Enji and Kaya fell into deep thought.
Whether they liked it or not, the subordinates who had shared life and death with them for so long were now in danger of being exterminated by Ghoul Investigators.
For the moment, they were safe while the investigators focused on establishing a perimeter, but once the suppression began, they would be no different from rats trapped in a jar.
At this rate, they would all be wiped out. Before that happened, they had to break through the encirclement and escape, even if it meant accepting casualties.
The problem was where to strike.
The information they could gather over the phone was limited, meaning they couldn't gauge the investigators' strength. They had no way of knowing where the weak point lay.
If they forced an escape now, they would be nothing more than moths flying straight into a flame.
They could not accept their subordinates dying in vain.
"Then that leaves us with..."
"Attacking from both sides, I guess."
After opposing each other for so long, Enji and Kaya had gradually come to think alike.
If they couldn't find an opening, they would have to create one.
They would coordinate with their subordinates and strike the front and rear of the perimeter simultaneously.
No matter how many troublesome investigators were stationed there, if they were hit from opposite sides at once, their strength would be forced to split.
The risk was that the perimeter might be too dense. If they were delayed while forcing their way through, reinforcements would soon pour in and they would be surrounded in an instant.
No matter how strong Enji and Kaya were, they couldn't overcome being completely outnumbered.
Especially if a Special Class Investigator was among them, the danger would double. A single Special Class was equal to them individually.
There was nothing favorable about the situation, and the risk was enormous.
But they couldn't stay away.
For them, it was more unbearable to stand by helplessly and watch their subordinates die than to perish at the hands of the investigators themselves.
Having made up their minds, the two rose with heavy expressions.
Then, a voice stopped them.
"I'd rather you didn't go."
It was Takaki Koma.
He was clearing away the empty cups left on the table; Eto was nowhere to be seen.
Only the sound of something being rummaged through in the inner room reached them.
"What are you talking about?"
Enji asked.
He couldn't understand why Koma, who should have had almost nothing to do with this, was intervening.
"You're going to fight, right? Against the investigators. If you clash head-on, a lot of people are going to die."
"Ghoul deaths are practically part of everyday life. It's not something you need to worry about."
"Sure, a lot of your side will die too..."
Koma set the teacups in the sink and returned to the living room.
He spoke with concern written plainly on his face.
"But a lot of Ghoul Investigators are going to die too. From what Eto says, you two must be insanely strong. I don't like that."
At his words—which sounded like genuine concern for the investigators' lives—Enji's brow furrowed and Kaya's eyes narrowed with sudden hostility.
To them, Ghoul Investigators were objects of pure hatred.
In the darkest corners of their memories, Ghoul Investigators were always there. They were the natural enemies that had to be eliminated even before the rivals standing beside them.
And Koma was trying to protect them.
The goodwill they had felt toward him for raising a Ghoul daughter vanished in an instant.
"What the hell are you talking about? You want me to just sit here and watch my comrades get slaughtered by those investigator bastards?"
"You'd better choose your words carefully from now on. Depending on the situation, I won't care if you're Yoshimura's friend or not."
Slowly, the whites of their eyes darkened as their [Kakugan] surfaced, and with it came a thick, seeping killing intent.
The moment that intent leaked out, the rustling from the inner room stopped. Eto had sensed it too.
But she only paused for a moment before returning to her searching.
Koma took the killing intent head-on, twirling a ballpoint pen in one hand—though no one knew where he'd gotten it from.
He frowned, but made no further move, simply sitting back down at the empty table.
"Calm down. It's not that I want your people to die. I just hate the idea of Ghouls and humans alike dying by the thousands. If you leave now, that outcome becomes almost certain."
"If we don't go, our side will just be slaughtered! Are you saying we should give up and minimize casualties? Surrender quietly and get dragged off to Cochlea!?"
"That's not what I'm saying. Just listen to me until the end, you hotheaded idiots!"
Enji snapped, and Koma shot back with a scowl. Kaya rubbed the back of her neck and spoke up.
"I don't know if it's worth listening to. In the end, unless one side suffers a fatal loss, the other cannot survive. A childish ending where 'nobody dies and everyone lives happily ever after' doesn't even appear in fairy tales these days."
"You read fairy tales?"
"You do?"
"It was just a metaphor! I'm not saying I read them!"
