Volume 6 Chapter 5 – Bloody Sunday 2

| Todou Kyosuke

“Ah-heh, ah-heh…”

“Hahaha. Where do you think you’re going?”

My head and body were still out of sync. I wanted to run straight, but I couldn’t. It felt like my limbs were rebelling. I imbued a small stone with just enough magic to avoid detection and threw it at his legs.

“Ugh!”

“…The surveillance cameras are a pain. Blind spots are still blind spots…”

He tripped over his feet and fell awkwardly. Thinking it through, I realized I’d probably been caught on camera quite a bit on my way here. Hah… No wonder people call me muscle-brained. I hadn’t considered it at all.

Well, whatever.

Still, being at Level 1 is so inconvenient. Getting caught on camera? Unbelievable. Sigh… Can’t be helped.

Guess I’ll use healing magic… as a weapon.

“Keys.”

“Ah, y-yes!”

I should have done this from the start.

The “Sincere Punch” had been forbidden ever since that incident with Rozenmarie and Tia Croix.

Back when I was still 19 and brimming with curiosity, I secretly tested a no-magic-stone version of it against monsters. Essentially, I halted the activation of healing magic right before it started and delivered a barehanded punch. A modified “Sincere Punch.”

The effect was phenomenal. The targets went wild, like they were addicted to some drug.

It wasn’t sincere at all. Or maybe it was?

At the time, I quickly switched to a fatal strike to avoid getting caught, and it ended without incident. Since then, I’d sealed the technique away.

I reflected on how overpowered it had been for my level back then.

It wasn’t as effective on the guy just now. Maybe it’s because my rank has dropped. Still, it’s better than using stones. By observing the intensity of the healing magic in their eye color, I could quickly gauge the required strength. Some excess leakage was inevitable, but it was manageable with adjustments.

I’m a craftsman, after all.

Sometimes, bold approaches drive innovation, which eventually becomes a cornerstone of history.

Yeah, it’s all about the hands—manual work.

A craftsman needs to move their hands.

I passed through the wide entryway, went down the hall, and into the living room. Without hesitation, I opened a specific door.

Inside the room, as I’d sensed through detection magic, were two girls.

They were stripped naked, blindfolded, handcuffed, and barely provided with the means to relieve themselves—a grotesque, dehumanizing, and heartbreaking sight.

Without hesitation, I stood before the man responsible and imbued my toe with healing magic. I kicked, shattering both his knees.

“…Was this… your doing?”

“A-aah, y-yes…”

I grabbed the hair of the collapsing man and yanked him upright. For now, I sliced off his left ear using wind magic. Cutting it off outright might have been too much. Maybe I’d use this as practice for partial recovery magic. Or should I not bother? Hmm… Let’s try stopping midway.

“Call everyone involved. Now.”

“A-ack, y-yes!”

An hour passed.

The people in the car were brought in as well.

Each time someone arrived, I used the modified “Sincere Punch.” Another arrival, another punch. Like flipping Reversi pieces to white, I systematically went through them. For now, I severed each person’s left ear, partially healed it, and left half intact. It became a badge of sorts for their group, easy to identify.

“Is this everyone?”

“One person is currently serving time.”

For now, I lopped off the ear of the guy who said that. The alignment felt incomplete without it.

As each one arrived, I delivered the punch, broke their knees, severed the left ear, left half intact, and healed it. That became the routine.

Repetition is key for any craftsman. Through this, I learned to fine-tune the intensity.

…What a hassle.

Should I just kill them all?

No… I need to get used to this. Craftsmanship, craftsmanship.

Those crawling on the floor, unable to move, looked like cockroaches trapped in a roach motel.

Eight of them, in total.

They say where there’s one cockroach, there are a hundred, but… I guess this is today’s limit for the motel.

During the process of gathering them, I learned they had abducted these two girls and kept them here. When they got bored, they swapped them out for new ones.

One of them even admitted matter-of-factly, “We’d trade them out for new ones when we got bored.” So, I promptly sliced off his right ear.

The two girls were in terrible condition, one especially covered in bruises. They’d been blindfolded, so I used strong cleansing and healing magic. While at it, I cast the spells across the entire room as well—it felt wrong not to.

Still, why did I have to clean up the whole room? Frustrated, I sliced off another cockroach’s right ear.

You could call it venting.

On the large glass window overlooking the living room, I had them draw an organizational chart with a thick marker.

This made everything easier to understand.

Here’s the breakdown: this guy was the leader, and the others were divided into execution and recording teams. Their MO was to lure girls in need of money through social media, abduct them when bored, and profit from selling videos. The recording team sometimes scouted far-off targets, which the execution team would then kidnap.

Their methods felt eerily familiar…

The one directing all of this was the last person who arrived.

“Your name?”

“…Satoshi Kuzukawa.”

Hah…

For now, I severed his right ear.

Why? His eyes radiated a crazed, flickering intensity—a clear sign of violence. This persistence… Was it drugs?

Hah… Using drugs outside of combat?

This world is absurdly dystopian.