My Vampire Older Sister and Zombie Little Sister - Book 7: Chapter 3

Part 1

There was something there.

There had to be something bad up ahead.

I was ready for that much. It was more of a mental defensive line than having an actual plan, but I was still nervously cautious.

It only took one step.

After just one step upon descending the stairs, I realized I had made a mistake.

There was no obvious light or sound. I did not find a ghost with a transparent lower half or a bloody fallen warrior.

It happened as soon as the sole of my shoe touched the concrete floor.

“Ugh!?”

It felt like I had stepped in some kind of super sticky pollution. I quickly aimed my smartphone’s backlight at my feet…but there was nothing there. Even though my toes felt a disgusting sensation like my foot had plunged ankle-deep in a full spittoon. When I raised my feet, it seemed odd that no sticky strings were attached to it.

Had Sagawa Akemi really run down here to put her mind at ease?

Had Evil Spirit spread this in order to kindly embrace their members?

Really and truly?

All I felt was a hunch that I was mistaken about something.

“Ayu…mi? Do you know what…this is????”

“I’m one of the products, so I don’t know how everything is created. I don’t know what’s written in the Bokor textbooks. But if they’re simply using drug components to distort our perception, there shouldn’t be any way to have it affect everyone the same. Maybe they’ve sprinkled flour around and provided some kind of substitute for flesh or mucous membranes.”

…My dumb little sister said some things I didn’t understand, but that wasn’t what mattered. Ayumi had noticed this oddity too.

“…”

In Kukyou City, every home supposedly had an underground space to be used as a disaster shelter. Those sealed doors had actually connected to the large-scale tunnel network created by the Bright Cross to secretly abduct Archenemies, but the large round entrance here had been pried open.

…But how?

The central handle was a bent mess and a few of the deadbolts had snapped. But those things were designed to resist disasters, so they should have been able to survive an attack from a tyrannosaurus.

I could have sworn something was bursting out from the crack of the slightly opened door.

The more I narrowed my eyes to determine what it was, the more its outlines wavered and its colors danced.

It ultimately looked like long, wet hair.

“Onii-chan, pull yourself together. You’re going to save the Class Rep, right?”

When Ayumi said that, the shimmering thing withdrew a bit. I could still see it in my peripheral vision, but I doubted it was real. It may have been a mixture of lies and the truth. I didn’t know if it was chunks of flesh or flour, but whatever was crawling around at my feet was insignificant. If something truly powerful was lurking in here, I would have already been killed.

I tilted my smartphone sideways and viewed the scene through it.

“Maxwell, search the image for any objects that might trigger a simulacrum phenomenon. Similarly, check for anything – stains on the walls, the backs of bugs, etc. – that would look like a face, hand, or humanoid shape and highlight them with a solid color.”

“Sure. Executing masking process.”

…Even if what you thought was a ghost was actually dried pampas grass, the ability to trigger that kind of malfunction in perception with a 100% success rate was still a threat. I couldn’t waste time on illusions created by my own brain when anyone could be lying in wait inside these dangerous tunnels.

“The body is divided into 5 parts,” muttered Ayumi. “I think this is interfering with the Ti Bon Ange, which is related to memory and personality. Although I couldn’t say whether it’s meant to shake pursuit or strengthen the mental state of the Voodoo practitioner.”

“…”

“The things crawling along the walls and at our feet might just be lumps of flour injected with a Gros Bon Ange…no, just with a Nanm to allow it to move in a muscular way. Although I couldn’t say whether they’re spreading the impurity or eating it to clean it up.”

I breathed in and out.

The stickiness at my feet had mostly gone away. The slipper-sized lumps of flour fled from my gaze like wharf roaches on a rocky beach.

Had this place always been like this?

It was not like I knew the place all that well. And given what had happened in this dark subterranean space, it was best to stay away.

Overall, it felt something like a subway tunnel. It had a domed ceiling and fluorescent lights on the walls at even intervals. The pillars had numbers and letters painted on them and there were tracks on the floor.

It had definitely been a scary place.

But like visiting a haunted house a second time or replaying an RPG, I thought I would have an advantage by knowing the lay of the land. I thought the location would help us.

Yet it felt this different?

It felt like I had never been here before. No, it was like I had started playing on an ultra-hard sudden death mode no one had told me about.

“There are bloodstains on the ground,” said Maxwell. “They continue further in. I have finished marking the scene through the screen.”

“This isn’t the bloody footprints from before.”

“Sure. You have no tool for analyzing blood samples, but this could have come from elsewhere. The runner may have noticed the footprints here and wiped off her shoes with a cloth that then started dripping, or she may have been injured herself.”

