Volume 1, Chapter 9: Jinxes Aren't Usually This Accurate
1:17 a.m.
Shuichi sat at his computer, staring at the screen; he'd been at it for nearly twenty minutes.
He hadn't turned on the light. The only glow in the room came from the cold white of the monitor, lighting up the empty drink cans piled on the corner of the desk and half of his listless face.
Now and then a car passed outside the window, and the AC unit hummed low; beyond that, the whole apartment was so quiet the only sound was the occasional soft tick of the mouse wheel.
There were even fewer files on the hard drive he could open than he remembered.
Many of them hadn't been complete copies to begin with, and after several years another chunk of the data had corrupted, so what was left was scattered bits and pieces, like a book with most of its pages torn out.
Shuichi went through two folders and finally stopped on a calamity beast classification record from twelve years ago.
【Swarm-Type Calamity Beast Observation Report】
【Provisional classification: Mother Hive-type】
He had been leaning back in his chair; now he sat up a little straighter.
"So there really is one."
The file opened.
There wasn't much text inside; most of it was images.
The first looked like a wolf.
The second was a six-legged insect.
The third was a round lump of flesh covered in tentacles.
Their outward appearances were completely different.
But once the dissection photos were put side by side, you could clearly see that the dark-red tissue inside their bodies had nearly identical patterns; even the arrangement of their nerve bundles was almost the same.
Shuichi scrolled down.
【A single mother can produce spawn with different functions as needed.】
【Types confirmed at present include: predation, reconnaissance, parasitism, defense, transport.】
【All spawn are capable of independent activity, but a suspected information feedback phenomenon exists.】
【Some spawn actively destroy their own core structures before death.】
Farther down.
【The mother is usually located no farther from the spawn's area of activity than—】
The rest was corrupted.
Shuichi stared at the block of garbled text for two seconds.
"Picked the perfect spot to break, didn't it."
He clicked the mouse a couple of times.
No miracle happened.
Still garbled.
But it was enough.
At least the speculation in that Girl Hero Observatory thread wasn't far off.
The calamity beasts that had appeared over the past few days really might come from the same mother.
Shuichi grabbed his phone and opened a map.
Day one, Xin'an Commercial Street.
Day two, Jiangbin Road.
The parasite had appeared at the parking lot by the old river embankment.
Then Changze North Road.
Today, Xincheng Station.
After roughly connecting the locations, the area wasn't as large as he'd imagined.
Basically all within Linjiang City's East District.
And the apartment where they lived—
Was inside it too.
Shuichi looked at it for a few seconds.
Closed the map.
"..."
So why did it have to be here, of all places?
Move out?
The thought had barely come up before he rejected it himself.
One month's deposit, three months' rent up front.
This month's rent had just been paid.
Moving out would mean cleaning the place.
Too much trouble.
Forget it.
He went back to the files.
Mother Hive-type calamity beasts weren't especially rare; at the very least, the Organization had dealt with more than one in the past, though the vast majority of mothers didn't have strong head-on combat abilities. What made them truly troublesome was the number of spawn, and how hard it was to find the hidden main body right away.
But this one seemed a little different.
If those few really were things made by the same mother, then it was producing spawn much too quickly, and none of them were weak.
Especially today's.
Without Yusei's empowerment, Mio would most likely have been fighting it for a long time.
At that thought, Shuichi suddenly stopped.
Yusei.
King.
And a Mother Hive that had suddenly become abnormally active over the past few days.
It was probably just a coincidence.
It had better be.
He kept scrolling, and soon found another entry.
【Some highly mature mothers exhibit active adjustment of spawn structure targeted at prey.】
【It is speculated that they can recover combat information through dead spawn.】
Shuichi's hand stopped on the mouse.
A few seconds later.
He softly clicked his tongue.
That one wasn't so good.
If it was true, then every time Mio fought one of these, that thing might learn a little more about her.
Day one, her lance technique.
Day two, her energy shield.
Day three, her physical enhancement.
Today, there had even been the new Kingship-boosted state.
Of course, he might be overthinking it.
In the records, "some" didn't mean "all."
Things didn't line up that neatly in the real world.
Shuichi closed the file.
The screen went back to the desktop.
Then he noticed it was already 1:52 in the bottom-right corner.
"..."
He had work at nine tomorrow, so he'd have to get up at eight-thirty.
If he didn't go to sleep now, he really would be late.
He unplugged the hard drive and shoved it back into the deepest corner of the drawer. As he got up, he picked up the half-finished pudding on the desk, looked at it, and in the end didn't touch it.
