"Let me repeat what you just told me — in case I misheard something."
President Funny Valentine sat in the stationary train car, looking down from his elevated position at the battered Native American man who had limped back to him:
"Mike O. was kicked to death by the cripple. That's what you said, isn't it?"
Sandman pressed a hand over his wounds and gave a small nod.
"..." Valentine lifted his coffee with a pinky, then set it back on the saucer without a sound.
He didn't pursue the subject. Half to himself, he murmured: "How many Holy Corpse Parts have surfaced so far?"
The ones taken from Diego. Gyro Zeppeli's left and right eyes. Johnny Joestar's left hand. One that had vanished in the downpour, location unknown. His own heart. And the torso — he'd already sent someone to find it.
By that count, it was nearly complete.
"You may rest." Valentine rose.
Sandman lifted his head. "My people's land—"
Valentine glanced at him. "Our agreement was 'seize the Holy Corpse Parts,' wasn't it? Or do the Native people not have a firm grasp of what agreement means?"
"..."
That said — Johnny Joestar was impossible to defeat in direct combat, and the man's injuries made it impossible to continue the race on foot regardless.
"Come here." Valentine beckoned.
The moment Sandman was within reach, Valentine grabbed the tablecloth and threw it over him — even with some warning, the wounds slowed him just enough. It landed perfectly.
The tablecloth went flat immediately, as if the Sandman beneath it had simply ceased to exist in this world.
...
"Did you see that, Gyro?! That flying kick — tell me it wasn't incredible!" Johnny spun toward his companion, barely containing himself.
Gyro: "..."
He'd been trying to teach Johnny the true Golden Spin. He hadn't expected his friend to launch from ten meters out and stomp the enemy into paste.
"I can feel it — this armor really can make me move. I just need practice. We were wrong about that cat."
"Pal, I completely understand how you feel, but walking around in that is going to draw some attention. Can we get back to what I was trying to say earlier? The Spin."
"Weren't you the one who told me not to get my hopes up about the Spin?" Johnny asked.
Gyro rubbed his chin. "I'd already talked myself into teaching you and then the beetle interrupted me. Now that we're here, I'm teaching you today whether you like it or not..."
Johnny gave a perfunctory couple of "mm-hmms" and turned the cat's words over in his mind.
Something about "third at the finish" — was she predicting one of them would place third in this race? He couldn't make sense of it. Who — or what — was that cat? Was she the "devil" she'd warned him against?
He thought again about the tracks in the wilderness. Hoofprints circling three separate maps.
————————
Days blurred into each other. She'd lost count of how many stretches she'd crossed.
She just followed the next direction she could feel, and kept moving. Food grew scarcer and scarcer, until a landscape of unbroken white finally explained why.
Winter had come.
"Tired."
Exhaustion was setting in. And with it, that familiar hollowness in her stomach — manageable for now, but the last time she'd eaten was two full days and nights ago.
She hadn't truly eaten her fill even once since arriving here. Even the farmer she'd met on the road two days ago — who'd given her more beef than she'd ever eaten in one sitting — had only gotten her to about seventy percent.
Yimi had gotten stronger. But a stronger body demanded more fuel to run.
She padded forward — then stopped.
"Awroooo—"
A wolf pup about the size of a stray dog howled at the sky. There was something oddly plaintive beneath the wild cry — something frustrated and grieving.
"Meow, meow, meow, meow—" Yimi raised a forepaw and smacked him twice.
"Urooo—"
The wolf pup looked back at her with wounded eyes, then reluctantly began pawing through the snow ahead, carving a path. The lump on top of his head was all the evidence needed of how that negotiation had gone.
Other than being a bit hungry and a bit cold, Yimi was in reasonably good spirits — because the main quest indicator on her system panel had gone from 1.5/10 to 5/10.
The newly acquired Corpse Parts were the legs. Practically handed to her. These fused fragments had been living inside what she identified as a medium-sized cat belonging to the local species known as "dog."
The wolf pup had started it — he'd come looking for a fight. Yimi had flattened him, collected the Corpse Parts in the process, and conscripted him into snow-clearing duty.
She didn't hunt medium-sized cats, though. Uncle Nuomi — the one who used to play with her back home — was a medium-sized cat (a dog). That connection was probably the only reason the wolf pup tailing a predator had even a shred of safety.
"Mrow-mreow-mrow-mrow~" No meaning. Just happiness.
She'd worked it out: the 10 in the quest was the total number of Corpse Parts she needed. She was already at half. Even a smart cat could appreciate that.
The paint in her spiritual reserves no longer looked like muddy dye-water — now a faint thread of gold shimmered through it. She had no idea what it meant.
"Raise the price when the other party is in need — but never abuse it. Those consumed by greed beyond all human feeling destroy themselves. That lesson has been written in blood more times than can be counted."
The phantom of the Saint — the one who had worn the Crown of Thorns — flickered past, murmuring words he'd been repeating to her for days.
"Meow." Yimi gave a simple response.
Based on the System's suggested form of address, she stood up on her hind legs and, for all the world like she meant it, greeted the Saint's long-faded phantom:
"Got it, old geezer."
"..."
No response. Then again, the two of them had never truly spoken to begin with.