A Ghoul laughed in front of her.
Then, something dark red flooded her vision.
Kasuka and Kureo threw themselves backward before they even had time to draw their Quinque. It was the fastest judgment and reaction either of them could claim in their entire careers as Ghoul Investigators.
Even that wasn't enough.
Parts of their bodies were swallowed by a Kagune that burst outward like an explosion.
KWA-GA-GA-GA-BOOOOM!!
Three streams of Kagune whipped around them like a storm. Marude, standing outside the blast radius, ducked a flying chunk of stone and shouted, "Kureo! Kasuka!"
The two figures rolled across the floor.
Kasuka seemed to have taken less damage; she was able to plant her knees and hands on the ground and push herself up immediately. Kureo, however, could only stagger, unable to move properly.
"Kureo! Are you all right—damn it!"
Marude ran to Kureo and checked his condition, only to grimace and spit out a curse.
A red stain was rapidly spreading across Kureo's chest.
A piece of the Kagune he hadn't managed to dodge had torn away the flesh from his chest to his shoulder. Through the pooling blood, something pale and bone-like was visible.
It was a critical injury. The fact that he was still conscious was a miracle in itself.
With a stunned look, Eto turned back.
Because of the darkness and the distance, her face wasn't clear, but the mass of Kagune covering half her head like a mask was unmistakable.
It was still only partial, but it was undeniably a Kakuja.
"A Kakuja... Damn it! Why the hell is that appearing now?!"
There was a saying that when a Kakuja Ghoul appeared, hundreds of people would inevitably bleed. That was why Kakuja were seen as symbols of disaster.
Not only their strength, but their speed, stamina, and regeneration were all absurdly high. Even in a partial state, those traits remained.
This is already beyond what we can handle! At minimum, a Special Class Investigator needs to be deployed!
They had to run. But could they?
He recalled Eto's movements from moments ago. She was a Ghoul who moved at monstrous speed, ignoring gravity itself.
There was no way they could shake her while dragging a critically injured Kureo. But they couldn't just stand here and be slaughtered either.
Just as Marude, bracing himself for death, raised his Quinque rifle and aimed at Eto,
Kasuka stepped in, her back forming a barrier in front of him.
"As Associate Special Class Investigator Mado Kasuka, I order you by the authority of the leader."
"Cough...! Kasuka...?"
Kureo, still conscious, coughed up blood and called her name.
Without looking back at him, Kasuka fixed her gaze on Eto as the latter pulled the Quinque spear out of her own chest.
Squelch!
Because it had been inflicted by a Quinque, the wound didn't close immediately, leaving a gaping hole. Yet Eto seemed to feel no pain at all; she simply brought a hand to the rapier that had pierced her neck.
It was a casual motion, like brushing dust from her clothes and straightening her collar. Behind her, the three streams of Kagune writhed menacingly, like hunting dogs waiting for their master to finish dressing.
Watching this, Kasuka spoke over her shoulder to the two men.
"Update the target Ghoul's rating to SS. I've judged the danger too high for our current combat strength, so we are retreating. First Class Investigator Marude Itsuki, escort the injured First Class Investigator Mado Kureo out of here."
Her voice was bureaucratic and flat. None of her earlier composure remained.
That was how seriously Mado Kasuka viewed the appearance of a Kakuja, and why she was issuing a retreat order.
For the two of them—excluding herself.
Understanding the implication, Kureo raised his voice even while coughing blood.
"What are you talking about...! You're planning to hold that monster off by yourself?!"
"For now, this is the best choice, Investigator Mado. Even if the three of us fight, we have no chance of winning."
"Damn it! Drop that stiff tone! Cough...! That habit of yours—the one that comes out when you've resolved yourself to die—is still the same!"
Kureo clenched his teeth and forced his broken body upright.
He shook off Marude's hand when the other tried to support him, making his will clear.
"There's no guarantee I'll survive if I run in this state! I'd rather stay! If I'm going to die anyway, I'll spend my life here...!!"
"...Sigh."
Kasuka sighed, still keeping her eyes on Eto.
The rapier lodged in her neck wasn't coming out easily, as if it had caught between the vertebrae, and Eto was tugging at it irritably.
Judging that they had a brief window, Kasuka glanced back at Kureo.
"You remember our promise, don't you? If we ever faced a situation where there was no way out, one of us had to survive."
"Like hell I'd forget! But it doesn't have to be you!"
"No. It has to be me. In your condition, you wouldn't survive a single hit. After that, that child will chase us as we run, and we'll all be wiped out."
The same went for Marude. His individual combat strength was lower.