Too sweet.
He'd give it to Yusei tomorrow.
That reminded him of what Mio had said earlier—
The plain one, second row on the left.
Shuichi stood still for two seconds.
Then put the pudding in the fridge.
Bed.
***
8:26 the next morning.
Shuichi was woken by a phone call.
The ringtone went on for ages before he finally found the phone under his blanket.
"Hello."
"Where are you?"
Yusei.
Shuichi kept his eyes closed.
"In bed."
The other end was silent for a second.
"What time's your shift?"
"Nine."
"What time is it now?"
"No idea."
"Eight twenty-six."
"Still early."
"The fastest you've ever made it from getting up to the supermarket is forty-five minutes."
Shuichi opened his eyes.
"That's because I showered."
"You're not showering today?"
"Not showering."
"..."
Yusei seemed to choke on that.
"Come downstairs in ten minutes."
"Why?"
"I'm downstairs."
"Why are you downstairs again?"
"Because I knew you wouldn't get up!"
The call ended.
Shuichi lay in bed looking at the ceiling.
A few seconds later he closed his eyes again.
Five seconds.
Ten seconds.
He shot upright.
"Pain in the ass."
8:38.
Shuichi went downstairs with a head of messy hair.
Yusei was waiting at the apartment entrance.
They both had shifts today, so he'd already changed into his supermarket uniform, and he was holding a paper bag from the convenience store.
When he saw Shuichi come down, Yusei tossed the paper bag over first.
"Take it."
Shuichi caught it.
Inside were a rice ball and soy milk.
He glanced down at it.
"Where are the eggs?"
Yusei turned and walked off.
"Eat it or don't."
"There were eggs yesterday."
"Yesterday was yesterday."
Shuichi thought that line sounded familiar.
He seemed to have said it himself.
Sure enough, some things shouldn't be said carelessly.
The two of them walked toward the supermarket.
There were already plenty of people heading to work and school; morning rush-hour traffic was jammed at the intersections, long lines stretched in front of the bus stops, and the city had gone completely back to normal, as if that seven-meter calamity beast had never smashed an entire street to pieces a kilometer away yesterday.
Yusei kept flexing his fingers the whole way.
Shuichi watched for a while.
"What are you doing?"
"Controlling my strength."
"Still not used to it?"
"Like it's that quick."
Yusei raised his right hand helplessly. "This morning I nearly ripped off my doorknob again, and now even picking up a cup, I have to think first about how much force to use."
"Nice."
"How is that nice?"
"I can hire you when I move."
"Clean up your own place first."
"Not moving."
"Why not?"
"The deposit."
Yusei looked at him for two seconds.
"You actually thought about moving last night?"
Shuichi's step faltered almost imperceptibly.
"Just a passing thought."
"Why'd you suddenly want to move?"
"The upstairs neighbors are too loud at night."
Yusei glanced up.
"Isn't the unit upstairs empty?"
"..."
Shuichi bit into his rice ball.
"Which is why it's been pretty quiet lately."
Yusei couldn't shake the feeling something was off.
But before he could press further, a familiar voice came from up ahead.
"Morning."
Asakawa Mio walked over from the side of the road.
Today her hair was in a low ponytail, and she wore a light-colored blouse and navy slacks with her supermarket uniform on top. Since there was no fighting to be done, that overly sharp heroic air had faded quite a bit, and she looked like a perfectly ordinary young shop clerk.
Only, she was carrying three paper bags.
One for herself.
One she handed to Yusei.
The last one she handed to Shuichi.
Shuichi looked down.
"What's this?"
"Breakfast."
Yusei immediately turned his head.
"Why does he get one too?"
Mio glanced at him.
"You treated me to dinner yesterday."
"Then just give one to me."
"He ate too."
"..."
Yusei found the logic entirely sound.
It just felt a little strange to him.
Shuichi didn't stand on ceremony and simply took it.
He opened it.
A plain pudding.
His hands paused.
Mio was already walking ahead.
"Didn't you say the one yesterday was too sweet?"
Shuichi looked up.
"You bought it specially?"
Mio didn't look back.
"Picked it up at the convenience store on the way."
"Oh."
Yusei glanced at the pudding in Shuichi's hand.
Then at his own.
A rice ball.
He fell deep into thought.
"Why isn't mine a pudding?"
Mio finally looked back.
"You never said you liked them."
"Then I'm saying it now."
"Too late."
Shuichi put the pudding in the bag.
