After quickly showering and coming back, Todo and Kusakabe had returned to their neat, pre-[Culling Game] selves.
"Ahem. So, shall we talk business now?"
Todo acted as if his recent disgrace had never happened. Even while saying that, he kept bringing his nose to his freshly changed clothes and sniffing them over and over.
Fortunately, instead of the stench of dogshit, the clothes carried only the faint smell of fabric softener.
Megumi, pretending not to have seen that, asked the first question.
"First of all... what exactly are those people?"
The dozens of non-[jujutsu] users Todo and Kusakabe had brought with them were currently packed into a single apartment.
No matter that they had been brought by comrades, they couldn’t just accept a bunch of unidentified people into their living quarters without caution.
With that many people involved, the first thing to discuss was how they would be treated.
"They’re the non-[jujutsu] users we rescued in Koto Ward."
"Koto Ward? You were there?"
"Don’t even get me started. I never want to go back. Supplies were gone, infrastructure was wrecked, and curses were swarming everywhere.... It was hell on earth."
"We sent people that way a few times, but couldn’t find you because...?"
"We didn’t really establish a base. We were focused on rescuing survivors, and there wasn’t a single intact place left anyway."
After hearing the explanation, Megumi let out a small sigh.
So that was why, even after sending subordinates to every starting point, they had never heard back. They had simply had rotten luck and never crossed paths.
There were still a few strange points left, though.
"But as I understand it, once [Culling Game] started, all non-[jujutsu] users were given a chance to leave the barrier at least once. So why were they still there...?"
"According to them, some long-haired man in monk’s robes appeared in their dreams and asked whether they wanted to follow him or not. Most of them escaped under Kenjaku’s guidance, but apparently there were plenty who thought it was just a dream and went back to sleep, or ignored him."
"Could they have been lying?"
"No. They were all on the verge of death."
It made sense, but it still wasn’t enough.
They refused in their sleep and got thrown into [Culling Game] as a result? Could a specific ‘binding’ really work that sloppily?
He couldn’t shake the feeling that this, too, was part of Kenjaku’s plan.
Todo, who was smart in his own way, quickly caught on to what Megumi was getting at and added an explanation.
"Even if Kenjaku intended to leave non-[jujutsu] users inside the barrier, there was no other choice but to rescue them. If he intended for them to die, then we had even more reason to save them, and even if that wasn’t the case, would it really be right for [sorcerers] to stand by and watch danger right in front of them?"
"...I’m not saying we should have just let them die."
"Then that settles it."
"They don’t really seem to have anywhere else to go, so we might as well take responsibility for them. We should be able to finish [Culling Game] before the supplies run out."
Once Nobara agreed so readily, the conclusion came easily.
The non-[jujutsu] users they had rescued would live in the neutral zone until [Culling Game] ended.
"Good thing the boss of the neutral zone is you."
"We can’t exactly drag them around while we’re going off to fight."
"With this, we can get back to our real mission."
Feeling lighter, Kusakabe slumped back in his chair.
What was the point of dragging around people who couldn’t even fight? They’d only be dead weight.
The duty of a [sorcerer] was to save civilians, sure, but honestly, it was a pain in the ass and exhausting.
'The problem is where the hell we’re supposed to find Tsukumo.....'
Hakari still hadn’t joined them, which was a big problem, but the real issue was that if she deliberately hid herself, there was no way to find her.
On top of that, they had spent all five days doing nothing but man-versus-nature bullshit, so the search had made zero progress. They didn’t even have anyone with tracking abilities, so the odds of pinning down one person inside this huge barrier were slim.
They were in a situation where they had to start from absolute scratch.
"Guess we should’ve gone with Okkotsu after all."
"You met Okkotsu-senpai?"
"Yeah. We ran into him on day three."
After meeting Todo, the pair had been wandering around on the third day when they happened to encounter Okkotsu passing through the area.
For various reasons, they hadn’t joined up with him, but looking back now, it would have been more efficient to catch him and wait before moving together.
Kusakabe sighed at the regret, but Todo had plenty to say about that too.
"Okkotsu was the one who assigned us civilian rescue in the first place, wasn’t he? If all three of us had stayed there, it would’ve been overkill."
"But if Okkotsu had been with us, he would’ve cleared out the nearby curses in no time. Our mission was already detached from the main objective anyway. Tracking Kenjaku and Tsukumo is only a form of containment. The real main job is the 1000 points and escorting the angel."
"Even if we don’t know about the master, there’s no harm in finding Kenjaku quickly. Not following Okkotsu was a choice based on sound judgment."
