On the midnight street, the Slit-Mouthed Woman's sickly pupils reflected dozens of identical, breathtakingly beautiful faces.
Her chaotic mind stalled. When did she ever provoke this bunch of lunatics?
Why were they all coming after her?
However, the inherent rage of being an amalgamation of resentment instantly overwhelmed her.
This world did not allow the existence of so many beings "more beautiful" than her!
These women before her all deserved to die!
"Raaagh—!"
The Slit-Mouthed Woman let out a hoarse roar and locked onto the nearest Sailor Suit Tomie. Driven by resentment, she transformed into a black blur and charged.
But these Tomies were no pushovers either.
"You ugly freak, you're dead today!"
"Kill her!"
"Smash that ugly face to pieces!"
The battle erupted.
The combat power of these individual Tomies might not match the battle-hardened Martial Arts Tomie, but they were entirely unafraid of death and wielded a bizarre assortment of weapons.
The Sailor Suit Tomie charging at the very front was snipped in half at the waist by the giant scissors.
Blood and internal organs splattered all over the Slit-Mouthed Woman.
Just as the Slit-Mouthed Woman grinned, the severed upper half of that Tomie tightly hugged her thigh and opened her mouth to bite into the back of her knee.
*Bang!*
An iron hammer smashed into the side of the Slit-Mouthed Woman's forehead, sending her stumbling.
*Squelch!*
A fire axe chopped into her shoulder blade from behind, wedging itself deep into the bone.
*Vrrrr—!*
The roar of a chainsaw descended from above, slicing straight down toward the crown of her head!
The Slit-Mouthed Woman went completely berserk, frantically swinging her scissors to snip one Tomie after another in half.
But even more Tomies swarmed and submerged her.
Some hugged her waist, some bit her arms, and others relentlessly stabbed her in the back with knives.
It was a completely skill-less mob beating.
A dozen seconds later, the Slit-Mouthed Woman's tall figure was thoroughly dismembered.
Severed limbs and broken arms, mixed with the Tomies' own mangled chunks, littered the street.
Yang Yi stood outside the circle, watching with keen interest.
Was the battle... over?
No.
The chunks belonging to the Slit-Mouthed Woman slowly squirmed as an even more massive surge of resentment skyrocketed. The minced meat and broken bones on the ground were drawn by an invisible force, converging and reassembling toward a central point.
This was the Slit-Mouthed Woman's rule: as long as her resentment remained, she would not die.
"Tch, what a troublesome ugly freak," the Martial Arts Tomie curled her lips in displeasure.
The other Tomies also stopped their assault, watching the scene coldly, ready to dismember her again once she finished reassembling.
However, an accident occurred.
A Tomie wearing a baggy hospital gown was standing to the side, panting.
Just as the Slit-Mouthed Woman's body was halfway through reassembling, her newly reformed head suddenly sprang up from the ground!
It bit straight toward the Hospital Gown Tomie.
"Ah—!"
The Hospital Gown Tomie only had time to let out a scream before the Slit-Mouthed Woman's head clamped its jaws onto her.
"Trash!" the Martial Arts Tomie cursed.
"What an embarrassment!"
"Why don't you just die!"
Dozens of Tomies cast cold glares at the Tomie who had failed to dodge.
"Ah... It hurts! It hurts so much!"
The Hospital Gown Tomie screamed in agony as her body began to undergo a terrifying mutation.
A hideous scar spread upward from the corner of her mouth, tearing all the way to the root of her ear!
She twisted and convulsed, forcibly assimilated into a "Slit-Mouthed Woman"!
But the corruption was mutual.
The skin on the Slit-Mouthed Woman's head clamped onto her actually began to turn pale and smooth. The slit on her mouth vanished, and a tear mole slowly surfaced.
A few seconds later, an entirely new monster stood up.
She had two faces—a Slit-Mouthed Woman's face growing right out of a Tomie's face.
Beauty and ugliness, holiness and horror, achieved a paradoxical unity within her.
The Slit-Mouthed Tomie was born!
"How could there be such an ugly Tomie?" The Martial Arts Tomie rolled her wrists and tightened her grip on her baseball bat.
The other Tomies also raised their weapons again, aiming at the newborn ugly freak.
Right at that moment, an Office Worker Tomie in the distance had a drastic change in expression.
She looked up toward the end of the street, her voice brimming with terror.
"This is bad! Those 'Cleaners' are here! Some Tomies have already been caught!"
"They're coming to catch us! Run!"
