hostages,” I said. “Locate them first.”

“I know that.”

Ayumi moved from the roof to the balcony.

She checked in the windows of a few rooms.

“Doesn’t look like they’re on the 2nd floor. They could be in a closet or under a bed, though.”

“The Scylla wouldn’t be able to see me out here from there, so we at least know she isn’t hiding there. Anyway, can you open the window? If you have to break it, have Maxwell search out a good method.”

“No, it opened. I can get in through here.”

With one of the windows open, she stepped inside with her outdoor shoes still on.

“This looks like a married couple’s bedroom.”

“Don’t spend too long looking around. We’re short on time.”

But…

Even if the curtains were blocking out the light and keeping it dark, it was hard to believe that footage was of the Class Rep’s house that had seemed like such a safe space.

The rooms hadn’t been ransacked and there was no rust-smelling liquid splattered on the floor or walls, but I could still sense something sinister even through the camera.

Almost like Ayumi was exploring an old, abandoned building.

How lived-in the place looked, the cute stuffed animals, and the smiling mascots looked creepy because they felt almost out of place.

“Umikaze Speechia might not have a blade at the Class Rep and her mom’s throats. She might have placed a portable gas cylinder in their hands and then bound them with duct tape to do it more remotely.”

Ayumi made sure to check under the bed, below the dresser, in the closet, and anywhere else someone might be hidden. Then she cut silently across the room and apparently stuck her head out into the hallway. The phone in her hand was not held quite as high as her eyeline, so I could not see the hallway myself.

“Onii-chan, does that mean, in the worst case, securing the two hostages and the hostage taker will mean moving in on three points simultaneously?”

“If you need help, just ask. I can assist you from out here.”

“Then my top priority’s gotta be the Scylla.”

She put it dryly, but she was right.

It was natural to want to rescue the hostages first, but Ayumi would only be able to secure one of them at a time. So instead of playing her single card on just one of the hostages, it was safer to use that card to capture the single hostage taker. If the Scylla could not do anything, no one would get hurt.

“Nothing out of the ordinary on the 2nd floor. I’m heading down to the 1st.”

“Wait, Ayumi. There’s only one stairway. And unlike at school, walking on it will make noise someone below can hear. You can’t let her notice you.”

I knew the risks. It was scary, but it had to be done.

I did my best to act natural while I wandered up in front of the Class Rep’s house. That alone made it feel like I had run into a solid barrier of air. The Scylla was definitely watching. Instead of walking past their fence, I pressed the intercom button next to their mailbox.

“Class Reeep? Are you still not done? Hey, Miss Forehead Glasses!”

I decided to ring the intercom over and over.

I wanted that noise to distract Umikaze and cover up the sound of Ayumi descending the stairs.

The Scylla wanted to trap us, so she wouldn’t want me to realize I was being watched. What does that mean? It means she would want the Class Rep’s house to seem as normal as possible. This silence may have been her trying to decide whether or not to ignore the ringing intercom. But since she knew I knew the Class Rep was inside, she couldn’t just pretend like no one was home.

So what would she do?

Would she try to mimic the Class Rep’s voice over the intercom, or would she grab the Class Rep’s phone and send me a message saying she’s changing and can’t come out right now?

It didn’t matter to me.

What mattered was Ayumi’s view I could see through my phone. She was descending the stairs maddeningly slowly in her effort to be as silent as possible.

I was pretty sure the intercom monitor at the Class Rep’s house was on the dining room wall. If the Scylla was biting her thumb in front of that, my sister would not encounter her in the entranceway at the bottom of the stairs.

Right?

Hopefully the Scylla wasn’t pressed up against the front door using the analog peephole to look out.

My sister finally took the final step and her feet arrived on the 1st floor.

“Made it.”

“The dining room is highest risk. Check around before going there. See if you can find the Class Rep or her mother.”

“Class Reeep?” I called out loud again while moving from in front of the main entrance and circling around into the garage space. I came across the bath window before reaching the back garden.

The frosted glass window was closed, but I aimed my phone toward it regardless.

“Maxwell, analyze the polarization pattern and reconstruct the image.”

“There is no one inside.”

Frosted glass altered the image a lot less than a randomized digital mosaic. If you could send a laser from your phone to analyze how the light was scattered or analyzed the pattern of the reflected light, you could easily display the “original image”.

…This is for emergencies only. Do not abuse the ability, gentlemen.

I continued on around to the garden where the window had normal glass. Except there were white lace curtains in the way. The location meant this would be the living room. A simple cloth curtain was enough to prevent mathematical analysis from seeing through, but…

“Maxwell, switch on the night-vision camera option. Use IR to see inside.”

“Sure, sure. Why must I have a perverted user who only ever asks me to help him peep? (￣ー￣)”

It was well-known you could see through white swimsuits with IR, but you could do the same with thin dresses and curtains too.

“Nothing detected.”

“There are only so many places on the 1st floor you could stuff two people: the bathroom, the dressing room, and the dining room I’d already identified as a threat.”

Did Umikaze have the hostages lying at her feet? Even if their hands were tied behind their back, they could still resist. Keeping them there would take guts even if you were an Archenemy.

Or was she not thinking clearly due to the venom from Itou Helen?

That was no reason to relax. Just like with someone who had nothing left to lose, this would only make her a lot harder to predict.

“Be on your guard, Ayumi. The Scylla and the hostages might all be in the dining room.”

“But I’m in the dining room.”

“!?”

When that message popped up on the top of the screen, I just about had a heart attack.

I frantically moved aside the camera app I had filling up the small screen.

But.

Would Ayumi really have time to type out that message if she was facing Umikaze Speechia while a hostage or two were used as a human shield?

I brought back up the video that let me share my sister’s vision.

“…”

The stove and sink seemed lower than the ones in our kitchen. They must have been designed for the Class Rep’s mother’s height. I wasn’t as familiar with the price of kitchen stuff as I was with computers and phones, but it looked like each item had been chosen based on what suited her best instead of trying to keep a consistent aesthetic.

Ayumi opened up all the spaces that could be hiding someone: the fridge by the wall, the oven, the storage closet, and even the under-the-floor storage for spice bottles and an emergency supply of cup noodles.

“There’s no one here.”

“They must be somewhere else then.”

“I’ve checked the bathroom and dressing room. I even checked inside the diagonal drum of the washing machine. There’s no one in the house.”

“How is that possible, dammit!?”

I didn’t have it in me to continue acting.

I swore loudly and entered the living room from the garden. The dead silent room filled me with an awkward feeling, partially fueled by how I was standing inside with my outdoor shoes on. This was the awkwardness of entering someone’s house when they were out.

Ayumi poked her head out from the dining room.

She had apparently completed a circuit of the 1st floor.

That twin butter roll sister shook her head.

“Maxwell, what about the door to the underground shelter?”

“No. Only the one for your high school was opened. I doubt it is possible Umikaze Speechia could have used that to get in or out.”

“Even though you say she was probably in that facility back when it was running?”

“That only puts her at the same level as Miss Ayumi.”

Just to be sure, I peeked down the stairs to that door, but I could tell just from shining my phone’s light down there. I didn’t see anyone in front of that door which looked like it led to a bank vault.

I came to a stop in the foyer.

They weren’t here.

No one was here.

The Class Rep, her mom, and even Umikaze had vanished like a ghost ship out at sea.

Where had they gone?

What had the Scylla done and were those two all right!?

“…”

I needed to calm down and focus.

I had to throw out all speculation and think about what had actually happened.

