After eating a breakfast accompanied by Koma’s special sauce—blood—Eto slung her schoolbag over her shoulder and left the house.
The road to school, a route she walked every day, felt unusually heavy today, as if she were wading through a swamp.
An elementary school student around her age passed by her side.
He wore a carefree, easy smile, as if he hadn't a single worry in the world. Eto stopped in her tracks and gazed at her reflection in a building’s glass window.
She tried to smile. ...It didn't work. It felt too awkward.
When she was with Koma, she felt safe. But now that they were apart, that security vanished.
The anxiety that she might be separated from her father again crept up inside her, vivid and suffocating.
It was so apparent that Koma would surely notice her distress.
Can I really leave everything to Dad...?
It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Koma. But she couldn’t shake the worry.
For her sake, he had a tendency to shoulder every burden alone, even if it meant pushing himself beyond his limits.
Hadn’t that nearly broken him, both mentally and physically, in the past?
Was there no other way? Some answer that would lighten Koma’s burden and solve this problem more simply and decisively?
Right now, only Hitokawa knew Eto’s identity.
Koma had assured her that until he settled things with Hitokawa face-to-face, the man would not reveal the secret to anyone else.
If... just hypothetically...
She let the thought drift.
What if an unfortunate accident were to happen to Hitokawa?
If he could never speak to anyone again, couldn’t write, and lost consciousness... if he were reduced to a vegetative state... no, something even more certain would be better.
A state of silence that no one could refuse; the cruelest and most honest way to protect a secret.
If the human named Hitokawa Tomoru were to die...
“...!!!”
Eto snapped out of it.
Dangerous. Her reason warned her that she must not let her thoughts wander any further.
Dizzy from the realization that she had been imagining something so horrific, she leaned her arm against the glass for support.
She looked at her reflection once more.
Your face right now... it looks as serious as someone about to commit murder.
“...”
...Right now, she felt she finally understood what Minami had said before leaving.
This was not a face she could ever show Koma. Nor should she.
Eto began to walk again, though her steps were unsteady.
She wasn’t in the mood for school.
Moreover, if she stood out for the wrong reasons, a teacher might notice and report her condition to Koma.
She wandered without a destination.
She simply wanted a place devoid of people.
She wanted to rest in a place where her keen Ghoul senses could confirm that no one had entered her territory.
Eventually, she found herself in a downtown park.
Since it was a weekday afternoon, the area was deserted.
Eto sat on a bench, pulled her knees to her chest, and buried her face in them.
Silence.
While silence shared with another could feel suffocating, the silence of solitude was somehow reassuring.
A gentle breeze, skimming across the grass, drifted toward Eto and brushed through her hair. Feeling a sense of coolness, Eto began to calm her heart.
But regaining her composure was different from solving the reality of her situation. Eto whispered in a frail voice,
“...Maybe I really shouldn’t be with Dad.”
“Why would you think that?”
“――――!?!?!!”
Her body reacted instinctively, and Eto leaped away.
She put more than ten meters between herself and the bench, glaring back at it. Sitting right where she had been was a man she had never seen before.
He wore a black coat that reached his ankles, despite the mild weather. A black fedora was pulled low, obscuring most of his features, but he appeared to be middle-aged.
Eto’s heart pounded with shock at his sudden appearance.
Her senses had been spread out like a spiderweb, monitoring for any intrusion.
And yet, the man had approached without a sound. Eto hadn't noticed him at all until he sat beside her and spoke.
She tried to catch his scent. There was nothing. He was odorless.
The man raised a leather-gloved hand to adjust his hat. Even that simple movement produced no noise. He was soundless.
Beneath the brim of the fedora, the man met Eto’s eyes.
His presence was incredibly faint—the kind of unremarkable face one would mistake for a random neighbor and walk right past.
Despite the conspicuous black coat in broad daylight, he seemed to blend into the environment as if he were hidden in the midnight shadows. He was colorless.
He possessed an eerie presence, yet Eto couldn't determine if he was an enemy.
As she stood there confused and breaking into a cold sweat, the middle-aged man calmly extended a finger and pointed at her.
“Your ‘eye’ has been exposed.”
“...! Ah!”
At his words, Eto touched her right eye. She couldn't see it, but she knew.
The heat surging in her right eye was proof that her [Kakugan] had manifested.
“Do not be so clumsy with your emotions. Aside from hunger, emotion is the easiest way for a Ghoul to reveal their identity.”
She had already paid a painful price for that very mistake this morning.
Eto tried to retract her [Kakugan], but it wouldn't fade as quickly as she wanted.