Kaya shouted at the looks Koma and Enji gave her. But the way her ears had turned red suggested she had at least encountered one.
Koma let out a long sigh, as if trying to clear the tension from the room. The ballpoint pen continued to spin between his fingers.
"You seem to be misunderstanding something, but I'm not a savior, and I'm not some saint. I don't have the power to save everyone, and I don't even believe such a thing exists."
The pen kept whirling.
"People and Ghouls are dying right now. Somewhere I don't know about, someone is dying even as we speak. It was like that yesterday, and it'll be like that tomorrow too."
Koma spoke in a voice heavy with loneliness. He had seen too many people fade away.
His father. A suicide victim who had cursed his own life and ended it. People devoured by a Ghoul's appetite. Ghouls discovered and exterminated by investigators.
This wasn't a dry news report on TV. This was reality, and he had lived long enough to know that death was a constant, invisible presence.
Enji and Kaya stared at him again, dazed.
That was what they found strange about Koma. He was human, yet he understood the world of Ghouls.
Even without saying it, even without seeing it himself, he seemed to intuitively know the pain, loss, hatred, and bonds that had shaped their lives.
"So at the very least, I want fewer people to die today. Especially the people around me."
"The people around you?"
"Well, my friends, or maybe the CCG where my late father's old colleagues work..."
The tip of the pen stopped with a click, and he pointed it at the two Ghouls in front of him.
"Or weird Ghouls who sit around drinking coffee with me."
Koma gave a bitter smile to Enji and Kaya, who were staring at him in surprise.
"You're just the weird guests Yoshimura sent over, but in the end, we've made a connection, haven't we? If you two leave this house today and never come back, it'll hurt. And if I find your names on the death list tomorrow, alongside my friend's and his junior's, I'll probably go half-mad."
It was sincere, through and through.
That was why it was so hard to accept. In Enji and Kaya's world, someone like Koma was an anomaly.
"...You're worried about us even though you only just met us?"
Koma snorted a laugh. Even he seemed to find his own meddling ridiculous.
"It's that damn attachment. I almost got beaten to death by my father once for siding with Ghouls because of it..."
Of course, part of it was that he was sick to death of the endless chain of resentment between Ghouls and humans.
As he shuddered, remembering the time when his father had seemed the most terrifying man in the world, Kaya spoke up.
Perhaps Koma's sincerity had reached her, because the coldness in her voice had softened considerably.
"...I understand that you don't want us to die. I also understand that you don't want the investigators to die. So what are you going to do? A conclusion with minimal damage on both sides is realistically impossible. Wishes that can't be realized are nothing more than tantrums."
"I'm thirty years old. I don't feel like throwing a tantrum."
As he said that, Koma glanced back.
Just in time, Eto was returning with a huge bundle of paper scrolls in her arms.
"So now, we find a way."
Eto unfurled one of the scrolls and spread it flat on the table. Enji and Kaya's eyes widened when they saw what was on it.
"This is...!"
"What, you think we're some peaceful little household living in bliss? We're always preparing for the worst-case scenario."
What Eto had brought was a map. But not just any map. It was a complex web of structures and lines rarely seen in the city.
It was a map of the massive sewer system stretching beneath the city, not the city itself.
Koma had obtained it from Hitokawa in preparation for the possibility that Eto's identity might be exposed to the world.
It was meant to secure an escape route. No one had expected it to be used like this, however.
"You..."
Enji and Kaya were at a loss for words as they looked at Koma, who had provided the map.
Koma crossed his arms and began drawing lines.
"I'll say this now: the help we're giving you goes only as far as securing a route to rescue your subordinates. I don't want to get mixed up in a bloody fight between Ghouls and investigators. A simple citizen's wish is to live modestly, one step away from that mess."
"You're already involved the moment you're helping us, aren't you?"
"I'll just dip one foot in and pull it right back out. If a crime isn't discovered, it isn't a crime."
"That's not exactly something you should say in front of your daughter."
"That's life experience. And if you put it that way, you and I living together is a crime too."
"There are unjust laws in this world."
After ruffling Eto's hair as she instantly changed her attitude, Koma turned his gaze back to the two of them.
Having confirmed Koma's words, his attitude, and the 'hope' he had offered, Enji and Kaya looked at him with eyes that had begun to trust him.
