Mushi Uta:Volume 11

Novel Illustrations

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  Cover

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  Color Page 1

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  Color Page 2

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  Color Page 3

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  Page 17

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  Page 71

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  Page 269

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  Page 343

Prologue: 0.00 The Others

Mushi—

These were supernatural beings who suddenly appeared more than ten years ago.

Since their outward appearance resembled insects, they became known like that.

“Deepest Layer Restricted Block, Walls A to D… are all fully open!”

“We cannot transmit the emergency quarantine signal! Intelligence division members with electronic control abilities dispatched!”

Mushi nested within adolescent boys and girls.

Feeding on their host’s dreams and hopes, they granted them supernatural powers in exchange.

Those possessed by Mushi—were called Mushitsuki.

“Communication with dispatched members was cut off…! All high-ranking members at once…?”

“E to H… a-are open!”

The government created the agency called the Special Environmental Preservation Bureau and concealed the existence of Mushi.

Also called the SEPB for short, this organization captured Mushitsuki and used all possible methods to conceal them. At present they trained these captured Mushitsuki and moved behind the scenes to have them capture further wild Mushitsuki.

“All exits to the surface have been sealed…! The system won’t listen to me!”

“W-we’re trapped…?”

“Restricted Block, remaining walls I to L are also opening!”

Special Environmental Preservation Bureau, Central Headquarters.

This base was located deep underground in Akamaki City, where all the country’s important agencies were gathered. Called the Underground Stronghold, this vast space was now filled with shrill alarms all over.

“Please dispatch the Annihilators to Restricted Block.”

In the room with monitors that showed the situation around the Stronghold, Vice-Director Miguruma Yaeko dispatched commands.

“All members. Please get ready for what appears from the other side of the barrier.”

All subordinate Mushitsuki obeyed Miguruma’s calm voice. Clad in pure white coats and goggles, they started running around inside the monitors.

“There is no response from Harukiyo—Irregular Class Rank 1 member, Ooenma. All other members dispatched.”

One of the members inside the room spoke. Their urgent-sounding tone of voice spoke of the harsh situation.

Right now, not even a single person in the Stronghold could remain calm, except for Miguruma Yaeko.

She simply narrowed her already narrow eyes and looked up at the monitor in front of her eyes intently.

On her mouth was a kind smile, completely unchanged from the usual.

“Deploy Tamamo to the 28th Layer, Yakugami to the 20th Layer, and Kasuou to the 5th Layer and have them all erect their lines of defense. When we reform the command center at the 5th Layer, we will start to evacuate the higher Layers in order.”

“Meaning, we retreat?”

The members around stirred.

“Vice-Director… What on earth is happening?”

“Just a rebellious phase.”

The members all raised brows, but soon their expression became tense.

Among the monitors installed in the center, a large door slowly opened.

It emitted white steam like the breath of a giant and the thick door opened to both sides.

While Miguruma and the rest were watching it, what appeared from inside was—

“…A caterpillar?”

Someone muttered.

Appearing from the other side was a small object slithering on the floor.

However, the next instant…

A veritable tidal wave of caterpillars flew out from within the door. Seeing this scene with crawling caterpillars everywhere—on the door, on the floor, on the ceiling—the members all gulped.

“Kasuou, do you read? I will leave supreme command to you. Start the evacuation plan immediately.”

It wasn’t just the swarm of caterpillars appearing from the door. There was also an electric line glowing in bluish-white that surged on the walls as if to compete with the caterpillars.

“UWAAAAAHHHH!”

A shout echoed inside the room. A line of lightning surged through the wall, assaulting the members.

Yaeko was no exception to this electrical attack as well. Crawling up her legs and going along her body surface, the bluish-white line reached her face.

However, Yaeko was unmoving.

“Even if the organization called the SEPB will vanish from this world today—”

She accepted the sharp pain of the electric blade piercing her brain with a kind smile.

“I will still love you.”

Wearing her “smile of chains”, Vice-Director of the Special Environmental Preservation Bureau, Miguruma Yaeko—

Had her consciousness swallowed by the darkness.

0.01 Daisuke Part 1

“This is Akamaki City?”

The long road connecting to Akamaki City, Higano Bridge, was blocked by large military vehicles.

Clad in pitch-black coat and goggles, Blaze Class Rank 1 member Kakkou—Kusuriya Daisuke—looked at the scene ahead and groaned.

“We can’t see anything…!”

The city supposedly at the other side of the bridge was wrapped in a milk-white mist.

It wasn’t mere mist.

It was as if a clear boundary of mist rose from the end of the bridge, towering over them. It even spread high into the clear sky, covering the entire city in the shape of a dome.

“What is going on inside, Acting Branch Head?”

The boy standing next to Daisuke, Ogata Akatsuki, spoke.

“Fwah, seeing it live is much more pressuring than how it looks on the news…”

Looking up at the wall of mist with a foolish expression was Goroumaru Touko. Her title of the East Central Branch’s Acting Branch Head seemed wasted on her, what with her bed-hair, cheap suit and glasses about to slip down from her ears.

“Acting Branch Head!”

Akatsuki who raised his face again was also clad in the same pitch-dark coat as Daisuke.

It wasn’t just Daisuke and Akatsuki.

Various combatants in charge of the main forces of the East Central Branch were gathered on the sealed Higano Bridge.

“Y-yesh! E-err, Akamaki City became wrapped in this mysterious mist about an hour ago… the entire country’s in an uproar! Even other countries around the world started reporting it as an abnormal event! Well, things are pretty bad and we’re doing our best to suppress it, but there’s no way we can hide everything about something like this…”

“Everyone here knows all that. We want to know what’s going on inside the mist.”

Standing atop a vehicle roof, the handsome-looking Kabuto spoke. As he asked this in a low voice, he exuded much more pressure than needed.

“R-right! We can’t get in contact with the inside at all! No matter the government or civilians, all humans inside Akamaki City are completely silent! Not only phones or wireless, but even the internet and satellite connection, are fully shut out. And another creepy thing… is that not even one person got out of Akamaki City.”

Touko started shaking, her face pale.

“As a bonus, none of the people entering the mist ever returned… awawawa, autumn’s already over and yet we have this out-of-season ghost story… s-seriously spooky!”

“Is it some Mushi’s ability?”

“If not, it would be an actual paranormal phenomenon. But this scope is too large.”

“Maybe some Mushi Matured.”

Akatsuki and Kabuto seemed to agree with Daisuke’s hypothesis.

“T-the scariest thing is the Central Headquarters is keeping radio silence! Them! The Central Headquarters! Even branches other than ours surround Akamaki City from all sides, but how are we supposed to act, in this state where no communication comes from Central Headquarters… to be honest, I can’t make heads or tails of this.”

“Senri, can you look inside?”

Daisuke turned to the girl at Akatsuki’s side. Haji Senri, clad in a long coat, reached both hands toward the mist.

“I’ve been doing it for a while now, but…”

Senri was blind, but she could sense the existence of Mushi.

“Sorry, I can’t ‘see’ anything… this entire mist is like one giant flame, so I can’t peek inside it.”

“It’s fine, Senri. Don’t overdo it.”

Akatsuki worried for the weak-bodied Senri. Kabuto then spoke from the roof of the vehicle.

“Looks like there’s no doubt this is some Mushi effect. And speaking of flames, what’s Harukiyo doing? It’s turned out like this even though he’s supposed to be in Central Headquarters?”

There was a jolt. A person who blanched upon hearing Harukiyo mentioned was there.

Although clad in the same equipment as Daisuke and the rest, that person had no goggles. At first glance they looked like a girl, but Nakayama Kanon was a full-fledged boy.

“Calm down, Kanon. Harukiyo’s not here.”

Daisuke called to him, and Kanon nodded with a scared face again and again.

Central Headquarters, home to several strong Mushitsuki, was cut from any and all contact.

Even just this fact was an unprecedented happening.

“I’ll go check things out.”

Making sure that the holster at his waist had his handgun, Daisuke stepped ahead.

“W-wait just a minute! Kakkou-san, if something happens to you the unrest might spread inside the SEPB…”

“So if we get through with large forces, at the worst case, there’s the possibility of annihilation. It’s fine, I’ll just peek inside the mist and come right back.”

Touko looked dissatisfied, but didn’t stop him any further.

“I-I understand. I’ll tell the other branches to wait until you return!”

“If anything happens to Kakkou they’ll be glad, rather. The demon’s finally dead, and all that.”

“Ahaha.”

“What’s funny, Akatsuki-kun?”

“Eh, I-I wasn’t the one who said… I’m sorry.”

Hearing the reassuring voices of his companions from behind, Daisuke turned toward the mist.

Walking several dozen meters, he stopped in front of the milky-white wall. The moment he tried to softly touch its surface with his finger, he felt his finger being numbed.

“Is it electricity…?”

Was this electric current the source behind the cutoff of all transmissions, perhaps?

A green checkered beetle landed on Daisuke’s shoulder. Its body expanded to become tentacles, fusing with his body and forming a glowing pattern.

“What’s for certain is that this isn’t some natural phenomenon.”

His legs fused with his Mushi stepped inside the milky mist.

“…!”

Strong static electricity attacked Daisuke’s head.

An electrical discharge also ran through the surface of his coat. However, the specially-made equipment and Daisuke’s strengthened flesh were enough to withstand that impact.

He walked through the white space where he couldn’t see even several meters ahead.

Even while frowning at the sensation of his head numbing, Daisuke kept walking straight ahead inside the white space.

“—Kuh…?”

Suddenly he felt dizzy.

This sensation, not unlike drowsiness, was trying to rob the power of his knees.

Should he go back or continue?

After a momentary hesitation, Daisuke kicked the ground.

Even if he came back, he wouldn’t understand anything. He ran toward the direction of Akamaki City.

As he did—he saw a light.

On the other side of the mist, he could see small spots of light running around haphazardly.

“What’s that…?”

Hastening his running speed, he went toward the leaping lights—

“—!”

Suddenly, the mist became much thinner.

A strange sight was revealed to Daisuke’s eyes.

That was—a large ship.

At some point, he was standing on the deck of a ship that was rusted reddish-brown.

“ooOOooOOOOH!”

A shout like a beast’s howl was heard from overhead.

As Daisuke raised his face, he saw a human figure wrapped in a white glow floating in air.

It was a human wearing a hoodie. His face was hidden by large goggles and he covered his head with the hood. Was he able to ignore gravity and stop midair due to the pale glow wrapping his body?

An SEPB member…? No, more importantly, what’s this place—

As Daisuke was confused, the person wearing goggles completely vanished from his sight.

He had no idea what happened.

The glowing person simply vanished without any prior warning—and at the same time, he suddenly appeared at a different spot.

A large ship—this was probably a scrapped vessel.

The goggled individual standing atop the ship’s rusty funnel started tilting—

And died.

Daisuke, who saw people heading to death countless times before, could clearly tell that.

He stood there in a daze and suddenly felt something moving nearby.

As he turned with a start, he immediately saw a bizarre object.

It was apparently a boy.

The word “apparently”—came because that boy had no lower abdomen and half his face was gouged away. His hair, made into a topknot with a rubber band, was wet with fresh blood.

The boy without his lower half started crawling toward Daisuke—

Then shuddered, collapsed and became unmoving.

He died.

There was no need to check; he obviously couldn’t live like that.

What the hell is this? Where have I wandered into—

As he stood there in shock again, someone’s shout flew into his ears.

“There’s nothing here anymore…!”

He heard the voice from the other side of the deck. Daisuke rushed to the fence, leaning over it.

It seemed that he really was on a scrapped ship. Looking down from the giant vessel, there wasn’t the great sea there, but rather unpaved, exposed ground.

Standing on the surface was a young man wearing an expensive-looking suit and a black hat.

And facing him slightly further ahead was a girl. She wore a surgical mask that hid her mouth.

“Come, Mikko!”

The young man reached to her, but the girl shook her head to the sides.

“If I could return to the past—I would have probably killed all of you the moment we met…”

Sliding her mask down, the girl’s exposed mouth wore a smile.

“Kii-kun, Kasshi, Rui… as well as me… we shouldn’t have come here…”

Tears were shed from the girl’s eyes.

A girl who smiled while crying.

To Daisuke, she looked like she was losing her sanity.

“Because of us.”

The milky mist reached the girl’s half-smiling, half-crying face.

“This country.”

Once again, the thick mist was trying to block Daisuke’s vision.

“Will get filled with Mushi.”

Daisuke was unable to move from the spot.

His legs were on the deck as it glued there, and he couldn’t emit a voice.

“And reach its end.”

An ominous prophecy.

The girl’s mad words vanished within the mist.

Daisuke’s legs twitched.

He could move now.

What on earth was going on—

To confirm that, he started rushing to where the girl was.

“What was that, just now…! It was no illusion…!”

The calmness when that person glowing in white had their life extinguished.

The stench of blood coming from the boy who lost half his body and exhausted himself.

The youth’s voice and the girl’s prophecy.

All of them felt so real they could pierce his flesh.

Where was he?

Who were they?

Daisuke had to find that out—

“…!”

The mist cleared.

The thick mist that seemed like it continued forever vanished, and the place where Daisuke stood—

“Akamaki City…?”

Was the exact center of the city.

A crowded crossroads and the national way where cars drove smoothly.

Daisuke had lived in Akamaki City a few years ago. The buildings were a bit different compared to then, but he knew this was the Akamaki City townscape he remembered.

He tried infiltrating Akamaki City, and came out into Akamaki City.

That wasn’t unnatural.

However, since it was like that—

“Where was that place just now…?”

Turning around, he could only see a peaceful townscape.

He couldn’t see any ship anywhere.

Not only that, he couldn’t even see the wall of mist that he’d passed through just now.

And there was another odd thing.

It was too peaceful.

People were walking around, chatting or talking on their phones. There was no sense of danger there.

“No one… noticed that they’re trapped in the mist?”

At present, it wasn’t a situation where one would think that Akamaki City was isolated from the outside.

And there—

“Eeeeek!”

A scream rose.

Turning toward the crossroads, he froze.

“Wha—”

Looking at the national road ahead, he could see a bicycle and a truck floating in air. These drew a parabola in air, crashed to the ground, twisted, and then slid onward to knock off other vehicles.

He couldn’t see it well, but apparently something charged, crashed into vehicles and blew them away.

And, on the road ahead, running with flapping limbs was—

“…Cough! Cough!”

A girl running away from something, her face on the verge of tears.

That girl—had her mouth hidden by a surgical mask.

1.00 Precog

Although these crossroads were the very picture of peace, this unrealistic scene drew near.

Passersby raised screams at the approaching roars and tremors.

“Cough! Cough!”

While coughing, a lone girl ran at full speed. Her mouth was hidden by a surgical mask, her bangs were swaying and her expression was desperation itself.

What made her run like that was the cars that flew in air after something crashed into them.

Since it was closer to Daisuke, he realized the cause.

“A Mushi…!”

It was a large, black mass that charged on the national road while blowing away vehicles.

It looked like two craggy slabs of stone slapped together, and on them there were several vibrating pairs of thin wings.

That by itself resembled the structure of a Mushi that Daisuke had encountered countless times.

“Is it… really a Mushi?”

However—that was all.

It was only wings.

The head and body were nowhere to be found.

The huge Wings that flew in an extremely low altitude knocked around obstacles, charging through the national road while heading his way.

“Never seen that kind before. It looks like a Minion Type, but…”

Mumbling this, Daisuke himself noticed that the surrounding gazes were focusing on him.

Walking with his coat and goggles in town would draw attention. Daisuke removed his equipment and hid his goggles and gun inside the rolled-up coat. In Daisuke’s case, that was all he needed to transform into an ordinary high schooler.

Right now he couldn’t grasp the situation, but since there was a Mushi, he could only do one thing.

“Hey, you! Look here!”

He waved his hand at the girl.

This place was way too prominent. It seemed much better for him to take the mysterious girl somewhere emptier and eliminate the Mushi.

Originally, if something like that happened, the Central Headquarters would have rushed there first thing. So it was abnormal not seeing even a single combatant there.

Central Headquarters wasn’t operating—

This situation was the very worst and the one that scared Daisuke the most.

“Quickly!”

The girl noticed Daisuke waving at her.

Flapping around pathetically, the girl rushed toward him—

And suddenly flew at him.

“Wah! You idiot, don’t hug me!”

“Cough! Cough! Haa… wheeze… ugh!”

The girl clung to him, coughing horribly. Perhaps lacking oxygen, or just sick with the flu, her face was as pale as a sick person.

“Sa…! Save me…! Plea… ugh.”

“I get it, so don’t cling to me! —Ah, shit!”

The wings came close. Daisuke put the girl on his back and started running down the road.

“Ah… you can’t…! T-this position… at least princess carry me… urp.”

The wings were faster than Daisuke. The distance between them was shrinking.

“Ah…! You just touched my bu—”

“Shut up!”

At this rate he was going down with this unknown girl.

He was almost resolved to just fight despite knowing he would draw people’s eyes when it happened.

“I-it’s alrea…dy fine…! It should, vanish soon…!”

The girl on his shoulder began flapping around.

Vanish?

As Daisuke turned around—the phenomenon the girl spoke of happened.

The silhouette of the wings that pursued them while destroying obstacles was growing thinner.

That form quickly grew transparent and was then gone as though melted into thin air.

All that remained was the destroyed cars and buildings and the stunned passersby.

“What is going on…?”

As he stopped in shock, the girl fell from Daisuke’s shoulder, groaning an Ouch.

“Cough, cough…! —This is the worst…”

Moving slowly, the girl raised her body. She fixed the position of her mask, still looking down.

“Why are you being so rough with a woman… and you touched my butt… you probably just wanted to look cool saving a girl. You know that normally doing just this wouldn’t make you popular with the ladies. In the first place, if you decided to save me you should use your head more… and you touched my butt…”

Grumbling this, the girl lowered her mask. She wore a strained smile.

“—However, even if you’re the worst, I don’t hate you.”

Even though Daisuke was the one who saved her, she told him that he should be grateful.

Her age was probably the same as Daisuke. She was probably taller than average for girls her age. Possibly due to her cold, her almond eyes were a bit bloodshot. Her pink surgical mask was embroidered with the word “Love”, with the letter “o” in the shape of a heart.

“…”

There was no mistake.

Her face, that could even be called beautiful—

—Because of us, this country will get filled with Mushi and reach its end.

She was the same girl who spoke her ominous prophecy he saw inside the mist.

“…Cough.”

The girl’s coughs became severe. Perhaps losing her focus due to relief, her body shuddered and fell.

Daisuke immediately supported her body.

“Hey!”

“I have… to go quickly…”

She mumbled this as though delirious. She didn’t look like she could walk by her own power.

The national road fell into panic. Passersby focused on Daisuke and the girl.

“Tch…”

Having no choice, he shouldered the girl again and left the place.

“Who are you? What was that Mushi?”

“I’m… Mikko.”

The coughing girl introduced herself.

Mikko.

There was no doubt. It was the same name he heard inside the mist.

It was probably better to ask the person herself what that strange scene was all about.

In order to move as quickly as possible to a place without people, Daisuke tried fusing with his Mushi.

The green checkered beetle landed on his shoulder.

—Or at least it should have.

“—”

However, his Mushi did not appear.

Looking around him, it wasn’t anywhere.

This never happened even once since he became Mushitsuki.

“—I can’t use… the Mushi’s power…?”

On the stunned Daisuke’s back, the girl coughed.

“I have to quickly save them… my family…”

She mumbled this as if moaning in her sleep.

“They’re going to give birth to a lot of monsters… my family…”

“…!”

The capital enclosed by milk-white mist.

An abandoned vessel where both the dead and the living shouted.

And his meeting with the mysterious girl, Mikko.

These happenings—

Were just his first step in the road to the prophecy of destruction.

1.01 The Others

Kii-kun.

That was his most used nickname in his fifteen years of life.

Never mind his friends, but even his parents called him that.

“You sure have a lotta free time, Kii-kun.”

In the convenience store located in the suburbs of Akamaki City, another person called his name.

“Let’s go play somewhere, Kii-kun.”

And yet another person under the clear sky.

Sitting in the corner of parking lot and glaring at his cellphone, he mumbled to himself.

“—Say, I wanna ask you, though.”

Kii-kun, high school freshman. His height and weight were average as if on purpose, and even the structure of his face was plain. The white T-shirt and slacks that were his school’s uniform were size M. His only attractive feature was the grown bangs that he pushed up his forehead and bundled in the form of a topknot.

“I got an email saying ‘sorry, I can’t do this anymore’… what does this mean?”

Still seated as he held up his phone and showed it to the others, the blinding sun leapt into the eyes.

It was afternoon after school, so the sun was still high.

“Who is it from?”

His friend that had his collar open answered.

“His girlfriend that he started dating just last week.”

“Oh, Kii-kun’s actual first girlfriend.”

His friend who wore glasses sighed.

They both then spoke together.

“You got dumped.”

“But whyyyyyyyyyyy?!”

Kii-kun shouted and his two friends grabbed him.

“A week! It’s been just a week! I’ve been talking to her a lot, finally felt things were going well, confessed and started dating her! We still only went on one date! It was the kind of pure relationship where we didn’t even hold hands, and I thought everything was just starting…!”

“No sane person would go for a hike as a first date. Not to mention it was raining and you climbed the mountain in complete silence… was this some kinda training montage?”

“It’s that magazine’s fault! ‘The amazing view from the summit will create an unforgettable anniversary’… it wrote things like that!”

“It wrote nothing about using a ropeway, right?”

“I-I made up for it properly! I apologized and I even sent her emails from early morning to late at night, and I went back home with her every day…”

“I’m so glad I wasn’t your girlfriend. You’d probably show up in my dreams. In a bad sense.”

Sobs leaked from the depths of Kii-kun’s throat.

“Ugh…! Oooooooh…!”

“H-hey, don’t start bawling over something like that…”

As Kii-kun crouched and broke into tears near the trash can, his two friends put an arm around his shoulders from both sides.

“Cheer up. You’ll definitely find another good girl soon.”

“You’re basically a good guy. You just end up getting carried away and do some nonsense.”

“Ooohhh… Thank youuu…! You’re also good guys…!”

A good guy.

He was often told that by the people around him.

Since he wasn’t good at studying and wasn’t particularly good at sports, that might have been his one and only strong point. There were also times where he got told “but you’re a good person,” and had his advances rejected, but…

He would most definitely keep living a normal life as a “good guy”.

He suddenly embraced this premonition, but found it satisfactory.

“Wanna go to karaoke or something? My treat.”

“Ugh, your nose is leaking. You’re dirty, c’mon.”

“Yeah…! I’ll go…!”

Wiping his nose on the tissue paper he was given, Kii-kun raised his face.

Then, there was an immensely loud car honking.

Following that, a high-pitched breaking sound, and a hard impact.

Kii-kun and his two friends watched the road, gasping.

They could see a car that suddenly stopped and a dark figure thrown ahead.

It was obvious what happened at a glance.

“An accident…?”

Kii-kun twitched at his friend’s words.

“T-they just jumped into the road!”

From the driver’s seat came a middle-aged man. The pedestrians around all clamored and people also appeared from the convenience store Kii-kun was nearby to see what it was all about.

Are they dead…?

Witnessing this unimaginable accident, Kii-kun felt himself go pale.

However, his nervousness ended up being needless.

The dark figure rose up and started walking.

And headed toward him.

Not only the driver, but even the curious onlookers were shocked. Although the victim flew about 10 meters from the impact, they didn’t even turn to look at the car.

“Looks like some homeless person…”

Just like his friend said, the dark figure was covered in mud-stained clothes. They dropped their gaze and moved as if they were crawling, so he couldn’t really see their face. Their long hair dragged after them.

This dark person was trying to approach the trash can.

“They’re hurt—”

Kii-kun noticed a dark spot left after the person moved.

“Huh?”

“Err… is that blood on the ground…? Should we call an ambulance…?”

Timidly approaching the black mass, he raised his voice.

“Hey, stop that, Kii-kun.”

“No, but…”

He was just another onlooker, but he felt sick just overlooking a wounded person like that. At the very least he wouldn’t be in the mood to sing in karaoke like this.

However, this was apparently a needless worry for this dark figure.

“Ouch!”

The thin arm extending from within the clothes pushed Kii-kun aside. The person ignored Kii-kun who fell to his butt, and started fishing inside the trash can.

“Wait a minute! He was worried about you!”

The tall boy raged, putting an arm on the dark person’s shoulder.

“…!”

Seeing the face of the person turning around, Kii-kun and the rest froze.

This dark thing was a woman. She had discolored, swarthy skin and very thin ankles and neck that looked like withered trees. Her long, dry hair was like wires, and her eyes were dyed in the red of blood—

A demon.

It was much more realistic than anything Kii-kun had seen before in movies, manga and stories.

Was this due to starvation?

Her face looked like she had neither food nor water for a long, long time and reached the zenith of famine. She was so starved that her mouth constantly flapped open and close in search of something, and her eyes couldn’t distinguish between people and objects—

“—…ya…ee…oh…”

The women mumbled some incomprehensible words. At the very least this wasn’t Japanese. As she grabbed back Kii-kun’s friend’s arm, she clung to him desperately.

“Eek! What’s up with her…!”

“Hey, stop that!”

“Eeep…! This is seriously creepy…!”

Along with his bespectacled friend, Kii-kun tried forcing the woman away.

However, the next instant.

The woman’s head rotated like a doll’s and her wide eyes stared at Kii-kun and his two friends.

“—!”

Being stared by the woman’s starving eyes, he felt as if something was grasped inside him—

That sensation assaulted Kii-kun.

“Something” grasped inside him was being sucked away, absorbed into the woman’s flapping mouth—

Just like Kii-kun, even his two friends were completely paralyzed. Onlookers around and the cars on the road were completely still, as though time was frozen.

Being seized by an indescribable fear, it took Kii-kun every nerve he had to resist.

“…uWAAAH!”

Forcibly moving the arm that wouldn’t listen to him, he thrust the woman away.

The flow of time resumed.

However, his two friends weren’t able to come back.

They lost their strength and collapsed to the ground. They closed their eyes as though sleeping and stopped moving.

It wasn’t just that.

A huge object was floating above the collapsed two. A shape several times thicker than a telephone pole was split into three joints, ending in pointy tips.

He thought it was ridiculous as well, but if he had to liken it to something—they were probably insect legs.

There was no body or a head. The giant insectile legs were split into black and white and floated in air.

“Ooh… aah…?”

He was dreaming.

It was definitely some nightmare or an illusion.

He was about to faint, but the woman’s starving eyes and the screams around brought him back.

A large tremor shook the convenience store.

The spot where Kii-kun stood a moment ago was stabbed by a black leg, reaching deep. Fragments of concrete rose as though exploding, the entire parking lot had a crack run through it and the ground swelled.

“…oh… ka… mikko…”

He had the feeling that he heard this mumble among the screams flying around as the dark woman looked to a different direction.

1.02 Daisuke Part 2

Apparently only very few people used the parking lot under the elevated railway.

Since it was far from the business district, there wasn’t a lot of traffic. There were barely any cars parked there, so it was probably a private enough spot.

“Can’t even use my cellphone… really, what’s going on?”

Clicking his tongue, Daisuke lowered his cellphone from his ear. He was trying to reach his comrades outside Akamaki City, but it didn’t connect.

“The goggles…”

He tried operating his hidden goggles but the result was the same. There was no wireless response.

This situation was bad.

Since Daisuke infiltrated into Akamaki City and had no way to communicate, Touko and the rest would definitely get cold feet.

If even the Blaze Class Rank 1 Kakkou had breathed his last in this situation that happened in Akamaki City—

If they misinterpreted it and got cautious, they would move out too late.

In actuality Akamaki City was the very image of peace, and he wanted to break into the city with a great number of forces as soon as possible to check on the Central Headquarters’ safety—

“Hey, you. You have a cellphone?”

He called toward the girl who rested next to a vending machine.

“—No, I don’t.”

The girl called Mikko retrieved most of the color of her face.

“Really? Why don’t you have one?”

“You’re doubting me… you really are the worst.”

“…”

“More importantly, can you give me some spare change? I’d like for you to show me that even a person like you has enough for at least a can of juice.”

He couldn’t see her mouth due to the mask, but from the way her almond eyes narrowed she was probably smiling.

“Also, I have a cold. Meaning, I’m sick. You should be at least humane enough to care about me a bit—”

Daisuke’s hand moved without him thinking, but surely there was no reason to blame him. The sound of a cheek being slapped echoed and the girl’s head turned aside.

“Ow…”

“Ah—sorry, I just suddenly became mad…”

It was true he felt mad.

Originally Daisuke wasn’t the kind of person to hold back just because the other party was a girl.

Therefore, even disregarding that, he was confused at himself acting like this, even if this was more like a mere caress.

He certainly was annoyed at the other party’s actions, but was he really that short-tempered?

No, rather than being short-tempered, when he saw this Mikko girl’s face he felt, how to put it—

“What a scary person you are…”

The girl held her cheek while shaking.

She was around his age and a beauty. She seemed to have an idiosyncratic personality, such that if he met her even once she would remain in his memory—but he felt a strange sense of Déjà vu.

Had he met her somewhere before?

How to put it—her very face made him angry.

He couldn’t recall why, though.

“Hitting a woman is the worst and the lowest… but I guess it cannot be helped. Since I am not going to start hating even such a person beyond saving as you, you’d better feel thankful.”

“Oh, I’m sorry…”

“Ow.”

He lightly struck the opposing cheek. The girl’s neck turned the other way.

Daisuke looked at his hand and groaned.

It really did seem that he lost all self-control the moment he saw this girl.

Was this someone he couldn’t accept on a visceral level?

“The worst… you really are the worst…”

“This time I really did it unconsciously, but anyway… I’m not kind to people just ‘cause they’re girls, and I didn’t save you out of my goodwill.”

Regaining himself, he asked Mikko.

“I’d like to ask you something.”

“…”

“What was that Mushi just now? Why was it chasing you?”

Taking up Mikko’s chin, he glared into her eyes.

“Mushi?”

“That monster just now.”

“Cough… oh, I see, it did look like an insect. I see, Mushi…”

“…”

“Starting now, I shall call those things like that.”

The way she said this and nodded many times, it didn’t look like she was feigning ignorance.

“If you ask me what that thing—that Mushi—is, I can only answer this.”

A shadow befell Mikko’s expression.

“A monster that my family gave birth to.”

He couldn’t immediately understand the meaning of the girl’s words.

“…There’s no way.”

After a long silence, he finally uttered words of rejection.

Mikko smiled sadly.

“That is fine. Expecting you to believe so readily—”

“It’s impossible.”

He interjected into the girl’s words.

Those who gave birth to Mushi were the beings called the Original Three.

There wasn’t even a single report about anything other than them creating Mushi.

At the very least, until now.

“Or are you saying that the Original Three are your family?”

“…? The Original… Three?”

Miko furrowed her brows.

“I do not know who you refer to, but my family… they were with me since I was little, and are very important to me.”

“…”

“Due to certain circumstances, we have run away together… but we got separated. On the way, that child couldn’t hold back and ‘ate’ someone unrelated, and then…”

“…”

“Err—are you alright? You are looking pale.”

The girl’s voice made Daisuke realize that he became speechless.

This was a made-up story.

Or possibly, it was nothing more than this strange girl’s delusion.

Otherwise—

It was a happening that couldn’t be foreseen.

“Does that mean there’s someone other than the Original Three that can create Mushi…?”

That Mushi which was nothing but wings was of a type that he’d never seen before.

It only had part of the body, and no host.

A so-called “Imperfect Mushi” that did nothing but rampage.

“Does that mean there’s a fourth one…?”

No—it was too early to decide this.

He only one found Imperfect Mushi and just heard that someone gave birth to it.

However—

There was probably a need to confirm this.

There was a need to investigate it, perhaps with the same priority as ascertaining what happened to Akamaki City—or possibly even higher.

This problem was simply that important.

“—Was that what you meant by that creepy prophecy?”

“Cough… huh?”

“’Because of us, this country will get filled with Mushi and reach its end”—”

“…?”

“You definitely said this. To a suited man.”

Mikko tilted her head, looking absolutely confused. It didn’t look like acting.

“A suited man…? And I said this to him?”

“Don’t play dumb.”

“—I am sorry. You must be mistaking me with someone.”

Saying this, Mikko coughed.

If this girl really wasn’t playing dumb—what was that scene Daisuke saw?

That milky mist showed Daisuke an illusion?

However, if it was an illusion, the Mikko he saw at the time and the girl in front of him were too similar.

He simply couldn’t process the chain of incomprehensible events fast enough.

Despite things outside his expectations happening, that he couldn’t get any contact with the outside was also a problem. The things he could do were limited.

First, he had to get in contact with the SEPB.

The moment he decided this, Mikko was looking at the faraway sky.

“…Did you hear it?”

“Yeah.”

There was a huge impact sound coming from afar, as though something exploded somewhere.

“My family possibly ‘ate’ another person…”

Mikko bowed to Daisuke.

“Thank you very much for saving me. It was quite a violent method and I will never forget the atrocious way you struck me later my whole life, but since I am more of an adult I will have to thank—”

Slap. “Ow,” the girl wailed.

“…To thank you. Well then, let us part here.”

“No, I’m coming as well.”

Turning toward the direction where he heard the sound, Daisuke spoke.

“I can’t just leave it like this. Your family or whatever… and you.”

For the first time, the girl called Mikko showed something else then a smile—she made a face like she was terribly confused.

1.03 The Others

A huge shadow fell to Kii-kun’s feet.

Following a black leg, a white leg lowered its claws and swung toward him.

“Waaaah!”

Crawling on the ground on all fours, he dodged the claws at the last moment.

The roar and tremor broke the asphalt, and onlookers ran away, screaming.

Kii-kun rose up and flew into the road.

“Eeee—”

Turning back, the nightmare was coming.

Black, white, black, white—stabbing the ground alternatively, these “legs” assaulted him.

Meanwhile, the dark woman didn’t seem interested in Kii-kun. Not even turning to look at his collapsed friends, she returned to the trashcan, fishing its contents and looking hungry.

“W-what the hell is thiiiiiis!”

Kii-kun ran away from the two legs.

The sounds of people’s screams and vehicles getting skewered and the vibration of asphalt breaking pursued him from behind.

“W-what the hell! What happened to them…! P-police…! Waaaah…!”

Until just now, he was supposed to kill time with his friends.

His heart was broken, but he wanted to relieve his sadness with karaoke.

Even so, why now was he chased by a monster?

“Ughuuuuh…!”

As he turned in the corner of the crossroads, the “legs” changed their direction as well.

The pedestrians he pushed aside raised screams behind him.

Perhaps there were victims of this “legs” chasing him.

But if he were to stop, he’d end up skewered. He could imagine his body torn off, flesh flying about.

“I don’t… want to die…! I don’t wanna die yeeeeeet!”

He didn’t want to die yet.

Until yesterday he lived a normal life. He wanted to keep living like that.

Him dying—he wasn’t prepared in the slightest for that.

“Haa…! Haa…!”

Why me—

He was out of breath. His heart felt ready to burst.

Go for someone else—

Somewhere in his heart he wished for that.

He was fine with being called inhuman. Everyone other than him was fine. Even if he had to exchange with a complete stranger, he didn’t want to die.

“Help…!”

He didn’t matter paying any price if it ended with him not dying now.

It happened right after he embraced this wholehearted wish to not die.

“Ouch…!”

Strength left his legs. The momentum made him tumble down.

While grimacing, Kii-kun looked at his own legs—

“—”

He froze.

His right leg was gone.

There was no blood. Everything down of his ankle crumbled down like sand.

“What are you doing! Run away!”

Someone shouted near his ear.

Someone held him up as he fell on the ground.

“Don’t just freeze! Run!”

This was a boy, around Kii-kun’s age or a little bit older. Clothes, hairstyle and face—he had no distinguishing features whatsoever. About the only unique thing about him was the band-aid on his cheek.

“Even if you—tell me to run—”

Kii-kun looked at his own leg—and was startled.

He had a leg.

Had fear caused him to imagine otherwise? His supposedly crumbled leg returned to itself and there wasn’t even a single scratch on it.

Roars and screams approached.

Kii-kun came back to his senses and started running with the mystery boy.

“How much longer do we need to run!”

“How much longer… I’m already… at my limits…!”

Looking at the monster chasing from behind, the pedestrians on the road all ran away and scattered around.

There was only one figure standing ahead.

A girl with a mask hiding her mouth coughed.

“Idiot! What are you doing there! Move, Mikko!”

The boy next to him shouted.

“Cough… from the moment we heard the first sounds, 5 minutes and 32 seconds have passed.”

The girl who was completely unmoving faced Kii-kun and the other boy.

“—It should be gone any moment now.”

The girl’s glazed eyes—perhaps she had a fever—looked toward the “legs”.

Kii-kun and the boy stopped in place and turned around.

As they did, the girl’s prophecy became reality.

The two legs, black and white, were vanishing right before Kii-kun’s and the pedestrians’ eyes.

Nothing remained of the monster that destroyed the asphalt like it was mere tofu. All that remained was the scenery of the destroyed national road and the pedestrians standing around, stunned.

“…”

It felt like waking up from a bad dream. He couldn’t understand what just happened.

The boy next to him pressed closer to the girl.

“How did you know it’d vanish?”

“Cough… because it’s rare for Mushi to survive for more than 5 minutes.”

“What?”

“You there, I apologize for involving you in this.”

The girl turned to Kii-kun.

“However, it was a nauseatingly shameful way of running.”

“…Ha?”

“With you pushing unrelated people out of the way like that, I realized at a glance that you operated under a self-centered thinking of wishing to be saved, even if it was you alone. It was horrible, seeing you act like you wanted to sacrifice other people… cough.”

Kii-kun’s face became red.

It was just like the girl said. He was willing to go that far to get saved.

He didn’t know he was that much of a selfish person—

“T-that—I mean, you know...”

“However, I do not dislike you.”

The girl narrowed her eyes in a grin.

He couldn’t see her mouth due to the mask, but her eyes were definitely smiling kindly—

He realized that, although he’d shown her his ugly self, she really did forgive and accept him.

“…”

“What are you looking all happy for? I’m going to get mad.”

Being coldly told that by the other boy, Kii-kun felt his face heat up again.

“I-I-I-I-I’m not happy!”

“Why were you chased by the monster?”

Being stared daggers by the boy, Kii-kun recalled.

“My companions… a-ah, wait! They’re…!”

Were his two friends safe? Without understanding anything, he abandoned his collapsed friends.

“Wait, I’ll go too. Looks like there’s a need for information.”

“My name is Mikko. And you?”

Being looked by the unknown boy and girl, he gulped.

Was Mikko a nickname? It seemed like these two weren’t just passersby.

“I’m… called Kii-kun.”

Just to be safe he gave his nickname, then looked at his leg.

It was right there.

What if his leg vanished just like that monster—he felt anxious.