…Were we catching up to her? Or were we being lured in?

I felt like I just kept staring in the mirror and asking myself the same questions over and over again. The words started falling apart in my head.

“Let’s get going, Onii-chan. Whether it’s a Ti Bon Ange or a Nanm, things must not be going according to plan if they’ve pulled out their secret weapon. Not much further now.”

“R-right.”

I awkwardly agreed. At some point, Ayumi and Maxwell had taken the lead. This place had a way of throwing me off no matter what I was trying to do.

I gulped and followed the spots of blood on the floor through the abandoned subterranean space. I had trouble imaging how serious this injury had to be based on the amount of blood. It didn’t seem to be a shallow injury, though.

I relied on the backlight to continue through the curving tunnel.

Ayumi was not holding a light as she walked alongside me. There was a lot I didn’t know about Zombie physiology, but she may have had good night vision.

A few other tunnels joined with this one, but we did not hesitate. The bloodstains on the concrete could not have been more obvious a trail.

I heard an odd sound from the darkness down one of those alternate tunnels.

It sounded a lot like a draft blowing through a hole.

…No, wait.

The wind? In this vast but enclosed underground space???

“This is bad. One of the exits is open! Sagawa Akemi is going to escape!!”

“Wait, Onii-chan!”

Ayumi frantically called out to me, presumably because her night vision was better.

But it was too late.

Just one step too late.

My foot.

My foot stepped in…something.

Something like the muddy bottom of a swamp?

“……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………”

I did not move for a while.

I did not even check to see what I had stepped in. But I could tell. This was not a bizarre illusion like before. Nor was it a mysterious pawn made from a lump of flour. This was definitely and unmistakably real. I had crossed a forbidden line. I had literally planted my foot squarely on a taboo.

A rusty smell reached my nose. But not of rust itself. It was simply “rusty”. Just like someone speaking around a taboo word, my mind avoided producing the actual answer.

I wasn’t consciously doing it.

Large beads of unpleasant sweat dripped from my cheek to my chin and a shudder ran through my body. And that action placed it in my vision. The distance was zero and our coordinates overlapped. It was right at my feet.

Could I call it…blood?

It was a bucket’s worth of dark red. But I could not exactly call it a pure liquid. It was more like a ball of jelly…

“Urp? Wahh!?”

It was so disgusting I reflexively pulled my hips back. I lost my balance and fell right back onto my ass.

But it wasn’t over.

What was that windy noise? Ayumi had told me to stop because she had seen something in the darkness. What more was there!?

The irregular whistling sound was surprisingly close by. I had been panicking, but this actually brought calm rationality back to a part of my mind. It was like the strange optical illusion where a wheel spinning fast enough would begin to look like it was spinning the other way.

Yes, that was right.

“…Close by? But there aren’t any exits around here…”

And despite sounding like wind, not one of our hairs was moving. There were no giant round doors nearby. Then this sound had to be something else. It was not wind.

Meanwhile, my puny human eyes adjusted to the darkness.

I could see the outline of something there.

What was it?

Something slender and tall stood at the center of the intersection between two tunnels.

Someone.

Yes, it not something. Someone.

“Eek!?”

But the sound was not coming from them.

It came from their feet.

A high school girl was desperately clinging to the skinny figure’s feet while coughing up soft squishy lumps…and the strange sound…was coming from…her throat…?

“Y-you…what are you…what are you doing there!?”

I finally held out my smartphone’s backlight.

And the light revealed it all.

A sickly pale young man with thin-framed glasses looked like he had stepped out of a painting due to his black suit and tie.

And at his feet, Sagawa Akemi looked like she had been given a deadly poison.

Part 2

“Oh…”

No matter how closely I watched her mouth, it was impossible to tell what she was trying to say.

“Ah…eh?”

Sagawa Akemi’s eyes rolled back in her head. Even she must have had some pride as a girl that she had been desperately preserving. But she finally reached her limit and a clump larger than her face exploded from her mouth and she collapsed face-first into the dark red mess she had just spewed.

A member of the black market had not been waiting here to help Sagawa Akemi escape. They had used that as an excuse to silence her and erase any thread leading back to Evil Spirit.

At this point, I recalled an animal documentary I had once seen.

In an experiment to test the strength of a certain snake’s venom, they had dripped some venom into a bucket of pig’s blood. After stirring it, the blood had become too thick to remove the stirring stick.

But that wasn’t what this was. This taboo could never exist in the natural world!

“…Wh-what did you even do…to cause this…?”

“What did I do? I squeezed out some lime juice, that’s all.”

