Katsumi’s body fell backwards in shobsp; For a moment, she thought it had been something that Seiji did. It seemed impossible knowing him and his abilities. Then she saw him falling over as well from the attabsp; “Who… Where…”

  The force of the attack did more to Takako than anything else. Like she had said before, the state of the body meant very little to her. She fell back against the ruins of the first floor of the school to get support. “To punch through even the reinforced uniform… Who was it?” Takako started to look around for the source.

  However, despite the pierg shot through both of them, even Seiji returo his feet. The bestial rage didn’t look to have softened in any meaningful way. He only looked more pissed off now. Which made Takako groan with some disappoi. It hit both of them, but she hoped that it had more stopping power to put him down so she could just easily finish him off. “Such a pain. You just won’t die.”

  “…Yuki…”

  “Still going on about that nonsense…” She pulled Katsumi’s body back up to front Seiji once more. “I ’t believe a single person would put someoo such a blind rage. It’s like he’s immortal or some such stupid thing.”

  “That’s a more accurate statement for yourself than him,” replied a voice to a question that was never asked.

  Takako flipped Katsumi’s head around to hunt down the sound of the voibsp; She was on the searce more for the unknown interloper. “Who are you?”

  “Not fond of things you ’t see or trol?”

  “There’s nothing I ’t.”

  “I’m sensing fear in your voice.”

  “I’m not afraid! There’s nothing that be doo me.”

  “Very true. From what I’ve seen. I ’t kill you as you are. So why are you afraid then?”

  “I said I’m not! Get out here and I’ll show you who is!”

  “Is it the unknown or the voices from the darkness? Does it make you feel like how you were before? Locked within your own mind.”

  “Who the hell are you? You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I know more than you think. I know your story. After that, it just took a little thinking to figure you out. You seem plex, but you’re quite simple. You’re afraid of going back.”

  “Shut up a out here now!”

  “You’re right. I do o put ao this.”

  “Bold words. Think you back—“ Suddenly, a rge metal gau appeared from nowhere hitting Katsumi’s faterrupting Takako’s taunting. She flew backwards from the force, but it didn’t st for long. Another appeared behind her hitting her ba the dire that she came from. “…the hell!”

  Takako could barely keep up with what was happening. It was only three floating giant gaus half of the size of a human, but they were hittioo fast to read get her bearings. She had to take the pummeling until she figured out the speed of them. With time, she mao slice through with her bdes and break the cycle.

  Already bloodied from Seiji’s fight, she barely looked any different, but the damage to Katsumi’s body was extensive. It was only thanks to her enhanced body from Yuki that she survived everything. Takako treated the body with no care ard to safety.

  No one had yet appeared otlefield. “Damn…still hiding…” Takako sed the ruins of the first floor for anything.

  “Just handling something.”

  The voice came in the dire of Seiji, who she had fotten about with the hreat. However, unlike before, he was her fuming or even standing. In fact, most of the talismans that had been c him had fallen away. His shredded clothes exposed his bloodied body.

  o him, a new figure stood, likely the ohat had been talking to Takako the eime. “You put down the animal.”

  “I simply stopped him from doing something that he’d regret.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “Killing the girl you’ve taken over.” The figure turowards Takako and started to walk to her. “That’s something that I’ll take on.”

  “Bold words.”

  “It’s quite simple.” They suddenly leapt forward boung through the air like a danbsp; Anau appeared out in front, grabbing Katsumi. Metal fingers cmped down c her body from under her shoulders to her waist. Then the dark figure grabbed a hold of Katsumi’s left arm with another massive gauhat they wielded personally. Bursts of blue light ignited from vents all around the gau’s forearm creating thrust. It only took a moment for a pop of the shoulder and arm to be dislocated followed by the tearing of skin and spray of blood.

  They tossed the torn limb aside as Takako groueeth with annoyance, clearly not feeling the pain. The unknown person made ation to move onto the arm. Rather than lose both, she roughly puhrough the gau arouorso to break free. “Damn you!”

