Only a few seconds later, in the courtyard of Tsunekiyoshi Jingu, corpses lay strewn across the ground in disarray, their luxurious robes soaked through with blood. The scent of incense had been completely overwhelmed by the reek of blood, leaving only the heavy smell of rust drifting on the night wind.
Flesh-Mod Tomie stood at the center of the pile of bodies, covered head to toe in blood, her breath visible as white mist under the night lamps.
A ferocious aura swept across the entire courtyard. The cool night wind turned scorching hot, and the candle flames swayed wildly, nearly leaping high enough to burn the lanterns.
Aside from Flesh-Mod Tomie, there was almost no one else left standing in the courtyard.
Why almost? Because a group of hinin had already fled to the edge of the shrine grounds, about to rush into the surrounding mountains to escape.
Their movements were far faster than an ordinary person's — a few strides carried them a dozen meters. Some ran on all fours like beasts, hands and feet together; others simply vaulted over the walls, their grayish-white fur gleaming coldly under the moonlight.
The members of the Tsuneki family — or rather, the hosts of the fox spirit clan — were fleeing for their lives.
Signs of their flight had begun even before Flesh-Mod Tomie started her slaughter. Once she cut loose in earnest, they abandoned everything and ran for it.
But Flesh-Mod Tomie was simply too fast. In less than a minute, every hinin noble gathered there had died beneath her fists, and the Tsuneki family members hadn't managed to get far at all.
Among them was one who hadn't yet grasped what was happening — still standing in place, staring at the scene unfolding before him, pupils trembling violently.
"You! What are you doing?!"
Tsuneki Hisayuki's voice was hoarse, his eyes bloodshot, his chest heaving violently.
In truth, he still hadn't figured out what exactly had happened.
Today's events had struck too hard, too fast. His fiancée had suddenly transformed into Ultraseven, killed his grandfather, then broken off their engagement and flown away, still in that form.
That alone would have been bearable. Worst case, he'd simply abandon Hinako and retreat into the mountains to live in seclusion.
That had been his grandfather's dying wish, and he'd been about to do exactly that.
But now — what was this?
The moment Hinako had flown off, a muscular woman had appeared out of nowhere and begun a massacre, wielding strength terrifying enough to rival a kaiju, while claiming to act in Ultraseven's stead — stripping the very humanity from the people who'd killed his grandfather.
Flesh-Mod Tomie turned her head to look at him, tilting it to one side. Her neck let out a crisp crack.
"Don't let this fool you — I'm Ultraseven's helper, you know."
The corners of her mouth curled into a bloody smile, her tone light and playful, as if discussing the weather.
"Helping wipe out these weak hinin monsters — that's my job."
"Hinin monsters?"
Tsuneki Hisayuki's eyes widened as he looked at the corpses littering the courtyard, bodies torn and shattered beyond recognition — nothing about them looked inhuman at all.
"Weren't they all human?! They were just ordinary people! Even if they'd committed some crime, the law should judge them! What right do you have—"
"At birth, human nature is good."
Flesh-Mod Tomie cut him off, tilting her head, her expression like someone regarding an ignorant child.
"Without a good heart, one isn't human. Is that really so hard to understand?"
Tsuneki Hisayuki opened his mouth, but something seemed lodged in his throat.
Without a good heart, not human? Then what was a good heart? Who got to define it? Where was the standard?
He had spent over a decade learning everything a human was supposed to learn — knowledge, common sense, principles — studying and imitating humanity until he could truly call himself human.
And yet, as a human being, he found himself utterly unable to comprehend this woman's logic.
'At birth, human nature is good' — Confucius's words. When had their meaning twisted into 'those without goodness aren't human'?
"Madwoman... you're insane!"
Tsuneki Hisayuki forced the words out through gritted teeth.
Looking at Flesh-Mod Tomie's face, he suddenly recalled something a teacher had once said, lamenting.
Humans, of all creatures, were the best at defining their own kind as "other." They called people of different skin color barbarians, people of different faiths heretics, people of different opinions traitors.
Once you slapped on a label, you could strip someone of their rights as a human being with a clear conscience.
The woman before him was, without a doubt, exactly that kind of being — she had unilaterally redefined humans as inhuman monsters according to her own logic.
"Insane? Maybe."
Flesh-Mod Tomie answered indifferently, her gaze sweeping past Tsuneki Hisayuki toward the fleeing figures at the edge of the courtyard.
Instinctively, he followed her gaze.
The instant the words left her mouth, her figure had already vanished from where she stood, leaving only a ring of shattered air pressure.
In the distance, a Tsuneki family member who had already sprinted over thirty meters was running on all fours, grayish-white fox fur bristling out from his sleeves and collar, his speed several times faster than a normal person's.
He heard the sound of wind tearing behind him and instinctively turned — and a face was already right in front of his.
"Too slow..."
Before the words had even finished, a broad palm had already landed on his face. His features caved in and cracked apart at incredible speed, and with a dull thud, right before Tsuneki Hisayuki's eyes, the man's head burst into a spray of blood.