That grim reaper opened his mouth while tapping the ground with a cane that looked like an upside-down J. His hand was wrapped around the metal head which was shaped like a small skull.

It was enough for my heart to leap in my chest. He actually responded to me. That should have been entirely normal, but I had trouble trusting anything normal here.

What was he?

An Archenemy like Ayumi and Erika? Really!?

“Are you unfamiliar with it? It is the most basic of Voodoo curses. You cut off half a lime growing on the tree, leaving the other half on the branch. Perform a certain ritual with the half you took and the half you left will develop the strongest and most undetectable toxin. There is but one antidote: take the half offered on the altar and give it to the victim.”

“…Maxwell.”

“The exact method is not provided, but an online encyclopedia does have an entry on lime poison. And the general explanation is the same.”

Barring something silly like this guy having written that entry himself, this was the real deal.

He was Evil Spirit.

He was a real Bokor lurking at the depths of that Voodoo black market!

I couldn’t read his emotions. He tilted his head with eyes like tree hollows, his black bangs shook, and he seemed focused more on Ayumi than me.

“This is something of a problem. What do you think you two are doing here? You do not seem to be Bokors from Evil Spirit.”

“Give-…!”

“What does that matter? At the very least, we don’t look like allies, do we?”

I was more motivated by my overwhelmed mind than righteous fury as I just about shouted for him to give back the Class Rep’s soul, but Ayumi coldly got in my way.

…This man was from the black market.

Those people would slap a price tag on anything, so I couldn’t let him know the Voodoo doll in his hand held any special value. He would use it as a hostage…

Meanwhile, that grim reaper’s horribly sickly eyes scanned Ayumi from top to bottom and he neurotically tapped the floor with his skull-headed cane.

“…Oh? That is some impressive preservation. Much like robots, Zombies are created for their labor, so it is unusual to find one that preserves the brain like that. But that just deepens the mystery. Why would someone ignorant of Voodoo have such a high-quality product?”

“…Just so you know, Houngan control methods won’t work on me.”

“No, I would imagine not. Your brain is a bit too fresh to boss around. I see. So the four aspects of your body have been bound together without cutting away the Ti Bon Ange. That structure gives you autonomy. You really should have been allowed to sleep in the dirt a while longer to destroy your decision making power.”

This was a side of Ayumi I had never seen.

This was bad. Before long, my knowledge would be far too inadequate. Like someone who stopped going to school after screwing up their times tables or like someone whose debts just kept piling up, I would be entirely overwhelmed.

“That said, strength is strength. Boy, use her as you like and send her after me as you like. She is yours, is she not?”

That phrasing ignited something deep in my mind. Everything finally came into focus.

Evil Spirit.

I didn’t know the detailed distinctions between Voodoo Houngans and Bokors.

But I knew they would use, absorb, and throw out anything, including humans and religions. They would transform laughing and crying humans into walking corpses to achieve their goals.

I could see now how that had transformed into a black market. And I had never intended to get along with them.

“You…!!”

“Warning,” said Maxwell.

But the fire inside me was extinguished just as I started to step forward.

The man in a suit stroked the metal skull head of his J-shaped cane and then tapped it against the floor.

And words overflowed from his mouth.

“But that means no hard feelings. If you will use a criminal, then you can hardly complain if I use a criminal of my own.”

Something squirmed.

It was at the feet of that gloomy man with sickly eyes hidden behind his glasses. It was the high school girl, Sagawa Akemi, who had remained motionless ever since collapsing face-first into the lump of what looked like dark red jelly. Instead of smoothly standing up, it was more like her head, arms, and legs were slithering around on their own like struggling snakes.

Ayumi’s eyes widened and she shouted.

“Acute Zombie Powder!? Directly below such a big city!?”

“The lime toxin is no more than an ignition meant to activate that. Besides, poisons and medicines are two sides of the same coin. If you can only use deadly poisons to kill, you have a long way to go as a priest who holds all things in their hands.”

The suit-wearing grim reaper did not seem to mind at all.

“And a controlled mutation is much better than the traditional methods when it comes to removing the Ti Bon Ange from the body and tying the three aspects together. And why the surprise? We Bokors who have offered a sacrifice to an evil spirit, so we can acquire all but the person we care for most.”

The unrestrained black-haired priest was a perfect contrast. He was entirely broken, but he did not move an inch. He said he had offered up the person he cared for most. Was this the end result of someone who had failed to find anything more important than themselves?

“The situation is too urgent to bury her and allow her brain to mature. Her movements will be somewhat awkward since the separation of the Ti Bon Ange will be incomplete, so I must apologize in advance.”

