Chapter 6: Monster Hunters Really Do Exist!

After a search through Kyoya’s room, they returned to Aiko’s and had a seat on her sofa.

“We didn’t learn a whole lot,” Yuichi said. “Have you asked anyone in your household?”

“Yeah,” Aiko said. “No one’s heard from him, and they don’t know where he’s gone. He’s not going to school either, apparently...”

“Isn’t your father worried?” Yuichi asked. “He seemed like a real doting dad. Hasn’t anyone called the police?”

Although they were vampires, they were trying to live normal lives, so calling the police seemed like a natural course of action.

“It seems he put out a request to look for him, but he’s not acting too worried, I guess. He never really gave my brother a lot of attention.”

Yeah, that’s how it goes for sons, Yuichi thought. “So what we do know is that he came back injured one time, and that he likes busty girls.”

“Forget about the busty girls!” Aiko cried.

“We need to figure out where he went... right? You think he has a connection to the group from the abandoned hospital?”

“I don’t think they’re part of our clan. I don’t know everyone in it, but I doubt any of them are street people.”

“You don’t think your brother is drinking blood and making more vampires, do you? If he wants to take over the world like you said, he’d need servants.”

“No way. I don’t think he’d ever go that far, and I’ve never heard of drinking blood making more vampires. I don’t even think we can do that.”

“But right now, we have to assume that they’re connected somehow. Maybe I should have talked to them more...” Yuichi hadn’t given much thought to the vampires in the abandoned hospital incident, but now he was pondering it. “Well, I’m gonna start searching around. Noro, you should wait here at home.”

Yuichi stood up. He had a bad feeling about this.

“Huh? You’re leaving? I can go with you...” Aiko began.

“No,” Yuichi said, voice straining a little. “I feel like the scale of this is a lot bigger than we thought. If we end up in another fight, I don’t know if I can protect you.” He’d let her come with her to the hospital, but that was before he knew that things would had escalated. He didn’t want to knowingly put her in danger.

“Sakaki, this is my problem. I can’t just put it all on you,” Aiko responded, determinedly.

“Okay,” Yuichi consented. “But I don’t think there’s much more we can do by ourselves. Can I bring Mutsuko into this?”

After a moment’s thought, Aiko nodded. “Oh, and before we go, I want to introduce you to my mother.”

“That’s right, I haven’t met her, have I?” Yuichi asked.

Aiko led Yuichi to her mother’s room. Aiko’s mother sat in the glow of the LCD TV, the room’s only source of light. She was hugging her knees and watching the TV intently.

On the screen was a home shopping program, with two women talking cheerfully about combinations of health foods and diet equipment.

“Um, what’s with her?” Yuichi asked hesitantly.

Aiko turned on the light. “Mom, at least turn on the lights.”

“Oh, Ai. What’s wrong? I’m conserving energy! The little things really add up, you know.”

“The best way to conserve energy is to turn off the TV, Mom. Didn’t you know?”

“Oh, but I couldn’t! Who’s that with you, now?”

Aiko’s mother, Mariko, had a face even paler than Aiko’s, with dark circles under her eyes. She seemed like a woman who might have been beautiful if not for the sickly air hanging over her. She was wearing a loose-fitting white dress that resembled a nightgown, which added to her air of slovenliness.

She’s not at all like Noro, Yuichi thought. Now that he thought about it, Aiko wasn’t much like her father, either.

“Yuichi Sakaki,” Aiko said, introducing him. “He’s in my class. I brought him here to help me out with something.”

“A pleasure to meet you,” Yuichi said politely. “I’m Yuichi Sakaki. I owe your daughter a whole lot.”

“My! What’s this now, Ai? You brought home a boy? And a handsome one, at that! Look at me, dressed the way I am...” Despite the appearance of ill health, Aiko’s mother seemed rather high-strung.

“Mom... you’ve ordered even more weird stuff...” Aiko said.

The room was in disorder, in a way that was reminiscent of Mutsuko’s room. This time, though, the clutter was mostly health equipment, clothing, and accessories. There were no windows in this room, either. It was around sunset now, but even if it were noon, it would probably be pitch black without the lights on.

“It is not weird stuff! This EMS uses electricity to strengthen your muscles. It’s perfect for someone nonathletic like me!”

