The young woman's name was Liz.
Right — one look at that name told you she wasn't Japanese. She was a member of the United States forces.
She had acquired a Cursed Technique through the Culling Game system while serving with her unit, and after endless live-combat training her strength was genuinely respectable — roughly the level of a Semi-Grade 1 Sorcerer.
That put her near the very top of the entire base.
Which was why the brass valued her so highly.
For the past month, the Cursed Spirits assigned to her had always come from the hardest bracket. She had even killed more than one Special Grade Cursed Spirit.
But today was not like other days.
Today she was facing an assignment that had nothing to do with killing Cursed Spirits. And this assignment, in truth, demanded far more from her than slaying a Special Grade ever had.
"H-hello…" The woman looked at the blue-haired girl standing in front of her, nerves crawling up her spine, and bent into a shallow bow. "Miss Mahiru, I'm the liaison officer assigned to escort you—"
Terrifying. The pressure was crushing—
Screw it, I'm dead, I'm dead, I'm dead… why did a job like this have to land on her!
She had faced all kinds of horrifying Cursed Spirits. She had fought her way through all kinds of brutal battles.
But she had never once stood before an enemy and felt pressure like this.
Don't make any sudden moves. Don't show a trace of hostility…
The girl in front of her stood with her arms folded, still wearing the faint impatience she'd picked up waiting outside the gate. She looked pure, spotless, harmless as a lamb — and Liz found her absolutely terrifying.
Like a bottomless abyss. Like a Black Hole that swallowed everything it touched.
So this was that blue-haired Cursed Spirit?
The sheer weight coming off her was ridiculous. Liz swallowed hard.
"I don't need an escort." Mahiru waved a hand. "You don't have to do anything for me. Just get me inside."
Out of the question.
Command had been explicit: under no circumstances was Mahiru to be allowed to move freely. If Liz let her wander off alone, she'd be facing a court-martial.
Liz swallowed again and put on a placating smile. "Miss Mahiru…"
The other soldier standing beside her, a man, spoke first. "Our apologies, Miss Mahiru."
He was the other top-ranked combatant on this base, assigned alongside her to receive Mahiru.
"We'd like to accompany you, Miss Mahiru — not to monitor you or anything like that," he said politely. "It's mainly that the base is enormous and the internal layout is complicated. With me along, whatever you want to do becomes much easier. For instance—"
He rattled on and on.
Mahiru's patience thinned. She dug a pinky into her ear.
"Fine. Whatever. If the two of you want to tag along, tag along."
The two soldiers exchanged a glance, both letting out a breath.
Mahiru paid them no further attention. She crouched down low.
Cursed Energy gathered in her eyes, and she began studying the traces of Cursed Energy left on the ground with total concentration.
This spot was exactly where the trail had gone cold the last time she'd tracked Mahito.
As the Cursed Energy condensed, the marks on the ground surfaced piece by piece in her vision.
The girl rose and followed the trail forward.
The two behind her hurried to keep up.
God, the pressure was off the charts.
Liz's mouth pulled into a grimace.
Wasn't this blue-haired Cursed Spirit supposed to be bubbly and completely unserious? Why was she so stone-faced now?
Liz's exceptional strength had earned her a measure of authority within the unit. As near-senior staff, she knew exactly what the United States forces were doing here.
Which was precisely why her conscience was screaming.
Damn it. What if Mahiru figured it out?
Mahito was hidden inside this very base — that was a fact she knew for certain.
If Mahiru dug him out right here, the whole thing would blow wide open. She honestly had no idea why the brass had let Mahiru through the gate at all!
Liz cut her eyes toward the man beside her, trying to transmit a message by stare alone: Are we prepared for this?
If you people let Mahiru in, you must be prepared! You must have it all locked down, certain Mahito won't be found — that's the only reason you'd let her walk in!
She looked at him with hope written all over her.
The man seemed to grasp exactly what she was thinking, and something complicated crossed his face as he turned his eyes away.
"…" Liz's smile froze solid.
Damn it! So they weren't prepared at all!
Liz was two seconds from a breakdown.
So sending her out on this assignment was just sending her to die!
If a fight actually broke out, standing aside wasn't an option — but if she stepped in, how the hell was she supposed to beat Mahiru?
