When was the last time he saw her?
He couldn’t remember clearly, but it had probably been two or three years.
The woman who had said that once he could pull his own weight, there would be nothing left for her to teach had, true to her word, vanished like the wind.
He had felt both relieved and a little lonely, but he hadn’t tried to stop her. She had her own dream.
He had only smiled and sent her off, promising himself he would cheer her on even from afar.
A world without curses might be a little boring, but he had thought that wouldn’t be so bad either.
Still,
"Teacher... is that you?"
"Yeah. It’s me."
He hadn’t expected to meet her like this.
Todo stared at Tsukumo, who gave a faint, tired smile, for a long moment before speaking.
"Aren’t you going to ask?"
"Ask what?"
The question he always asked.
It was less something he asked because he was truly curious and more a greeting he offered every time they met.
There was no way he didn’t know what he was saying. He knew, and did it anyway.
"If we’d met at a better time, maybe. But right now I’m not in the mood."
"......."
"I’ll be blunt. Let Laru go and leave here. And forget that we ran into each other today."
"Would you do that if I were your teacher?"
"No, I wouldn’t. But I still have to ask. I don’t want to fight you."
Tsukumo Yuki’s expression was complicated as she said it.
There was something regretful in it, something angry too, all tangled together so tightly that her thoughts were hard to read.
She looked a little drained, but at the very least, she didn’t seem willing to cooperate with their negotiation the way they wanted.
If they let her go here, they would probably never find her again.
Once the second [Culling Game] opened and the barrier expanded, a search would be impossible.
That was why they had to hold on to her somehow.
"Wait, I think you’ve got the wrong idea."
"What idea?"
"We weren’t ordered to exterminate you. Could we just talk for a bit?"
"I don’t want to talk to you. If I have to hear any more out of you, I think I’ll really explode. And I already knew this wasn’t an extermination order."
Tsukumo shook her head and pointed at Todo and Kusakabe in turn.
Even if they were both top-tier first-grade strength, that still wouldn’t be enough. They wouldn’t be a match for most curses or curse users.
But against her, they were no threat at all.
"Even if you didn’t assume I’d have backup, there’s no way the two of you could handle me. If you really wanted to kill me, Okkotsu Yuta or Yoshino Junpei would have come along too."
"If you know that, then please just play along. We don’t want to fight either. Aren’t you even happy to see a student you haven’t met in a while?"
"I am happy. I’m happy, but now that I’ve seen your face, isn’t that enough? Disappear before I run out of patience."
No matter how they coaxed or soothed her, her attitude stayed stubborn.
It looked like she wouldn’t bend until things truly reached the point of no return, but Todo could sense a faint hesitation beneath it all.
'If she really didn’t want to talk, she could’ve just ambushed us and knocked us out.'
With her skill, she should have been able to subdue both Kusakabe and Todo without killing them.
And yet she had shown herself kindly, then ended things with a warning.
Now that they were face-to-face, her heart was wavering too. The stubbornness she was showing now wasn’t the reaction of someone who truly hated this; it was the desperate refusal of someone who was confused and didn’t know what to do with herself.
"Tsukumo, I don’t know you that well, but you’re not the kind of person who would do something like this..."
"Teacher Kusakabe, I’ll do it."
"Huh? Oh, okay...."
"What are you two doing?"
Her gaze, fixed on the two comedians trading lines, had gone a little cold.
There was still a chance of persuading her, but if they dragged this out in such a sluggish way, disappointment and departure were inevitable.
So they had to press hard from the start.
"Teacher, please stop this now. It’s not too late."
"Heh. You’ve grown a lot, Aoi. I never thought you’d say something like that to me."
"Is this really the world you wanted, Teacher? This madhouse where strangers kill each other just to gain power?"
"......"
"The teacher I know is free-spirited, but she has her own line she won’t cross. So what is this? This isn’t right. It has to be corrected."
He had added a little acting, but these were Todo’s true feelings.
He hadn’t wanted to look pathetic, but as he spoke, emotion kept rising in his throat, and his voice grew more and more earnest.
Tsukumo, who had tried to reject all communication, was listening now.
"...It’s an unavoidable sacrifice. Some bloodshed is inevitable for progress."
"And who decided who gets sacrificed? Did they volunteer to join the [Culling Game] themselves?"
No. This was all Kenjaku’s doing.
Aside from a few who had abandoned all decency in their intoxication with power, most of the players were either being threatened with death without even knowing why, or had already died and become points long ago.
Tsukumo Yuki, who was cooperating with Kenjaku, knew that fact better than anyone. It was also the source of her own pain.
"You know yourself that doesn’t make any sense."
Struck at the heart of it, Tsukumo’s expression twisted.
"Shut up. What do you know...?"
"Then what do you know, Teacher!"
Todo’s roar echoed out.
The sound burst from somewhere deep inside him, so powerful that even he was startled by how loud it came out.
"While you’ve been hiding all this time, what have you been doing? Do you even know what kind of hell this barrier has become?"
He had seen it.