That doesn’t actually work, Yuichi thought, but he bit his tongue. It wasn’t any of his business.

“I just came to introduce him to you. So take it easy, okay, Mom?” Aiko begged. “Sakaki’s going home pretty soon.”

“Oh, really? That reminds me, Ai, have you sucked Sakaki’s blood?”

“Mom! What are you talking about?” Aiko cried, flustered.

“You should mark him while you have the chance,” Aiko’s mother assured her. “And sucking blood can provide benefits—”

“Sakaki, go on without me!” Aiko insisted, sending Yuichi out of the room.

After a while, Aiko joined him outside, her face red for some reason.

“What happened?” Yuichi asked.

“M-Mom said that weird thing! Um, look, forget it!”

Yuichi decided not to pursue the matter any further.

They got back to Yuichi’s house only to find Yoriko standing just inside the front door, scowling.

He assumed it was because he’d brought Aiko with him, but that wasn’t what she ended up berating him for.

“Big Brother, you’re late!” Yoriko shouted.

“Why are you mad at me?” Yuichi asked. He couldn’t see how his being out a little late could have inconvenienced her in any way.

“When you get to our room, you’ll see! And why are you with Noro, anyway?”

“Oh, she had something to ask Mutsuko about, so I brought her along,” Yuichi said. “We stopped by her house, which is why I’m late. Sorry.” He still didn’t know why she was mad at him, but he apologized anyway.

“What?” Yoriko’s expression hardened.

Aiko shrank a bit, uncomfortably.

“Noro, I hope we can talk later,” Yoriko said, her voice monotone despite the gracious words. Then she walked back into the living room.

Confused, Yuichi and Aiko mounted the stairs, then headed for Yuichi’s room.

“Yo!” The first thing Yuichi saw upon entering was Kyoshiro Ibaraki, waving a hand and smiling breezily.

Yuichi stalked up to him, grabbed his arm, and twisted it behind his back.

With the joint locked, he pulled him off his feet and threw him backwards, sending the back of his head into the windowsill with a bang. It was a type of Ura Nage, a reverse throw in judo.

“What are you doing here?!” Yuichi demanded as Ibaraki cowered, rubbing the back of his head.

Ibaraki was blond and blue-eyed, with deeply set features, and the label “Ibaraki-doji” over his head. He looked like a foreigner, but unlike Natsuki, he was a real monster, not just a figurative one. He was a genuine oni, too. A horn appeared on his forehead when he was using his power.

They had traded blows during the whole Natsuki incident, but afterward he’d tried to act like friends, much to Yuichi’s irritation.

“Hey! What kind of way is that to greet a person? You could have killed me!” Ibaraki protested.

“Oh?” Yuichi asked. “I thought you were tough.”

“Unless I’m in oni form, I’m no tougher than a human!”

“Oh, really? That’s too bad. That should have been fatal, then.”

“You’re such a jerk. How can you say stuff like that with a straight face?” Ibaraki demanded.

“Sakaki, that’s going a bit too far...” Aiko said, flabbergasted.

“So what do you want, and why at this hour?” Yuichi asked. It was around 7 PM by now.

“I came to return your gym uniform,” Ibaraki said, pointing to the desk. The gym uniform was lying on it, folded neatly. “Your mom said you’d be back by dinner and I should wait for you upstairs.”

“I told you you didn’t have to return it, didn’t I?” Yuichi asked.

“What was I gonna do with it?” Ibaraki shot back.

“Thrown it out, maybe?” Yuichi asked. “You know, since I said that to avoid ever having to see you again?”

“That hurts. You’re mean. After I came all this way...”

“Yeah, yeah. Thanks a million. Now you’ve done your thing, so leave.”

“We oughta go somewhere and hang out!”

“Didn’t you hear me? I told you to leave!” Yuichi was just about to employ force when he heard footsteps running down the hall.

“Hey, what was that sound? Has the love triangle resulted in a yandere outbreak?!” Mutsuko burst through the door into the room.

“Yo!” Ibaraki said, raising a hand in greeting.

“Huh? Hey, Ibaraki! And Noro, too!” Mutsuko said as she looked around Yuichi’s room.

“He just got here and he’s already yelling at me to leave,” Ibaraki complained. “Talk to him, won’t you?”