“If your emotions are turbulent because you've encountered a stranger—someone you cannot identify as friend or foe—then change your perception. Instead of assuming they are an enemy, think of them as a ‘liar.’ It is simpler that way. You can maintain your guard while still controlling your [Kakugan].”
“Ah...!”
As she followed the man’s advice, the heat in her right eye began to dissipate. Her [Kakugan] receded.
Eto didn't understand why a complete stranger was offering her such advice. Once she had calmed her eye, she looked back into the man's gaze.
His eyes were sharp yet transparent, bearing the marks of a hard-lived life. But within them, there was warmth.
A warmth like Koma's.
A warmth like the woman who had once taught Eto about death.
It was the kind of warmth that made one want to lean in and cry whenever the world turned cold and cruel.
“Who... are you...?”
Koma had lost both his parents. Even Ukina, the only relative he had known, was gone.
Because Koma treated Eto as his own flesh and blood, his eyes were always warm.
And there had been that woman who, in her desire to teach Eto about death, had used her own life. Though their time together was brief, in her final moments, she had looked at Eto as if she were her own child. Her gaze had been warm, too.
And now, here was another man looking at her with that same warmth.
Who are you, to look at me with eyes like those?
Eto was curious, but the man simply pulled his fedora lower.
By avoiding her gaze, he signaled that his next words would not contain the truth she sought.
“...Let’s just say I am the ‘Owl.’”
Owl.
A nocturnal hunter that flies silently through the sky to snatch the throat of its prey.
It was a fitting name for a man who could sit beside her without leaving a single trace of his presence.
As if wishing to steer the conversation away from himself, the man spoke again.
“You seem to have something on your mind... If you don't mind an old man's company, I'm willing to listen.”
“...”
Though her suspicion hadn't entirely vanished, Eto approached the bench and sat beside him.
It wasn't a rational decision.
Rather, it was something more primal... something etched into her very blood telling her that this person was safe.
Moreover, she desperately wanted to vent the worries that were tightening around her chest.
“...This is something I read in a novel,” she began.
She couldn't reveal the full truth, so she adapted the story, using a plot from a book she had once read as an example.
“It’s a story about a baby dragon. The protagonist happens to find the dragon and raises it. But... the world has been locked in a bloody war between humans and dragons for ages. They hate each other.”
“Hmm...”
The Owl let out a small hum.
It was a reaction that seemed both thoughtful and as if he had already deciphered the hidden meaning behind her words.
“The protagonist has a lifelong friend. They bicker sometimes, but they are truly close. However, that friend hates dragons. He even belongs to a knightly order that specializes in hunting them. One day, the friend discovers that the protagonist has been secretly raising a dragon.”
“...”
“The friend wants to eliminate the dragon, but the protagonist wants to protect it. Because of the dragon, a rift forms between them. ...What should be done in a situation like that? How can it end without anyone getting hurt? Should the baby dragon be abandoned after all...?”
“I don’t believe that is the answer.”
The Owl interrupted her.
His tone was a blend of a stern lesson and a gentle embrace.
“An ending where no one gets hurt is a difficult thing. It might be possible in a novel, but reality is built on a cruel structure. Even if you abandon the baby dragon, pain is unavoidable. In that case, the protagonist will surely be the one to suffer.”
“...”
“Let me ask you one thing. Why doesn't the protagonist hate dragons?”
“...Because she knows that not all dragons are evil. ...She says a dragon saved her when she was little.”
“But the protagonist’s friend doesn’t know that.”
“...!”
It was a short sentence, but it struck a chord deep within her.
The Owl continued.
“From that friend's perspective, it is only natural that he finds dragons untrustworthy. As a member of an order dedicated to killing them, every dragon he has encountered in his life has been one that needed to be slain. In his heart, the concept of an ‘exception’ does not yet exist, as it does for the protagonist.”
“...”
With a light hop, Eto jumped down from the bench. The Owl watched her.
“Are your worries gone?”
“Not entirely... but thanks to you, I see a way forward. Thank you.”
“I am glad to hear it. Wherever you go, do not forget to master your emotions. ...Eto.”
“Yes! ...Wait, what?”
Did I tell him my name? She turned back toward the Owl, but the seat was empty.
True to his name, he had vanished without a sound, just as silently as he had arrived.
Though she still didn't know who he was, Eto bowed deeply toward the empty space in gratitude.
Then, she slapped both her cheeks to psych herself up.
“To catch a tiger, you have to enter the tiger's den!”
With a look of fierce resolve, Eto took off running.
Her destination was the CCG branch building—the place where Hitokawa worked.
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