Part 3

This was different from the Western-born image seen in movies and games. This was a Zombie created by a secret Voodoo ritual carried out by a legit Bokor.

Fire extinguisher, fire axe, rail-changing lever…anything. My eyes darted about in search of some kind of weapon so my legs would not give out from fear. When Ayumi and Sagawa Akemi (who was being controlled like a marionette) began grappling with monstrous strength rivalling construction machinery, it would mean a lot if I felt like I could do something.

Or so I thought.

And yet…

Without warning, Sagawa Akemi’s uniform swelled out from within and her entire body inflated like a round balloon.

“Wha-…ah…?”

I had Ayumi as an example of a Zombie. I was so familiar with that Archenemy, so when this bizarre form was so very different, my mind had trouble keeping up.

“Onii-chan, hide!!”

A tremendous impact hit me from the side as Ayumi shoved me away like I had been hit by a small motorcycle. And as soon as the two of us made it behind a concrete pillar…

“!?”

“!!”

…How could I even describe it?

It did not come from her mouth. In fact, she seemed to retain some of her senses to the very end. But because she so desperately clamped her lips shut, it had nowhere to go and a vertical line split open from her throat to just above her navel. Since I was shoved behind the pillar, I didn’t see what happened next. But I did hear a wet popping sound. It was likely fully-transformed blood, flesh, fat, and bone. The horrific sound that rang in my ears was like shoving a dissolved human body in a pump and spraying it out of a firehose. The front and sides of the pillar sizzled like Chinese cooking. I did not at all feel like we were safe here. The popping sound that lingered in my ears and the white haze that hung in the air seemed sinister enough.

I could not see directly ahead due to the pillar shielding us. But I heard a monotone voice from the young man who had to be standing next to that cannon which launched the flesh and blood contained in the bag of skin.

“The true purpose and essence of Zombies is to convert criminals into a source of labor that will support the community ruled by the priest. And physical labor performed with monstrous strength is not the only thing demanded of them.”

He wasn’t affected?

In the simulator, the Zombies had tried to bite anyone who approached, even Ayumi. Did he have a way of removing himself as a target or at least partially controlling them?

Ayumi whispered some extra information while I practically embraced her.

“It’s like a zombie computer. If a ritual would be too risky to do yourself, you build a filter using some poor victim. That way the side effects won’t reach you.”

“The Petro are so unruly, you see. Prayers to them can be quite effective, but the curses when you screw it up are quite cruel indeed. It never hurts to keep some insurance.”

The Bokor spoke calmly before I could say anything.

…Could he hear our conversation? Or had he just guessed we would be saying something along those lines?

The more I thought about it, the more it trapped me.

I spoke to Ayumi in my arms.

“More importantly, what happened to the Class Rep’s doll? Did Sagawa have it or did that Bokor take it?”

“It’s always her with you, isn’t it?”

“You have to ask? Should I add that to my blog profile?”

This man was from the black market. He would not let a “product” go to waste, no matter what it was.

I pulled a pocket tissue from the packet, balled it up, and threw it outside the pillar.

…I was afraid of the white haze and the sticky goop, but the tissue didn’t immediately grow discolored, dissolve, or burn. Would we be fine as long as that stuff wasn’t directly dumped over our heads?

Instead, the movement must have caught their attention because I heard a few sticky sounds from beyond the pillar.

“Looks like that guts cannon wasn’t a one-time thing…!”

“With the filter in place, it doesn’t matter to the Bokor how many times the ritual fails. It must be an ecological weapon that can alternately fire and reload as many times as he wants. It repeatedly walks around, intentionally fails the ritual, and breaks down any obstacle with its insides. Nothing could be more of a pain.”

Of course, it was all over if that thing circled around the pillar. I didn’t know what exactly would happen if we took a direct hit from that, but I really didn’t want to think about it much.

“…Onii-chan, start running on my signal.”

“Ayumi.”

“We’re done for if she circles around. There’s another tunnel right over there, right? We need to take action before that isn’t an option any longer. C’mon!”

I gasped.

Her muscular strength was 10 times that of a normal person. Instead of pushing or pulling me, she essentially threw me out from behind the pillar.

Even so, time seemed to stop in the instant my eyes met those of the fattened lump of flesh.

The line down the center of her body wriggled irregularly.

With a painfully-loud noise, the tunnel was once more filled with the sticky components of a human body.

It was an extremely close call.

One step before the intersection, I rolled onto a different path that branched off like a lowercase “y” and I just barely escaped the wet blast.

I could never even get close in a normal fight. Not to the horrific cannon that Sagawa Akemi had become and not to the Bokor waiting behind her!

Ayumi said more in the gap between attacks.