“Yu, it’s important to be nice to your friends,” Mutsuko said sternly.

“We’re not friends.”

“Now, time for you to do some explaining! You’re always leaving me to go off with Yori and Noro! And now Ibaraki, too? I can tell you’re sneaking around hiding something from me! What is it?”

“No, actually, we just came here to ask you about that...” As Mutsuko began huffing, Yuichi quickly tried to bring her to grips.

“Oh, really? That’s okay, then!” Mutsuko said, her mood recovering on a dime. “Tell me all about it!”

She sat down in front of the low table. Yuichi and Aiko followed suit.

“Oh, don’t mind about me. I won’t tell anyone.” Ibaraki unwound himself from the windowsill to join them.

“We don’t want you here. Leave,” Yuichi said.

“Now, now, now... I could be useful, y’know? With whatever you’re asking your sister about. It’s gotta be something you can’t handle by yourself, right?”

Yuichi had to concede that, as an oni, Ibaraki might know something about vampires.

“What do you want to do?” he asked Aiko.

“Well, he’s not a normal person, so it should be okay...” she said.

It was true that Ibaraki was hiding his true identity from the world at large, too. It seemed unlikely that he would spread the information around.

“Fine,” Yuichi said. Then he began to explain the situation so far.

Yuichi explained that Aiko was a vampire, that her big brother had middle school syndrome and wanted to conquer the world, that he had seen vampires in the abandoned hospital, and that Noro’s brother was now missing.

“First, let me point out one thing!” Mutsuko proclaimed.

“What is it?” Yuichi asked.

“The Pink Clinic is not abandoned!”

“Huh? But...” He was about to counter, but then he remembered. The lights had been on. You wouldn’t see that in a true abandoned building.

“It’s not a functioning hospital anymore, but someone’s still maintaining it! I never miss a trick when it comes to that stuff!” Mutsuko said proudly.

“Ah, that’s right,” Yuichi said. “You like abandoned buildings, too.”

“That’s right! I don’t go exploring in buildings someone clearly owns! You can’t just barge in just because it looks abandoned!”

“Sakaki... what if those people were the owners of the building?” Aiko asked timidly. “What if we did something bad?”

“I dunno. Even if it was breaking and entering, we had to save the girl, right?” Yuichi didn’t think he’d done anything wrong. “You know anything about vampires?” he asked Ibaraki.

“Vampires... they’re kind of a different niche from us,” Ibaraki said. “I can’t remember them ever obviously intruding on our territory, at least.”

“Yeah,” Yuichi said. “I figured you wouldn’t be useful.”

“Hey, hang on! Oh, I know. Those guys’ve been more activate lately. There might be some connection there.”

“Who are ‘those guys’?” Yuichi said with annoyance. “Quit putting on airs and get to the point already.”

“Listen, you,” Ibaraki shot back, “there’s such a thing as a conversational flow. A cryptic start catches interest and makes it go smoother... but well, whatever. I’m talking about monster hunters. I used to see them here and there, but lately they’ve been pretty active all over town. Makes it hard to sleep at night. I don’t think we’re the ones they’re after, though. Seems there’s something else they want.”

“Monster hunters, huh?” Yuichi thought back to the upperclassman, Rokuhara, who’d attacked Aiko in the school courtyard soon after the first term had started. He’d erected a barrier and created familiars from dirt, and said those were powers the monster hunters had lent him.

“What do you want to do, Noro?” Mutsuko looked at Aiko expectantly.

“Good question,” Aiko said. “I want to bring my missing brother back, and get him to stop all his foolishness.”

“Got it! Leave it to us!” Mutsuko announced.

Mutsuko really was reliable, Yuichi thought. He didn’t yet know what she could do in this situation, but having her around always made him feel like things would work out.

“But I can’t believe you’re a vampire... Hey. What kind of stuff can you do?” Mutsuko asked, her eyes sparkling.

“Um, nothing in particular...” Aiko said apologetically.

“Can you release your Control Art Restriction System? Wield a Marble Phantasm? Oh, what about firing beams from your eyes, or stopping time?! Wait, you’d need a Stand to do that, right?”

“Um, I really don’t know what you’re talking about... I heal a little faster than most people, that’s about it... and I don’t like hearing sutras...”

