Hikokawa watched the two Ghouls moving away from the abandoned building, all while staying hidden on the rooftop of a nearby structure.
He'd heard that plenty of Ghouls didn't care what happened to their own kind, so he hadn't been very confident. Still, it looked like they had at least a shred of conscience after all.
Well, that part was fine.
It served the purpose of drawing them away from the abandoned building.
But there was one fatal problem hiding in all this.
"...Who's that kid?"
"How should I know!!"
Eto was still right beside Hikokawa.
That was the problem.
The little girl leading the two Ghouls away wasn't Eto at all, but a complete stranger.
The orphaned girl Eto had been supposed to pretend to be had actually shown up for real!
Feeling like nothing had gone right lately, Hikokawa turned to Eto.
"Then why didn't you leave sooner! Some weird brat barged in and ruined everything!"
"Do you think acting like you're crying naturally is that easy!? Even child actors have to train systematically from a young age!"
In short, she'd hesitated because she couldn't pull off a natural performance, and the real thing had stolen the lead from her.
Honestly, asking Eto to play an innocent child in front of that rotten group that had kidnapped Koma was too much.
It was a relief if she could even suppress her killing intent. The moment they casually mentioned her father, it was practically guaranteed she'd explode on the spot.
"How is that so hard!? Why not just go back to the days when you'd beg outside a toy store to buy you something!"
"Ha! A stupid toy! The second I realized buying one of those meant making Dad work longer hours, I quit!!"
"You figured out your parents' hardship way too early, you filial daughter!!!"
"Thanks for that!!!"
By the time they'd wasted enough energy on pointless bickering, the two Ghouls had followed the girl far enough away from the abandoned building.
Eto and Hikokawa, both glaring at each other and breathing hard, finally looked away, knowing the perfect moment to strike had arrived.
"So, should we ambush them?"
"Yes. That's what I'd like to say, but...."
"Is the kid the problem?"
"...."
Leaving Hikokawa silent, Eto leaned against the railing and narrowed her eyes.
Morning was approaching, and fog had begun drifting between the buildings, blurring their outlines. The wind was blowing the wrong way, so she couldn't catch their scent either.
"It's hard to tell from this distance, but the fact that she's wandering around at this hour, and the fact that the other two aren't reacting much.... It's pretty clear she's a Ghoul. Are you hesitating?"
That was right. Just as Eto had guessed, Hikokawa was hesitating because of the third Ghoul that had suddenly appeared.
Right now, Hikokawa had temporarily set aside his identity as a Ghoul Investigator and was standing with Eto. They were fighting the Ghoul that had kidnapped his friend.
But then another Ghoul, completely unrelated, had appeared, and he found himself hesitating.
The feelings of a friend who wanted to save Koma and the feelings of a Ghoul Investigator, hardened over years of not being able to ignore a Ghoul once he saw one, collided inside him.
He wasn't sure how to deal with that Ghoul.
A little girl wandering around after losing her parents. But a Ghoul.
A little girl crying pitifully. But a Ghoul.
His head hurt.
Eto, who had been with him all this time, felt almost human, and that only made the confusion worse.
"...A poor Ghoul child looking for her mother. What's there to hesitate about?"
Eto turned her gaze away again and threw out a look and tone that were anything but friendly.
"We can just take that kid to Cochlea too. She can live comfortably and eat well, never even knowing whether her missing parents are safe."
"Ugh...."
Hikokawa let out a groan, as if she'd hit a sore spot.
To imprison and isolate them in Cochlea. That had once been Hikokawa's argument to Koma and Eto. Judging by Eto's expression, she'd clearly been holding onto it.
Hikokawa's hesitation meant his once-rigid beliefs had begun to change, but Eto, who felt every second was precious, couldn't exactly be grateful for that.
Time was still passing while they stood here like this.
"There's no more time to leave Dad alone. If you're going to hesitate, then I'll just...."
Eto's words cut off unnaturally.
Hikokawa noticed something was wrong and turned to her. She was looking down at the Ghouls on the ground with the expression of someone who thought she'd heard wrong.
With a hand cupped to her ear so she could hear better, Eto's face slowly shifted into shock.
"Oh my God.... We need to save that kid right now!"
"What!?"
Thud!
Before he could even ask why, Eto kicked off the railing and hurled herself dozens of meters down toward the street below.
"Hey, kid. Where the hell did you lose your mother?"
The squad leader didn't like being led around by a child, so he spoke in a threatening voice to the girl walking ahead of him.
They'd said they were going to the place where she'd last seen her mother, but the alleyways were so complicated that he couldn't tell whether the girl was lost, or whether she was deliberately leading them in circles, or both.
"...."
When the girl stayed silent, the squad leader scowled.
From the start, he'd always hated weaklings who didn't know their place and acted up, or anyone who ignored him.
"Hey! Are you ignoring me, brat!"
As the squad leader bared his teeth and strode closer, the girl stopped walking.
Just when he thought she'd finally understood, she spun around.
"...Huh?"
What came out of the squad leader's mouth was a dumbfounded sound.
A small metal object was pointed at him. Once he recognized it, he couldn't help but be stunned.
