With the investigation complete, Shirou prepared to pull out.
"Even if you say we should pull out... we're already surrounded!"
Caren stared at the door as it shook under the relentless pounding, her face pale. "Shirou, are you planning to kill all those ghouls?"
A staggering number of ghouls had surrounded Odd Vorzak's residence.
They could simply defeat them all, but that would alert the mastermind hiding behind the scenes.
After a moment of thought, Shirou said, "There's no need to go to that much trouble. From what I've observed, these ghouls are only capable of the most basic stimulus responses. Caren, do you remember what first caused the ghouls to attack us?"
The girl tilted her head and thought for a moment. "That was... Hmm, was it because we checked into the inn?"
Shirou nodded. "Exactly. It was the act of 'checking in' itself. The ghouls only moved to surround us after we rented a room at the inn. The same thing happened this time. They came here and surrounded the place because we broke into Odd Vorzak's house. These ghouls aren't capable of independent thought. They can only respond to situations that were predetermined for them."
"Hmm, I understand... But what does that have to do with our current situation?"
"Once you understand how they operate, slipping past their notice is easy."
Shirou continued, "Trying to escape from the house would definitely make them target us, so we need to convince them that we're already dead."
Caren seemed to realize what he meant. "Wait, you're not planning to..."
"I'm planning exactly what you think I am."
Shirou smiled.
...
A few seconds later, the ghouls gathered outside the cabin finally smashed through the door.
They filed inside without expression and began searching for their targets.
Their tiny minds contained nothing but the appearances of Shirou and Caren. They had no interest in anything else.
Naturally, none of them noticed the sword planted in the center of the floor.
At that moment, the blade erupted with light.
"Broken Phantasm."
The explosion Shirou triggered released an enormous surge of energy, blasting the entire cabin into the air.
The ghouls inside were vaporized instantly in the blaze of light, while those packed outside were reduced by the shockwave to chunks of flesh that no longer resembled anything human.
"Now the ghouls will assume we died in the explosion as well."
Shirou spoke from inside the cellar, where he had erected a protective Barrier around himself and Caren.
She rolled her eyes in exasperation. "What do we do next? We can't alert the enemy, but we can't continue investigating either. We can't stay hidden here until dawn."
At that moment, Caren's smooth thigh was pressed firmly against Shirou's face, while Shirou's solid chest pressed against her forehead.
The underground space was so cramped that they had no choice but to squeeze together in a bizarre position, looking remarkably like a piece of modern art.
"Well," Shirou said, "at this point, we have no choice but to go back and ask that person for help."
Caren's face turned ashen. "..."
"You'll have to apologize properly to Natalia-san, all right?"
...
"You came back even sooner than I expected."
Natalia lit a cigarette and looked at the two of them seated on the sofa.
After going around in circles, Shirou and Caren had ended up right back where they started.
The inn where Natalia was hiding was probably the only safe haven in the entire town.
The female hunter tilted her head with a wicked grin. "Sorry, what did you just say? I didn't quite catch it."
Caren's face reddened as she forced out the words. "Please... please cooperate with us!"
"Oh? Who was it that said she didn't want to work with a suspicious Magus?"
"Ugh...!"
"All right, Natalia-san. Stop teasing Caren."
As Shirou tried to smooth things over, he began explaining the information he had withheld earlier.
As a gesture of sincerity in requesting Natalia's cooperation, he told her the real reason he and Caren had come to this town.
"Odd Vorzak... You mean the 'Demonic Bee User'!?"
Natalia's reaction was far stronger than expected. The cigarette between her lips nearly fell onto the carpet.
"Do you know him?" Shirou asked.
"Know him? I know him all too well...!"
Natalia bit down hard on her lip.
Unlike her usual cold, hardened demeanor as a hunter, she was visibly agitated, and intense murderous intent radiated from her entire body.
Shirou later learned that Odd Vorzak had once been one of her targets and that the two of them had clashed before.
Something deeply unpleasant must have happened between them, but Shirou chose not to pry.
It took Natalia several minutes to calm herself before she lit another cigarette.
"I see. So you were the one who killed Odd Vorzak."
"He was already one of the living dead by the time I killed him."
"Either way, you were the one who finally put an end to him... You have my thanks, Shirou Amamiya."
Natalia murmured the words in an exhausted voice.
Her succubus bloodline must be much thinner than Lady Avalon's...
That must be why she has retained most of her human emotions, Shirou thought.
"I'm sorry to interrupt your melancholy reminiscing, but could we get down to business?"
Caren's cold voice pulled Natalia back to the present.
"Sorry, sorry."
Natalia took out a photograph.
"This is the one I'm hunting. He's also the one who turned Odd Vorzak into one of the living dead."
"...Hmm."
Shirou raised an eyebrow.
The object shown in the photograph appeared to have been pieced together from multiple human bodies.
Corpses that had been chopped apart, joined together, fused, and separated had been combined into a huge mass of flesh, with a large, charred hole at its center.