The first thing I knew for sure was that the Class Rep had entered her house alone.

I knew her phone’s settings had been changed.

And I knew she had vanished from that house.

Everything else was speculation.

She had definitely disappeared, but the changed setting might not have been an SOS. It was even possible Umikaze Speechia had never been here.

But what would that mean?

Could the Class Rep have chosen to flee through the back garden of her own volition while we were waiting out on the street? Or could her mom (who we didn’t actually know had been at home) threatened her and taken her somewhere?

“It’s no use. I can’t figure anything out.”

“Fugu.”

Throwing out my assumptions was turning into an obsession that was in turn keeping me from thinking. I was avoiding the most straightforward possibility.

I had to think through this honestly.

I had to stop forcing myself to look for more-unlikely possibilities and I had to gather up what hints I had. But what conclusion would that lead me to?

“The Class Rep’s house would have been the best target for Umikaze.”

There must have been some kind of attack.

But the house had not looked ransacked and none of the windows or locks had looked broken.

It wasn’t impossible they had run afoul of some random robber or home invader, but that idea didn’t sit right with me.

The most likely option was Umikaze.

The living room window I had climbed in through had not been locked.

The Class Rep’s mom would have been surprised to see someone show up through there, but what if that person was wearing the uniform of her daughter’s school and said she was her daughter’s classmate? And what if that girl, who held a finger to her lips to ask for silence, had looked sickly pale from all the venom in her bloodstream?

That woman would have realized things were dangerous outside the home.

But.

That was exactly why she might have invited in the haggard girl, especially if she claimed to be her daughter’s friend. The girl wouldn’t be a stranger, so she couldn’t just throw her back into the danger outside.

On the other hand, Umikaze would not strictly need to deceive the woman.

If it didn’t work, she could break the window and use the woman as a human shield. Her trap would no longer function then, but she would still end up with the upper hand.

However…

“If Umikaze left along with her hostages, what actual options remain for her?”

Whether or not she was aware of it, the venom in her bloodstream would knock her out sooner or later.

So…

“Fugu. Come to think of it, she couldn’t win by taking a hostage and holing up in a single location. I mean, a long-term battle is bad for her, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, but running around with a hostage isn’t much better for her. Time is on our side, so we would only need to surround her from a distance and tell her to give up and come on out. We wouldn’t even need to locate her and capture her.”

That’s why I had assumed she would go for a short-term trap. I had assumed I was meant to notice something was amiss with the Class Rep and go investigate next door where the Scylla would be waiting to strike.

But she was gone.

She had run away.

Why would she draw this out like that?

“No, that is not an adequate explanation.”

“Maxwell?”

“If we assume Umikaze Speechia the Scylla has run away, how do we explain the disappearance of the two hostages?”

“Because she wanted them as human shields in case we tried to chase after her, right?”

“One hostage would be sufficient to stop you, user. I do not know how much stronger a Scylla is than a human, but taking two possible enemies with you while woozy from venom is highly illogical.”

“Fuguu. I really don’t want to hear the answer, but what if she brought them with her so they couldn’t give us any hint where she was going?”

“No. Then she could have simply killed the mother or the daughter and left them here. What reason would she have not to at this point?”

My heart felt like an invisible thread was squeezing it tight.

“I cannot see what the Scylla is trying to do. User, if you had an unknown venom in your veins, what would you want to do first?”

“I’d want an antidote, I guess.”

“Sure. Before choosing whether or not to defeat your enemy and whether or not to preserve your position, you would want to eliminate that venom. Yet Umikaze Speechia came here first instead of visiting a medical specialist. Why is that?”

“Fugu? But didn’t Onii-chan say it’s an Archenemy poison? A normal hospital can’t help you with that.”

Itou-san was a Circe Witch, so she used animal transformation potions.

A serum or antidote for the original animal’s venom might be able to save her, but those clear tentacles were a rare thing. Japanese hospitals wouldn’t be able to heal the venom from an Australian jellyfish.

Which meant…

“Even if she went somewhere else first, her ultimate goal would be Itou-san. She would demand an antidote for the venom.”

That meant she would want a hostage to get Itou-san to do as she said, so she would want to capture someone close to Itou-san.

And yet…

“No.”

Maxwell’s message felt like an attack.

“The forehead glasses Class Rep’s mother is like a friend of a friend for Itou Helen, so they have likely never even met. She would be unable to abandon the woman for moral reasons, but would seeing the woman in danger really make her feel like her heart was tearing in two?”

“…”

“Umikaze Speechia cannot defeat Itou Helen. The Circe Witch is the Colosseum Queen and she is also ranked above the Scylla. With that power balance in place, Umikaze cannot leave any room open for resistance. This will all be a waste if the antidote she is given turns out to be an even more powerful venom. So coming here seems like too much of a detour.”

“Fugu. So is she first using those hostages to get Onii-chan to obey and then using him to get that Circe girl to obey?”

“No. Like I said, that is too much of a detour. The Scylla cannot determine how long until she passes out, so she would want a solution as quickly as possible.”

If she was simply after an antidote, she would have attacked Itou-san’s family, taken them hostage, and used them to negotiate despite the risk. She had to act now due to the venom, so was Maxwell saying she would ignore the realistic risks and take a gamble?

But that isn’t what had happened.

Then had Umikaze come here for some other reason? We couldn’t work out where the Scylla had gone until we figured out what that was.

“M-maybe she didn’t give it that much thought.” Ayumi sounded hesitant to say this. “Maybe she’s desperate and wanted to take someone else out with her.”

“No. I have nothing to fully reject the possibility of her acting on illogical emotion, but if it could have been anyone, she would not have specifically targeted this house. For example, she could have set fire to the microplastic snow around the school to burn down that former fortress of hers.”

That was a frightening thought, but Maxwell was right. Umikaze had some kind of goal in mind. Taking hostages with you had to be a lot more difficult than I could imagine. It wouldn’t be as simple as putting a cat in a carrier to bring it to the vet.

Umikaze had come here.

Why?

She had taken the Class Rep and her mom away instead of killing them here.

Why?

“My house and the Class Rep’s are next door, yet she chose this one.”

“Isn’t that because she wanted to attack the powerless humans?” asked Ayumi.

“Even though the only person at our house was Erika who has to sleep during the day? She couldn’t resist any more than a human.”

“Then why?”

“She would have been feeling woozy from the venom, so a coffin would be too heavy to carry around as a hostage. I mean, that coffin is the drawer below a queen size bed. But if she dragged Erika out, she would turn to ashes in the sun. She wouldn’t be much of a hostage if she died. Umikaze needed someone who could walk on their own two legs.”

“Isn’t that still too much of a detour for simply pressuring Miss Itou Helen into providing an antidote?” asked Maxwell.

“It could have been anyone.”

Look at it the other way around.

Someone really had disappeared, so Umikaze must have had a reason for choosing them.

“She stole our personal information from the school database and that would include information on Itou-san’s family. She would at least know that Itou-san is the only Archenemy in her family. And what would Itou-san do if she’s shown a hostage?”

“…”

Ayumi was a Zombie.

She had incredible strength and she could make more Zombies by biting people.

But having power did not mean you would just use it blindly. Archenemies could join the rest of us at school because of that element of trust.

“Archenemies aren’t feared because they have monstrous power. It’s only when they lose the conscience that guides that power that they get treated as monsters. So what Archenemies fear most is having people think they’ve lost that conscience. …Itou-san won’t be able to hold back in front of her family. Even if the hostage is a complete stranger, she can’t choose to not hand over the antidote.”

