After school, Utaha walked toward the train station alone, her shadow stretched long by the evening sun.
Amidst the bustling crowd of commuters and students, she felt like an outsider. The people around her hurried along, discussing mundane trifles—exams, work, romance, dinner—completely unaware of the "things" lurking in the shadows. And this "ignorance" was a "happiness" she had also possessed until yesterday.
The train arrived at the station, and a cold, mechanical female voice announced the stop.
Utaha squeezed into the crowded carriage with the flow of people, met by a wave of air mixed with the scents of sweat, perfume, and food. She found a relatively spacious corner near the door to stand, put on her headphones, but didn't play any music. She just used them to block out the external noise and continued to immerse herself in her thoughts.
Cursed Energy stems from negative emotions, but high-level application requires transcending those emotions, maintaining calmness or even joy.
Recalling Sukuna's teachings, she subconsciously tried to sense that so-called "Cursed Energy" within her body. She closed her eyes, trying to recall the sadness when she had heard of Tomoya's death, the fear when facing the Cursed Spirit, and the anger toward Sukuna, this unstable factor.
A faint, cold sensation seemed to coalesce in her lower abdomen, but it was fleeting and difficult to capture.
She sighed.
As expected, it wasn't that simple.
Just then, Sukuna's voice, lazy but with a hint of a new discovery, rang in her mind. "Hey, little girl, don't just stand there dazed. Look across from you, at that black-haired girl sitting there with her head down."
Hearing this, Utaha lifted her eyelashes and looked through the gaps in the crowd.
On the opposite seat, there sat a black-haired girl who looked to be about her age. The girl kept her head down, her thick bangs covering part of her face, her hands tightly gripping the straps of the school bag on her lap, her body trembling slightly with tiny movements.
But what caught Utaha's attention most was that although the girl's head was down, she would occasionally and extremely quickly steal a glance toward her from the corner of her eye, her gaze a mix of intense curiosity and... unconcealable fear?
"Is she... seeing something?" Utaha asked Sukuna uncertainly in her mind.
After the incident at Tomoya's house, she knew that ordinary people might suffer aftereffects after accidentally "seeing," but this was the first time she had seen someone pay such continuous attention with such complex emotions.
"Correct."
Sukuna's tone held a touch of amusement. "She sees me or rather, she sees the thing attached to you. In the look she gives you, the curiosity is for you yourself, but that fear is directed straight at me. Interesting... those eyes are not ordinary."
Just as Sukuna sensed, that girl was indeed Yotsuya Miko. She possessed a natural pair of Spiritual Eyes, and since some unknown time, she had been able to see "things" that ordinary people could not perceive—those Evil Spirits of various forms, mostly nauseating, wandering the human world.
Unlike Cursed Spirits, which actively attack the living and are condensed from strong negative emotions, these Evil Spirits seemed to have clear rules for harming people. They usually can't directly hurt those who can't see them, but they instinctively entangle and peer at people, bringing discomfort and chill.
For Miko, daily life was a never-ending horror movie. A rotting passenger might be sitting on a bus seat, a twisted form might be curled in the shadows of a corner, and even her living room might have a translucent ghost floating through.
Her only way to protect herself was to temper her acting skills on the fly, mastering the art of "Ignoring." No matter how terrifying or disgusting the sight, she had to force herself to stay calm and expressionless, never letting those things realize she could see them. Because once she was noticed, she didn't know what would happen.
This required a will of iron and constantly taut nerves. It was an exhausting task that heavily drained her mental energy.
After school today, as usual, Miko dragged her weary body and mind onto this train. The carriage was still "bustling": a soaking wet water ghost hung from a hand strap, a jawless old lady ghost floated in the aisle, and several small spirits scurried around the passengers' feet.
Miko skillfully lowered her head, avoiding all eye contact, silently praying to get home quickly.
However, after the train had passed a few stations, she keenly felt the surrounding "atmosphere" change.
That shadow-like chill and the feeling of being watched had actually weakened?
Carefully, with a movement almost impossible to notice, she lifted her eyelids and quickly scanned the carriage. Then, she found the source of the anomaly—the tall, beautiful girl across from her with long, straight black hair.
This girl was very beautiful, the type that even Miko couldn't help but look at a few extra times—mature, sexy, yet elegant, almost like a "femme fatale" stepped out of a manga.
The curve of her chest was almost the same as, or even better than, her best friend who had abnormally developed parts.
But what attracted Miko wasn't just her outstanding appearance. She saw that with that girl as the center, a radius of about one or two meters had actually formed a strange "pure land".
Those Evil Spirits that were usually arrogant were now like they had encountered some terrifying natural enemy, shrinking back and not daring to approach, even actively detouring. In the area where the girl was, the air even seemed much fresher.
What made Miko's heart stop even more was that when she focused her gaze, she vaguely saw a blurred but incomparably terrifying phantom emerging behind the girl. That phantom had four arms, a hideous silhouette, and emitted an indescribable aura of tyranny and evil that seemed to originate from the primordial era.
Although it was only a fleeting illusion, that sense of fear striking deep into her soul was a hundred, a thousand times stronger than any Evil Spirit she had ever seen before.
'More... more terrifying than all the Evil Spirits...' Miko screamed internally, her body instantly stiffening, almost unable to breathe.
She quickly lowered her head, her heart pounding as if it were about to burst out of her chest.
She didn't understand what it was, but she knew one thing.
That girl was definitely not normal, the thing attached to her was a terrifying existence far beyond her understanding.
Driven by fear and intense curiosity, she couldn't help but steal another glance, both afraid of being discovered and uncontrollably wanting to confirm if it was her hallucination.