“Kii-kun, you said?”

For some reason, the boy changed his expression. Startling, he looked at Kii-kun’s hair.

Was his topknot hairstyle so rare?

“Mikko… do you know this guy?”

The girl tilted her head, looking confused. Looking at Kii-kun, she narrowed her eyes in a grin.

“Nice to meet you.”

“…Nice to meet you.”

He somehow answered with a strained smile.

There was no doubt that this was his first meeting with the person called Mikko.

1.04 Daisuke Part 3

Kii-kun.

As they came to the convenience store with the boy of that name, they found out that it was being investigated by the police.

Two boys who collapsed at the parking lot were taken away by an ambulance.

He could hear firefighter sirens. They probably came to extinguish the cars that were destroyed and caught fire.

“What happened to those guys? No way they’re dead, right…?”

Mixing among the onlookers, Kii-kun asked, looking really worried.

“Looks like they’re still breathing. I don’t know what will happen from now, though… Cough.”

Mikko spoke while coughing.

“…”

As far as Daisuke saw, the condition of Kii-kun’s two friends wasn’t good.

To him, they looked like what happened to a host when their Mushi got killed—they became Fallen.

However, unlike that state that Daisuke knew, the two boys had apparently lost consciousness immediately after the Mushi was born. That would mean those “legs” weren’t under the host’s control from the very first moment.

“What about that dark woman you talked about?”

“L-looks like she’s gone. —I-I’m not lying! That woman definitely did something! She was fine even after being run over by a car, so she definitely wasn’t normal…!”

According to Kii-kun, a certain woman did something to his friends.

A dark woman clad in tattered clothing.

Originally, there should have been only three of those called the Original Three who gave birth to Mushitsuki.

However, the dark woman Kii-kun had explained about matched none of them. Her appearance was different from Oogui, and Shinpu wouldn’t go fishing around in trash. Sanbikime had never been witnessed before, but the created Mushi wasn’t a Fusion Type anyway.

However, the “wings” and “legs” Daisuke saw—definitely resembled Mushi.

He couldn’t see past that contradiction.

“Do you have a cellphone?”

“Hmm? Yeah—”

He grabbed the cellphone Kii-kun took out and pushed in a number.

“The number you have dialed is presently unused. Please check the number and—”

He couldn’t reach the SEPB’s emergency address. Never mind the Central Branch, the East Central Branch that Daisuke belonged to was the same.

He pushed in the numbers of as many acquaintances as he could remember. Haji Senri, Ogata Akatsuki—

“The number you have—”

It was no use.

All numbers associated with the SEPB were completely shut out.

“…Are you aware that at present Akamaki City is engulfed in a strange mist?”

“Huh? N-no… A mist, you say?”

“What’s this, all of a sudden? Cough.”

Both Kii-kun and Mikko were confused.

Something was going on inside Akamaki City that became an enclosed miniature garden.

However, the people inside it were unaware of that.

Daisuke couldn’t think that the facts the Central Headquarters were completely silent and him being unable to use his Mushi were a coincidence.

Although he could see the omens of something odd, there was no one who could stop them—

“Kii-kun—have you ever been on a ship?”

“A ship? Right, I haven’t… I was on a plane, though.”

Kii-kun frowned as if not understanding what the hell he was talking about.

“…”

The moment he entered Akamaki City, Daisuke had definitely seen it within the mist.

Kii-kun had half his body in a horrible state and was dying.

And then, Mikko nearby spoke.

—If I could return to the past—I would have probably killed all of you the moment we met…

He didn’t mistake it.

—Kii-kun, Kasshi, Rui… as well as me… we shouldn’t have come here…

While crying, Mikko prophesized destruction.

However, Kii-kun and Mikko said they never met before.

If so, then what was that scene?

Just an illusion?

Or perhaps—a laughable thought passed through his mind.

On the abandoned ship where dead appeared one after another, the scene of the girl prophesizing destruction.

What if this wasn’t the present or the past, but instead something that would happen afterward—

“If ‘she’ isn’t here, I will go already.”

“W-wait a minute! What about those two? Would they never return?!”

“There are no cases of people waking up after becoming like that. Unfortunately… cough.”

“No way…”

“Cases? What do you know about that Mushi?”

Mikko who entered the national road while weaving through onlookers, Daisuke and Kii-kun followed.

“—It is my father’s fault.”

Mikko coughed.

“My father is a researcher. Originally, he was an accomplished psychologist, and he was also a doctor who conducted clinical experiments… due to my mother’s death, he immersed himself into certain research.”

“Certain research?”

“—Immortality.”

Twitch.

Daisuke unconsciously moved his eyebrows.

“Research about the Undying, a person who’d never die… he started chasing after that silly thing. My father, who had even been called a genius, broke down, unable to accept my mother’s death. Everyone laughed at him and isolated him—but at a certain point, he obtained collaborators.”

Mikko frowned in pain. She was possibly angry, or perhaps sad.

“The Round Table… if they hadn’t become patrons to my father, half as a joke, and pushed this research on him, this wouldn’t have happened.”

The Round Table?

Daisuke only just barely stopped himself from emitting a voice.

He heard about them before from his superior, Goroumaru Touko. They were a limited-member club formed by the rich, that possessed vast influence.

“As my father obtained research funds, he dirtied his hands in inhuman experiments. Who Kii-kun met is one lab rat. She went through horrible stuff, and I took care of her. In the end she became able to give birth to monsters, but—”

Mikko looked at Daisuke. Her almond eyes narrowed in sorrow.

“I think of us as sisters.”

Kii-kun’s face stiffened.

“W-what… is that for real? Or is that from some movie?”

“Right, you should just go and think that. About your friends—I really am sorry.”

Grinning with just her eyes, Mikko started walking again.

Kii-kun stood there in shock.

“…”

Daisuke left the topknot boy behind and followed after Mikko.

—If I could return to the past—I would have probably killed all of you the moment we met…

It wasn’t like he believed that scene.

However, what if—if a Mushi with the power of prophecy existed, it was possible that this was the meaning behind that mist.

There was no longer any information he needed out of Kii-kun.

Even if he wouldn’t get killed like in the prophecy, it was probably best to part ways here.

“Cough… Daisuke-san, was it? Why are you following me?”

“Because there’s still loads of things I wanna question you about.”

The Original Three were enemies to Mushitsuki.

Not one had been defeated as of yet, and he couldn’t allow himself to miss the omen about the possibility of a fourth one being born.

Once he managed to escape Akamaki City, he should return to report—

That path crossed his mind, but he soon rejected it.

He couldn’t take his eyes off of this girl called Mikko. Even if he took her out of Akamaki City, he had no guarantee one could safely pass through the mist.

“Are you attracted to me? I still find you disgusting even if you were to hide it, so please state it clearly. I’m sorry, I cannot see someone like you as a potential mate. However, even someone as creepy and hopeless as you who just got rejected by me, can be my friend.”

“What are you planning to do, once you find the dark woman?”

“Ow.”

Daisuke asked this while lightly slapping her, and Mikko rubbed her cheek.

“I want—to set her free.”

“…”

“I know where she is heading. Since she was brought from overseas—she is probably trying to head back there.”

Mikko made a small cough.

“Wait!”

A voice came from behind.

Kii-kun ran toward the two, his face on the verge of tears.

“D-don’t leave me behind…! I’ll go too!”

The boy appeared again to pursue Daisuke and Mikko.

Although it was something so simple—

Shudder.

An inexpressible chill stabbed Daisuke from head to toe.

Kii-kun, who should have parted once was reunited with Mikko—

This inseverable connection caused a reasonless anxiety to swell inside him.

“…What? Got any business with us?”

Daisuke endeavored to speak in a cold voice.

“Me, too…”

“What are you talking about? …Cough.”

“Just like those two—that dark woman also did something to me.”

Both Daisuke and Mikko stiffened their faces.

“Will I… also become like them?”

The boy entreating on the verge of tears, and the horrible corpse he saw within the mist.

Those two people that had a topknot overlapped in Daisuke’s eyes.

1.05 The Others

Kashua Artines became an exchange student.

On weekdays he’d commute to the famous school called Horusu Seijou Academy, but today he was on sick leave.

The time was evening. Normally this was about the time he’d go home from school, change to house clothes, and eat his dinner alone in the house he stayed in as an exchange student.

However, today he had an errand to take care of.

“A lot have black hair, so they’re probably from Central Asia… and so many of them, too. From how they’re shriveled, it looks like it happened a while ago, though…”

Kashua was crouching in this rectangular space wrapped in darkness. He put a penlight in his hair and mumbled to no one in particular.

“The stowaways were trapped here. And what are these bullet holes…? There’s also blood. What happened in this warehouse that caused the stowaways to vanish…”

While mumbling this, he exited from the double doors outside.

“Looks like there’s a need to investigate the owner of this container. —Oh, crap.”

Illuminated by moonlight, Kashua’s slim outline became visible.

With his vivid blond hair and brown eyes, slim figure and small face, he was often seen as older than his 17 years of age. Wearing a hoodie and jeans, he chose to look like a boy going out for jogging. The goggles hanging from his neck were cheap ones he bought from a bike shop.

“I forgot to do my homework for tomorrow.”

The sighing Kashua was caressed by the salty wind.

He was at a certain pier in the suburbs of Akamaki City. In its corners was a place for containers, and there were no human figures other than him. This scenery of the lines of innumerable containers could perhaps be compared to a forest.

“Last week’s midterm test was bad. My math grade was too high, and my Japanese was horrible. I need to strike up a balance to not stand out…”

Muttering with his hood lowered down, he operated his cellphone’s mail function.

—He found the place likely to supply his target.

He sent an e-mail written in a foreign language. That was converted to numbers, and it would be sent to a certain country not through the mobile company but satellite.

“There was the report that the test subject escaped from a facility connected to the Round Table and there was a happening in town today. Was it just a coincidence, that route leading here? If, perhaps, the test subject was acquired here and would try to come back… it’d be very good for my hunt.”

While walking among the containers, Kashua exposed his well-treated hair to the moon.

“They’re completely shriveled up. I can’t even imagine how starved that test subject must have been.”

Walking for a while, he arrived near the entrance to the bay. On the other side of the pier the city’s neon lights were blinking.

“If she ran from the city, she’d definitely cross there. I can try waiting for a few days. …If I’m not going to go to school tomorrow, I don’t need to do my homework.”

As he wondered where to hide around, it happened.

“—So you really want me to do my homework that much, you monster?”

With the city’s lights to its back, a dark figure approached with unsteady gait. Wrapped in a dirty robe, its long black hair dragged behind it.

His target appeared as if on cue. He hid in the shadows of the containers.

He removed the device around his belt buckle and brought out a small syringe. It was thinner than a cigarette and looked like a toy, but had enough power to put large animals to sleep within moments.

“I’ll wrap this up before the day fully ends.”

The surroundings were already gloomy.

This happened just the moment before Kashua leapt from behind the containers.

“…!”

A bright white light lit his vision.

He heard violent engine noises and several semi-trailers rushed into the docks. Blinding high beams illuminated the dark figure.

Limbs and neck that were nothing but bones, and goggling, red eyes.

She was clearly forced to abstain from food not just for one or two days, but for a long, long while. He could tell she was a woman from the way some roundness was just barely retained on her body.

“What…?”

As Kashua narrowed his eyes from the blinding light, he could see that the semi-trailers immediately surrounded the dark woman.

The doors opened with bangs and many large men flew out. They were clad in camouflage clothes and equipped with helmets and face masks.

“The JSDF—no, that’s wrong. Who are these—”

The man in camo all brought out something like guns and pulled the trigger.

“—…!”

Shot from all directions, wired bullets squarely hit the dark woman. Her shrill, choked voice echoed in the pier. These were apparently some kind of stun guns.

The dark woman howled. Tearing off the electrical wires stabbed into her, she assaulted the camo men.

“Don’t look her in the eyes! You’ll get ‘eaten’!”

Commanding these camo men was a youth clad in an expensive-looking suit. Kashua couldn’t see him well due to the backlight, but he looked to be still young—approximately twenty years old.

With superhuman arm strength, the dark human struck the camo men. She easily broke through their ranks and danced toward the suited youth.

“What the heck, don’t make me work.”

Both arms of the dark woman that tried to grab him slumped to the sides.

With flowing movements, the youth fended against the woman’s arms. As she leaned toward him, he struck her medulla oblongata directly above with a nimble hand blade. Flipping back, the dark woman stopped moving as though paralyzed.

It seemed quite old-fashioned, but these trained movements—was this budou, Japanese martial arts? Kashua saw this hand-to-hand combat technique for the first time.

“Fire! Keep firing!”

Quickly leaving the woman’s side, the youth ordered.

Gunfire echoed. The dark woman’s entire body became a porcupine full of stun gun needles.

And she finally stopped moving.

Immediately the camo men took the next action. They wrapped tape around the dark woman’s limbs and stuffed a large bag over her head, throwing her inside a semi-trailer.

Within only a few minutes, the capture ended as a huge success.

Riding on the semi-trailers, the camo men retreated from the pier in the blink of an eye.

Remaining there leaning against a luxury car and smoking a cigarette as if to celebrate his victory was the youth.

“So there were ‘hunters’ other than me? —Looks like there’s a need to make him spill the beans about who he is.”

Although his prey escaped, it seemed like his syringe would end up useful.

Kashua leapt from behind the containers. Killing his footsteps, he approached the youth from a blind spot.

“Ah, there’s someone there! I can ask him about it!”

Twitch, Kashua stopped moving.

Three shadows appeared from the direction of town.

“And another one on the other side!”

The youth twitched. He turned around and noticed Kashua’s existence as he instantly hid the syringe.

“I’m curious about that semi-trailer just now. It wasn’t the type of car to move containers.”

“Are you trying to show me how sharp you are? So shamelessly exposing your shallowness with such an obvious piece of reasoning is a fault of yours. However, even if you are like that, I still—ow.”

“Wha! Why are you hitting a girl! You’re the worst!”

“Stop acting like some frail girl—ow. A-and now even Kii-kun hit me…”

“Sorry, I dunno why, but I get really angry when I look at you.”

Civilians?

Kashua dropped his hidden syringe to the ground and stealthily crushed it underfoot.

Two boys, a girl, the expensively-dressed youth, and Kashua.

These five people gathered under the lights of the pier.

“Kids shouldn’t come here at this hour.”

The rich youth laughed to break the ice. He was a good-natured young man—or that was the air he gave, but after seeing what happened just before, Kashua couldn’t help but feel suspicious.

“They’re suspicious. They’re probably not unrelated to all of this.”

Glancing at the youth and Kashua, one of the boys spoke. —He had such an average appearance that he could serve as reference material. Other than the band-aid on his cheek he had no distinguishing features.

“H-how come you understand that sort of thing, Daisuke?”

“Somehow.”

“I’m not suspicious.”

Kashua clearly spoke. No matter where one looked, he was just a boy in the middle of jogging. There was no basis to call him suspicious at all.

For some reason, silence fell.

“Let us first introduce ourselves. It would be much easier to question each other if we know each other’s names, after all.”

No counterargument to the girl’s suggestion came from anyone.

“Mikko.”

“…Daisuke.”

“K…Kii-kun.”

“I’m Rui.”

“Kasshi.”

No one was going to give themselves away easily, it appeared. Kashua also used his school alias.

Those names had no meaning at all—

Kashua thought so, but he didn’t miss the change in expression in just one of them.

Only the boy called Daisuke grew stiff upon hearing their names.

He didn’t know why that was so, but there was one thing for sure; he didn’t welcome the meeting of these five.

“I’ll ask just in case… but do you know each other?”

At Daisuke’s question, the four people exchanged glances—

“Nice to meet you.”

Everyone spoke together.

2.00 Immortals

Mikko, Kii-kun, Rui, Kasshi.

Due to those four, this country was going to be filled by Mushi and end—

This ominous prophecy heard within the mist made Daisuke’s anxiety swell.

“Alright, eat as much as you’d like!”

The expensively-dressed youth, Rui, spread his arms with a full smile.

Daisuke, Mikko, Kii-kun, and Kasshi all sat in front of a luxurious dinner.

“Woah, never seen anything like this before!”

“Cough.”

—How about we talk while grabbing some dinner? My treat, of course.

Daisuke accepted Rui’s invitation, because he judged that he couldn’t allow himself to remove his eyes from him.

Since he’d spoken as casually as if he’d invited them to some ramen place, however, he never expected it to be a fancy hotel restaurant.

There were no other customers. Apparently it had been all rented out.

“…”

Kii-kun and Mikko were eating without any caution. Watching them, after he made sure there wasn’t any strange drug inside, Daisuke also grabbed the fork. Seeing that, Kasshi followed suit.

“Rui, was it? You’re awesome! Who are you?”

“Just a rich guy. It’s inheritance from my parents, though. If I don’t use what I got it’d be a waste, right?”

“Oh, so a deadbeat, then. Like some snotty young lord.”

“Uhaha, watch out your words, brat. I’ll charge you for the meal otherwise.”

Kii-kun and Rui exchanged words with smiles, looking cheerful. It was apparently solved easily.

“Quite the hobby you’ve got there, indulging in your sense of superiority by using your parents’ money on strangers to gain their gratefulness and respect. It seems that you possess quite the twisted personality, but I don’t hate you. And the food is scrumptious.”

“There are so many wrong things in how you said it just now, but thanks.”

Rui accepted even Mikko’s disagreeable comments with a smile. At a glance, he was a mere dandy, but his black hair was like a jewel that glowed differently based on the light going through it. Even so, he wasn’t acting with any pretense, so it felt as casually as if you talked to your college classmate.

After trying all sorts of food, Daisuke put the fork aside.

“Hmm? Is that fine, Daisuke? If you don’t eat a lot, you won’t grow.”

“My purpose is coming here isn’t just to get treated to dinner.”

Filling his mouth with mineral water from the glass, he glanced at Rui and Kasshi.

“I’m here to ask those two suspicious people about the dark woman.”

“Nothing’s about me suspicious in the least.”

The boy who called himself Kasshi stated. Although he lowered his hood, he apparently had no intention to remove the goggles hanging from his neck.

“But he is suspicious. The one who took the dark woman away on the pier was him.”

“…!”

Daisuke, Mikko and Kii-kun all looked at Rui.

“So you did see me. You really came at the worst possible timing.”

Rui readily admitted it. He scratched his cheek with a finger, looking awkward.

“We’ve used a bit of forceful method, but that’s our right. Originally we would have paid reward money and buy that sort of commodity.”

“Cough. …The Round Table.”

Mikko mumbled. Kii-kun looked confused.

“The Round Table?”

“A secret club of rich people. They’re the patrons of my father’s research… and his partners in crime. I heard that they were secretly bidding on who would buy the results of the research.”

Rui raised a brow.

“Your father’s research? Meaning, you’re the doctor’s…”

“Daughter, yes.”

Seeing the girl lower her head, Rui wore a painful smile.

“Aren’t you the one who let the guinea pig run from the facility…?”

“Could you please return my family?”

“They sent me—the youngest among the Round Table—running in order to do just that. Well, we need to return it not to you, but just to the research facility. Honestly, what a bother this all is. I already hopped off this train a long time ago, I was supposed to go on a trip with my beloved daughter.”

“Eh, you have a kid? When you’re so young?”

Being asked this by Kii-kun, Rui’s expression changed. His eyes sparkled and he reached into his breast pocket.

“Oh! She’s still small, but I can say she’s an angel—no, a goddess! Will you see the pictures?”

“I don’t really care. More importantly, please tell me more about—”

As Daisuke sighed, Rui rose from his chair.

“You say you don’t care about my daughter? Hey, you punk. Try saying that again.”

“I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care, I might as well die rather than care about your daughter.”

The two stuck out their noses and glared at each other.

“Cough… you’re like hooligans. Try to understand your own vulgar natures—ow.”

“Hey, Daisuke! Stop hitting Mikko like that, for god’s sake!”

“Will you look at the picture? Hmm? Or do want to hear my recording of her? Or the footage of her walking for the first time?”

“I’m sorry. I’ll apologize, so don’t show me that stuff. I really don’t care in the least.”

“…What a bunch of children.”

As Kasshi mumbled this, he was glared by everyone else.

“Ha! Then, why were you in a place like that? Leaving aside the doctor’s daughter!”

With a vein bulging on his forehead, Rui returned to his seat. Although he was the oldest there, it didn’t mean that he was adultlike in the least.

“I just so happened to go there after saving Mikko.”

“M-me too…”

“I just ended up there on my running course.”

Rui laughed at the three boys’ excuses.

“Liars. You were definitely hunting the dark woman to get a reward from the Round Table. Or perhaps you have another reason to aim for that. There were several people like that before. We call those people Hunters.”

Daisuke’s chest suddenly hurt. This familiar term made him recall painful memories from the past.

“It’s true, regarding me and Kii-kun. You can just ask Mikko. We were just dragged into this.”

“So, will it be farewell here? Doesn’t look like it, though. Kasshi too.”

At Rui’s words, the three boys affirmed with silence.

“Simply be honest. You shouldn’t get involved anymore.”

“—I am interested in the research of the Undying.”

He apparently needed a reason to stay with Mikko. Daisuke spoke.

“So I don’t intend to back down at this stage.”

“Me too… that dark woman might have done something to me. I want to know what that was.”

Kii-kun bit his lips. He was probably afraid of being abandoned.

“Undying—you say?”

Daisuke didn’t miss Kasshi’s eyes growing sharper.

“Now you’ve got my interest. Since I decided to tag along on my own, you don’t need to mind me.”

“This is ridiculous—”

Drinking all his wine, Rui placed the glass down violently. His expression was dyed in anger.

“Have you heard from Mikko? About that failed research…”

“Failed?”

Daisuke looked at Mikko. He heard nothing about the research failing.

“Cough… some people thought it was no failure. That’s why I took my family and ran.”

“Just like the people throughout history who attained fortune and fame and then at last sought the secrets of immortality… there were many people like that in the Round Table. What did that lead to, though? Never mind the Undying, it simply created an unknown monster.”

A monster that could birth Mushi—

No, more precisely it was Imperfect Mushi.

Although removed from the original purpose which was “immortality”, if it gave birth to an entity that could become the next Original Three—

Daisuke couldn’t ignore that research.

“But… the dark woman was run over by a car and didn’t die. Meaning—”

Perhaps recalling a scary sight, Kii-kun’s voice was shaking.

Rui spat out, his voice full of disgust.

“She’s just hard to kill. And it was gained by methods no normal people would benefit from. This convinced me and I first gave some money, but I also got off that train. I was forced to deal with the aftermath, and then I plan to end this silly research.”

“To end it, you say. —Really?”

Coughing, Mikko looked at Rui.

Her almond eyes and the youth’s jewel-like black hair faced each other.

“If you put an end to my father’s research and release my family with me… I will help with your ‘hunt’.”

“That’s a promise.”

Rui nodded with a serious face.

The smile of the girl who narrowed her eyes kindly—looked truly happy.

“Then I will tell you about the other test subject that ran away with me.”

What was that?

Since he couldn’t fully understand her, no voice came out.

Another test subject—it sounded to him as if Mikko said this.

“I hate your patronizing way of speaking… but do you have any idea about them?”

“Cough… I do not know his current location. But he would definitely head there.”

“He, you say?”

Daisuke rose up from the seat without thinking.

A “fourth” of the Original Three might be born.

Since the “dark woman” who held this possibility had been captured, all he needed to do was investigate the research.

He really thought so, and yet—

“Don’t tell me that your family has more members…”

“Yes, I ran away with two people.”

Finishing the meal, Mikko returned her mask in place.

“But my family’s larger than those two.”

The girl smiled as if introducing a happy family.

2.01 The Others

The middle of the night.

In the hotel room given to her by Rui, a small, sharp noise echoed.

Light peeked into the room wrapped in darkness. The entrance door was slightly ajar.

“Good evening. …Cough.”

As Mikko, who sat on the floor while grasping her knees, spoke, the intruder’s movements completely stopped.

“So you came first. I cannot say I hadn’t excepted it, though… cough.”

“…You knew I’d come?”

Wearing his hood and hiding his face with goggles, the boy—Kasshi—looked down on Mikko.

“You looked like you were interested in my father’s research. Have you gotten this key by defeating Rui’s personal forces in the corridor and stealing it? —Please calm down. Although you are the kind of pervert to wear goggles and actually intrude into a girl’s room at night, I will not do anything like hate you.”

“I’m not a pervert.”

“If you want to kidnap me and make me speak about my father’s research, it’s impossible. It looks like Rui has many guards posted in places even other than the corridor.”

“I can also get it out of you in this room.”

“That is also impossible. Because he would probably come soon…”

“He?”

Kasshi removed his goggles.

Mikko looked up at the boy and narrowed her eyes.

“The person behind you.”

“—What are you doing here?”

Hearing this whisper at his ears, Kasshi felt as if his very heart was being grasped.

A ghost-like figure was standing right behind Kashi. No, with the corridor’s light from behind him and the sharp glints of his eyes, rather than a ghost—it was more like a demon coming to inform a person of their death.

It was Daisuke.

“So Rui’s guards being collapsed there is your doing? I knew you were no normal brat.”

“…Same goes for you.”

His face stiffening a bit, Kasshi retreated from Mikko.

“Are you fine, Mikko? Did he do something to you?”

Daisuke looked down at Mikko worriedly. His demon-like killing intent was gone as if it never existed.

“To me it seems like this turned even more dangerous thanks to your appearance. After all, you are the kind of man to try and sink your fangs into any woman that you—ow. No, he did nothing.”

“Just like you predicted. I appeared, and then Daisuke would.”

“…A prediction, you say?”

Kasshi and Daisuke looked down Mikko who was sitting on the floor.

“Cough. …You two are similar. You each have your own duty, and so you seek to know about my father’s research. I knew you would definitely come to me and get the jump on it before the others.”

The pair’s silence affirmed Mikko’s reasoning.

“Therefore, I thought of rejecting you. I am very tired today…”

“Can’t let you do that. There’re too many things I need you to talk about. Like the subject of the research, for example.”

As Daisuke approached, his face became slightly hazy.

Mikko coughed. She had a cold since she escaped the research facility, but it worsened due to her expending her stamina. The heat and fatigue stopped even her thoughts.

“My father’s research—”

She narrowed her eyes, her face red.

As she tried to recall, scenes of the past rose to her mind.

Her father locking himself up in the research room, devoting himself to it as if possessed by something. Mikko grew up while watching his back. She used the research documents scattered on the floor instead of coloring books.

The rich, suspicious people called the Round Table appeared, taking Mikko and her father to a research facility. Her father rejoiced and asked for test subjects from the Round Table, thus advancing his inhuman research.

What they gave to Mikko was to become a caretaker for these test subjects that they brought from who knows where.

Mikko was imprisoned in the research facility just like them. She would watch over the subjects’ health, hear their stories and keep them alive.

They spoke about many things.

All the way from their personal circumstances and curses spat at her father. Anger, sadness, pain, and at times happiness—

Hearing the stories that held all possible emotions, Mikko consoled them.

And one day, a miracle occurred.

“Have you ever… wished for something from the bottom of your heart?”

She looked up at Kasshi and Daisuke with drowsy eyes.

“Feelings you wanted to make true, no matter the sacrifice…”

Daisuke gulped.

“Never.”

The one who answered was Kasshi.

“For me, my own desires are meaningless.”

“…That is very sad. All people have things they want, and they can only live toward that hope. For the sake of that hope—they can even overcome death. If you say you wish for nothing, you are already in despair. You are empty, like a living corpse… cough.”

Kasshi was shaken by emotions for the first time.

It was rage. Frowning, he glared at Mikko like he wanted to strangle her.

“However, I—like you like that.”

He was apparently surprised.

Kasshi who widened his eyes was engulfed by Mikko’s kind smile.

“Whether or not you start wishing for something is for you to decide. It can’t be given to you by anyone and can’t be enforced by anyone—you yourself can hope for something and live to reach it. That is something very fortunate.”

“…”

“Right now, you are freer than anyone.”

Her fever seemed to be rising more and more. The back of her head hit the wall with a thud.

Her vision blacked out for a moment.

Unfamiliar sights entered Mikko’s mind.

In front of a building that had a pointy silhouette, she came face to face with a familiar dark man. Next to her were Kii-kun, Rui and Kasshi.

The scene changed, and Mikko was on a deserted ship.

—Kii-kun, Kasshi, Rui… as well as me… we shouldn’t have come here…

The one saying this was none other than her.

It felt so familiar—and yet, this was a scene that she felt like she shouldn’t ever know.

Why did she see that now?

Before she could recall the reason, the mumbling girl was pulled back to reality.

“I’m—”

Apparently Mikko’s words caused quite the shakedown to Kasshi, which was unexpected. She thought this boy was cold and rational, but now he bit his lips and his clenched fists shook.

“All of us can definitely get along. Yes, just like a family…”

From the other side of the hall there was a loud thud.

“Wah… Uwah…”

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

Kii-kun appeared. He clung into the one who asked him this, Daisuke, almost tackling him.

“M-my arm… my arm’s attached, right? R-right, Daisuke?!”

He looked to be quite disturbed. He had his two arms all right.

“It’s obviously there. Had a nightmare or something?”

“A nightmare… yeah, it was a dream. —Wait, you guys, why are you with Mikko! Don’t ostracize me!”

“Fwah… why are you all gathered here and why are my subordinates all asleep?”

Rui appeared.

“I won’t ask for details, so go to sleep already, kids. Do you even realize how far I’m going with you, instead of being with my precious daughter who’s more important than the world itself? If you don’t, I’ll force you.”

The terribly moody youth was apparently serious. He cracked his fist.

While looking over them, Mikko narrowed her eyes toward Daisuke.

“We can all get along.”

“…”

Daisuke sighed unpleasantly, and Kii-kun, Kasshi and Rui exchanged glances.

“Right, I feel the same way toward all of you—”

Before reaching her limits and losing her consciousness—

Mikko recalled just who she was.

2.02 Daisuke Part 4

Exiting the hotel come early morning, the five people came to the outskirts of Akamaki City.

Immediately after getting off the luxury car, Daisuke frowned.

“Was there a place like that in Akamaki City…?”

A fantastic new world wrapped in morning fog spread in front of him.

He could see many buildings in the style of Middle Age Europe—the type called baroque, if he remembered correctly—with all kinds of sculptures. A townscape full of churches could be seen on the other side of the fence.

Kii-kun unexpectedly turned to look at Daisuke.

“You never came here before? To Castello.”

“Castello?”

“Castello del Lago. I wanted to go on a date here someday. That girl dumped me yesterday, though…”

“Castello del Lago…”

Hearing that name, it felt somewhat familiar. It should have been a real theme park from overseas.

Due to certain circumstances, Daisuke had lived in Akamaki City several years ago. Perhaps due to being so focused on his mission back then, not only had he never come to play in this theme park, he hadn’t even noticed its existence.

Kasshi asked Mikko.

“Is the other test subject here?”

In front of the fences surrounding the spacious premises, the armed forces that were Rui’s private soldiers were already waiting. Men in camouflage suits holding projectile-type stun guns were communicating through wireless.

“Cough… yes, there is no doubt.”

Mikko rested for the evening and apparently recovered some. However, it didn’t look like her coughs would stop.

“How do you know?”

“Because there’s something here that he would want.”

People would live for their hopes—

Mikko said this last night. This was something completely different from a guess or a conjecture; she apparently had something she was convinced on.

“Looks like it’s true.”

Rui who went to speak with his private forces returned to Daisuke and the rest with a bitter expression.

“My subordinates confirmed that there’re strange monsters in the compound. Not only were they unable to reach the employees inside, no customers came to Castello since yesterday.”

Kii-kun startled.

“Ee? Then, that…”

“I used my Round Table connections to make sure no one comes here, but there’s limit to how much I can hold back involved people and the media. —What are we doing to do?”

“…Cough.”

Mikko started walking. She headed for the entrance that had no reception desk.

Daisuke also followed the girl. Kasshi came as well.

“Goes without asking.”

“E-eh…? I-I’m still not mentally ready, though…”

“You can just stay there, Kii-kun. In fact, that’d be better.”

“Uuugh… I-I don’t want to be left alone.”

Seeing Rui smile and start walking, the half-crying Kii-kun hurriedly followed.

Going through the entrance, they got into a plaza made of bricks. Lamps with carvings and a carriage connected to a horse statue appeared within the morning fog.

They all took out of the plaza and advanced further into the premises.

The inside of the theme park wrapped in an eerie silence looked completely empty of people.

However, that thought was soon betrayed.

Because they noticed human figures collapsed within the morning fog.

“E-eeeek!”

Raising this strained scream was just Kii-kun.

It wasn’t just one or two people collapsed there. Men and women of various ages and appearance were on the ground, completely unmoving.

Kasshi approached one collapsed person and put a finger on his neck.

“Not dead. But it looks a bit different from just being fainted, too.”

“So these are the customers who came here yesterday?”

Rui emitted a groan mixed with anger.

As far as Daisuke could see, it resembled the state of those who had their Mushi killed. Those who lost their emotions and memories, becoming the living corpses called Fallen.

“They probably became his prey. My family—my ‘big brother’—did this to them… cough.”

“T-they’re the same as my friends…”

Kii-kun spoke with a shaky voice.

“The same, meaning—”

Daisuke glared at the other side of the morning fog. From the shade of the baroque-style buildings appeared countless shadows.

“So it’s like that.”

There were rod-like objects that appeared like spider legs and things like insect heads floating in air.

He could see five of them, but that number kept growing.

These were Imperfect Mushi.

They were waiting for their comrades to gather there, or perhaps they were just checking on what Daisuke’s group was going to do. These Mushi were all looking at them.

“Eeee…”

Kii-kun fell onto his butt, causing Rui to grab his arm and force him to stand up again.

“Stand up, Kii-kun. If you don’t want to die, that is.”

Daisuke, who was ready to move at any given moment, frowned.

“These things… were they waiting here since yesterday? Aren’t these imperfect Mushi supposed to vanish quickly?”

“It is possible that these born Mushi are slowly changing… cough.”

If they were just changing it was fine.

However, if this was “evolution”—wouldn’t they become the same Mushi that Daisuke knew well, before long?

Daisuke’s worries only kept growing.

“Also, since my big brother has quite a large definition of his territory… these are probably like soldiers guarding him.”

Mikko casually went behind Daisuke to use him as a shield.

“Therefore, if something happened to my brother, these Mushi would be unleashed in Akamaki City.”

“So that means that before handling the test subject, we need to handle these things. If so many of them spread all over the country it’d be a mess.”

Daisuke clenched his fist.

If he could fuse with his Mushi, eliminating them wouldn’t be impossible.

However, although he tried it last night many times, he couldn’t use his Mushi powers.

Had the mist engulfing Akamaki City done something to him…?

Daisuke wasn’t as clueless as to be happy he became a normal person again. He had the fear that he was unknowingly affected by some Mushi’s attack and had his powers sealed.

“You seem like you know what these monsters are. Then I’m not hallucinating them.”

Kasshi saw the Imperfect Mushi for the first time, and yet he spoke calmly.

“Those who step any further will be attacked—to me it looks like that.”

“I do agree, but my forces spread around the premises aren’t so plentiful.”

Appearing one after another, the Mushi nervously approached Daisuke’s group. However, seeing that they weren’t going to attack soon, it looked like Kasshi and Rui’s reasoning wasn’t wrong.

“Let us think up a plan. I have come here once as a child.”

Mikko took a pamphlet from the nearby store without any permission and spread it at the five’s feet.

“If we… cough… split into two like this, we can go through this route… if we move like that, I believe we can pass through almost the entire premises, so—”

Her finger rapidly slipped on top of the pamphlet. Even while coughing, she explained her strategy without any pause.

“After we eliminate these Mushi, I will show you to the place my brother is probably at… cough.”

Mikko’s plan was simple and clear—but dangerous.

Everyone exchanged glances, all wearing serious expressions.

Silence was soon broken.

“Me and Kasshi will go north. You three go south.”

Deciding first was Rui.

“Don’t order me.”

Although complaining, Kasshi hid his head with the hoodie. He apparently agreed with the plan.

“So I gotta protect you again.”

“Cough… you may state otherwise with your mouth, but I am sure you’re happy to go along with a woma—ow.”

“No waaay… this for real?”

It was unexpected that he needed to take care of a sick person and a coward, but Daisuke had no other choice.

It wasn’t the first time they worked together and it was dangerous placing Mikko and Kasshi in the same group. Rui had apparently already understood each person’s position and personality.

“I’ll getcha something good to eat again if we live through this, brats.”

“This morning’s bread was a bit damp.”

“Why are you trying to climb on my back, walk on your own.”

“Cough… even while you act truly cold, I actually—ow.”

“I don’t wanna die…”

Each saying their own parting words, the five people split into two groups.

Immediately after this—

“—This is different from what I’ve seen…”

Mikko uttered this curious phrase.

2.03 The Others

Mikko’s plan was quite simple.

They would split into two groups, draw the Mushi in the premises and lead them to a certain spot.

It was just that.

However, for him—Kii-kun—it really was mission impossible.

“GyaaaAAAHHHaaaAAAH!”

The theme park called Castello del Lago became a horror park full of monsters. Men and women, the young and the old were all collapsed around and Mushi that were only body parts roamed around.

Already several minutes passed with them running to draw the monsters away.

As they ran full speed ahead, there was a line of Mushi at their back.

“How many of these monsters are theeeeere! I can’t do it! I’m gonna dieeee!”

“Cough! Cough! Wheeze… wheeze… I’m at my limit, too…”

“We just started running!”

Kii-kun was whining while Mikko was running unsteadily and helplessly. Daisuke shouted at both of them.

Apparently, the Mushi thought of this three-person group as their prey. Finding their figures, the Mushi still wriggled chasing after them. Their numbers were already getting close to thirty.

Even Kasshi and Rui who parted from them were probably faced with the same situation.

However, he had the feeling they were faring better than him—because they didn’t have to take care of two burdens who were stupid and lacked stamina.

“Eee...!”

Several Mushi appeared from the shadows of the clock tower ahead.

“Don’t stop!”

As Daisuke shouted sharply, he accelerated.

He leapt ahead when a Mushi made only of sickle-like legs tried to stab him. However, the moment before it happened, he ducked to dodge, sliding toward a Mushi that was only a head.

Sharp fangs came to bite him, but Daisuke leapt to the side using a feint. The head Mushi bit into empty ground and the momentum caused it to tackle against another Mushi.

Mushi got all entangled and crashed into shops. There was now empty space in front of Kii-kun and Mikko.

“That was so cool...! Who are you!”

If he mistook one step he’d probably die in pieces.

Kii-kun couldn’t understand how he had the nerves needed to calmly jump into this situation. Appearance-wise, he looked just like any normal boy—

Daisuke came back and ran in front of Kii-kun and Mikko.

“So without their hosts, Mushi are this easy... they’re even below animals, then.”

“Cough…! Hosts?”

“No—never mind.”