Plus, Itou-san was generally the nervous small animal type.

Her experience in the nationally-broadcast Colosseum probably played a role, but she did not like having attention focused on her.

She was afraid of betraying people’s expectations.

She was afraid of standing up on the stage in the spotlight. If her family or any of us pressured her to hand over the antidote, she would hesitate to attack the Scylla even when she could easily win. Because she was afraid of destroying her relationship with her family or school friends in the process. She did not want her family to look at her with fear in their eyes and think of her as a coward or a monster.

If she screwed that up, she would lose everything.

Because when one available option made her look like a saint, every other option looked barbaric by comparison.

The Scylla was an Archenemy that used location and situation to divide up a group and plunge them into panic so she could control them as she pleased.

“That would be a dangerous gamble for her,” said Maxwell.

“Take it up with Umikaze. She might not be thinking straight thanks to the venom. But we do know she went for option 2. She’s after us as friends of Itou-san instead of just grabbing some random passerby.”

Itou-san could not choose to abandon a stranger in front of her family, but just in case she would choose to attack anyway, Umikaze must have wanted me or the Class Rep.

“But that does not explain why she took both hostages,” said Maxwell. “The Class Rep alone would work for that plan.”

That…was a good point.

We were the ones that could not allow a single person to be lost. Umikaze wouldn’t care.

“…”

But wait.

If I couldn’t make sense of it no matter how hard I thought about it, was I wrong about some fundamental aspect of it?

“Maxwell.”

“Sure.”

“How much time would Umikaze have had left once she arrived at this house?”

“I have very detailed data on Miss Itou Helen’s specs from when I was supporting her in the Colosseum. To be blunt, it is strange that Umikaze Speechia is even still conscious. That may be due to the commonality between a Circe Witch and a Scylla.”

“In that case…”

“Did you figure something out, Onii-chan?”

Archenemies without special powers weren’t the only ones influencing this situation.

Even without Maxwell’s assistance, a human could find something they could do.

So could it be?

“Umikaze would have been so woozy she could barely stay standing.”

“Fugu. And?”

“But that wouldn’t eliminate her malicious intent. In fact, being so close to her limit could mean any attempt at playing innocent failed. …But the Class Rep’s mom is human. I was admittedly a lot younger at the time, but she had enough of a heart to shelter a stranger like me when she didn’t have to. So she would probably do the same for someone else. But what if she learned the person who showed up at her home without warning was actually lying in wait to harm her daughter?”

“Ah!?”

“Do you think she would have just let it happen? Sure, she was up against an Archenemy, but Umikaze would have been barely staying on her feet and it’s not like she could just call the police. She probably would have felt pressured into doing something herself.”

What did that mean?

Everyone had vanished from the house.

But what if it hadn’t been the Scylla who wielded violence there?

“Y-you mean that Class Rep’s mom did it!?” asked Ayumi.

“I have no proof, but that fits the situation better. Ayumi, did you see any bloodstains on the way here?”

“Of course not!”

“Neither did I. …That means it wasn’t a blade. Did she catch her off guard and wallop her with a dryer or something? If the house has power, she could have even electrocuted Umikaze.”

“Fugu? Wasn’t the intercom working?”

“That runs on a battery. Just like the smoke detectors on the ceiling.”

But that aside…

“Even if she did catch the Scylla by surprise and knock her out, I doubt she’s killed her yet. Then there would be a corpse inside here.”

Ayumi started to breath a sigh of relief, but then she noticed what I had said.

“Yet?”

“Why do you think they’re all gone? Kill her in the house, and they’d be the top suspects.”

The police were not functioning at the moment.

No matter how it looked, we had no idea how peaceful things were below the surface. The endless downpour of microplastic snow would cover up a lot of evidence and signs.

“B-but! I find it hard to believe she would attack someone like that. We’re talking about someone who crosses to the other side of the street when a dog barks at her while she’s taking a walk!!”

I walked through the house again while listening to Ayumi. I had my eyes on the floor. Everything looked nice and clean, but that was what struck me as odd. It was ''too'' clean. There was no keeping all the microplastic snow out when you opened and closed the door and that would make the floor all crunchy, but there was no trace of anyone having being in here other than us.

Had someone cleaned it all up very recently?

I crouched down on the dining room floor.

“This isn’t alcohol. It’s faint, but there’s a distinct chlorine scent.”

“Check the storage closet,” said Maxwell. “Do they have any industrial Perfect Wash?”

“Fugu?”

“That was originally a bleach used to get tough stains off of dress shirt collars and whatnot,” I explained. “But when used undiluted, I’ve heard it can fully break down DNA – that is, blood and saliva stains. That’s become famous enough that you sometimes see it used as online slang.”

Ayumi was dumbfounded.

But that didn’t sound like something a housewife would know offhand. I grabbed the recipe-searching tablet affixed to the fridge. You couldn’t trust fingerprint locks. Those same fingerprints were already all over the screen’s protective sheet.

Once past the lock screen, I performed a few operations and found this: “Bloodstains, how to eliminate”

“Even when you erase your local device’s search history, it’ll still be somewhere, either at a local base station or on the company server. And that you can’t erase without some very special software.”

I took a slow breath.

And I turned toward Ayumi who had gone pale.

“She must have been really mad that someone was not just attacking her daughter but doing it just to ‘use’ her. I don’t know if she plans to dump the unconscious Scylla in a river or bury her in microplastic snow and set it alight, though.”

“She would…she would go that far? Fugu, but all she wants to do is save that Class Rep! Hit the Scylla to knock her out and she’s done!!”

“Ayumi, the police aren’t functioning right now.”

“Which is why she protected that Class Rep herself!!”

“And what does she do with the unconscious Scylla afterwards? She can’t hand her over to the police. And if she just dumps her somewhere, that girl will be back for revenge soon enough. Leaving her here would be even worse. You never know when she’ll come attack you in your sleep. Tying her up won’t work either because an Archenemy might be able to cut the bonds with sharp claws or by twisting her joints at inhuman angles. So how is she supposed to protect her daughter?”

This wasn’t about greed and she didn’t even particularly hate the Scylla.

But.

She would do whatever it took to protect her daughter.

“This tracks with her past logic. She’s the one that always sheltered me back when my home was like a warzone. The neighbor kid should have been like a total stranger and she would have known she was only bringing a lot of trouble onto herself, but she did it anyway.”

“…”

“So how far would she go for her own daughter? This isn’t about being human or Archenemy or being a professional or amateur. Umikaze seems to have overlooked this, but everyone in Kukyou City has the agency to make their own decisions. So once someone decides to do something, they’ll do it. No matter what.”

She would protect her daughter.

But she would not have her daughter branded the daughter of a murderer.

So she would see this through.

It was her kindness that motivated her to go to such lengths to protect.

And to do that, she couldn’t smash open the Scylla’s skull in her own home, splattering evidence everywhere, and she couldn’t hide a corpse in her home since it would rot more by the day, making its presence harder and harder to overlook.

So if she was going to kill the girl, she would do it outside.

Instead of hiding the corpse, she would dump it.

And in a way that would lead no one back to her. But not to defend herself. It was all to keep any dark shadows from falling on her daughter’s future. Wasn’t that why she was seeing this through to the very end?

The police were not functioning and order had collapsed, so if Umikaze was killed and dumped outside, anyone could have done it. And if she was soaked in water while she rotted or burned until she carbonized and then a long enough time passed between her death and the investigation, the information from the cadaver would be much less specific, leaving the police in the dark once they finally arrived.