“Do you suck blood? Have you sucked Yu’s blood? Do you spend your days doing lewd blood stuff? There’s something so erotic about sucking blood! Oh, yeah! It’s an analogy for sex, too!”

“U-Um... I don’t really do that...” Aiko looked down, her face red.

“Huh? Then how are you a vampire?” Mutsuko asked.

“If we don’t drink blood now and then, we get sick. That’s about it.”

“Oh, so it’s like a health drink? That’s nothing compared to what we have to do,” Ibaraki said.

It was true: he had said something earlier about their race’s cannibalism feeling like a karmic punishment. Indeed, this felt tame by comparison.

“I see... that still doesn’t sound very vampiric to me. Why do you think of yourself as a vampire, Noro?” Mutsuko asked, probing closer to the foundation of the idea.

“My parents say we’re vampires, and I’ve never had any reason to doubt them,” Aiko said.

“Sucking blood does seem to be the minimum requirement for a vampire... I guess you do barely clear the bar.”

“Yeah,” Aiko said. “I’ve heard that if we don’t take in any blood at all, we will weaken and eventually die.”

“How much blood do you need?” Mutsuko asked.

“Just a little, once every few months. That keeps most of the major problems away.”

“Hmm... It does all seem a little diluted,” Mutsuko mused. “You said earlier that your only weakness was sutras, right? It feels artificial, like you’re actively restraining yourselves... Are your brother and the rest of your family the same way?”

“Yes... um... there are some people who drink a lot of blood, and they tend to look very young,” Aiko said.

“That’s really not what I expected... Maybe your clan are Dracula-alikes, watered down? Or maybe you’re just classic vampires... It’s tough.” Mutsuko pondered.

“How are Dracula-alikes different from classic vampires?” Yuichi asked, wondering what hairs she was splitting this time.

“Dracula is a vampire who appears in a novel by Bram Stoker, but the folkloric vampires are a bit different from Dracula,” Mutsuko explained. “The differences are important! There are a lot of different types of vampires, after all! In Japan we have blood-sucking yokai like the nure-onna, and Yugoslavia has blood-sucking watermelons, right? And they all have different weaknesses.”

“Um, not sure how I feel about being compared to a watermelon...” Aiko murmured. She didn’t seem to like that at all.

“Well, it’s okay,” Mutsuko said. “Let’s assume for now that Noro’s clan is an extension of Western vampires that the stories are based on. Noro, you’re wondering if your brother is drinking blood to make more of his kind, right?”

Aiko nodded.

From what Aiko had told him, Yuichi had been taking that as a worst case scenario, too.

“The idea of sucking blood to make more of your kind came from ideas about disease,” Mutsuko said. “Well, with yokai and spirits and stuff, a lot of them are based on contemporary events and phenomena.”

“Right, like the Black Death. I’ve heard about the connection between pests and vampires,” Ibaraki said with a bit of pride.

“Hey, did you just throw in that little bit of trivia because you happened to know it?” Yuichi asked suspiciously.

“What if I did?” Ibaraki asked.

“Oh, Ibaraki!” Mutsuko exclaimed. “Recent research suggests that the Black Death that ravaged the Middle Ages wasn’t caused by pests, but was actually a viral strain of Ebola or Marburg hemorrhagic fevers!”

“And Sis, stop using every chance you can to show off your knowledge,” Yuichi said.

“Well, setting that aside,” Mutsuko went on, ignoring him, “we think of vampires as being a type of undead, someone who died and came back to life. You get legends like that anywhere in the world where people bury their dead — legends that if you don’t bury them properly, they’ll come back to life as a monster. So having vampire clans like yours around doesn’t match the standard vampire image.”

“Um... you’re not suggesting... I’m dead, are you?” Aiko asked in fear.

“Hey, don’t worry!” Yuichi gripped Aiko’s hand.

“Huh?” she asked. “Um...”

“It’s warm, see?” Yuichi explained.

She had all the signs of life, Yuichi thought. She definitely wasn’t undead.

“Quit flirting!” Ibaraki yelled.

“Shut up!” Yuichi snapped back.

