The decision to return to Sendai wasn't one we made lightly. We were now officially rogues, hunted by the Execution Squad, and every train station was a potential ambush point. But the "Backup" data in my head—the memories restored by the Chronos-Virus—was pulsing like a homing beacon. My father's research wasn't just a memory anymore; it was a map.
"The Ghost Station can only stay hidden for so long," Maki warned as we boarded a private bus Yuta had managed to 'procure' through his connections. "The elders aren't stupid. If they realize we've left Tokyo, they'll lock down every prefecture between here and the northern coast. We're essentially walking into a funnel."
"Then we make sure they're looking the wrong way," I said, looking at Megumi.
Megumi nodded, his hands weaving a complex sign. "I'll leave a shadow-clone trail heading toward Osaka. I can tether a small amount of cursed energy to each one. It won't fool them for long, but it'll give us the twelve-hour window we need to reach the house."
The Return to Sendai
Sendai was quieter than Tokyo, less visibly scarred by the "Glitch" energy of the reboot, but the air still felt thin and brittle. As we walked through the outskirts of the city, the suburban streets felt like a graveyard of my own childhood.
We found the house at the end of a long, overgrown path. It was a small, two-story traditional home, its wood darkened by rot and the weight of ten years of neglect. But to my Void-eyes, the house wasn't made of wood and paper. It was wreathed in a thick, invisible layer of [Null Code]. My father had shielded this place so effectively that the System hadn't even been able to "see" it to delete it during the initial purge.
"Stay back," I warned the group, my hand hovering inches from the gate. "The security here isn't just traditional Jujutsu. It's Logic-Smithing. If you step on the wrong 'line' of the ward, the house won't just hit you—it will attempt to format your existence to match the surrounding environment."
I stepped onto the porch. The air hummed with a low-frequency vibration. A screen appeared in the air—not the slick, purple interface of the System, but a primitive, flickering HUD made of harsh white light.
[USER AUTHENTICATION REQUIRED] [INPUT: BIO-SIGNATURE AND MEMORY KEY]
I placed my hand on the light. I didn't think about a password or a pin. I focused on the memory I had just recovered: the smell of my father's old ink scrolls and the specific, rhythmic sound of rain hitting the tin roof of the shed.
The light turned a steady, calm green. The front door creaked open, exhaling a breath of cold, stagnant air.
The Guardian of the Hearth
The interior of the house was frozen in the exact microsecond of the "Deletion Event." A half-eaten bowl of rice sat on the dining table, though the grain had long since turned to grey dust. The air was thick with the scent of old paper and ozone. But in the center of the living room, a figure was standing, silhouetted by the dim light filtering through the shoji screens.
My heart stopped, and for a moment, I forgot how to breathe.
"Mom?" I whispered.
The woman turned around. She looked exactly like she did in the faded photographs in my wallet—kind, tired eyes, a soft, familiar smile, and the blue apron she always wore when she was cooking. But as she stepped into the center of the room, the sunlight hit her, and the illusion began to fray. Her face flickered violently. One moment she was human; the next, her head was a collection of jagged, black geometric shapes that defied the laws of perspective.
[ERROR DETECTED: GUARDIAN_V1] [TYPE: SENTIMENT-VIRUS / LOGIC-TRAP] [LEVEL: ???]
"Ren," she said. Her voice didn't come from her throat; it sounded like a thousand overlapping recordings of my mother's voice, played at slightly different speeds. "You're late for dinner, honey. Why are you bringing... unauthorized files... into the Source?"
"It's not her, Ren!" Nobara yelled, her hand flying to her hammer. "It's a Special Grade Error! It's using your own sentimentality to anchor itself to reality! Don't let it synchronize with you!"
"I know," I said, the Void flaring around my feet, carving small rifts into the wooden floorboards. "But she's also the lock on my father's laboratory. To get to the truth, I have to delete the only home I have left."
The Error-Mother's smile turned into a jagged, impossibly wide grin that stretched past her ears, revealing a throat made of scrolling green code. Her arms elongated, her fingers sharpening into black, digital blades that hummed with the power to erase.
"Then let's see, my little King," she hissed, her form flickering between a loving parent and a monstrous glitch. "If you've grown strong enough to survive the weight of your own grief."
The Battle of the Hallway
The "Mother" moved with a jerky, frame-skipping speed that made her impossible to track with normal eyes. She didn't run; she simply appeared three feet closer every time I blinked.
I threw a [Gravity Pulse], but she didn't dodge. She simply "unzipped" her torso, letting the wave of pressure pass through her empty center before reassembling her pixels on the other side.
"Maki, Yuta! Don't damage the foundation!" I shouted as the others moved to engage. "If the house collapses before I find the lab, the data is lost forever!"
Maki engaged the Guardian with her cursed tool, but every time her blade struck the Error, the metal would flicker and turn translucent. The Guardian wasn't just a physical threat; she was a Logic-Virus. She was trying to overwrite the properties of our weapons, turning them into "empty files."
"Ren, the Void!" Yuta yelled, parrying a digital blade with his white-hot cursed energy. "It's the only thing she can't overwrite! You have to be the one to end this!"
I looked at the flickering face of the woman who raised me. Even though I knew she was a construct—a security program left behind by my father—it felt like a second betrayal. I stepped forward, my hand glowing with a deep, crushing violet light.
"I'm sorry, Mom," I whispered. "But the game is over."
I didn't strike her. I reached out and touched the center of her flickering chest, where a small, pulsing white core sat. I didn't push gravity; I pulled the Void out of myself and into her.
The Guardian-Mother froze. The geometric shapes of her body began to smooth out, turning into pure, white light. For a split second, the glitching stopped, and she looked truly human again. She placed a digital hand on my cheek, and for the first time, her voice was singular and clear.
"Good... boy," she whispered.
Then, she dissolved. The house groaned as the security wards finally snapped. The floor in the center of the living room began to slide away, revealing a hidden staircase that led deep into the earth—into the Logic-Smith's Lab.