To be honest, that probably wouldn’t work all that well to throw off a real forensic investigation, but that isn’t what mattered here. It only mattered that the Class Rep’s mom thought it would. An when people felt cornered, they apparently had a tendency to either grow paranoid of everything around them or to start baselessly assuming everything would work out in their favor.

“That has to be it. She knocked woozy Umikaze out by catching her off guard, cleaned up the blood, and then carried her from the house. And she went through the back garden so we wouldn’t notice from out front.”

“Then where’s that Class Rep!?”

“Her mom is trying to kill someone in order to protect her. She’s obviously trying to stop it.”

She could have shouted to let us know something was wrong, but maybe she had feared doing that would cause her mom to panic and kill the Scylla right then and there. Or maybe she had thought calling for help would be socially devastating for her mother.

A lot of people would keep quiet about cases of bullying or abuse because they felt they could not call the police. Not because they wanted to protect the abuser but because they wanted to protect the victim.

The apple didn’t fall far from the tree with that mother and daughter.

They thought they could solve it on their own and they felt they had to do it themselves. Because otherwise their attempt to save someone they cared for would actually harm them.

Sometimes those thoughts could lead you in the wrong direction.

“Maxwell, run a search.”

“Sure. For what?”

“She plans to dispose of the Scylla’s body, but a fire would be too conspicuous in a residential district even during the day. She’ll probably use water. So she’ll want a nearby river, waterway, or ditch. She didn’t take her car, so she can’t have gone too far. She must be within 100 or 200 meters of here! Just locate any dirty body of water large enough to submerge someone and let them rot!”

Ayumi looked entirely lost, but what we needed to do had been obvious from the beginning.

I just had to point out one thing.

“Remember that SOS?”

“Fugu?”

“The Class Rep was biting her lip because she couldn’t ask anyone for help with this, but she still left us a hint by changing her phone’s voicemail setting. Small as it might be, she still left a mark for us to find. She thinks fighting on her own here is best and she’s doing her best to convince herself of that, but she did it anyway. The Class Rep and her mother might keep secrets, but they’re not bad people deep down. She only wanted to protect her family and their ordinary life from a home invader while she can’t call the police. …What’s so wrong about that? We’ve gotta go save her before she goes too far!!”

Having Ayumi wait out in front of the house had kept this from being even worse.

Maybe that woman hadn’t wanted to make a lot of noise, but she had chosen not to use her car to carry the unconscious Scylla away. If Ayumi had arrived later and the woman had been able to drive her car out of the garage like normal, she could have gone more than 100 times as far.

“The closest possibility is Babbling Brook located 50m north of the Class Rep’s house,” said Maxwell. “It is called a brook, but it is really just an artificial waterway.”

“Give us three…no, five different possibilities. She couldn’t have taken Umikaze far, but she wouldn’t want to kill someone too near her house either.”

This was extremely out of the ordinary for her. Enough so that she frantically made an internet search for methods after taking that first step. None of this was well planned out. It was like she was searching blindly and unsure what to do. There was no predicting when she would suddenly change course.

“For now we have to get to that Babbling Brook place!”

This was my home, but I didn’t know all those rivers and stuff around here had actual names. I would probably recognize the place once I got there.

My bicycle wasn’t much use in the unnatural snow. It was like the tires were slipping on a soft sandy beach. Since the closest one was 50m away, it would be faster if I ran there on foot.

“Ayumi, if you can run on this snow, then go on ahead. Please!”

“There’s…there’s still hope!!”

She had 10 times the strength of a human.

So much of her stich-covered skin was exposed and the snow seemed to explode beneath her feet when she took off running.

I knew there was still hope.

It took energy to harm someone. A lot of it. It was even said murderers who attempted to dismember their victim’s corpse would often gather all the necessary tools and get started but ultimately give up partway through after finding out how troublesome and time-consuming it was.

That woman was only human.

Even carrying the unconscious Scylla would take a lot out of her, so her extreme tension was probably allowing her to push past her usual limits.

But that wouldn’t last forever.

So there was one big question: would she manage to walk all the way to the river and “do the deed” before she ran out of mental gas?

If she managed to smash open the unresisting Scylla’s skull or even just threw her into a river, that was that. A Scylla was apparently an aquatic immortal, but I didn’t know if she could actually breath underwater or if she could use such an ability while unconscious.

The brook in question ran through the residential district.

It was not even as wide across as the roads around here and it only had a small concrete bridge across it. There was nowhere to play and nowhere to fish. It looked a lot like an artificial waterway meant as a safety valve that would guide rainwater away.

The snow must have piled up on the bottom because the water filled it up to the banks despite no real increase in rain recently. The road was only a few dozen centimeters above the water level.

Ayumi had arrived ahead of me and she was leaning out over the small bridge’s railing. She was staring down at the water, but she shook her head when she noticed me.

“No, it doesn’t look like they’re here! The snow doesn’t look disturbed!!”

“We’re running short on time.”

That woman had carried a 50kg weight this far and then walked right past this river to go elsewhere. Even though it would have all been over “for the time being” if she dumped the body in the water here.

She had shaken free of the temptation. Just like someone trying to decide between stopping at a half marathon or turning back for the full marathon, and choosing the latter.

She was not going to come to her senses like this.

She was not just running on temporary tension. The needle had to still be turned all the way over to maximum. She was not going to stop partway through and she would see this through to the end once she arrived at her destination.

“Ayumi, let’s split up. Share your map with Maxwell and head for the further away rivers while I check the closer ones. You’re a lot faster than me, so please!”

“B-but then what about you?”

“Things have changed. We aren’t up against a full-power Scylla, so I don’t need an Archenemy’s strength to protect myself. So go! Hurry!”

Ayumi was still hesitant, but she must have understood that being even a second too late would bring us back the point of no return here. She finally managed to shake free of something and ran to the other side of the bridge while using her phone as a guide.

“Maxwell, where should I go!?”

“Travel 80m west from your current location. You should come across an exposed portion of Crescent Moon Creek.”

“Exposed?”

I couldn’t come to a stop.

I had to run full speed even as the snow tried to grab at my feet.

“Most of the creek is actually a culvert, so it is covered by the ground. There have been complaints about the water quality and the smell because the lack of sunlight and oxygen has caused the plankton to die, allowing only the putrefying bacteria to multiply and turning the creek into sludge.”

That was perfect for dumping a body since it would decompose more before discovery.

But this taught me there were areas so close to home I was entirely unfamiliar with. Things looked so different when viewed from an unfamiliar angle and the supposedly orderly city layout seemed like it was set up to lead me astray.

Eventually a rotting eggs smell reached my nose.

It was the stench of sludge.

The creek was a public property, so no one could clean it up or put a cover over it even if they knew that was the source of the stench. I could see why people were submitting complaints to city hall if it smelled like this 24/7.

But if you wanted to get rid of something and have it decompose beyond recognition, this would be the place to go.

“!?”

I quickly came to a stop as I came across the goopy-looking river and hid behind a corner of a wall there.

Someone was there.

And they were not alone.

That swaying blonde hair really did stand out. I stuck just my phone out around the corner to check with my camera.

“Search targets located,” said Maxwell. “The forehead glasses Class Rep and her mother are there, with Umikaze Speechia over the latter’s shoulder.”

“Contact Ayumi and call her back here.”