A little bit of hope peeked its head.

He didn’t know why, but the boy called Daisuke was apparently much more used to this situation than Kii-kun expected. Their plan might be able to succeed like this.

They would capture that incomprehensible test subject or whatever and solve the case.

If they did this and the situation calmed down, Kii-kun should also be able to understand what happened to his body.

Until then he’d desperately go along with them. —If he didn’t do this, he would probably just be left behind like one of the victims strewn around the area.

He couldn’t stand being left behind—

Right now, Kii-kun was single-minded.

“Cough! Cough!”

“Are you alright, Mikko?”

“Haa, haa… you ignore a woman suffering like this… you sure have some sadistic fetishes… Even if you are a complete pervert, I will still—ow.”

“Tch.”

She really looked to be at her limit. After hitting the girl’s cheek, Daisuke carried her slim body.

“You’re gonna have to run on your own though, Kii-kun!”

“Wheeze, wheeze… I know that…”

Even if he tried bluffing, his lungs already hurt.

Even carrying Mikko, Daisuke’s running speed was unchanged. “Don’t breathe at my neck!” “This is me offering my gratitude. You looked like you would enjoy it… cough.” “What’s wrong with your eyes!” Seeing them argue like that from behind, Kii-kun’s chest pricked.

Mikko was important. She seemed to know important things, she was smart and she was also beautiful.

The knight who would save her was apparently Daisuke. It wasn’t Kii-kun, who aspired to be that part.

“—So, what did you mean by this being different from what you’ve seen?”

“Cough… what are you talking around?”

“Don’t play dumb, you just said this now.”

Daisuke and Mikko began talking.

At a place irrelevant to Kii-kun.

“I do not really remember… but I probably referred to Castello being different from the time I came to play. After all, it is in this state… cough.”

“Are you going to be so evasive about your father’s research, too?”

That was obvious.

Unlike Daisuke, Kii-kun was just a normal high-schooler, and he couldn’t do anything.

He simply frantically followed them, wishing to be saved by someone.

Thinking that, he was really pathetic.

“…But that doesn’t mean I give up.”

He mumbled.

He held no grand dream such as wanting to save someone or change the world.

He simply didn’t want to die. If he ended up like his friends, that were the prey of the dark women despite being such good guys, or else like all the people collapsed around Castello, it would hurt too much.

“Ouch.”

Since he ran while thinking, he stumbled on one of the collapsed people.

He tumbled down and scraped his hurt knee, raising his face.

“Ah—”

Daisuke and Mikko’s backs were already far away.

As he timidly turned around—the large swarm of Mushi was obviously after him.

“Daisuke—help—”

No voice came out.

His hips gave in to fear. Cold sweat erupted from his entire body.

At the head of the swarm was a Mushi with only a head. Although it didn’t have a body, it was large enough that it probably couldn’t be contained inside a classroom.

“No way—”

He did nothing wrong since he was born. Nothing at all.

It wasn’t a tough birth and he was born easily. He suffered no huge wound or illness and his grades were always the average of average. In middle school he was in the basketball club, and once he was senior enough, he became a club regular in his second year.

He was blessed with good friends and he even made the girlfriend he wanted. The latter soon dumped him, though.

Once he thought back to his life thus far, he suddenly noticed.

“Is this what they call having your life flash back before your eyes—”

He didn’t think he could nor did he want to save people.

He had no power to change anything.

He just didn’t want to die.

What was so bad about him having this wish when he couldn’t do anything?

As he wished for this as if to fight back, Kii-kun’s lower torso—

“—”

Was bitten by the Mushi’s head and broke down with a spray of blood.

2.04 Daisuke Part 5

“Are you going to be so evasive about your father’s research, too?”

While leading away the swarm of Mushi and running, Daisuke asked the girl on his back.

“…You really are good at handling Mushi.”

And Mikko was trying to change the subject.

Ahead of them, the body of a Mushi appeared. It rolled speedily to assault them, but Daisuke used a flowerpot to jump over it and escape.

The ways to fight and deal with Mushi had been drilled into Daisuke’s body.

It was the crystallization of the knowledge and experience accumulated by the SEPB. For more than a decade, paying for it with many sacrifices.

Although he couldn’t use his Mushi, he wasn’t afraid of some low-grade Mushi.

“If I keep it a secret like this, it seems like it will not end with a mere slap on the cheek… cough.”

She apparently had a sharp intuition. It happened just as he thought about leaving her there.

“My father couldn’t accept my mother’s death. He became deeply worried about life and death, as a result devoting himself to research about immortality. …Cough.”

A large body of water could be seen ahead.

It was a pond.

With the morning dew like mist and the small island in the middle, it really looked like a miniature garden.

“As an attempt to gain the Undying, he soon threw away research about gene manipulation and the like. Since humanity had been unable to reach the Undying from its origin to this day… he wished for a more dramatic change.”

“Enough with the preface. What was the research about?”

While carrying Mikko, Daisuke took a detour around the pond. According to the pamphlet they saw before, there was apparently an artificial pond in the premises.

“Cough… my father’s aim was tying people’s spirits and bodies together.”

“Tying… their spirit and body?”

“Rarely, there are cases where a certain mental state can cause the flesh to reject its death.”

“…”

“A soldier in a war, single-mindedly wanting to save his comrades despite being fatally wounded. A father who was gravely injured in an accident and yet survived because he yearned to meet his daughter. A man who came back from clinical death due to hearing his lover’s voice… strong feelings differing from instincts could allow one to surpass physical death.”

Strong feelings.

Daisuke thought this research was fishy, but these words brought a bad feeling to his mind that kept growing.

“Greed, desire, wish… hope. I do not know how to best call that feeling.”

Or perhaps something like—a dream.

Daisuke groaned in his heart.

“There were people who had their eyes on my father’s theory. People who gained everything: money, position, anything at all, and grew tired of life… they called themselves the Round Table. My father’s research was nothing more than a pipedream, and yet they supplied it with suitable test subjects, not stopping his delusions.”

“Suitable test subjects?”

Even without turning around, Daisuke knew that the large swarm chasing them only kept growing. With a certain space between them, they were followed by the sounds of tremors and buildings being knocked down.

“They were people who desperately wished to obtain something. Almost all of them came not from developed countries, but from other places that had less than blessed environments… they were all people who starved, suffered, raged, saddened, and cried…”

“And what did your father… do to those people?”

“He made them even more hungry, suffering, angry, sad and crying.”

He felt sick just imagining it.

It was obviously illegal, but this research could never be forgiven from a moral standpoint as well.

Making that possible—were the powers called the Round Table.

“Plenty died. But that was still within expectations… My father thought that those test subjects who reached the edge of death and yet didn’t die, or perhaps those who came back to life, held the possibility of becoming Undying… cough.”

“Sounds like a world-class piece of shit.”

“My father lost his sanity. He even stopped letting me, his biological daughter, out of the research facility so that I could take care of the test subjects… but one day, a miracle occurred—”

“…A miracle?”

“I do not know what happened. However, the one you call the dark woman had an effect on another test subject. —Effect, is the only way I can call it. That guinea pig created something. There is a way of referring to that thing. Daisuke, you were the one who taught me it.”

“Mushi—”

Mikko’s arm caressed Daisuke’s head as if in tender care.

“Since there was a result, the research was accelerated. The numbers of test subjects increased, and I felt so bad for those I cared for, so I took them out of the facility with me… my limit was two people, though.”

“A result, you say? What is the connection between Undying and Mushi? Since something completely unrelated was born, wasn’t it a failure?”

“He probably can no longer go back… so he insisted this was a result.”

Mikko said this and closed the conversation, but for Daisuke this was no mere research.

The experiments conducted in secret by the SEPB’s Central Headquarters—

Daisuke had heard about them, albeit only a little.

He came to know of them from a certain disk given to him by Ebina Yuu, as well as his meeting with the other “Daisuke”.

Mikko’s father’s research might be part of it, and it produced these Imperfect Mushi.

“Cough. Among the test subjects, only a very few exhibited the possibility to birth Imperfect Mushi… the one supposedly here at Castello is another one.”

If this research or whatever continued, it would become irreversible.

Inside Daisuke, anxiety was changing into conviction.

The scene he saw inside the milky mist crossed through his mind.

—If I could return to the past—I would have probably killed all of you the moment we met…

On an abandoned ship who knows where, Mikko said this while crying.

—Kii-kun, Kasshi, Rui… as well as me… we shouldn’t have come here…

That creepy prophecy.

If it really was no illusion.

—Because of us, this country will get filled with Mushi and reach its end.

Daisuke had no idea why he was able to see that.

But if that indicated a future of destruction.

Wasn’t it a mistake for Daisuke to keep protecting Mikko and Kii-kun like he did now?

Perhaps what he should have done was, just like Mikko during that scene said—

“Cough… by the way.”

Daisuke came back to himself from Mikko’s voice.

What am I thinking about—

He was mad at himself for thinking of something idiotic.

“Where is Kii-kun, I wonder?”

Daisuke stopped in place.

As he turned around—there were only the rabid Mushi there.

At some point, the annoying crying boy had vanished.

2.05 The Others

“You said you were in your second year of high school, Kasshi. Well, are you enjoying school?”

“…More or less.”

“What country are you from? I can tell from your looks you’re western, though.”

“…”

“Your Japanese is good!”

“…Thanks.”

So annoying.

Kashua found Rui’s way of talking to him as if they were friends very disturbing.

Even more than the large swarm of Mushi chasing them from behind.

Despite this being their first meeting, more or less, and it being a relationship of mutual suspicion, he couldn’t understand why the older man was communicating with him like a long-time friend or perhaps a parent.

“Have you been here for a long time? Made any friends?”

“…A little.”

Kashua and Rui were doing well leading the Mushi inside Castello.

Kashua trained himself every day, but Rui also seemed to have considerable stamina. Despite him wearing a suit that looked difficult to move in, he didn’t show any signs of fatigue. However, if he got tired and was eaten by those Mushi, it would be a bit quieter.

“Got a girlfriend? I’m sure you do, with how handsome you are!”

“…”

“Use contraception, alright? Or well, if you intend to take responsibility, you don’t have to! Just like me!”

Rui laughed and struck his back. This was the first time he felt like killing someone ever since he came to this country.

“…I don’t have a girlfriend.”

“I see, how unexpected! You look like you’d be popular.”

That’d be a problem. If it looked unnatural for him to not have a girlfriend, he needed to make one.

“It’s fine, you should experience love while in school—”

He kept running, only nodding and humming to Rui’s stupid words.

He was worried about Mikko’s group that split from them. It would’ve been ideal for the two of them to be together, but because of the incident last night he knew that was impossible.

There was no need to panic. Leaving Kii-kun aside, Daisuke was there.

That band-aid boy had the same scent as him.

Although he looked average at a glance, he should actually have considerable battle experience. A mere brawler wouldn’t be able to get behind Kashua so noiselessly. He couldn’t have any military training at that age, but he probably was trained by some special organization.

“Girls your age love surprises. They want a little bit of spice in their daily lives—”

It was certain that Daisuke was watching over Mikko for some goal of his.

If Daisuke really was the same kind of person as Kashua, his goal was clear.

Undying—as well as Mushi.

If he could go back with those secrets, the country Kashua belonged to would acknowledge his results. Even if it was just this failed Undying and the monsters that were even below animal intellect.

Kashua had been sent to this country to grasp the identity of a certain abnormality.

If he could accomplish that splendidly—

Thinking that far, his mood sank.

He did what he needed to do, so he knew what would happen with him.

He would just get sent to another unfamiliar country and repeat something similar—

“What, you have no confidence in talking with girls? Don’t make that face.”

“…I’m not making any face.”

Suddenly, the events of last night passed through his mind.

— You are empty, like a living corpse.

The girl with a cold, Mikko, hit the mark as she said this. So finally he raged, but—

—However, I like you like that.

She said that Kashua needed to decide himself what he wished for.

Without being given it by someone, without being forced, the way he wanted to live his life.

—Right now, you are freer than anyone.

How silly.

Free. Those were the furthest words from Kashua possible.

Not even once since he was born had he felt free. If he got freedom at this stage, he would just be troubled.

“Smile more! Being a little more friendly would make your life better, Kasshi. Are you in your rebellious phase?”

“Shut up.”

He would leave Mikko’s questioning for later.

He needed to start with this man—with Rui.

As a member of the Round Table, he was apparently also connected to Mikko’s father’s research. He would obviously be able to get some information from him.

Even if he died after torture, if Kashua said he was eaten by Mushi, no one would suspect him, most likely.

“Let’s pick up our pace, Rui. We’ll get cornered like this.”

“Is that so? Well, that’s fine.”

Rui smartly agreed. Kashua wanted to doubt whether he really was a member of that influential, powerful Round Table.

He decided to get away from these Mushi, lead him to a suitable place and torture him there. Kashua was equipped with both the knowledge and the tools for that.

It wasn’t just torture. Science, physics, math, electrical engineering, mechanical—Kashua had all kinds of knowledge hammered into him since childhood.

“Say, Kasshi.”

“What now?”

It was probably yet another cheap love theory or teaching. He was sick of it already.

“Do you have any family?”

“…”

“Probably not.”

How did he understand that—

It wasn’t supposed to mean anything for him, but for some reason he felt pissed off.

“Look at this. My daughter. Cute, right? Isn’t she the beauty of the century? I can’t wait for her to grow up.”

He showed a photo he took from his pocket. It was a small child wearing—no, being forced to wear a dress.

“…And?”

“I’m asking if she’s cute! Say she’s cute!”

“Yeah, real cute, that one. So put it away already.”

“Alright—you pass.”

Cheerfully putting the photo back in his pocket, the youth—

Stopped running.

“Wha—”

Kashua also stopped without thinking.

Obviously, as the space between them shrank, the Mushi pursued Rui who stopped in place.

“Have you gone mad? Run!”

Rui didn’t seem tired. Rather, he wore a light smile.

“Rui!”

Even when Kashua called to him, Rui didn’t try to move a single step.

Does he have some idea…? No, that can’t be! Does he want to die? Even though he just told me he can’t wait for his daughter to grow up?

Kashua’s thoughts ran around his mind the fastest they ever did.

“Hey…!”

Rui made no move. All he did was direct Kashua with a testing gaze.

I still didn’t get any information from him…! No, there’s still Mikko for information! But just in case, what if she’s already dead? What’s the value of risking myself here to save Rui? Shit, this idiot, what’s he thinking—

Instead of his unceasing thoughts, his body moved.

Kicking the ground, Kashua danced at the speed of an arrow and pushed Rui aside.

“Woooh!”

He stabbed the Mushi consisting of only a body with a hidden knife before it crushed Rui.

He put in entire body’s weight on the blade stuck between the gaps in the Mushi’s sinews.

Pitch-black bodily fluids drew an arc in the air. Trembling painfully, the body was thrown to the ground, right into the path of the charging Mushi.

One of them managed to avoid this clash.

A Mushi made only of legs attempted skewering Kashua with its sharp claws.

“Ha!”

Instead of Kashua who couldn’t defend in time, Rui emitted a sharp breath. As if using some magic, the super-heavy claws flowed over Rui’s arms and deeply stabbed into the ground.

However, he wasn’t completely unhurt. Rui’s arm tore and blood sprayed.

“Alright, let’s skedaddle, Kasshi.”

Turning around, Rui wore a mischievous smile.

“—”

Kashua experienced “coming back to his senses” for the first time in his life.

Grabbing Rui’s collar, he rushed.

“Wah, w-wait, Kasshi! Calm down!”

Still holding the youth’s chest, he rushed away at full speed from the Mushi.

In moments they got away from them and flew inside a temple with carved statues. The inside was apparently a gift shop and he pounded the youth against a shelf full of merchandise.

“—Are you insane? Or are you suicidal?”

He put a small syringe against the back of Rui’s neck.

“Well, I don’t care. Do as you wish. Just wait until after my torture and do it where I can’t see you.”

“…Do you really have no family? Parents? Siblings?”

“Obviously not. I hadn’t wished for it, but I was born from artificial insemination. So what? Are you telling me that I won’t know how it feels? I don’t want to know either.”

The sharp needle stabbed into Rui’s neck. All that remained was injecting him with the chlorine.

“I have no interest in the feelings of a parent—who decides to abandon the daughter he loves like that.”

Rui laughed.

“Kasshi, do you—want to become my adopted son?”

The fingers about to inject the medicine stopped.

His thoughts did, too.

Were his ears broken?

Hearing these incomprehensible words, Kashua let his mouth hang open.

“Of course, only if you’re not against it.”

What was that guy even saying—

Adopted son? Was he saying that he wanted Kashua as his child?

Despite them being complete strangers until yesterday? Despite being only two or three years beneath him in age? By the guy who was told he was about to get tortured and got his neck stabbed by a syringe?

Now the man in front of him seemed even crazier than he had when he threw himself at the Mushi.

“Why—”

“If you really had someone important to you… you wouldn’t get so angry, being told you were empty.”

Rui was apparently talking about what happened last night.

Was Rui saying he sympathized with him just from this?

“The person I loved the most in the world died soon after giving birth to my daughter. At that time, I became just as empty as you. Once you thought that—I stopped thinking of you as a stranger.”

“…”

“Leaving the talk about adoption aside, stop thinking about doing those things to me. The Round Table have their pride. Those who lay a hand on their members would definitely get taken care of.”

“—If I die then they’ll just send a replacement. This time they’ll investigate not from the outside like me, but even deeper.”

He prophesized this. It was already decided.

If Kashua were to die, the next agent would get sent. And this time it would definitely be someone far better than Kashua, who could secretly infiltrate the very bottom of this.

“I’m talking about you.”

Rui looked Kashua straight in the eyes. He didn’t seem scared of the syringe at all.

“Become my family, Kasshi. You should be the one to realize the most of anyone that there’s no other way to save you, right?”

No matter how he seemed, he was part of the Round Table—so he’d apparently long since seen through Kashua’s identity.

Those backing Kashua were powerful. Therefore, he couldn’t pull out on his own, and gaining a half-hearted collaboration didn’t change the impossible.

However, any relation to the Round Table, and a familial one at that, was another story. The closed, conservative Round Table would do anything in its power to cover for families, and would probably defend him to the last. No one could get through that power of solidarity.

He could become free.

He could have a family.

He didn’t dare to imagine this—because if he did, it would’ve probably been more painful, so glimpsing this future he never thought of confused Kashua.

“This is just sympathy—”

“At first it was. But I wouldn’t welcome you as family so easily. But you saved me. Weighing it against your mission—you saved someone’s parent, me. I like you.”

Rui was probably just trying to shake Kashua and prevent him from killing him—

Kashua didn’t think so because he saw Rui’s serious eyes. Those black jewel-like eyes felt as if they exposed not only their opponent’s hearts, but even Rui’s heart itself, showing it to him.

“Don’t think too deeply on the important things. Acting based on your guts is enough.”

Rui smiled.

“If we become family, wouldn’t it be fun?”

How stupid.

However, Kashua couldn’t mouth those words.

“As a special bonus, you’ll also get the world’s cutest sister.”

Certainly true. Kashua saw the picture and said the child was cute.

“…You must be crazy, but did you really think you could convince me so easily?”

“So stubborn. Is this what they call a tsundere?”

He injected just a little bit of chlorine when something happened.

“Uwaaaaah!”

A scream came from the outside.

It sounded familiar.

“Tch—”

Kashua pulled out the syringe from Rui and peeked out the building.

“What is he doing in here…?”

“Apparently he got separated from Daisuke and Mikko.”

While rubbing his neck, Rui stood next to Kashua.

The topknot boy approached them, drawing Mushi after him.

“Gyaaaah—aaah! Kakaka, Kasshi! And Rui! Save meeeee!”

It was Kii-kun.

Because he shouted so loudly, the Mushi that Kashua and Rui got away from responded. The now united large swarm of Mushi pursued them.

Rui sighed.

“That guy’s got bad timing. —You can respond whenever you’d like.”

He apparently didn’t intend to acknowledge the fact he was saved from death.

“…It was because saving you was so stupid that it made me mad. And me saving Kii-kun now—is because what kind of human would I be if I didn’t save that sorta guy?”

“Sure, sure.”

Kashua and Rui leapt out of the building and united with Kii-kun.

“Ah, I’m so relieved! How dare Daisuke and Mikko abandon me like thiiiis!”

He was crying pathetically, but Kii-kun had no wounds anywhere on his body. Including the fact he managed to find Kashua and Rui, he seemed to be quite lucky.

“You’ve done well to survive, Kii-kun.”

As Rui smiled cheerfully, Kii-kun protested with sobs.

“Don’t speak of it so easily! I really thought I was gonna die! Thinking I might really die—die? W-wait, what? I was definitely about to die—what happened back then?”

He was apparently confused from fear. And he even became unstable.

“I’m so glad the two of you are fine, you guuuys!”

“If we needed you to care for us, it’d be the end of us.”

“S-shuddup! I don’t want to lose any more frieeeends!”

Friends.

Kii-kun probably said that without any deep meaning.

Therefore, Kashua neither grew angry or ignored him—

“Who’d be your friend?”

Kashua’s mouth curled into a smile.

2.06 Daisuke Part 6

“Cough. A little more…”

Mikko on his back mumbled while coughing.

Daisuke nodded wordlessly. Due to running for a long distance while carrying a girl, even his stamina reached its limits.

The large swarm of Mushi drawn by them already grew so large that he couldn’t see its end.

Running on the shore of the large pond, he could see a huge plaza ahead.

In the center of that plaza was a giant concrete-made monument. Perhaps abandoned in the middle of a parade, there was a large car with decorations there.

“—Looks like they also did their job.”

He raised his sweaty face at Mikko’s words.

On the other side of the plaza there were clouds of dust.

Running and bringing swarms of Mushi with them, Kasshi, Rui and Kii-kun could be seen.

“Kii-kun… so you were safe.”

“Just like I said, right? That he’s definitely safe… cough.”

Right—when he was shaken at Kii-kun’s disappearance, she told him that he was probably fine.

Daisuke couldn’t just plunge into the Mushi and go looking, so he had to believe her words.

“Was that another one of your prophecies?”

“No, I only said it for some peace of mind.”

Daisuke raised a brow.

He felt as if Mikko’s way of talking and personality slightly changed from when they’d first met.

At first she was more like a girl his age but became more and more shameless—

Daisuke, Mikko, Rui, Kasshi, Kii-kun—the five of them entered the plaza almost at the same time.

“Daisuke! Mikko! How dare you abandon meeeee! I nearly died!”

“If you’d died, we’d have some peace and quiet.”

“You’ve carried Mikko all the way here? Impressive.”

The reunion with those familiar figures of a topknot, a hoodie and an expensive suit nostalgic guys was complete.

“Sorry. Since I didn’t really care, I hadn’t even noticed you were gone.”

“Cough… in that sense, it’s your fault for having no presence, Kii-kun.”

There was no time to rejoice at everyone’s safety.

The Mushi chasing after Daisuke and the rest invaded the plaza. In no time the entire surface was filled with Mushi.

Daisuke and the rest took a sharp turn near the monument and aimed for the plaza exit.

The five ran shoulder to shoulder, weaving through the arch made of flowers.

“Alright—it’s go time!”

Rui shouted.

As he did, many figures jumped out from the shades of the flowers surrounding the plaza flew out many figures.

They were the armed forces wearing camo suits. Readying their machineguns, they stood to block the way of the Mushi chasing them.

“Fire! Let them eat lead!”

How on earth had he gathered these much soldiers, weapons and bullets? It was unpleasant just to imagine how much gunfire echoed.

Sparks, flashes of light and a lot of exhaust smoke filled the plaza.

Rui’s soldiers, who surrounded the plaza and lay in waiting, began their uniliteral annihilation of the Mushi.

“Keep shooting till they stop moving! There’s no end to them!”

Whenever there were breaks in the gunfire, Rui’s vigorous encouragement flew.

Gathering all the Mushi in Castello del Lago into one place and using firearms to destroy them.

This exceedingly simple strategy consisted only of that.

He couldn’t tell whether normal Mushi could be beaten like this. However, against these Imperfect Mushi, who had no special abilities and low intelligence, it was effective enough.

Having their tough hide pierced and collapsing, the Mushi vanished one after another.

“…”

Seeing the efficiently eliminated Mushi in front of his eyes, Daisuke was thinking.

If he could use his Mushi ability right now, what would have happened?

Most likely—he wouldn’t have believed in Mikko’s strategy and instead defeat these Mushi all alone. He would have wasted whatever little power remained and perhaps exhaust himself before fully annihilating them.

“Even without my powers… I can still defeat Mushi.”

He only now noticed something so natural.

The Mushi called Blaze Class Rank 1 Kakkou was outrageously powerful.

However, it was possible that he was the one who relied on that power the most of all—

“Cough… Is your arm injured, Rui?”

Coming back to himself from these words, he looked at Rui. The youth’s arm was wrapped in a handkerchief and was dyed in blood.

“Ah, a little.”

“Hmph.”

For some reason Kasshi looked sulky as he averted his gaze.

Apparently something happened between them while they were alone.

“Looks like we’re fine here.”

As Daisuke said this, the four nodded.

There was a huge explosion.

Along with a tremor, cracks ran through the huge monument at the center of the plaza. Exploding it was also part of their strategy.

“Now, I will show you to my big brother… cough.”

Being led by Mikko, Daisuke and the rest left the park.

Behind them, masses of concrete crushed the Mushi.

Taking the armed forces with them, the five taking came—to a large castle, a Castello.

The outer wall decorated by sublime carvings spread to both sides, while a spire made of a series of thick, round pillars rose in the center. Underneath the dark clouds, this structure looked like a giant wedding cake.

As the sun was starting to sink and lights around were being turned on, something waited at the base of the castle.

A dark mass.

It was a person clad in clothes dirtied from mud and dust. The limbs visible from the gaps in the clothing were quite thin and dyed in black. Due to them casting down their gaze, long hair hid half their face.

Only a single thing this figure wore—a white cloak with a red embroidery sewn on it—was as beautiful as if it was brand new. It was probably stolen from some store.

Unlike his dirty appearance, his figure sitting on the stairs going to the castle looked rather smarmy and haughty. From the gaps in his long air, bulging eyes stared down at Daisuke and the rest.

“—Let’s start.”

Rui raised a hand. The soldiers deployed, intending to surround the man.

“W-wait!”

Kii-kun flew ahead. “Hey!” Rui tried to stop him, but was ignored.

“You’re probably the same as that woman, right! Some kinda guinea pig… if that’s right, then you know how to create those Mushi whatever!”

Daisuke turned around and grabbed the boy moment before he could reach the cloaked figure.

Even so, Kii-kun didn’t stop.

“You lot did something to me, can’t you do anything about that? That woman stared at me… can’t really explain it, but I feel weird! Help me!”

Weird—what did he mean by that?

As far as Daisuke could see, there were no changes to Kii-kun’s body.

“Help me…!”

Staring at the clinging boy, the cloaked man opened his mouth.

“—”

He mumbled something. Daisuke couldn’t understand his words.

“He says, go away… cough.”

Mikko said. She could apparently translate him.

“This is my castle… he says.”

Kii-kun and Daisuke furrowed their brows.

Seeing their puzzled looked, Mikko coughed.

“He was apparently the king of another country. But since he was too ambitious, he was apparently shunned by the powerful men of his country and they made a deal with the Round Table so that they’d take him, he’d be treated as missing and die here…”

Everyone’s gazes turned to Rui.

The youth nodded with a grave face. Mikko’s explanation seemed to be correct.

Daisuke asked Mikko.

“Can this guy really create so many imperfect Mushi?”

“Probably. Since he’s really obsessed with power and authority… thinking it’d console him who suffered in the experiments, I did talk to him about a certain castle in this country, meaning Castello… at some point he started thinking of it as his own… cough.”

So he went insane—

He wasn’t Kii-kun, but Daisuke also had a lot he wanted to ask this man.

However, if this key person himself was in a state of confusion he could do nothing. Even taking him along and imprisoning him was impossible as long as he couldn’t get in contact with the SEPB.

So it was better to hand him over to the Round Table and wait for another opportunity to snatch him away.

“N-never mind all that! Please tell me how I can be saved!”

Mikko translated Kii-kun’s plea to the man.

The man mumbled something. He didn’t look like he cared about Kii-kun.

“These soldiers are useless. They’re too weak. They need to be something else—he says. Cough.”

“W-what about me—”

“Right, I just need to lose my form. If I do that, neither lead bullets nor sword would work. Then next time I will—”

The words translated by Mikko were completely incomprehensible.

Kii-kun grimacing in despair signaled the final act.

Rui wordlessly shook his hand.

The armed forced immediately all shot their stun guns.

Being stabbed with electrical currents all over his body, the man howled. He kicked at the ground like a beast and flew toward the soldiers.

One was caught and collapsed. An imperfect Mushi was created but instantly felled by a real bullet.

“…Undying, huh.”

Looking at the man resist like no normal person could, Daisuke unconsciously grimaced.

The man’s power of life was certainly fearsome. Even receiving shocks he had yet to collapse, and his forms of counterattacking with nimble movements didn’t seem human.

However—he was not Undying.

Daisuke had once fought a being that could be called that.

That fight was already over. Also, it ended as a cruel failure—

The man in front of him was not Undying. As proof, although it was difficult, the armed forces managed to catch him. While weakened he showed an opening and he had his body restrained by tape.

Finally being constricted in his movements, the man in the cloak was taken away by Rui’s private forces.

“Is he really the last out of the guinea pigs that ran from the research facility?”

Remaining in front of the castle were only five people. Daisuke turned to Mikko.

“Yes, there is no doubt about it… cough.”

“Where’s that facility?”

As Kashi asked this, Kii-kun grabbed him.

“Are you going there? D-don’t leave me behind, I’m going too!”

“I do believe you shouldn’t get involved anymore… cough. It doesn’t seem like you intend on turning back…”

Receiving the gazes of the three boys staring at her, Mikko narrowed her eyes sadly.

“—Is that some kinda joke?”

Rui who was speaking with someone over his cellphone raised his tone slightly.

Everyone turned to look at him.

“Did something happen, Rui?”

“I’ll call back,” Rui said, cut off the phone and spoke to answer his question. “Apparently we can’t get in contact with that facility… as well as people who went to check the site.”

Before the castle being illuminated by the setting sun, silence fell.

“Let’s go.”

Kashi spoke.

“Where’s that facility?”

“I will guide you. A certain vessel had been remodeled to create the research facility.”

“A vessel…?”

Kii-kun asked with a low voice.

As if a prelude, Mikko coughed.

“An abandoned ship.”

The one who was so shocked his breathing stopped at these words—

Was Daisuke alone.

3.00 Armageddon

Welcoming Daisuke and the rest who got out of Castello was the large head of a Mushi.

A moment before it clamped its mouthpart full of sharp fangs down on Mikko who was at the front, the camo suits around tore it with gunfire.

“Wha—”

The one to first raise his voice was Kii-kun.

“Why are there Mushi outside Castello!”

Although unable to let out any sound, Daisuke and Mikko, Rui and Kasshi also froze in shock.

They had supposedly eliminated all the Mushi created by the cloaked man.

Even so—outside the fences enclosing the premises there were several Imperfect Mushi running wild. Waiting there, Rui’s soldiers fought them with live bullets and were barely holding out.

Daisuke clicked his tongue.

“So there were survivors…!”

“Cough… no, this is—”

Mikko stared at the direction opposite of Castello.

Daisuke followed the girl’s gaze.

Several Imperfect Mushi came running from the road connected to Akamaki City. Rui’s soldiers hurriedly intercepted them, but it was a situation where a new one could come at any time.

Turning toward Rui who put a cellphone to his ears, Daisuke asked a question.

“From the direction of the city…? What’s going on—Rui!”

“…Apparently, large numbers of Mushi are rampaging all over Akamaki City.”

Rui lowered his cellphone and spoke in shock.

“W-why! Haven’t we caught all the guinea pigs?”

“Wasn’t the man we caught the last one?”

“I do not believe it possible… but perhaps something happened to the research facility. Perhaps another one was unleashed into the city…”

The masked girl’s forehead had cold sweat.

“No… way…?”

Kii-kun turned speechless.

“—I have not seen this… is something getting twisted…?”

Daisuke did not miss Mikko mumbling this.

It was for sure that Mikko was hiding something, but he didn’t have the time to pursue it.

The situation he was scared of was happening.

It was what Daisuke—no, the SEPB wanted to avoid the most.

The large-scale rampage of wild Mushi and the panic caused by this.

Just like Rui thought, if Imperfect Mushi were unleashed to Akamaki City, it was already too late.

They could no longer hide Mushi’s existence, and there would definitely be victims among the fleeing people. The infective fear would bring a second disaster, and at the worst, it was possible for military forces from abroad to appear as well.

Daisuke gritted his teeth.

“Rui! Can you call outside Akamaki City?”

The youth who still stood in place wordlessly pulled out his cellphone. So he was telling him to try.

He hurriedly pushed in a number.

However, no matter what branch he tried, he couldn’t connect to the SEPB.

“—Shit! Why doesn’t it go through! Rui, someone like you definitely knows about the Special Environmental Preservation Bureau, right? Why can’t I connect to any of them outside Akamaki City?”

This wasn’t the time to be hiding his identity. He expected that a Round Table might have some connection to them—

“Special Environmental…? I don’t know anything like that…”

The youth didn’t even try to take back the cellphone Daisuke was handing back to him.

“It shouldn’t have been like this… I didn’t mean for it to be like this…”

Rui always acted so sociable and bright, but now he was pale.

“We just wanted—to buy the Undying—”

He apparently noticed just how serious the disaster created by the Round Table only now when the situation became irreversible. Since he didn’t even know about the SEPB, Rui was probably just another subordinate among the members, but even so, he wasn’t sinless.

“Haha… what the heck’s this… am I looking at the end of the world…?”

Kii-kun’s groaning voice spoke of the scene before his eyes.

Creepy monsters came to attack one after another.

Even when the armed forces intercepted them, they were gradually losing their members.

That scene was enough to make one sense destruction.

“Cough… I have to go.”

Mikko suddenly spoke.

“Inside that place—the ship—sleeps the worst Mushi.”

“The worst Mushi…?”

Kii-kun’s voice asking this back was dyed by cynicism.

Daisuke could understand how he felt. Was she saying there was a situation even worse than this?

“It was what my father and the Round Table viewed as a result… that Mushi—is subconsciously connected with the person who created it.”

“…!”

Daisuke’s heart leapt.

A person subconsciously connected with a Mushi—

Was that not, without a doubt, the thing called a Mushitsuki?

“Since it is dangerous, it is made to sleep with medicine… but if something happened to the facility and the person administrating the medicine was gone—it would become irreversible.”

Mikko coughed.

It would become irreversible.

Was that also a prophecy?

—Kii-kun, Kasshi, Rui… as well as me… we shouldn’t have come here…

Everything started from that prophecy he saw inside the mist.

In that scene, Kii-kun and Kasshi died, while Mikko and Rui were arguing.

He still wasn’t certain that this showed him the future.

However.

The bad intuition born inside Daisuke kept swelling, ready to burst at any moment.

—If I could return to the past—I would have probably killed all of you the moment we met…

He couldn’t allow these people to go to the ship.

Daisuke felt as if someone was whispering that to him.

“…!”

While gunfire echoed, vehicle engine noises were mixed within them.

An expensive car appeared from the road. Weaving through the battlefield of the camo suits and Mushi, it made an emergency brake near Daisuke’s group.

Flying from within the car was a suited old gentleman with a young girl in his arms.

“So you were safe…!”

Rui strongly hugged the girl handed over to him.

She was probably his beloved daughter. Not knowing the joy of her father, she was peacefully sleeping in his arms—or so he thought, but she opened her eyes.

The toddler looked at Daisuke with sleepy eyes and reached to him. She was a cute girl with jewel-like, sparkling black eyes that she probably inherited from her father.

“…?”

Daisuke frowned.

The girl looked like she wanted to say something—but closed her eyes again and fell asleep.

Well, he didn’t care about Rui’s daughter. However, she’d become a good excuse.

“You should leave, Rui.”

Daisuke’s words caused Rui’s back to twitch.

“For your daughter’s sake.”

“...”

There was also the ominous prophecy.

He wouldn’t speak of murder just like Mikko in that scene.

However, thinking of this low chance, it was probably better for at least one less person to go there.

“—Sorry...”

Rui’s shoulders shook and he mumbled in a hoarse voice.

That was the expensive suit youth’s declaration of surrender.

“This is the obvious choice as a parent.”

Kasshi spoke resolutely and Rui turned to him.

“Kasshi... won’t you remain, too?”

A strange silence befell the two.

If Kasshi responded to Rui’s suggestion, perhaps Daisuke himself should also add something—

“I have to make sure if something happened.”

“I see...”

“But after I’ve done what I need to—“

Kasshi lowered his gaze a little.

He looked at the small sleeping girl in the youth’s arm—it might’ve been Daisuke’s imagination, but—for an instant, the boy’s mouth looked like it loosened.

“If I feel like it, you can come see me again.”

“...She’ll definitely be happy too.”

Rui smiled, looking really happy.

“Have a good one, Rui... cough.”

Mikko started walking.

Daisuke and Kashi followed her.

Unexpectedly, Kii-kun also stepped ahead. Daisuke stopped him.

“Kii-kun—“

“No... I’m going too.”

“It’d be safer going with Rui. You realize that, right?”

“I’ve been dreaming about myself dying for too long... I can’t take it anymore...”

Daisuke furrowed his brows.

Kii-kun acted strange. His scared expression was the usual, but his voice was shaking.

“I understand... that I need to go ‘there’ in order to save myself...”

“...? Do as you please.”

Giving up on convincing him, Daisuke turned ahead.

—If you can’t understand it from my words, I just need to get you to step down in the middle.

Daisuke would head to the abandoned ship alone. He couldn’t be picky about his methods now.

There were those who were resolved to continue on this path.

There were those who held what was important to them and stopped in place.

Each with their own feelings, they parted in this place with echoing gunfire.

3.01 Daisuke Part 7

Was this reality?

It looked like a frighteningly realistic panic film.

The streets of Akamaki City were filled with human shouts and the howls of Imperfect Mushi. People covered in blood were collapsed, and the remains of destroyed vehicles and buildings lay all around. There were fires and people and Mushi ran in and out smoke.

All order was lost and the country lost its functions.

No, not only that, but it even made him think that the world ended.

“They’re just filming a movie—I wish…”

This unrealistic scene made Kii-kun leak a hoarse voice.

“…”

Daisuke grimaced. The regret made him clench his jaw.

As a member of the SEPB, his job was to save these fleeing people.

However, right now Daisuke couldn’t use his Mushi powers.

Also, if he didn’t go to the ship, there might be even more victims—

There were limits to what he could do right now.

“We need a way to get to the suburbs. Let’s go look for a usable car.”

“Cough… how about this one?”