“Anyway, it’s believed that vampire legends originated from instances of premature burials. People who weren’t dead, but in a death-like state, were put in coffins and buried. Then someone heard something and dug them up and found a person inside, covered in blood and struggling for breath. This death-like state is believed to have a connection to the disease that stiffens the body, known as catalepsy!”

“Enough about that,” Yuichi said. “Let’s get back to Noro’s brother. There was a coffin in his room with blood inside it. What does that mean?”

“Let’s see,” Mutsuko said. “Some stories say that vampires weaken if they can’t sleep in the soil of their homeland. From there arose stories that they absorb the spirit of the earth they sleep on to heal themselves. In that case, we can probably assume he’s just got a lot in common with your generic vampire? If so, he has a lot of limitations... So let’s list some of the common ones! First, their weak points are sunlight, garlic, holy water, holy ash, crosses, white magnolia stakes, and silver bullets. They don’t show up in mirrors, can’t cross running water, and can’t enter a house unless invited. Their powers include super strength, the ability to turn to mist, wolves, and bats, and flight. They can also charm people and suck their blood to enslave them, and stuff.”

“It all sounds like nonsense when you just list them out like that,” Yuichi said. There was no sense of unity to them, and there were too many specific features. He felt like they had to narrow it down.

“Well, that’s because it’s an amalgamation of people’s ideas about a lot of different monsters,” Mutsuko explained. “Silver bullets were originally the weaknesses of werewolves, and holy water and crosses were for the Devil. But over time, they all merged together. It’s like... how fanfic adds stuff to the original canon, then other creators add their ideas to the fanfic, and at some point it all gets treated like the original!”

“Um... Mutsuko, we don’t have any powers or weaknesses like that...” Aiko said apologetically.

“Well, that’s even better, right?” Mutsuko said. “If he doesn’t have any powers, then he can’t conquer the world, can he? But for safety’s sake, let’s assume he does! Let’s assume he can do all that stuff and go from there!”

Yuichi tried to imagine what a vampire with so many abilities would be like. He probably couldn’t beat something like that. Superhuman strength was one thing, but how do you fight something that could turn into mist?

“Anyway, our first step should be going to the hospital where Yu saw the ‘Vampire?’s! That place sounds really fishy to me!” Mutsuko announced, standing up abruptly.

“What, right now? Don’t you think it would be better to go there during the day?” Yuichi protested.

It was July, so it was still rather light out at this time of day, but it would turn dark soon. It didn’t seem smart to go, at night, to a place where they might find vampires.

“It’s been a while since your brother went missing, right? So we can’t afford to waste any time! By the way, Noro, do you get stronger at night or start acting any differently?”

“Huh? I dunno. I think I just get sleepy?” Aiko said, tilting her head.

“Everybody does that,” Yuichi criticized reflexively.

“I know that! I keep telling you, I don’t have any special powers just because I’m a vampire!” Aiko shouted.

In the end, after discussing how day or night seemed to make no difference to Aiko’s brand of vampire, they decided to head out.

They came to the remains of the Pink Clinic, AKA the Mochizuki Gastrointestinal Hospital.

The power, gas, and water were all working, confirming that despite appearances, it wasn’t really abandoned. It just seemed it was presented to look that way.

The door at the front entrance was locked, but Yuichi just picked it again, and they had no trouble getting in.

Right before they went inside, they took out the masks they’d brought and put them on. Yuichi had the skull mask and Aiko the rabbit mask, like before. Mutsuko’s mask was made out of wood, with creepy cavity-like holes in it.

Ibaraki apparently didn’t care if anyone saw him, and just left his face bare.

“Look, since no one else is going to ask, I will. What exactly is that?” Yuichi pointed to Mutsuko’s shoulder.

“This? It’s an ultraviolet light projector!” Mutsuko proclaimed. There were enormous lamps mounted on both her shoulders and something that looked like a battery on her back. “It was this or a log, but I figured this one would be easier to wield!”

“Um... well, never mind. If a vampire appears, I’ll let you handle them.” Yuichi had his doubts as to whether something like that would work, but if Mutsuko thought it would, maybe it would. “And just to be safe, could you keep your voice down? It is night, and someone else might be here.”

“Oh, please. Yu, you worry too much!” Mutsuko said loudly.

“That’s exactly what I mean!” he hissed back.

They opened the door and crept inside. It was dark within.

“That device of yours might come in handy right about now,” he pointed out.

