About twenty hours had passed since the kidnapping.
These bastards had no manners when dealing with people at all. They hadn't given me so much as a sip of water, let alone anything to eat.
The hunger felt like my stomach lining had fused to my spine, and the thirst was drying my esophagus out to the point of pain. It was a fantastic feeling.
Endure it. Just endure. This much is nothing compared to the hunger a Ghoul feels. If I think of Eto, this is nothing at all....
...Eto was suffering through this kind of pain?! Like hell I could just sit here!!
Thud!
Feeling like I was about to lose my grip on my sanity, I slammed the back of my head into the wall.
The wound from the steel pipe split open again, and pain surged through me, but at least I managed to grab hold of my senses again.
My body was worn down, and my mind seemed just as ruined. Maybe this was the aftereffect of facing not one lunatic, but a whole group of them.
The artist-slash-salarymen who'd been debating what kind of art to make out of my disassembled body were still in their meeting and hadn't come back yet.
They'd been gone for quite a while, so it wouldn't have been strange if they returned at any moment.
"Mmnya... mmnya...."
Minami, who had woken up earlier from some weird dog dream, was nodding off again.
This was the perfect chance.
Creak...
I grabbed the loosened stake connected to the shackles and pulled.
I couldn't make a mistake. I had to pull it out as quietly as possible.
I slowly increased the force as I wrapped the chain around my arm and tugged at the stake. Even the tiny scraping sound it made felt deafening to me.
The concrete wall sounded like a kid whining because a tooth was being pulled.
Even with the noise, Minami didn't wake up. The stake was almost out. Just a little more!
Swoosh!
"...!!"
The resistance suddenly gave way, and the stake popped free. I flinched and reached out.
I managed to catch it before it hit the floor thanks to my reflexes, but the slack chain dragged noisily across the ground instead.
Shrrrk!!
"...!"
Holding my breath, I shifted my gaze to check on Minami.
A moment later, a sigh of relief escaped me.
"Mmm.... Kuu...."
Minami only frowned slightly before settling back into a peaceful sleep.
Feeling sweat bead in my palm around the stake, I wrapped the chain fully around my arm and wedged the stake in place. That way, the chain covered the underside of my wrist like a sleeve, and it wouldn't scrape the floor anymore.
With my freed hand, I pulled out the stake on the other side.
Now that one hand was free, it was easy to deal with the second stake.
...Phew.
I rolled my stiff body around to loosen it up, trying to spread the feeling of liberation through every part of me.
Okay. I can move fine.
Now all that was left was escaping this place.
I checked the door leading out of the room, then looked at Minami, who was dozing in the chair beside it.
I didn't know what her circumstances were, but as long as she was cooperating with those Ghouls, she was extremely dangerous to me. If she woke up and realized I was gone, she'd report me to them immediately.
I'd have to knock her out before I left.
Thinking that, I gripped the chain with both hands and approached Minami carefully.
How long did you have to choke the carotid artery to make someone pass out again?
I was remembering that old fainting game that used to be popular when I brought the chain up toward her neck.
Then—
Grab!
Whoosh!
"!?"
My field of vision flipped over in an instant.
It happened so fast I couldn't even tell whether I'd been lifted off the ground first or whether Minami, who I'd thought was asleep, had grabbed my wrist first.
Bang!!
My body was hurled onto the hard floor.
Air burst out of my lungs, and Minami pinned me down from behind, twisting my right arm into a dangerous angle.
"You thought I was asleep? Too bad~ I was just pretending~☆ You were sneaking around and trying so hard, Koma-kun, it was so cute I couldn't help messing with you~."
"You bitch...."
Minami's teasing voice in my ear made irritation flare up.
I tried to shake her off and escape, but it didn't go my way. She had me in a proper joint lock, and if I moved even a little, it felt like my arm would snap.
Minami giggled as if my struggling was hilarious.
"No use~. Women these days all know basic self-defense martial arts for dealing with creeps~. I've been practicing with a book called How to Become a Mature Woman and Take a Man Down, and my skills have been improving like crazy."
"Huh? That sounds absurdly familiar somehow."
For a second, I almost remembered the nightmare from back when Eto had actually read that book and used it to throw me down and lock my joints.
"Really~? Then that won't do~. You were just trying to touch my body while I was pretending to sleep, weren't you? Men really are lewd~. Where were you planning to touch? My chest? My stomach? Or maybe my...."
"I was only trying to touch your neck."
Feeling the edge of a dangerous remark, I cut her off in a hurry.
But what came back was Minami's disappointed voice.
"That won't do~. Guilty~. Should I hand you over to the police~?"
"Why? Is trying to knock out a kidnapper and escape really such a serious crime? You're the type to accuse someone of molestation if their hand brushes your skirt on the subway."
As I spoke, I steadied my breathing.
I didn't have time. I had to shake Minami off and get out of here. Which meant I had to do something about this joint lock first.
There was only one method I could think of, and it required resolve.
"My neck's my erogenous zone~. You tried to greedily paw at someone else's sensitive spot like an animal, so now you've got to pay the price~."
Minami went on in a bright, excited voice, clearly enjoying the conversation with me.
She was spouting nonsense because she wanted to keep the banter going, but I refused.
"Is that so? Then I'll hit somewhere other than your neck."
The moment I said that, I clenched my teeth and twisted my body by force.
I ignored the fact that my joint was still locked.
A dangerous cracking sound came from around my shoulder, and a beat later, searing pain tried to take over my brain.