This looked more like a road than a bridge. The creek full of thick water was flowing a level below here, but the current took it underneath the ground itself. I couldn’t tell what it did after that. It really did feel like no more than a waterway.

At the intersection, I could see movement by the guardrail running alongside the road located a level above.

An adult woman carried the Scylla over her shoulder and a glasses girl was clinging to her and trying to stop her.

I had finally found her.

I had found the Class Rep!!

“Why wouldn’t she have knocked her mom over on the way here?”

“Umikaze Speechia is in no state to cushion her own landing,” said Maxwell. “She may have been worried that doing so could end up subjecting the defenseless girl to a modified belly-to back suplex.”

The woman’s other hand held a hammer…no, it looked like one, but was it actually a meat tenderizer? She may have grabbed something from the kitchen.

“Mom!!”

After coming this far, the Class Rep let out a pained cry.

But it did not reach the woman.

She casually dropped Umikaze to the ground like she was setting down a bag of cement. The long blonde hair braided together at only a few spots down its length was snaked out across the snow.

How much of the damage would the microplastic snow have absorbed?

When the mother than mercilessly raised the meat tenderizer, the Class Rep rushed straight at her. The “hostage” was now on the ground, so she no longer had to hold back out of fear of harming Umikaze.

But.

Even so.

Did you forget, Class Rep? Your mom is wielding that blunt weapon in order to kill someone. Clinging to her hips from the front will only get you hit on the exposed back or head.

So if you’re really a mother, I really hope you can recognize the very child you’re trying to protect.

“Maxwell, support me!”

“This course of action is extremely not recommended.”

“I have my doubts too, but the Class Rep is in trouble if I don’t do it!!”

At this point, I didn’t have time for anything clever like contacting the Class Rep somehow and having her distract her mom while I snuck up from behind and grabbed the weapon away.

There was nothing as fancy as “planning” here.

But if I introduced a target who was within reach and would cause more trouble than the Class Rep, she was abound to redirect her hostility that way.

Of course, I wasn’t an Archenemy. I was only human. And I didn’t have a gun or knife.

But this was the only way of making her feel danger right now.

I was wearing a mask to avoid breathing in the microplastics, so I could hide my identity by wrapping a large handkerchief around my head like a bandanna.

I couldn’t be Amatsu Satori right now.

I had to become Mystery Boy A as I popped out around the corner of the wall.

I aimed my phone toward them and produced as many bright flashes and loud artificial shutter noises as I could.

I forced my voice into a bit of a falsetto and shouted as loud as I could.

“Ah ha ha!! Holy crap! The apocalypse really has arrived in Kukyou City! I’ll get loads of view from this! Internet advertisement cash here I come!!”

Yes.

She had dragged the Scylla from her house to avoid having her home be the murder site. She wanted to dump the body in a river because she thought letting the body decompose would confuse the forensic investigation.

But.

All of that went out the window if she was photographed in the act. She would fear my phone’s camera more than a gun or knife, more than an Archenemy’s strength, and more than her daughter clinging to her.

“…”

She slowly turned her head toward me like a machine and focused her eyes on me.

I guessed we were more than 10 meters apart.

And yet.

I heard…something slicing through the air?

As it passed right by me???

“Warning: this is why I said this was not recommended!!”

She had done a windup like a baseball pitcher.

And then she threw it.

I finally realized the object that flew right past my face was the hammer-like meat tenderizer.

Wait, was that it stabbed into the concrete wall behind me!?

“This continues to not be recommended! Major warning: do not take your eyes off your opponent during such a critical situation!!”

I heard a short shriek.

When I quickly looked forward again, I saw the Class Rep’s attempt to tackle her mother had been foiled when she was tossed aside by a single arm.

That woman was looking my way.

With mechanical-looking eyes that were disturbingly lacking in emotion.

This was the same look she had given Umikaze Speechia the Scylla.

The rusty nails look coming from beyond her glasses was something the Class Rep had definitely inherited from her.

She had locked onto me.

“Tch. I missed.”

She kicked off the snowy ground and raced straight toward me.

This was not a Zombie like Ayumi or a Vampire like Erika.

She was human.

Simply human.

But.

This wasn’t about her biological specs. It wasn’t even about the actual clash. My legs had been drained of all power from the moment I heard her low voice that sounded like it came from a wrinkled witch. This was the neighbor who had protected a complete stranger like me since I was little. She may have seemed even kinder than my actual mother. She was like an absolute safe zone for me, so when I felt her directing real and merciless killer intent toward me, it really did feel like my legs were going to give out below me.

Yeah.

Home was the same as school.

There was no such thing as a truly unconditional safe place on this entire planet.

“Warning!!”

“Gah!?”

With just one arm, she grabbed at my throat and lifted my feet from the ground. And without slowing down, she slammed my back against the concrete wall behind me.

I…couldn’t breathe?

This was insane.

I was pretty sure she had never even tried out kickboxing as a form of exercise, so could she really manage this just by swinging her arms and legs around? Was this really the work of that gentle woman who looked good in glasses!?

Her mind was boiling over with anger, but this boost in strength was not just a plus for her. She had to be damaging her own body on the inside.

“Stop, mom! You need to stop this!!”

The Class Rep was shouting while still lying down on the microplastic snow a short distance away.

That pulled my mind back before I could fall unconscious.

The woman also increased her brutality.

So she could protect the Class Rep.

We both wanted the same thing, but that had taken us in very different directions.

I was starting to fear she was really going to use just her hand to crush my throat and break the thick bone within.

But…

You may be willing to go to hell for your daughter’s sake, but I don’t want to see her cry either. And to avoid that, you need to remain a part of the family you’re trying to protect! Because I know you’re not a murderer or conspirator! You’re the kind of person who comes rushing over when you hear a child crying!!

Families weren’t guaranteed to say together forever. They would break apart if you didn’t consciously work to hold them together. I knew that all too well. I still had nightmares about it.

So.

I really did respect you for constantly protecting the Class Rep’s family. Because I know how much of a miracle it is to hear ‘welcome home’ when you step through the door in the afternoon. It told me there really were people out there like the ones you saw in dramas and on movies. My family couldn’t manage it, but it taught me that all that talk about family bonds wasn’t just a complete lie. You are about half the reason I didn’t fall into despair about the world as a whole!

So.

Don’t you dare.

Don’t you dare let go of all that just because you hit a bit of a bump in the road!!

“It makes me so sad to see you like this!!”

“?”

Was she taken aback because I yelled from so close, or had she finally realized she recognized my voice?

For whatever reason, her grip on my throat weakened slightly, so I took that chance to move my empty hand behind me.

I reached for the concrete wall.

I felt around to find the hammer-like meat tenderizer stuck into the wall and I grabbed it.

“Wait…are you Satori-kun!?”

“Hello, Shoumi-san. Agh…but it’s time you came to your senses!!”

I struck with the makeshift weapon as hard as I could.

But not at the face in front of me.

At the wall behind me.

I grimaced at the dull pain from my wrist, but that wasn’t all that happened. The microplastic snow was clinging to everything out here, so the impact that ran through the concrete wall stripped the minute particles from it and sent them soaring through the air.

She was wearing glasses.

And while she had blown past her body’s limits, she was not used to getting all that much exercise. She was out of breath and her temperature was elevated. Anyone who wears glasses probably knows what that means.

Yes, the lenses were fogged up.

That was why she failed to hit my head when throwing the meat tenderizer. She had walked here carrying a 50kg weight, so of course she was out of breath and overheating. And what if the microplastic snow rushed in toward her while those lenses were faintly damp?

