In the fortified villa district, silence pressed heavily against the walls.
"Wow…"
The sound of running water from the shower finally stopped.
Click.
A graceful woman with soft pink-purple hair stepped out of the bathroom, wrapped in a single bath towel. Her flushed skin glistened with lingering droplets, her aura mature yet tense.
But she froze at the door.
Someone was there.
"…Who are you?"
Her voice was calm, but her sharp eyes fixed ahead.
Seated leisurely with a glass of red wine was Yami Tsukishiro. He swirled the glass with a practiced grace, his gaze roaming over her without hesitation, as though savoring every detail.
The elegance, the danger—undeniable.
But he didn't waste words.
"Madam," Yami spoke smoothly, "are you searching for your daughter?"
The mention of her daughter made Takagi Yuriko's pupils shrink.
"What do you mean? Saya is already on her way here."
She had already contacted her daughter. Saya should have been coming safely.
Yami chuckled softly, shaking the red wine as if amused.
"No… she won't be coming."
Just like that—direct, merciless. His words pierced her chest like a blade.
"You—did you kidnap Saya? What is it you want?"
Her voice tightened, but she hid her panic behind the practiced composure of a politician's wife. If this man had kidnapped Saya, then surely this was for ransom, leverage… something she could bargain with.
Clink.
He set the glass down, then pointed casually at her, a mocking smirk playing on his lips.
"What I want… is you."
"...Me?"
Yuriko's gaze flicked down to the bath towel barely clinging to her body. The implication was clear. She thought of Saya's face, then quietly, firmly, she loosened her grip.
The towel slid to the floor.
Her voluptuous figure was revealed, only her hands covering her most private places. Her voice shook, but her eyes did not.
"As long as you let Saya go… you can do whatever you want with me."
Yami blinked.
"…"
He hadn't expected that.
The misunderstanding was his fault—yet she had responded with such decisiveness it caught even him off guard.
Slowly, she stepped forward, closing the distance, her arms dropping to her sides as though offering herself without resistance.
Yami sighed, reaching out his hand. His fingers pinched lightly against the softness of her chest.
"Sorry. It seems I wasn't clear enough."
Her body trembled violently at his touch.
"Your daughter… is no longer in this world."
Yuriko's eyes widened.
"What?! You killed her?!"
She seized his clothes with both hands, desperation breaking her composure.
"No. Not death—literally." Yami's tone was smooth, unhurried. "If you want to find her, then take this."
He left a glowing invitation—an ethereal light sphere—before his body sank into the shadows and vanished as if he had never been there.
"…"
Yuriko stared blankly. A man had just disappeared in front of her eyes.
Illusion? No…
Her gaze lowered to her hand, where a faint red mark burned on her skin—the place where he had pinched her. The red wine spilled across the table was still fresh. Everything screamed reality.
For a long moment she stood frozen, then finally exhaled, her thoughts racing.
Her eyes hardened.
Turning swiftly, she went to her closet. Clothes slipped on one after another, followed by a rifle drawn from its case. Armed, she clenched the sphere of light without hesitation.
The villa burst with golden brilliance, flooding the room and spilling through the windows.
Outside, the sudden glow caught the attention of everyone in the camp. Soldiers broke down the door in alarm—
But Yuriko Takagi was gone.
She had already made her choice.
---
Yami Tsukishiro stood on the villa balcony, eyes narrowing over the survivor district.
Souichirō Takagi.
A man he disliked in every sense.
"…Might as well die."
Not long after—
"Sound the alarm! Defensive barricade collapsed the dead have breached!"
Sirens split the night. Panic spread through the camp as gunfire stuttered and shadows surged.
Waves of the dead rolled over the perimeter like a black tide.
Yami felt no sympathy. His form slipped into darkness and stepped out from Ella's shadow.
She'd already completed the task—she had found Rika Minami.
But the scene was… strange.
This looked like a military base, yet the dead weren't slaughtering indiscriminately.
They were surrounding and pinning the soldiers down, funneling them, suppressing them.
"Master, you're here. This person is Rika Minami."
Ella's face was usually a frozen mask—the sort that could command thousands of corpses to overrun a fortress without blinking.
But the instant Yami appeared, that frost thawed into something sweet and bright, a girl basking in her master's attention.
Across from her, Rika Minami stared, stunned.
Short purple hair, sun-kissed skin, a fitted leather jacket—every line of her said "elite operator," but even she looked rattled.
The contrast was surreal. It felt like this entire base had been attacked just to grab her.
Why? What did they want from her?
"…Hn."
Even Yami paused for a heartbeat. He'd told Ella to find Rika, not stage a full-scale siege with an undead army.
Still—she was his. Scold her, or praise her?
He smiled. "Well done. I'll reward you when we're back."
"Mm!" Ella's eyes lit up.
Yami stepped forward, confirming his target up close. "You're Rika Minami."
Rika's jaw tightened, eyes narrowing, calculating. She'd seen too much tonight—fog that moved like a living thing, corpses obeying a girl's hand, a man walking out of someone's shadow.
"And you're… Marikawa Shizuka's friend," Yami added.
At Shizuka's name, Rika's heartbeat stumbled. Worry cut through her composure. Shizuka—was she safe?
But resistance here was pointless. The undead hemmed the soldiers in, and the two in front of her were beyond anything she'd trained for. She answered, steady but cautious: "…Yes."
"If you want to see her again, take this."
A golden sphere of light hovered before her, humming softly.
Rika stared. The girl who commanded the dead. The man who walked from shadows. The world she knew had slipped its rails.
She reached out, resigned but ready.
The instant her fingers touched the light, she vanished.
"…Five slots used up. Done," Yami murmured, dusting his hands. "Ella, release the dead."
Ella tilted her head, hopeful. "Master, may I… take them instead?"
"Take them? …Fine."
He remembered Ella's gift—anything undead under her control could be stored within her domain. These corpses were weak, yes, but fodder has its uses.
Fog blossomed at Ella's feet and spilled over the base in a breath. When it thinned, every corpse was gone—drawn into her abyss. Ella, too, had disappeared.
Only the soldiers remained, blinking at the sudden emptiness, guns shaking in their hands.
"…Did that really happen?"
They looked to one another, to the silent corridors and the shattered barricades, as if the last few minutes had been a fever dream.
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