"Then let's put our heads together and plan the rescue operation right now. You've got a spare burner phone, right? Use it to contact your subordinates and ask for the exact details of their current location and the investigators' positions. Hurry. If Hitokawa said to finish evacuating by midnight, it wouldn't be strange for the suppression to begin the moment the clock strikes twelve."
**
"...Sir. ...Mr. Hitokawa!"
"Mmm..."
At the touch shaking his body, Hitokawa pulled the magazine off his face and shook off his drowsiness.
When he opened his eyes, he saw Hoshino, his subordinate and teammate.
The outdoor lamp illuminating the dark surroundings cast a faint red tint over her hair.
"You're awake? It's eleven, like you asked. You should start warming up soon."
"Haaah. Already that late, huh..."
Rubbing his stiff neck and shoulders, Hitokawa rose from the folding chair. He could see the area around him growing busy.
He took out his phone and checked the time. 11:03 p.m.
They had to finish all preparations before midnight; once the chief commander gave the signal, they would begin their descent into the sewers.
Just as he was thinking they should start preparing, he noticed Hoshino giving him a half-lidded look from the side.
"What?"
"You seem way too relaxed. What kind of investigator sleeps that soundly right before a suppression operation starts?"
"Condition management is part of the job. Besides, I was tired from spending the evening telling nearby residents to evacuate."
"But aren't you nervous at all? This is my first time joining a large-scale suppression, and my hands and feet are still shaking!"
"Don't exaggerate. Our assignment this time is rear support."
Hitokawa hadn't been a senior investigator for very long. Perhaps that was why he had been assigned rear support, which involved relatively little contact with Ghouls.
Rear support in name only, of course. If any Ghouls slipped through the perimeter, they were tasked with chasing them down and finishing the job.
Still, in a suppression operation with a perimeter this well-built, their turn might never come.
"Look at that guy and learn something. He's younger than you, and he's way calmer."
Hitokawa looked toward the person behind him, who was turning pages with a calm expression. He seemed so composed that he looked completely detached from the other investigators preparing for battle.
He was a Ghoul Investigator temporarily assigned to Hitokawa's team for this suppression. Hoshino narrowed her eyes at him.
"That's not calm. That's weird. And what's with that outfit?"
Hoshino's disgust was understandable. Hitokawa actually felt uneasy about it too.
The newly assigned Ghoul Investigator was wearing a school uniform.
He was still a kid who hadn't even graduated high school yet.
In a space full of adults, the presence of a boy who wasn't even old enough to drink was stranger than strange. It was downright eerie.
"Well, I did complain to the support chief that this was insane... but they said his skills were solid, so we should trust him and use him for now. Apparently, he's a proper Ghoul Investigator, so we may as well let him handle it."
"Even so, he's way too young..."
"If it really doesn't work out, we can protect him."
"Then that just adds another burden."
"Don't worry. It's just one more burden on top of you."
"What did you say!?"
As Hoshino hissed like a wildcat, Hitokawa held her head down with one hand and looked at the boy, who was still focused on his book.
He wasn't pleased either.
What he hated was the sight of a boy—someone still wearing a school uniform—standing on a battlefield thick with the stench of blood. What kind of circumstances had brought such a young kid here, ready to stain his hands with Ghoul blood?
He wanted to tell him to go home and get out of here, but after hearing his record, that feeling vanished completely.
"He hunted an S-rated Ghoul by himself?"
S-rated.
The Artist, whom Hitokawa, Koma, and Eto had only barely managed to bring down together six years ago, had been S-rated.
Hitokawa was certain that if even one of the three had been absent back then, they would never have defeated the Artist.
Of course, after the passage of time and his own growth, Hitokawa now had the confidence that he could hunt an S-rated Ghoul alone, but that was only confidence.
Anyone classified as S-rated was a formidable enemy who required at least a semi-special class investigator to take on.
There's something about that kid...
Hitokawa wanted to find out what that unknown something was.
After forcibly calming Hoshino with a flick to the forehead before she could lose her temper again, Hitokawa called out to the boy.
"Hey!"
"...?"
The boy finally looked up from his book.
"We should be getting ready to deploy for the suppression soon. So, uh..."
Hitokawa stammered, suddenly unable to remember the boy's name.
The boy, who seemed to have no real distinguishing features beyond the fact that he didn't fit the atmosphere around him, adjusted his glasses and said, "...My name is Arima Kishou."