The blue sky.
The flower field.
Taking them in, Eto blinked.
This was an unfamiliar place. She didn't know why she was here. But she didn't question it.
Everything felt hazy, as if she were dreaming.
She didn't want to think about anything. She didn't even want to move a finger.
As she stared blankly up at the sky, a shadow fell across Eto's face.
Someone was looking down at her.
"What are you doing?"
"...Dad?"
"Don't just lie down anywhere. You'll get bitten by ticks."
Koma sat down beside Eto, offering oddly practical advice that didn't suit the dreamlike space at all.
Eto pushed herself up and looked at his face. Koma held out what he had been carrying.
It was a bright red berry.
It looked so full of juice that red liquid seemed ready to spill out at any moment.
"What is this?"
"Just eat it."
Even as she tilted her head at Koma's dry voice, Eto took the berry.
After staring at it for a moment, Eto steeled herself and took a bite. Juice overflowed, tracing a red line down her jaw.
Eto's face twisted.
"It tastes bad."
"Just eat it quietly."
"Why do people eat things like this?"
"So you can live."
"...?"
At the meaningful words, Eto turned to look at Koma.
He only stared silently at the flower field, his expression different from usual. Eto found that strange, but she bit into the fruit again anyway.
It still tasted awful.
Chewing the solid lump that she couldn't tell was fruit or filth, Eto looked over the flower field the way Koma was doing.
It was a field of pure white flowers. But that field was turning red.
Like blood spreading through it.
Even that sight felt strange. And yet she didn't stop chewing.
She had been hungry for so long that she couldn't stand it anymore.
Whatever it was, she wanted to deal with this emptiness first.
Whatever it was...
Thud-thud-thud-thud!!
Mado Kureo and Marude Itsuki were racing through the sewer at full speed.
They had moved to the prearranged location to regroup with Kasuka after clearing out the Ghouls swarming in, but all they found there were shattered pipes and the traces of a battle trailing down the wall.
They hurriedly used a long ladder nearby to descend to the floor where Kasuka and the Ghoul were presumed to have fallen.
When they reached the bottom, what greeted them was a massive tremor and a roar like an earthquake had struck.
It didn't feel like a human and a Ghoul fighting. It felt like some enormous monster was rampaging wildly.
Then, after that final thunderous impact, no more sounds of fighting came.
Sensing something ominous, the two men quickened their pace. Kureo in particular was so pale with worry for his wife that he looked ready to collapse.
When they finally reached the battlefield, what they saw was a scene of ruin, with walls and pipes collapsed everywhere as if a typhoon had passed through... and...
Crunch. Crunch. Crack.
A small silhouette, tearing into what looked like someone's arm.
Perched on the tip of a jagged concrete shard, her [Kagune] wings hanging down, she looked like a raptor that had finished the hunt and was enjoying its meal.
His wife was nowhere in sight. A Ghoul was eating someone's arm.
The moment Kureo registered that, his eyes went wild.
"You bastard!!!!!"
"Mado!!"
Before Marude could stop him, Kureo charged out with his spear-shaped [Quinque] in hand.
The Ghoul chewing through the flesh and bones of the arm, Eto, turned her gaze toward him. Her pupils were still not normal, expanding and contracting in repeated spasms.
As she reacted to the killing intent directed at her and began to bare her own, she suddenly sprang upward as if launched.
Bang!!
Then a bullet fired from the corner shattered the edge of the concrete Eto had been standing on.
A familiar voice followed.
"Didn't I tell you to stop using bad language? What if you blurt something out and Akira picks it up, huh? Husband?"
"K-Kasuka! I thought you'd been taken out!"
Mado Kasuka emerged from behind a large chunk of debris.
She slung the long gun she had just fired over her shoulder with practiced ease and rubbed at her other arm.
Blood had soaked through her white coat, and the torn fabric exposed skin blackened with bruises.
"I did take a serious hit. She came down from above and attacked so fast there was nowhere to dodge. I had no choice but to give up one arm."
