Breath.
Inhale. Heart. Pump. Transporting oxygen.
To the muscles, the brain, the kakuhou.
Calories, oxygen, and RC cells are consumed at a staggering rate. No, they are being incinerated.
Pain. A signal transmitted from the muscles, the lungs, the heart, and the kakuhou. A warning directed at a body being pushed beyond its limits.
She suppresses them with endorphins and adrenaline.
Pushing pain and fatigue to the periphery, she analyzes every scrap of information delivered by sight, sound, and touch. Her brain dictates the next move. She breathes. She moves.
And thenโshe dodges.
๐๐๐๐!!!
The razor-scaled kagune grazes her by a hair's breadth, pulverizing the wall. The outside world is revealed through the gapโa violet sky. Judging by the light, it is the break of dawn.
Attacks fly in from both sides once more. Tentacles covered in scales, and feathers like knives. Rinkaku and Ukaku.
She judges that a frontal assault is impossible. She maps out an escape route.
Behind her. She throws her body through the hole the rinkaku had torn open moments ago.
The city, still draped in slumber, spreads out before her. Before she can fall into the abyss below, she drives her fingers into a crack in the concrete. Defying gravity, she lobs her body upward.
She plants her feet on a window frame devoid of glass and, with a violent burst from her ukaku, scales the exterior wall of the abandoned building.
The world is still asleep. The probability of someone witnessing the anomaly of a ghoul sprinting up a skyscraper is low. Based on that judgment, she reaches the rooftop in a single, desperate climb.
As she alights upon the open floor, she takes a ragged, deep breath.
She needs to replenish the oxygen her lungs crave. But she cannot let the tension in her muscles snap. If she relaxes for even a moment, her body will collapse.
"๐๐ถ๐ง๐ง! ๐๐ถ๐ง๐ง! ๐๐ถ๐ง๐ง! ๐๐ถ๐ง๐ง!"
Oxygen is scarce. Her head spins. Nausea rises. Thirst. Hunger.
Hungry. Hungry. Hungry. Hungry. Hungry. Hungry.
Meat. Meat. Meat. Meat. Meat. Meat. Meat. Meat.
I want to eat meat. How much time has passed? Meat dripping with sweet juices. Did Mr. Hitokawa rescue Papa? I want to chew and swallow, to erase this emptiness and this thirst. Is Papa safe? Meat. Hitokawa. Meat. Papa. Meat. I want to eat. Meat. Papa. I want to eat. Papa.
I want to eat Papa.
"NO!!!"
No. That's not it.
I don't want to eat Papa. No, I want to. Stop it. Don't think. Because I love him so much. Why am I like this? Because he looked so delicious.
Truth be told, you wanted to eat him then, too, didn't you?
Years ago, the thing you truly craved wasn't the ghoul in the police uniform.
It was the Papa standing right beside him.
๐๐๐๐๐๐!!!
Eto bit down on her own forearm.
She had to silence the grating tinnitus in her ears. Between the severe physical exhaustion and the hunger, the boundaries of her reason were beginning to crumble.
Is this because I ate that ghoul's flesh earlier?
Or is this Eto's true nature?
There was no way to knowโnot now.
๐๐๐๐!!
The floor of the rooftop exploded.
Crawling out of the hole was the Insect-Masked ghoul. Following close behind, the Department Manager scaled the wall as Eto had, his ukaku flaring.
"That damn brat is becoming a massive headache."
"๐๐ฆ๐ฉ๐ฆ๐ฉ๐ฆ๐ฉ๐ฆ๐ฉ๐ฆ!!!"
Leaving the Assistant Manager to his bizarre laughter, the Manager stared at Eto. Despite her enemies being right in front of her, Eto made no move to react. Her shoulders heaved with ragged breaths, and the ukaku on her shoulder flickered like a candle about to go out.