This time, her vision was truly reduced to zero.

“Kyah!?”

Your vision of course allowed you to see things, but it also helped a lot with keeping your balance. You can see that easily enough by shutting your eyes and seeing how much harder it is to balance on one leg. Shoumi-san began to wobble with her vision suddenly dyed white, so I swung my body to the side while still dangling from her hand. I also grabbed at her wrist with both hands and twisted it to the side with me. Both of us collapsed onto the microplastic snow.

Then we rolled along the ground.

We were fighting to get on top and to be the one holding the meat tenderizer.

“If we let her live, she will try again. She will be back to attack again until she is successful! Capturing her and tying her up isn’t enough! She’ll just get away!! So!!”

“So…what? You’re going to kill her!? You’re going to smash her head in with this meat tenderizer!?”

“Yes!! She already knows where we live and my daughter is beyond my reach everyday at school! There are too many openings. Just one knife to the gut and I can’t save her!!”

“Can’t you see that decision – that kindness – is making the Class Rep cry!?”

“!?”

I couldn’t overpower her.

Shoumi-san’s mind was burning too bright with anger, so she wasn’t thinking straight but she was more powerful than me! She was going to win this struggle!

“Be a good boy, Satori-kun. Just hand over the meat tenderizer. Now!!”

“Hell no.”

“Please help me save my daughter. All you have to do is relax your grip. I don’t want to have to hit you!!”

“Each and every word you think is helping her is only tearing her life to pieces!!”

I didn’t care anymore.

She had the upper hand while leaning down on top of me, but I was going to have my say!!

“Are you insane? However they might act elsewhere, parents can’t afford to do the wrong thing in front of their kid!! They can’t destroy their child’s image of them! I thought you understood that! Isn’t that why you couldn’t bear to see the warzone next door and took in a stranger like me!?”

I must have had a dark look in my eyes back then and I’m sure I really would have rotted away if she hadn’t given me a warm blanket and some hot milk.

So now it was my turn.

You’re the one who protected these feelings burning in my heart. Instead of falling into a jaded worldview and deriding the idea of hoping for a miracle, I can actually believe there is some kindness in this world.

So.

So.

So.

I refuse to give up here.

If your heart really has gone empty and you don’t have anything left with which to save the Class Rep the right way, then I’ll return what you gave me in the past!!

This opportunity came from you originally, so hold your head high and let me save you!!

“Maxwell!!”

“Loud noise warning.”

The blast of noise was so loud I thought it would blow out my phone’s speaker.

That alone wouldn’t do any damage.

Not even a smartphone was that convenient.

But.

Shoumi-san had already been blinded by the microplastics sticking to her glasses, so what would happen if her inner ear was shaken by an ear-splitting roar?

“?”

She wobbled to the left while on top of me. And she may not have even been aware of it.

I used that to my advantage.

“Ahhhh!!”

I twisted my hips to throw her to the side. I climbed on top of her instead and used my weight to pin her down.

But even after that, she smiled thinly up at me.

With a hint of self-deprecation.

“What are you going to do now?”

“…”

“You are where I was 30 minutes ago, Satori-kun. You might have the upper hand now, but as soon as my hands are free, I will go and kill that girl. Tie me up with rope or handcuff me if you like, but I will break free. And once I break free, I will kill her. So what do you do!? Try to persuade me? Put me to sleep with a drug? Seal me up in some secret underground room? None of those are realistic! Now you know what the one and only actual answer is, don’t you!? The only way to stop a criminal who won’t listen to reason is to kill them!!”

Maybe so.

Maybe so, but still!

“Maxwell.”

“No,” she said. “I’m asking you. You’re the one that irresponsibly stopped me and is thus exposing my daughter to danger, so don’t think you can escape this by running to your machine for answers.”

“Kh.”

I was pinning her down and held the meat tenderizer, but my heart was going to be swallowed up if she kept this up!

When she lectured you, she would cut off all other options with a bunch of super reasonable arguments that even a child had to accept.

This person really was Shoumi-san.

No matter how far she had fallen!!

“And don’t try to say it would make my daughter sad. We both know this is about something more important than that. So what is it you want to do in front of that daughter? Answer me! And if you can’t, then get off of me!!”

She hopped up from below me.

She was going to throw me off of her!?

“…!!”

I clenched my teeth and raised the meat tenderizer.

By the time I held my phone toward her face with my other hand, she had almost entirely broken free.

It almost looked like a golf practicing app.

Lines indicating the ideal angle, level of force, and speed of the swing were displayed over the real image shown on the phone.

But the real image in this case was the glasses woman’s skull.

I used the meat tenderizer with a light enough touch that it was like pressing a switch on her right temple. I was pretty sure it was a light enough blow that it would cause the entire stack to collapse in a game of Daruma Otoshi.

But because I followed the guide, the force propagated accurately into her skull and rattled it just enough for her eyes to go unfocused. I quickly stuck my thumb in her mouth because it looked like she was going to bite her tongue from the shock, but she did not react at all to having something stuck into her mouth.

She had passed out.

“Pant, pant!!”

“Just to be sure, you should remove her snowy glasses and check her pupil’s reaction when you shine your phone’s light.”

I didn’t have it in me to follow Maxwell’s advice there.

I heard someone trudging through the snow on trembling legs to approach me. I slowly looked up while still sitting on top of the woman.

“Satori…-kun? Are you okay?”

“Sorry, Class Rep. I couldn’t find an answer for anything.”

“Those questions were meaningless. She didn’t have an answer herself.”

That was true.

No one had an answer.

But Shoumi-san had hoped I would have one, even though she felt irritated by my sudden arrival while she felt pushed to the limit. So she had tried to get me to give one. If I had been able to give her an answer, I might have been able to end all this and eliminate all her concerns by telling her she didn’t have to kill Umikaze and telling her she could protect her ordinary life without any blood on her hands!!

She had been about to kill someone because she couldn’t find another answer, so she had wanted someone to stop her more than anyone, but even I had ultimately taken the easy way out and relied on violence. So it all left me with a bitter aftertaste.

“Maxwell, what can I tie her up with?”

“Your belt or zip ties would work. Plastic rope digs into the skin, so tying them too tight can cut off blood flow.”

I dug through my pockets and found a few zip ties for tying together cables. Don’t ask why I had them on me. That’s just how workshop boys are. Think of it like how dog lovers always have dog fur on their clothes. For now, I used one of those to tie unconscious Shoumi-san’s hands behind her back.

And.

This was not over yet.

“Where is Umikaze Speechia?”

The Class Rep had left everything there to come check on me.

Which meant…

“…”

I saw someone slowly walking while half dragging her heavy body along using the guardrail.

She wasn’t walking toward us.

She didn’t have that much fighting spirit left.

She had turned her shabby back on us so she could sneak away. Her long blonde hair swayed side to side like an old grandfather clock’s pendulum.

Yeah, that makes sense.

She already had venom pumping through her veins and then she was nearly killed after being caught off guard by Shoumi-san who she had underestimated for being a mere human. Now was not the time for her dignity as a JB member or as an Archenemy. She could only bite her lip and tremble in shame as she ran away.

It reminded me of the skinny young man from JB who had been shot to death in the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department holding cell. The video hadn’t shown his face as he died, but I imagine it was something like this.

But.

I was sick of being tossed around by her selfishness. If it weren’t for her actions, the Class Rep and Shoumi-san never would have suffered like that.

If I let her go, she would try to strike back the first chance she got.