Kasuka looked up at Eto, who had leapt into the air. Eto stood atop the remaining pipe debris, looking down at them. She was probably wary of the sudden increase in enemies.
Even so, she didn't stop chewing on the arm in her mouth.
That was the arm she had torn from the Ghoul corpse she had first fed on.
Whether by accident or intent, the rampage she had gone on just before landing that blow on Kasuka had drained a lot of her stamina.
Even without reason, she seemed to have sensed that, and instead of pressing Kasuka's injury, Eto chose to fill her stomach first.
Marude, who was looking up at Eto with Kasuka and Kureo, asked about Kasuka's condition.
"Is that arm done for?"
"At least a compound fracture. It's hidden by my coat, but the bone's poking out a little too."
With a shrug and a calm expression, Kasuka reported the severity of her own injuries.
"What's that Ghoul's rating?"
"When we first encountered her, she was somewhere between B and A..."
Kasuka's eyes narrowed as she looked at Eto.
Crunch!
Eto bit off only the part she had in her mouth and tossed the rest away. Apparently that was enough for now.
"She just jumped to S-rank. Everyone be careful. She's gone mad from cannibalism, but there's still a little reason left in the way she moves."
At Kasuka's words, Eto's body tilted.
As she dropped freely above the investigators' heads as if surrendering herself to the air, Eto suddenly spread her wings.
Kwa-gagagagaaang!!!
She cut her direction at a right angle in midair and shot forward, smashing everything in her path as she raced across the ground like a shell fired from a cannon.
Marude let out a startled cry as Eto brushed past him, sending shards flying like weapons.
"Where's the reason in that! A raging bull would be calmer than this!"
"Can't you see it!? She's targeting you right now!"
"What...!!"
Bang!!
Eto, who had seemed to pass Marude by, kicked off the wall and changed direction, shooting back toward him.
Kureo thrust his spear forward, and Kasuka, having switched to her long gun, crossed in front of Marude to block her.
Clang!
Blocked from the path to Marude, Eto stomped on the crossed [Quinque] and leapt back into the sky.
Watching Eto circle through the air like a bird performing tricks, Marude shouted, "Why me!?"
"Because in a fight against multiple opponents, you take out the weakest one first! I told you, there's still a little reason left in her!"
Marude had some skill as a Ghoul Investigator, but he was still far better suited to command than to direct combat.
That was why he might lose some shine in a one-on-one fight, but in a battle against multiple enemies, his presence stood out.
And whether by instinct or by chance, Eto had identified the weakest target that would become troublesome if left alone.
That was why she had gone after him first, but from the way her first strike had missed Marude's position by a wide margin, it was clear she still couldn't properly control her body.
"GRAAAAHHHH!!!"
Eto screamed as she rose into the air, then shot back down toward the ground.
At first, it looked like she was charging straight at Kasuka and Kureo without thinking. But then she flapped her wings and changed direction twice in midair.
Reacting to Eto's movement as she tried to slip past them and go after Marude, Kureo moved.
Clang!!
Eto's claws and the tip of Kureo's spear collided, throwing off sparks.
Eto seemed ready to press Kureo further, but she changed direction again with a beat of her wings and moved to Marude's flank.
And there, as if she had read Eto's movement, Kasuka had already taken position and was waiting.
Eto lashed out at her with a whip-like kick. It was the same leg Kasuka had cut off at the ankle.
The rapier flashed as if to sever the ankle again, to cut through the bone and muscle that had only just begun to regenerate.
Thud!!
But the rapier that had driven into the ankle stopped halfway.
Eto's [Kagune] wrapped around her leg and came down to the ankle, catching the rapier in its grip.
Using the momentum of the leg swing, Eto twisted her body in a full rotation and brought her other leg crashing down toward Kasuka.
Thud-thud-thud-thud!
At that moment, bullets flew. It was Marude's [Quinque].
Eto covered her body with one wing to block the incoming rounds, but in doing so she gave Kasuka the opening she needed to evade Eto's attack.
