It was sci-fi wrapped in a beautiful shell, almost like a mechanical angel.
And that made it easy for people to forget what it really was: a weapon. A killing weapon.
Only when it actually unleashed its power did they realize just how dangerous it could be.
So they stood there, still a little shaken, staring at the chunks of flesh carpeting the area around them. The heavy stench of blood, mixed with that rot-like reek of spoiled meat, even seemed to draw animals closer.
"What? Did Yuko-nee say something?"
Kiba Mikoto asked with mild curiosity as she took back the satellite phone.
After Yuko-nee contacted them, she'd had Mikoto hand the phone over to him. Mikoto had seen him frown slightly.
Clearly, something had happened to another team.
But he didn't answer right away. Instead, he looked toward a pink-haired girl in glasses.
"Why are you looking at me?"
Saya Takagi frowned, but there was a tremor of unease in her voice.
"Your father is dead."
Kain's reply was blunt. He had no intention of hiding it and letting her find out only after she got home.
Sooner or later made no difference. It wouldn't bring him back.
So he'd rather she knew now and faced it now.
"I see. Got it."
The girl who answered sounded calm. She turned and walked straight toward the room where they were still producing Earth Elixir.
"Why are you all standing there? Hurry up and make the Earth Elixir!"
Her voice carried out—steady, faintly detached.
Rational to the point of feeling like there was no emotion left in her at all. Not a trace of grief over her father's death. Cold. Almost heartless.
Seeing that, Kain's frown deepened.
He didn't think Saya believed he was joking. If anything, she'd accepted it immediately.
And Saya wasn't the kind of person who didn't care about her parents. If her parents died, she'd be the sort who might not even want to keep living.
She was smart—genius-level smart—but she shouldn't have been able to stay this composed.
Could it be… a side effect of the Earth Elixir?
Kain started to suspect the Earth Elixir had a side effect—something that suppressed emotion. That was bad.
Absolute rationality was more troublesome, and more dangerous, than someone with feelings.
All it took was a slight twist in someone's thinking—especially someone exceptionally intelligent—and they could become terrifying.
But… it didn't quite add up.
If it suppressed emotion, then the others who'd used Earth Elixir should have shown it too. Yet they still reacted normally—he could see it in their eyes when they looked at him, and when they looked at the scattered corpse chunks. No numb indifference.
So was it that the smarter the brain, the faster emotion got stripped away?
With that in mind, he discussed it with Saeko Busujima and Mikoto, trying to confirm whether Earth Elixir really had that kind of side effect.
"Um… I want to say… is it possible that—"
Rei Miyamoto spoke up, as if she'd just formed a theory. It came from putting herself in someone else's shoes.
"What kind of possible?" someone asked.
"Earlier, Kain… you used five doses of Earth Elixir, right? Your arm grew back. So… is it possible that if someone uses even more, then no matter what injuries they take, they can regenerate? Maybe even if they get killed and turn into one of the dead… they could come back?"
It sounded absurd, even to Rei—but she'd seen his limb regenerate after five doses. It didn't feel impossible anymore.
"That's different. The reason I can regenerate limbs isn't because of Earth Elixir. For me, it's just a nutrient supplement—packed with the raw materials the human body needs to regenerate."
Kain's tone hardened.
"And don't even think about using more than two doses. If you go over that, your body will have problems. Same as how a person can't drink unlimited water. Too much and you get water intoxication."
He'd said it like a warning.
As for Rei's idea… it was probably correct.
What was happening with Saya wasn't rationality. It was obsession.
She believed that if they just made more Earth Elixir, she could save her father.
And if Kain told her it wouldn't work, she wouldn't hear a word of it. She'd only decide he didn't want to waste that much medicine on her father.
In a sense, Saya had gone a little crazy.
"Um… how did Takagi's father die?"
Rei couldn't help asking.
Kain's eyes flicked to her with a look that made her inexplicably uneasy.
"Komuro Takashi. Your childhood friend killed him."
"…Huh?"
Rei froze.
Takashi killed Saya's father?
How was that even possible? Rei knew the Komuro family had ties with the Takagi family. And Saya was Takashi's childhood friend.
The three of them had grown up together. They knew each other inside and out.
There was no way Rei could believe Takashi would do something like that.
Unless—
A thought struck her. Her lips began to tremble, her eyes reddening.