“Oh, no! It’s got, like, no battery life,” Mutsuko said. “I’ve gotta save it for an emergency!”

“It’s useless, then!”

“So, what do we do? It’s too dark to see anything,” Aiko asked nervously.

“Ah. I might have an LED...” Yuichi was about to pull a flashlight out of his pocket when the lights suddenly went on.

Yuichi squinted in the sudden brightness as Aiko hid behind him.

Someone else was there.

Yuichi expected it to be a vampire, or perhaps a delinquent. But he was disappointed.

“Oh, if the front door was open, we could have just gone in there,” a voice muttered from further inside the hospital. “All that work for nothing...”

Footsteps approached.

As his eyes adjusted to the light, Yuichi could make out three silhouettes. The labels above their heads read “Monster Hunter I,” “Monster Hunter II,” and “Monster Hunter III.”

The boy in the center looked so unremarkable, it was remarkable. He was completely without distinguishing features. He was about Yuichi’s height, dressed in an entirely average T-shirt and jeans. To his left was a large man in a white mask. He was about a head taller than the boy, and wore a tank top and half-length pants, which displayed his heavy musculature.

The person to the boy’s right was shorter than him, and wore a white mask and a body-concealing white cloak. The curve beneath the cloak in the chest area suggested this figure was a woman.

“Are you the owners of this place?” Yuichi asked, just to be sure.

“Certainly not. I suspect we’re in the same position you are,” The boy in the center answered without hesitation.

“Hey, who are these guys? Were they setting a trap for us? Are they enemies?” Mutsuko seemed excited by the mysterious group’s sudden arrival. “I bet the kid in the middle is the boss! I think he’s about your age, Yu. He’s got a real ‘mastermind’ quality to him!”

“Sis, could you calm down?” Yuichi asked. “They seem just as confused as we are.”

While he couldn’t see the expressions of the people in masks, and the boy’s expression hadn’t changed, something in his gaze suggested that he found them all very suspicious.

“Okay, okay. Fine.” Mutsuko backed down, reluctantly. She seemed to be abiding by her stance that Yuichi was de facto leader, and she was only helping him.

“We came here for a test of courage. What about you guys?” Yuichi asked, deciding to probe deeper. He didn’t know who these Monster Hunters were, but they seemed like they might be more reasonable than the delinquents.

“Hmm, that’s interesting,” the boy said with a slight smile. “Even oni are doing tests of courage these days? I assumed you’d come here to eat.”

“I know these guys. They’re those monster slayer types,” Ibaraki said venomously.

They seemed to recognize each other.

“Monster slayers!” Mutsuko exclaimed. “Like Iscariot or Ura-koya!”

“Would you please shut up?” Yuichi hushed the still-excited Mutsuko, and turned his gaze back to the three monster hunters.

Monster hunters: those who hunted oni. Yuichi had heard of people like them before, and they weren’t a welcome presence right now. He didn’t care about Ibaraki, but what if they went after Aiko?

“I suppose there’s no point in trying to size you up,” the boy said. “You’re all hiding your faces, anyway. You clearly want to obscure your identities as much as possible.”

“You don’t have to hide yours?” Yuichi asked.

“As you can see, my face is excessively average. No one will ever remember what I look like. Now, let’s introduce ourselves. I’m known as Leader. I hunt monsters as a hobby.”

Yuichi examined the boy known as “Leader.” There was no menace in his posture whatsoever, and he didn’t appear to know martial arts.

“As for the man to my right... Just call him Giant. As you can see, he’s quite strong.”

“Giant, huh? Fine, whatever...” Giant said, sounding miffed. He looked like the strongest of the group to Yuichi.

“The woman to my left... let’s call her Knockers.”

“That’s sexual harassment, Leader,” the woman said.

“How about Sister, then?” Leader answered. “You’re so feminine, after all.”

Yuichi sensed no threat from the girl, either. Giant seemed like he would cause the most trouble.

“And you? If you wouldn’t mind introducing yourselves...” the leader addressed Yuichi and the others breezily.

“As you can see, I’m a fictional martial arts researcher!” Mutsuko exclaimed. She had clearly been trying her best, but it wasn’t in her to keep silent for long.

“As I can see, huh?” Leader asked, looking confused.