For five days he had wandered around Goto Ward, staring endlessly into the bottom of this [Culling Game].
Awakened people whose abilities were weak, or ordinary civilians who had been dragged in without even awakening at all. No one in this death game cared whether they lived or died.
Did she have any idea how desperately those weak people were struggling just to survive in such awful conditions?
"A world without curses? Don’t make me laugh. How many more people have to die for that dream of yours?"
"........."
"Even if curses disappeared, did you even think about what would happen after that? It’s all the same in the end! Even if everyone became a sorcerer, the logic of power wouldn’t disappear from among them, and things like this would just repeat themselves."
"...That can be redefined when the time comes. If we erase the variable called curses from the world entirely, then at least we can avoid people getting dragged in blindly like this."
"And with that, the common enemy called curses disappears too."
A world without curses? Fine.
But if everyone had to gain power for that, was it really the right thing?
It might take decades, maybe even centuries, before cursed energy fully blended into everyday life and everyone could live naturally.
Who was supposed to take responsibility for the chaos created in the meantime?
Todo wanted to ask Tsukumo.
Was she really prepared to bear the result that would come, and the weight of every single life involved?
And he thought she wouldn’t be able to answer with any real conviction.
"I..."
As Tsukumo’s hesitation became obvious, Kusakabe, who had been watching from behind, joined the conversation too.
"Even if your intentions are good, if someone else has to shoulder the damage caused by your choice, then that’s evil. At the very least, you shouldn’t have included ordinary people in your plan."
"...It’s been exactly fifteen years. Fifteen years of searching for every possible method, and every single one failed. What was I supposed to do?"
"Then you should have given up. Not teamed up with a bastard like Kenjaku."
A world without curses.
She had run all this way chasing only that, and now they were telling her to give up. Cruel words.
But absurdly enough, they were the truth.
"Give up...? I can’t... accept that."
Her tone wavered.
It meant she was right on the verge of giving in.
And now was the time to extend a hand of acceptance.
"Giving up doesn’t have to mean despair or defeat. You could always look for another way."
"Aoi....."
"You’re a strong-willed person, Teacher. You’ll be able to do it someday. You don’t need to suffer by teaming up with that lunatic."
"Hey, Todo. Wait a sec...."
Speaking in a gentle tone, Todo slowly took one step after another toward Tsukumo.
From behind him, Kusakabe tried to stop him in a panicked voice, but he ignored it.
Both hands raised completely, moving slowly so she wouldn’t be on guard. Little by little.
A kind teacher wouldn’t be able to push him away so easily.
"So come back."
"......"
"No matter how many years it takes, I’ll be with you."
By now he was close enough to reach out and touch her, and yet Tsukumo still didn’t seem like she intended to push him away.
The momentum had completely shifted to their side.
He felt a little guilty, as if he were taking advantage of his teacher’s feelings, but if that was enough to stop her, it was a bargain.
"I..."
"When we go back, we’ll have a lot to talk about."
About how they had been living all this time.
About how they would live from now on.
It seemed like they would need far too much time to talk about it right here and now.
With his heart racing, Todo began to say the final line he had prepared.
"We can’t turn back time, but....."
-If I can just bear the sin, that’s fine.
He shouldn’t have said that.
Where did the first domino that brought Tsukumo Yuki down begin?
When she was told she would die before becoming an adult, chosen as Tengen’s growth vessel?
When she lost the people precious to her while running away?
When Zenin Toji, whom she had thought was the key, died?
Or was it...
Mind?
Body?
If she had just settled for enough, could she have escaped the compulsion of that hopelessly rigid left brain?
Back in the present, the thing tormenting her most was Kenjaku.
The one and only collaborator, a man like the embodiment of chaos.
An evolutionist.
A dreamer.
A madman.
-Then just kill all the non-sorcerers.
The thief who stole Geto Suguru’s body.
Geto.
Ah. That tragic youth.
If not for that meeting on that day, [Jade Ruin] would never have happened.
-I’m not that crazy.
-In the end, the one who decides is you.
He had said it conveniently enough, but I was the one who pushed him.
I drove him, cornered at the edge of a cliff, into the abyss of madness.
Back then I didn’t know. I didn’t know that someone who had gone through a crisis could change so drastically from just a little nudge.
And sorcerers, who live with death closer than anyone else, would be even more so.
It was Gojo Satoru who killed Geto Suguru, but the situation that led to that was clearly her responsibility.
She had stolen a young man’s youth and made them kill each other.
That fact would never change until the day she died.
Who am I supposed to atone to?
Those who were dragged into the [Culling Game] and died?
Or........
-If I can just bear the sin, that’s fine.
..........
"Yeah. I should atone."
"Good thinking......."
-Crash!
"To, Todooo!!"
Atone to the one who had left, the one who had been made to dream an impossible dream.
"If I miss this chance, I’ll be stuck for another few years....."
I’ll kill the angel.
And once everything is over, I’ll kill Kenjaku too.
This is the path she chose.
A requiem for Geto Suguru.
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