By process of elimination, only Kasuka remained. One arm was unusable, but among them, she was the only one who could hold Eto back, even briefly.
Kasuka shrugged and continued.
"You know my personality. If I'm assigned a role, I stay true to its essence. A mountain climber climbs mountains, a Ghoul Investigator confronts Ghouls, and a leader must judge and act for the team."
As she spoke, Kasuka seemed to remember something and muttered,
"Ah, but..."
She touched the pendant hanging at her neck.
Inside was a photograph of the person she cherished most.
"It's sad not being able to fulfill my duties as a parent."
The image of the daughter waiting for them at home flashed through her mind, only to be erased by the sharp ring of metal.
Clang!
Eto finally ripped the rapier free and hurled it to the ground.
Then she turned the half of her face not covered by Kagune toward them. She was still smiling.
Killing intent and innocence mixed together.
Kasuka felt that perhaps the two were the same thing.
Right now, she judged, that child probably saw them as nothing more than frogs being toyed with, pelted with stones out of curiosity.
Whoosh...!!
In that instant, it felt as if the air had vanished from the world.
As though trapped in a vacuum, she couldn't breathe and her skin trembled.
She instinctively knew this was the prelude to an attack.
"Kasuka!!"
"Stop, Mado! If you go in with that body, you'll both die!"
Faster than Kureo could even take a step to charge forward, Eto's body became a red line and shot toward Kasuka.
Who was she aiming for? Kasuka in front of her?
Trying to understand the thoughts of a Ghoul driven mad by cannibalistic frenzy was foolish.
She could just as easily be pretending to attack Kasuka while finishing off the two behind her first.
So...
I have to cling to her no matter what!
Kasuka, having read the prelude to the attack, had already kicked up the long rifle at her feet.
Her hand caught the rifle as it spun through the air. Then her fingers quickly moved the selector.
This rifle-shaped Quinque changed its properties depending on the selector's position—from rapid-fire with low power to a single shot of overwhelming force.
And Kasuka's fingers moved the selector to a position she had never used before.
It was a trump card she had sworn never to use unless the situation was truly desperate.
But there's no way you'll just take it quietly!
The moment the distance between Eto and Kasuka closed, Kasuka thrust the rifle downward.
Not at Eto.
At the floor.
Then she pulled the trigger.
At first, the floor split apart as if centipedes were scattering in every direction. Eto thrust out a hand with her fingers bent like hooks toward Kasuka.
Light began to burst from the cracked floor all at once. It was the moment Eto's hand was about to reach Kasuka's head and crush her skull.
The floor swelled upward, and a fierce explosion engulfed both Kasuka and Eto.
KWA-GA-GA-GA-CRACK!!
"Ghk!!"
"Grrr...!!!"
Kasuka groaned as fragments surged up and struck her entire body, while Eto frowned like a child whose game had been interrupted.
The shock rising from below had prevented her from crushing Kasuka's head.
At the same time, Kasuka's long rifle shattered and vanished.
Originally, it had been designed to pierce the Kagune of a sturdy Koukaku Ghoul and destroy the target's insides in a single blow. Even without a Koukaku target, it was a monstrous weapon capable of instantly killing most Ghouls.
However, the barrel couldn't withstand such overwhelming power, making it a trump card that could only be fired once.
Kasuka had decided to use that trump card, which might have dealt Eto a fatal blow, to save the lives of her husband and her friend.
The thick floor around Kasuka had been blown away, revealing a massive maw. It looked like some untouched wilderness, a place beyond human reach.
Flash!
Eto's gaze shifted. It seemed she wanted a different toy now that this one had been ruined.
And then her eyes caught Kureo and Marude, both being pushed back by the explosion.
Eto decided to change targets. Even though she had been lifted into the air by the blast, there was no restriction on her with her Ukaku.
The moment she shot toward them, something wrapped around Eto's waist.
Kasuka.
Clinging to Eto, she smiled brightly.
"Bored because there's no one to play with? Play with me."
"...Hah!"
Eto smiled back at Kasuka.
Without hesitation, she roughly seized Kasuka by the head and unleashed her Ukaku from behind.
The two figures were shot downward at once, toward a hole with no visible bottom. Perhaps she wanted to see a human head smashed like a tomato after falling from such a height.
"KASUKAAAAA!!!!!"
As the two disappeared into the hole, Kureo's voice rang out in a mournful cry.
The fingers of Eto digging into her flesh, tightening around her skull, the sound of wind rushing toward the abyss, and the voice of the man she loved.
As if accepting everything, Kasuka closed her eyes.
**
In a book she had read long ago, the author compared the brain to the universe.
