However, the boy ducked down before the blade arrived, dodged the slash, and sent the force of his blow to the other end of his weapon. He sent the handle toward the girl’s torso.
“Ah.”
The high-speed exchange did not even last two full seconds. Mutsuki’s eyes caught up, but only after the girl used the momentum of her charge to jump away from the boy and avoid the scythe handle.
Mutsuki was not even given time to gasp before the exchange accelerated. When Lucia’s fingertips danced like he was waving a conductor’s baton, the pieces of black water scattered across the ground formed hands and assaulted the angel.
“Didn’t you know?”
The battle was over.
“An angel’s body cannot be defiled.”
The liquid demons approaching the girl turned to ash the instant they arrived within a certain area around her.
Lucia’s eyes grew wide because the girl’s body was now surrounded by blue flames so thin they were nearly invisible. The film of fire had created an inviolable barrier around her.
“A Corona!?”
The boy’s shock created a brief opening. In that instant, Ange ran right up to the boy while protected by her burning fire.
She unleashed a full swing of her great sword.
Lucia somehow managed to catch it on his scythe, but his slender body was launched several dozen meters as if a large truck had hit him.
“Dammit… You really are strong.”
Despite his surprise, Lucia placed his feet on a building’s wall to recover. However, he did not immediately make a counterattack. The film of blue fire that had burned the black water had spread as the angel approached and had scorched the boy’s beautiful face.
His constant thin smile vanished for just a moment and his eyebrows twitched, but he soon giggled and the smile returned.
“Okay, looks like I’m poorly matched against an angel.”
He jumped to the building rooftop with smoke still rising from him.
“Heh hehd That’s a lovely eye, Mutsuki-kun. You can violate me more thoroughly later, okay?”
After a parting wink, he turned around and left.
“Wait! …Oh, you! Micha will be here soon, so stay put!”
That was all Ange said before pursuing the boy.
Mutsuki had no idea what to find strange anymore as the red-haired girl brushed aside gravity to jump on top of the six-story building with that mass of metal in hand.
(Should I really have run away?)
Mutsuki hurried home while hiding his right eye.
(She told me to wait for someone named Micha, but I couldn’t stay when people started gathering there. Besides, who knows if I can even trust that Ange girl.)
He made excuses for his inability to do anything but run from that bizarre situation.
But he really did think running away had been the best plan. He felt bad doing this to Ange – who was at least a winged girl who could do a few inhuman things, even if she was not actually an angel – but he wanted to return home at the moment.
(Would a doctor be able to heal my eye?)
With that absentminded thought, he tried his best to think over it all calmly even if he was only feigning calm.
(It started with…that’s right. I got that phone call before the car started to move. A woman spoke to me.)
That had been the beginning of this mysterious event.
She had told him to run away and to survive until Ange arrived.
The caller had known Ange, the girl with the sword. And at the very least, she had not seemed to want to harm him.
That made him wonder if he should not have left when Ange told him to stay, but he did not have the nerve to head back to the station now.
After the call, the Porsche had started to move. What had that been? It had been destroyed before he figured out what it was after, but it had certainly turned his way.
Then that boy named Lucia had arrived.
“…”
Mutsuki brought a hand to his mouth.
He could still feel a lingering hint of that warmth, softness, and sweet pleasure.
That boy had seemed to want to earn his favor and Mutsuki had trouble disliking him.
However, that boy had been the one to do this to his right eye. He had also fought a deadly battle with Ange, who seemed more like an ally, but before that, he had protected Mutsuki from the car monster.
(This is hopeless.)
His thoughts spun round and round in his head and he doubted he could think about anything at the moment.
There had also been that black water and those blue flames. It was all a mystery, but his first priority was visiting an eye doctor. He reached the residential district while holding his right eye again.
“Mutsuki-chan, are you only now getting home? Welcome back.”
“Oh, y-yes. Good evening.”
Given the time, he ran into a lot of neighbors.
He had no idea what would happen if they saw it, so he paid careful attention to his right eye as he pretended to be the polite son of the Fujita family he usually was.
“You’re soaking wet. Did something happen?”
“N-no, I just fell in a pond is all. I’m fine.”
Even if he hid his eye, his clothes were wet and he was covered in ashes, so he naturally gathered attention. Feeling uncomfortable, he picked up his pace toward home.
He had his hands full with his own state, so he failed to notice something else.
“I see. Well, try not to catch cold. …Huh?”
The neighbor who had greeted him was only the first.
“Welcome back, Mutsuki-kun. …Hm?”
“Hi, Mutsuki-oniichan.! …Nn. …Fweh?”
“…!?”
One was a neighbor woman twenty years older than his mother, one was a girl the same age as Mutsumi, and one was a college girl who just so happened to be in the area.
Each of their expressions changed entirely when Mutsuki passed them by.
They more not just surprised by his wet clothes.
They all gave him a look of intense longing.
“I’m home.”
“Took you long enough. Hey, Mutsuki! I called you a thousand times, so I know you turned off your phone!”
As soon as Mutsuki arrived home, his impertinent little sister gave him an angry greeting.
He had never appreciated the voice of a family member or the familiar sight of the house so much. His legs were still weak, so he nearly collapsed to the floor.
“We’re out of ice, so I wanted you to buy some on your way- …What is that?”
He had made it home, but he could not help but lean on the entranceway door. That was when Chiaki walked in wearing her usual rough around-the-house outfit of a camisole and jeans, but she was shocked to find her brother soaking wet and covered in ashes.
“We need ice? I’ll buy some on the way back from the eye doctor. Can you get me a towel for now?”
“S-sure. And the eye doctor? Did you hurt yours?”
His impertinent but kind sister started toward the bathroom, so instead of saying thanks, he gave her a smile while holding his eye.
“…Eek!?”
As soon as he looked at her, a change came over her.
She held her hands to her navel and started to tremble. She fell to her knees and arched her back behind her. Her entire body shook as if electricity was surging out from the base of her legs. That is, her crotch.
“Ah… Ah…? What…is this? What is this!?”
“Chiaki!? What is it? Eh? Wh-what is it!?”
He frantically ran over because something was clearly wrong.
But without knowing what was happening, he had no idea what to do. As he stood there in confusion, his sister’s state only grew worse.
“Kyah… aheh?”
The healthy thighs contained inside her jeans spread on their own.
Beads of sweat visibly covered her entire body. Too much liquid to be sweat darkened her jeans around the base of her thighs.
“Help…me… Mutsuki…onii…chan…”
Chiaki turned her moist, cloudy eyes toward the boy as her shaking grew to convulsions.
Utterly confused, Mutsuki reached a hand toward her slender shoulder.
“~~~!!”