At a glance, she appeared to have exhausted her stamina. However, she had feigned this exact state once before to catch him off guard. The voice from behind the mask was unmistakably a child's, but she possessed a cunning that allowed for no lapse in vigilance.
Just as the Manager was readying his ukaku feathers to finish her off from a distanceโ
"๐๐ฆ๐ฉโฆ"
A laugh echoed.
Not the grotesque cackle of the Assistant Manager, but a child's characteristic, vibrant laugh. It was Eto. She was laughing.
Has she finally lost her mind? As the Manager stared at her, she suddenly raised her head.
๐๐ฉ๐ช๐ท๐ฆ๐ณ!!
The gaze he met through the gaps in her mask was enough to send a chill down his spine.
"Meatโฆโช"
Eto murmured in a slightly airy voice.
A shift in perspective. She didn't necessarily need to eat Koma or human flesh.
"Go the hell to sleep, you bitch!!"
Hitokawa lunged forward, kicking off the ground. He had spent years tempering his body to face ghouls. Subduing a normal humanโlet alone an injured womanโwas child's play for him.
But that was assuming his opponent didn't have the "lunatic" trait.
"๐๐ฉ๐ข๐ฉ๐ข๐ฉ๐ข!!"
Minami swung her axe. Not at Hitokawa, but at the bottles sitting on the steel bed beside her.
Seeing this, I screamed. "Watch out! That's sulfuric acid!!"
"โฆ?!"
By the time he reacted, it was already too late. The bottle shattered, and the axe blade sent a spray of acid flying. Part of it was headed straight for Hitokawa.
Sensing he couldn't dodge, Hitokawa spun his body. He flared his Ghoul Investigator's coat to protect his hands and face, then quickly shed the acid-soaked garment. Thanks to his swift response, he avoided injury.
The coat on the floor and the blade of Minami's axe began to hiss and bubble. ๐๐ช๐ป๐ป๐ญ๐ฆ!
"Ahaha! What a shame~. If that had hit you square in the face, you would have looked so much better!"
"You bastard!!"
An enraged Hitokawa prepared to lunge again, but his movements were frozen by Minami's next action. She had rested the blade of her axe against the edge of a nearby shelf.
A normal shelf wouldn't have mattered, but this one was packed with vials of unidentified chemicals.
"This place used to be a pharmaceutical company~. When they went under, it seems they left all sorts of chemicals behind. We've been using them quite effectively for 'processing' corpses~. There are more than a few toxic substances mixed in there."
Minami smiled brightly as she looked between me and Hitokawa.
"What do you think will happen if I break all of these? It would be quite a problem if toxic gas filled this basement, wouldn't it? Or would you like to play a game of Russian Roulette with random chemicals? You might get lucky and stay perfectly fine~."
"I have no reason to play along with your pathetic little games!"
"My, what a man with no sense of rhythm~. I bet you're not popular with children, are you?"
"Don't poke where it hurts!"
It was a stalemate. It wasn't feasible to subdue Minami immediately, yet leaving her be would invite disaster. She was currently threatening us with the axe and chemicals, but the moment we looked away, she might seize something else to tighten the noose around our necks.
We had to settle this here and now.
Hitokawa seemed to feel the same, his grip tightening on his greatsword. He was preparing to subdue her even if it meant taking a critical hitโregardless of whether that injury fell on him or her.
I reached out an arm to stop Hitokawa as he prepared to charge.
"Leave this to me for a moment, okay?"
"What are you planning? You think you can talk sense into that woman?"
"I have to try. If strength doesn't work, use words. If words don't work, use strength. Isn't that how it always is? Remember our box-pushing matches when we were kids?"
Hitokawa looked at me as if wondering why on earth I was bringing that up, but his gaze shifted instantly. Seeing his acknowledgment, I looked back at Minami. She was watching me, her eyes filled with anticipation for whatever words would come out of my mouth.