The corners of his mouth wanted to curl up a little.
Yusei happened to see.
"What are you smiling about?"
"Nothing."
"That's the second time today."
"You're keeping pretty good count."
"..."
Mio, walking in front, smiled faintly too.
And so the three of them walked into the supermarket.
***
Morning foot traffic wasn't heavy.
Tanaka Makoto had probably heard about what happened at Xincheng Station yesterday, because the moment he saw Yusei, he looked him up and down.
"You went to the scene again yesterday, didn't you?"
Yusei blinked.
"How'd you know?"
Tanaka Makoto took out his phone.
The Girl Hero Observatory.
The page was on the thread discussing the "mysterious strongman."
The blurry screenshot at the top didn't show a clear face, but Tanaka Makoto recognized the clothes.
"This is you, right?"
Yusei: "..."
Shuichi was restocking nearby.
He couldn't help glancing up.
Mio stood behind the register, pretending not to hear.
Yusei hesitated for a long moment.
"Kind of looks like me."
Tanaka Makoto's eyes went wide.
"What do you mean, kind of?"
"It's a bad photo."
"You can't recognize your own back?"
"Lots of people look alike."
"You wore that exact jacket last week!"
Yusei went quiet.
Tanaka Makoto lowered his voice.
"Is something wrong with your head?"
"There were people inside."
"I know there were people!"
"I couldn't just leave them."
"The police were there."
"The door wouldn't open."
"So you pried it open with your bare hands?!"
Yusei didn't know how to explain his strength.
He could only keep his mouth shut.
Tanaka Makoto pointed at him for a long time.
In the end, no chewing-out came out of him at all.
"...Next time, at least cover your face."
Yusei looked up.
"Huh?"
"Don't 'huh' me."
Tanaka Makoto waved a hand irritably. "People these days are all kinds of crazy. If the internet actually digs you up and people start camping outside the supermarket every day, are you going to take responsibility?"
"Oh."
"And one more thing. Saving people is fine, but don't go thinking you're actually bulletproof."
With that, Tanaka Makoto walked off.
Yusei stood there.
It was a while before he spoke quietly.
"I thought he was going to chew me out."
Shuichi set down the last bag of bread.
"He already did."
"I guess so."
Mio glanced over from the register.
She didn't say anything.
But her expression had visibly eased.
Shuichi noticed.
It seemed she really had been worried Tanaka Makoto would keep digging.
Just then, a young customer walked past the shelves holding his phone.
His screen happened to be on the Girl Hero Observatory too.
The sound wasn't off.
"Holy shit, Blue Lance is sixth now."
His friend beside him leaned in.
"Wasn't she seventh yesterday?"
"Just updated."
"She's been showing up way too often lately."
"The new battle attire's a plus too. Look at the vote right now, she's already shot up to twelfth on the combat suit ranking."
Behind the register.
Mio's face was blank.
Shuichi turned his head and glanced at her.
Her ears weren't red.
Big improvement.
The two customers weren't finished.
"I still like the legs."
"All you care about is legs."
"And you don't look?"
"I look at the waist."
"..."
Mio lowered her head and tidied the register.
Her hands moved noticeably faster.
Yusei had heard too.
He was just about to laugh.
Mio looked up.
Their eyes met.
Yusei silently swallowed the laugh.
Shuichi was in a great mood.
Watching this kind of thing from the sidelines really was entertaining.
At lunch break, a new thread showed up on the Girl Hero Observatory.
This time it wasn't about Blue Lance.
It was yesterday's calamity beast correlation analysis thread, bumped up to the front page.
The title had changed too.
【Consecutive East District Calamity Beast Incidents Share a Single Source? Full Compilation of All Five Locations】
The original poster had marked every calamity beast appearance from the past few days on a map.
They'd even deduced the parasite from yesterday.
Of course, they didn't know what had happened in the parking lot; someone had simply spotted Blue Lance briefly appearing in that area on nearby surveillance footage, so they'd marked it too as a "suspected battle site."
Five locations.
Forming an irregular circle on the map.
The instant Shuichi saw it, his chopsticks stopped.
Something wasn't right.
He'd drawn it himself last night.
But he'd only connected the dots roughly.
Once this poster added in the locations where each calamity beast had first been sighted, the pattern became obvious.
They weren't moving around a certain place.
They were spreading outward.
The earliest, Xin'an Commercial Street, was closest to the center.
After that they got farther and farther away.
As if something were hiding there, releasing different spawn over a wider and wider area.