Mikko and Kasshi remained calm. Approaching a car that ran into a power pole and had its driver run away, they struck their heads together and began to consult.

Was there a situation even worse than this…?

Daisuke glared at Mikko’s back.

On the ship within the mist he’d certainly seen people that looked like Kasshi and Kii-kun dying, while Mikko preached about destruction. It made him feel like there was further misfortune and that the worst had yet to come.

Maybe I should just tell them what I saw—

This thought passed his mind, but he soon rejected it. He himself still doubted it, so he doubted they’d believe.

If so—

After getting the ship’s location, he’d stop the three of them here.

If he did this, the prophecy would be stopped, and the possibility of Kasshi and Kii-kun dying would lower. Daisuke alone was enough to investigate the ship.

“The engine’s dead. Can’t use this car.”

“Cough… others are all burned out, turned over, or have holes in them, it seems.”

“I-if we don’t do it quickly, the Mushi over there are gonna come here…!”

Kasshi and Mikko turned around while the flustered Kii-kun clung to them.

Kii-kun was no problem. There were plenty of ways to leave him behind.

There was no need to confine Mikko yet. Because he needed to hear from her where the ship was.

The problem was Kasshi.

He—resembled Daisuke.

He would watch over the others without missing a beat, and his own movements had no waste to them. He acted like a civilian, but he definitely received some training. However, unlike an anti-Mushi combatant like Daisuke, he was probably an anti-person professional. Since Daisuke couldn’t use his Mushi power, there was no guarantee he could win in a fight against him.

“Let’s split up and search.”

Daisuke suggested.

“Eeeeh? What are we going to do if we get attacked by Mushi!”

“…That would be faster. Be useful for a change, Kii-kun.”

The others agreed. The four would scatter around and start looking for vehicles.

As a countermeasure against danger, they would act in a range where they could all see each other—this condition was added to the search, but it still created many openings. Kii-kun and Kasshi started looking into prominent cars, and soon their attention went away from Mikko.

Daisuke quickly moved through blind spots, sneaking behind Mikko.

“…!”

He pressed the girl’s mouth on top of her mask and held her up.

All sounds were erased by the screams and destruction around. Daisuke entered a narrow alley with Mikko in arms, running full speed away from Kasshi.

If Kasshi was strong, he simply had to not fight him.

Leaving the two boys behind and remaining alone with Mikko completed his goal.

“—Sorry for being rough. Are you alright?”

In the back alley after turning corners many times, Daisuke released Mikko.

The masked girl sat on the ground, making pained coughs.

“How absurd, worrying about kidnapping. I do not know how many women you sank your poisonous fangs into until now, but you seem quite used to—ow. …It’s not as if it’s really painful, but I do think slapping a girl so many times is a bit crazy…”

“…When I look at you, I get really angry. Sorry.”

While sincerely apologizing for that, Daisuke got on one knee. He looked at the girl’s face from the same height.

All that remained was questioning her about the ship.

However—what came out of Daisuke’s mouth was a completely different question.

“What was the scene you saw?”

“…”

“You spoke as if you knew this was going to happen.”

After coughing once, the girl looked Daisuke back in the eyes.

“Yes—I was aware this was going to happen.”

“…!”

“But it’s already meaningless… this situation is already far removed from what I knew.”

Mikko narrowed her eyes, sad.

“What do you mean?”

“Both Castello and the tragedy in Akamaki City… there weren’t supposed to be this many Mushi born. It differs from what I saw—”

He couldn’t understand what Mikko was talking about.

Daisuke grabbed her shoulders.

“I saw—the abandoned ship. Kasshi and Kii-kun died while you were arguing with Rui.”

“Yes, I also saw that.”

Mikko’s almond eyes stared at Daisuke intently. Her black eyes that absorbed all light froze him, as if they stole his very heart.

“What I have seen is impossible to change, no matter who you were.”

“So you—were a Mushitsuki?”

Daisuke firmly held his consciousness as to not be taken in by the girl’s eyes.

Mikko grew with the guinea pigs and called them family. If during that time Mikko had become a Mushitsuki—

“You know the future…? Is the mist isolating Akamaki City your ability—”

“Cough… you really are stupid. Please don’t disappoint me too much.”

As she narrowed her eyes and smiled, the girl spoke as if likening him to a child.

For a split second—he felt as if her figure overlapped with someone he knew.

Crackle… Daisuke’s head numbed. He felt like he was just about to recall it but it vanished like mist.

“I am not a Mushitsuki. At the very least, I do not have the ability to show what I have seen to other people.”

“Then…! What was that thing I saw?!”

“You were shown that. So you could watch over what is about to happen now. —It means that the one who did this wants you to reach the ‘finish line’. That is their goal.”

“The one who did this…?”

“We must head to the finish line. You look like you want to stop, and yet the one standing in your way the most—is none other than yourself.”

Daisuke shuddered as a chill ran through his spine.

It was already too late by the time he felt a presence from behind.

“Last night you took me by surprise—”

Without even having time to turn around, a thin needle was stabbed into Daisuke’s neck.

“But don’t underestimate me.”

Kasshi, who’d approached from behind at some point, whispered this at Daisuke’s ears. He could feel something cold being injected into his veins through the syringe.

He lowered his guard—no, that was wrong.

Mikko’s smile told it all.

So they were on this together when I first suggested to go look for cars… they set a trap for me—

“If you are unable to reach the finish line—what would happen to you, I wonder?”

His heart leapt.

He recalled.

Mikko, the girl with the mask.

Daisuke had met her before—

“Y…you are—”

Unable to reach Mikko with his arm held out—

Daisuke’s consciousness was cut off.

3.02 The Others

“Thank you very much. You really saved me… cough.”

Rolling Daisuke’s unconscious form into the shadow, Kasshi heard Mikko’s words of gratitude.

“I don’t need any thanks. I simply eliminated someone who stood in my way.”

“Have you killed him?”

“I just gave him a temporary shock that made him faint.”

“I see… cough. Now, let us go back to Kii-kun.”

“We don’t need him, do we?”

“No, I would feel too bad to abandon him…”

As Mikko narrowed her eyes in sorrow, Kasshi stared at her.

She already realized that Kasshi had been sent for some mission after the Undying. Kii-kun would probably stand in his way to accomplish this. However, quarrelling here or interrogating Mikko would be a waste of time.

“Even right now the danger just keeps growing. It is fine, with me, you and Kii-kun together, I will show you to the abandoned ship, just like promised…”

“Got it.”

Just like she thought, Kasshi agreed with her easily and started running.

“You are a good person, Kasshi.”

Mikko narrowed her eyes and smiled. She spoke toward the running boy’s back.

“You moved Daisuke to where he wouldn’t get attacked by Mushi, and as for Kii-kun… you act coldly, but you’ve let your guard down around him. You also looked relieved when Rui decided to stay with his daughter.”

“…”

“If we met under different circumstances, we surely would have been good friends.”

It was her real opinion.

She knew this was nothing more than a hypothetical, fanciful story.

However, it being her fancy meant that these were her true feelings.

“Especially you and Daisuke… you definitely would have gotten along.”

“He’s dangerous. It felt almost like—I was facing against myself.”

“Including the fact that you can’t abandon someone you have opened your heart to? You had no intention to abandon even Kii-kun, right?”

“…Sorry, but I don’t feel like I’ll get along with you either.”

“Daisuke also said something similar… cough.”

As they exited the back alley and came out to the main road, the boy with his face covered in tears was waiting for them.

“What’s up with you! I thought you went and abandoned me! —Hey, where’s Daisuke?”

“He apparently recalled some urgent errand. He said to let him act on his own and left.”

Mikko gave a lie explanation to the crying topknot boy.

Since Kii-kun was so honest he seemed to easily believe it. He made an expression that was a mix of worry and anxiety.

“Oh… but he’d be fine on his own. And we have Kasshi with us.”

“So you’re not going to even try protecting yourself.”

“Ah! I found a car that’s still working!”

Wiping his tears, Kii-kun showed Mikko and Kasshi to the road.

“Don’t have the key, though.”

It was a small van. It was abandoned, park on the alleyway.

“Cough… we obviously wouldn’t have the key. How typical of your half-hearted usefulness—err, I am not praising you, so could you please not smile?”

“It’s just the right kind of old model. No problem.”

Kasshi acted quickly and with no hesitation. He stuck a metallic rod through the window, unlocked the door, dove under the wheel and started fiddling with something there.

It took less than a minute to get the engine started.

“Get on.”

Following Kasshi’s orders as he took the driver’s seat, Mikko took the seat next to him and Kii-kun sat behind.

The van instantly moved. While skillfully avoiding overturned vehicles, debris of destroyed structures and collapsed people, they thrust through the main road.

“How can you start it without a key and drive it so normally… no, I definitely shouldn’t ask this.”

“Everyone has their own secrets. It is rude to ask him that, considering his infamous criminal record… cough.”

“I have no criminal record, nor am I infamous.”

As they approached the center of Akamaki City, the number of Imperfect Mushi increased.

“Uwah!”

Kii-kun raised a scream. A Mushi flew from the side and blocked their path.

Kasshi dexterously operated the gears and turned the wheel. Avoiding the Mushi’s attack a moment before it hit, he ran through the empty sideway and avoided danger.

“…Looks like going through the main road’s difficult. We’d better avoid it.”

“So horrible… is this actually possible…?”

As they reached the center of Akamaki City, there were more and more fleeing people and victims. All buildings, roads, and vehicles they could see were destroyed beyond recognition, and wounded people ran while screaming.

The van turned at a crossroads and looked for another road.

“Mikko… what did your father do…”

Kii-kun said. Mikko coughed.

“Until my mother passed away… he was a kind man. He was a respected doctor and a psychologist.”

Mikko could recall two forms of her father.

Her kind dad—as well as her dad possessed by his research, withered and thin, like a completely different person.

“He lost someone that had no replacement in the world and was trying to regain her… or perhaps he has sacrificed his reason and morals to never lose anything again. Surely even Rui—no, all people drawn in by my father’s research like moths into the flame were perhaps all the same…”

As her father completely changed, he also changed his ways to deal with Mikko, his biological daughter.

He used her like she was some stranger and made her take care of the test subjects. She could clearly remember their faces as they suffered and muttered curses of resentment.

As she recalled this—she felt her fever getting worse.

“If you ask me, he was neither patron nor researcher. He believed that clinging to hope and wishing for something amplified the power of vitality, and when he thrust these test subjects into despair again and again—he was just like a demon of hell. A demon who kicked down the stones piled on by the dead, tormented them and enjoyed their suffering to forget his own pain…”

“But there was a result.”

“It was a failure. Just a coincidence. Something completely unrelated was born.”

Mikko actually told him this, but her father scolded her violently. He actually said that she was the crazy one and even had her go through counseling.

So she reached her limits and ran away.

However—since it became like this, she couldn’t ignore it.

“Since the situation is like this, I believe we should nip the research in the bud. Although I was just a caretaker, I am one of those responsible for this… cough.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Burn it all down… the materials on the ship, samples, records—if anything came out after I left, then that as well.”

“If something happened… is there a possibility of the research about the Undying having been completed?”

The one to ask this was Kii-kun. Mikko and Kasshi looked at him through the mirror.

“No way… I believe the chances for that are low.”

“…Oh.”

“I can’t really think of how wishing for something connects to the Undying. If it really exists, how should we call it?”

Perhaps having thought of something, Kasshi mumbled as if speaking to himself.

Mikko narrowed her eyes.

She knew what to call it.

“That is… called a dream.”

Kasshi and Kii-kun raised their brows.

“A dream?”

“Do you not have one? Wishing to become something…”

The two boys were silent.

After a while, Kii-kun opened his mouth.

“I don’t really get all that, I guess… I’m just giving it my all to think how to end this without dying.”

“I also don’t have one—or so it should’ve been, but now… I don’t know.”

Kasshi spoke vaguely.

What was going to happen to these two boys ahead—

Mikko knew about their conclusion.

Although she supposedly forgot, upon meeting Daisuke, she recalled it while continuing this journey.

Due to a certain reason, she had “seen” it.

However, she still had to head over there.

Because it was a kind of—contract.

Mikko smiled, narrowing her almond eyes.

“Kasshi, Kii-kun, and Rui as well… I really like all of you.”

Suddenly being told this, the two boys reacted differently.

“Wha…! What’s that, all of a sudden… well, I don’t dislike you either, or rather, err…”

“I don’t think anything in particular.”

As they got away from the city center, the less people there were, there were also less Mushi.

Running as far as their gasoline allowed, the van Mikko rode on exited to the suburbs. When there were no more houses, they could also see no Mushi.

Finally they arrived to a plain made of exposed, discolored ground.

Kii-kun looked outside the window and groaned.

“This is…”

As far as the eye could see there were only mountains of discarded things around. At the horizon, where large machines such as trucks or cranes were thrown away, a gentle sea could be seen.

“A research facility…?”

If the Mushi-infested city was hell, then this was—

The end of hell.

The sky that retrieved its silence was being covered by even thicker clouds.

“Yes, in this landfill… it’s further inside.”

Following Mikko’s directions, the van with the trio crossed through the landfill.

Soon seeing what appeared, Kasshi muttered.

“Rather than a research facility, this is—”

Left on the landfill facing the sea, it was dirtied black and rusted by the salty wind.

It was probably imposing in the past as it travelled the world’s seas.

This huge body would have probably instilled awe in whoever saw it before.

However, the thing towering in front of them right now was nothing more than a lump of steel filled with loneliness and vanity.

“A ghost ship.”

A large, abandoned vessel.

This was Mikko’s group’s “finish line”.

3.03 Daisuke Part 8

—If I could return to the past—I would have probably killed all of you the moment we met …

Next to the dying Kii-kun, Mikko prophesized this.

Those were events about to happen.

Mikko said that Daisuke was there to see them unfold.

—If you are unable to reach the finish line—what would happen to you, I wonder?

The girl smiling with narrowed almond eyes.

Since this was an unforeseeable “reunion” he’d been unable to connect her to the person he knew, but—

Daisuke knew her.

He finally arrived at her identity.

“—Please wake up.”

He felt a numbness pass through his mind.

Although he recalled Mikko’s identity, he couldn’t easily believe in it.

“You must head toward the ‘finish line’…”

His head was numbed again.

A familiar voice shook the confused Daisuke.

“Kakkou-san—”

Blaze Class Rank 1, Kakkou.

This designation would not allow him to keep on sleeping.

It didn’t allow him to avert his eyes, no matter how strong his enemy and no matter what scary thing he had to face.

“—!”

Retrieving his consciousness, Daisuke leapt up.

Readying his body and being wary of the environment, there was no one in the dirty alley. He couldn’t see Kasshi and Mikko who knocked him out.

“Shit… how long have I been sleeping?”

While he lost his consciousness, he had the feeling as if someone was whispering at his ears—but apparently that was just his imagination. The only one there was Daisuke.

“Mikko… is she really that woman? If so—”

He rushed through the narrow alley.

The sun sank and the curtain of night fell on the city. There was no doubt he lost quite a lot of time.

As he leapt toward the main road, shouts of people running away from Imperfect Mushi echoed around.

Never mind Mikko and Kasshi, but he couldn’t see even Kii-kun anywhere. They probably found a car long ago and headed to the ship.

“I’ve made an outrageous misunderstanding…!”

Not only did he misunderstand it, he was put into a fatal situation from the very beginning.

“Mikko—what’s up with that woman? Does she understand the situation? If so, she might die as well…! No, but unlike me—”

Daisuke held his head, his thoughts running all over the place.

His breath quickened and his heartbeats hastened. Excessive anxiety made cold sweat erupt from his whole body.

“Calm down… I need to organize everything I understand. What is this situation?”

He spoke to himself.

“Right now… I’m in the enemy’s trap. And completely, at that. That’s also probably why I can’t use my Mushi power. But I don’t know who the enemy is… and what ability is it.”

Daisuke wasn’t the type for difficult reasoning and calculations in the first place. Even so, he desperately gathered the clues he’d been given.

“What can I do in this situation…?”

As he became convinced again, the despair of it all crushed Daisuke.

This sight of abnormal Mushi unleashed in town, with people’s death throes flying about—

This was no mere nightmare.

“I really fell for it, hook, line and sinker… what does the perpetrator want for me to do…?”

Mikko looked as though she knew the answers to his questions.

—It means that the one who did this wants you to reach the ‘finish line’. That is their goal.

Was it really just that?

It wasn’t just reaching it.

What if…

Even if it was stupid thinking this, if he believed the lone hope in his heart…

“Do they want me to stop Mikko’s prophecy…?”

To put a stop to Kii-kun and Kasshi’s death and Mikko’s prophecy of destruction.

Did this mean that was the mission given to him?

However, even if that was true—Daisuke didn’t know where the ship was.

“What’s going to happen if I can’t reach that ship…?”

Right now he was mumbling to himself about things only he himself knew. Even if he asked anyone else, they’d never understand him.

However, he had conviction.

If Mikko’s prophecy was the truth, he had to stop it from becoming reality—

“Where’s that ship…!”

Raising his face, he started thinking of ways to look where he was heading to.

He already knew that it was useless trying to get in contact with the SEPB.

Then what about the Round Table?

No, Daisuke didn’t know Rui’s number, and he had no connection to other members. He didn’t have the time to look for ways to get in contact with Rui right now.

This is bad, I’ve got no allies—

The Round Table held an immense power and authority.

The facility researching the secrets of the Undying was a secret among secrets, so there wasn’t any way he’d know someone who so conveniently knew about its location—

“—”

Daisuke’s breath caught.

There was someone.

No, more precisely—there might be.

He was shocked at himself thinking about that person.

He only knew one person who was so ridiculous as to know all the convenient things and then conveniently and calmly make them happen.

“Please…! Answer!”

He took out the cellphone that Rui never took back from him and pushed in a certain number.

As he desperately listened to the ringing sounds, after a few dozen seconds…

“—Hello?”

He got an answer.

He actually got it.

He unconsciously held the cellphone harder and couldn’t speak.

“Hello?”

The other party said again, puzzled. The voice still sounded young. About the same age as Daisuke.

“Please don’t hang up!”

He suddenly spoke loudly.

He couldn’t think of any way to explain the situation to the other party and make himself understood.

“You probably don’t know about me! But I know you! Even your name and other things—oh, no, since it’s you, you’d just say something like ‘all that is perfectly possible with a bit of investigation’. …Don’t hang up!”

“…”

“I don’t know where you’re living now or what’s your way of life. You’re probably in high school at Ouka City. You’re hiding your awful personality and doing well on the surface. That’s for sure. Because you’re the most twisted person in the world! Don’t hang up, alright!”

He just started badmouthing him. But he didn’t want to get hanged up.

“…”

“But you should know! You said you knew nothing, but that had to be a lie! You love lying! You definitely know! Even feigning to be a mere high schooler, you’d notice any small abnormality, and investigate it in secret. You’re that kind of guy. Then you should have also noticed what they’re doing! And investigated it!”

Even he couldn’t understand what he was saying.

However, the other party definitely listened to him.

“Investigated about the Round Table—and the research about the Undying!”

“…”

Daisuke didn’t know a way to accurately explain the current situation.

If he explained the particulars in detail, it might actually cause the other party to hold doubts. That was who he was.

“Please tell me! Where’s that abandoned ship that they’re using as a research facility or whatever? I have to get there as quickly as possible!”

“—eve—”

“’Even if I knew, what would I gain from telling you that?’ is out of the question! If you don’t tell me—you’ll regret it your entire life.”

“…”

There was no way he wouldn’t get affected by Mikko’s prophesized destruction. It would bring harm not just to the person himself, but to his family as well.

“This is no time for your lies, nastiness, cynicism, jokes in bad taste or badmouthing you’re so good at! If you know, then hurry up and—”

“Northeast to Akamaki City, there’s a landfill in the suburbs.”

A simple sentence.

That calm voice gave the answer Daisuke was looking for without a shred of hesitation or doubt.

So he really did know about it.

Rather than happiness about obtaining this answer—he instead felt nostalgia and bitterness.

“…”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“—What are you doing…”

A hoarse voice leaked from his mouth.

“Allow me a prophecy—”

Preluding with this, he shouted toward the cellphone.

“While pretending to be smart, you’re going to collapse at the most important junction! And even when things are really… and I mean really important, you still haven’t woken up! You always spoke as if you knew anything, and you told me you’d end everything with that… and yet you just went and gone to sleep without waking up!”

“…”

“You’re… a liar…”

As Daisuke crouched and wrung out his voice like this, the other party probably couldn’t understand the meaning of his words.

Silence continued.

Just when he thought he got hanged up, the other party suddenly spoke.

“Allow me a prophecy.”

Preluding this, the other party spoke calmly in a jesting tone.

“Your prophecy will not come true.”

“…”

“Me not waking up when it’s important… how pleasant, just imagining it.”

“…”

“Even you, who for some reason seems to know more about me than I—was deceived by me.”

Daisuke gulped. His body froze as though paralyzed.

“Wha…! What do you—”

He could hear the phone being hanged up.

He wanted to call right back, but stopped.

He knew where the ship was.

He needed to find a vehicle as soon as possible and head there—

If he called again, he’d definitely be told that.

And if he was ordered so—he would just make it come true.

“…”

Daisuke raised his face, running through the city swirling with destruction and screams.

3.04 The Others

The starting rain pounded hard on the car window.

Rui watched the streams of water running down the glass surface expressionlessly. He caressed the small girl sleeping peacefully on his lap.

“What should we do now, master?”

The old gentleman in the driver’s seat asked through the mirror.

“…”

Rui’s heart was filled with a sense of loss.

The gunfire he could hear from outside the car and the death throes of his private forces echoed inside his empty self.

“—I don’t care. Everything ends now.”

When his Round Table comrades brought the story about the research of the Undying, he couldn’t easily believe it.

Although he cooperated, he intended on keeping his distance from those guys.

However, that was just deceiving them.

“What if”—

Perhaps the one who thought this and looked with burning eyes from afar was himself, more than anyone else.

This emptiness served as proof.

The reality where Mushi destroyed the city.

It reaffirmed his sins and meant the failure of the research.

“No, it already ended long ago. When I lost her, my world lost all meaning.”

There was only one woman he truly loved.

Rui offered everything he had to her, and she also accepted it all.

In this world, filled with so much hatred and betrayal, she taught him the meaning of infinity. If she hadn’t given her selfless love, Rui would have probably turned into a monster that controlled others through money and authority.

They obviously exchanged the vows of marriage, and had a child.

And—his most loved person suddenly left the world he inhabited on a journey.

“I couldn’t accept that it ended… and ran into a dream. To the stupid nightmare of the Undying.”

Rui looked at the sleeping face of his daughter.

He wished for the Undying for this girl’s sake.

Since he didn’t want to lose a loved person again, he tried making his daughter Undying. If he could release her from the cruel fate of death, his daughter would be happy—

Him believing so from the bottom of his heart probably meant he lost his sanity.

Reality would become a living hell that allowed no death.

That fate—was nothing more than a curse.

“The moment I lost her, I really thought I’d been cursed… but I was wrong. The one casting curses was myself—”

In order to forget the unbearable sadness and emptiness, he was trying to use his own daughter.

Such a person was even scarier than Mushi, and was nothing more than a walking disaster.

If he really intended on stopping the research about Undying, he should have done it long ago.

But since he didn’t, he prophesized.

“My curse will change this country—no, this world.”

The monster called Mushi would destroy people.

The form of that future that only had despair rose to his eyes.

“Let’s get out of the country. Call a car.”

So he was going to run away.

“So at least this child doesn’t get cursed… let’s run far away.”

“…There are many people who need your powers, master. If you were to abandon the country, you really wouldn’t be able to solve anything.”

“I don’t care…”

It was how he really felt.

Actually, he thought so from the very moment he lost his beloved.

Once he lost his partner in life, everything he’d offered up to her was lost as well.

“A world without her is worthless—”

It happened when Rui mumbled this.

His daughter suddenly rose.

Large eyes that didn’t look as if she just woke stared at her father Rui’s face.

“…You can go back to sleep. When you next open your eyes, it will be in a world without monsters—”

Slap.

A dry sound and a slight pain stopped Rui’s words.

His still-young daughter used both small arms to strike his cheeks from both sides.

With an angry face, his daughter stared at him.

“…”

Rui froze, startled.

His daughter’s knees folded. Leaning on his chest, she began sleeping comfortably again.

“No way. Have I just been—scolded?”

Heat began to gather on his cheeks.

This slight pain brought to mind his past vividly.

When he tried running away of carrying the burden of his lineage and wealth, there was a woman who scolded him the same way.

The person who told him that he wasn’t alone and tried living with him.

“Haha, ha… getting scolded by my own toddler, what kind of a parent am I?”

How could he have forgotten?

Being dyed by sadness made him forget all the fun times as if they were a distant past.

“What a stupid dad I am… haha.”

She was alive.

He lost the woman he loved, but his connection with her was sleeping on his lap.

Although she lost her flesh, if the shape of love created with the one he vowed an eternity with still remained—

That eternity still continued.

Perhaps Rui hadn’t lost everything yet—

“—Go to the ship.”

His short order was followed by the old man. He turned the car.

“I already obtained the Undying…”

Even if the life of his loved one was lost, the life she’d left him was in his arms.

That connection remained unsevered.

If that wasn’t Undying, what even was?

“All that remains is cutting off the curse.”

He might already be late.

However, he was going to use his power to cut off at least one of the origins of disaster.

All for the sake of his beloved, still-living daughter.

“I wish this daughter of mine wouldn’t wake into a nightmare…”

So she could live in a peaceful world that had no Mushi.

So he could welcome a son that had one or two bad habits.

Rui headed toward the place that was the beginning and the end.

3.05 The Others

As Mikko and the rest stepped aboard, violent sparks greeted them.

“Wah!”

Acting exaggeratedly surprised, Kii-kun leapt back.

While cautious of the surroundings, Kasshi spoke in a low voice.

“Apparently Rui was right and something did happen.”

The corridor connected to the inside the boat was horribly destroyed.

The rusted walls had holes in them, and the lighting on the ceiling were cracked and blinking. Torn electric cables short-circuited, scattering bluish-white sparks.

“These are not marks of explosive devices or guns. It looks as though it was made by a burner, but…”

Kasshi spoke while touching the holes on the walls with his fingers.

Mikko led the two boys, going to the end of the corridor.

“Perhaps the ‘result’ had been released, or the test subjects on the ship birthed a new Mushi… no matter the case, we need to be careful.”

The inside of the boat regained its calm, and there were no people around. Originally there were strict guarding measures through a network of surveillance cameras, so it was weird for no one to show up once Mikko’s group infiltrated.

The three people had their faces lit by the blinking lights and sparks while walking through the corridor.

“I-I saw this in a movie… it’s like wandering into a ghost ship.”

“Since we can hit them, Mushi are better opponents than ghosts. We’re lucky.”

“Cough… on the other side of that door is the original research facility.”

Mikko pointed ahead.

“Or rather, what used to be the door.”

Kasshi pointed out. The corridor dirtied with rust and dust was blocked by a thick metal board. The handle part was gouged out and the door remained as crumpled ruins.

“W-what did they do to break it like this… Kasshi, lend me a hand.”

Even the door that originally required one to undergo a checkup by a guard was now meaningless. The two boys together pushed the metal aside and stepped inside.

“Uh… w-what is this…!”

Kii-kun paled.

Completely unlike its disguise as a scrapped vessel, it was a clean corridor with furnishing and ornamental plants—supposedly. At the very least, it was like that until the day Mikko escaped.

At present both ceiling and floor were indiscriminately gouged by giant claw marks. There were also people wearing white coats and camo suits collapsed on top of a burnt carpet.

As far as they could see, there were more than ten people lying there.

“No one seems to be breathing. They’re unlike the living corpses we found at Castello.”

“Ugh…”

Kasshi frowned and Kii-kun leaned against the wall, pale.

The smell of burning flesh caused Mikko to cough.

“Almost this entire floor is the researchers’ lodging area… looking at this, it seems that this floor completely lost its functionality.”

“And where was the actual research conducted?”

“A few floors down from here. Originally it was a remodeled warehouse, apparently…”

Mikko looked ahead into the corridor. There were huge holes from floor to ceiling.

“We can’t use the elevator that was there. We will have to walk a bit, but let’s use the emergency staircase.”

“You two… you really are calm in this sort of situation…”

Kii-kun said in a groan. Perhaps due to fatigue and nausea, he had dark circles under his eyes.

“I must find out what happened to the test subjects and the ‘result’. —If it’s too hard for you keep up with us, Kii-kun, you should leave the ship.”

“No, I’ll go. I will go.”

She thought he’d say that.

No—she knew that Kii-kun would say that.

Mikko had seen “that moment”.

Since Kii-kun was there, it was impossible for him to drop out in the middle.

“I see… understood. Let us go, then.”

Mikko coughed and then advanced in the corridor.

Inside the ship wrapped in silence, there were many corpses lying in heaps.

With a sense of tension as sharp as a knife, they kept going along the corridor, took a corner and finally reached the emergency stairs.

“Cough… we should be able to reach the lower research rooms from here.”

“Eh? W-wait a minute!”

Kii-kun looked around him, going around the corridor, flustered.

“Kasshi’s gone!”

“…”

Mikko silently narrowed her eyes.

This was also something she knew.

Although the boy vanished here, they’d meet again later—

“Kasshi! This can’t be, hey! Where are you!”

“—Let’s go, Kii-kun. He should be fine even alone.”

“Well, that’s true, but we’re… w-wait!”

Mikko finally went down the stair and Kii-kun hurried to follow her.

“Rui, Daisuke, and now Kasshi… it’s scary, we’re losing people.”

Ignoring the boy’s mutter, she went down the stairs, her steps clattering.

As Mikko and Kii-kun reached the lowest floor, a lone door stood in their way.

They opened the door and entered.

“What—the hell…”

Kii-kun was at a loss for words.

The fact that it was completely destroyed was the same as the upper floor.

As well as the many people collapsed there.

A single thing was different—

Something other than humans filled their sight.

“—This really looks like paradise.”

Hundreds, thousands of butterflies danced around the room, spreading scales.

Insects with wings, arthropods climbing the floor and the walls… the ship was being dominated by these being that could all be colloquially referred to as bugs.

And it wasn’t just insects.

Even mammals like monkeys and horses could be seen further inside.

Not remaining among their own kind, any and all living being filled this space.

It really did look like a Garden of Eden, where no one had enemies.

“What… is this… wah! There’s even a panda! Is this a zoo?!”

“It wasn’t only humans who were gathered for experiments. Looks like the cages that held them broke down and they were released… cough.”

While crushing the bugs on the floor, Mikko walked ahead.

All manners of creatures rejoiced while only humans were dead.

However, to human eyes this looked like an ideal world—

It could only be called cynical.

“—It’s about time, then.”

While insects flew around and animals walked unrestrained, Mikko turned to look back.

“For Kii-kun to disappear.”

That annoying boy had vanished at some point. She couldn’t hear him asking for help.

Following Kasshi, Kii-kun also vanished.

Only Mikko remained.

She was not surprised at this.

She knew that this would happen.

“…But even if I know it, this is sad.”

That was fine, though, as she would meet them again.

Even if that was the final chapter of destruction, she had to witness that moment.

What was about to happen now—was an unchangeable fate, after all.

“…”

Mikko turned ahead, walking through the corridor.

After turning around several corners, she stopped in front of a certain door.

She weaved through the door that was already open from inside, and stepped into the room—

“So we meet again.”

Inside the gloomy room, the eyes of the person collapsed against the wall looked at Mikko.

“Father.”

Clad in a white coat, he was a bearded man in his forties. His dangling arms had no strength in them, and the stomach of his coat was dyed in bright red.

“What have you…”

Lowering her mask, she bit her lips hard. She immediately used both hands to support her expired father’s chin and looked at his face.

Clang! A metallic pounding sound resounded inside.

The room was spacious and it had many machines installed along the walls and an operating table in the center.

However, there was something else.

Vaguely visible from further inside the darkness—were large iron bars.

Behind the bars she could see glinting eyes. Raising a wordless war cry, someone tackled the bars and shouted again.

“Your research has failed…”

Mikko did not turn to the bars.

Her father’s figure which was turning into a silent corpse looked horribly pitiful.

He’d lost his beloved, dreamed of the Undying, and it became everything to him.

“You were never looking at the Undying in the first place… after all—”

Shedding tears, Mikko smiled.

Although he was overwhelmed by his sadness, lost his sanity and devoted himself to inhuman research—

For Mikko, he was her one and only father.

“The research about the Undying belonged to me since long ago.”

A voiceless scream echoed from within the bars.

Mikko glanced there.

The figure tackling the bars again and again was scared and curled in the darkness.

At some point—

The guinea pigs started being scared when they saw Mikko’s smile.

If she wouldn’t hide her mouth with the mask, they became too scared to even approach her.

“I was not even ten years old, so I couldn’t possibly understand the research documents just from seeing them—you probably thought this…”

Mikko turned back to her father and spoke softly.

Ever since losing her mother, Mikko’s only toys were the materials thrown away haphazardly by her father.

Her father fell into research, not even looking at Mikko. Therefore, he hadn’t even noticed that she quickly overtook his knowledge and even tired of the materials she used as playthings.

“Letting the Round Table know about the research and calling them was also me… as well as having a certain auctioneer among their numbers to select test subjects…”

Mikko was ordered to take care of the guinea pigs the Round Table brought.

She felt a genuine love and took care of them. They became so close to her that rather than her unrelenting father, they were much closer to being her family.

“You starved the test subjects, dangled bait in front of their eyes to call their desires and wishes, and apparently thought of amplifying their powers of vitality—but the fact that it wasn’t so…”

The guinea pigs all spoke to Mikko about their curses and their own unending despair.

She seriously listened to their stories and encouraged them.

She shook them awake many times as they nearly died—and spoke of hope many times.

It’s fine, you’ll be saved.

You’ll definitely get what you want some day.

She whispered this to them again, and again and again.

Even if they themselves stopped wishing for it—

“As well as the fact that they overcame death many times due to the love I gave them…”

Although her father had supposedly lost his sanity long ago, to her it looked like his eyes were dyed in the color of fear.

Right, her father was afraid.

Of none other than his one and only daughter, Mikko.

“If you had never noticed these facts, you could have kept going crazy in your research—but you did notice. You have realized that you were living for a long time inside the happy dream I’ve given you…”

All to make the dream of being Undying continue forevermore.

Her father continued his research, got the Round Table as collaborators, and they were all having a pleasant dance.

Even so, the unexpected result of Mushi had been created.

Even so, her father looked back to his daughter.

“Because you noticed and tried to kill me, I had to run away… without me, you shouldn’t have been able to restrain those test subjects that went past the frame of human beings.”

Thinking about it, her father ending up like this was perhaps the natural result.

Mikko thought of at least ending everything, took the promising test subjects with her and escaped.

However, her father probably couldn’t give up. He turned the Round Table assassins on her.

Although this was Mikko’s research, he tried to get the test subjects back and continue research without Mikko.

And so—it ended up as the expected failure.

“However, father, you can be assured. No matter how weak, stupid, and obsessed with a misguided dream you are, even if you are beyond salvation—“

Mikko narrowed her eyes and raised the corners of her mouth.

“I will still love you.”

She smiled kindly.

Her father’s body shook. Perhaps this was a postmortem spasm, or else he touched one of the exposed cables.

Wearing a smile that could even scare the dead, she turned around.

“You are also… glad at my return.”

Inside the iron bars, the figure with shackles screamed.

Fear and anger and hatred—these eyes that held all emotions glared at Mikko.

That figure was clad in an unfitting cloak.

“You had supposedly been caught mere hours ago, and yet you’re here… does this contradiction mean that fate is regaining its original form?”

Mikko stood up. She put her mask back on her mouth.

“Among the many test subjects, only three had promising prospects… and only one reached a ‘result’… I have thought that this research was failure.”

Three test subjects and one ‘result’.

With things being like this, continuing the research was impossible.

Or so she thought.

“But—”

Mikko’s mumble was drowned by a sudden roar.

A massive tremor shook the ship.

Even this impact that sounded as if something on the ship exploded didn’t shake Mikko’s legs.

“Looks like it started.”

Her father and the cloaked man behind the bars.

She told her farewell to them with her gaze.

“Have a good day, you two. —Since ‘back then’ I have set everything on fire, I was unable to witness that moment… but I will probably be able to see it from outside now.”

Leaving behind mumbles only she understood, Mikko left the gloomy room.

Due to the tremor just now, the animals in the corridor were panicking.

Without her smile crumbling, Mikko calmly went through the corridor, going up the emergency stairs—retiring from the ship.

Outside the ship there was a fierce rain.

She could black clouds filling the sky and lines of lights running through them.

And these lights were gathering—

They became a thick pillar that pierced the ship along with a roar.

“Is that lightning…? No, this is—”

Mikko mumbled, her eyes narrowed.

The light pillar swung down to the surface like a gigantic hammer, engulfed the ship and instantly smashed the upper floors.

“I should call it fate.”

The ship’s upper floors broke down, melted, blew to pieces, and a while after that—

It was as though the lightning striking down from the heavens was played on reverse.

From the bottom layer of the ship, a vortex of light and destruction thrust toward the sky.

3.06 The Others

After confirming that Mikko and Kii-kun aimed for the emergency stairs, Kashua went alone.

To not get noticed by the pair, he silenced his footsteps and ran back along the corridor.

“Mikko said she was going to burn down this place. I should secure some documents before that…”

Returning to the hall where the elevator was, he peeked inside.

Inside the hall that connected to the depths of hell he saw the electrical cables spreading sparks. He couldn’t see the elevator vehicle itself anywhere, and the panel was completely silent and unfunctional.

“So this is my only way to get there before her.”

In order to gather evidence for what was done here and what happened—

To fulfill his own mission, Kashua leapt into the hole. He went on maintenance ladders that were broken, grabbed wires, and landed on the steel frames below. At times, the sparks served as light sources.

As he lightly climbed down as though he was a pinball, he finally saw the bottom.

There was a door leaking light.

Landing there, Kashua forced the door open.

“…Like some paradise.”

The destroyed corridor was monopolized by insects and animals.

Several people in white coats were collapsed, but seeing all these lively animals walking around made him feel an inhuman elegance.

“Not only humans were experimented on, then.”

Kashua pushed these animals aside and picked up his pace.

He had no time until Mikko and Kii-kun came. He had to find the data that served as the basis of the research fast and get out.

“Undying… I never thought the Round Table’s secret would be something like that.”

He mumbled to himself.

The influence wielded by the Round Table through their wealth and connections wasn’t limited to this country. As his home country had anticipated some unnerving movements, they’d sent Kashua there.

“Anyway, once I bring back this truth, my job will be over…”

He would end his job—and then what?

That question rose to mind.

Kashua hadn’t felt this doubt before. Fulfilling his missions was the very reason he existed, and succeeding in this was the only way to prove he was born for a meaning.

