Bright city lights streaked past outside the window, drawing lines across the glass.
The reflection in the window showed Eto flipping through a stack of documents.
"...Is this for real?"
After reading everything Hitokawa had handed her, Eto couldn't hide the disgust on her face.
"The world's big, and there are a lot of lunatics in it."
As if he understood how she felt, Hitokawa spoke while keeping one hand on the steering wheel. The material she was reading now was the information he had gathered on "Shinaoto Minami."
At first, he had expected the search to be difficult, but it had come together surprisingly fast.
This Minami woman, for whatever reason, was using her real name instead of even a fake one.
And Eto was now replaying, in real time, the feelings he must have had while gathering information on Minami.
With a sigh, Eto looked out the window.
The buildings gradually seemed to sink lower, and before long they vanished entirely, replaced by a vast spread of darkness.
The sound of waves reached them even with the windows closed. They had reached the coast of Ward 12.
Hitokawa slowed the car.
There weren't many vehicles coming to the sea at this hour, so moving slowly wasn't much of a problem.
"We made it to the Ward 12 coast, but... what now? We can't just search blindly. The coastline here is way too big."
"No problem. Keep driving at this speed."
Eto said this as she rolled down the window. A cold sea breeze carried the smell of salt inside.
With her head half out the window, Eto closed her eyes. At first, Hitokawa couldn't tell what she was doing, but he soon realized she was trying to pick up a scent.
"You can find him with that?"
"Don't underestimate a Ghoul's sense of smell. Sharks can catch even a tiny trace of blood from kilometers away. And if it's Dad's blood, I'll never miss it."
It was a reassuring statement, at least on the surface, but depending on how you heard it, it sent a chill down your back. Maybe it was because she sounded so unlike a human.
Now that he thought about it, the whole situation was strange. A human and a Ghoul racing through the night streets in the same car.
You wouldn't find this in a movie, and if the CCG found out, it would never end with just a written apology.
More than anything, Hitokawa and Eto had once come close to a direct clash.
And yet now they had temporarily joined forces over Koma's crisis. But if they managed to save Koma safely, then what?
"What am I supposed to do then..."
He worried over it, but eventually came to the conclusion that even thinking like this probably made him unfit to be a Ghoul Investigator.
What was there to do, really?
There had never been a smooth example of coexistence between Ghouls and humans.
Eto and Koma, simply by being together, became a dangerous ticking time bomb for each other. If they weren't separated, a "tragedy" would definitely happen.
Eto had to go to a Ghoul detention facility. He couldn't back down from that position.
It would be sad for both of them, but it would still be better than suffering something even worse later on.
"But..."
He stole a glance at Eto's profile. She was staring out the window with a rigid expression, carefully searching the air outside one scent at a time.
She was seriously worried about Koma, desperately trying to find him.
"Damn it! Don't make that face! It just makes this harder! If you're a Ghoul, can't you at least act like one?"
The Ghouls he knew were cruel and cunning.
When they were in danger, they would throw even their own family to the wolves as bait, and Hitokawa had arrested more than a few of those kinds of monsters.
But with Eto, it was becoming harder and harder to lump her in with them.
When he first learned Eto's identity, he had no hesitation about isolating her, just as he had told Koma.
He believed everything he had seen from Eto until then had been an act designed to deceive him.
But even after learning she was a Ghoul, Eto was still Eto.
She adored her dad, was prickly with Hitokawa, and was both mature and, in the end, still just a child.
Aside from the fact that she was a Ghoul, she was almost no different from the girl he had watched for years.
Maybe, if he isolated Eto, the sadness would end up applying to him too.
"Grrr...!!"
In the end, Hitokawa had to admit he was hesitating, and could only press his forehead hard against the steering wheel to steady himself.
"That's dangerous if you drive like that."
"I know."
While Eto continued searching for traces of Koma, she was also reading Hitokawa's reaction.
She didn't know what he was worrying about, but her words carried a slight edge, as if telling him to focus on the task at hand.
"Can I ask you something?"
"Is it important?"
"It doesn't seem all that important, so if you want to ignore it, you can. But why are you trying so hard to save Koma?"
At that, Eto frowned and shot him a look as if he had just said something stupid.
"Because he's my dad. Obviously."
"You know he isn't your biological father. You're not even blood-related, and you still want to save him?"
"Haah..."
Eto sighed. It wasn't even worth discussing.
She had already answered that question a long time ago, on the very day she and Koma fought the police Ghoul.
"Whether we're blood-related or not doesn't matter. I believe Dad is my dad, and Dad treats me like his daughter. What more do we need? No matter what anyone says, he's my precious family."
...This kid had definitely lived twice as long as everyone else. Was that really something a girl who had just entered elementary school should be saying?
Hitokawa couldn't tell whether he should be impressed or exhausted.
If every doting father in the world heard that, they'd probably cry a river of tears.
"...And also."
"And also?"
Apparently Eto wasn't finished. Hitokawa glanced over at her again.
She was still looking outside, but now she wore an expression he had never once seen before.
"Even if Dad stopped treating me like his daughter, even if we stopped being family and became strangers, as long as he's the human called 'Takaki Koma,' I'll save him. No matter what."
"......"
Hitokawa's body went rigid.
They say crisis makes people grow, but... wasn't this a little too much growth?
For a single instant, just one, the atmosphere around Eto was nothing like that of a daughter. And it was even less like a Ghoul.
It was more like... a woman making a vow for the sake of the person she loved...
Hitokawa stopped himself there.
Anything beyond this was dangerous. It was definitely Pandora's box.
He didn't know for sure yet, but after they saved Koma, he was starting to worry about what would happen to him afterward.
Mostly things like chastity... and crime...
"Yeah, isolating them is probably the answer..."
While Eto kept searching hard for Koma's scent, Hitokawa had to sink into serious thought.
"Mmnya~ mmnya~. zzz..."
Minami, who had been in the same room as me under the pretense of guarding me, had somehow drifted off in her chair.
I wasn't sleepy because of the tension, but I did feel tired. It seemed like the night was getting pretty deep.
Keeping an eye on Minami, I wrapped the chain around my hand.
Then, just like last time, I pulled at the stake embedded in the wall, taking care not to make a sound.
Clink...Clink...
Maybe because I'd already loosened it earlier, the stake shifted more than expected. One more pull and it looked like it would come free...
"N-no, don't, Koma-kun~~!!"
"!!?!"
My heart nearly dropped through the floor. Minami, who had been asleep, suddenly shot upright without warning.
Had I been caught? But Minami only woke up and didn't do anything else.
She blinked with half-open eyes, staring into empty space. Anyone could tell she was still half-asleep. Was that a sleep-talking fit?
"That was some loud sleep-talking..."
Anyway, I quickly put the stake and chain back where they belonged.
A moment later, as Minami's mind gradually caught up, she wiped the drool from the corner of her mouth and hurriedly looked at me.
"Koma-kun!! Thank goodness~. You didn't get taken away~!"
"What do you mean 'taken away' when I'm already the one being held captive?"
I wasn't especially curious what kind of dream she'd had, but the stake's position had shifted from where it had been a moment ago.
To distract her from that, I asked about the dream.
"Well~ I had a dream that Koma-kun got arrested by the police for violating the Child Welfare Act."
"What kind of dream are you having!?!?!!"
I almost wished I hadn't asked.
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The chapters have been deleted and re-uploaded with a higher-quality translation.