A deluge of gold strings shot out of her formation and rushed at Pyrovault. The older man jumped backward. He fished a hand into the breast pocket of his trench coat, pulled out a fist-sized black glass vial that shouldn’t have been there, and threw it. It collided with the supernatural strings and burst into flame, burning them all up.
“I see now why they call you Pyrovault,” Archive said. “Is your coat full of those incendiary bottles?”
“Hmm? Wouldn’t you like to know. I could have much more than just bottles in there, couldn’t I?” Pyrovault looked at the anchor he was carrying. “Luck’s on your side today, Vanit Slayer. Have fun exterminating all those monsters!”
He took a vial out of his coat and smashed it on the ground, causing blue flames to erupt upward and envelop his body. When they died down, no trace of him remained.
“Karamori!”
Fujinaka ran up to Karamori, who had collapsed onto the ground. His clothing was stained scarlet.
“I’m okay, Fujinaka… These are just like scratches to us.”
The bodysuit Karamori wore under his clothes shined softly and stopped his bleeding. It was woven from a special material produced by vanit and given to Canaries to help them against the otherworldly opponents they were sent to fight. The thin material was impossibly strong and could do things that would otherwise be unimaginable.
Fujinaka looked at Archive.
“Who the heck was that guy?” she asked.
“A member of Grave Nest, an organization that seeks to collect vanits and profit off their unusual abilities. Once they get wind of a vanit, they will do anything to obtain it. That includes killing people who get in their way.”
“Kill…?!” Fujinaka echoed, shocked by the other girl’s matter-of-fact tone.
“Archive…stop scaring Fujinaka,” Karamori said, slowly sitting up. He was still pale, but his suit had restored his mobility.
“Mr. Karamori, I disposed of most of the Half-wits, but two or three escaped,” she said dispassionately.
Karamori looked at her with confusion. “That’s… Thanks. You did plenty. But why’d you come back? That isn’t like you.”
“It was a gamb—”
But before she could finish the word, Archive began to blur, and she closed her mouth.
“A gamble?” Karamori asked, but Archive remained silent, pain etched on her face. He raised his eyebrows. “Fate not letting you answer?”
Deciding not to press it further, he approached the young man who had been under the investigator’s protection.
“Sorry. All sorts of things started happening at the same time, and it got a bit chaotic. Are you okay?”
“O-okay? Of course I’m not okay! Who the hell are you people?” the young man asked, trembling with fear.
“Think of us as people who work to eliminate monsters like those. You should forget about the old man who got here after us. You said something that caught my attention earlier. About someone named Takeo?”
“Y-yeah. I did. I just know those monsters have something to do with that loser. I’m sure of it!”
“Calm down. First things first, who’s Takeo?”
“He is referring to Takeo Komaki, a second-year student at Shujitsu High,” Archive said casually. “Mr. Komaki is in the art club, and to put it bluntly, he is being bullied by the victims of this case.”
“H-how do you know that?” the young man asked. He looked at Archive with fear in his eyes, but Karamori ignored his question and continued.
“So why do you think Takeo is involved in this case?”
“I—I mean…those things look exactly like the pictures Takeo always draws!”
“…!!”
A shock ran through Karamori, Archive, and the older investigator. Revelation struck them like a bolt of lightning; that single sentence was enough for them to realize they had overlooked one important possibility.
The Half-wit came from a drawing.
A drawing implied an artist and a drawing utensil.
That thought hadn’t occurred to them because they had been so preoccupied by the abnormal nature and ferocity of the Half-wits. They dealt with such strange phenomena in their line of work that a drawing spawning out of nowhere was hardly something to bat an eye at. Still, it would have been a good idea to try to consider the situation from a more logical angle.
“Archive, where does this Takeo live?!” Karamori asked.
“I have located his home. Please follow me,” Archive said, breaking into a run before she finished speaking. Karamori followed her.
That must have been what Pyrovault was talking about. And given what he’d said, the man was likely going to pay Takeo a visit himself—to capture either Takeo or the tool he’d used to draw the Half-wit.
The late-evening sun hid behind a cloud before it dipped below the horizon.
“It’s not my fault… It’s not my fault…”
Takeo Komaki sat on his bed in a dimly lit room with the curtains drawn, his arms around his knees. He was trembling, overwhelmed by his guilt.
A beam of evening sunlight snuck in through a gap in the curtains. It divided the room with an orange line, swaying gently.
“Ah, I see… You’re the oblivious type, eh? Or maybe it’s a special drawing utensil that’s to blame.”
The boy looked up to see a large man in the room.
“Wha—?!” he screamed, jumping up and falling out of his bed.
The man had a wrinkled face and a large, hooked nose. The corners of his lips curled upward like a carnivore eyeing its prey.
“Wh-who are you?”
“Just a friendly old man. Consider me a shoulder to cry on. Ha-ha-ha! You have a problem you want to discuss, don’cha? Say, I dunno, how you conveniently managed to create a monster that’s killing all the people you hate?”
“I-it’s not like that! I had no idea the pen had this kind of power! I just wanted it to teach them a lesson! I even stopped drawing before it was done because I thought I was being stupid! And now that half-finished drawing…it’s…”
The boy held his head and cowered. The man, however, was unforgiving. He grabbed the boy by the neck and slammed him against the wall.
“Gah…!”
“No crying, brat. You’re gonna tell me what you know. Quickly. I don’t have much ti—”
A sharp sound cut through the air, and something flew toward Pyrovault, interrupting him. He let go of the boy and jumped back just before a wooden arm pierced the space where he’d just been standing.
On the wall behind the boy, who was violently wheezing, was the original Half-wit. Other Half-wits had also appeared on the walls and floor.
“Huh. I didn’t know they could do that,” Pyrovault said, keeping his cool.