However, a single sentence said by a man changed Kashua.

—Do you want to become my adopted son?

He was asked whether he wanted to have a father removed from him in age only by three or four years, as well as a little sister more than ten years his junior.

Even Kashua, who never had a family, knew this was abnormal. He couldn’t rely on a rich man’s caprices.

“…”

Although it was impossible—he felt his heart growing slightly warmer just from thinking about it.

A feeling he felt for the first time ever. It wasn’t as bad as he thought.

Therefore, this was enough.

He didn’t feel like going along with the caprices of that overly friendly man—and Kashua didn’t want to involve the man who told him he wanted to be his family and his daughter into this.

“I’ll just hurry up to end this job and then go back—”

To his country.

He was about to mutter this, but no words came out.

Go back?

To a country where no one knew Kashua’s face, where he had no family or acquaintances, and his own existence was concealed?

Could he really call that coming back?

—Won’t you remain, too?

Rui’s words crossed his mind again.

If he were to accept that youth’s words.

Perhaps Kashua could actually obtain a place he could return to—

“…!”

Feeling a discomfort, Kashua stood in place. He strained his ears.

Animal growls and insects buzzing.

In this corridor filled with those noises, Kashua noticed the existence of an abnormal space.

“There’s… no sound.”

Kashua turned the corner and started walking again.

Only one corridor was silent. There were no insects of animals there, as if they purposely avoided it.

Going through the soundless corridor, he opened the door at its dead end.

There was a room with thick bars there.

Fluorescent lights flickered, showing him all sorts of precision equipment and an operating table. And further behind them was what looked to be a jail made of thick metal bars.

“—Who are you?”

There was someone in that jail.

Since the lights didn’t reach them, he couldn’t see their face. However, the person inside had their chest heaving. This was the first survivor he’d met ever since entering the ship.

The person behind bars was silent.

If they were alive and jailed inside, there wasn’t any need to hurry up to deal with them. Kashua looked for any papers around the room, operated the digital terminals and dug out information.

It didn’t take him long for a brief look of the documents and digital data.

The one in the jail was apparently one of the promising subjects. Part of the research conducted in the name of actualizing the Undying was left in front of his eyes.

“—ack…”

A weak voice came from behind.

As he turned around, he saw the person inside the jail moving their mouth.

“What was that?”

“Want to go… back—”

This wasn’t Japanese. It was Kashua’s mother tongue.

Going back.

They said this, their expression lacking any emotions, and their voice so weak that it was impossible to tell whether they were male or female.

“—I’m envious of you having a place to go back to.”

Kashua’s mouth mumbled words even he didn’t think about.

“I want to go back…”

The jailed person shed tears.

As if this was the final drop of their life, these tears went down their cheeks.

Seeing that.

An impulse Kashua had never felt before welled up inside him.

“I didn’t have a place I could yearn for before my death.”

Perhaps it was his competitiveness.

Even this exhausted person had a place they held in their heart.

This truth made Kashua suffer unbearable pain.

“Until now, anyway. But that’s no longer the case.”

Throwing the materials on top of the operating table, he pulled out a lighter from his pocket.

If he took this much back with him, and took even the test subject, his mother country would probably praise him.

However, that was all.

His country would most likely use these materials to continue research about the Undying.

He knew well that it would just create new problems down the line.

“Even I want to die while thinking of somewhere I want to go back to.”

Rui, if you want to play pretend family—

He spoke in his heart toward the youth who wasn’t there.

The mission he received from other people who was longer important to him.

Maybe I’ll play along a little—

Because Kashua had seen her.

He’d seen Rui’s still-young daughter.

The girl who might become his sister.

So he’d do it to protect her future.

Rather than for his mission, Kashua would work for his pretend family—

“If I were to take this back—I get the feeling that I can’t wish for a family anymore.”

Kashua lit his lighter to burn the gathered materials.

Since he not only escaped but actively hindered his mission, his country would never forgive him.

Since he committed this taboo, he had no intention of involving Rui in this.

But that was fine.

He didn’t have to have a family.

Rather than that, Kashua chose to think of a family.

“Die with me.”

With a refreshed feeling, he turned to the one in jail.

Apparently even someone like Rui, who knew neither his parents’ faces nor any family, still had a rebellious phase. Since he burned all the documents, he also had no choice but to stop his country from getting their hands on the test subject, the only living proof of the experiments.

It happened when Kashua approached the bars.

A heavy impact shook the vessel.

“…! An explosion? No, this is—”

He preserved his balance by grabbing the operating table.

A few harsh tremors shook his legs.

And immediately after that—

Light engulfed his sight.

“——!”

An outrageous impact pierced the ship as if it was struck by a gigantic hammer. The room’s precision equipment raised sparks and exploded from the inside.

“Gwaaah!”

His sight was dyed in gold.

Was this—lightning?

Everything around him broke, burned and exploded.

And—

“—aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”

A scream that sounded out of this world pierced Kashua’s eardrums.

As he raised his head within his vanishing consciousness, the one inside the jail shouted something.

Grabbing onto the rails, reaching as if to ask Kashua for help, that person—

Had no face.

There were just eyes shedding tears.

However, their chin, nose and even head were wrapped in a blue glow—and vanished into thin air, melting like bubbles.

“—”

Kashua was speechless, glaring at the jailed person transformed into this strange form. Their outstretched arm was also wrapped in an azure glow and lost its outline.

Even without an expression, he knew from those eyes.

Despite this abnormal situation—

This person was still going crazy with homesickness.

Wishing from the bottom of their heart to go back to their hometown.

“I see—you don’t belong here.”

Being stared by azure glowing eyes, Kashua’s mouth moved on its own.

“I also have it. A place to return to—”

It wasn’t a hometown.

However, he could say it confidently.

He came to this land for his mission and managed to obtain something he wished for from the bottom of his heart.

“I got a family—”

As Kashua prophesized this, a flash of a vivid sight passed through his mind.

Rui and his young daughter.

Kashua would gain a younger sister and watch over her growth.

She would grow up quickly, her hair would grow out, she would smile energetically—

Her body covered in a silver glow, she would take a shining spear in hand—

“…!”

It was just a momentary illusion.

As Kashua saw his sister’s future, his entire body was enveloped in a white light.

As if that glow was extracting something from him, it was being sucked toward the one in the prison.

“GWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

Something was pulled from his heart.

He was eaten by the prisoner.

Although they no longer had any mouth, the light stolen from Kashua was being absorbed by the prisoner, who, for the first time—

Narrowed their eyes at this momentary tranquility.

Leaving a blue glow behind, they fully vanished.

3.07 The Others

“This really looks like paradise—”

Mikko described the room like that and he timidly stepped ahead.

“…?”

Kii-kun suddenly noticed his shoulder being grabbed.

However, even when he turned around there was no one there.

“T-there’s no way it’s an actual ghost…”

His body shaking, he wanted to keep going after Mikko—

But someone called his name.

“—”

It wasn’t that he heard a voice.

However, it called him.

He was convinced of this somewhere in his heart.

“—”

Wordlessly, Kii-kun turned his back to Mikko and walked.

His fear was starting to vanish. Although he had no goal, he walked through the corridor full of animals as if pulled there.

Doing that, he arrived at a huge hole in the dead end of the corridor.

It looked as if it was gouged with a high-power burner, but he couldn’t see the part cut off—the remains of what was likely a door.

Passing through the hole, he found a gloomy room occupied by butterflies.

In the center of the wide room was a dirty operating table. Near the walls were many machines he’d never seen before, but some were destroyed, and butterflies were escaping through the hole in the wall.

Further into the room was a table laden with rotten food, covered by tattered dresses and coats. He realized at a glance that all of it used to be originally expensive.

And even further into the room—was a jail cell made of iron bars.

“—”

Kii-kun approached the bars and looked down a black figure crouching inside.

He barely realized this was a woman. However, her long hair was dry and parched and her body was no more than skin and bones. At a glance, he might have mistaken it with a corpse.

The woman in the jail turned to Kii-kun.

Pierced by her goggling eyes, he came back to his sense.

“—Y-you…! From back then…!”

There was no mistake.

This was the dark woman that made Kii-kun’s two friends collapse.

As he noticed this, he started.

“W-where am I? —Mikko! Kasshi!”

When had he come to this place?

Also, just like Kasshi, Mikko also vanished.

The dark woman screamed.

“Eeek!”

As he was startled and leapt back, the dark woman reached with her hand from between the bars.

She was apparently trying to get the rotten food. However, she was unable to reach it and cut through air again and again.

“Hey, you… what did you do to them! What have you done to me!”

He tried his best to act brave and shouted.

However, the dark woman didn’t lend him her ears. Once she realized she couldn’t reach the food, she reached toward air and managed catching a butterfly.

“Eh, h-hey, no way—”

Kii-kun’s bad feeling was right on the mark.

The woman spun around and crouched. Then she carried the captured butterfly to her mouth—

“Ugh…!”

And ate it.

He couldn’t see it because her back was turned to him, but just imagining it made him want to hurl.

How starved was she—

He couldn’t think of this woman who was so starved she lost all rational thought as human.

“Am I… dreaming?”

He knew it was useless asking the dark woman anything.

She was already crazy and couldn’t answer any of Kii-kun’s questions.

She couldn’t explain what was happening to his body.

“This has to be a bad dream… even this arm—”

Kii-kun’s left arm crumbled down.

Just like the illusion he saw while running in the city.

Just like the nightmare he saw in the expensive hotel.

There wasn’t even blood; it just crumbled like earth from the elbow down.

Kii-kun’s bloodshot eyes looked around the gloomy room.

“—The Undying.”

He searched around the ruined room with his remaining arm.

“Undying… Undying… is it somewhere here? Mikko said something like that.”

At this rate, his entire body would vanish and he’d die.

In order to awaken from this bad dream, he needed a proof he’d definitely never die.

“Undying! Where’s the Undying!”

A weakling like him went on this scary journey for a goal.

That was the power of Undying.

Since something was happening to him, if he didn’t manage to get it, he’d die—

That fear led Kii-kun to this scrapped ship.

“Where is it! How can I be saved…!”

Wailing, he looked for clues anywhere and everywhere.

However, all he could find were papers with incomprehensible numbers and records. He couldn’t find even a single way to save himself.

One of his legs folded.

As he lowered his gaze, he saw that his right leg crumbled down.

“—Save me.”

He mumbled.

He couldn’t find the Undying anywhere. Staying here was meaningless.

“Save me, pleeease! Mikkooo! Kasshi! …Rui!”

Screaming pathetically, he headed toward the entrance to the room, almost crawling.

“Waaah! No! I don’t wanna die—”

Since he was missing an arm and a leg, he couldn’t proceed well.

Even so he desperately headed to the hole connecting the room and the corridor, but someone in front of him blocked the way.

“…Eeek!”

Flinching, Kii-kun rolled around the center of the room.

Appearing from the other side of the hole was a person clad in white clothes.

He knew immediately this wasn’t Mikko or Kasshi. The man’s hospital robe was torn here and there, and he hanged his head as if to throw his scraggly hair.

A ghost.

So it looked to Kii-kun’s eyes. It really was suitable for this ghost ship.

And the next moment, that impression—turned to conviction.

“—”

He couldn’t even scream from fear.

A creepy object was floating next to that person.

It was an Eye.

It had a round shell that looked as hard as rock, it had eyelids, and was enveloping something that looked like a human eyeball. Around the size of a basketball, it floated in air while ignoring gravity.

At first he thought this was a Mushi.

Those monsters that only had part of their bodies.

However, the Eye floating in front of him did not attack the person in hospital robe. Not only that but it was even glaring straight at Kii-kun as if to do it instead of the man clad in white.

“Ah…ah—”

Kii-kun’s tear-stained face was enveloped in a pale blue glow.

The hot wind and roar that rushed at him a moment later were like a disaster incarnate.

A large, round hole opened up in the wall right next to Kii-kun. A hot gale blew through there, stabbing through the electronic equipment and the butterflies.

“…!”

The roar and vibration shook the entire ship.

Kii-kun couldn’t move a single muscle.

If his eyes were working alright, it looked as though the Eye emitted something like a pallid heat ray and shot through the nearby wall—

The jailed woman screamed again. She reached with her hands toward the butterflies that were now escaping through the new hole in the ceiling. Apparently the fact that her food was escaping was much more important than what happened right in front of her.

Kii-kun had a hunch.

This guy’s the one who broke the ship—

The destruction strewn everywhere inside the ship was this Eye’s work.

And he was the first “result” of the research that Mikko mentioned—

The sole case of the host still living after birthing a Mushi—

“S-save me—”

While his body was crumbling down, he was facing a cruel Mushi.

In this situation that had nothing but despair, Kii-kun wished for only one thing.

I don’t wanna die—

He tried crawling away, but the man remained blocking the corridor. Naturally, as he slithered to the other side, he just reached the bars.

A moment later, the thin arms extending from behind held him.

“—!”

The dark woman raised a scream. Hugging him from behind through the bars with both arms, she raised a shriek of pain.

He was about to get eaten.

So he thought.

“UWAAAAAAAAAAH!”

As he fell into full panic and turned around—

He saw the dark woman was crying.

While he shuddered, he could hear groans.

It was the white man. The man who stood at the entrance as if to block it raised his face.

The man was crying, too.

And Kii-kun as well—

“—!”

The man shouted.

He couldn’t understand the words. However, he could understand the anger and the sadness, as well as the loneliness and the suffering—he shouted as if he condensed too much of those feelings that a single person couldn’t bear.

A card was pasted on the man’s white shirt.

It had a single word there.

“Alpha” was written on it.

“—!”

The woman shouted too.

This shout contained a maddening grudge, hatred, as well as hunger. Her thin, pointy fingertips stabbed through Kii-kun’s clothes, digging into his flesh.

“UWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

Kii-kun also shouted.

This shout had, inside the fear and sadness, his despair of wanting to live.

“AAaaAAH!”

He finally understood.

They were all the same—

They all had something they strongly wished for.

Kii-kun’s wish to live, to avoid death, was probably very natural.

However, he couldn’t get it no matter what he did—

They were split into those who ate and those who were eaten.

Everyone had the same “essence”.

Strongly wishing for something.

However, without making it come true—

“AAAaaaAAAH!”

While shedding tears, the trio’s shouts reached their peak.

A lightning flash pierced the ship.

“—aaa!”

It wasn’t the Eye’s attack.

It was far more overwhelming, an impact that held uncontrollable power. The ship was assaulted by such shaking that it made him wonder whether the entire thing sank down and then floated again as if rebounded.

Inside the white space that felt as if time stopped, Kii-kun could see.

A fragment of the operating table that blew off due to the impact tore the stomach of the man in hospital clothes.

Butterflies dancing in his sight were blown off and wrapped in a purple glow.

The thin arms restraining him were absorbing that purple glow.

And—

Something inside him burst, became light and was absorbed by the woman behind.

It wasn’t just that.

An azure light was mixed in with that.

This azure light that was raining ceaselessly from somewhere went to those three—

No, it engulfed the entire ship.

As if it was some sort of catalyst, it combined all people on the ship into “one”—

“Uh—”

A whirl of information assaulted Kii-kun.

The memories of all people in the ship were instantly pushed into his mind.

What happened to cause this?

Who were they and why were they in this place?

Everything flowed into Kii-kun—

“AAaaaaAAAAAaaAAAH!”

And burst.

With lights of many colors mixing, an instant passed, and within that broken up time—

Along with an impact and shouts.

The world—changed.

3.08 Daisuke Part 9

Riding the motorbike that he found in the city, Daisuke came to the landfill on the suburbs.

Reddish brown ground, piles of thrown waste, and the violent rain.

Daisuke found it within this apocalyptic background.

“This is… the ship, then.”

A rusted, large passenger boat.

The same as the one from “prophetic dream” Daisuke had seen when first infiltrating Akamaki City.

As he came down from the bike, a pale blue heat ray was unleashed from inside the ship. Piercing through the ship’s hold, it made the vessel greatly swerve.

“…! What was that just now—”

Daisuke rushed up the mountain of waste.

He looked down from the peak of waste to ascertain what was happening below to the ship.

And Daisuke observed that moment.

“—”

The pillar of light falling inside the fierce rain pierced the ship.

The ship’s exterior was blown off, and a tremor shook the landfill.

Small explosions popped on the deck, in the cabins and even in the bilge. Perhaps it was the equipment inside being shorted out, as it spouted flames and spoke and there was a pallid electrical discharge.

An azure glow, a purple glow and pitch-black smoke—or rather miasma—gushed from inside the ship. All those colors competed and mixed, engulfing the ruined vessel.

“I—”

The first to show a change was the purple glow.

Pushing the other colors aside, the purple glow flew high into the air. The light tearing a hold into the black clouds changed form, becoming a swarm of butterflies glowing purple, and fluttered down to the landfill.

He looked up stunned as the purple butterflies gathered and took a human shape.

“I didn’t make it in time, then—”

He couldn’t use the power of his Mushi.

He couldn’t get in contact with the SEPB.

There were Imperfect Mushi made of body parts.

These truths all mixed together into one conclusion inside Daisuke.

Because of that he sought this place, and yet—

Daisuke couldn’t stop this destiny.

“So this is the moment you were born.”

The thing born from the gathering of glowing butterflies took the form of a beautiful lady floating in air.

She had a crimson long coat and long hair. She had eyes glowing in the color of the rainbow.

“Oogui…!”

One of the Original Three, the supernatural being that gave birth to Mushi—

Daisuke just witnessed the moment that Oogui was born.

Meaning, the world Daisuke found himself inside of was—

“Elvioréne.”

A voice came from near Daisuke.

“…!”

“That was her name—or rather, of the person that served as her base.”

At some point a girl came sitting beneath Daisuke at the top of the mountain of waste. She put a hand to her masked mouth and coughed.

“Mikko…!”

“You cannot interfere. Not you, at least.”

Following the purple glow, something split the boat into two.

The deck bulged and was then broken from inside. Blowing away the heavy downpour as it gushed from within the ship was a black miasma—as well as a tidal wave of some white swarm.

Caterpillars.

Tens of thousands, perhaps millions of these caterpillars were gushing out of the ship.

Leaping out from within them was pure white arm. An elegant cloak and bloodshot red eyes were buried inside the flood of caterpillars.

“GWOOOAAAAAAAAH!”

The man born from the caterpillars and miasma emitted a decidedly inhuman scream. The ship’s bow was covered in caterpillars and was rapidly decaying.

“Diorestoi.”

Mikko whispered calmly.

“There was no one as crazed with selfishness and ambition as the person who became his base.”

Daisuke’s pulse quickened.

Now he could understand what Mikko was talking about.

What was happening right before his eyes—

Having gone through the short journey to get there, Daisuke now realized the meaning of this.

Because he understood this—he couldn’t move a step away from the spot.

“And the remaining one—Aria Varei.”

Mikko calmly continued speaking.

The azure glow engulfing the ship gradually thinned, slowly vanishing.

“Quickly ran away from here.”

“…”

“At this moment, he’d ‘combined’ with everyone inside the ship, and after combining their memories, he split again. I do not know what his aim was… perhaps it was nothing more than a coincidence. However, because of that, everyone who was present here understood what happened.”

A pallid heat ray tore through heaven and earth.

The flash of light shot from inside the ship and gouged out a part of it. Even then the unstopping impact engraved giant scars throughout the landfill.

Subject to immense pressure, the ship’s stern crumbled and a tremor passed through the landfill.

From within the destroyed ship flew out countless spheres.

Seeing them, Daisuke unconsciously let his voice leak.

“Eyes—”

These were eyes covered by tough shells floating in the sky. Daisuke had fought these before—

“OOOOOooooOOOOOOH!”

A man appeared from within the destroyed ship. He wore something like hospital robe and unleashed the countless Eyes around.

The man was crying.

His scraggly hair was wild, and his clothes were dyed in red, perhaps meaning he was wounded. His Eyes unleashed heat rays all around, forming valleys of fissures around the landfill.

“Alpha was the research’s first ‘result’, and was supposed to be the last. As to why only he produced not the Imperfect Mushi but became the first one whose state could be called a Mushitsuki… I do not know.”

As the random firing of heat rays by the Eyes continued, further shouts echoed.

“GyaaaAAAAaaAAAAaaAAAH!”

Along with screams of pain, a swarm of black bugs came crawling from within the crumbling ship.

Much like a tidal wave, they gushed out from all over, multiplying into an avalanche. However, the one screaming couldn’t be seen anywhere.

No—he was.

The black insects gathered on the half-destroyed deck and transformed into a human chin.

The chin created a neck, created a nose, created eyes, and became a human face and upper torso.

And it was someone Daisuke knew.

“Kii-kun—an unfortunate person who just so happened to be in the wrong place…”

Mikko narrowed her eyes sadly.

“T-that guy…”

Daisuke knew Kii-kun.

It was obvious since he was with him just a few hours ago, but even those black insects were familiar.

“What the hell’s going ooooon!”

While pelted by the fierce rain, Kii-kun saw his own body and shouted. Even as he tried using his torso to escape, the black bugs that formed his body wouldn’t let their owner get away.

Those black insects—were tardigrades.

Small tardigrades that wriggled with their countless legs became part of Kii-kun’s body.

“I-I’m a monster—ugh!”

An Eye’s heat ray pierced the wailing boy’s topknot.

Kii-kun face melted, and he died—or not.

The tardigrades gathered at another location and formed the boy’s upper torso again.

“I won’t die…! I don’t dieee?”

As Kii-kun half cried, half shouted, the Eye focused on him again.

However, a white glow came from inside the ship. This white flash leapt around the destroyed ship, jumping toward above on of the floating Eyes.

It was a boy with his entire body covered in a glowing, white pattern.

“Perhaps Kasshi himself was the one who symbolized both beginning and end.”

He was Kasshi. He equipped the goggles that always hung from his neck and they had a glowing pattern on them.

Kasshi’s fist blew away the Eye without any remains. His leaping power that allowed him to jump high into the air and the physical power that allowed him to crush the Eye’s hard shell were no longer human.

“Run, Kii-kun! —Or rather…”

While alighting down to the surface, Kasshi yelled.

“Ichiku Kimitaka!”

Daisuke’s heart froze.

“I—chiku—”

Ichiku Kimitaka.

Daisuke obviously knew that name.

Mikko spoke.

“Since we all shared our memories, we came to know of each other’s names and natures.”

Anyone who belonged to the SEPB knew him.

After all, that name belonged to—no, Daisuke had an even deeper connection to him—

Daisuke’s thoughts became jumbled and his head blanked out.

“Kasshi! Help meeeeeee! What’s happening to me…!”

“It’s fine, quickly get out of—”

Kasshi’s words were cut. He noticed that the remaining Eyes were glaring at him.

Unable to move while in air, Kasshi returned to glare at one of them. His goggles glowed red and a laser-like crimson locus followed his line of sight.

The Eyes all shot out their heat rays at once.

Kasshi’s body was crushed to smithereens.

“Kasshi—”

Kii-kun froze.

The moment later, one of the Eyes burst and burned away as though in an explosion.

Behind the destroyed Eye suddenly appeared an unharmed Kasshi.

No, looking at him closely, he wasn’t unharmed. His shoulder was cut and blood gushed out. However, Kasshi soon aimed for another Eye and vanished.

“Kasshi was the first Fusion Type and a scary Mushitsuki. Although a newborn, he didn’t rampage at all, but instantly understood his abilities.”

The Eye right above Kashi was blown off, and the boy vanished again. His two arms were ripped and fresh blood spurt.

“He could disassemble and then reform his own body. By using this ability, he could heat up and therefore erase any object in a straight line on the molecular level. —Ah, he’s finally here, too.”

Mikko removed her eyes from the ship.

Her gaze pointed at a group of armored cars that were approaching the landfill from the distance.

They all surrounded the ship and camo suits holding guns and gun turrets flew out.

Several luxury cars also appeared, a gathering of men and women in suits appeared, and one of them shouted.

“Don’t let anything escape! Finish them all here!”

“This is Rui.”

Bombardment sounds tore through the fierce rain.

The Eyes floating in air, Elvioréne, the squirming caterpillars and black insects on deck, as well as Alpha and Diorestoi, Kasshi, and Kii-kun were all swallowed by this fire.

“Wha—”

Kii-kun’s surprised face was blown away by gunfire. But soon the tardigrades gathered again in a different location and Kii-kun’s despairing face was reborn.

“Rui! It’s me—Kii-kun! Kasshi’s here, too! Help us!”

“…”

Kii-kun and Kasshi looked down at Rui.

Rui bit his lips. He gave further orders with the face of a demon.

“Finish everything here!”

Kii-kun opened his jaw wide—and the next moment, he looked at Rui with an expression of burning anger.

“Rui—you motherfuckerrrrrrrrrrrrrr!”

Gunfire engulfed the abandoned ship.

“Gwooooaaaaaah!!!”

“UuuUUUhhhhh!”

On the destroyed deck, the man buried in caterpillars.

On top of the burning destroyed cabin, Alpha.

While shouting at the tops of their voices, each used their own ability, whether caterpillars or Eyes, to defend against the gunfire.

“Hehe—”

The woman floating in air used swarms of purple, glowing butterflies as her shield.

Kasshi hid in the remains of the ship, waiting for gunfire to pass.

Being killed by this fire and then rewinding himself, Kii-kun shouted.

“Isn’t it the Round Table’s fault, you fuckerrrrrs! Even me becoming like this—and my pals turning like that, is you guys’ fault! I know everything! I dare you to say something! Rui! Rui…!”

Kii-kun howled.

“Chairman of the Round Table—Ichinokuro Ruisu!”

Daisuke widened his eyes.

“He’s… Ichinokuro…?!”

Yet another name that Daisuke knew.

However, that name really was far too unexpected for him—

“Why are you so surprised? Haven’t you long since realized that?”

While looking down at the chaotic ship, Mikko spoke.

“You surely know what you’re looking at.”

“—”

It was just like Mikko said.

He already realized in what sort of place he was standing.

However, his reason couldn’t catch up with his feelings.

He thought he did understand—but he hadn’t known who Kii-kun and Rui were.

Mikko spoke plainly to the shaken Daisuke.

“This is the scenery of the past. —We are in the moment the Original Three were born.”

Oogui, Shinpu and Sanbikime—

The Original Three were born here.

Daisuke witnessed this moment.

Being unable to use his Mushi powers and contact the SEPB were natural. Neither existed in this era, after all.

Ever since Daisuke leapt inside the mist covering Akamaki City, he was being shown an illusion.

No, perhaps this was no illusion—

“Perhaps we really came into the past—is what you’re thinking, right?”

“…!”

“Is that why you hurried here? You were expecting that perhaps there was a Mushitsuki with the ability to travel to the past and turn back time… and thought of trying to stop the birth of the Original Three.”

Mikko’s expression as she looked down on the ship was completely unchanged.

She narrowed her eyes with sadness—or perhaps enjoyment.

“However, unfortunately for you, this is an illusion. These are all past events, based on my memories…”

“Your…?”

“Yes, however, there were some differences. In actuality Akamaki City was not run over by Mushi. That was definitely—a warning to us from the Mushitsuki showing us this.”

The Mushitsuki showing them this? A warning?

He had too many questions so his mind couldn’t catch up.

There were too many mysteries and he didn’t know their core—

“But in the end, they probably wanted to show you this. I do not know whether this illusion would end or not, if you weren’t here to see this… therefore, I removed you from trying to put a stop to it. In order for us to get out of this world.”

Mikko’s tone was unrestrained, but he couldn’t read what she was thinking about.

“Now, it is time to start. Please watch over it.”

The camo suits continued their attacks, but couldn’t get any result.

Receiving an attack by the large swarm of caterpillars, several camo suits were swallowed by the white wave while raising screams. Also, the Eyes shot heat rays through the surface, splitting armored cars into two.

“This is the crossroads that connects past and present.”

Mikko’s words were apparently on the mark.

The ship and the landfill, as well as the sky glowing in purple—

Were engulfed by a white flash.

3.09 Daisuke Part 10

“WOO—AAaaAAAAH!”

Alpha held his head and screamed.

The Eyes shooting heat rays all blew up and vanished one after another in the sky.

It was Kasshi. Every time he erased his form, goggles glowing in red, an Eye exploded to pieces. Then, as Kasshi reappeared, he already focused on another Eye.

“Stop—”

From the zenith of the piled waste, Daisuke groaned without thinking.

Although guns and bombs didn’t work on the Eyes at all, Kasshi shot them down one after another. Witnessing this overwhelming power, Daisuke knew it was useless but he wrung out his voice.

“Stop this already…!”

If this was an event that happened in the past—

No matter what Daisuke did, it was useless.

“No, he will not stop.”

Mikko sitting at Daisuke’s feet spoke in a measured tone.

“As the first Fusion Type Mushitsuki, he was exceedingly powerful. However—he was imperfect.”

Kasshi finally broke through the Eyes’ defensive wall.

Nothing stood in the line of sight connecting Kasshi and Alpha.

“WAAaaaAAAH!”

Alpha raised a scream and fled from the spot.

Kasshi’s goggles focused their gaze of death. His figure vanished.

“—aaa!”

Bending backwards, Alpha had his chest bubble then burst. His body rebounded on the deck, was thrown off of the boat and rolled down to the landfill.

Spreadeagled, Alpha already lost consciousness. Despite the fact that part of his chest was gouged and raised smoke, he still appeared to be living.

As Alpha received this grievous injury, the camo suits leapt at him. They stabbed him with syringes probably containing some sleeping medicine, then restrained his body with tape.

The boy who defeated Alpha, Kasshi, stood on top of the funnel with an afterimage.

“Rui—”

As Kasshi looked down to the landfill, his forehead—

Burst and gushed fresh blood.

It wasn’t just his forehead. Blood gushed out from his entire body, and his hoodie was dyed in red.

“It’s just like you said. You must finish everyone here.”

Kasshi’s tone was calm, just like usual. Never mind his own wounds, not even his words had any weight behind him.

“You should finish this nightmare right here.”

The boy’s gaze looked at the luxury car behind Rui.

Seeing the young girl sleeping through the glass window, Kasshi’s mouth loosened.

A kind smile—almost as if he saw his own family, his younger sister.

“Is that so?”

Rui also turned to his beloved daughter.

As if holding something back, his shoulders shook.

“—Exactly.”

The youth raised his face, with large tears falling down from it. His tightly held fist turned pale.

While Kasshi nodded in satisfaction, the swarm of caterpillars attacked him.

“…!”

And not just them. From the opposite side the black tardigrades pushed like a flood.

“Whaa…? Hey, stooooop!”

Kii-kun raised a scream. Endlessly spouting from his body, the tardigrades all began to move toward Kasshi at once.

“Sensing its ‘natural enemy’, Kii-kun’s Mushi probably felt instinctive fear. Since he’d just become a Mushitsuki, he couldn’t control his Mushi.”

Mikko spoke.

“And Kasshi was just as immature.”

Kasshi’s goggles glowed red.

Tearing a hole in the wave of caterpillars and tardigrades about to cover him, he moved to the upper sky.

Although he escaped from that pinch, Kasshi’s thighs gushed blood.

“His ability is the disassembly and rebuilding of his physical body. —He managed to understand his ability and control it with quite the miraculous speed, but it wasn’t perfect.”

The caterpillars and tardigrades didn’t let Kasshi escape.

Using each other’s bodies like stairs, they climbed and aimed for the escaping boy in a hoodie.

Kasshi kept moving to other places to dodge—but red blood gushed from his back.

“Every time he moves, there’s a small defect—meaning, some part of his body being rebuilt is left out. If he’d trained as a Mushitsuki, perhaps perfect teleportation would have become possible. However, he didn’t have that time…”

And because he understood that, Daisuke had told him to stop.

However, Kasshi did not stop.

Moving all around the destroyed ship, he shaved through the swarm of caterpillars.

He was doing that to search where Diorestoi was hiding. As far as he could see the amounts of caterpillars lessened, but Kasshi also had more wounds.

“—”

Kasshi’s goggles captured a certain place on the ship.

Landing atop the destroyed wheelhouse, he stuck his arms inside the caterpillars.

He then pulled out the cloak of a man covered in crawling caterpillars.

“…How impudent—”

From within the gaps of the caterpillars covering his face, Diorestoi’s bloodshot eyes glared at Kasshi.

The man emitted black miasma from his body and leapt to the sky. From within the miasma that covered his head like a dark cloud there was the silhouette of a large structure like some holographic image—

An ear-splitting bell noise shook the air of the landfill.

“Guh…!”

Kasshi grimaced, his knees folding.

And it wasn’t just him. Kii-kun held his chest and kneeled, and Elvioréne floating in air also scowled. The camo suits and expensive suits on the surface raised suffering groans and crouched.

He tried ringing the bell again—

However, Kasshi’s fist did not let him.

The arm glowing in white momentarily vanished, then reformed as it shot through Diorestoi’s body.

The aftershock created from reforming energy at a super close range shook the entire ship. It erased both deck and caterpillars, and the impact that had yet to stop caused the surface of the landfill to cave.

Eliminated from his chest down, Diorestoi crumbled down like dust.

However—

“Does thou have a grudge, fool?”

A hoarse voice resounded from a different location.

Turning at the outer wall of the boat, a man in a white coat appeared.

His skin was charred back, and this man who was, at a glance, without any sign of life had many caterpillars clinging to him. Engulfed by black miasma, after half the caterpillars retreated—

The form of a man covered in caterpillars and wearing a splendid cloak appeared.

Mikko spoke.

“The three beings born here did not have a form. The many lives gathered for the test subjects mixed, staying inside the frame provided by those three who became their bases… also, they were still as weak as newborns—”

Seeing the grotesque form of Diorestoi, Kasshi mumbled calmly.

“—So you can control corpses. Looks like there’s no end to this unless I eliminate each and every caterpillar.”

Kasshi and Diorestoi’s battle started.

With the blow just before, Kasshi’s one arm was dyed in blood and became unusable. The swarm of caterpillars pushed at him, and he was about to be crushed by their weight.

Moving to the air, Kasshi escaped the net of caterpillars.

And, the next instant, he flew into the deck like the strike of a meteor, kicking apart caterpillars.

As he won in quantity, Diorestoi made use of the caterpillars as shields, at times used himself as a distraction, shaving Kasshi’s body little by little.

Each devoured the other to survive.

Every time each repeated their attack, more and more of the ship was destroyed to metal scraps.

“You surely know this, Daisuke. Even though you know this is meaningless, you still expected it, right?”

Mikko looked up at Daisuke.

“…”

She was right.

While watching this fight unfold in front of him, a small hope was born in his chest.

He was strong.

Kasshi’s strength went beyond imagination.

If Mikko’s words about Diorestoi and the rest being like babies with their powers were true—

Perhaps he could win.

Not just Daisuke. Any Mushitsuki would hope for this.

“I am the same. Even more than Diorestoi and the rest who were born beyond human understanding, I was taken in by the potential of Mushitsuki…”

Mikko’s singsong voice was drowned by Kasshi’s howl.

A white flash ran through the ship.

Kasshi’s form vanished and reappeared many times, dozens of times. Every time light burst, the caterpillars covering Diorestoi were erased, and finally—

The shield covering Diorestoi was peeled off.

Kasshi did not miss this chance. His goggles glowing red, he turned.

“OooOOoooh—”

As Diorestoi widened his bloodshot eyes, his body was blown to pieces.

The white glow afterimage brought a gale, raising debris high in the air. By the time it rained down the ship along with the rain—

Diorestoi’s existence vanished from the boat.

Witnessing this unbelievable sight, Daisuke was frozen stiff.

“He beat—Shinpu—”

The tardigrades no longer tried covering the Mushitsuki standing on the funnel again. They remained unmoving, fearing him.

“Kasshi…!”

Kii-kun looked up the funnel, his lower body crumbled. Even the boy who was always a coward and needed help forgot his own surroundings and gritted his teeth painfully.

Alpha and Diorestoi—

The Mushitsuki who won against those two disasters was already fully dyed in blood.

From head to toes, there was no place that wasn’t bleeding. In a glance it was even possible to think he fainted while standing. His hoodie and goggles had been eaten by caterpillars and were in shambles.

“—”

Wetting his face with fresh blood, Kasshi’s goggles turned above.

Up there—was the remaining disaster.

It was Elvioréne.

“If only his—the Mushitsuki called Kasshi’s power had been just a bit more complete.”

As she mumbled this, Kasshi’s form vanished.

Butterflies glowing purple were emblazed and vanished one after another—

Elvioréne’s upper torso that was in a straight line from him exploded and vanished.

“Or perhaps if Kii-kun had a completely different wish.”

However, the next moment, from the remaining lower torso, tardigrades glowing purple gushed out. These gathered, took form and restored the form of the beauty.

“—Hehe.”

Elvioréne’s pupils of the seven colors of the rainbow gazed at the distant Kasshi.

Seeing her completely unharmed form, Kasshi was speechless.

Kii-kun’s expression froze.

“Wha—why are you… the same as me…”

Kasshi vanished again.

Unable to do anything, Elvioréne’s body burst apart.

However—

Once again, tardigrades gushed out from the body and restored her as if nothing happened.

“This is useless—”

Daisuke groaned.

Since he’d fought Oogui many times, he knew this very well.

Oogui could use the abilities of those she made Mushitsuki.

Kii-kun’s ability—was the power of the Undying.

Accordingly, Elvioréne who’d given him this also possessed the power of Undying.

“If fate had changed gears but only a little—perhaps everything born here would have vanished and the world wouldn’t have changed.”

Looking up to see Kasshi repeat his attacks without stopping, Mikko spoke.

“However.”

The blood-smeared Kasshi landed on the funnel. Crumbling goggles fell from the face of the boy looking up at the sky.

And in front of his empty eyes—

“Hehehe—”

Was the calmly sneering Elvioréne. Despite having been erased countless times, not one wound remained on her body.

Kasshi tried to step ahead again—

“—”

However, his knees lost power and folded.

Exhausting himself, the eyes of the boy who lost his glow looked at the surface.

He looked at Rui and at the girl sleeping in the car next to him—

And smiled.

What did he feel in his last moments, that made him smile so happily?

Kashi collapsed with a smile—and never rose up again.

“KAAAASSHIIIIII!!!”

Kii-kun’s wail echoed in the landfill wrapped in fierce rain.

“The first Fusion-Type died soon after birth. And—”

The same moment as Mikko mumbled this, something crawled out from within the fissures made in the cracked deck.

It was white caterpillars.

Daisuke grimaced.

“So he lived—”

A single lump of caterpillars slid on the deck.

These gathered to the boy collapsed on the funnel—

“Thou who has destroyed me… I shall take thy body as offering.”

Kashi suddenly rose up.

It was obvious he wasn’t the same as he was alive from his bloodshot eyes and tone of voice.

“Now this power belongs to me—”

Kasshi sneered with a hideous expression, but his movements completely stopped. Apparently something happened, as the boy’s body began shaking.

“Guh…oooh! C-curse you—”

The arm of the trembling boy stabbed a syringe.