Before that could happen, I swung my fist first. I drove the hand gripping the chain like a knuckle-duster straight toward Minami's face.
"!?"
Pow!!
My fist landed before Minami could react. She probably hadn't expected me to try escaping by breaking my own joint.
It was a punch thrown without proper form, but it was heavy enough to jolt her whole body hard.
I shoved her away as if throwing her over my back, then got to my feet. After that, I bit down hard on the arm I'd used to punch until it bled.
My scream never made it out of my body. It echoed inside me instead. If I screamed now, they'd hear me.
I'd been prepared for it, but the pain from forcing a joint out was worse than I'd imagined.
When my arm had been broken before by some Ghoul in a police costume, I'd at least been drowning in adrenaline, so I could endure it. This time wasn't like that.
I braced my back against the wall and forced my collapsing body to stay upright.
Cold sweat ran down me, and my vision swam. My brain, sensing danger to the body, was already pumping out endorphins or whatever other internal drugs it could to dull the pain quickly.
A moment later, once the pain had faded enough for me to think straight, I turned back to Minami.
She was lying face-down on the floor, groaning. Blood was running from the cut on her forehead where the chain had torn into her.
"H-hey, hitting a woman's face is too much.... Is this what they call misogyny?"
"Haa... haa... misandry, you bitch...!"
After everything she'd done to me....
I'd learned that if I let my guard down and acted carelessly, I'd get wrecked again.
Sure enough, while I was clutching my dangling right arm, Minami, who I'd thought couldn't move, suddenly lunged.
Expecting her to pull something else, I didn't let my guard down and sprang after her.
What Minami was reaching for was the steel pipe that had brought me here in the first place.
Are you kidding me? I never want to taste that steel pipe again, even if I die!?
Grab!
Minami swung the pipe the moment she picked it up, and I thrust out my left arm.
The chain wrapped below my wrist blocked the pipe and sent sparks flying. It hurt so badly I thought my left wrist might snap too, right after my right arm's joint.
Pow!!
As the pipe was blocked and Minami's guard opened up, I drove my left foot into her abdomen.
Her face twisted in pain and her body folded forward. As I kicked, I swung my upper body forward, which had been thrown off balance backward by the motion.
My forehead crashed into Minami's forehead.
Crack!!
"...!!"
Minami's head snapped back.
She staggered for a few seconds, then her body toppled backward like a tree falling over.
Her eyes had rolled back so only the whites showed. She was completely out.
"Haa! Haa!"
I barely managed to steady my collapsing body and catch my breath.
I'd swung the steel pipe so hard that my left hand, wrapped in chain to block it, was still numb.
Who said women were weak? They say female animals are scarier than males, and Minami was exactly that kind of creature.
Looking at Minami on the floor, I rubbed my shoulder.
Because I'd forced my way out of the joint lock, the bone there had been dislocated.
"Hup!!"
Thud!
Grabbing below the elbow, I shoved it back up with a shout.
After squeezing out another wave of cold sweat, I felt the joint settle back into place.
But the damage itself hadn't disappeared, so pain still surged every time I moved.
Let's get out of here fast. If I didn't hurry, there was no doubt my daughter, the most terrifying of all those female predators, would come running.
That absolutely could not happen.
No matter how strong Eto was, there were four Ghouls in this building.
If the guy Minami called the "boss" really existed, then that made five. Numerically, Eto was in far too much danger.
I thought through my plan as I opened the door to the sealed room.
"I'll have to find a phone as soon as I get out.... If I can pin Eto down so she can't come here and call the CCG...."
Just as I was making plans like that, I opened the door.
"You're human, but you're quite something, aren't you?"
"...!?"
When the door opened, there was a man with a horse-like face standing right in front of me.
It was that Ghoul, the one they called the section chief or whatever.
Powww!!!
"Cough!!"
Before I could even react, a brutal fist slammed into my torso.
After what felt like several seconds of being sent flying through the air, I finally crashed into a hard wall and dropped to the floor.
"When making a work of art, the key is how well you refine the soul of the piece. You've got an astonishing amount of grit and an unbreakable will. You might become the best work this company has ever produced."
I couldn't even make out what the horse-faced Ghoul was saying.
'Damn... it...'
I cursed inwardly. Not because my nearly successful escape had ended in failure.
As I collapsed to the floor, I felt pain in my broken arm.
More precisely, the tooth-shaped scar on my right arm was throbbing.
It was a little different from the pain I felt when I met the gaze of a Ghoul looking at me as prey.
'So you really came....'
That child was nearby. And apparently in a very bad mood. That vague feeling was there.
I wanted to tell her not to come. But there was no way to send that message.
My consciousness had already cut out.
"Is this the place?"
"...Yes."
Hitokawa and Eto's gazes crossed on a seven-story building directly ahead.
There was a sign that suggested it had once been a pharmaceutical company, but it was now a ruined building with nothing left but a faded sign from long ago.
"Do you have a plan?"
"First priority is securing Koma's safety. And then...."
Clack, clack, clack!
The moment he got out of the car, Hitokawa opened the metal case.
From inside, a massive sword like a bird's wing sprang out and settled into his hand.
"...We eliminate every obstacle after that."
"That's the best thing I've heard you say, Hitokawa-ojisan."
Eto's left eye was burning with a blood-red light, like a flame that could no longer be held back.
Toward the unsettling building whose windowless openings looked like hundreds of mouths, the two of them strode forward.
The rescue operation for Takaki Koma begins now.