“There’s no time. Onii-chan, you use Maxwell to find another way around. With emergency waterways for flooding and backup power rooms, there have to be plenty of doors and passageways. That thing seems to only use simple actions. As a fellow Zombie, I’ll attack it head-on and buy some time for you to circle around and hit the Bokor in the back of the head.”

“You can’t, Ayumi. Your body might be sturdy, but you can’t regenerate like Erika can! You can’t just stuff all the goop back in like that one can, right!?”

“I’ll still have a better chance than you. …And you’re not going to run away until you save the Class Rep, right?”

“…”

“See? I wouldn’t ask you to do something you can’t. I know you won’t run away. So let’s do the best we can do under those conditions.”

I didn’t have time to call her name to stop her. The familiar twin butter rolls of my little sister’s hair vanished back into the tunnel filled with acidic smoke.

The horribly wet sound of the cannon sounded again.

“Dammit!”

There was no stopping it now. If I wanted to minimize Ayumi’s injuries, I had to end this as quickly as possible.

“Maxwell, search for a route!”

“No. You make that sound simple, but where am I supposed to find a map of the former Bright Cross’s secret facility, you imbecile?”

A-Ayumi, the plan is already falling apart!!

But just like she had said, there was no backing out now. I pretty much blindly ran through the forking tunnels while relying on the echoing sounds to circle around.

Yes, that meant the firing and reloading was continuing.

“This is crazy…”

That Bokor and Zombie had both originally been human, right? Could a single set of “teachings” really change them that much? If so, I was actually shocked at the potential found in humans!!

“I am noise cancelling the echo of the sound and displaying the direction on the screen,” said Maxwell. “I cannot guarantee that it is 100% accurate, but please use it as an estimate.”

“This way?”

Even though I was relying on the sound, I was guided to a rusted metal door in a concrete wall. Was Maxwell using the sound as it passed through the objects? I slowly opened the door and aimed the backlight inside to find a few rusted lockers lined up and fallen over. It may have been a room for inspection and maintenance workers.

No machinery or equipment related to the Bright Cross remained, but there were a few tools lying around. I borrowed a large wrench.

There were a few more doors, but Maxwell guided me to a square panel on the floor. Did it lead to one of the waterways Ayumi had mentioned? I just hoped that goop was not flowing through there.

But.

A thought occurred to me while I climbed underground (while already underground).

Even if I conveniently avoided Sagawa Akemi and arrived behind the Bokor, what did I do then? Could I silence him with this blunt weapon? In a single blow without him noticing me? This was no time to be thinking about holding back. So did I have to do it with the intention of killing him???

A-A-Ayumi, you idiot. You started this without thinking it through, didn’t you? Wasn’t it all falling apart around us?

Meanwhile, I crouched down to travel through a 1m-thick steel pipe.

The wet sound of the cannon grew louder. I was close. I would return to that unrealistic battlefield before long. I had likely succeeded in circling around. Once I climbed back up, I would have passed the gas-bloated puppet that Sagawa Akemi had become and I would find the Bokor waiting with back defenselessly exposed.

The sounds alone made me feel faint. I wanted to end it as soon as possible. I adjusted my grip on the heavy wrench in one hand and held my smartphone in the other hand as I approached.

I followed Maxwell’s guidance to another square panel I could lift like a manhole cover.

The sound grew a lot louder. It was so close by. I was in the blind spot just beyond a curve in the tunnel.

“Maxwell, he’ll notice once I get closer, so shut off the backlight.”

“It will be nearly pitch black, so you will have to go the rest of the way blind.”

“Smartphone cameras these days are more sensitive than the naked eye, right? You don’t need to display it on the screen, but I’ll leave it to you. Once I’m within range, turn on the backlight. I’ll use that as my cue to rush in, so keep my reach in mind.”

“And if the Bokor notices you first?”

“Then flash the light as brightly as possible.”

Not much further.

…One more step.

It couldn’t be much further than that…

And the judgment was made.

With a lightning-like flash of light, everything in that curving tunnel was burned into my retinas.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

My breathing stopped.

The backlight cleared my vision. Maxwell sent several warning messages, but I didn’t have time to read them.

I was wrong. I hadn’t understood anything.

I had only heard the sound until now. I hadn’t actually seen the source itself. I shouldn’t have assumed I understood because I existed in the same area. I should have braced myself for a greater shock. I should have been better prepared before attempting this.

Red and black.

The colors were everywhere.

It was like a Rorschach test made by dumping more and more paint on the walls and floor. There was some white and some soft lumps of pink mixed in, but where had those originally been in her body?

…That much I had expected to find, but it went beyond that.