The only role she could realistically play was as a smear on the sole of that blue-haired girl's shoe.
No, no — the man realized she'd taken it wrong and hastily signaled with his eyes.
He glanced at his wristwatch, then at Mahiru, then at the buildings far off inside the base.
Only then did the meaning slowly land.
Oh. So Mahito was already tucked away, and they weren't worried about Mahiru finding him.
Right, of course. If the old man dared let Mahiru inside, he'd have had that contingency ready long ago.
The problem was that Mahito wasn't the only thing here Mahiru couldn't be allowed to see.
What the man meant was this: they'd hidden Mahito, yes, but time had been short, and the other things — the ones harder to move, harder to conceal — hadn't been dealt with at all.
Which was why the two of them had to shadow her and improvise.
Ah. That was so much worse.
Liz's face crumpled.
Honestly, she'd rather Mahiru just found Mahito.
Mahiru walked ahead, tracking Mahito's Cursed Energy trail while lifting her head to survey the base to either side.
The base was, in fact, immense.
The United States forces held four consolidated stronghold cities in Japan, and this base alone occupied half of one of them. It sprawled.
From the inside, the whole area seemed to be carved by high walls into a series of sealed-off blocks. The buildings within were sealed just as tightly — no way to see what any of them held.
But Mahiru could feel the presence of a great many living people here.
Inside those shuttered buildings, plenty of people were living and working.
"What's that place?" Mahiru pointed at one of the buildings.
The woman behind her hurried forward in short, quick steps.
"Those… are factories inside the base," she said, since there was nothing else she could say. "There are quite a few important factories on the grounds. They produce the critical supplies and weapons that keep the civilians alive and the unit running."
Factories?
The girl's eyes flickered twice. She rubbed her chin. "Then go bring me a worker. There are some things I'd like to ask."
"Uh…"
The man and woman traded a look.
"Does it have to be a worker?" Liz asked, treading carefully. "You could just ask us, really—"
"A worker." Mahiru's voice hardened. "You said you'd cooperate with me, didn't you? Then go."
There was no arguing with it — the hardest fist makes the rules. The two soldiers had no choice but to obey. They asked Mahiru to wait where she was, and the man jogged over to the nearest factory. A short while later he came back out towing a middle-aged woman.
The middle-aged woman was Japanese.
So the people working in these factories were all local Japanese, then.
Mahiru could see the residue of other Cursed Energy traces clinging to her hands.
She was probably making some kind of cursed tool in there — or the Cursed Energy Bullets the military used.
The woman went still when she saw Mahiru.
She clearly recognized her.
"Miss Angel, is there something you need?" she asked.
Mahiru lifted a hand, and a thread of Idle Transfiguration Cursed Energy rose and rippled in her palm.
"Have you ever felt a Cursed Energy fluctuation like this one?" Mahiru asked. "Inside your factory."
The middle-aged woman glanced at Liz, then at the man.
She hesitated, and only when neither of them objected did she reach out with an easier mind and touch it, feeling the Cursed Energy in Mahiru's palm.
She closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them and shook her head. "Nothing at all."
"You're not lying?" Mahiru tilted her head slightly.
The woman shook her head. "I'm not lying."
Hm? No, she really wasn't.
Lie detection wasn't Mahiru's strong suit, but with a novice Jujutsu Sorcerer like this woman, someone who hadn't mastered her Cursed Energy yet, any violent swing of emotion made the energy on her body swing with it — Cursed Energy comes from negative emotion, after all.
People who lie get frightened. They get tense.
Those minute fluctuations might be beyond most people's senses, but at this range Mahiru could read them clearly.
The woman in front of her was telling the truth.
She had never seen Mahito.
"Then how about this." Mahiru wasn't finished with her yet. "Have you seen any sign of Mahito?"
"Mahito? Who's that?" The woman blinked. "I work in the factory all day. The only people I see are the ones I always see—"
Mahiru asked again and again, and confirmed that the woman genuinely had never seen Mahito.
After the questioning was done and the woman was sent back, Mahiru had Liz fetch several more workers and put each of them through the same round of questions.
The results didn't change.
Watching that outcome, the man and woman visibly relaxed.
Mahiru let out a soft, flat sound. "Hah."
