“Etoooooo!!!!”
Seeing Eto with a Kagune piercing straight through her abdomen, I lunged forward.
For an instant, memories of the day I lost my father flashed through my mind.
The despair of that moment. The sense of loss.
The grief. The rage.
Not again.
Was I really going to lose family to the same bastard all over again?
“Aaaaargh!!!!”
Meanwhile, Hitokawa let out a beastly roar and swung his greatsword at the Kagune that had impaled Eto.
His face twisted like a demon’s, as if he were furious at himself for being so foolishly careless and letting his guard down.
Slash!
The Kagune tentacle was severed, and I caught Eto’s collapsing body, the Kagune still lodged deep in her abdomen.
“Eto! Stay with me, Eto!!”
“Don’t pull that tentacle out, Koma! It’ll cause massive bleeding!!”
I held Eto close, but she was unconscious. Blood simply spilled from her lips, surging up from the wound in her gut.
Hitokawa stood protectively in front of us, facing off against the Ghoul.
He ground his teeth, clearly disgusted by this absurd turn of events.
“Hey, hey! What kind of sick joke is this? We rip the mask off that insect-masked bastard, and why the hell does the Artist pop out instead?!”
Hitokawa had memorized the Artist’s composite sketches distributed by the CCG. He recognized him instantly. This bastard was the Artist.
Under Hitokawa’s hostile glare, the Artist simply shrugged.
“It’s not some magic trick. Nor is it an act. The Section Chief and I are separate individuals. We simply share one body.”
“...A split personality?”
“Something like that. As is well known, I am a man who wishes only to devote himself to art. I leave the tedious physical labor to the Section Chief. Though, I didn’t expect to be taken down quite like this.”
The Artist shifted his body as if he were sore all over, revealing another Kagune in addition to the one that had stabbed Eto.
“Thanks to you, two of my four kakuhou have become unusable. The Section Chief can only operate two Kagune, after all.”
That was where Eto had miscalculated.
Because he had only used two Kagune, she hadn't imagined there were other kakuhou hidden within him. She had subdued him believing she had broken everything he had.
“You son of a...”
“Don’t give that bastard the satisfaction of a response.”
I moved Eto to a corner.
After tilting her head to the side so the blood wouldn't block her airway, I pushed myself up.
Then, I reached for my weapon.
Bang!
“...!”
The Artist reflexively raised his arm to guard.
His brow twitched as he felt the searing pain of the round boring into his forearm.
“A Q Bullet. I recall giving those to a different subject. How is it that you have one?”
The red bullet pierced through his forearm and lodged itself in his shoulder. He plucked it out and questioned me.
“Who knows. Go ask my father in hell, you bastard.”
The boiling rage in my chest leaked through my voice.
Hitokawa, standing nearby, tried to restrain me.
“Hey, Koma. Calm down. You can’t lose your head right now.”
“I am perfectly calm. I’m calmly thinking of the best way to slaughter this piece of shit.”
“How the hell is that being calm?!”
Hitokawa didn’t seem convinced, but I truly was exercising self-control.
If I weren't, I would have already emptied the remaining four rounds into the bastard's face.
I had to hit a vital spot to bring him down for good.
I had to settle this here and now. Only then could I focus on Eto’s treatment.
Even if I tried to flee with her, this was a man who would hunt us down relentlessly.
The shot I just fired was merely to test his reaction speed.
As expected, he possessed physical abilities far beyond a human's. To ensure a killing blow, I needed a more systematic approach.
That was why I was enduring this. I was suppressing the urge to let my fury explode.
“Mmm~! That’s it! Yes! That expression! That emotion! The inspiration is surging! As I thought, you have the perfect qualities to become a masterpiece!”
I don't know how my clenched teeth and frantic calculations looked to him, but the bastard spread his arms wide, his face flushed with excitement.
“The fools of this world don’t understand beauty. They live their lives without even realizing how the city erodes their souls. They are mere livestock. That is why beauty is necessary! A beauty that can elevate livestock into intellectuals! Takaki Koma! You shall be the foundation for a great work that expresses that beauty!”
“If you love your 'art' so much, why don’t you just become a masterpiece yourself?!”
Unable to stomach the mad rambling any longer, Hitokawa charged, his greatsword trailing behind him.
The Artist looked at him as if he were a mere nuisance, then sneered at the sight of the weapon.
“A Koukaku Quinque. To charge in knowing it's a poor match for my Rinkaku... how truly pathetic.”
Two streams of Kagune writhed like dancing snakes, lashing out at Hitokawa.
Boom! Clang!
Dodging the serpentine strikes or deflecting them with the flat of his blade, Hitokawa pressed the attack. He unleashed a heavy blow, but the Artist evaded it with effortless grace.
I grew anxious, tightening my grip on the gun. With the two of them locked in close combat, I couldn't fire recklessly. One wrong move and I'd hit Hitokawa.
The opportunity would come. A moment where they separated and the Artist was exposed.