“Just think of these things on my shoulders as the Sexy Commando’s rings!” Mutsuko proclaimed.

“Don’t mind her,” Yuichi said. “You said we shouldn’t try sizing each other up, but we didn’t come here for anything special. Like I said, it’s basically a test of courage.” They really hadn’t come for any specific purpose, so it wasn’t even a lie.

“Oh? Ah, well... We came here to kill vampires. But it seems we were too late. The place was deserted.”

“Vampires... You’re sure there were vampires here?” Yuichi asked.

“That interests you, huh?” Leader asked.

“Didn’t I say we came on a test of courage?” Yuichi responded. “Having vampires here makes it all the better.”

“It seems there were some here, but they were all small fry,” the leader shrugged. “We’re looking for the original, the one who made them. Any idea who it might be?”

“Nope.” Aiko’s brother came to Yuichi’s mind immediately, but naturally, he didn’t say that out loud.

“Hmm, you’re being awfully tight-lipped. And after we’ve been so forthcoming. I’ll tell you one more thing: the original is injured. We nearly had him, but he pulled out his second form... No reaction to that, eh? Well, you’re wearing masks, so it’s hard to read your expressions. Ah, well.”

Leader scratched his head, but he didn’t really seem bothered by it.

“Well, it’s all right. I was just thinking we might go back empty-handed when you came right to us. That should be enough for today.” Leader turned to Sister. “You’ve caught on by now, right?”

“Yes. One oni. One vampire, though a rather weak one. Two humans. But one appears to be a Holder.”

Yuichi stiffened at the words. He didn’t care about Ibaraki, but Aiko’s identity had been compromised?

“I see. Then let’s just finish off those two.” The moment Leader spoke, the lights went out.

Yuichi grabbed Aiko and leaped to the side.

“Sis!” He kept moving, dodging multiple objects that came flying at him as he made a mad dash for the sofa.

There was a “shing” noise of something metal springing outwards. Mutsuko had extended her saber and gone on the defensive.

Yuichi knew he didn’t need to worry about Mutsuko in situations like these. She could take care of herself.

“Now, this was unexpected,” Leader commented. “We can’t fight or we’ll hurt the humans, which is against our policy. We’ll have to be going for today.”

“Yu! Don’t let them get away!” Mutsuko shouted.

Yuichi moved instinctively in reaction to her words.

The darkness around them presented no problem to Yuichi. He remembered the entire layout of the room, and could sense coming attacks through sound and air flow. He leaped over the line of sofas after the retreating monster hunters.

“Idiot! We can see you!” Leader shouted.

They had shut off the lights, after all, so they must have expected to fight in the dark.

The man known as Giant launched a straight punch aimed at knocking Yuichi to the ground. Yuichi dodged it and pressed into his personal space.

Furukami!

It was hard to move with much precision in the dark, so his best shot was to use overwhelming strength to keep the battle short. To that end, Yuichi activated his furukami. It was Yuichi’s ace in the hole: the ability to exceed human limits.

Yuichi thrust his palm forward at point blank range, but Giant reacted, raising his left arm in front of his chest to guard. Yuichi had seen that coming, though — that was what the furukami was for.

He unleashed all his power on the blocking elbow. Despite Giant’s well-honed musculature, Yuichi’s fist broke the elbow and shattered his rib. He didn’t bother to confirm that Giant had fallen before he went straight for Leader.

Leader threw something in his hands at him. Maybe he had just been pretending he didn’t know any martial arts. The object sped towards him, but Yuichi dipped down to dodge it.

Leader shot a low kick at Yuichi’s head, but Yuichi met the leg with an elbow and hit back with all his might.

Leader’s leg let out a nasty snap.

As he fell, Yuichi grappled him, brought his hand around behind his back, and forced him to the ground.

“Sis!” Yuichi shouted.

He could tell the woman known as “Sister” was getting away. Not even someone like Yuichi could stop three people at once.

“Ultraviolet Light Device!” Mutsuko shouted. The device on her shoulders emitted a powerful blast of light.

Sister froze for a moment, blinded. Then Mutsuko, who had gotten up close to her at some point, unleashed her taser.

Yuichi tied up the monster hunters. He put their arms behind their backs and bound their thumbs together with zip ties.