Hundreds of billions of neurons and glial cells clustered together.
The place where emotion, learning, cognition, memory, reasoning, and imagination take place. The source of the entire body.
The small space of a single head is still an unexplored unknown world. It evokes an endless universe, and even researchers who should shun the unscientific can't help but feel a kind of mystical reverence.
Wasn't that ridiculous?
The universe? Mysticism?
What emerged when the skull was cracked open was nothing more than a delicious lump of meat mixed with fluid.
Did beasts understand the beauty humans drew?
How much attention did savagery pay to the hymns of value built by intelligence?
Break it.
Crush it like a chick's egg that hasn't even hatched yet.
Break this woman's head and eat the brains.
Enjoy the sweet feast as a beast, and as a predator, by right.
"...And yet, why are you getting in my way?"
Eto, with [Kakugan] in both eyes, asked.
And another Eto, pinned beneath her and gripping her collar, growled back, "Don't kill her."
"You're really an idiot, aren't you? This woman saw my face. That's different from a man who barely saw anything, or one who only caught a glimpse of half of it. She saw my face clearly, from the closest possible distance. She has to die."
"I said don't kill her!"
"Haah..."
The Eto with red eyes sighed.
Thud!
Then she drove a fist down.
The other Eto's head snapped to the side. Even in a dream, blood sprayed vividly.
No—before that, was this really a dream? Eto herself couldn't tell.
Looking at the Eto whose cheek had swollen red, the red-eyed Eto said coldly, with contempt, "Shut up, you hypocrite. Your petty morals aren't even good enough to be a third-rate joke here. What then? If we let that woman live, what happens? Are you going to start a life on the run forever? She's a bomb. A ticking bomb that could ruin the peace I want at any moment! We have to tear it out by the roots!"
"..."
Grip...!!
Without a word, Eto tightened her hand around the collar of the red-eyed Eto. In response, Eto twisted her face with even greater fury and swung another punch.
Thud! Smack!
"You complete idiot! Give up on one of them! Either the everyday life with that person, or that woman's life! Do you think someone like you can bear everything!? Someone as powerless as you!? Do you think if you just throw a tantrum like a child, everything will just fall into your arms?!"
The red-eyed Eto yanked back at Eto's collar and glared fiercely at her.
"Don't make me laugh. That's the very definition of madness."
"...I know it's stupid."
Eto spoke. Her eyes were those of a frail human, but her gaze didn't waver.
"It must be really stupid. Wanting to have both sides, like a child throwing a fit. And I've kept watching someone who never stopped doing that, even after growing up."
"...What?"
"That idiot did something stupid again today. The work of Ghouls should be left to Ghouls! The work of Investigators should be left to Investigators! But he couldn't bear to watch both sides pile up dead, so he stuck a foot in, then couldn't get back out and nearly got himself killed all over again! And even now, he still won't give up! I've kept watching that kind of stupidity for years!! For more than ten years!!"
"...!"
He stood at the crossroads between an ordinary life and the hardships of being a Ghoul father. Greedy as he was, he embraced both and made them one.
He stood at the crossroads between his Ghoul daughter and his Investigator friend. Proud as he was, he embraced both and forged a single bond.
The battle between a Ghoul pack and an Investigator squad was about to begin, and he, mad enough to be truly mad, had thrown himself into the chaos to reduce the sacrifices on both sides.
"I know it's hypocrisy! I know it's insane! Even so, I stayed with that person who never gave up and kept trying to make it happen!! I want to live an everyday life with someone like that!! I'll never forgive myself if I deny that person's life!!!"
Thud!
The red-eyed Eto was shoved to the ground by the other Eto. By now, their positions had reversed.
And it didn't stop there; the pinned Eto began to be buried in the dirt.
Eto glared at the one being buried and said, as if issuing a threat, "Never show yourself in front of me again...!!!"
At those words, at that sight, the red-eyed Eto let out a languid sigh as if there was nothing to be done.
"Hmm. I guess I can't help it. But you know..."
The scenery began to change.
Everything around them darkened, and an unknown pressure of wind wrapped around Eto's body.
And the buried Eto began to change shape. She became the form of a familiar adult woman. Eto was holding the woman's head, the woman whose eyes were already closed as if she had accepted everything.
At the same time, the mouth of the Eto that had not yet fully disappeared moved and said, "It's already too late."
"...?!?!"
Eto spread her wings and tried to stop her falling body.
But the floor was already right in front of them, and Eto and Kasuka crashed onto it.
KWA-GA-GA-GA-BOOOOM!!
With the impact came a flood of bright red blood filling her vision.
Yes.
It was already too late.