"Ugh, fine. You’re right. What’s the point of going on and on about something that already happened? Since we’ve linked up with this side, good is good. Anyway, that’s that."
In fact, Todo wasn’t all that wrong.
Unlike the Tsukumo search team, Okkotsu’s side had a way to find Kenjaku no matter what. There was no need to cling to his ankles for no reason.
Kusakabe also wasn’t truly blaming Todo; it was more of a light complaint, like, if he’d been with them, wouldn’t things have ended faster?
"Did Okkotsu-senpai leave any message?"
"He said he was going to find Choso first. Seems he isn’t worried about Mai. Says there’s a way for them all to meet."
"Ah, right. If Choso’s there, they’ll be able to find Kenjaku pretty quickly."
Yuji, who knew Choso’s ability exactly, nodded.
A sensitivity that could track blood-bound enmity. No matter how far apart they were, Choso could find blood relatives.
If he could even break through Tengen’s barrier, then finding the location of Kenjaku, the one who had given birth to him, probably wouldn’t be that difficult.
The Mai/Maki sisters were... a little ambiguous, but they’d probably be able to meet too.
With senses sharpened to beastlike levels, Maki could probably find Okkotsu quickly if she left even the slightest mark.
In any case, there was no need for either side to go out of their way to help the other first.
"If only we’d known the barrier rules in advance, I would’ve brought a tracker or something."
"Considering even cell phones are dead, that might not have worked either."
"Guess we just have to trust it."
They decided to stop worrying about Okkotsu’s side.
Now all that remained was figuring out Tsukumo Yuki’s location.
They couldn’t go fight alongside her directly, but they could still help.
"Fushiguro, could I borrow your shikigami?"
"I can lend it to you, but... its detection range doesn’t go beyond 2 kilometers. It probably won’t be much help."
The newly made [Divine Dogs - Totality] had lost the advantages it originally possessed in the process of merging.
The white dog’s sense of smell was still there, and its flight ability had actually improved, but its size had grown several times over, making it unsuitable for searching.
Considering that its size increased depending on output, it clearly hadn’t been designed for tracking from the start.
"More importantly, shouldn’t we first handle the places the master probably won’t go?"
Todo pulled out a map from somewhere and marked the barrier surrounding the Tokyo area.
Drawing everyone’s attention, he began crossing out the regions least likely to matter.
"Neutral zone, Koto Ward, and Shinjuku are out. If we’ve touched a place even once, we should exclude it."
"You’re saying that like you’re certain Tsukumo’s avoiding us."
"Think about it, brother. If you were the master, would you want to meet the people who betrayed you?"
"Hmm... I wouldn’t exactly call it betrayal. We’ve never even met her face to face."
"Maybe not for you, but this is a clear act of betrayal against the jujutsu world. It’s a situation where you’d have nothing to say even if you were sentenced to death on the spot. The master doesn’t know we’ve entered, but she’ll be prepared for pursuit. She won’t want her location exposed no matter what, so she’ll avoid fighting as much as possible."
Todo summoned Kogane and searched for Tsukumo Yuki’s name within it.
[Tsukumo Yuki - 1 point]
That one point was probably earned by hunting curses Kenjaku had released to avoid point confiscation.
What she wanted was the blossoming of [sorcerers] through the continuation of [Culling Game].
There was no reason for her to chase 1000 points. It would be lucky if she didn’t just become a target for the rankers.
Considering their generally battle-crazed nature, there was no way they’d pass up a strong opponent like Tsukumo.
By that logic, Ikebukuro and Shibuya, the rankers’ territory, were also excluded.
But there were still plenty of landmasses left on the map.
"What else can narrow the possibilities further?"
"In that case, I happen to have something good. Amai!"
"Yes?"
At Nobara’s call, Amai, who had been waiting outside, opened the door and came in with a tense expression.
Standing there awkwardly and watching their faces, she received Nobara’s order.
"Go get Pikachu."
"Eep."
At the unexpected request, Amai shuddered.
She wanted her to bring that monster here herself?
The last thing she wanted was to provoke its temper and end up roasted alive.
"N-no, I don’t want to."
"He’s still stuck in bed. What’s there to be scared of? We already promised not to hurt him, so relax."
"I still don’t want to! If that guy even snaps his fingers, I’ll turn into fried chicken!"
"Damn it, why are you talking so much? You’re such a coward for a guy."
"...."
"Want me to hit you and make you go? Or will you just go?"
"I’ll just go...."