Yusei leaned over.
"What are you looking at?"
Shuichi immediately scrolled down.
"A website."
"I know it's a website."
Yusei simply dragged a chair over.
Mio heard too.
The three of them looked together.
Below the post, people were already guessing.
【If it's really a Mother Hive-type, shouldn't we be able to work backward to the center?】
【I tried. The margin of error's kind of big, but it's roughly on the south side of Old Town.】
【Isn't that place basically all demolished?】
【The underground drainage system there is super complicated.】
【Don't tell me there's actually a big one hiding underground?】
Yusei looked for a while.
"What's a Mother Hive-type?"
Mio answered.
"A type that makes other calamity beasts."
Shuichi glanced at her.
"You know about it?"
"I've seen the files."
Mio frowned. "But I've never fought one myself, and Mother Hive-types don't usually produce this many high-strength spawn in a row."
"So the netizens guessed wrong?"
"Not necessarily."
She took the phone and zoomed in on the map.
"If these really came from the same mother, then the last few attacks might not have been random at all."
Yusei asked.
"It's looking for something?"
Mio shook her head.
"I don't know."
Shuichi lowered his head and ate.
He didn't cut in.
Because he didn't know either.
He hadn't seen that part of the records last night.
And rather than "looking for something," there was another possibility.
It was just testing.
Testing what in this city would come out to stop it.
Testing Mio.
Maybe even testing the King who had suddenly appeared.
Shuichi's chewing slowed.
If that was really the case.
Then the next thing to come out probably wouldn't just be some spawn it had casually churned out.
"Shuichi."
Mio suddenly called him.
He looked up.
"What?"
"What do you think?"
"About what?"
"This thread."
Shuichi glanced at the screen.
"Me?"
"Didn't you look at it for a long time yesterday too?"
"..."
This woman's memory was way too good.
Shuichi thought about it.
"I think netizens have a lot of free time."
Mio: "..."
"That's it?"
"Mm."
Yusei nodded.
"That definitely sounds like something he'd say."
Mio didn't ask anything more.
She accepted it quite naturally.
Shuichi lowered his head and kept eating.
He relaxed a little inside.
Good.
Got away with it.
***
3:12 p.m.
The supermarket stockroom.
Shuichi was crouched on the floor alone, sorting a shipment of drinks that had just arrived.
There was no air conditioning in here, just an old fan in the corner that kept turning its head back and forth, and even the air it blew was hot. The stockroom door was half open; the beeps of barcode scanners and the voices of customers drifted in now and then from outside, and everything was normal to the point of being a little boring.
Shuichi pushed the last case of drinks under the shelf.
He stood up.
His vision suddenly went black for an instant.
"..."
He grabbed the rack beside him.
He didn't fall.
The dizziness only lasted two or three seconds.
It cleared quickly.
Shuichi stood there for a while.
He looked down at his hands.
A thin layer of sweat had broken out on his palms.
It seemed to be happening more and more often lately.
He put his hand into his pocket.
No pills.
He'd forgotten them when he changed pants last night.
Forget it.
It wasn't like it was guaranteed to hurt.
Shuichi picked up the cardboard box to head out.
Then there was a very faint tremor through the stockroom floor.
THUD.
Shuichi stopped.
The noises outside were still normal.
Nobody had noticed.
He didn't move.
Three seconds later.
THUD.
Another one.
Very faint.
As if something very far away and very large had slowly bumped against something underground.
Shuichi slowly lowered his head.
There was nothing on the concrete floor.
The fan was still turning.
The drink cases weren't even rattling.
An ordinary person would probably just think a truck had driven by.
But Shuichi knew better.
Because before the third tremor came, he had already sensed that familiar presence.
Not a single one.
Too big.
So big it wasn't even on the same level as those earlier things.
THUD—
This one was much clearer.
A bottle of water on the top shelf wobbled slightly.
Shuichi closed his eyes.
A few seconds later he opened them.
"..."
Jinxed.
They'd actually called it.
Just then.
The phone in his pocket started buzzing like crazy.
At the same time, a chorus of alert tones went off throughout the supermarket outside.
A city disaster warning.
Shuichi took out his phone.
There was only one line on the screen.
【WARNING: Large-scale abnormal reading detected underground in East District.】
A second one followed immediately.
【The abnormal area is rapidly expanding.】
The third popped up almost at the same time.
【All residents, proceed to the nearest shelter facility immediately.】
Shuichi looked at the screen.
Another tremor came from under the stockroom floor.
Something had woken up.