"Stop it! What are you doing to the Tsuneki family?!"
Tsuneki Hisayuki's eyes nearly split with rage as he let out a beast-like roar, kicking off the ground to charge forward.
But he'd only taken two steps when Flesh-Mod Tomie was already gone from where she'd been.
A scream rang out to his left. He turned to look — half a body was flying through the air, the mist of blood not even fully dispersed — and Flesh-Mod Tomie's figure had already appeared ten meters away, behind another fleeing victim.
"Stop! I said stop!"
Tsuneki Hisayuki's voice cracked as he chased after her desperately, but he couldn't even catch her shadow. Every time he locked onto one direction, a scream would erupt from another; by the time he turned to look, another corpse lay on the ground.
Flesh-Mod Tomie's movements were absurdly fast — she wasn't running, she was launching herself. Each time her foot touched the ground, a sonic boom followed, the flagstones shattering as her whole body shot forward like a supersonic missile.
Whether the distance was fifty meters, a hundred, or two hundred, it made no difference to her.
In the blink of an eye, the Tsuneki family members died one after another beneath Flesh-Mod Tomie's palm, screams rising from far to near, from left to right, overlapping, growing denser and denser.
"W-why..."
Tsuneki Hisayuki couldn't catch up to her, couldn't even brush the hem of her clothes. All he could do was watch, helpless, as his kin fell one by one, dying before his very eyes.
"Such a simple question — is it really necessary to ask?"
Flesh-Mod Tomie's voice came from a dozen meters away, calm as if discussing what to eat for dinner.
"All the innocent people have already left. Everyone still here — every single one — is a hinin monster that deserves to die."
As she spoke, her right hand was gripping someone's throat — it was Toshiyuki Eide.
Toshiyuki Eide dangled in midair by the neck, his face turning the color of pig liver, legs kicking wildly, his pant legs already soaked through. His hands clawed uselessly at Flesh-Mod Tomie's fingers as he looked at the guest he'd once flattered so shamelessly, whom he'd worked so hard to invite — and forced out a plea for mercy with everything he had left in his throat.
"M-Miss Kawakami... it's me... I'm the one who invited you here... we're... we're friends, aren't we? Please, spare me!"
Flesh-Mod Tomie tilted her head, looking at him the way one might look at a mouse dangling by the tail.
"Friends? I don't have any friends. But don't worry — thanks to you, I was able to wipe out the Tsuneki family this easily. So, unlike you people who flay the living, I won't be peeling off your fox skin."
Her fingers slowly tightened.
Crack.
Toshiyuki Eide's neck twisted at a grotesque angle, his eyes frozen in their sockets, his mouth still shaped around the plea for mercy, his tongue forced out from the corner of his lips — purplish-red, hanging limp.
Flesh-Mod Tomie released her grip, and the body dropped with a thud, face-first into the pool of blood, splashing up a small spray.
Fwoom!
A crimson fox claw tore through the air, grazing past Flesh-Mod Tomie's head — but caught nothing except a churning cloud of sonic-boom turbulence, the fierce wind spreading out and making Tsuneki Hisayuki's robes snap and flutter.
By now, he had transformed into a half-human, half-fox form, capable of unleashing tremendous power even in this material world — but even so, the gap between him and Flesh-Mod Tomie was plain to see.
Flesh-Mod Tomie, who used her self-created Hamon Qigong to enhance her body, now surpassed even the Ultraseven in raw power within the material world.
Tsuneki Hisayuki spun around, searching for Flesh-Mod Tomie, but couldn't even track her movements. One after another, his kin turned into corpses the instant the storm swept past, and screams rang out unceasingly from every direction.
"Stop this! You call yourself Ultraseven's helper, don't you? Then stop! Hinako already agreed to let the fox spirit clan retreat into the mountains — stop killing!"
Powerless to stop Flesh-Mod Tomie, Tsuneki Hisayuki screamed into the courtyard, toward a figure he couldn't even see, hoping Hinako's name might make her halt.
"Nope~ Hinako Shimizu never agreed to any such thing. She never said that the Tsuneki family, the fox spirit clan, all of you could simply go on living."
Flesh-Mod Tomie's voice drifted over from another direction, her tone as casual as if she were out for a stroll, making idle conversation.
"But don't worry — Hinako Shimizu does hope you'll survive. She can't command me, but she is that person's human host, after all, so I'll give her wishes some small consideration."
Before the words had even faded, Flesh-Mod Tomie's voice appeared again — right behind Tsuneki Hisayuki. He spun around violently, and there she stood, three steps away, covered in blood from head to toe, her breathing as steady as if she'd just finished a leisurely walk.
For a moment, everything went utterly still.
In the courtyard of the shrine, only the breathing of Flesh-Mod Tomie and Tsuneki Hisayuki remained. Nothing else.
Because every other living thing besides the two of them had, within those brief tens of seconds, already died at Flesh-Mod Tomie's hands.
____
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