There were twisted triangles contained in circles.

There were astrological symbols.

There were strings of crushed letters.

This would not happen by coincidence. This was not a kind of psychological test that made me see meaning and symbols that were not there. …It had been designed this way. Had that Voodoo villain had Sagawa Akemi expel her innards over and over and over and over in order to create this!?

Yes, Sagawa Akemi’s firing and reloading had used the side effects of failing a ritual. She had been an unfortunate breakwater. That meant the Bokor who held the controller had to be performing some kind of “ritual” to pray to those Petro or whatever they were.

It was a magic circle.

As soon as it entered my vision, it felt like taking a stun gun to the back of the head.

“Gah!?”

“Oh, dear.”

The man in a suit turned around when he saw the light and heard my careless shout, but there was nothing I could do. My spine failed to support me and I crumpled to the ground.

I saw a flashing in front of my eyes.

Just seeing it was enough to do this? This went far beyond red and blue flashing lights!

“I see. So that was your trick. Indeed, human wisdom is more frightening than a monster’s strength.”

Where was the wrench? Where had my smartphone gone? I couldn’t even gather enough strength to get up. If I didn’t focus my mind, I would pass out.

“That visual imprinting was meant for use against an Archenemy. It directly interferes with the Gros Bon Ange. I do apologize for the complete and utter overkill, but this is a battle. I must ask that we hold no hard feelings over the outcome.”

“…Dammit.”

I couldn’t move my arms. Same for my legs. My cheek hurt as the thick metal rail dug into it, but I couldn’t even roll over. I doubted I could even open my mouth properly.

But that was a serious problem.

I had to retrieve the wheat doll containing the Class Rep’s soul. I didn’t know what had happened to Ayumi, but I couldn’t allow her to be harmed any more. And most importantly, I couldn’t let that goddamn Evil Spirit black market continue running.

“Maxwell…where are you? Answer me…I have instructions…run a system…recovery.”

“Hm? Is that your god? How very strange. Then what is your connection to that puppet you used as a shield? It does not seem you have removed her Ti Bon Ange to control her.”

While the wet cannon sounds continued on and on, my sideways vision flashed irregularly and narrowed. No, I couldn’t allow myself to pass out. I knew that, but my convulsing fingers could not detect the familiar sensation of the smartphone. I was just a high school boy without Maxwell. And yet I had to stand up to the legit occult…

“I would like to confirm one last thing. Boy, where do you stand?”

“…?”

“The woman causing trouble up top is a Valkyrie, so she must be an assassin of the kind gods. But what about you? Are you the guide she needed to find us, are you the alarm that called them here with your scream, or are you a witness who observes the mystical and spreads word of the paranormal? To be honest, I see no reason for you to be on this stage.”

“…What are you…talking about?”

This Voodoo Bokor was a human, but he wielded greater paranormal power than an Archenemy. I couldn’t imagine what the world looked like through his eyes, but my mind was still full of questions.

Yes…

“Where I stand? This stage? What does that mean? Did you know that blue Valkyrie was going to attack!?”

“No? That warrior maiden was a complete surprise. But Evil Spirit is a black market that allows you to freely buy anything you want as long as you sacrifice that which you care for most. We will make her pay. There are countless ways to sell a goddess or two.”

…Are you kidding? He only saw that monster as a product?

“Many have doubted the physical existence of the gods, but, well, she did appear on the national broadcast for that Colosseum. This is an excellent opportunity. There were some who said they would love to make her their own.”

This was not some long-held dream or a wish someone had risked their life on.

I had no intention of taking Karen’s side, but still…!

“Thinking back…there was a sign, or rather a messenger. The Echidna provided a warning of the goddess’s visit.”

“Echi-…?”

That Archenemy had infiltrated Absolute Noah and destroyed the entire ark. She had gone missing, so why was her name being mentioned here?

“So that makes your presence all the more baffling. What is your role? Even if this allows us to acquire the Valkyrie, what function do you serve?”

A challenge against the gods.

A group or organization gathered to strike back against those unparalleled beings.

“…You. You’re the same…as the Echidna?”

“It doesn’t really matter. Now, this really is a problem.”

Looking to the black eyes beyond his glasses felt like staring into tree hollows. And he clearly said the following:

“Even if you come as a set with that puppet…there is no way to accurately set your price without knowing your role. It could be troublemaker, sacrificial genius, or whatever else – just something.”

Those words reminded me of the boiling anger in my head. Yes, he was from the black market that discarded lives like a convenience store clerk heated up a bento. And it wasn’t just my life on the chopping block. It was Ayumi’s and…!!

“…Class…Rep…”

“?”