After a while, the lights came back on.

Leader was sitting on the floor with his back against the wall. The masked man and woman lay on their sides, unconscious.

The humans, Yuichi and Mutsuko, ended up sitting across from the monster hunters.

Yuichi was feeling the aftereffects of the furukami, but he wasn’t too badly off — he could still fight.

Mutsuko sat beside him with her saber out, ready for action. (More likely, she still hadn’t perfected the sheathing mechanism. Yuichi was afraid she might stab him by accident.)

Aiko was waiting a little ways away, and Ibaraki had gone off to reset the breaker.

“You really got us. I never imagined something like this might happen,” Leader said, dumbfounded.

“Did you really think I would let a mastermind escape?” Mutsuko declared.

“I don’t even know you... Anyway, I can tell you’re someone to watch out for. Are you always like this? Not just when you’re wearing the mask?” Leader asked.

Mutsuko’s way of speaking was certainly unique. Not even a mask could conceal her identity, Yuichi thought.

“And you, too,” Leader said, turning disbelieving eyes to Yuichi. “What are you made of? You don’t look like the kind of person who could break a leg.” Despite his injury, though, he didn’t seem to be suffering that much.

“It was dark. I had to rely on force,” Yuichi said.

“And here I thought our training to act in the dark was perfect,” Leader mused.

Yuichi also had some degree of night vision, but he had been caught off guard by the sudden blackout. He had been forced to move based on his memory of where things were, a monitoring of sound and air currents, and instinct.

“Oh, but this is really outside of the realm of expectation. This shouldn’t have happened to me. Not in such mundane circumstances, anyway,” Leader complained.

“We got to see whose story was more robust, yours or mine. That’s all it is!” Mutsuko proclaimed.

“How much do you know?” Leader asked, narrowing his eyes.

“There’s nothing I don’t know!”

“Don’t lie. There are lots of things you don’t know,” Yuichi interjected to Mutsuko’s insinuation.

“Well, never mind about that,” Leader replied. “See, we’re basically playing superhero. We vanquish the monsters running rampant in this world. We have nothing against humans like you.”

“A likely story, after you attacked us!” Yuichi barked.

“You want to make a trade?” Leader said lightly, disregarding his anger.

“You really think you’re in a position to offer a trade?” Yuichi asked.

“Maybe not, but then what will you do? Kill us? Torture us for information?”

“Leave the torture to me!” Mutsuko’s eyes lit up at the mention of the word.

“Please, Sis, just shut up!” Yuichi sighed. “Fine. What kind of trade?” He had to admit he didn’t know what to do with them after this. Handing them over to the police didn’t feel right, but just releasing them could make trouble, too.

“There are two things we want: that you not try to learn more about us, and that you let us go. In exchange, our organization will keep away from the vampires and the oni. I don’t know why you’re working with non-humans, but it seems like you don’t want us attacking them, right?”

“What guarantee do we have that you’ll keep your end of the bargain?” Yuichi asked.

“You’ll just have to trust us. I don’t think I’m asking for anything out of line, personally,” Leader said.

Yuichi looked at Mutsuko. Mutsuko nodded back, silently.

“Fine. But the vampires are the only ones you need to stay away from. In exchange, I want you to answer some questions.”

“Hey! What about the oni?” Ibaraki, just returning, yelled at Yuichi.

“Not my concern. You can fight the monster hunters forever, for all I care. Now, I want to know about the vampire you were after.”

“Good point,” Leader said. “If we agree to stay away from the vampires, things will keep getting worse. Someone needs to deal with them, so if you’re willing to do it, we’ll leave it to you.”

Leader then proceeded to tell them about the vampire. He sounded an awful lot like Kyoya to Aiko. According to Leader, his group had almost taken him out, but he had gotten away at the last second.

“You said he had a second form?” Yuichi asked.

“Yeah,” Leader said. “Some monsters can transform, and we call the transformation their second form. In his case, he grew wings and flew away. There’s nothing we can do once they’re in the air.”

“Wings?” Yuichi looked at Leader as if expecting him to laugh, but he appeared to be serious.

“We were looking for places the vampire might be lying low, and we had two candidates to choose from,” Leader said. “This was one, but it seems to be empty, so it must be the other one.”

The other place was Seishin High School.