"…Fine. I understand now."
Understand? Understand what?
The two of them had barely loosened up, and their hearts hitched right back into their throats.
Mahiru didn't answer. She kept walking, and they had no option but to keep following.
The further they went, the clearer Mahito's trail became.
Eventually the path led them down into a tunnel.
The factories above had all been rebuilt by the United States forces, but this tunnel looked like an abandoned passage that had always been here, dark and damp.
Onward.
Mahito's trail grew clearer still.
Almost… right on top of them.
The girl didn't hesitate. She raised her hand, and white Cursed Energy light brewed in her palm.
[Husk]!
Blinding white light tore outward. The attack, carrying a monstrous volume of Cursed Energy, slammed straight into the wall.
The blast shook the earth, sending shattered stone flying.
The man and the woman both stumbled backward in shock.
A gaping breach had been torn clean through the tunnel wall. And behind that breach lay a secret, enormous underground chamber.
In the dead center of that space sat a blue-haired man covered in stitched seams, staring back at Mahiru with astonishment written across his face.
"Hold on," Mahito said, his voice refusing to accept it. "How did you find this place?"
Mahiru said nothing. She narrowed her eyes, raised her hand — a second [Husk] already finished brewing at her fingertip.
The girl snapped her fingers.
White light ripped the air apart again and struck Mahito dead-on, the horrifying Cursed Energy swallowing him whole.
"Damn it—!" Mahito's scream tore loose.
Then the scream cut out too.
Mahiru lowered her hand. The attack was over.
A massive crater had been blown into the underground chamber.
And Mahito had been reduced to a puddle of remains.
Incredible.
The thought slipped through Liz before she could stop it.
"Miss Mahiru, you're incredible — taking out Mahito that easily." She launched straight into flattery.
Mahiru shook her head, as though she'd expected it all along. "That was a clone."
"Huh? A clone?" Liz's jaw worked for a second, then she managed a sheepish laugh. "Then… that's a bit of a shame."
"Still, doesn't it prove Mahito never infiltrated our base?" the man put in with a smile of his own. "Ah… what a relief. Good news either way, right, Miss Mahiru?"
Mahiru didn't speak. She turned to face the two of them, wearing something that was almost a smile and wasn't one at all.
The man held his own smile in place. "Haha… Miss Mahiru, in that case, allow me to see you out."
"…"
"Er, Miss Mahiru? Was there anything else you needed? Shall I escort you out now?"
"…"
"Miss Mahiru?"
The girl smiled then, and the smile was gentle. "Do you two think I'm an idiot?"
The blast of Cursed Energy erupted skyward with a roar, and a terrible pressure crashed down over them.
The bodies of the man and the woman locked rigid under that immense weight, the threat of death wrapped around every inch of them.
In their eyes, the blue-haired girl was still smiling, but her gaze had gone glacial. "Did you think a cheap little trick like that would fool me?"
In that moment, Mahiru confirmed it beyond doubt: the United States forces were working with Mahito.
All the way in from the front gate, Mahito's trail had grown more and more obvious… but how could it possibly have been that obvious?
It was plainly leading her by the nose.
And when the end of that guided trail turned out to be a Mahito clone, the girl nearly laughed out of pure anger.
Did these people honestly believe she couldn't tell the difference between a trace left by accident and a trace left on purpose?
"And another thing — those workers I just questioned." Mahiru's smile went cold. "Good news: they've never seen Mahito. Bad news: they don't even know who Mahito is."
The girl took a step forward.
"But how could they not know who Mahito is? My Community sent the warning about Mahito out to everyone. So why do the workers living here look like they never received a single message from me?"
Faced with the accusation, both soldiers came apart.
Liz could barely form words anymore; the man beside her was still just managing to hold together.
He kept smiling in front of Mahiru. "That has to be… because they're too busy working. No time to read the messages you send them—"
"What kind of contract did you sign with these ordinary people?"
"No, it isn't like—"
"Answer me!" Mahiru barked. "What have you done to these ordinary people? Those points of yours that came out of nowhere — where exactly did they come from?"
In that instant, an emotion both foreign and long absent surfaced inside Mahiru.
Yes — for the first time in who knew how long, Mahiru felt rage she couldn't contain.
____
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