“Where is the Class Rep’s Voodoo doll?”

He actually looked confused. He truly did not know what I meant. To Evil Spirit, each individual life must not have been enough to feel guilt over.

“I do not know who that is, but do you really think we would damage one of our products?”

“Oh, I see…”

That was a relief to hear.

He was the scummiest of scum, but it looked like I could at least trust his professionalism.

And had you forgotten?

It was true I was a regular high school boy who couldn’t do anything without Maxwell. But even without the smartphone in my hand, it could still pick up my voice. I couldn’t see the response on the screen, but I could send instructions.

Plus, it was not concrete I felt pressed against my cheek on the ground.

“Maxwell, you’ve recovered the power, haven’t you? Then send in the train like I commanded you!!”

By the time the noise reached our ears, it was too late. You would not respond in time if you reacted only once the wall of air was pushed out from the darkness.

“Kh.”

I didn’t care if it was pathetic. I could barely move, so I gathered all my strength to twist my body, crawl like a dying caterpillar, roll, and somehow get off of the metal rails.

This deadly train had probably been used to transport Bright Cross soldiers around the tunnels and it did not have any obvious lights.

And there were no brakes on this train, you moron.

“Ah.”

I had no idea what the gloomy Voodoo Bokor tried to say.

A moment later, the space was filled by that steel hammer.

A tremendous wall of sound struck my body. To be honest, I couldn’t see the instant of impact. The man’s body disappeared like a movie with frames missing. The train continued down the tunnel, just about hit Ayumi as well, and sent Sagawa Akemi’s swollen body flying into the darkness.

After it had completely vanished into the black, I finally heard the screeching of its brakes.

“…Ayu-…are you okay…?”

“Fugu. Did you do that, Onii-chan?”

I more or less crawled toward her voice.

I hadn’t had time to worry about whether that would be considered justified or excessive. I didn’t know how my actions would be judged the following day, but for the moment, I was thankful I had survived.

…Oh, right.

Where had my smartphone ended up? Had it been crushed by the train’s wheels?

“Onii-chan, there’s a light flashing over there.”

So it survived.

The tingling in the back of my mind gradually faded. I took a deep breath, slowly stood up, and grabbed the rectangle of light Ayumi had mentioned.

“Maxwell, I want to find the Voodoo doll containing the Class Rep’s soul. I’m sure the Bokor and Sagawa Akemi were smashed to pieces, though…”

“Warning.”

The text on the screen completely ignored what I was saying.

“I did not activate the brakes. Something else caused the train to stop.”

A moment later…

It was like a sticky liquid had been poured into my ears. My spine froze. I heard an odd noise, but I couldn’t even turn around to look.

It was like my entire body had rusted over.

Once I gathered so much strength I thought each of my joints was going to snap, Ayumi and I slowly – truly slowly – turned around.

You’re kidding right?

This has got to be a joke!

“…”

A loud tremor came from the darkness. A giant silhouette had toppled over. The motion had been a lot like a manhole cover being pushed up from below.

A train. That was a train, right? It had to weight dozens…no, hundreds of tons. While I would prefer to not have killed them, this was not much of a relief.

Was it the Bokor himself or Sagawa Akemi’s changed form?

Either way, was legit Voodoo really this incredible!?

“Ayumi, you run away…”

“Onii-chan!?”

“Maxwell, electrify the third rail at our feet. Blow past all the limiters so it’ll shock someone even if they aren’t directly touching it. I don’t care if the power rail breaks from the heat, just roast them!!”

I had no idea if this would work. I even had a suspicion no “physical method” would work.

But I couldn’t do nothing.

I couldn’t allow him to attack Ayumi or escape to the surface with the Class Rep’s doll.

I could accept anything a Vampire or Zombie might do. But I couldn’t ignore someone who turned people into products and sold them. If someone with that kind of power escaped, it would be a tragedy for everyone!

“Bring it on, Evil Spirit! The guy who did that to you is right here!!”

A great pressure clearly reared its head in the darkness.

…Looking straight at it might be enough to shatter my soul…

My heart pounded at the thought.

And just then…

I heard a quiet sound.

It reminded me of a noisy midsummer night. But wait. This was…?

Bzzz.

Bzzzzzz.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzz.

“Flies…?”

I muttered the word when I saw some large silver flies buzz right past my face.

This was not just two or three.

There were 50, 100, 200…no, even more!? The swarm of flies filled the space with the force of a silver sandstorm. They appeared from behind me and charged toward the Voodoo monster lurking in the darkness!?

“Wait, Onii-chan! Don’t touch them!”

Ayumi realized something and raised a shrill cry.

