After arranging the club's affairs, Asakura hurriedly left the activity room.
"Takuma-kun, did something happen?"
Asagumo caught up and asked.
"Honestly, it's not a big problem, I just need to confirm something."
Asakura nodded: "Yesterday, Yanami and Yui should have mentioned the wanted criminal in the group chat, right?"
"Yeah, they said the wanted criminal was already captured by you." The girl nodded.
"Around noon today, that guy escaped from the detention center."
"What?" The girl looked surprised.
"And then he was caught by the police again just a little while ago..." Asakura said calmly.
"..." The girl looked at Asakura, thinking he was teasing her on purpose to see her get startled.
"Well, in this day and age—even if it doesn't quite match the Middle Kingdom—there are actually quite a lot of surveillance cameras..."
Asakura continued: "I don't know what happened, but when that guy escaped the detention center, he had already become something neither human nor ghost."
His "eye" snakes couldn't provide very precise information. After all, snakes have limited communication skills; they certainly couldn't compare to humans, who have a dozen different ways to describe a single thing.
"He wasn't like that yesterday?" The girl asked in a low voice.
"He was pretty human yesterday."
"That doesn't sound like a compliment..."
"No, I'm serious."
Asakura shook his head: "To be honest, the fact that he woke up today is already quite beyond my expectations. Based on my estimate, he should still be in the ICU today..." He suddenly paused: "Wait, hold on, could it be because he was in a place like that that he could escape so easily today?"
"The ICU?"
"Because yesterday, my persona was 'an ordinary guy who got lucky and found a wanted criminal knocked out by snake venom.'" Asakura rubbed his chin: "Could it be a side effect of the venom? Anyway, when he escaped today, his skin seemed much paler, his body was hunched over, his teeth were protruding, and his nails were yellow... When the police caught him again, he was by the river catching fish and eating them raw."
"Eating raw river fish isn't good, is it?"
"Witnesses said he was wandering near the riverbank, muttering in a low voice, 'My precious, my precious,' or something like that."
"Gollum?!"
"It shouldn't be the One Ring, I hope."
Asakura complained.
That said, his interest was piqued again.
It seemed his previous guess was correct; the man did have something he considered a treasure—likely a supernatural item similar to the Cursed Camera. That thing had protected him to some extent, allowing him to evade police surveillance in modern society until yesterday.
But yesterday, or perhaps earlier, he lost that "precious..." which was why he was so easily discovered and taken down...
Thinking of this, Asakura suddenly froze.
Wait, was it really because he lost the supernatural item that my snakes could take him down?
If that treasure only worked against humans, my snakes could have handled him easily even if he hadn't lost it.
Furthermore, if that item worked equally against all living creatures, would it still function properly against me, someone who possesses magic and is a supernatural existence in my own right?
Considering the man looked quite normal yesterday and yet, in just one day, he looked as if he had wasted away over a long period, the latter explanation seemed more likely—the item was probably still in his possession until he was knocked out yesterday, and was only lost after he was poisoned.
In that case, the item should be at the spot where I took him down yesterday.
It wasn't the riverbank, but a place a bit closer to the road, though still quite secluded.
With that thought, Asakura immediately took Asagumo to the site where he had neutralized the man.
However, even with his perception fully active and the infrared vision of Snake, he still couldn't find the lost supernatural item.
"Did I guess wrong?" Asakura couldn't help but doubt himself.
"Could someone passing by have picked it up?" Asagumo had also helped search the area several times to no avail.
"It's possible, but if that's the case, it'll be a bit of a problem..."
Asakura scratched his head.
Judging by the state of the wanted criminal after he lost the item, that supernatural object was likely no good news.
If an ordinary person found it, at most they'd be beguiled like that criminal; they wouldn't be a match for Asakura anyway. But if someone with magic—or even a witch—picked it up, that would be a real disaster... Heaven knows how much chaos that thing could cause.
"If there's really nothing we can do, let's give up for now..." Asagumo said rationally. "Worrying about it won't yield any results. We just have to wait for it to reveal itself or slip up. There's no need to drain your spirit beforehand; saving your energy will be more useful when the time comes to solve the problem."
"Chihaya, you're absolutely right!" Asakura clutched his head and muttered in frustration. "I want to say that, but it's really hard to act like I don't know..."
One can deceive anyone, but it's hard to deceive oneself.
If simply saying "I don't care" could let one drop an obsession, depression probably wouldn't exist in this world.
"Takuma-kun..."
"Sorry, Chihaya. I have an idea. Can you help me?" Asakura looked at the girl and said seriously.
"Yes, whatever Takuma-kun needs." The girl's eyes were full of absolute trust.
Asakura placed his hands on her shoulders and slowly leaned his face toward hers.
Although she had prepared herself mentally, seeing Asakura lean in caused her whole body to stiffen.
Her heart began to race, her breathing became erratic, and her cheeks flushed crimson. It felt as if the entire world had vanished, leaving only his approaching silhouette.
However, just as the distance between Asakura and her was less than a finger's width, his movement suddenly stopped.
"That's enough. Thank you, Chihaya..." Asakura said with a smile.
He had originally intended to use his magic to trigger the girl's curse, skipping time to a certain extent to speed up the recovery of his Eye of Truth. Doing so would have been a massive burden on both him and Asagumo—it was even possible that forcing the Eye of Truth this way could have truly blinded him in one eye.
But in reality, he could use a trick. As long as he prepared himself to "shout the answer the moment he saw the truth through the Eye of Truth..." he could see the answer ahead of time through Future Sight. This way, he could "freeload" the effect of the future Eye of Truth without any burden.
Seeing Asakura's face shining with the joy of knowing the answer, Asagumo didn't hesitate for a second. She stood on her tiptoes and kissed him fiercely.