As soon as her words fell, the Tomies who had been so vicious a second ago—including the newborn "Slit-Mouthed Tomie"—stiffened abruptly before turning tail and fleeing.
"Run!"
"Damn ugly freak, don't block the way!"
The Martial Arts Tomie reacted the fastest. She grabbed the wrist of Yang Yi, who was still enjoying the show.
"If you don't want to be caught and experimented on, run!"
Her hand was very cold, trembling slightly. Without leaving room for argument, she dragged Yang Yi into a dark, narrow alleyway nearby.
Yang Yi let her pull him along, asking her curiously.
"Who are they?"
"They're a secret organization dedicated to containing 'anomalies'! I think their codename is the CP Gay Foundation or something?" The Martial Arts Tomie sprinted wildly while pulling him. "Me and those ugly freaks from just now all escaped during a 'containment breach' at their base last time!"
Her voice was full of dread.
"That place locks up a massive amount of anomalies. Hachishakusama, Sadako... they're all in there! The Tomies caught by them suffer a miserable fate! They use us to test the lethality of various contained objects, and even actively create different Tomies for cross-infection experiments!"
The alley was deep, and their footsteps echoed in the narrow space.
Just as the Martial Arts Tomie finished speaking, blinding lights flared at the end of the alley.
*Screech—!*
The sound of braking rang out as several pitch-black heavy armored vehicles completely blocked the alley entrance. The searchlights on their roofs locked onto the two of them.
The Martial Arts Tomie's footsteps skidded to a halt, her face turning deathly pale.
"Dammit! How did they get here so fast..."
She let go of Yang Yi's hand and reached back to grip her baseball bat.
"Handsome, they're here to catch me. You go on ahead."
She prepared to fight to the death to create an opening for Yang Yi.
Yang Yi smiled.
He didn't look at the armored vehicles at the alley entrance; instead, he turned his head to look at the Martial Arts Tomie.
"Go?"
Under the Martial Arts Tomie's astonished gaze, Yang Yi grabbed her hand and took a step forward.
In the next instant, the sirens and engine roars all vanished, replaced by a completely different street. The two of them were now over a dozen kilometers away.
The Martial Arts Tomie remained frozen in place, still holding her forward-charging posture.
She whipped her head around. There was absolutely no sign of the "Gay Foundation" behind them.
They escaped just like that?
The Martial Arts Tomie's breath hitched. She slowly turned her head, staring at Yang Yi with a peculiar look.
Could this man have also escaped from the Gay Foundation?
"You mentioned earlier that according to the 'Foundation's' research, this world reveals itself to different degrees depending on the person." Yang Yi spoke up, breaking the silence. "Could it be that this world exists in multiple layers?"
"Yes..." the Martial Arts Tomie replied. "They say this world is like floating on the surface of the sea. Most ordinary people can only see the scenery on the surface for their entire lives, which is the real world. But some people can dive beneath the surface and see the terrifying sights hidden below."
She unconsciously lowered her voice.
"Rumor has it that the deeper you dive, the more terrifying the things you see. Those contained anomalies, and even the ancient gods and demons from mythology, are all entities that have floated up from below."
"Is that so."
Yang Yi's smile deepened.
Could it be information depth?
With a shift of his divine sense, he actively adjusted the "information tier" he was receiving.
Instantly, the world before his eyes underwent a drastic transformation!
The street was still the same street, but the sky was no longer the dark of night. A blanket of blood-red obscured the heavens, and a colossal Blood Buddha, piled high with billions of rotting Buddha heads, was looking down upon the earth with a compassionate gaze.
Coiled atop the tallest skyscraper in the distance was a six-winged angel composed of countless pale eyeballs and shattered wings, its body impaled by numerous broken flaming swords.
Further away in the city's bay, a terrifying Godzilla stitched together from various severed demon limbs continuously let out mournful, bloodcurdling roars.
The entire world was densely packed with horrifying monsters invisible to mortals. They rarely interacted with one another, merely co-parasitizing beneath the "surface layer" of this city.
Yang Yi revealed an incredibly radiant smile.
This world was truly too chaotic, and far too fun.
With the crisis averted, the Martial Arts Tomie's tense body finally relaxed. She looked at Yang Yi's flawless side profile and the intoxicating smile on his face.
She couldn't help but stick out the tip of her tongue, gently licking her lips as she shot Yang Yi a flirtatious wink.
"Handsome~"
"I'm homeless right now. Could you take me in for the night?"