A Third-Rate Villain, Subdued
Starlight left, and I wasn't far behind her in leaving the bookstore.
Thirty-seven books in all, and about thirty-four of them were titles she had recommended. I bagged only the three or so I meant to start right away and walked out.
"Thanks to you, I found a lot of books that look like fun."
The ones she'd recommended really were quite good.
These days, even meeting an S-Rank hero doesn't stir much of anything...
Maybe it was because I'd already met an S-Rank villain and the protagonist. Even face to face with Starlight, an S-Rank hero, I felt nothing in particular.
"Still, I ought to be careful."
We had ended up exchanging contact information, somehow.
"Did you get a decent shot?"
"No... it was too fast. Came out blurry."
"But where'd they say a villain showed up?"
The moment I stepped outside, the murmur of a crowd reached me.
No wonder she got scolded. A villain must have turned up.
They seemed to be talking about Starlight. I listened to the restless voices as I headed for the clothing store next door.
A shop under the brand name Cloud. The place was fairly large.
"Welcome."
The employee offered the bright, practiced greeting of the service trade. I nodded back and looked around the floor.
I'll just grab something I can actually wear.
There was no grand reason I'd come. Nearly everything in my closet that fit this body was the clothing of a little girl — skirts, blouses, dresses, all of it light and fluttering.
I can't wear that...
No matter how used I'd grown to this body, clothes like those were out of the question. It wasn't even that I disliked them so much as that I refused them on instinct.
"This'll do."
Once something looked like it would fit, I bought it. I wasn't planning to go out often anyway, and I meant to live while staying as far from incidents as I could.
Is it already too late...?
No. It wasn't. Not yet. For now, I was fine.
Ten outfits, chosen that way. Any more and I wouldn't be able to haul them home, so I stopped there.
I can always buy more later.
Five tops, two bottoms. Together with what I already owned, that was enough to rotate through.
"Thank you."
I bid the employee goodbye and left the shop.
Books and clothes both... this is pretty heavy.
Not so bad that I was groaning and dragging them, but my arms were locked tight with the strain. At this rate, was I going to grow muscles?
"...It's gotten late."
I'd spent more time in the bookstore than I'd meant to. The sun was already thinking about going down.
Four o'clock isn't exactly late, but...
Staying outside when you never knew what might happen, or when, was not a good idea.
Rustle—
The two paper bags in my hands knocked together.
"Can I even carry these all the way...?"
I could manage for now, but all the way home? I should have had every book delivered. Grabbing a few to read today had been a mistake.
Heavy clothes in one hand, heavy books in the other, I started back toward the bus stop.
"Shouldn't somebody stop that?"
"Somebody call the police...!"
People were clustered along the street I meant to take.
...What's going on?
A crowd like that — something had happened.
"No. Let's not get involved."
I had no reason to tangle myself in another incident. Why invite the exhaustion?
So I walked on past, whether they murmured or not.
"Fuck! Who the hell are you now?! Get lost! You here to watch a show?!"
"U-uwaaah...!"
No — I tried to walk on. If only I hadn't heard the child.
That wretched little voice turned my head before I could stop it.
"All of you, get lost! If you don't want to see this brat die, then get lost!!"
"Waaah! Dad...!"
A man lay facedown, stabbed. A woman with burn scars across her face clutched a boy against her, an arm warped into a blade pressed to his throat.
"Shut up, fuck! My head already hurts!"
She was not in her right mind. She staggered with the blade out, eyes half rolled back.
So there are junkies in this world, too.
Her face was twisted into a terrible grimace, as if she were screaming through unbearable pain.
"Get lost, all of you...! You want to die too?!"
She swung her arm in wild arcs, hysterical, spitting rage.
...Is there really no one who can help?
There were people calling the police, calling for a hero.
"Calm down! Please, put the child down!"
"Calm? Fuck! I said move!!!"
"Hhh... haa... hah...!"
