Hiromi didn't even have time to process who Takumi and the others actually were. Compared to the three Serpo Aliens behind her, Takumi's group felt downright friendly.
And the moment her eyes met Takumi's, her heart gave a sudden thump; Hiromi's cheeks flushed lightly as she shook her head. "What phone call? I never called."
"Oh? So it was you then…" Takumi shifted his gaze away from Hiromi and locked onto Megumi, who was standing in the corner.
The instant their eyes met, Megumi felt a jolt like electricity—but more than anything, she felt overwhelming joy. He can see me!!!
"Takumi-san, who are you looking at?"
Following the direction of Takumi's gaze, Asia saw nothing but a mottled, peeling wall.
Yukino also nodded along, then suddenly felt a chill. "Don't tell me… it's a ghost?!"
"You're basically a youkai yourself now. What are you afraid of ghosts for?" Takumi flicked Yukino lightly on the forehead and withdrew his gaze.
Over there, still unseen by everyone else, Megumi let out a startled cry. "Takumi-kun?!"
She had never imagined that the exorcist from the flyer would turn out to be Takumi.
"I moonlight as an exorcist… I just didn't expect you to show up like this, Kato-san." Takumi rubbed his temples, digging through his memories.
At last, he unearthed a faint scrap of recollection related to Megumi. Back then, even if he did happen to see her, he would subconsciously ignore her.
If not for the fact that he'd already transcended the level of low-dimensional life-forms, he wouldn't be able to perceive Megumi's existence now either.
"Takumi-san, who are you talking to…? And who are they?!" Asia was completely lost, staring in confusion at the three Serpo Aliens in front of them.
The three Serpo Aliens, meanwhile, were watching Takumi's group with equal seriousness.
"They're using some unknown method to teleport here instantaneously. Does this planet's human civilization really possess such power?"
"Something is wrong. We detected a forcefield barrier just now, but now it's vanished."
"Capture them all and then unravel our questions."
After exchanging a few emotionless lines, the three Serpo Aliens immediately took action.
An invisible shockwave of brainwaves surged forth like a tide, beginning to erode the minds of everyone present, but before that wave could even get close to Takumi, it was snuffed out by the magnetic field surrounding his body.
"Strange. We can't affect their minds with telepathy. Use a more powerful interference method!"
"Six Roots!"
The human skins covering the Serpo Aliens were instantly shredded by telekinetic force, revealing their true forms: long-limbed, grotesque bodies that were downright hideous.
"They look kind of like Dada, that three-faced monster from Ultraman—only uglier and more disgusting."
Takumi complained as he took the full brunt of the joint telekinetic blast from the three Serpo Aliens.
Boom, boom, boom!
The air cracked with a rapid series of explosions; the brutal telekinesis came crashing down from above like a ten-thousand-ton hammer, pulverizing the space where Takumi and the others stood!
Rumble!!!
The entire building shuddered with a deep hum, and the concrete floor at Takumi's feet collapsed under the impact in an instant. Yet when the dust billowed up, Takumi's group was hovering intact in midair.
"We–We're… flying?!" Looking down at herself floating in the air, Hiromi was completely dumbfounded. Her beautiful eyes turned to Takumi, filled with total disbelief.
Standing in the void, Takumi was still calmly evaluating things to himself.
"Not bad—quite a solid telekinetic blast. Different from Momo's style. Plus, thanks to their racial talent, when the three of them combine, the power multiplies several times over."
"Focused into a single point, it's enough to suppress an ordinary High-Class demon, but in front of me, you've got no right to show off!!"
Without moving a single step, Takumi simply exhaled a breath of icy air.
"[Wind-Blown Snow]!"
A razor-sharp, bone-chilling gale roared out, sweeping through the entire ruin in an instant.
Crack, crack, crack!!!
The floor, walls, and ceiling all frosted over at a speed visible to the naked eye, freezing solid in the blink of an eye. In just one single breath, the entire ruin of Naimu General Hospital had become a giant ice sculpture.
In that knife-cold environment, Asia, Hiromi, and Megumi all instinctively drew closer to Takumi. In this bitter cold, the only warmth to be found was near him. Only Yukino was perfectly comfortable in the environment but even she was stunned, her beautiful eyes fixed on Takumi in shock.
"So you're a yuki-onna too?!"
"…I'm not."
"Then what is this? That's clearly yuki-onna power. Don't think I can't tell!"
"…"
Takumi really didn't have a good way to explain that one, so he just pointed at his own obviously-male body.
"Anyway, I'm not. I just happen to possess this power, that's all."
He didn't bother trying to explain further; it was too much of a hassle. Then he walked straight up to the three Serpo Aliens who had been frozen into ice sculptures and lightly tapped one with a fingertip.
Crack—boom!!!
In an instant, the Serpo in front of him shattered into a pile of fragments.
[Ding! Randomly plundered trait: Telekinesis (Blue)]
[Telekinesis (Blue): Your mental power is exceedingly strong and can interfere with physical reality.]
The flying shards were all absorbed into Takumi's body, triggering the effect of [Overeat (Purple)].
As an ultimate life form, he completely ignored any potential toxins in the alien flesh. The only problem was that the gap in life-level between him and the Serpo Aliens was too vast.
As a result, even after eating quite a bit, his aura barely rose at all.
On top of that, when Takumi analyzed the Serpo Aliens' genes, he couldn't extract any useful genetic fragments to copy.
The core reason was that the Serpo Aliens' genes had massive defects. They had already learned to edit their own genes over the course of their evolution.
After all the modifications, their species had only one sex—male—and their population growth depended entirely on cloning technology.
After endless cloning, they lost both emotion and reproductive ability. They had become both "collective" and "individual" at the same time, completely losing the capacity to continue evolving.
So now, they were pinning all their hopes on humans—specifically, on extracting reproductive functions from humans—to break through their current racial bottleneck.
"…The only thing really worth admiring is their science and technology. As for the Serpo ship… it's right over there!"
Using the telekinesis he'd just acquired, Takumi located the Serpo Aliens' spacecraft. The moment he released the telekinetic lock, a massive saucer-shaped craft appeared in the previously empty air.
"U–UFO!?" Hiromi yelped, utterly stunned that there actually was a UFO.
In truth, everything had happened so fast that her brain was still basically hard-crashed. Then her hands moved on reflex; she immediately snapped a couple of photos.
Takumi didn't pay that any mind. He promptly sent the Serpo ship into his spacetime realm.
There was no way the vessel contained all of Serpo technology, of course—but it undeniably held plenty of era-defining tech. If he could excavate and make use of it, it would become yet another card in his hand.
....
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