"What? Are you going to try and persuade me? Like some cool novel protagonist, giving a refreshing lecture to change the heart of a heroine who's strayed onto the wrong path? That sounds fun. Go ahead. I'm looking forward to seeing if you can change me."
"Persuade you? Like hell. I'm not doing that."
Hearing the sincerity in my sigh, her expression shifted to one of surprise.
"Oh? Is that so?"
"I know the world is full of different values, and even an act that looks hideous to others can have special meaning to the one doing it. Changing that would require either the arrogance to believe only one's own justice is correct, or an internal shift within the person themselves. I'm not that great of a guy. I don't have the arrogance to think my justice is absolute, and I don't have the key to trigger a change in you. Oh, don't misunderstandโthat doesn't mean I have any intention of acknowledging your dog-shit behavior."
Consuming human flesh out of necessity for survival is one thing, but I would never validate those who find self-satisfaction in murdering people for "art."
Minami grumbled, appearing bored. "That's a pity. So? What are you going to do, then? Beg for your life?"
"I'm going to insult you."
"...What?"
For the first time, a look of genuine confusion crossed Minami's face at my unexpected response. Regardless, I took a deep breath and let out the emotions that had been building up all day.
"Listen here, you crazy bitch!! Do you have any idea how much shit I've gone through today because of you?! It started with Hitokawa finding out about Eto's identity and nearly led to us killing each other, and it hasn't stopped since! What? You want to become a ghoul? You want to turn me into a masterpiece? Are you vomiting through your mouth after swallowing your eighth-grade syndrome and common sense through your anus?! If you want to spout that garbage, do it after you've been hit by a steel beam falling from the sky!!"
Minami took the verbal assault in stunned silence, like a mute who had just swallowed honey. I, on the other hand, felt like I could finally breathe. When bad things happen, you really have to let it out. I felt completely refreshed.
But I wasn't done yet. Steeling my heart, I utilized the ultimate taboo of insults.
"Is that ridiculous personality of yours inherited from your parents? I bet they're thrilled to death in the afterlife."
A direct attack on her parents and the deceased. No matter how much I had suffered, my conscience pricked at me for going this far, but I had to see it through. Because 'parents' were the key to her.
"...!!"
Minami's expression froze for the first time. Her mouth hung open as if to say something, her gaze locked firmly onto me. In this moment, her entire world was focused solely on my presence.
I had been waiting for this.
"Now!!"
"๐๐ข๐ข๐ข๐ข๐ข๐ฉ!!"
๐๐ค๐ณ๐ฆ๐ฆ๐ฆ๐ฆ๐ค๐ฉ!!
Following my signal, Hitokawa threw his entire weight into pushing the steel bed. Since it wasn't bolted to the floor, the heavy slab slid toward Minami, propelled by Hitokawa's momentum.
"?!"
By the time Minami reacted, it was too late. The steel bed slammed into her, pinning her against the wall. The impact forced her to drop the axe as she gasped for air, caught between the bed and the concrete.
"๐๐ฐ๐ถ๐จ๐ฉ!!"
Minami was subdued. But it wasn't entirely over. The impact of the bed had jarred the shelf, and two vials of unidentified liquid rolled toward the edge. I didn't know what was in them, but if they fell, they would hit Hitokawa and Minami.
"๐๐ถ๐ฑ!!"
I threw my body forward to catch the bottles before they could fall. Everything had gone according to plan; I couldn't let it all be ruined at the very end.
The "box-pushing match" I had mentioned to Hitokawa was a game popular in our elementary school. We had used desks instead of boxes, but the name remained. It was a game where teams of two won by pushing the other team back to the wall.
Hitokawa had remembered and moved exactly as I intended. Back then, I would often distract the opponents with my talking while Hitokawa would launch a surprise push. It was a tactic possible only between old friends. And the resultโฆ
"...Did we succeed?"
"...We succeeded."
Only after showing him the vials I had caught in both hands could we finally let out a sigh of relief.