Someone even tried to talk her down. It only provoked her, and her arm cinched tighter around the boy's neck.
"Isn't there anyone who can stop her? A hero trainee, somebody — there has to be someone!"
"Then why don't you stop her!"
"I—I'm weak! All I can do is light a fire at my fingertips!"
Someone begged the crowd for help. But not one person there had the strength to save the child.
...Again.
The noise of people. A child in someone's grip. No one stepping in. That same infuriating moment I had felt a long time ago.
Don't... get involved.
It wasn't like back then, when someone precious — my little sibling — had been taken. This was only a stranger's business, passing by.
This was a world with heroes in it. Not a world where a child died simply because I failed to move.
"P-please save me... hhk, haa...!"
If I stepped in, and an Association user of psychometry — someone who could read the memories of a place — came to investigate, they would learn about my ability. Last time I'd been lucky enough not to be found out. This time would be different.
...Even weakened, my ability is still Severance.
The world had plenty of identical powers, but one like mine was hardly common. Even the Association had no one who held an ability like Severance.
A power with no form, one that could reach out and interfere with someone else, was rare to begin with. Even telekinesis, the first thing anyone pictured at the word superpower, was vanishingly rare in this world. I might not be caught on the spot, but I could certainly draw suspicion — the suspicion of the protagonist, who was capable of killing me. So absolutely—
"Ha, you fucking—!! I said shut up!"
"S-somebody stop her, quick! She's going to kill the kid—"
The woman, snarling through her headache, swung that sharpened arm to kill the child.
Shhk-shhk!
"...U-uwaaak!! Fuck!!!"
"Wh-what!"
Blood fountained from her right arm.
"Wh-which bastard was that!!"
She screamed, wild with rage — and then,
Spurt—!
A thin line scored itself across her throat, and blood welled.
"K-keok...!"
"Q-quick, get the kid first!"
"Somebody grab him!"
While the woman clutched her neck in a panic, trying to stanch the bleeding, one of the onlookers snatched the crying child free.
Whee-oo— whee-oo—!
And in the same moment the child was pulled clear, a siren rose.
"Police! Right now......?"
The officers couldn't finish. Whether it was because the scene had already been settled, or because the culprit was already down, I couldn't say. I had left with the two heavy paper bags in my hands, and their faces were already out of sight.
"...Haah. Am I an idiot? Or just too stubborn to look away?"
I let out a long breath and made for the bus stop.
On the roof of the clothing store Yuhwa had just left—
"Hmm. So it was no misapprehension of this one, after all."
Alice sat there and watched Yuhwa go.
For a month she had kept in touch with Yuhwa only through messages, and all the while she had been following her.
Not every moment, of course.
She was still a member of the Villain Alliance, walking a thin line between curiosity and the comfort of an easy life.
"Within the Villain Alliance, one feels no thirst for blood."
But her true thirst was a curiosity sharper than blood.
How curious. She feels as though she is hiding something.
They said an executive of the Villain Alliance had died in a single instant, body hacked to pieces, without even managing to resist. And yet from Yuhwa, now walking quickly toward the bus stop, she could feel no power of that order.
"Well... coming to understand it shall be amusement enough."
She watched Yuhwa board the bus, then rose.
"And so... nothing must be allowed to interfere with my entertainment."
Blood gathered at her back, and a host of bats took shape.
At Alice's command, the bats streamed toward the street where the police were putting the scene in order.
"Wh-what is that!"
"Barrier! Yongwon! Barrier!!"
The officers tried to hold the swarm back, but the bats were not aiming for them.
Boom—! Splash—!
"Scattered thus, no memory shall be readable."
Blood lay strewn across the ground. It was there for one purpose alone: to foul the working of psychometry.
"...The meddlers have been dealt with. Now I ought to consider how best to enjoy my amusement."
Beneath the blaze of day, the silver-haired vampire hid herself in the brightness and slipped away at her leisure.