I still didn’t have an answer to the questions that woman had hit me with. In fact, I had instead wielded a blunt weapon against her when she was only driven by her worries.

“Satori…-kun?”

But I did know one thing: I couldn’t let her go.

This had nothing to do with being human or Archenemy.

I got up from Shoumi-san while still holding the meat tenderizer that looked like it was designed based on a hammer.

I slowly stood up.

I couldn’t let that girl get away.

No matter what.

“Satori-kun!?”

That small figure was trying to run away on shaky legs.

She was curling up her back as if to protect herself and occasionally looking back over her shoulder in the most pathetic way.

Since she was running, she had to know what she had done was wrong. She had known it was wrong, but she did it anyway. And when it didn’t turn out the way she wanted, she had tossed it all aside and run away to save her own hide.

I couldn’t just let her go.

I only had to use that conspicuous blonde hair as a guide.

“Heh.”

I hadn’t meant for it, but a breath of laughter escaped from the bottom of my gut for some reason.

I heard a dull sound from my hand.

It came from the grip of the hammer-like meat tenderizer I was squeezing tight.

Oh.

Is this what it felt like for Shoumi-san, who isn’t an Archenemy or a pro assassin, to lift me by my neck with a single hand?

Even if someone tried to stop me or more or less threatened to take away my future, I wasn’t going to listen. I had my hands full just keeping the next five seconds from falling apart.

I was vaguely glad that I hadn’t squeezed my phone in that same way.

“Don’t you run away…”

I understood now why she had thrown the meat tenderizer at me as her very first attack.

You couldn’t plan further than five seconds out in this state. You couldn’t wait long enough to lure your fleeing prey into a dead end so you could attack them there.

My mind had progressed further than that, but my body refused to listen, like it was staggering forward. I wasn’t going to stop. Because this was the correct answer straight outta the textbook!

“…from meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!”

Something caught at my right arm.

Just as I prepared to throw the meat tenderizer at the coward’s back, the Class Rep frantically grabbed at my arm with all her strength. The meat tenderizer slipped from my hand and spun off in the wrong direction.

But that was fine.

I didn’t need that weapon.

“Stop, Satori-kun.”

I could find stones to hit her with if I dug into the snow around here. And if I didn’t want to place any suspicion on the Class Rep or that woman, then it was a lot cleverer to find a weapon out here.

I had a vague idea that I could tear her leg muscles like this and then maybe she wouldn’t be able to get back up.

That sounded good to me.

And shut up, conscience. I don’t want to hear from you right now.

“Please!! Don’t you resort to violence too! Don’t leave me all alone!!”

The Class Rep shouted something while her feet were lifted from the ground and she swayed like a pendulum.

A pleasant scent tickled at the tip of my nose.

She was using both arms to cling to me, so a lot of softness and warmth was reaching me. Ignore the situation and we probably looked like a boyfriend and girlfriend pressing shoulders together.

But…

(She’s getting away.)

However…

(Class Rep, she’s getting away. Then she’ll strike back. And what about Shoumi-san? It’s all that Scylla’s fault. She’s an Archenemy. What were her good points? A transfer student. I thought she was a friend. Is there anything that will make her hesitate? JB. She was after me. It’s my fault. Because I just sat there and let it all happen!!)

The scales were shaking.

The cup sitting on the scales was beginning to spill its overfilled contents.

Would I stop here, or would I continue one? Would I let her live, or would I kill her?

Would I give up, I would I break free?

I clenched my teeth so hard I thought they would break.

And I shouted the thought on my mind at the very last moment.

“Class Rep!!”

I couldn’t have sounded more pathetic.

It must have sounded oddly distorted, like I was peeling something off of the back of my throat.

But then I felt her arms around my neck instead of my arm and we tumbled down onto the snow together.

“Ah.”

None of it felt bittersweet.

She was sobbing and wailing while clinging to my chest. Almost like she had completed her round of Russian roulette without dying.

Had it been that bad?

Had it looked that likely I was going to kill someone here?

“Ahhhhhh! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!”

I heard a silly fwump sound.

Umikaze Speechia must have tripped over her own feet.

She had been trying to escape while propping herself up on the guardrail, but now she had collapsed limply into the microplastic snow. Her long blonde hair trailed behind her. Itou-san’s venom must have finally caught up to her. After collapsing forward, the Scylla showed no sign of getting back up.

And.

“Fugu.”

With a dull thud, Ayumi dropped straight down on top of Umikaze with the intensity of a lightning bolt.

She must have been leaping from rooftop to rooftop.

My sister crouched down with her feet together atop the face-down Scylla and she looked over at me.

“What the heck, Onii-chan!? You tell me to rush here and I get here to find you hugging your Class Rep while ignoring the harsh reality around you? What happened to her mom!?”

“You just ended this. Although I was kind of hoping to show she wasn’t even worth killing.”

Things might look over and done with, but this was in fact not at all over.

Once I had Umikaze Speechia the Scylla’s arms bound behind her back with a zip tie, I managed to lift her up onto my shoulder.

But…

“Ghhh.”

“You’re not a trained firefighter, so why would you think you can do that, Onii-chan? Here, give her to me.”

“But Shoumi-san managed to walk through the snow carrying her… And you’re in charge of her anyway.”

“Fugu? The neighbor?”

“She’ll honestly be too much for me once she comes to, so I was hoping you could restrain her with your Zombie strength once she starts struggling.”

Yes.

We had knocked her out for now, but the Scylla would begin plotting revenge as soon as the venom left her body. And Shoumi-san would do everything she could to kill Umikaze Speechia to prevent that. It didn’t matter that this was her daughter’s classmate.

We had stopped things for the time being, but we hadn’t actually solved anything.

“Looks like our only choice is to drag them back home.”

“Fugu. Your Class Rep really looks like she wants to help.”

“No way. I want her to remain pure. I’m not getting her involved in this.”

“Wait, hold on. What about me?”

Ayumi, a very convenient girl I could summon with the tap of a button on my phone, glared at me, but I ignored it.

Our first destination was my house.

Maybe we should have left Shoumi-san with the Class Rep and let them go home, but I really didn’t think the Class Rep could handle her alone. If she woke up and still had that inhuman strength left, she would be able to tear right through a zip tie or duct tape.

It was less than 200m home, but my arms were exhausted by the time I got back while dragging Umikaze Speechia by her legs. She was in her school uniform, so her underwear was fully visible the entire time. But in that situation, it didn’t even seem like a treat.

But getting home wasn’t the end.

I still had another job to do just in case.

I caught my breath and then grabbed the shovel and broom from the entranceway.

“I’m going to erase the track made while dragging her. Ayumi, you look after things here.”

The falling snow would likely cover up the track on its own, but it couldn’t hurt to manually alter the microplastics already on the ground. Anyone who didn’t know the situation would only see me as a pierce of garbage who dragged an unconscious teenage girl back home with him.

Even after the poisoning, Umikaze had showed no sign of relying on a hideout kept by another JB member.

I doubted she had any direct colleagues or subordinates, but I didn’t want to get on the wrong side of a muscular young man who got the wrong idea about what was going on. It wouldn’t be surprising to find someone using the pursuit of justice as a way of blowing off steam while the disaster kept them indoors and their frustrations built. I really didn’t want to get beaten up further after all this.

Oh, and one other thing.

“I heard you captured the Scylla, Senpai.”

“I did.”

I called my underclassman and had her join me. After completing the work outside, I went back into my house.

“Eek!?”