I just had to be patient.
“Haaaat!!”
With a shout, Hitokawa swung his greatsword toward the Artist’s legs, intending to strip him of his mobility.
However, that attempt was thwarted by a Kagune strike hitting the side of the blade.
The massive impact created an opening, and the Kagune stabbed straight into Hitokawa’s abdomen.
Hitokawa barely managed to pull the greatsword in front of him, narrowly avoiding being impaled, but he couldn't stop the overwhelming force from blasting him backward.
Thud!
“Cough!!”
He slammed into the wall, gasping for air. The hand gripping the greatsword trembled, and fine cracks appeared on the wing-shaped blade.
As the Artist rushed in to deliver the finishing blow, I seized the moment and pulled the trigger.
Bang!
“...!”
The bastard stopped mid-stride and jerked his head back.
The bullet, aimed perfectly at his temple, grazed only a few strands of hair before whistling past. Damn it. For a rookie, that was an incredible shot, and he still dodged it.
The Artist’s attention shifted to me.
The moment he paused, Hitokawa kicked off the wall and lunged. But the Artist had read the move; he swung his Kagune without even looking.
Hitokawa ignored the Kagune brushing past him and kept charging.
He didn't stop, even as the sharp scales tore into his side and cheek.
“!”
The Artist finally looked at Hitokawa in surprise, but the greatsword was already mid-swing.
The Artist bent his long torso, narrowly escaping the reach of the blade. However—
Pshhh!
Despite dodging the main blade, a sudden small projectile flew out and embedded itself in the Artist’s abdomen.
It was a feather-like blade launched from the greatsword. The projectile erased the distance the Artist had just created.
Wounded, the Artist leaped back to create space.
Hitokawa, clearly suffering from the wound in his side, didn't pursue, instead clutching the bleeding gash.
“Hitokawa!”
“I’m fine!”
He staggered for a moment, but then gripped the greatsword with both hands and faced the Artist once more.
“This guy is still weakened from the injuries Eto gave him. He can only use two Kagune. Normally, the power gap would've ended us instantly, but right now, the two of us can take him!”
Hitokawa sounded confident, but the situation didn't feel that way to me.
Due to the elemental matchup, Hitokawa couldn't land a decisive hit without taking damage himself, and once I ran out of bullets, I'd be nothing more than a bystander.
Three rounds left.
I had to settle this within three shots. I couldn't afford a single miss.
I leveled the pistol at the Artist, tracking every movement.
The Artist looked between me and Hitokawa and suddenly sighed.
“I truly dislike physical exertion, but being pushed around by the likes of you is an affront to my pride. Very well.”
He looked reluctant, but his movements were decisive.
He reached downward. His hand gripped none other than his fellow Ghoul—the middle-aged man known as the Section Chief.
The Artist roughly seized the unconscious man by the neck and hoisted him up.
There was no trace of camaraderie in the gesture. He wasn't even trying to wake his ally.
Suddenly, Hitokawa’s expression shifted violently, as if he had realized something horrific.
He charged at the Artist, screaming, “Koma!! Stop him!! Stop him now!!”
“...?!”
I didn't understand what was happening, but the urgency in his voice was unmistakable.
I pulled the trigger at the exact moment Hitokawa swung his blade.
Bang! Crack!
The bullet tore through flesh, and the greatsword cleaved through a body.
But it wasn't the Artist's body.
It was the Section Chief's.
The corpse of the Section Chief, shot in the chest and decapitated at the shoulder, fell limply to the floor.
...Then where did the shoulder go? And where did the Artist vanish to?
Crunch. Munch.
“Ahh... I really do hate the taste. It's awful, but it can't be helped.”
Thick, viscous blood dripped down.
From the ceiling.
Our eyes snapped upward.
There, hanging upside down with his fingers embedded in the concrete, the Artist was calmly devouring the remains of his own comrade.
“You...”
“...You crazy bastard.”
Hitokawa spoke first, and I finished the thought. Now I understood what he had sensed.
There is a very simple, very efficient way for a Ghoul to recover from injury.
By eating.
The Artist had consumed his own ally to heal himself.
Sssshhh!
Another Kagune sprouted from his waist.
Three dark-red tentacles danced around him in a macabre display.
“I suppose this amount only recovers one kakuhou? Well, this should be sufficient.”
The Artist ripped his fingers from the ceiling.
As he dropped down upon us, he spread his Kagune wide and lashed out.
“Let’s begin round two.”
BOOOOOOM!!!!!!!!
The Kagune swept past us, slamming into the floor in three separate locations.
The impact ripped through the already fragile floor of the abandoned building, and cracks spread like a spiderweb beneath our feet.
Suddenly, the ground gave way, and a dizzying sense of weightlessness seized my body.
“You’ve got to be kidding meeeee!!!”
“A second phase?! This is way too much!!!”
Screaming, we plummeted into the basement amidst a rain of concrete debris.
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