It was a pistol.
The girl was aiming it at him with trembling hands, gripping it tightly.
"What the hell is wrong with this brat? I'm trying to help you find your mother, and you're acting up with some ridiculous toy?"
"M-my mother... is gone...."
The girl opened her mouth in a thin, shaking voice.
She was crying like when they first met, but what filled those eyes wasn't sadness or fear. It was hatred.
"You... you killed her!!!"
"What kind of bullshit is that...."
"Chief, dodge."
"...Huh?"
Just as the chief frowned at the sudden remark, the squad leader's calm voice drifted in from beside him.
At that instant, something hooked the chief's ankle, and his body lost its balance and tilted.
At almost the same moment, the girl's finger pulled the trigger and flames burst from the muzzle.
The bullet that should have struck the chief in the chest instead grazed his shoulder as his body tipped sideways.
For a Ghoul, that wouldn't have been much of a wound.
But....
"Aaaagh, it hurts!!!!!!"
Agonizing pain surged through him.
The place where the bullet had passed burned as if a poker had been shoved into it. The wound showed no sign of healing and kept bleeding.
Still sprawled on the ground, the chief finally managed to gather himself and stood up, veins bulging on his forehead.
"You damn brat!!! What did you do!!!"
But by the time the chief had recovered, it was already over.
It was too much for a small girl's body to handle a weapon with such heavy recoil.
She'd managed to fire it, but the kick had knocked the pistol from her hand. Before she could even reach for it, the chief closed the distance in an instant and stomped on the gun.
With the same calm expression he'd worn when they first met, the chief was dangling the girl by the collar.
The way he studied the girl's face, struggling and choking for breath, looked less like an interrogation and more like he was checking a newly acquired "material."
"C-Chief! What the hell is going on!?"
"Ah, sorry. You're not very good at acting, so if I'd told you in secret, I thought this child might notice."
Smiling as if apologetic, the chief kicked up the pistol he'd been stepping on.
The chief caught the gun as it flew through the air and inspected its contents.
"A red bullet...? This is a Q Bullet!!"
"Yes. It's one of the few weapons that can wound a Ghoul besides a Quinque."
The girl kicked the chief's body, which was smiling lazily, over and over, but he didn't budge.
He brought his nose close to the girl's clothes, and his eyes gleamed as if confirming his suspicion.
"Just as I thought.... You had a cloth soaked with Ghoul blood hidden inside your clothes. You knew we were sensitive to scent, so you were wandering around trying to find a Ghoul corpse, weren't you? Well done, child. I almost fell for it too."
"Scent!? Trick!? Y-you mean that brat is...?!?!"
"That's right. Human."
"Graaagh!! A human dared to wound my body!? Hand him over, Chief!! I'll tear him apart myself!!"
"Calm down. You can't kill her yet. This belongs to 'that person.' You know, that person's hobby."
"Ah...."
Just from that, the chief seemed to understand the situation and let out a groan. Even so, he still couldn't fully accept it and ground his teeth while glaring at the girl.
The chief nodded as he watched the girl thrash around despite being pinned by overwhelming force.
"Yes, yes. I understand. It's a shame, isn't it? Not being able to carry out revenge that was almost complete. Someone you don't know sent you a pistol, and someone you don't know told you where the one who killed your mother was. Honestly, having a superior with such a strange hobby really wears the subordinates out."
"Ugh, ngh....!!"
The girl struggled and glared fiercely at the chief.
Watching her, a memory surfaced.
"Oh, right! That defiant look in your eyes. I remember now. You must be the daughter of that woman I made before? Did you perhaps see how beautifully your mother was transformed? Really, with your mother coming to mind every Christmas, you won't be lonely, will you?"
"...!!!"
At those words, the girl's eyes widened and tears spilled out.
The sight of her mother, twisted into something so horrific she didn't even want to remember it. The shock of seeing that image in the photo delivered with the pistol had still been traumatic enough to linger.
"You, you people...!! You killed my mother...!!"
"Don't be so sad, child. We're professionals in this field, after all."
The chief slowly lifted the girl up.
Then he twisted his body and swung hard, as if he were about to smash her head into the ground.
"Soon you'll be beautifully decorated and standing where your mother was...!!"
With a mad grin, his arm came down.
But only the sound of wind followed, and the girl did not hit the ground.
What fell instead was a single red dot.
"A red dot...?"
He wondered why there was suddenly a red dot.
But there was one red dot.
Then two. Then dozens poured out, merging into one before spreading wide.
Shhhhk!!!
At the sound, like a fountain spraying, the chief realized what the red dots were.
They were blood spurting from his own severed arm.
"How about building something else instead of this child?"
Both the chief and the squad leader turned toward the unfamiliar voice coming from beside them.
There stood a small figure wrapped from head to toe in a blanket.
Even compared to the girl, that figure wasn't much larger.
It lowered the girl it had been carrying in both arms, along with the severed arm that had been brought along like an accessory, and set them on the ground.
The two Ghouls sensed it immediately.
This time, it wasn't a fake like the girl.
It was the real thing.
The dark red light shining through the Owl mask proved it.
"For example, a memorial built from your bones?"