Asuna blinked, the weight of her own words catching her off guard.
She stared at the grotesque, blood-smeared face mashed against the reinforced glass of the observation window.
The creature wasn’t clawing or banging.
It was just…
waiting.
“So…” she murmured, her voice trembling.
“It isn’t actually trying to break in.
It wants us to open the door and get out of here?”
“Obviously.
Just look at him.” Asagiri raised a hand, casually pointing a finger at the mangled visage as if admiring a painting.
A faint, amused smile tugged at his lips.
“See how anxious the poor guy is?
He’s practically begging to escort us out.
And…”
Asagiri paused, tilting his head to study the gore.
“Judging by the state of his complexion, he definitely isn’t breathing anymore.
Based on the ‘Caregiver’ hint we received, I’d wager this is an Evil Spirit.
Probably the lingering resentment of a staff member who died in this hellhole.
Its desperate attempt to shoo us out only proves your theory.
We had an hour…
well, a little over fifty minutes now.
Once that timer hits zero, something catastrophic is going to happen to this asylum.
Something that ensures nobody ever leaves.”
“An…
Evil Spirit?” Asuna’s face drained of all color.
Her voice fractured into a terrified whisper.
“Are there really ghosts…”
“What’s so shocking about that?” Asagiri replied, his tone utterly nonchalant.
“We were just magically teleported into a rotting asylum.
The existence of ghosts and Evil Spirits is just par for the course at this point.
Hell, we might not even be in our original universe anymore.”
Before Asuna could process the existential dread of dimensional displacement, Asagiri pivoted the conversation.
“But theories are just theories.
There is only one way to verify if our little hypothesis holds water: we open the door and walk out.
If we’re wrong, the guy outside is going to rip our throats out the second the latch clicks.
So, the million-dollar question remains.” He looked at her, his dark eyes glinting with morbid curiosity.
“Who opens the door?
You, or me?”
Asuna swallowed hard, her gaze drifting back to the blood-soaked face in the window.
Cold, suffocating terror gripped her chest.
He was right.
Deductions meant nothing without proof.
If they were wrong, opening that door was a death sentence.
But if the person opening the door was attacked, the one standing behind could slam it shut and survive.
She was terrified.
Every instinct screamed at her to hide, to beg this strange boy to take the risk.
Throughout their entire ordeal, this enigmatic guy calling himself Yoshiaki Hojo had taken the lead.
He had done all the heavy lifting while she merely offered basic observations.
How could she possibly ask him to act as human bait?
Despite the paralyzing fear freezing her veins, her pride and sense of justice refused to let her cower behind another player.
“I…” Asuna took a shaky, deep breath.
Her slender fingers curled into tight fists.
“I’ll open it.
If it attacks me, I’ll do everything I can to shove it back.
You use that chance to lock the door.”
Asagiri didn’t miss a beat.
He immediately stepped aside, clearing a wide path to the exit, and offered a sweeping, exaggerated bow.
“Oh, fantastic.
Lady Asuna’s righteous bravery truly brings a tear to my eye.
I am deeply moved.
As a gentleman, I must insist—ladies first.”
Asuna stared at him, completely dumbfounded.
Yes, she had volunteered, but his instant, shameless acceptance was staggering.
“You are…
a deeply strange person,” Asuna muttered helplessly, dragging her heavy feet toward the exit.
Approaching the threshold, the horrific details of the bloody face became agonizingly clear.
Asuna’s limbs went numb.
Her mind blanked out, consumed by the primal dread radiating from the glass.
In the suffocating silence of the ward, she reached out with a trembling right hand and wrapped her fingers around the rusted doorknob.
She squeezed her eyes shut, bracing for the end.
Just as she applied pressure to turn the metal, a firm hand clamped around her wrist.
“Alright, that’s enough of that,” Asagiri said, his voice dropping its mocking lilt.
Before Asuna could even process the shift, Asagiri smoothly shoved her behind him.
He stepped up to the door, hefting his heavy chainsaw in one hand while grabbing the doorknob with the other.
Without a single ounce of hesitation, he twisted the lock and threw the door wide open, announcing his arrival in a cheerful, singsong voice.
“Chainsaw Man is here~!”
Click.
The heavy door swung outward.
The sight waiting in the corridor made the blood freeze in Asuna’s veins.
Freed from the narrow confines of the observation window, the true scale of the monster was finally laid bare.
It was draped in a tattered, filth-encrusted light blue uniform, soaked through with layers of dried and fresh gore.
A cracked plastic ID badge dangled uselessly from its chest.
But it was the creature’s posture that defied logic.
It had been hunched over at a grotesque, ninety-degree angle just to press its face against the window glass.
As the door opened, the Caregiver slowly began to straighten up.
Joints popped and cracked like snapping timber as the monstrosity rose.
It kept rising until its misshapen head nearly scraped the ceiling of the decrepit corridor.
Asuna’s breath hitched in her throat.
The thing had to be at least three meters tall.
The sheer, suffocating mass of the giant radiated an oppressive aura of death.
Then, in a fraction of a second, the terrifying tension was shattered.
“Excuse me, coming through~”
Asagiri’s tone was impossibly light, as casual as a shopper handling a crowded grocery aisle.
He didn’t even flinch at the three-meter-tall behemoth looming over him.
To Asuna’s absolute disbelief, the towering giant actually took a heavy, lumbering step backward, dutifully clearing the path out of the ward.
Asagiri strolled out into the bloody hallway without a care in the world.
He paused, glancing back over his shoulder at the stunned girl still rooted to the floorboards.
“What are you spacing out for?” he asked, tapping the side of his chainsaw impatiently.
“Time is money.
Dawdling might tank our clear rating and ruin the dungeon rewards.
Hurry up, let’s go.”