"This thing was discovered more than twenty years ago in northern Bavaria, Germany. The angle makes it difficult to tell from the photograph, but it moves around on eighteen horse legs."
"Horse legs...?"
A cold smile appeared on Natalia's face. "There's no limit to how grotesque these things can get. The man who created it was a Magus named Heinrich Zepter."
Shirou asked, "Why did he create this monstrosity?"
"Try not to be too surprised. Apparently, it was for the Resurrection of the Dead."
"What a desecration..."
The nun, who proclaimed herself an apostle of God, frowned.
The photograph showed the results of the inhuman research conducted by a mad Magus who sought to resurrect his deceased lover.
"Kid, what do you imagine the Resurrection of the Dead to be?"
"It would be..."
It would mean restoring the lost body and the lost soul, then turning back the time that had been lost.
Natalia shook her head. "Heinrich's idea of the Resurrection of the Dead is quite different from yours, kid."
Ordinarily, the miracle known as the Resurrection of the Dead was just as Shirou-kun imagined it, the restoration of both the soul and the body.
Neither could be abandoned.
If the soul was not restored, the result would be nothing more than a mindless corpse that could move.
If the body was not restored, it would be no different from a rotting mass of flesh.
Natalia smiled wryly. "As long as the body is resurrected, it doesn't matter what happens to the soul. See? That's heretical enough, isn't it?"
"I don't understand. What's the point of resurrecting only the body?"
"Who knows... Maybe even he doesn't know."
"Why?"
Natalia explained, "For generations, the Zepter family has devoted itself to achieving the miracle of 'Resurrection of the Dead.'"
"At first, they racked their brains trying to resurrect intact corpses. Then they turned their efforts toward piecing together dismembered bodies."
"Eventually, they mastered a technique that could combine parts from different corpses and grant them biological functions."
What the Magus had ultimately achieved was no longer the original "Resurrection of the Dead." To put it another way...
"Exactly. They strayed completely from their original goal. This is no longer 'Resurrection of the Dead.' It's 'Monster Creation.'"
For several generations, the Zepter family had already been regarded as showing signs of "losing control."
To resurrect the dead in a complete state.
Leaving aside those who died of old age, it was impossible to fully restore someone killed in a sudden accident to exactly the way they had been before death.
Therefore, resurrection had to remain possible even when the limbs had been severed.
No, it could not be limited to bodies with all their limbs. Resurrection had to be possible even when parts were missing.
But accomplishing that required a technique capable of completely manipulating the physical body.
A technique that could fuse, combine, bind, and control any assortment of body parts, regardless of their condition.
"They really went completely off course, didn't they? Did the Association finally hold him accountable?"
Natalia stared at the mottled ceiling as though the matter had nothing to do with her.
"Once you use an entire village as experimental material, even the Association would have trouble covering for you."
After committing an unforgivable crime, Heinrich fled Germany and disappeared without a trace.
Many years passed before his whereabouts were finally discovered not long ago.
"That man is hiding somewhere in this town right now."
Sensing a profitable opportunity, Natalia accepted the commission to eliminate the evil Magus and entered the town alone.
What awaited her was a population of ten thousand residents, all completely under the Magus's control.
She had been forced to disguise herself and hide in an inn, gathering intelligence while waiting for an opening.
Thanks to her Succubus bloodline and the Barriers she had established, she had managed to remain concealed within the enemy's stronghold without being discovered.
The ones who broke the stalemate were Shirou and Caren, who had come in pursuit of the Dead Apostle Odd Vorzak.
However, that man had already become one of Heinrich Zepter's test subjects, most likely on the very first night he entered the village.
The infamous "Demonic Bee User" had been killed and turned into one of their "companions," another resident.
That was the full story up to this point.
"The enemy is the entire town... You've got to be kidding me..." Caren clicked her tongue.
Natalia smiled. "I've actually prepared six different escape plans. Would you like to hear them?"
"No."
Shirou narrowed his eyes.
Heinrich Zepter absolutely could not be allowed to remain in this world any longer.
Natalia nodded in satisfaction. "I knew you'd say that."
"Now then, I've told you everything I know."
"It's your turn to provide me with some 'assistance.' That's how a healthy partnership works, isn't it?"
The emphasis she placed on "assistance" immediately put Caren on guard.
"What do you want?"
"What I want is very simple."
As she spoke, the huntress pointed at Shirou.
"...?"
A peculiar gleam flickered in Natalia's eyes.
Shirou had only ever seen that look in nature documentaries, in the eyes of a predator preparing to devour its prey.
He suddenly felt as though he was about to be eaten alive.
...
"It really is just sleeping, right? Nothing else is going to happen?"
Sitting on the edge of the inn's bed, the red-haired boy voiced his concern.
With her back to him, Natalia closed the door. Then she turned around with a smile.
"If it's Shirou-kun, I wouldn't mind doing something else if you wanted to."