“Mine—rotting vessel—”

The wounds carved into Kasshi’s body became inflamed, and the skin turned red.

Mikko mumbled.

“—It was a trap. Scared of the possibility Diorestoi was still alive, Kasshi poured this medicine into his blood.”

Kasshi—no, Diorestoi—rolled and fell from the funnel.

He rebounded on the hard deck and fell to the surface.

“Gwooooh! Curseeees!”

Even as he leaked curses, Rui swung his hand toward Diorestoi.

“Capture him! A monster’s sealed in that body!”

He squeezed out this sorrowful order.

The camo suits shot Diorestoi full of tranquilizing bullets, then used tape and a steel box to seal him.

The people dressed in expensive suits behind Rui approached the youth.

“Chairman Ichinokuro. Leave the cleanup to us. This was, after all, the item I have offered up to auction.”

A long-haired youth and a beautiful woman who clung to him entreated Rui.

Rui bit his lips hard. His strongly clenched fist had its blood vessels popping.

“Got it. We will seal it forevermore in the Round Table—”

“Of course, sir…”

Looking down at this sight, Mikko narrowed her eyes as if in jest.

“The captured Diorestoi and Alpha were supposed to get dealt with by the Round Table, but apparently there was trouble created by conflicting interests. Members started fighting over them, and there were even some fools who got turned into Mushitsuki during that…”

“—Hehe.”

Elvioréne, who controlled the purple butterflies, turned her back to the ship. The camo suits assaulted her with bullets, but they obviously couldn’t beat her.

While seeing off the beauty distancing herself, Mikko rose up.

“With her natural enemy gone, Elvioréne became free.”

The purple glow was growing smaller in the sky—

And was fully gone.

“There are small differences, but this was an actual event from the past.”

Daisuke called toward the girl who was climbing down the mountain of refuse.

“Where are you going?”

“I have taken a small break. I think I will now fulfill my role. —In order to awake from this nightmare as well.”

Mikko turned to Daisuke with narrowed eyes.

As the masked girl climbed down the mountain of waste, she approached the ship.

Then, she coughed.

Rui noticed Mikko and reached to her.

“There’s nothing here anymore… come, Mikko!”

Mikko shook her head to the sides.

“If I could return to the past—I would have probably killed all of you the moment we met…”

Letting her mask hang, she revealed her smiling mouth.

“Kii-kun, Kasshi, Rui… as well as me… we shouldn’t have come here…”

Tears flowed out of Mikko’s eyes.

That scene caused him Déjà vu.

He’d seen it before.

Inside the mist covering Akamaki City, he’d clearly seen this moment.

Wearing an expression that was half smiling and half crying, she declared clearly.

“Because of us, this country will get filled with Mushi and reach its end—”

It was like a prophecy.

However, it didn’t indicate the future.

Declared in an age that already passed, it was an ominous declaration that couldn’t be stopped by anyone—

That was the true form of the prophecy Daisuke had witnessed.

“RUIIIIIII! MIKKOOOOOO!”

Tardigrades gathered next to Mikko and appeared the zombie-like topknot boy.

His face twisted with hatred and anger, Kii-kun shouted, sounding like a completely different person.

“Isn’t this your faaaaault?!! Mikko, you actually used your father to continue the research, and the Round Table helped with that… you knew all this!!!”

“What—”

Daisuke gulped.

Never mind the Round Table, it was his first time hearing that Mikko was the one who conducted the research.

However, this was true.

Mikko herself said this.

The moment that the Original Three were born—all people on the boat had their consciousness mixed, and shared their memories.

“Then you know it, right, Kii-kun? I was simply devoted to father’s research, and wanted to help him forget the sadness…”

Mikko smiled sadly.

“You’re kidding me…! That excuse is—”

“Also, it is true that things becoming like this was my and the Round Table’s fault—but not just me.”

Kii-kun’s expression froze.

“Kasshi died and this world became one with Mushi—Kii-kun, it’s also the fault of your own dream.”

“…!”

“Because you wished for the power of Undying, Kasshi died.”

In the blink of an eye Kii-kun’s face became crying.

“My fault… is it really…?”

“But it’s fine. Even if you embraced this sinful dream that changed the world and transformed into something monstrous—”

Mikko sneered.

Her tears already stopped.

Instead, the girl’s smile—was filled with unfathomable, selfless love.

“I will still love you.”

Like an innocent child.

Or perhaps a bewitching adult.

It was a merciful smile that ensnared everyone who saw it like shackles.

“I saw the true Undying among you.”

As if to welcome the paralyzed Kii-kun, Mikko spread her arms.

“During the period I played in the ship, I couldn’t believe it. I simply thought it was the means to keep my father in his delusions. However, after seeing you, Kasshi and Kii-kun, I realized how shallow my thinking was.”

“Mikko…?”

Seeing the girl’s carefree smile, Rui was speechless. His arm reached out to save her now dangled listlessly.

“Ending this here is outrageous.”

Kii-kun, whose lower body became tardigrades, approached Mikko.

She lovingly hugged that foul body.

“Beings like Kasshi and you are the closest to Undying.”

Ahead of Mushitsuki was the Undying—

Mikko said this.

“—I can’t allow you to continue.”

Rui raised his arms.

The camo suits all turned their guns to Mikko.

“If I die here… you will become alone forever, Kii-kun.”

Mikko whispered to Kii-kun.

“We will never be able to give birth to another Undying like you—”

The topknot boy raised his face absently.

And then he slowly looked at Rui.

Raising a buzz, the tardigrades stood in front of Mikko.

“Kii-kun—”

Rui was speechless.

“Let us part here, Rui. Our paths are different.”

Mikko looked behind Rui. The luxury car with his sleeping daughter was parked there.

“And please do not get involved with us again. You do not wish to involve your family, right?”

“…!”

As Rui’s face changed color, Mikko smiled kindly.

Inside that hellish scene, the two waiting forms were blurred.

A milky white mist was starting to drift from somewhere.

It was familiar to Daisuke.

It was the same as the one that surrounded Akamaki City and invited him to the world of the past.

“Looks like this game is over too.”

Mikko raised her eyes.

Looking up at Daisuke who stood atop the debris, she narrowed her eyes.

“Let us meet again in reality.”

As the landfill was quickly being engulfed in mist, Daisuke looked down at that girl.

Binding those she gazed upon with the shackle called love and smiling like a Saintess.

He only knew one person in the world like that.

“So you’re the one who did this…”

He mouthed her name.

“Miguruma Yaeko—”

Scrapped ship.

Landfill.

Camo suits and rich suits.

As well as—

Ichinokuro Ruisu.

Ichiku Kimitaka.

Miguruma Yaeko.

This era, this time, and the people who’d witnessed the moment that the world changed, were all being covered by white mist.

“Find me as quickly as you can, Blaze Class Rank 1, Kakkou.”

In the moment she was erased by the mist, Yaeko erased her smile.

“Even now, our enemy grows stronger—”

“Wha…?”

Our enemy.

Daisuke was about to ask regarding that meaning, but his arm was hidden by the mist and vanished—

And his consciousness cut off.

4.00 Release

As the mist scattered, Daisuke’s sight was dyed in pitch-dark.

A black mass wriggled, gathered and flowed.

That was—a black cloud.

“…!”

Daisuke’s body shook. Noticing that he was looking up at the sky, he came back to his senses.

As he looked at his body, he saw that he was wearing his pitch-dark coat. He also had his pistol at his waist. Large goggles covered his face.

There was rain.

The sensation of the cold droplets and wind blowing from the side felt fresh.

Feeling his body with his five senses, he now clearly knew.

Until now he’d been dreaming and acting within that dream.

“Why am I in such a place…?”

His consciousness was still jumbled. He shook his head and looked at his feet.

The vast townscape spread beneath his eyes.

Akamaki City. He could see of the familiar buildings in this city that was once his residence.

Daisuke—was standing atop a high-rise building.

“I tried infiltrating Akamaki City and entered a mist… from then, I was supposedly shown an illusion. In the past Akamaki City, I…”

Daisuke had wandered into the Akamaki City of bygone days.

Mikko, Kii-kun, Rui, Kasshi.

He met the people naming themselves this, traveled with them and reached the land of the prophecy.

There, he saw it.

The moment when the Original Three were born.

The time when everything started and the world changed—

“Was that really just an illusion…?”

While pelted by the rain, Daisuke raised his hand.

A checkered beetle glowing in green landed on his fingertip.

He could use his Mushi powers—

Daisuke came back to reality.

“When did I get here…?”

It was certain he’d tried getting inside Akamaki City and was trapped in a fake world.

Even the fact that that mist was a Mushitsuki’s ability was within expectations. He still didn’t know who they were, but Daisuke probably fell victim to some attack and saw an illusion.

However, he had no memories of climbing up to the top of a high-rise building.

There were also doubts at him being completely unharmed. They should have been able to kill Daisuke whenever.

He couldn’t read the aim of this formless enemy.

In this confused state, while looking down the city—Daisuke felt that something wasn’t right.

“There are no people…?”

Fast food restaurants and the lines of office buildings in this main street were empty.

Never mind pedestrians on the street, he couldn’t even see any cars on the national highway.

In this now silent main road, only the sound of pelting rain resounded creepily.

“Am I still inside the dream…?”

Seeing this unrealistic sight, he had a bad feeling.

—Because of us, this country will be filled with Mushi and reach its end.

This ominous prophecy declared within the world of illusion was reborn in his mind.

“—ear me? Please respond! Kakkou-san!”

Suddenly he heard a woman’s voice in his ears.

Daisuke startled, holding his ear.

“Kakkou-san! Are you safe? Please reply alreadyyy!”

“—Touko-san?”

It was a familiar voice. Apparently it was talking through the goggles’ wireless connection.

“Ah! Ah! Kakkou-san? It’s you, Kakkou-san! Are you fine?! You haven’t answered for a long while, so I thought the worst…!”

“I’m fine. Nothing… happened to me.”

“Are you fine? Really really? Are you not hurt? Why did you enter Akamaki City and immediately all signals were cut oooooff! Were you fighting someone?”

Touko’s voice was genuine. No one could hope to mimic this acting branch head who sounded so unreliable even now.

Finally feeling that he really came back to the real world, he felt some small relief.

“Don’t worry. As for combat—I haven’t fought, probably.”

“Probably? Then what are you doiiing! You hadn’t made your routine reports for two days straight!”

“Two days?”

He asked back without thinking.

He knew that he’d fell to this mysterious illusion attack and lost consciousness for a while—

And he’d been in the world of the past for two days as well.

“Did I really not make contact for that long? I was—”

“Why are you talking about it as if it happened to someone else! Where are you now? —Oh, I can pinpoint the goggles’ location from here! What on earth happened?”

“I don’t know…”

He had no other way to answer.

If he announced to her that he’d seen the past, he felt like she’d just worry more.

In the first place, he wasn’t convinced that this really what happened in the past.

“Geez! Immediately after you entered the mist, we lost all contact and the goggle location system couldn’t find you! I didn’t think you were dead because it’s you, but I still worried!”

“Sorry. I’m fine, but I can’t really grasp the situation for now. How’re things outside Akamaki? Inside things are a bit weird—”

“Ah, I know where you are, Kakkou-san—whaaat! Y-y-y-you’re?! That’s no good! You’re in a very bad place right now!”

Daisuke frowned.

“Bad place? What’s bad about it?”

“It’s about to get swallowed!”

Swallowed.

Daisuke couldn’t understand in the least the meaning of her words.

“Explain! What’s going on!”

“D-do you really not know what’s currently happeniiing?”

“That’s what I’ve been telling you!”

“N-not long after our contact was cut off… the mist covering Akamaki City cleared up.”

“Eh—”

Daisuke leaned from the building’s roof, looking around the empty streets. His coat was flapped by the wind, striking the fences behind him.

The mist covering Akamaki City cleared up.

If that was true, then why was it so empty? The SEPB should have been able to get inside Akamaki City as well—

“Although the residents of Akamaki City had been shaken by the mist, there were no casualties at all. But soon we received an emergency broadcast from the Central Headquarters’ information department. That, too, soon cut off due to certain obstacles…”

“An emergency broadcast from HQ? What did they say?”

“It was a urgent request of help. —Meaning, an SOS.”

Daisuke was lost for words.

The Central Headquarters asked them to rescue them?

The part of the SEPB that held the most fighting forces did?

“No way…?”

“They’re apparently locked up within the Stronghold—inside HQ’s base! Plus, there was fear that some dangerous being was released from within the Stronghold to the surface, so they sent an evacuation order to the city.”

“Central Headquarters being locked up? A dangerous being…?”

“We got in contact with the government and evacuated civilians to the designated area! Publicly we said that an unexploded ordnance was discovered, but this is impossible to hide anymore…”

“Why did it turn out like that? Doesn’t the Stronghold have Harukiyo?”

The devil was supposed to be in Central Headquarters.

Daisuke didn’t know what was his goal in remaining at HQ what, but he couldn’t believe that ridiculously powerful man would fall into that sort of desperate situation.

“I don’t knooow! Anyway, this is the situation… ah! It’s coming! Never mind everything, just run away! Retreat!”

“Retreat you say… but what’s coming—”

As Daisuke overlooked the landscape of Akamaki City, his eyes stopped at a certain place.

Something was revealed at the end of the national road spreading below.

An amorphous presence, completely black and like smoke.

It appeared from within the gaps in buildings as though crawling, slowly advancing to where Daisuke was, it seemed.

“What is—”

“R-run away, hurry! Several Northern Central Branch members that served as scouts were already eaten! Even you, Kakkou-san, can’t handle something like that alone…!”

Accompanying this black presence, it was actually something white eating the buildings.

It was as though white color was painted over a drawing of the city.

Thick and sticky, a foul white was encroaching Akamaki City little by little.

“—”

Finally, Daisuke’s eyes captured the identity of that creepy color.

Caterpillars.

There was no doubt about it.

Daisuke had once seen it—whether past or present, he’d witnessed it countless times.

The identity of the dangerous being released from Central Headquarters.

He realized what it was.

“P-please run away! Kakkou-san!”

Touko shouted.

“Shinpu’s main body was unleashed!”

Slowly.

But surely.

The large tidal wave of caterpillars dyed Daisuke’s sight in pure white.

4.01 Daisuke Part 11

The townscape seen from the building was being swallowed by white caterpillars.

Roads and vehicles and everything up to high-rise buildings were being covered by the white waves, vanishing into the miasma.

Although the speed of encroachment was slow, at this rate—

“Please quickly evacuate, Kakkou-san!”

His boss Goroumaru Touko shouted at him through the goggles’ wireless communication.

“Is this really Shinpu…?”

Daisuke had fought Shinpu before.

Shinpu, who gave birth to Special Types that had Mushi of an indeterminate form, looked like an old man and could bring forth a swarm of caterpillars—

However, what he saw beneath his eyes was on another league entirely.

—That thing is but a mere fragment.

Another one of the Original Three, Oogui, had said this.

—The Central Headquarters is hiding one of the Original Three…

A girl who once belonged to the East Central Branch with Daisuke had said this.

The Shinpu that Daisuke had fought was no more than a fragment, and if the thing he saw was its true form—

“So the Central Headquarters really did hide Shinpu’s main body.”

In the past Daisuke had witnessed, Shinpu—Diorestoi—had been captured by the Round Table.

However, for some reason it was now in the hands of Central Headquarters, and it got unleashed.

“Oh, calling it a ‘main body’ is only our conjecture, and Central HQ probably won’t admit it.”

“Now that things are like this they couldn’t hide it. We need to take the initiative anyway.”

“T-that’s right, so provisionally we’ll treat it as Shinpu’s main body.”

“How’s the Central Headquarters right now? Surely they hadn’t been wiped off?”

“Ever since their request for help, it’s complete silence. We think they might be trapped in the Stronghold…”

“If the caterpillars really spread this far, even the Central Headquarters wouldn’t last for long.”

Why was Shinpu’s main body unleashed now of all times—

Although he was curious about the reason for this, it didn’t look like he had the time to carefully reason about it.

“With a target this large, looks like the only way to deal with it would be to strike the main body. I’ll keep looking for it.”

Was it his hatred for having been jailed for so many years, or another reason?

Shinpu had definitely grown stronger since the moment of his birth.

The scenery in front of Daisuke spoke of that scary truth.

“I’m telling you that you can’t! You’re already within the enemy’s range!”

“Range?”

It happened just as Daisuke asked back.

One high-rise building swallowed by the caterpillars and miasma moved.

Its zenith swelled.

A large swarm of caterpillars became about as large as a human—

“—”

And “something” looked at Daisuke from within that gap.

Red-black cloudy eyes.

For just an instant he glimpsed the silhouette of a rotten, darkened face.

Daisuke knew that face.

“Kasshi—”

As he was about to pull his gun, Daisuke’s brain was pounded by a cracking roar.

It was a horrible ear-grating sound, much like if an outrageous mass of metals were being pounded one against another.

It was the sound of bells.

“…!”

As he grimaced and looked above, he could see a huge building floating there.

It was the Church.

The medium of Shinpu’s ability.

By the time he hurried to get away, it was too late.

“Oh n—”

A storm of pitch-dark miasma blew around Daisuke.

He tried escaping, but his legs were frozen.

In the blink of an eye his sight was wrapped in darkness.

The clouds covering the sky.

The townscape of Akamaki City spreading under him.

These all vanished far, far away, covered by the pitch-dark miasma filled with malice and the ear-grating bell sound.

“What does thou want…?”

In the darkness cutting off all senses, a hoarse voice resounded.

This voice was shrill and cracked, and didn’t sound like either man or woman.

“What does thou desire…?”

A space where he was unable to see or touch anything.

Daisuke couldn’t even tell whether he was standing on his two legs or else lying down.

“What does thou wish for—”

A light flared within the darkness.

It became bigger by the second, and Daisuke realized he was standing on a surface. At some point his equipment was released and the goggles hiding his face also vanished.

The surface became soft like rubber.

“Have thou expended so many victims…?”

It wasn’t—the ground.

It was a mountain of people.

Innumerable people were lying beneath him, and many were familiar to him.

“Thy dream has eaten this many dreams.”

The Mushitsuki turned into Fallen by Daisuke’s hand.

“Is thy dream truly that valuable…?”

The Fallen all stood up, clinging to his body.

Their weight caused Daisuke’s shoulders to creak, and sharp nails ripped his skin.

“Thy dream… for the weak, it is naught but a nightmare…”

At this unbearable suffering pain, Daisuke’s scream—wouldn’t come out.

He gritted his teeth and slowly closed his eyes.

Sensations of his neck being wrangled, nails digging into him, and his inner organs being gouged gripped his brain. This pain, as though all the nerves in his body were being ripped out numbed him, and the taste of his own fresh blood spread warmly in his mouth.

“Thou have dreamed for too long…”

Pain, hatred, and fear were trying to fill his heart, but Daisuke made no move.

While all five senses raised shrieks, he looked for a door inside him.

There was definitely a door.

He searched for the hidden door covered by all manner of torture—

And finally found it.

Inside this space of darkness was a door leaking light.

“Thy long-standing dream… is a nightmare…”

He wrenched open the door.

That door, which brought light into that world filled with darkness—

Was Daisuke’s eyelids.

“I already knew that for a long time—”

As Daisuke opened his eyes, he saw the townscape dominated by white caterpillars.

There were heavy clouds in the sky.

“I told you this before. Don’t think the same trick will work on me again and again.”

Daisuke’s sight pierced through the distant building.

He couldn’t see the “something” supposedly there anymore. There were just caterpillars.

Seeing that Daisuke repelled his mental attack, he probably escaped.

It wasn’t that he became stronger than before.

He became more devious and more guarded—

Daisuke clicked his tongue and put a hand to the goggles.

“Touko-san. I’ve just been mentally attacked by Shinpu.”

“Weh? A-are you alright?! I told you to get away! That’s probably what finished off those North Central Branch scouts! What attack was it?”

“The same kind of mental pollution Shinpu attacked with before. Since he could even take control of my sense of pain, it might’ve been stronger. If you see a human figure inside the caterpillars, you probably shouldn’t lock eyes with it.”

“U-understood…! I’ll pass it along to all branches! Are you fine, Kakkou-san?”

“Not a big deal.”

He underwent training to resist mental attacks and experienced them a lot.

He’d never get beaten by a mental attack—

He prided himself on that.

“…”

However, the moment he infiltrated Akamaki City, Daisuke was easily taken into an illusory world of the past.

It was supposedly another kind of mental attack.

Why had he fallen prey to it so easily?

Because he hadn’t felt any hostility within that milky mist?

Even if so, it was certain he was weaker than he was before.

He didn’t have much power remaining and wasn’t sure if he could fight with his full strength even one more time—

“…We need the Central Headquarters’ power.”

Daisuke mumbled.

The large swarm of caterpillars encroaching Akamaki City only increased.

This wasn’t a situation that Daisuke could handle alone.

Calmly accepting this truth—was because he’d saw the illusion of the past.

He met people who fought Mushi without using the power of Mushitsuki.

Humans were far stronger than Daisuke gave them credit for.

His comrade in arms also told him this before, but Daisuke was apparently too conceited—

“I-I agree. But the entrance to the Underground Stronghold is fully covered in caterpillars…”

“So we can’t approach?”

“Yeah, once we tried it, they were immediately battered and defeated… they probably got hit by the mental attack you mentioned. We are discussing whether we should send some high-ranking members, but every branch fears the risk of sending in their aces, so we can’t quite reach a conclusion…”

Immediately after the Central Headquarters went silent it turned like this. He now ironically missed HQ’s absolute authority.

Daisuke clicked his tongue. He couldn’t see any hope like that.

“I’ll go. Guide me to the nearest entrance.”

“Eeeh! B-buuut, I just let everyone in the branch know that the missing Kakkou-san was found to raise morale.”

“It’s fine, come on.”

“Haah, acting independently yet again… well, no one’s going to follow you in this situation anyway.”

“Just in case anything happens, have Akatsuki wait nearby.”

A map appeared in Daisuke’s goggles. It told him the location of the entrance connected to the Stronghold was.

“Please report properly, alright? I hope you won’t get lost again.”

A green checkered beetle landed on Daisuke’s shoulder. Its body transformed explosively, becoming countless tentacles and fusing with his entire body.

“Got it.”

His entire body glowing in a pattern, Daisuke kicked the ground.

He went back to the edge of the roof, sprinted to gain momentum—then leapt.

His black long coat fluttered in the sky of Akamaki City.

Cutting the wind, Daisuke used his enhanced leg strength to land on the neighboring roof. The green glow passed through his entire body, causing the concrete-made floor to cave in.

Leaping further from building to building, he approached the ground.

After he landed a few times to stand on the national road, the caterpillars appeared right in front of him.

However, Daisuke ignored the caterpillars, took detours and ran toward his destination.

“Just a biiit more. I don’t know what’s waiting for you there, so be careful.”

“Yeah.”

Daisuke finally arrived in front of a large building.

During the time it was disguised as the entrance to the Central Headquarters’ underground base, it was the former site of an old hospital complex with surgical and medical departments.

At present, it became a place completely unrecognizable from how it was before.

Squirming white covered the entire building, covering even the colors of the walls.

“That’s bad—”

If it looked like that from the outside, the inside must be even worse.

As he grimaced and approached the building, the caterpillars immediately leapt at him.

“Tch.”

So they tried launching an attack to test the waters—

It happened just as Daisuke pulled his gun out.

“…!”

A roar and a tremor shook the air. His sight was dyed in gold.

A bolt of lightning fell on the area swarmed by white caterpillars.

The electrical attack and shock wave blew them away.

“Wha…?”

As Daisuke hurriedly assumed a defensive posture, a golden outline floated in front of him.

The two legs standing on the scorched ground were long and slender. It had a slim waist and a chest drawing a modest hill.

However—it wasn’t human.

This silhouette growing gold raised crackles, and the ends of its swaying, long hair further burned and erased the caterpillars spread about.

It was the figure of a woman sculpted from electrical discharge.

She was probably around twenty years old. Daisuke didn’t think he’d ever seen her beautiful face.

“Who’re you?”

He probably thought of her like a ghost met at a graveyard in night. However, the situation being what it was, it was doubtlessly a Mushitsuki ability.

She glared at Daisuke, silent.

“…?”

The woman turned her back to Daisuke. She swung her hand to the side.

An electric storm blew around, reaping through the caterpillars.

Heading toward the hospital, she created a scorching path.

The woman turned around and glared at Daisuke again.

“Is this… a trap?”

Daisuke mumbled this with caution, and the woman suddenly smiled—

Then her form burst and vanished.

Still readying his gun, Daisuke stood in place, shocked.

Even after the woman vanished the caterpillars didn’t seem like they were going to block the path into the hospital. They slithered on the ground as if avoiding that specific spot.

“Touko-san… I might be able to get underground.”

Putting a hand on the goggles, he informed his boss.

“Doesn’t look like it’ll last for long, though.”

He was able to avoid the caterpillars now, but there was an apparent time limit. They slowly came to narrow the road again.

“There’s no time. Give me an order.”

He could feel that his unseen superior was worried.

However, she apparently decided.

“—Approved.”

Goroumaru Touko gave him an order with a muffled voice.

“Blaze Class Rank 1 Kakkou. Sneak inside right away and check the situation.”

Daisuke wore a bitter smile. He started walking.

“Meaning, get inside there and clean it all up… what a bland order.”

“Can you do it?”

It might be a trap.

However, there was no choice but to move forward.

“I was simply thinking that you’re sounding like Haji.”

While mouthing the name of his previous East Central Branch Head—

Daisuke entered into the hospital.

4.02 Daisuke Part 12

The hospital’s interior was dominated and occupied by caterpillars as far as the eye could see. They wriggled on both ceiling and floor, making it seem like he was inside some huge beast.

Daisuke took the lone path without any caterpillars in it.

Walking, he could see a hole ahead. It appeared to be the elevator entrance, but perhaps due to the caterpillars, the door and the elevator body itself were crumbled rotten and became a mere cave.

“Meaning, I need to go down from here?”

Daisuke flung his body inside the hole.

The vertical hole became like a cave for growing caterpillars. Daisuke barely leapt over the remaining steel, diving deeper and deeper inside.

“…Entering’s fine and all, but it doesn’t look like I’ll be able to get out.”

Looking above, the hole Daisuke came through was being blocked by caterpillars.

“If this is a trap they’re inviting me inside here… is it meant to trap me along with the Central Headquarters? Well, managing to do would inflict a heavy blow to the SEPB’s fighting forces, but—”

How deep was he by now? He finally landed on the floor that appeared.

Raising his face, he saw as expected a corridor filled with caterpillars.

“So that’s what Shinpu is thinking?”

Kicking the floor, he rushed through the corridor.

The camouflaged entrance on the surface allowed him to reach the highest section of the Stronghold. It was mostly the area where Mushitsuki members lived, so it was the closest to the surface.

“I didn’t think the Original Three would act so humanlike…”

The Original Three were drawn by people’s dreams and ate them—

That was the answer that the SEPB, as well as Daisuke himself, had gained this far from experience.

Just like bees drawn to honey.

Just like moths to the flame.

These were such absolute instincts that it felt like they were born for this.

Was thinking this way a mistake?

“I have no proof that Central Headquarters is even safe. If they were all annihilated long ago, I’m just an idiot walking right into a trap—”

Seeing the corridor ahead, he smiled.

“—Looks like I wasn’t, though.”

Until now he could see nothing but caterpillars, but now there was a change to that.

They were blocked from going ahead at a certain point as if there was an invisible line drawn there.

“Looks like they’re safe for now.”

Ahead of him was a Mushi with a blurry outline.

It was a millipede, long and narrow, its body about 2 meters long with dozens of small legs.

That Mushi was familiar to Daisuke. There were about 5 millipedes and the caterpillars blocking the corridor couldn’t move ahead as though scared of them.

Passing through the boundary that the caterpillars couldn’t charge through, Daisuke approached the millipede.

“Tamamo. It’s me, let me through.”

The gigantic millipede crawled up Daisuke’s legs, bringing its fangs near his face. Looking into the eye of this Mushi that was green smoke given form caused the pit of Daisuke’s stomach to constrict.

It was a Mushi that controlled the sense of fear. He knew its host for a long time.

The millipede released him. Sliding noiselessly and separating from him, it opened the path.

“The situation really is severe…”

As he ran in the empty corridor, this time black mist stood to block his path.

As Daisuke approached, the mist coagulated midair, transforming to sharp claws.

“Kasuou.”

Responding to his voice, the claws stopped in place.

Behind the passing Daisuke, the black claws dispersed and became mist again.

Both Tamamo and Kasuou were elite combatants here in the Central Headquarters. For the two of them to directly spread this sort of defensive net meant they were in a huge predicament.

As he kept running ahead, he saw a door. The entrance to the residential area.

Daisuke stepped in front of it and the door opened.

“—”

Clamor greeted him.

It was a spacious hall.

Combatants clad in white coats—the Central Headquarters’ standard issued equipment—formed a defensive circle and surrounded Daisuke. Further around them many white coats turned eyes full of caution at him.

He could hear voices. “Is that really Kakkou…?” “Is there some path connected to the surface?” “How is he unhurt—“, all confused at the sudden visit from this Rank 1.

“—Is your body fine, Tamamo?”

Among the present white coats, there was a person wearing a different color. Beneath her coat she wore a miniskirt with a lamé and there were small wings on her back.

“Pfft, are you still stuck in the past, Kakkou-san? Ever since the Night of the Meteor Shower I can’t make any extreme movements, but I became really good at using my Mushi, y’know?”

The girl who said this while wearing an impish smile was the host of the millipede from before.

“Kasuou-san and the rest are inside, though.”

“Got it.”

Finishing this short conversation, Daisuke cut inside through the barrier of white coats.

While being directed with gazes of shock and fear by the members of Central Headquarters, he went through several doors—

“Are you the real deal?”

As Daisuke stepped into a new room, vivid azure eyes pierced through him.

It was a blond girl clad in a white coat. Members that looked to be her subordinates were following from behind.

“Because there’s recently been this faker called Mimic or somethin’ roaming around. And well, it’s an emergency anyhow. Gotta be careful.”

The girl clad in black mist, Kasuou, glared at Daisuke with exposed hostility. Her wild, beastlike murderous intent filled the room, striking even the members that were supposedly her allies.

“—Where’s Miguruma?”

Not even making any greeting regarding their reunion, Daisuke looked around the room.

“There’s something I need to ask that woman.”

“…Tch.”

Kasuou clicked her tongue, looking displeased. She erased the black mist standing in the room.

“Since you’re not even listenin’ to what I’m saying you gotta be the real one… how’dya even enter the Stronghold? Is there a place you can use to get out? If you’re here as reinforcement, where’re the other members?”

Although she was no longer cautious, Kasuou stayed blocking his path to the door that led further inside.

“It’s just me. I just wanted to check on things and came to the opening—and somehow managed to get inside. The exit’s already blocked by caterpillars though.”

“Huuuh? Are you an idiot?! That’s gotta be a trap! What were you thinking, getting captured here so easily like that? I’ll fucking kill you!”

“Where’s Miguruma? Is she dead?”

“Listen to what people are saying, you piece of shit! Look at my damn face! If that woman died I’d be cracking a huge smile right about now!”

The dangerous atmosphere made the surrounding members tense.

However, this was how Daisuke’s and Kasuou’s conversations were for a long time now.

“Let Kakkou through.”

A woman’s voice was heard from the goggles.

It wasn’t Goroumaru Touko. Now that he entered the Stronghold, he could hear the transmissions coming from the Central Headquarters.

“He is no fake.”

“…Ha, you were unconscious not too long ago but you seem to be back to yourself, our great Vice-Director.”

Spitting this, Kasuou stepped away from the door.

Daisuke tried passing next to Kasuou, but then stopped.

“What about Harukiyo?”

As he asked in a low voice, the blond girl grimaced.

“Don’t care. This’s what happened ‘cause he’s not here. Pathetic.”

“How much longer can you hold out?”

“Maybe five hours or so… we look so safe because of Nene’s regeneration ability. But she’s also approaching her limits.”

“…”

“It’s time to attack. We focused everything on defense so far, but in the unlikely case I’m done for, if we have you—”

“Don’t count on me.”

Kasuou widened her blue eyes and glared at Daisuke.

“I don’t know how much longer I can fight.”

Once another person heard of it, it would become irretrievable.

Kakkou was the SEPB’s last resort. Although most felt hatred to him, he knew that he also served as their mental pillar.

“…Piece of shit.”

Spitting this, Kasuou averted her eyes. Was she angry—or perhaps disappointed?

“Still haven’t fulfilled your promise to me, either.”

Daisuke stayed silent. He passed next to Kasuou.

A promise.

It wasn’t just Kasuou.

Daisuke still had other promises left unfulfilled—

“—So you came, Kakkou.”

As he passed through the door, that woman stood there.

The spacious room was gloomy, and several dozen boys and girls in white coats sat on the floor.

Facing machines that looked like computers were the Mushitsuki of the intelligence department. They were probably trying to revive the connection with the outside and checking how things were inside the base.

The woman in her late twenties standing in the center of the room faced Daisuke with a kind smile.

A smile that made whoever witnessed it feel both relieved and awed so they couldn’t move from the spot. The smile of shackles—

Daisuke had witnessed the moment it was born.

“Or should I say, welcome back? Because you have safely returned from ‘that world’.”

Daisuke removed his goggles. Revealing his face, he glared at the woman ahead.

“—Mikko.”

“It has been a decade since I was called that.”

Daisuke’s most hated woman in the world.

Special Environmental Preservation Bureau Vice-Director, Miguruma Yaeko, said this—

And then gestured as if she was making a cough.

4.03 Daisuke Part 13

“Come inside.”

Miguruma beckoned Daisuke to inside the neighboring room.

“How is the situation above ground?”

It was apparently a warehouse. A space with steel shelves was lit by emergency-use pale light.

“Please report the branches’ movements to me, Kakkou.”

Miguruma fiddled with the cans laid on the shelves. They were apparently already prepared to be besieged like this.

“…It’s only a matter of time before we can’t keep up with citizen evacuation. We also lack the firepower to deal with the Caterpillars. We need to think up of a plan for the branches to rescue the Central Headquarters from the Stronghold.”

Daisuke reported as the combatant Kakkou.

In front of him was the Vice-Director, Miguruma Yaeko.

There was no trace of Mikko he’d seen in the past world. —Or so he wanted to say, but now that he looked at her, her eyes and voice certainly had traces of Mikko.

“It will fail. The branches currently lack the power to break through this, and there’s no commander to get in contact with. —If we had your branch head it would’ve been different story, though.”

Miguruma grinned. Daisuke couldn’t understand what was so funny.

“Meaning that we can’t do anything?”

“I did not say this. I have an idea. However, strangely enough...”

Miguruma looked at him.

“Several of my strategies—involve the Rank 1s.”

“…”

“Already one of those is meaningless. You shouldn’t have come here, but instead gathered members on the surface. I told you this inside ‘that world’ as well, but you really are stupid.”

That world—

Meaning, the world of the past.

He already knew it from her words before.

Being dragged into that illusion wasn’t just Daisuke, but Miguruma as well, apparently.

Daisuke had shared seeing the moment the Original Three were born with the woman in front of him.

With Miguruma Yaeko—the masked girl called Mikko.

“I now know why I was so mad at that Mikko girl. Since she was actually Miguruma Yaeko it’s obvious. So you saw the same illusion as me?”

“Leaving aside what happened inside, I am your superior right now. If you strike me, I shall have to apprehend you for treason.”

“…Was what I saw there really the events of the past?”

“…More or less the truth.”

Miguruma played with the cans.

“My father was devoted in his research of the Undying and was spotted by the Round Table of the time. Although this research was far too heavy for my stupid father, I secretly continued it.”

“…”

“When my father noticed it, not only had he felt no gratitude, he even feared me and tried to have me killed. Therefore, to finish this delusion I took some test subjects to escape with—and then met those three.”

Those three.

Daisuke knew who she spoke of.

“Kii-kun, Rui… Kasshi.”

“Ichiku Kimitaka, Ichinokuro Ruisu, Kashua Artines.”

He knew about them.

First, Ichiku Kimitaka.

That name—belonged to the Central Headquarters Director of the SEPB.

He instead became a Director-General in name only, and even grasping an essential authority, he vanished from people’s eyes in recent years. Including Daisuke, only a very select few knew the reason for his disappearance.

“You obviously know Ichiku, but you have also met Ichinokuro Ruisu before, right, Kakkou?”

He obviously knew him.

Because that name also related to the decisive battle in the past. Above all else, the one with the actual connection—or rather being the nucleus of that fight—was Ichinokuro Ruisu’s lone daughter.

Although this battle had supposedly long passed, it was actually much older than that—

It had connection to the moment when everything started.

Since he came to know this truth, Daisuke was shocked.

“Kashua… perhaps even that name wasn’t his real one. Nowhere in the world is there any proof he had existed. People like him would infiltrate this country from time to time.”

A nameless boy from another country.

He didn’t know his true identity.

However, he was the first Fusion Type Mushitsuki.

When born, he fought to stop the change in the world, and in the end perished.

There were only very few of the Fusion Types, and they were always full of irregulars—and he was the very first of them.

“So back then—Mushi were born in the truest sense.”

At Daisuke’s question, Miguruma—

“Yes, exactly.”

Clearly nodded.

“There were signs of that. But even though it was an experiment that never should have succeeded… in that instant, even I don’t know what happened.”

Miguruma Yaeko wore the same smile she did when she was called Mikko.

Carefree.

A kind smell that looked as if blessed the world itself.

“So you—are the cause of everything.”

It was completely unconscious.

Daisuke suddenly noticed that he was aiming his gun at Miguruma.

He didn’t know the identity of the feeling storming inside him right now.

Was it anger?

Was it hatred?

Had he been turning them over in his mind until now when he could finally direct them at their source?

Or perhaps—were the many people he made into Fallen until now forcing him to do so?

“I am the cause?”

Miguruma erased her smile.

“Have you not seen what happened in that world and in that time with your very own eyes? Then why do you think so?”

“You ask me why? But you—”

“Yes, I was there. Is it because I stole my father’s research? Is it because my father started the research? Is it because Rui and the Round Table cooperated with the research? Is it because Kasshi wasn’t strong enough? Is it because the completely unrelated Kii-kun’s dream ended up killing Kasshi?”

He put strength into his finger on the trigger.

“How far, exactly? How far do we need to go to determine the so-called cause?”

If it was his previous self, he could push the trigger unhesitatingly.

No—that was wrong.

The past Daisuke wouldn’t begrudge the cause. He fought only to protect his dream, and didn’t care about anything else. His enemies were just the Original Three and he never pursued the reason of their birth.

“I will not deny that it is our fault that the world changed. However, I cannot agree with the word, cause.”

He knew it rationally.

Everything he saw in the world of the past went according to Mikko’s prophecy.