One possibility.
Takashi had turned into one of the dead—and attacked Saya's father.
So Takashi was—
"Takashi's still alive."
"…Huh?"
"He's alive, so how could he have killed Takagi's father?"
"'How could'?" Kain said, voice edged with amusement. "When death is on the line, human nature usually doesn't hold up. Especially when both of them were infected with the dead's virus… and there was only one dose of medicine that could save them."
He let that hang for a beat.
"What choice do you think people make?"
"Y-you mean… Takagi's father didn't use that dose… and gave it to Takashi?"
That had to be it.
And this guy was horrible—deliberately wording it like that.
"You think Saya's father was that stupid?" Kain's tone grew sharper, more mocking. "If this weren't a fallen world, sure, maybe he might sacrifice himself to save Takashi."
"But in a world like this? He wasn't only carrying his own life on his back. He was carrying more people's lives. He had responsibilities. You think he'd trade all those lives for one ordinary high school kid?"
Rei's face tightened.
Saeko, meanwhile, understood why Kain was doing this.
He was deliberately giving Rei a sliver of hope—then crushing it inch by inch, pushing her deeper into despair.
Saeko had already sensed he didn't like Rei much. Or Takashi.
And then Saeko remembered what Black Label's Kuroneko had said—about the manga of this world she'd read, the "plotline" where Rei was supposed to fall for Takashi.
So if Kain disliked Takashi, was this… jealousy?
Honestly, Saeko couldn't imagine herself liking a guy like that.
Takashi had a certain "reputation" at school. If you put it bluntly, he was a delinquent.
So whatever that "work" claimed was probably unreliable in places.
"So… Takashi killed Takagi's father? That's impossible. Takashi wouldn't be able to beat him either. And that 'Demon Wing'… how could he deal with that?"
Kain abruptly changed direction.
"Shido Koichi. You hate that man, right?"
Rei blinked, then nodded.
"…Takagi's father found him. And yes—he charged in and tried to cut him down immediately."
Rei's breath caught.
So that bastard finally—
"He didn't die."
The surge of relief that flashed across Rei's face was snuffed out instantly.
Damn it. He got away.
"He should've died," Kain went on, savoring it, "but thanks to Komuro Takashi's kind heart, he stopped Takagi's father's blade… and Shido lived."
Rei's expression went stiff.
What was this?
Her childhood friend saved her enemy?
"And here's the best part," Kain continued. "A dead body dropped down from the floor above right next to them—"
He narrated it piece by piece: exactly how her childhood friend had behaved, like a perfect fable of the farmer and the snake—except this time, the childhood friend was the snake.
By the time he finished, Rei looked pale.
Her nerves weren't holding up at all.
As for the Syringe base they'd just dealt with—Kain had deliberately compiled that kind of morale-crushing video as an open, brazen threat.
A show of force.
It meant that if Syringe didn't have absolute confidence, they'd have to curl up like rats and stop attacking recklessly.
Because Kain couldn't stay in one place for long and comb the area endlessly.
Leaving that video behind ensured that, if Syringe wasn't stupid, they wouldn't dare stir up trouble for a while.
And that window of time would let Saeko's side build strength at breakneck speed.
By the time Syringe believed they could come out again, Saeko's faction might have expanded to an absurd level.
And honestly?
Leaving a video like that also had a bit of swagger to it.
"You really are pretty damn nasty," Mikoto said, unable to stop herself.
He could've just said it all upfront.
Instead, he toyed with her. Ground her down.
"Nasty?" Kain replied flatly. "I was never a good person. Good people don't survive in hell."
"…True," Mikoto said, nodding.
She'd joined Black Label for the same reason—because she couldn't be a purely good person either.
Even if the people she killed were embodiments of evil and darkness, she still didn't believe she was "justice."
So what kind of hell was Kain talking about?
It wasn't the dead.
His missing arm, the earlier wound in his chest, the kind of weaponry he carried—she couldn't imagine what kind of hell would leave someone like that injured.
And based on what she knew, those injuries had existed before the dead crisis. Something that big should've caused a stir back when the world hadn't collapsed and the internet was everywhere.
But instead…
Silence.
So was that possibility the military-obsessed fat guy mentioned… actually real?
Kain was too mysterious.
And it made Mikoto want to understand him even more.
(End of Chapter)
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