Thanks to that, the leg Eto had aimed at Kasuka's neck swept through empty air, and Kasuka forcibly wrenched her rapier free, escaping Eto's attack range.
Spinning around to land on both feet, Eto leapt again, flapping her wings.
Eto's hunt continued.
Bang!! Clang!! Thud-thud-thud-thud!! Thud!! Kwaaaang!!
The beast with two wings rose and fell toward the prey on the ground.
The combined coordination of Kasuka, Kureo, and Marude formed something like a dome-shaped barrier, holding back Eto's assault.
Her attacks were fierce and irregular enough to make anyone dizzy, but their teamwork was so solid that she couldn't break through easily. But they couldn't land a decisive blow either.
"Marude! Now's the time to use that brain you're so proud of!"
"What's there to think about! That Ghoul's [Kagune] type is [Ukaku]! If she's burning through her stamina like this without any pacing, she'll run dry before long!"
"Speaking from experience after fighting her once, that won't work."
Clang!!
At Kasuka's words, Kureo and Marude, who had been deflecting Eto's attacks, turned to look at her.
"What did you say?"
"She moves the moment you say it. Marude! Shoot that girl down, quickly!"
Just as Kasuka said, once Eto had burned through enough strength, she stopped attacking and began kicking off the intact walls to climb upward.
Marude raised his gun, thinking she might be trying to flee, and Kasuka, having switched to her long gun as well, sniped at Eto.
As Eto climbed while blocking the hail of bullets with her [Kagune], she stopped at one point and thrust out the [Kagune] on the other side.
Kwa-gagak!! Bang!!
"GRAAAAH!!"
When she pulled the [Kagune] out of the wall, a strange Ghoul came with it.
It looked just like a harpoon cast into water spearing a fish.
Crunch!!
Eto bit deeply into the side of the Ghoul whose shoulder had been pierced by her [Kagune].
Ignoring the Ghoul's screams, she forcibly tore away part of its flesh and organs, then threw the Ghoul aside like trash.
Watching the Ghoul slam into the ground from roughly twenty meters up, Kasuka let out an impressed breath.
"Wow. She takes one bite out of a man and tosses him away. That girl's got real queen material."
"Is this really the time for jokes, honey?"
"Was that Ghoul even a girl to begin with? Couldn't tell with the face covered."
While the investigators traded remarks, the Ghoul that had just fallen began crawling toward them. It was still alive.
Bang!!
But the Ghoul's attempt to lunge at the investigators was stopped when Kasuka's bullet pierced straight through it.
Leaving the Ghoul to die with a huge hole in its forehead, Kasuka turned her attention back to Eto and asked, "Honey, what's the generation cycle for a Ghoul's kakuhou?"
"Hm? Why are you asking that all of a sudden?"
"Just answer quickly."
"Hmm... As you know, a kakuhou is formed inside a Ghoul's body when it accumulates more than a certain amount of RC cells. The [Kagune] is what erupts from there. There are individual differences, of course, but for a new kakuhou to form, it would take quite a long time of continued RC-cell intake. At the very fastest, maybe a month."
"Right? That's the standard, isn't it?"
As if reassured that her own understanding had not been wrong, Kasuka let out a small breath. Then she turned her tense gaze back to Eto.
"...Then how are we supposed to explain that?"
At the end of Kasuka's gaze was Eto's [Kagune].
Not the two [Kagune] spread out like wings.
Something like a tail was sprouting from behind Eto's back. The shape was still unstable, but Kasuka's eyes hadn't been wrong.
Eto's 『third [Kagune]』.
She had only just made her second [Kagune] bloom moments ago, and now, not long after, she was beginning to bloom a third.
Shock and disbelief flickered through Kasuka at something that should not have been possible under any circumstances.
Cold sweat ran down her cheek, even she, who never lost her composure, could not hide it.
"I'm revising the rating. At minimum, that thing is S+ rank."
Faster than the cold sweat could fall to the ground, Eto's body shot forward and crashed into the investigators.