“These aren’t normal flies. This is either a Kudlak or a Strigoi. Either way, it’s a carrier of deadly disease. It’s a Vampire just like Onee-chan!”

“?”

I was more confused than surprised. Ayumi said this was the same as Erika, but I couldn’t see anything in common.

This large swarm of silver flies was not biting or scratching anyone. It simply swarmed around the monster in the darkness like a silver river.

But it was quite effective.

I heard a sound like rotten fruit falling from the branch and splatting against the ground.

And that was all.

That Voodoo monster who had survived a direct hit from a train lost its form. It dissolved and fell apart. Its flailing arms and legs fell away before it could even cry out in agony.

…Oh, so that’s it.

“Are they intentionally creating unsanitary conditions to hasten decomposition…?”

Ayumi was a Zombie Archenemy, but her skin looked like it would repel water and her body smelled like a girl. But she had to maintain that state. She spent a lot of effort worrying about temperature and humidity, she periodically received injections of preservatives, and she had stitches across her entire body.

This river of silver flies was the opposite.

It was like throwing a corpse into a sauna so full of steam it was hard to breathe. They carried tons of putrefactive bacteria, they created a hothouse like how honey bees used their gathered body heat to kill hornets, and they trapped the victim in that sticky cage before delivering the finishing blow.

“…”

There was no sign of it left.

There was only liquid there. It reminded me of the urban legend of an old man who died in his reheated bath and was found as a stew.

The swarm of flies slurped up the liquefied Voodoo Bokor. Was this more like a Vampire?

It was not fresh blood. It had been allowed to rot just enough to match the Vampire’s tastes. Just like a connoisseur who preferred fermented wine or cheese.

Finally.

Truly finally.

I had been unable to move or speak while watching the barbaric act unfold, but a slender figure rose before me. No, the silver flies had gathered together to form it. When the mass of filthy thin-winged insects scattered again, a small girl with jewel-like eyes, short silver hair, and a black military uniform stood there. She wore the baggy black jacket like a dress and thick synthetic fabric covered her slender legs for an odd sense of unity.

Only then did I realize something.

Someone lay collapsed at this girl’s feet. It was Sagawa Akemi and the Voodoo Bokor. Both their bodies were intact.

“That was the same as using a certain variety of maggot to break down and sterilize a putrefied wound. I am a fuse for putrefaction and unclean foods, so it is entirely within my power to selectively eat only the contaminated portions.”

…Come to think of it, the Vampires in legends were said to have done a lot of bad things, but wasn’t spreading infectious disease one of those?

“I prefer not to show such discretion in a kill-or-be-killed battle, but I must not leave a poor impression on the younger brother.”

The military uniform girl in a flat hat spoke in a singsong voice and casually tossed something my way. I hesitantly caught it and found it was a doll made of wheat. It was a lot like raw bread dough, but it actually reproduced the forehead and glasses.

“Younger brother, I recommend you leave that with the Queen. She will know what to do.”

“Brother…?”

“My apologies. I forget to name myself. I am Fly Villiers.”

She removed her hat, slowly bowed, and spoke with oddly smooth enunciation.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, younger brother. And younger sister as well. I should have introduced myself in the proper manner, but I was forced to compromise due to the urgency of the situation. Please forgive me.”

“Eh? Huh?”

“I can explain in detail later.”

With her head still elegantly lowered, she looked up at me with a challenging look in her eyes and spoke clearly.

“Please pass this message along to the Queen: The 13 Eastern European Families are starving for a chat over bloody tea.”

[crucial notice] From the Notes of a Certain Hunter [on the pinup board]

The 13 Eastern European Families. There is little information on their origin and the number of people belonging to them, but they form an international organization with great meaning for Archenemies. They are known as the 13 Eastern European Families, but we must question whether they are really based in Eastern Europe and whether they really have 13 leading members.

The central figure is said to be a Vampire known as a Queen, but things changed once she was captured by the former Bright Cross. Instead of seeking independence, Archenemies as a whole began attempting to fit in to human society.

Some say the Queen allowed herself to be caught to influence public opinion among the Archenemies and some say she did it to infiltrate the Bright Cross and analyze the humans’ Archenemy combat technology, but opinions are too mixed to find any concrete details.

The organization is officially said to have broken apart upon the Queen’s capture, but when you gather the witness accounts found in the gaps of history, you can see a large presence there instead of small remnant groups.

Not much is known about how the Vampires of the 13 Eastern European Families separate themselves by rank, but it does not appear to be a simple meritocracy. Based on accounts from those lucky (or unlucky?) enough to encounter these living legends, the word “curse” can be found hidden in almost everything they say.

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