—Because of us, this country will be filled with Mushi and reach its end.

Everyone in that period of time became the cause for its change. If even one person missed, the journey connected to that prophecy would not reach its goal.

“—”

While knowing this, he couldn’t lower his gun.

Did something different from his own will did this to him?

Daisuke had seen more Mushitsuki collapse in the midst of their dream than anyone else.

While fighting longer than anyone, he carried their feelings.

That was the continuation of their dream—

Perhaps it could be called hatred.

Whatever emotion it may be, and despite Daisuke not being adequate to be carrying it—

“…!”

A faint noise and shaking passed through the Stronghold.

A small abnormality that he might’ve noticed because they were facing each other wordlessly. The sound was coming from above.

“So Diorestoi shook off his paralysis?”

Looking up the ceiling, Miguruma narrowed her eyes. Despite having a gun pointed at her, she was completely unmoving.

“So those caterpillars… are definitely Shinpu, then.”

Daisuke did not lower his gun.

“So after getting caught at the ship, Shinpu—Diorestoi—was hidden by the Central Headquarters?”

“The SEPB didn’t exist at the time. It’s the result of meddling by the government, calculations by the Round Table and all sorts of things. Apparently a body double left by Diorestoi kept going around, though.”

“…”

“You’re probably already aware of this, but the Annihilators are also test subjects who had a fragment of Diorestoi used on them. Because of that, when the main body got away from us, it stole back those fragments and we were easily made powerless.”

Miguruma easily revealed the truth which was top secret for many years now.

“…Did Diorestoi show me that illusion?”

“What would he gain from doing that?”

“…? Then, who—”

The Stronghold shook again.

The tremor this time was much more powerful, and the sound was approaching.

“Is it not obviously the cause for the mist isolating Akamaki City? That was a warning against me, and from you it sought salvation. —Even if I say this, you probably won’t understand that because you are slow on the uptake, Kakkou.”

I really wanna slap her again, he groaned in his heart.

Daisuke disliked the person called Miguruma Yaeko so much that he got unconsciously really angry in the world of the past.

“Since you are provisionally one of the Undying, please restrain yourself.”

Those words sounded like a joke.

Miguruma Yaeko was forever smiling, and even now she smiled, but still—

“—What did you just say?”

Those words were too heavy to ignore.

Undying.

He’d never miss these words that came out again and again during critical fights.

“You said that I’m—one of the Undying?”

“Did you think that being strong was the only condition to become Rank 1?”

Miguruma’s narrow eyes looked at the frozen Daisuke.

“One who never dies. That is what it means to be designated Rank 1.”

“…Then what about Rina!”

He shouted without thinking. It was so loud his own throat felt numb.

Unlike just before, he clearly realized.

He was about to press the trigger out of his own volition—

“She’s dead!”

“’Ladybird still lives in our hearts’.”

Perhaps to Miguruma, his swelling killing intent was nothing more than a breeze.

“Everyone in the resistance who inherited her will is saying such words. —Thank you, Kakkou. You have completed her being an Undying.”

He was speechless.

“Her brand of Undying—is a curse. Her existence as someone who was deified would trap people endlessly, never letting them free.”

This was ridiculous.

Was that really Undying?

“It’s not just Rina—even that girl’s who’s sleeping right now has nothing to do with this!”

The Rank 1 spear user who vanished in a great battle rose to his mind.

Not many survivors remained after that decisive battle that ended in complete failure, so the ones who knew her name were few.

“Rank 1 applies to her Mushi, in that case. Even after vanishing, it can return to life by changing its host—the only Mushi to do this is the Morpho butterfly alone.”

A Mushi that can return to life many times.

This irregular Mushi that became the driving force trying to retrieve a world without Mushi was even now in deep slumber.

“Harukiyo—”

“He is the burning flame. Regardless of his own will, he will keep using others as fuel to keep burning. Conclusively, he does not possess his own fate. Therefore, other people’s fates will keep him alight.”

“That’s… really a stretch.”

Daisuke spoke in a hoarse voice.

These were all convenient conclusions.

It wouldn’t be odd for any of the Rank 1s to die at any time.

He could assert it because it really was always like this with him—

“I… almost died many times.”

“And yet you lived.”

“I was on the verge on death many times! Especially when involved with the other Rank 1s, it was always like this—”

“Obviously. Because you are the Rank 1 that tests the other Rank 1s.”

Miguruma wore her kindest smile yet.

Like a mother—

A smile full of mercy, as if she was the one to give birth to him and raise him well.

“What—was that—”

“Did you not think it strange? The fact you were always there in every large battle.”

There was no way he hadn’t.

But that was natural, considering he was the strongest Mushitsuki in the SEPB—

“Only one person had been determined to be Rank 1 at a glance… all others were designated Rank 1 after they fought with you and survived. As a result, in the beginning you were only meant as a litmus test, but by continually surviving, I can now say this for certain.”

As she raised her lips in a grin, Miguruma Yaeko’s smile looked devilish.

“That you are a bona-fide Rank 1.”

No.

Him surviving was just a miracle.

However—there was something he thought.

At first, he captured Fuyuhotaru alone.

Next, he was sent to someone determined as a Rank 1 who was in Akamaki City, outside his jurisdiction.

There he fought Harukiyo, and, after experiencing a certain decisive battle, he returned to the East Central Branch and became Tachibana Rina’s monitor. Despite the fact that until then he served in the East Central Branch not as monitor but as a combatant.

It was only him who repeated battles to the death against Rank 1s again and again—

He noticed this truth.

“The goal of my research that I’ve worked for more than a decade on that day… no, even before that, lies in the path waiting for you.”

Sweat poured out on Daisuke’s hand grasping the pistol.

The person called Miguruma Yaeko worked for many long years.

She was using even those born outside her expectations, the Original Three and Mushitsuki.

All to uncover her desired goal of the Undying—

“You Mushitsuki are the result of the evolution leading to Undying.”

The sound heard from overhead and the tremors shaking the Stronghold became stronger and stronger.

The Stronghold was so violently shaken it was like an earthquake.

The door to the warehouse opened and the white coats spilled inside.

“Vice-Director! What on earth is this tremor…! Isn’t Shinpu doing some kind of atta—”

They were Mushitsuki from the intelligence department. Coming to get orders, they noticed Daisuke training a gun on their commander and became speechless.

“Please do not mind it. This is not the first time he’s threatened me with a gun.”

“…”

Daisuke’s gun still aimed at Miguruma, he stared at the intelligence department Mushitsuki.

Even if he killed Miguruma right here, he knew it wouldn’t solve anything.

However, his emotions didn’t allow him to lower his gun.

“B-but, Shinpu is still…”

“No, I also thought so at first—but that is likely mistaken.”

Daisuke’s gun twitched.

“Did the branches on the surface come to save us…?”

“Wasn’t it you who said they lacked the power to do so, Kakkou? No branch has Mushitsuki with the destructive power needed to come this deep underground so quickly.”

Then what on earth was going on?

Seeing Daisuke think frantically, Miguruma looked exasperated for an instant. It reminded him of the expression Mikko had as a girl.

“You really are slow on the uptake, Kakkou.”

Even if he was told so, he didn’t immediately understand the meaning of her words.

However—

“—”

A certain premonition pierced Daisuke’s from head to toes.

Raising his face, he looked at Miguruma.

“Haven’t I said so? To escape this predicament, we require the power of a Rank 1.”

Those words convinced him.

Turning on his heels, he pushed away the intelligence department and came back to the hall.

“Kasuou!”

Flying toward the tense-looking combatants, he shouted loud.

The blonde girl turned to him.

“I got it! Shinpu’s comin’ to attack! But to defend—”

“Dig up toward the surface!”

“…Huh?”

Silence engulfed the hall.

“Never mind defense! Everyone gather in this hall right now! We’re getting out!”

Kasuou looked puzzled, and Daisuke returned her glance.

However, perhaps reading something from his expression, she turned around and ordered the combatants.

“We’re getting out! Gather as many as possible in one place! I’ll protect you from the debris! Those who have attack power, focus on digging! Call back the support team right now!”

“B-but how much do you think it’ll take to reach the—”

“I don’t give a fuck! Just do it! I’ll kill you!”

The white coats obeyed this intimidating order, still confused. They hurriedly started moving and those combatants who were more powerful quickly gathered in the hall.

Kasuou spread her mist, spacing it to protect the white coats.

“Hey, Kakkou. You got an idea, yeah?”

“Help’s coming.”

As Daisuke trained his gun to the ceiling, Kasuou grinned. She issued orders.

“—Let’s do this shit!”

Daisuke’s gun fused with the checkered beetle spat hellfire.

It wasn’t just Daisuke.

The attacks made by the several dozen Mushitsuki had the strongest fire power, enough to bust through the ceiling.

Violent light and roars filled the Stronghold.

Ceiling broke and vanished and soon the hall became as wide and tall as a baseball stadium. All the falling earth and sand was diverted by the black mist into the corridors or the warehouse.

The space opened overhead became as large as a high-rise building—

Then, it transformed into a space that was nothing but darkness.

While continuing their attacks, some Mushitsuki dropped out. One and then two members fell to their knees, breathing raggedly.

“Not yet…! Or more like we’ll never reach out like this!”

“Just a bit more…!”

As Kasuou exhausted herself and was sweating, Daisuke also asserted while continuously firing his gun.

The vibrations shaking the Stronghold grew bigger and bigger.

“…!”

An especially large tremor assaulted the Stronghold.

This overly huge impact caused members to collapse and stop their attacks.

“Kuh…! What was that just now! Shinpu?”

“No, that’s not—”

Breathing hard, Daisuke raised his face.

The space which was only darkness had a small light floating in it.

No light from the surface would ever reach there.

That point of light looked like it was falling toward the Stronghold.

“Haa? The hell’s that—hey! Is this for real?!”

Falling from above—was a girl.

She was probably surprised at suddenly losing her footing like this. Eyes widened in fear, her face was pale and frozen with fear as she fell, and she looked quite exhausted.

“…!”

Daisuke caught that girl in his arms.

Even regardless of the fact his arms were strengthened, the girl’s body was light.

“—”

A moment of silence.

And—a scream ran through the Stronghold.

Supposedly exhausted members leapt back from the center of Daisuke and the girl at once.

“E-err, I…”

The girl wanted to speak toward the running members, but no one listened.

She was a small girl.

And, for the Mushitsuki of SEPB, her existence was in a sense much scarier than Shinpu.

“—I know.”

Daisuke nodded and lowered the girl to the ground.

“I know, so it’s fine.”

Seeing Daisuke alone remain calm, the girl looked confused. Daisuke—no, Kakkou—being in the HQ’s Stronghold was apparently outside her expectations.

However, the next moment, she smiled with a happy looking face that didn’t fit the occasion.

“Kakkou-san—”

She was the SEPB’s as well as Kakkou’s strongest archnemesis, leader of the resistance organization Mushibane—

“Let’s join forces this time.”

She was the girl called Fuyuhotaru, real name Anmoto Shiika.

4.04 Daisuke Part 14

The sound of the crying wind echoed in Daisuke’s ears as he quickly ascended through the darkness.

“You ain’t seriously joining forces with the SEPB, right?”

Kasuou’s low voice was instantly swallowed by the depths of the abyss.

“…”

Anmoto Shiika was silent. She probably exhausted her powers to dig down from the surface, so her breath was slightly raised and her face was pale.

“How many SEPB members do you think were done in by Mushibane?”

“Mushibane’s apparently tried changing after Lady Bird’s death. They don’t want to fight the SEPB anymore instead to join forces if the time to defeat the Original Three came…”

As Daisuke said this, Kasuou glared at him with her azure eyes.

Daisuke and everyone else were pushed up through the great hole connected to the surface by an unseen power at great speeds.

. It was Kasuou’s ability. Her Mushi, a mist with no corporeal body, took Daisuke and the Central Headquarters members together, elevating them toward the surface.

As she was holding up this outrageous weight, the burden on Kasuou was considerable.

“Kakkou. Why are you aware of Mushibane’s circumstances?”

“…”

It was something Daisuke heard from his sister, Kusuriya Chiharu. But he didn’t think Kasuou would approve if he explained this.

“We’re—”

Shiika turned to face Kasuou. Perhaps feeling dizzy, though, her body nearly fell.

Daisuke instantly reached out and gave Shiika his shoulder.

“Close your eyes. You should recover even a little of your stamina.”

“…Right.”

She bit her lips as if wanting to say something, but Shiika did as she was told.

The Underground Stronghold was at such depths that even a fast elevator would take quite a while to reach. Therefore, it was beyond imagination just how much Shiika had exhausted herself to be able to dig that far down all alone.

—Let’s meet again next Christmas.

The one who promised this wasn’t the Mushitsuki Kakkou.

It was the normal high schooler called Kusuriya Daisuke.

There was still time until their promise.

Since he vowed to take care of everything he had to do until now, he couldn’t yet reveal his identity to Shiika.

Now he would have Shiika close her eyes—

Daisuke would use the voice and behavior of Kakkou only with her.

“We have also defeated many of Mushibane.”

Miguruma Yaeko spoke calmly.

“And you should be aware of them recently restraining themselves from attacks on the SEPB as you are out on the frontlines. Am I right, Kasuou?”

“…Yeah.”

While rising up the great hole where no light reached, at the very top were Daisuke’s group. Daisuke, Shiika, Kasuou and Miguruma faced each other, while all other members were below them.

At this speed it seemed like it’d take some more time to reach the surface.

“I can’t believe Lady Bird’s gone like that. It’s boring, not having any competition.”

“I understand that this the wish of the new leader, Fuyuhotaru. Not fighting the SEPB but instead joining forces with us when the time to fight the Original Three comes—in order to show their sincerity in this, it’s natural for Mushibane to use this opportunity to save us here.”

Miguruma’s narrow eyes looked at the girl supported by Daisuke.

“To begin with, since I love her so much, this kind girl will obviously save me, right?”

Shiika grimaced, her eyes still closed.

Daisuke and Kasuou glared at Miguruma wordlessly.

Had she predicted this development or was she actually calling this love?

He really couldn’t understand that sly woman.

“Even so, it was outside my expectations that they’d be so slow. Is it that they lack the brains behind the operating like always… or perhaps there are people within Mushibane who, just like Kasuou, don’t wish for us to join forces.”

Kasuou clicked her tongue, looking displeased.

“What really pisses me off is that Fuyuhotaru’s here all alone. Are you underestimating us?”

“She is very powerful. Although it was unavoidable for her to act alone, in order to not hurt anyone, her comrades must have opposed that. Above all else because we are enemies.”

“So can you explain how come she’s so calm and relaxed here with us, when we’re enemies?”

Daisuke’s body stiffened.

Inside his arms now he could definitely feel the body heat and breath.

They were the same he once felt—every time Shiika was wounded and weak.

He first felt it when Daisuke had killed Shiika’s Mushi and turned her Fallen.

“Kakkou. You and Fuyuhotaru should’ve been archnemeses. Not just me but everyone thought so. —How come you haven’t been fighting even after exchanging glances like that?”

“No…”

Shiika opened her eyes a little.

“Kakkou-san has never been my enemy…”

“Huuuh?”

Kasuou was speechless. Shiika closed her eyes again.

“There’s no fucking way! The hell are you saying!”

If possible, he wanted to hug Shiika right now.

However, Daisuke did not have the right to do that right now.

Shiika did say he wasn’t her enemy—but that was a mistake. He was Shiika’s enemy.

It wasn’t yet certain that what Miguruma told him was the truth, but Daisuke and Shiika had met as enemies. As a result, he turned her into Fallen—

Made her think he was another person, and they reunited.

As a result, Daisuke was also the one who made her suffer again.

He wouldn’t show her another half-hearted hope again.

Until all the Original Three were killed and everything was solved—

He couldn’t reveal his identity to Shiika.

“Right now, I could definitely defeat Fuyuhotaru. Yes, that Fuyuhotaru.”

Kasuou glared at Daisuke. He glared back through the goggles.

“Beating the Original Three comes first.”

“…! You’re fucking kidding me! What’re you tryin’ to do, protecting Fuyuhotaru like that?!”

“…”

“Aren’t you supposed to be protecting the Rank 1 who’s still sleeping?!”

“That woman…?”

Shiika widened her eyes, looking up Daisuke’s face.

Miguruma also looked at him.

“…”

Daisuke consciously went expressionless and silent.

He wasn’t about to be trapped by a long gone past.

Until now—he just pretended to forget.

At the very least he had to keep it up in this situation where Miguruma Yaeko was right there.

He couldn’t let anyone know that the trump card he’d always been looking for was in the hands of the East Central Branch—

“I do not mind you sulking, but don’t let our speed fall down, Kasuou.”

Miguruma rebuked Kasuou who even now looked like she was about ready to bite her.

“Wha…! Who’s sulking, hey!”

“It’s because you always got along like siblings while you were at the Central Headquarters. I do not understand why you don’t like it when it seems like he has some shared secret with Fuyuhotaru.”

“Huh? As if! —Fuyuhotaru, you bitch! What’re you lookin’ at me for!”

“Au… I-I’m sorry.”

“No, I also don’t remember us getting along…”

He was helped by this change in subject.

However, he sighed at Kasuou seeming to be the hardest to pacify, when it happened.

“…Kakkou-san? Can you hear me?”

Once again, the familiar shrill voice came from Daisuke’s goggles.

It was Goroumaru Touko.

“Touko-san? Can you hear me?”

“Looks like you got close enough for communication.”

Miguruma had earphones with a microphone on her head, and Kasuou also equipped her goggles.

“I can hear you, loud and clear! Meaning, you have successfully escaped to the surface! Hearing that Fuyuhotaru was acting alone to dig into the ground, I really was at the edge of my seat! You didn’t fight, right? Are you getting along?”

“Yes, she has responded to my love.”

Miguruma spoke through the microphone. Touko could be heard gulping.

“Haa! T-that is Vice-Director Miguruma! I-I’m so glad you’re safe…?”

“Thank you. We will soon arrive to the surface along with 280 combatants. And with Fuyuhotaru who helped us.”

“T-that is the most important thing! We’re already approaching our limits… the caterpillars just keep on multiplying and soon our evacuation wouldn’t be able to keep up…!”

“Please connect me to the other branches. We no longer need to be rescued, so please pour out your efforts on encircling Shinpu and keeping victims under check, centered around the North Central Branch forces. However, all members of Rank 3 and above are to wait for the arrival of Central Headquarters. When we arrive at the surface, we’ll begin an annihilation operation.”

“I-I will connect you!”

“We shall reach the surface in a couple dozen more minutes. Can you do it, Kasuou?”

“Ah, Kasuou-san! It’s me, Goroumaru! It’s been a long while, I’ve been promoted to Acting Branch Head!”

“Shut up, die.”

The cussing Kasuou was clearly tired. She was probably trying to hold back her fatigue by being so angry before.

Ten more minutes passed as they headed to the surface.

“You’re fine, Kasuou?”

Even with Daisuke calling to her, Kasuou made no reply. She glared above her with dark circles under her eyes, focusing on the control her ability.

Shiika opened her mouth. She removed herself from Daisuke’s arms and stood up.

“Thank you very much, Kasuou-san.”

A point of light appeared overhead as the girl bowed.

Kasuou raised her middle finger, silent.

They accelerated toward the lights of the surface.

And finally—

“—!”

Daisuke and the rest were pushed above the hole with great momentum.

Riding the spurting mist like a great geyser, the white coats were all thrown to the ground one after another.

It was probably an effect of using too much power quickly. Kasuou who fainted and collapsed to the ground had Nene, a user of a regeneration ability, rush over to her.

“Great work, Kasuou.”

Along with Miguruma Yaeko who narrowed her eyes, the Mushitsuki looked around them on the surface.

Daisuke and the rest were all standing in the middle of Akamaki City.

Citizens had apparently already been evacuated. There wasn’t even a single car on the highway that had three lanes at each side, and the townscape supposed to have thousands of people move through it was empty.

Instead of the humans supposed to be there, controlling this surface were—

“This is…”

Daisuke and Shiika were speechless at the sight.

The great capital of Akamaki City was fully swallowed by the caterpillar swarm.

4.05 Daisuke Part 15

A dessert covered in pure white sand—

Daisuke felt as if he’d wandered into a completely different world.

However, that was wrong.

The swelling hills used to be buildings.

Covering this sight was not sand—but white caterpillars.

“We… can’t go back anymore.”

Daisuke mumbled.

Since damages were on this scale, it was impossible to hide the existence of Mushi not just from normal civilians, but even from people around the world.

The world was going to change again tomorrow.

It would become a world where everyone was aware of Mushi.

However, whether this meant there was hope or only despair—

Would be determined today by Daisuke and the other Mushitsuki’s fight.

“Central Headquarters will unfold a battle formation centered around the team made of Yakugami, Yotsuba, Tamamo and Toramaru.”

Miguruma Yaeko passed orders through the microphone.

The white coats that only just escaped the Stronghold formed lines with trained movements.

A voice echoed from the goggles.

“We will send 5 combatants from the North Central Branch. Orders, please.”

Mushitsuki with grey coats and visors appeared behind the white coats.

“We dispatch Sakura from West Central Branch.”

Yet another voice. A tall girl clad in jumper-style equipment joined the ranks.

“South Central Branch. …Since we have no members of Rank 3 or above, we will focus on minimizing the damages caused by Shinpu.”

The South Central Branch once had a team made of high-rank members. However, Daisuke recently heard that that team had been annihilated.

“E-East Central Branch sends Kaguya, Himiko and Kakkou!”

Daisuke felt the presence of people at his back. Clad in their pitch-black coats, Kaguya and Himiko—Ogata Akatsuki and Haji Senri—appeared.

Just as SEPB’s elites gathered, the caterpillar swarm pushed.

He could see Miguruma retreat along with some of the combatants.

“I will assume command of all branches and supervise damage prevention. Central Headquarters combatants as well as the high-ranking members of each branch are to quickly proceed with the operation to annihilate Shinpu. The one in command of this operation will be—”

Miguruma Yaeko’s voice echoed through the goggles.

“Kakkou.”

No one argued against it.

There was simply no other person with battle experience as abundant as his, as well as someone who could grasp the power of all branches, excluding branch heads.

“Also, we will add Mushibane to our current operation.”

In a distant place, a storm of steam blew.

On the rooftop where caterpillars were blown off several figures appeared.

It was the group centered around Shiika. Mushibane’s nucleus fighting power. Among them was also the figure of a woman who once belonged to East Central Branch.

“Namie—”

The woman who used to be his comrade exchanged glances with Daisuke. He already knew for a long time that she’d betrayed the SEPB and joined Mushibane.

“—Begin operation.”

Miguruma issued orders.

“North Central Branch. Secure this place.”

Daisuke put a hand to his goggles and ordered.

A Mushi as thin as paper took flight in air. Centered around Daisuke’s group, after this Mushi passed all caterpillars in the path were blown to smithereens.

The clouds filling the sky were dyed a reddish-brown.

Dark-red raindrops started softly raining.

The red rain became fiercer, and the caterpillars touched by it writhed in agony, melting and vanishing. The rain that dodged Daisuke and the rest gradually increased its vigor.

“Erect a barrier around us, Tamamo. Including where Mushibane are.”

“Got iiit!”

A giant swarm of green millipedes crawled on the ground. Fearing this circle of millipedes, the caterpillars stopped their advance.

“A mental attack’s coming. Terasu, defend.”

At the moment Daisuke ordered this, a change came to the upper sky. Space warped and the silhouette of an old building with a triangular roof floated there.

It was the Church.

And not just one.

More than ten Churches rang the rusty bells on their roofs.

However—

“So you’re still treatin’ us North Central Branch as throwaways, Kakkou, huh…! Sense Isolation!”

A great volume of noise that could numb the brain echoed throughout Akamaki City.

The ear-grating bell sounds were struck by the noise and dispersed.

SEPB combatants and Mushibane all prepared to attack the Churches overhead, thinking this was their chance.

“Don’t move!”

Daisuke shouted loud enough so it could reach even Mushibane.

The movements of the Mushitsuki about to act all stopped.

“This isn’t the main body. We can just let Kaguya attack for now. Handle it as you see fit.”

Daisuke had been fooled before as well.

He thought that destroying the Church meant that he’d defeated Shinpu.

However, the scene in front of them showed that it wasn’t really so. It was nothing more than a part of Shinpu, and his real body received no damage.

“Understood.”

Akatsuki’s voice came from behind.

A golden light dyed his sight. Countless laser beams launched in a fan spread pierced through the floating Churches one after another.

“—Alright, now we wait. Preserve our current position.”

“…!”

All combatants turned to look at Daisuke, surprised.

“Right now, it’s meaningless to randomly attack the caterpillars. —There’s about three people here with sensing abilities. For now, try and find out where Shinpu’s main body is hiding.”

Daisuke heard a gasp from straight behind him.

Haji Senri was also one person with sensing abilities.

“Despite the fact an entire city had been swallowed by the caterpillars… finding the main body among them…”

This absentminded voice appeared to belong to one of those sensers.

“Do it.”

He instantly shut off all arguments with a calm voice.

Among the SEPB, Daisuke was probably the least popular Mushitsuki.

He mercilessly annihilated his enemies, a demon that allies could never trust—

However, that was fine.

The important thing was for everyone there to unite under their fear toward him.

The Original Three would never get defeated by just one or two Mushitsuki.

Daisuke came to know this through his countless battles.

“Or do you want me to shoot you down before getting killed by Shinpu?”

All the breathing he heard through the goggles went back to silence.

Kakkou the tyrant.

Being hated did not make him suffer.

Daisuke feared all Mushitsuki there being annihilated.

Right now, if the Mushitsuki there were gone—it would probably be impossible to gather the Mushitsuki forces to oppose the original three.

“—Understood. Beginning search of Shinpu’s main body.”

From behind, he heard Haji Senri agreeing.

Although Senri obeyed, her look of anger that could scorch skin was still there.

But it was worth it in exchange for erasing the fear from Shinpu and banding all units together.

“Miguruma. Give us some information about Shinpu’s main body, no matter how little.”

“Right now, it is unknown what form he takes. His main body, or rather the human vessel he requires, can also use the ability of camouflage.”

Daisuke grimaced.

If he could hide within this many caterpillars and even alter his appearance, it was immensely annoying.

“At present it was the right call not to needlessly waste your powers. If we don’t defeat the main body first, we wouldn’t be able to decrease the caterpillars no matter how much we attacked.”

Miguruma’s words unexpectedly caused the combatants to falter.

They were told that as long as they couldn’t find the main body, what they did was meaningless.

For the Mushitsuki facing an overwhelming number of caterpillars, this was not good news.

“It’d be too hard if we restrict this just to sight… Konoha, for now, search the entirety of Akamaki City.”

“…Understood.”

There was an inevitable gap between them.

At some point Daisuke’s forces were surrounded by caterpillars from all directions, becoming completely isolated.

The red rain and unseen impacts only just barely stopped the caterpillars’ momentum. Even the barrier of millipedes protecting the combatants from the reduced numbers of caterpillars was shrinking by the minute.

More and more Churches appeared in air, but the noise cancelled their ringing, and shining lasers shot them down.

However, it was obvious to everyone at a glance that those were just a drop in the bucket.

They were like a lone island stuck in the middle of a raging, storming sea.

It was only a matter of time before their defensive net, growing weaker and weaker, was punched through.

“We can’t do this…! Let’s retreat and regain our position…!”

“I told you to wait, Terasu.”

Daisuke cut her off.

He knew at a glance they approached the limit.

The circle of millipedes gradually tightened around them and the combatants all started gathering around Daisuke who was in the middle.

As he looked up, Mushibane was also shaken. They were confused at SEPB not moving even a single step from the spot.

The only one who remained calm among Mushibane was Shiika.

While between the Mushitsuki engaging themselves in the counterattack against the caterpillars, she looked at Daisuke.

“I’m telling you it’s impossible…! At least get some branches to defend us…! Do you want to kill the North Central Branch?”

“Kakkou-san…! My millipedes are already…!”

“This is Konoha… even when I look at the entirety of the city, I can’t see anything relevant…”

The voices announcing their limits flew through the comm.

Even the combatants preserving their waiting state started clamoring. They couldn’t stand the pressure caused by their island shrinking within the space fully dominated by white.

“—Enough being scared already.”

Daisuke’s voice overlapped with the many complaints filling the comm.

“You should’ve been scared plenty until now. Of your own Mushi and other Mushitsuki’s Mushi. Because you became a Mushitsuki you suffered, you went through pain, and went through hard days. But you’re sick of it, right?”

Crossing his arms, Daisuke took an upright position.

Even now that he was being surrounded by caterpillars, he could vividly recall it.

The time he became Mushitsuki.

Since he became Mushitsuki he fought, got hurt, yet even so clung to life. They were these kinds of days.

It wasn’t just Daisuke. Everyone there was supposed to be the same.

“Part of the reason for that is right in front of you.”

All signs of agitation vanished from the comm.

“Now—is the time to be mad.”

Someone howled.

Daisuke didn’t know that voice. It might have been someone of Rank 3 or below from the Central Headquarters.

However, that howl, so full of anger, began to infect other Mushitsuki there—

“—!”

One after another their shouts overlapped.

The Mushitsuki’s voices became a tremor and even caused the pushing caterpillars to sway.

Perhaps there were even some cries mixed in there.

Everyone in this place—no, each and every Mushitsuki shared this shout as if their body was one.

And, just as the combatants’ morale reached its highest peak—

The curtain rose.

The sign for counterattack came with Haji Senri’s voice.

“—Found it! 20 kilometers to the southeast! A small ‘flame’ response moving the caterpillars is there!”

All of the Mushitsuki in the lone island turned to the same direction.

Daisuke leapt. He landed in front of the combatants.

He swung his glowing fist, fused with his checkered beetle, toward the great swarm of white caterpillars.

“All units—”

Daisuke’s attack blew the caterpillars blocking their sight to smithereens.

“Let’s gooo!”

The Mushitsuki’s anger, kept pent all this time—

Now exploded.

“—!”

Angry shouts and war cries shook the ground.

With Daisuke at the front cutting open the walls of caterpillars with his glowing fists, the angry Mushitsuki advanced through the streets of Akamaki City.

All kinds of Mushitsuki abilities blew the caterpillars away, and they were able to advance to a certain direction in a straight line.

“Kaguya! Yotsuba! Open up a road!”

“Roger that!”

Golden lasers mowed the caterpillars at the front. A large number leapt up, vanishing after being engulfed in flames created by explosions.

“Full power! Super-Poison Puuunch!”

A girl leapt even further than Daisuke. Carrying a red cross mark on her back, she struck her fist at a single caterpillar—

Then, all caterpillars they could see were spotted by black dots. The infected caterpillars burst from the inside, rotted, melted into a muddy liquid and vanished.

Their view opened up. Daisuke accelerated further.

“Don’t lag behind! If you get isolated you’ll die!”

The SEPB’s Mushitsuki rushed through the gaps in buildings or else leapt over them, rushing ahead as a single unit.

“—”

As he checked on Mushibane, they also rushed with their full power next to Daisuke’s group. Creating a circle around Shiika, the hairband boy who ran at the front blew the caterpillars away as they advanced.

“The main body’s still at the same spot, right!”

“Yes…! But it might have noticed our approach, and it’s getting away…!”

Senri’s voice had painful-sounding breaths mixed in it. It was surely hard on the sickly girl to run for such long distances. However, she voices no complaint.

It wasn’t just Senri.

No people lagged behind Daisuke.

Shinpu was right ahead of them.

There was no Mushitsuki in existence who couldn’t run at this time—

“Run! Ruuun!”

Daisuke’s shout brought the tremor-like howl again.

The place of where Senri had sensed Shinpu was displayed as a red dot on the goggles.

And that red dot—

Aligned with where Daisuke’s group currently was.

Senri shouted.

“We have arrived…! He should be hidden somewhere around…!”

Daisuke stopped. Following this the other combatants also came to a sudden stop.

Senri said he was nearby.

However, all he could see around him was caterpillars.

Shinpu was hiding among them—

“What a bother—we just have to annihilate all caterpillars we can see!”

At Daisuke’s order was exactly what the combatants wanted.

As if spewing out their pent anger, a simultaneous attack struck the caterpillars. Ear-grating sounds of impact overlapped, and all kinds of attacks combined, turning into a white glow that dyed their vision.

Seeing that the combatants were all out of breath, Daisuke raised his voice.

“Stop the attack!”

As the combined attacks stopped, the surrounding scenery instantly changed.

As far as they could see, all caterpillars in the area around them vanished.

Their attacks’ aftermath destroyed buildings, cracked the asphalt, and broken water pipes spouted water. City lights were broken and the remains of metal fragments that were probably cars spread around.

“What about Shinpu!”

Daisuke turned toward Senri, who was at the very back of the unit.

“His presence—”

Senri closed her eyes to concentrate—and gasped. Opening her eyes, she looked to a certain direction.

Daisuke followed Senri’s line of sight and noticed it.

In the shade of a power pole broken down to half its length, something moved.

“—”

His body moved before he could think.

His legs clad in a glowing pattern kicked the ground. Recoil caused the asphalt to cave in, and a green afterimage instantly drew toward the power pole.

As Daisuke went around the power pole in speed that even he couldn’t believe, he readied his pistol.

“Shinpu—”

A person clad in a tattered hoodie was sitting down.

The checkered beetle fused its jaw with the gun, and he turned the muzzle spitting tongues of hellfire to that person.

Daisuke knew his face.

He was Kasshi.

Although his skin rotted and his form was completely different, the form of the boy who journeyed with him in the world of the past was there.

“Did you really think I was going to hesitate from seeing this face, at this stage?”

The hatred toward the Original Three far overcame his pity for the first Fusion Type.

Daisuke widened his eyes and drew the trigger.

A bullet spreading explosive flames around blew the Kasshi-form Shinpu into smithereens.

“—”

The body beneath the neck was engulfed in fire and collapsed.

Trailing notes of this gunfire echoed throughout the desolate Akamaki City.

No one moved.

No one uttered a word.

The entire area was wrapped in silence.

“…”

Daisuke slowly lowered his arm.

They defeated one of the Original Three, Shinpu.

Someone convinced of this raised a whoop.

It was no illusion, and it definitely felt real.

Therefore—

“—!”

The fact he felt an inexplicable chill and turned around was nothing more than an intuition.

Captured in Daisuke’s eyes were the Mushitsuki moment before swelling in victory. Combatants of both SEPB and Mushibane smiled and looked back at Daisuke’s face.

However, Daisuke wasn’t looking at them.

“—Shiikaaa!”

Without thinking he shouted that name.

Everyone glared at Daisuke with surprised faces.

Even Shiika herself couldn’t understand why Daisuke—Kakkou—knew her name and stared at him.

Not even she herself had noticed.

Not even Mushibane who were next to Shiika to protect her noticed.

Only Daisuke noticed that faint presence.

“Ruuun!”

Right behind Shiika who was standing still—

Something was bobbing.

A bizarre figure was formed as if it came out of Shiika’s shadow.

Its face—was of the boy called Kasshi.

However, his skin was white like a doll’s and both his eyes were dyed in pitch black.

On his head he wore a small loop made of gold—a crown—and he was clad in an embroidered cloak.

“Thou have done well… to welcome me… thou, who possesses the qualification of the King…”

As the boy moved his mouth, a hoarse voice echoed from somewhere.

With that voice finally everyone noticed his presence.

Shiika also turned around—but it was already too late.

The sounds of a bell ear-grating enough to break one’s head open echoed.

At some point, the silhouette of a large building floated above everyone’s heads.

It wasn’t a Church.

It was much larger and decorated with sublime carvings—it was a Castle.

With the towering Castle high above his back, Shinpu raised a shrill laughter. It didn’t sound human; that voice was as sharp as needles piercing one’s eardrums.

“Anmoto Shiika… I bestow thee the honor of becoming my vessel.”

A childlike laughter and an old man-like hoarse voice.

Black miasma gushed out of the boy possessing these two conflicting voices. It invaded Shiika’s body through her mouth and ears.

None could resist, were they Shiika or Mushibane who were supposedly protecting her.

Daisuke was the same.

As he was watching, all signs of life vanished from Shiika’s eyes—and she turned to face him.

“Child of Aria Varei… among those who possess the qualification of a King, I have chosen not thee, but this lass. Thou should be able to understand the reason for this…”

Shinpu’s hoarse voice echoed.

Moving the mouth—was Anamoto Shiika.

Her somewhat immature face twisted into an evil smile and a golden crown appeared above her head. With a flap, a sublime cloak covered her back.

“Because she is much more feared as a King than thee…”

Kasshi’s body at the feet of the transformed Shiika suddenly deteriorated with great speed.

At the same time, Shinpu’s body burning near Daisuke became countless caterpillars. Apparently, what Daisuke shot down was no more than a decoy.

“Ah…”

This was bad.

It was only Shiika—

Out of anyone in this world, it was Shiika alone—

That Daisuke could never attack.

“Gaze upon my form and despair…”

The gun fell down from Daisuke’s arm.

It wasn’t just him.

Even Mushibane could do nothing but stand there, stunned. With faced full of disbelief they were unable to move a muscle.

On the other hand, the SEPB—couldn’t move either, as expected.

Originally, Fuyuhotaru was a symbol of fear for the SEPB.

Since she was overtaken by Shinpu, it was natural for them to lose their fighting spirits.

“Truly wonderful… this scent… it belongs to someone who trampled others, who stood on top of corpses more than anyone else… that is exactly the King’s vessel…”

A shrill, soprano laughter overlapped with a voice full of joy.

“—”

What happened next supposedly took only a moment.

However, to Daisuke’s eyes, he saw it clearly as if it was in slow motion.

It was the scenery of despair growing more and more.

The first to become prey were Mushibane.

The hairband boy reached toward Shiika but his arm was ripped from the shoulder and blew away.

What did this was a single flake of snow.

Snow kept increasing its vigor, one flake at a time—

And a blizzard blew with Shiika in its center.

No one in Mushibane could resist this blizzard of despair.

The boy who lost his arm was wrapped in the blizzard and was dyed in blood, raising death throes.

Namie, who used to be Daisuke’s comrade, exhausted upon seeing Shiika’s form—and she also became prey to the blizzard. Blood spurt from her entire body and she expired in a horrible state.

Seeing Mushibane’s member turn into nothing more than scraps of blood and meat, the SEPB finally regained their senses.

Using all power in their possession, they attacked the crowned girl.

However, it was sadly meaningless.

The snow of fear that twisted space itself shot down all attacks. Those who were nearby got swallowed by the blizzard one after another and expired, raising a bloodcurdling scream.

“…”

Daisuke watched that sight, absentminded.

Ah—

Ogata Akatsuki confronted it.

However, it was useless as expected.

The moment the laser beams touched the snow, they distorted and broke with a sound, or else an impossible phenomenon happened and they were shot back.

He saw the boy trying to protect Senri, and yet both of them were swallowed in the blizzard, spraying blood—

Something inside Daisuke broke down.