The venom must not have worked well on her after all because Umikaze had already woken up in the living room, but she scrambled back on her butt the instant she saw Itou-san. Her arms were still bound behind her back, so her short skirt did some interesting things there. Not that it mattered when I had already seen everything while dragging her here.

Yes.

The higher-ranked Circe Witch could physically prevent the Scylla from doing anything more. But I couldn’t have Itou-san watching over her 24/7, so this was still only a temporary solution.

My underclassman put a hand on her lovely hip and a transparent jellyfish tentacle crawled out from her lower back.

“Looks like she’s woken up already, so should I inject her with a more powerful dose of venom? Oh, but if she’s developed some weird antibodies, the second time could cause anaphylaxis.”

“That won’t be necessary. I honestly called you here in case she wasn’t waking up and I needed an antidote.”

“Um?”

She tilted her head in the cutest way and the jellyfish tentacle bent to form a giant question mark.

Umikaze must have learned a hard lesson about that venom because she was seated with her back against the wall and trembling with her hands still bound behind her back. I crouched in front of her and got down to business.

“JB.”

“!”

“You sounded pretty confident when you said that. And you did all this to apply pressure to me. Now, you know what I mean by ‘all this’, don’t you? I’m not just talking about taking over the school.”

“…”

“Let’s discuss how this all began.”

Maxwell had mentioned that the microplastic snow was almost certainly an intentional attack instead of a simple disaster.

“How much is JB involved in this? Are you the person who built their Freischutz simulator, or are you someone it’s bossing around? And how much of this will recover if I deal with you?”

That might sound powerful, but having to ask all that was an admission that I was several steps behind. I had confiscated her phone, but not even Maxwell could break into it. I had no idea how much of that was reliant on their simulator, though.

But.

Confiscate her device and she loses all that. Just like I’m a normal high school boy without my phone.

I couldn’t let her notice.

I could only hope she was caught up in the moment.

“Wh-what do I…” She gave a pale-faced glance over at my underclassman’s wriggling jellyfish tentacles. “What do I gain if I tell you any of that?”

“I can persuade her.”

I didn’t mean Itou Helen.

When Umikaze looked where I pointed my thumb, she jumped so hard she fell over onto her back. This time, her underwear really was on full display.

Yes.

Shoumi-san was lying on the sofa.

“I don’t want to make a murderer out of her either, so let’s find a good compromise here. …I can’t solve the microplastic snow issue without you. That means it will be all thanks to your help that we can save her daughter. That will be enough to stop her. So talk. Before she wakes up.”

“…”

“If you don’t, I really don’t see how I can stop the bloodshed. If it comes to that, I’ll cut your zip tie, so just run away form here as fast as you can. I’m not on your side, but like I said, I don’t want any more blood on her hands.”

I didn’t make any weird threats.

I didn’t exaggerate.

I simply told the truth. Sometimes, that was the most frightening thing. That Scylla controlled groups in a closed environment using lies and panic, so she would understand better than most how valuable the truth was.

There was no stopping that woman.

She would do whatever it took to protect someone she had found to be more important even when weighed against the rest of the world.

Umikaze had to understand at this point how frightening a parent could become when they really and truly felt the need to act.

She gulped and she must have realized there was no other way of escaping this situation. She finally parted her lips and moved her dry throat to push out a trembling voice.

“I-I mentioned the Charybdis, didn’t I?”

“The monster that works in a pair with the Scylla, right? The students at the school became that giant monster when their panic made them form a single aggressive mob.”

A Scylla alone was not a powerful Archenemy. The Scylla simply attacked people in secret during the panic caused by the Charybdis.

But.

“That isn’t quite accurate,” she said. “There is a monster and I do specialize in taking advantage of the panic it causes, but the panicking students were not the monster.”

“…?”

“They were the heroes tossed about aboard the ship…in other words, they were my food. I can control them, but they aren’t my equal partner.”

Then what was the monster?

Could the giant man-eating monster be the Freischutz simulator? No, that wasn’t it.

After some thought, I arrived at an answer.

“The microplastic snow is the great storm – that is, the artificially created disaster – meant to shake the large boat and send the heroes into a panic,” she said.

“You mean the giant sea monster that created that storm is…?”

“The Noble Ingot cargo ship still burning out at sea and sending out an endless supply of snow. That is the partner, the Charybdis, that JB prepared for me. But that isn’t all.”

“?”

This went beyond anything I expected. She was starting in on a different topic.

Taking some semblance of the initiative may have relaxed her tension because she laughed a little.

“Didn’t you find that cargo ship fire odd? It’s been days since the fire began and it still isn’t showing any sign of being extinguished. Even though the firefighter boats surrounding it are professional equipment. Do you really think the fire would last this long for no reason?”

“An unextinguishable fire? But how could JB create something like that? I put out a microplastic fire near Huge Camera with just an ordinary firehose.”

“That only works with the snow accumulated on the ground,” said the blonde girl. Wait, no. There’s more than one blonde here. Said the ''wicked'' blonde girl. “But the cargo ship is the source of the microplastics, so the amount in the air there is far greater. The coast guard appears to be using a foam extinguishing chemical meant for use against petroleum products, but coating the ship’s deck and floor with the stuff isn’t enough. There, it can burn in the air when the density is right. Simply put, the heavy extinguishing chemical passes right through it. Right through the air that could ignite.”

The Charybdis was a monster that created a giant whirlpool to trap a ship full of heroes.

“I can’t believe this. So the firefighters or coast guard or whoever they are won’t accomplish anything no matter how hard they try?”

“But once they correct for their mistake, the Noble Ingot’s fire will not last long. All that remains is to find a way to get word to them during this blackout.”

I finally felt like the goal was in sight.

Ocean fires are fires aboard ships, oil rigs, megafloats, and other ocean structures. The definition is vague since fires on islands or reclaimed land connected to the ground qualify as ordinary fires, but some experts insist that fires on bridges, artificial islands, and underwater tunnels qualify.

Ocean fires tend to be taken less seriously than wildfires and fires at industrial complexes because of the low risk of it spreading to residential areas on land, but they are extremely risky fires that pose a significant risk of secondary damage to the firefighting crews sent there.

With fires on large ships such as cargo ships and cruise ships (and submarines, although those are rare in Japan), searching for survivors can be difficult because the smoke fills the corridors, turning it into a smoky labyrinth, and extinguishing the fire comes with a great variety of risks such as the possible ignition of the fuel or flammable cargo, the flooding of different areas of the ship, electrical shocks from shorts in the electrical system, and even the entire ship tilting or sinking. They can be seen as some of the most difficult fires to extinguish.

Ocean fires are dangerous even when they are the result of an accident, but the risk doubles when they are set intentionally. A large ship traveling between different nations can contain weapons not found in your home country and domestic cases might not be a good reference for how often guns or explosives will be found.

That is why ocean fires tend to be handled not by the ordinary fire fighters but by the coast guard who are trained as divers and for unexpected naval combat. That might sound simple enough, but the Fire and Disaster Management Agency belongs to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications while the Japan Coast Guard belongs to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism, so they often fight hard to be the ones placed in charge of a case that will make them look really good on the news when they solve it. Not because everyone wants to be a hero, but because those obvious results are an excellent way of demonstrating why they deserve a larger budget in the next fiscal year. It can be hard to tell since they are paid from the people’s tax money, but government jobs are indeed jobs and they are always focused on profitability – in other words, on cost performance.

But to put it another way, ocean fires are so dangerous that they stop worrying about such things when it comes to them.