Swallowing tears inwardly, Amai left the room with a face that screamed she really, really didn’t want to do this.
Not long after, the sound of wheels rattle-rattling came from outside.
Through the opening in the door, they could see a mint-haired young man in a wheelchair, with Amai dragging him along wearing a dead-fish expression.
"Pikachu, welcome."
"Who the hell are you calling Pikachu? Why did you call me?"
"Mark your activity range here for me. We’re looking for someone."
"You dragged me over for something that stupid...? No, whatever."
With an irritated shake of his head, the young man used quick pen strokes to cross out the entire Ueno area on the outskirts of the barrier.
In an instant, more than half of the remaining candidate locations disappeared.
"You said you don’t have a domain?"
"I don’t have a domain, but I’ve been all over this area for a long time. There weren’t any particularly noticeable guys either."
"No, not that domain. I mean the domain you can’t use."
"...!!"
"A loser who can’t even use [Domain Expansion] is useless now, so get out."
"Kraaaah!!!"
Foaming at the mouth, the young man went berserk as Amai dragged him out with a flustered expression.
Even as he was wheeled away, the young man kept hurling curses in an incomprehensible language.
His lightning-fast entrance and exit were already gone from sight.
After the storm had passed, Todo stared at the scene with a blank expression and swallowed hard.
"Brother, who was that just now?"
"Uh... the number one ranker."
"?"
"There are circumstances. We’re keeping him around for now. We decided he’d fight Junpei later."
"...?"
Everything was becoming more and more incomprehensible.
Why was that number one ranker here as a patient?
Why wasn’t he objecting even when treated that harshly?
There were far too many things he wanted to know, but Todo gave up trying to make sense of this absurd situation.
'Hmm. I’ll have to ask about his taste in women later.'
He didn’t even realize that having that thought made him just as abnormal.
"All right, then. That leaves two places."
"Nakano, and Itabashi..."
Nakano had been touched, but not stayed in.
It wasn’t an area rankers casually stepped into either, so there was plenty of possibility that Tsukumo was there.
That is, if they hadn’t caused all that chaos there yesterday while fighting Kashimo.
"Which one should we go to first?"
"Hmm... wouldn’t Itabashi be more likely?"
"Then let’s start there."
And so Todo and Kusakabe’s final destination was decided: Itabashi.
"When should we leave?"
"How about tomorrow, nice and easy?"
"Let’s just go tonight. We’ve rested enough, haven’t we? Or are you planning to slack off again?"
"Sh-shut up!"
At a hotel in Nakano.
In the half-destroyed building left in the wake of battle, a man was examining the traces of residual energy.
"It’s been about a day. They couldn’t have gone far."
Oddly enough, the man was shirtless and dressed bizarrely, with heart stickers pasted over his nipples.
The muscular body that contrasted with that look was deeply unbalanced, but the woman traveling with him didn’t seem to care about it at all.
"What a pain. They probably took him to the neutral zone."
"What happened to Kashimo?"
"His name hasn’t dropped off the rankings, so he was definitely captured alive. They’ll probably try to pit him against Yoshino."
The tall woman sighed and turned to leave.
The man following behind her, Larue, cautiously asked a question.
"What are we going to do now? Chase after them?"
"We won’t catch them if we chase them now. Even if we take the fastest route, Yoshino’s Shinjuku is in the middle... and if we’re exposed for no reason, things will get messy. We have to ambush them and strike when they’re about to hand over the 1000 points."
"Still, that’s..."
Larue had been about to ask if that wasn’t a little cowardly, but he shut his mouth.
He had sensed something ominous in the blazing eyes of his companion.
"It was your choice to follow me, Larue. You said you’d inherit Geto’s dream for the sake of your family."
"......"
"If you back out now, I won’t forgive you."
-The angel must be killed. No matter what.
After saying that, the woman left Larue behind and walked away.
Left alone, Larue muttered to himself with a sad expression.
"How did it end up like this?"
His family’s fate was uncertain.
He didn’t know when he would see them again.
And yet he had vowed to inherit Geto’s ideals and carry them out for the sake of their souls...
"And now I’m still stuck having to go along with that bastard’s plan."
Somehow he had ended up sharing a goal with Kenjaku.
He could do nothing but lament, and he felt pathetic for not being able to stop her.
At their first meeting, she had been lively and confident, but after cooperating with Kenjaku, she had gradually been losing her vitality.
No longer could he see the light of dreams in her eyes.
And so, even if he died, Larue could not abandon her.
"You’re my family too, Tsukumo."
Even if he said that, no answer came back.
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