"...We're not doing anything else," Shirou said, turning his face away.
One of Natalia's ancestors had been born from a Succubus and a human.
Although the half-demon blood in her veins had grown quite thin by her generation, she still retained some of the Succubus's unique abilities.
She did not possess the ageless immortality or physical regeneration of a Succubus, but Natalia had retained their racial ability to gain Mana by absorbing human vital energy.
Succubi approached men, created dreams, and drained their vital energy until nothing remained.
They were entirely different from fairies and Elementals. Instead, they more closely resembled the demons that were the Holy Church's sworn enemies.
Succubi possessed no physical bodies in the material world. They were Phantasmal Species that existed primarily on a spiritual plane.
For that reason, Natalia's constitution as a Magus differed slightly from that of an ordinary human.
Unlike human Magi, she could not easily restore expended Mana through normal food. Once her reserves were exhausted, she had no choice but to take more from humans.
That would hardly have been a problem in ordinary society. After all, no resource was more plentiful in this age than human beings.
Natalia only needed to establish a Barrier within a city to draw a vast quantity of Mana from hundreds of people, without leaving any of them with incurable aftereffects.
But she was now trapped in a small town inhabited solely by the walking dead.
The residents still looked human on the outside, but they could not provide Natalia with Mana. After remaining in hiding for so long, her reserves were nearly exhausted.
In truth, Natalia was nowhere near as strong as she appeared. She had already grown extremely weak.
The only reason she had not retreated was because, in her current state, she might not even be able to escape the pursuing residents.
"My, you really saved me. Had Shirou-kun not arrived, I might have died here."
As she spoke, Natalia removed her coat and hung it on a nearby rack.
Shirou's next task was to provide her with vital energy. That was the condition Natalia had set for their cooperation.
Though she called it "absorbing vital energy," all they actually had to do was lie together in the same bed and sleep until dawn. At least, that was what Natalia claimed.
Normally, a Succubus did not need such a ritual to absorb vital energy. It could be done from a distance.
Natalia, however, was currently too weak. That was why she needed closer physical contact with Shirou.
Caren, meanwhile, was sleeping in the room next door.
The useless girl, incapable of providing Natalia with vital energy, would have to endure the long, lonely night all by herself. Best of luck to her.
"Come to think of it, what would you have done to me if I hadn't been an Agent, but just an ordinary tourist passing through?"
Natalia tilted her head and considered the question for a moment. Then she gave him a seductive smile.
"Hmm... I suppose I would have locked you in the basement until I drained every last bit of your Mana."
This woman really was a demon, just like Lady Avalon!
Shirou stole a glance at Natalia.
Is this really going to be okay...?
His unease was perfectly understandable. He had already found himself in similar situations several times before.
"I only want to sleep with Shirou," a woman would say, only to devour him little by little afterward.
"It's only a little touching ♡"
"Come on, you can touch me too."
"My, Shirou looks like he's having a hard time. Shall I help you?"
...It's all Irisviel's fault! She's the reason I can't trust women anymore!!
Natalia looked like a perfectly respectable woman, so it should be fine... right?
With that thought, Shirou looked toward the silver-haired huntress.
"What are you doing?!" he shrieked.
Natalia glanced down at the belt she had unfastened and replied as though it were obvious, "Taking off my pants. You don't expect me to sleep in them, do you?"
Shirou stared at her in disbelief. "No, but even so... You can't get into bed wearing nothing but your underwear!"
"Why not? I usually sleep naked."
Ignoring the boy's complaints, the silver-haired huntress dropped onto the bed beside him.
"..."
Shirou swallowed.
Natalia usually carried herself like a cold, ruthless hunter, and even her clothing was practical and somewhat androgynous. But once she took it off, how could he describe it...?
Perhaps this was only to be expected from a descendant of a Succubus.
After shedding her black leather coat, Natalia was dressed remarkably lightly. Her upper body was covered only by a pure white tank top that left her navel completely exposed.
Her generous chest was pale and full, and the thin fabric plainly outlined her mature, shapely figure.
Below the waist was even more dangerous. She wore nothing but a pair of black lace underwear with an unmistakably mature allure.
Her long, well-trained legs were smooth and full, gleaming pale beneath the moonlight.
Simply sitting on the edge of the bed with her legs crossed, Natalia made it impossible for him to look away.
"Shirou-kun, where are you looking?"
Natalia brushed the hair away from her face and giggled.
"I'm not looking anywhere," Shirou muttered.
There was something strangely provocative about her smile. Was she really about to devour him completely?
Still... this was one of the conditions of their cooperation. He could not refuse.
Sorry, everyone!
Natalia switched off the bedside lamp. "All right. It's bedtime, kid."
"Ah, wait... I'm really not mentally prepared for this..."
Something soft and heavy pressed against Shirou's face.
Natalia hooked an arm around his neck and forcibly dragged him beneath the covers.