We lost again—

Until now he’d challenged the Original Three to decisive fights many times.

There was no one who fought them more than Daisuke.

And every time he fought, he tasted defeat.

However, now that was over.

Now the most important thing was taken from him.

Now it was over.

He would no longer fight or even lose ever again—he felt relief.

“—”

As a flake of snow fell on his chest, and while feeling an ear-grating sound breaking his body—

Daisuke.

Understood his death like he was an external observer.

4.06 The Others

No matter where he was.

No matter how much time passed.

He could smell the stench of rot at any time.

His country was ruled by a military dictatorship and civil war continued. The military was rotten and bribed, while the anti-government guerilla were no more than bandits.

The army and guerilla always targeted the weak.

Women, children, and the weak who had no weapons or money. They were extorted by the soldiers and had the source of their livelihood stolen by the guerilla. People without any shelter or food accounted for 80% of the residents.

That child was also another weakling.

Loitering around the corners of the capital, he would sleep next to those who starved to death. At that time the stench permeated his body, and there were times where he couldn’t tell whether he was dead or alive. That was why he hated corpses more than anything in this world, but he’d felt a bit safer sleeping next to a corpse while pretending to be one rather than alone, so he bore it.

One day, the army came for that child.

Since he was the dictator’s illegitimate child, he started living in the palace that day. The dictator’s more than ten legitimate children all died in a succession struggle.

Having now grown into a boy, the first thing he did was to erase all stench from the country.

Under the fake pretext of ending the civil war, he sent military forces to the slums and “purified” them. The dictator praised him for how he so mercilessly erased them, not leaving even a single survivor. He then took these slums that had no one living in them, erected churches in the name of mourning and gained the support of civilians.

However, the boy next attacked the town center, where the rich lived.

Then he built a church.

Churches where no one remained to pray.

When he then started indiscriminately butchering the guerilla, the dictator finally noticed.

The boy was trying to kill each and every person in the country—

The church was not for mourning. —It was a grave.

The dictator was mad, but he couldn’t punish the boy. He already had supporters that could be called worshippers, and the dictator couldn’t stop the rebellion by eliminating them.

Meanwhile, the boy wasn’t satisfied.

He couldn’t get what he really wanted.

The crown held by the dictator.

The symbol of a king who’d yield to no one.

He held the qualification.

Qualifications of the King.

Just like the boy saw with his own two eyes—it meant killing many people.

The boy became a youth and came to another country under the guise of studying abroad.

However, his father the dictator made a cruel deal with that country’s rich people.

—Do you wish to become Undying?

After being taken captive by someone, he was told this by a person in a white coat.

He then received all kinds of torture. The white coat man called those experiments, but the youth experienced the thin line between life and death many times. However, as he aspired to become king, he couldn’t die.

—Dream on.

A young woman would whisper this to him from time to time.

She was much scarier than even the white coats torturing him so absurdly.

She would look at him kindly with narrow eyes; a witch smiling like a saint.

—Keep dreaming your important dreams.

Those words let him live.

No matter how much he suffered and felt mentally cornered, her words made him not give up.

They wouldn’t let him die.

The dark, stagnant wish within him made him cling to life.

Wanting to become king one day and create an eternal world with no rot—

It happened when he attained this calm.

He saw a dream.

A dream where his dream came true.

All rot vanished from the world—and yet the narrow-eyed woman woke him from his slumber.

—It still hasn’t come true, right?

He fell into hell, and that despair and anger brought him back from the edge of death.

Much time passed since then.

Assaulted by an unknown impact and light, he died.

When he came back to life, he was no longer human.

The personality he had when alive vanished; his entire being was now bottomless desire that gathered and took on human form.

Although he attained freedom for a moment, he was soon enclosed again.

Once again, hellish times continued where he could do nothing but amass desire and hatred.

And then another salvation appeared.

A flash of light like the light he’d seen once saved him.

And now—

“I have… obtained the qualification of a King…”

He could feel it being filled by his desire.

Clad in a crown and a splendid cloak, he looked down at that scenery.

There was no sound.

No one moved.

There was only the familiar stench of death and the cruelly spread blood and flesh.

Once it would get erased by the fierce rain and he would never smell it again, even that rot was pleasant.

“I have… been saved…”

A calm smile rose to the girl’s young-looking face.

With her small legs she stepped on the corpses cut into upper and lower torso. One who was scorched fully black also possessed the qualification of a King, but now nothing remained of it.

The Castle floating overhead vanished.

The caterpillars controlling Akamaki City vanished, becoming grains of light.

The crown above the girl’s head vanished, as did the cloak.

“I am…”

In this world with dancing light particles, the girl was wrapped in relief.

Something was vanishing from within her.

Anger, hatred.

Admiration, Desire.

And—even bottomless power was scattering.

“Saved—”

There was the sound of whistling wind.

A severed electric cable spreading sparks moved by itself, wrapping around the girl’s legs.

“—GWOOOOOOOOOOOH!”

The girl’s face twisted in suffering.

Through the electric cable, a golden current surged through the girl’s entire body.

A pillar of pale-blue static electricity stabbed from the girl’s legs to the great sky. Tearing through the dark clouds, the pillar of light connected heaven and earth.

It was the same as the light that brought him back to life again and again.

The light that threw him to hell again and again.

“AAaaAAaaAAH—”

As the light vanished, the girl’s body trembled.

Sweat gushed out and tears overflowed. It was so painful because the girl’s body was human.

“AAaaaaAAAAAAAAAH!”

Around the screaming girl, the caterpillars that should have been gone were born. Just like an erupting volcano, from the gaps in debris welled out enough caterpillars to cover the skies, spreading all over the ruined city.

In the empty sky he could see a small crack being born.

A line of blood dripped from the girl’s bitten lips.

That line of blood soon evaporated, and that bright red color mixed with the miasma engulfing the girl—

Dyeing the miasma red.

—Did it still not come true?

The cracks growing larger in empty air, overlapped with the witch’s whispers.

That being’s wish.

That nightmare.

Had not yet come true.

As he recalled this despair, that being felt its own will being destroyed.

Right, this being continued many times.

He recalled his dream, made it come true, and yet was pulled back to a reality where it didn’t come true.

This repeated many, many times.

By that witch, and—those glowing fairy-like butterflies

However, there was already the limit.

“—”

The fissure born in air finally broke, and the world hiding the true form crumbled down.

What was there were the collapsed figures of the Mushitsuki in the town turned ruins.

However, there were no corpses.

“—Finally found you, shut-in bastard.”

Only one person standing with two legs on the ground was there. A boy readying a hockey stick.

“So, should I avenge Inuko?”

Pulled back to the world of reality, the person called Diorestoi lost his human personality forever.

4.07 Daisuke The Last

In the world dyed by the darkness called despair, a drop of light was born.

This dew slowly dripped down into the bottomless darkness.

The shining surface reflected someone’s face.

—Don’t give up on your dream.

Drip.

The bottom of the darkness was struck by the glowing dew.

A glowing puddle was born, split into many lines, and became cracks running through the darkness—

The sound of something hard being struck echoed.

“—!”

Daisuke opened his eyes. Noticing he was collapsed atop the debris, he hurriedly raised his body.

As he looked around him, he saw the other SEPB combatants rising just like him. Mushibane were the same.

“What…? What was I…?”

Shaking his head, he recalled what happened to him.

He led the front of the Mushitsuki and found Shinpu’s original body.

However, what Daisuke defeated was a mere decoy—

“…!”

Recalling what happened exactly before that, he turned back.

There was the form of a girl wearing a crown and a thick cloak. She opened her mouth wide, raising her voice in despair with screams of a shrill soprano voice.

She was floating inside a miasma as red as blood while her hair was fanned by the wind.

“Shiika—”

There were no traces of Anmoto Shiika in this screaming girl.

Right, that transformed girl had supposedly annihilated Daisuke and the rest. No one could resist the blizzard that destroyed all, and they all became lumps of meat—

“So it was an illusion—”

Someone was facing against Shinpu.

It was a boy shouldering a familiar hockey stick.

“I heard the SEPB’s got the strongest warrior, though.”

Still glaring at Shinpu, the boy spoke. Receiving the blowing red miasma, his jumper was fanned to the side. His handsome face had the color of anger.

“Looks like they’re not here, though. Can’t be among those who were annihilated by this child’s play.”

Annihilation—

He really did believe this result.

Until now this would never happen to Daisuke.

Even so, he was taken in by the illusion weaved by Shinpu—

Shiika was taken from him.

His biggest and lone weakness was targeted.

He’d been prepared for a mental attack, but never thought that Shinpu would use a decoy and then choose the perfect target to tip the scales between Daisuke and Shiika.

“I was caught in a trap…? Shinpu… did something so human—”

“Weren’t you aware how disgusting Shinpu was? —Still, something’s odd about him. For an instant his power grew so weak I was able to break his domain.”

Apparently he was saved by this boy. He grinned.

“Maybe he’d lowered his guard ‘cause the SEPB and Mushibane weren’t much of a challenge?”

“Does thou stand in my way…? O child of mine…”

The shrill soprano scream overlapped with this hoarse voice. While screaming, his body shivered and surged with the red miasma.

“Stop calling me your child, that’s super creepy.”

A large swarm of orange Autumn Darters flew out from this hockey stick-wielding boy.

“I’m Shiohara Shachito. —Shihidou Inuko’s boyfriend. Do take my name as souvenir when you go back to hell.”

The SEPB Mushitsuki all startled and looked at the boy calling himself Shachito.

Shishidou Inuko was a girl who served as a combat instructor in the SEPB. Among those here, Yotsuba, Tamamo, Yakugami, Sakura and other high-ranking Mushitsuki, including Haji Senri, were the students of the deceased Inuko.

“Wanko’s…”

Daisuke had met Shachito once before.

It was only for a brief moment, so in the end he couldn’t tell who he was.

But he could finally understand.

Well, him being her boyfriend was dubious, but even so—this boy was probably her last disciple. The unmistakable form of Inuko’s hockey stick served as proof for that.

—Those I’ve raised will one day fight alongside you.

His comrade in arms Inuko once told him that.

Her words were filled with such conviction as if she could see the future.

—I won’t allow you to monopolize all the fights to yourself anymore.

That was a prophecy.

The power of the new generation she spoke of had certain grown.

Right now, these were beside Daisuke in this decisive battle—

“It’s… no longer just my battle—”

He did nothing but fight and was trying to defeat the Original Three only to fulfill his promise to Shiika.

However, during that road he shouldered many burdens, had many things entrusted to him and the fight turned larger.

Daisuke was saved by the appearance of his unforgettable comrades in arms—

After the nightmare of an annihilation, many Mushitsuki stood with him now.

It was different from the past, where Daisuke would remain alone after every decisive fight.

—There’d definitely be a time where you couldn’t win alone.

His deceased friend’s will broke his pride and calmed his head.

“—SEPB!!!”

Daisuke wrung out a voice from the pit of his stomach.

The Mushitsuki who only just woke up from the illusion all raised their voices.

The checkered beetle landed on Daisuke’s shoulder. Its body split, became a glowing green pattern and fused with Daisuke.

“Shinpu—can’t use Fuyuhotaru’s powers!”

The combatants all clamored.

Daisuke looked up at the sky.

The Castle was incomparably larger than the Church—but that image vanished at some point.

“You’ve only controlled corpses this far, so you have your arms full with that girl. Right, Shinpu?”

He glared at Shinpu screaming and shuddering.

If he really used Shiika’s ability, he should have been able to wipe them all out.

However, Shinpu used a mental attack.

Why was that?

It meant—

“Thou all need to kneel… in front of thy King…”

A screaming voice and a hoarse voice.

Shinpu emitting two voices served as proof he still didn’t have Shiika under control yet.

“It’s because Fuyuhotaru’s still alive and resisting you.”

Shiika.

That girl, who was stronger than anyone.

Right now, she was fighting with Shinpu—

“Fix your formation! Seal Shinpu’s movements!”

At Daisuke’s order, the combatants of the SEPB all answered with a ground-raising voice.

“Namie! Leaving you in command of that side is fine, right!”

“Are you going to kill Fuyuhotaru, Kakkou?!”

Namie, member of Mushibane, shouted. Until last year she acted in a leading role under the East Central Branch, so she should be able to keep Mushibane united in Shiika’s stead.

“No!”

Daisuke and Shachito’s voice overlapped.

“If we hurt her body more than necessary, Fuyuhotaru might lose and become under Shinpu’s control. If that happens, he’ll probably steal her ability.”

“Oh, you sure are rational about this. I haven’t ever seen it, but everyone here being so scared of it means she’s quite something, eh?”

Daisuke and Shachito exchanged glances.

“If Fuyuhotaru becomes our enemy—I’ll beat her.”

“Okay. Meaning, if we get her back—this’s our victory.”

Exactly so.

That was why Shinpu had aimed not for Daisuke, but for Shiika.

“Focus on sealing his movements! If we do that—”

Daisuke strained his voice loud, glaring at Shinpu.

The combatants instantly followed his orders, readying themselves around Shinpu.

—Or so they should have.

However, everyone could do nothing but look at the crowned girl.

Smoothly and quickly.

There was nothing there anymore but a slight afterimage of the red miasma as it stretched a certain direction.

And then.

The form of the girl opening her mouth wide appeared floating right before Daisuke’s nose.

“Gah—”

With her whole body shaking and raising a shrill shout of agony, the girl’s hand buried itself into the pit of Daisuke’s stomach. The gushing red miasma stabbed Daisuke’s entire body and rampaged, trying to tear him apart.

He didn’t intend to lower his guard.

Shinpu’s movements were too weird.

Since he had Shiika’s physical body, it wasn’t like he turned his body to miasma and teleported around. It also wasn’t speed beyond the human eye.

Shinpu’s movements weaved between the gaps in humans. Since it floated within the miasma, it was impossible to read leg movements.

He would aim for the gaps in people’s hearts.

That was what Shinpu did best.

“…!”

If his body hadn’t been strengthened by his SEPB coat and the fusion with his Mushi, his stomach would’ve probably been gouged out. Daisuke’s body pounded against the ground, rebounded on the debris and blew away.

“Repent for thy sins…”

After eliminating Daisuke, Shinpu howled to the sky.

Trying to permeate the asphalt, a large number of caterpillars gushed out. These leapt high in the sky, then started falling down the combatants’ heads like rain.

“Halensis!”

Namie shouted.

One of Mushibane’s members, a long-haired black hair girl, reached toward the sky. The dung beetle on her fingertip swelled like a balloon.

Becoming large enough to cover the sky in an instant, the dung beetle opened its rubbery mouthpart. It swallowed all of the caterpillars and condensed them.

“I can’t eat… this much at once!”

“…! Shinpu is…!”

Everyone gasped at the hairband boy’s voice.

While their attention was caught by the caterpillars, the crown and cloak vanished.

“Over there!”

The SEPB combatants pointed on top of a building where only steel frames remained.

There they could see Shinpu shouting as though in song.

The Mushitsuki’s combined attack aimed for Shinpu. The storm of long-ranged attacks swallowed the girl along with the building.

“No…! Behind!”

All combatants turned to the completely opposite direction.

Riding the red miasma, the girl grabbed the necks of two combatants. They were swallowed by the miasma and fell powerless, hanging from her arms.

“Help—”

A shriek came from another angle.

Even there were combatants grabbed by Shinpu, swallowed by the red miasma and collapsing.

Floating here.

Floating there.

One after another, the combatants found the figure of the crowned Anmoto Shiika in their blind spots.

Soon the battlefield overflowed with screams.

Combatants were being felled by Shinpu who could possess multiple bodies at the same time.

“Is this some sorta whack-a-mole? Sorry, but—”

Orange flashed ran through the chaotic battlefield. He broke through while absorbing the Autumn Darters that came flying out of the debris around.

“The real one’s obvious! Since he emits such a strong forcefield!”

It was Shachito.

The swung hockey stick crushed Shinpu’s head—no, it couldn’t.

The red miasma became an invisible wall and protected the attack before it hit the girl’s head.

“—Hihah.”

Shachito wore a twisted smile.

The hockey stick glowed orange and Shinpu’s body sank into the asphalt. A tremor shook the ground and the girl’s legs pushed from above created a huge cave.

“Isn’t my ability heavy? Stay put for a short while.”

“…Senri! Can you do it?”

Staggering as he raised his body, Daisuke shouted.

Haji Senri knew what she had to do. She used her blind eyes to glare at Shinpu’s main body, forming the shape of a pistol with her thumb and index finger.

Her ability could see through unseen things and fry people’s untouchable interiors—

“Shoot!”

The fire pillar that gushed up with no advance warning engulfed Shinpu.

Swallowed by the fire, Shinpu raised his scream of agony even higher.

The girl’s flesh body rampaging inside the column of flames did not have a single burn on it. However, Senri’s ability should definitely be scorching only Shinpu who was hiding inside her.

“Retreat…”

Shinpu’s miasma swelled.

Flames and the hockey stick were blown away. Shinpu rode the miasma’s flow, weaving his way through the combatants and moving.

Shinpu instantly approached Senri and reached for her throat—

“I won’t let you lay a single finger on her.”

Along with this voice of calm fury, golden lasers rained down.

Heat rays launched by Akatsuki’s mayfly attacked Senri’s surroundings, not leaving a single gap.

Holes were punched into the asphalt and Shinpu’s approach was stopped. He was caught by a single thick laser and broke down.

“I knew it, one shot’s not enough!”

Along with an orange glow, Shachito teleported right next to Shinpu. He swung his hockey stick down again, but as if saying he wasn’t about to fall for it again, Shinpu dodged the attack by leaping into air.

Shachito and Shinpu’s game of tag started.

Shinpu moved around and Shachito teleported after him.

Meanwhile, the other combatants had their hands full fighting the clones. Although these were just clones, the only ones able to oppose them were pretty much only SEPB’s high-ranked Mushitsuki as well as Mushibane’s hairband boy and Namie. Lower ranked members just became prey one after another, collapsing.

“Senri! How many shots do you need until Shinpu weakens?”

At Daisuke’s question, Senri bit her lips. Her sweaty face was wrought with a grimace.

“I shot him with my full power but it didn’t weaken him much…!”

“How many shots!”

“…A lot!”

Hearing Senri’s shout of pain, Daisuke kicked the ground.

If one or two shots didn’t work, he’d attack until they did.

Blocking Shinpu’s speedy advance, Daisuke swung his fist.

However, the green arc cut through air.

Weaving through the attack and coming from behind him, Shinpu kicked Daisuke’s temple.

“Augh…!”

Blown away, Daisuke rolled and hit the other combatants.

“Guh…!”

“Hey, you. You’re a burden right now. Can’t you just stay in place?”

As he raised his body with a grimace, Shachito was next to him.

“Dunno who you are, but why’s a weakling like you leading the SEPB?”

Leaving a sigh, the boy with a hockey stick vanished.

A burden—

Shachito was right.

The price for fighting all these years ate at his body and mind. That heavy coldness dragged his legs like shackles.

“Kaguya, Yakugami, Sakura…! You all need to preserve your powers…!”

While breathing laboriously, he ordered through his goggles.

“No. I’m not about to stop protecting Senri.”

“Haa, you really cause us nothing but trouble.”

“Well, there’s nothing for me to do in the current situation regardless.”

Three opinions of three people came. At least Daisuke’s will was passed, supposedly.

Shinpu’s entire body shook and he raised a scream that pierced the air.

The red miasma blew away all Mushitsuki around, including Shachito. At the feet of both real body and clones there were black puddles of water, and the next moment these dark stains permeated everything around.

Not just the ground.

These dark stains spread even into the sky, and Daisuke and the rest were all assaulted by a sensation like falling.

Caterpillars gushed out of the ground, and a line of white stones—gravestones—appeared one after another.

“This is bad, we’ll get swallowed by his territory…! Namie! Terasu! Yotsuba—”

“Can’t you learn anything!”

Shachito pounded his orange-glowing hockey stick on the ground.

A moment before the ground and sky were both fully dyed, the black stain had a straight crack running through it.

“He really is the boss of Special Types…!”

“Territory Isolation!”

“Healing Punch!”

A common albatross butterfly burning in white glow.

Noise that could scramble one’s mind.

The fist of the red cross girl pounding the ground.

The world about to get engulfed in darkness and gravestones was smashed into smithereens.

“How impudent…”

Accumulating hatred, Diorestoi became much stronger than he was when born.

However, the same went for the Mushitsuki.

Fighting amongst themselves for many years, their Mushi powers were developed, they trained and became stronger.

All in order to keep fighting and surviving—

“Shoot!”

Senri did not miss this opening where his own world was being destroyed.

The erupting flames made Shinpu scream even louder.

However, they weren’t the only ones to use this opening.

“—Gaha!”

A girl wearing a grey coat and the girl with a red cross raised groans of pain at the same time.

North Central Branch Terasu and Central Headquarters Yotsuba. Several Shinpu clones clung to them, and they were both being fully swallowed by the red miasma. They both collapsed and were unmoving.

Using the main body as bait, he defeated two high-ranking combatants at the same time.

The Mushitsuki began being shaken—

“Don’t falter!”

Daisuke barked.

“This is that kind of fight. Only one here—us or the Original Three—can survive.”

They all knew that.

They never had the kind of optimistic thinking that there were would be no victims.

“We’re here to win.”

Here to win.

Before, in battles he would say this, they always ended as huge losses.

Therefore, he faced Shinpu this time to never lose again.

And Daisuke wasn’t the only one to embrace these feelings.

“Shoot!”

Senri piled more attacks.

The ground about to lower was blown back up. Combatants grew excited, eliminating the clones.

“…!”

Daisuke strained his face.

Shinpu’s eyes floating within the flames glared at Daisuke.

The next moment, Shinpu escaped the fire pillar and leapt into Daisuke’s chest.

“…!”

Anmoto Shiika’s slim, small palms stabbed up Daisuke’s chest. Unable to even let out a voice, his legs floated off the ground, and next his head was kicked down by slender feet.

Pounded against the ground, bones raised shrieks from all of Daisuke’s body. Perhaps he hurt his lung, as a spray of blood gushed out of his mouth.

“Kaha!”

“Thou art an eyesore, child of Aria Varei… foolish one who erases fear toward me…”

Whether from Shinpu’s rage, or else Shiika’s rejection at him having struck Daisuke—

The crowned girl repeating the attacks screamed even more shrilly.

“You ignoring me? How cold!”

“Shoot!”

Shachito’s teleporting hockey stick sealed Shinpu’s movements and Senri’s flames attacked him.

However, Shinpu’s attacks did not stop. While scattering the fire, he pounded Daisuke’s head against the ground with a heel, stepping on him.

“Wha…!”

Shachito looked confused.

As Daisuke rolled on the ground, gushing caterpillars covered him. Shinpu reached and let the red miasma wrap Daisuke.

“Gwaaah…!”

An unseen force was crushing Daisuke. At the same time he was also assaulted by a contradictory pain of his insides being wrecked as though exploding.

“Why do you hold a grudge against this guy!”

Shinpu’s arm was struck by Shachito’s hockey stick.

“Shoot!”

A fire pillar enveloped Shinpu.

However, Shinpu didn’t even turn to face Shachito or Senri. He put strength in the arm choking Daisuke.

“Also, why doesn’t anyone try to save him? What’s up with you!”

The answer to that question was simple.

Because Daisuke was Kakkou.

For all Mushitsuki, Rank 1 Kakkou was nothing more than target for fear and hatred.

None of them intended to protect him.

Until now, no one—including the Original Three—had managed to kill him.

All Mushitsuki there knew that.

Although created by fear and hatred—it was also a kind of trust.

“Fear me… if thou fear me, everyone will, too…”

While both were grimacing, Daisuke and Shinpu glared at each other from up-close.

Their connection did not start now.

The enmity between a Fusion Type Mushitsuki and the Original Three—had continued since the very moment it started.

As Daisuke had seen the last moments of Kasshi, the first Fusion Type, he knew this.

“I shall destroy any and all children of Aria Varei…”

Shinpu pounded Daisuke against the distant debris.

“Gwah…!”

Caterpillars gushing from the ground clung to his body to seal his movements.

Trying to use this momentum to attack, Shinpu nimbly moved toward Daisuke.

“—I can finally read your route.”

Something white wrapped around Shinpu.

As Daisuke dizzily raised his head, he felt moisture on his cheeks.

That was condensed steam.

“If you’re able to aim at one person, then I can aim as well.”

It was one of Mushibane’s members, the hairband boy. He reached toward Shinpu, rubbing his middle finger and thumb together in a click.

A storm of sphere-shaped steam repeatedly condensed and decompressed.

Pushing back the red miasma trying to run away, it sealed Shinpu.

“Thou art an eyesore…”

Senri used that moment to add attacks of her own.

“Shoot! Shoot!”

Unable to stand, Shinpu’s body was blown back. A great number of caterpillars was birthed from inside his cloak, blown away by the difference in mass induced by the steam and flames.

“My foolish children—”

Shinpu faced to the side, glaring at the hairband boy with hatred.

The boy wore a smile.

And not just him.

Namie and the rest of Mushibane and even the SEPB combatants breathing laboriously were all grinning.

Shinpu’s movements completely stopped.

“…!”

By the time he realized this and turned around, it was already too late.

Escaping the caterpillar bindings and sneaking behind Shinpu with both arms stretched was Daisuke.

“You let your eyes off of me, Shinpu.”

He closed his arms.

He applied the strength of both body and soul.

He was hugging Shinpu’s thin body.

Even if he died, he didn’t intend to let go.

“How dare thee touch me, thou insolent fool—”

Being hugged by frightening strength, Shinpu raised a shrill scream.

“Shoot! Shoot! Shoot! Shoot!”

Senri’s flames obviously engulfed Daisuke along with Shinpu.

They weren’t hot.

However, the red miasma was rampaging, trying to rip Daisuke off. With the outside of his body being attacked as well, the feeling of his limbs and his spirits was paralyzed.

“Shoot! Shoot! Shoot!”

“Ngh—”

Daisuke could see that face of suffering shrieking in soprano.

He knew that Shiika was suffering.

“Shoot! Shoot!”

Being eaten by the red miasma, blood gushed out of Daisuke’s entire body.

However, he could withstand it.

Because he wasn’t alone.

Shiika was in his arms.

He could withstand any sort of pain as long as he was with her.

Just like how they kept supporting each other and lived until now—

“Sorry…”

Moving his blood-filled mouth, Daisuke whispered.

“I could never properly save you…”

Shinpu opened his mouth wide, raising a shrill howl toward the sky.

The surroundings instantly turned gloomy.

Tearing through the dark clouds covering the sky, a sublime structure floated there.

The medium of Shinpu’s ability—a Castle.

The Castle brought shockwaves produced by ringing bells, assaulting Akamaki City. The remaining buildings in the city turned ruins were fanned by explosive wind and blew away.

As heaven and earth trembled and even the distinction between reality and illusion was destroyed by the ringing bells—

“Yakugamiii!”

At Daisuke’s signal, a combatant with a strange form stepped ahead.

He waited for this moment.

For the Original Three, their ability’s medium—was also their weakness.

“I don’t really want to touch that, though.”

A man wearing a tattered, rusted coat, Yakugami, swung his arms wide. In his hand he held, as expected, a great rusty scythe.

The rusted scythe swung in a direct line toward the sky.

As it did, gigantic chains appeared from air.

Each about as thick as a person, these chains wrapped around the Castle like snakes.

“…!”

Shinpu’s body spasmed, leaping from within Daisuke’s arms.

It happened gradually.

Anything touched by the chains accumulated rust. In the blink of an eye it spread all over the Castle, covering its surface.

Being covered by rust, the Castle turned real.

And they had a person who could destroy anything as long as it could be touched.

Daisuke howled.

“Sakura!”

“Can someone give me a lift?”

Behind the jumper suited Sakura appeared a braided girl who was apparently a member of Mushibane. The two girls then became dust and vanished.

The next instant, Sakura and the girl appeared on the Castle’s zenith—on top of the bell rusted shut.

A small scarab beetle landed on the tip of the hand hammer swung by Sakura.

“Eat this.”

The hammer struck the bell.

“—!”

The Castle exploded from the inside. It was breaking apart—

“Kaguya!”

“I know!”

Golden lasers rained down.

The fragments broken to smithereens were scorched by these heat rays and evaporated.

“Shoooot!”

Senri’s full-powered flame struck Shinpu capturing Daisuke.

“—OOOOoooOOOooOOOOH!”

The red miasma swelled.

Gushing out of Anmoto Shiika’s body, it slipped out of Daisuke’s arms and spread over Akamaki City.

Losing the medium of his ability, he probably thought that he couldn’t escape from Daisuke and the rest unless he did this.

Inside Daisuke’s arms, Anmoto Shiika’s head slumped.

Her expression finally regained its calm.

A bit of body warmth and her breath were reborn in his arms.

“Shiika…”

This time Daisuke hugged the released girl kindly.

Torn caterpillars poured from above.

The red miasma spreading in the Akamaki City sky became a rain of caterpillars, filling the ruins.

These all gathered and piled on one another—

Turning into three gigantic caterpillars.

Their body separated into many segments and sprouting countless, sharp legs—they were larger than any building that existed on earth. Not even piling several dome stadiums on one another would be enough to contain them.

“This is… Shinpu?”

Looking up the giant caterpillars, someone groaned.

As the Mushitsuki all stood in place shocked, the caterpillar began moving toward them. They came crushing the surroundings building, lowering their bodies to crush their opponents on the surface—

A large earthquake shook Akamaki City.

One of the caterpillars’ body greatly distorted.

It sank into the ground, raising creaking sounds, as if crushed by something even larger. Waterfalls of body fluids fell from the torn body.

“OOOOOOOOoooooOOOOOOOHHHH!”

He seemed to have moved there at some point.

Teleporting on top of the caterpillar, Shiohara Shachito struck it with the hockey stick. Orange Autumn Darters flying from all over Akamaki City gathered in his stick.

Apparently his ability was the control of mass.

The weight gathered from every place in the city distorted the point where the hockey stick touched the caterpillar. This orange glow emitted electrical discharges, and as Shachito needed to control the surplus power with his human hands, blood dripped from his nose and mouth. Unable to fully defend against it, the power’s recoil tore his body.

Although he’d seen an opponent of a completely different league, he hadn’t faltered.

He hadn’t hesitated either.

Rather, this form—which even included a smile—was that of a warrior.

Seeing Shachito like this, the other Mushitsuki also changed their expressions.

Each one howled, and they began a combined attack on the other caterpillars.

The second caterpillar had its body shaved little by little.

And the remaining one—

“…! You… stay back…!”

He heard Shachito shouting while puking blood.

“—It’s fine already.”

The one standing to intercept the final enemy was Daisuke.

Glancing at Shiika who he left lying in a distant place, he relaxed his expression.

“Just coming all the way here is enough…”

“What are you talking about…! Don’t just give up like that!”

Shachito yelled with anger, but he ignored him.

Daisuke looked up the giant caterpillar.

From where he was standing, it looked nothing more than a white, curved wall. That wall moved to crush Daisuke.

After several battles, they managed to corner Shinpu like this.

Daisuke managed to survive here not thanks to his powers alone.

He knew that well right now.

“It was thanks to you…”

The smiling Daisuke’s fist cut through air.

It wasn’t just the Mushitsuki here.

The wishes, feelings, pains and hatred of those who fell in battle—were all inside Daisuke.

Therefore.

He didn’t hesitate to pour out his entire remaining power into this.

Even if Daisuke’s battle ended here—he had no regrets.

“—Thanks to you, I’ve preserved my power.”

The white wall vanished from Daisuke’s sight.

The body of the caterpillar pursuing him was snapped in half.

With a moment’s delay—a tremor and a shockwave shook the surface, and the asphalt at his feet caved in. The caterpillar’s head burst and the fountain of body fluids rained on the entire city.

All that was caused by Daisuke’s fist.

Epilogue: Go to war

“—”

All Mushitsuki including Shachito were speechless, witnessing that.

“Curse you… Aria Varei’s—”

“Don’t call me that.”

Green glow surged all over Daisuke’s body. With afterimages of green lights welling out from the pattern on his body, he slowly advanced.

The caterpillar that had part of its head crushed used the recoil to once again try and cover Daisuke.

Daisuke used his body as a spring, sweeping it aside with his entire body’s strength.

About tenth of the caterpillar’s body was destroyed. A tidal wave of body fluids knocked down buildings.

“I’m Kakkou.”

The strongest Rank 1, Kakkou—

That was Daisuke.

With his fist thrust out in another immediate attack, he turned yet another tenth to foul liquids.

While his own blood mixed with the caterpillar’s body fluids, Daisuke charged. Every time he swung his fist, its tip shaved off the caterpillar’s body.

At the same time—

He could also feel something important inside him being burned away and vanish.

Among the memories of his many fights, there were also some fun memories.

“I’m—”

Kusuriya Daisuke.

He was someone who could be found anywhere, merely turning into a Mushitsuki from time to time.

If he used his entire power right here, he knew he would lose many things.

However, he had no other choice but advance, full speed ahead.

Otherwise, the Mushitsuki he’d finished off by his own hands would never forgive him.

Also—

His own dream didn’t allow it.

“—”

Daisuke readied his gun.

He felt his power and feelings gathering in the muzzle.

The battle of Mushitsuki would surely continue, however—

Dreaming of what lay ahead, he couldn’t stop in place.

Hellfire burning in bright red filled his sight.

A roaring strike swallowed the giant caterpillar.

The recoiling wind blew away the debris on the surface. Its momentum remained even after erasing the caterpillar, piercing the sky in the form of a fire pillar.

Burning everything up to the very last fragment, the gigantic caterpillar vanished without trace.

“…”

Along with remains of that bombardment, the green glow covering Daisuke’s body dispersed.

By erasing one caterpillar, the remaining two had their bodies crumble.

Thinking they’d vanish like this—they became a swarm of small caterpillars and pushed against Daisuke.

As if trying to take him along with them.

As if trying to cover him in the hatred they felt.

The large swarm of caterpillars pursued Daisuke at once.

However, he didn’t even see them.

Already unable to move a single finger, what he saw as his body slowly tilted—

“—!”

Was the face of a girl who rushed to him, shouting something.

Shedding tears, Anmoto Shiika grabbed Daisuke.

The two Mushitsuki were swallowed by the swarm of caterpillars.

And—

A blizzard blew.

A warm, beautiful white filled his sight.

The blowing snow purged everything.

Shiika and Daisuke.

Other than the hugging pair, this world allowed no one else.

Caterpillars broke down, were crushed, or melted, ripped, warped, and were erased from this world one after another.

He couldn’t hear their death throes.

Instead, he could feel himself being hugged by the cruel, merciless, cold snow as the swirl of hatred around vanished.

Those were—the last moments of Shinpu.

Remnants of the red miasma were melted into the blizzard and vanished.

“Kakkou-kun…”

As the battle finished and the space became soundless ruins, he heard Shiika’s whisper.

She was crying.

And warm.

Both her arms and the tears she shed on his cheeks were warm.

“When I… saw Shinpu’s insides… I realized… what would happen if we Mushitsuki made our dreams come true…”

Right, it was late, but he recalled.

Right now, the one Shiika was hugging was Kakkou.

His only regret was that he hadn’t taken off his goggles if it came to this anyway.

“No… maybe I already knew it… from when I ran away with Yuu-chan and Ubuki and saw that disk…”

He could see the surviving Mushitsuki rush toward them.

Let us be alone for a little—

As he thought this, a golden light filled his sight.

“—!”

It was a pillar of light.

He couldn’t describe it any other way.

The caterpillar corpses were also engulfed in light, sucked into it as if melting and vanished.

Crackle, the surface burst—was that an electrical current?

“What was that just now…?”

With the puzzled-looking Shachito in the front, the Mushitsuki all rushed to Daisuke and Shiika.

However, he—

Was unable to welcome his comrades.

“Kakkou-kun…?”

Shiika’s face wet from her tears now froze.

Daisuke.

Kakkou.

Slowly closed his eyes.

“Kakkou…kun…?”

Other than Shiika, everyone in the ruins of this battlefield that spoke of nothing, suddenly heard a voice through their goggles.

“A job well done, everyone.”

It was Miguruma Yaeko.

“As you have presently succeeded in the recapture of Akamaki City, the Special Environmental Preservation Bureau will now move onto the next mission.”

The Mushitsuki all froze.

At this exhausted and hurt battlefield echoed this calm voice.

“We will commence the annihilation of the Mushitsuki responsible for the mist isolating Akamaki City, for releasing Shinpu, and also for absorbing the Original Three and trying to fuse them, namely—”

The SEPB’s Vice-Director, as well as the woman who held the secrets of Mushi—

“Ultra Class Rank 1, C.”

Announced the entry into the final battle.

Afterword

Hello, this is Iwai Kyouhei.

Some time has passed yet again, but I somehow completed the 11th volume.

In this volume, almost all characters (including ones from the Bug series) revealed their true selves… or so I meant it to be.

All that remains is for each of them to reach their own end.

The story is entering its climax, so now they should be challenging the final battles.

While shouting and getting injured in this fight, they will all look for the exit.

Just like always, allow me to talk a little about this volume.

This is a warning to those of you reading from the afterword.

While writing this story, I came to realize that I like depicting a person changing. I was somewhat aware of it, but let me say this again.

People don’t change.

People can change.

I believe you can argue differently based on which of these sides you support.

Personally, I believe it’s natural even for the same person to change between the past and the present, and I also showed it in my work.

If that change is good you can call it growth, and if it’s not desirable it can lead to agony.

However, any change needs an opportunity, and at times that very opportunity itself is shocking enough to dominate this change.

Thinking like this, rather than the change itself, I even have the feeling that it’s the opportunity that’s important.

Even if you wish for change in the form of become something, an opportunity might not allow you that.

It mostly happens through random events, and what’s even worse is that everyone encounters this sort of thing at least once.

How you are right now was definitely changed by an opportunity from “back then”.

Meeting someone, parting from someone, changing your environment; these kinds of opportunities. It might be amusing if you recalled them and tried to compare your past and current self.

If you do this, you might come to realize how you wanted to be in the future and your potential for the future.

If we name this a dream, then it’s the opportunity leading to that change that’s important in this story.

A change, and its opportunity.

I believe there’s no doubt that it is actually those large things that will bring the story’s conclusion.

As always, many people have helped me to continue this story.

There are the editor and the editorial department, always patient with such a slow-writing author, as well as llo-san, always providing wonderful illustrations despite the frequent need for revisions.

And you, the readers. By hearing that you wished for a continuation, I was able to continue like this. Thanks to the voices of those curious about the conclusion, I believe I can finish writing it.

Thank you so much.

I have written some other works and wish for new experiences this year as well, and that’s undoubtedly the influence of Mushi Uta.

On top of attaining further growth and change, I want to write the best conclusion possible.

Look forward to it.

Iwai Kyouhei

Notes

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