  “I told you it’s quite simple. The girl’s going to bleed to death as I ripped off each of her limbs at ygestion.”

  Chapter 332 – Back-to-back Take Down

  Even in the moonlight, Takako couldn’t see the face of her straacker. The school had long lost power. It was as though the very shadows cloaked them from sight. Nothing from the look of their face could tell her anything about them. Only the sound of their voice, a grave tohat meant business. There was no doubt about what they would do.

  She took a step back from the strarying to figure out a solution. The stunning attack left her momentarily fused and paralyzed. It didn’t st for long as the stranger went ba the attabsp; They targeted her remaining arm, the right arm. Defending it with greater degrees of preservation, Takako dodged and evaded the attacks.

  During the fighting, it started t Takako back tht mind. “What are you doing? You’re one of Yuki’s friends, right. This girl is important to you. You ’t kill her. You’re just bluffing.”

  Jumping into the fight, the stranger danced around the air kig and pung off attag Takako from all sides nearly at onbsp; She had trouble keeping up with the speed and precision of the shadowed figure. “I’m not one of their friends. So the fate of this girl doesn’t matter to me. Killing is sometimes a y. You won’t dissuade me.”

  “Who the hell are you?!”

  “No one.” Spinning around in the air, they kicked Takako down into the ground from the height of twenty meters in mid air. They quickly darted down taking advantage of the stuate to remove the remaining arm from Katsumi’s body.

  Anchored in pce by anauakako could no longer move Katsumi’s body. “Bastard…”

  “This girl’s body is no longer useful to you. So run away back to your real body and wait. Wait for him to e to you. Because he’s still alive and won’t stop until he’s reached you. Go hide in fear.” The light from the girl’s eyes dimmed along with the for her body. Takako’s possessed presence had disappeared.

  Walking out of the crater, the stranger went over to Seiji’s body. They k dowo him seeing that he was starting to e around. “You’ve woken up.”

  Seiji blinked a little trying to get a sense of his position. Everythi wrong. Then he looked up in the dire of the voice he heard. The sight of an all bck figure that pletely seemed to defy the light made his head tilt. “What are you doing here, Nerine?”

  The bck bled off of her figure like she had been pletely drenched in water. “How’d you know it was me?”

  “I just did. It was obvious to me.” He awkwardly tried to get up, but found himself falling over. The ck of the left arm that he was relying on took him babsp; “What the hell is going on?!”

  “How much do you remember from yht?”

  “Everything…” he answered immediately, only to have to start thinking. The doubting look on Neriold him that he fot or missed something. “I remember getting really angry with that Takako girl for lying to me.”

  Without the o hear anymore, Nerine already figured all of it. “You lost sciousness after that moment and your instincts took over.” “My instincts? What do you mean? What happeo me?”

  “You became surrounded by your talismans. The same ohat appeared during yht with as. And you lost all doubt you had about fighting Takako.”

  Seiji hung his head down trying to remember what Nerine was telling him. Then he looked around the grounds of the school. It looked several times worse than he remembered with rge holes that he didn’t remember them having before. And Takako was nowhere in sight for him. He looked back to Nerine. “Did I—“

  “No, I stopped you. I knew how it would have made you feel.”

  A sigh of relief came out of his lips. “…thanks… I thought I had this under trol. I thought I had faced this after beating that bastard!”

  “You ’t out run or trol this. It’ll always be at your side. You just have to remember yourself.”

  “Damn it!” Seiji pounded his fist into the earth making it rumble uhem a little. He could feel the dark shadow hanging over him once more. It was something that he had almost fotten about with everything calming down. Yet Nerine was right. It was never gone.

  For the first time, he looked around at the ground. He saw the talismans around him. It wasn’t the first time he had seen them, but they were something that he generally ignored. He knew what they were. ‘These things again… Why…’ Seiji lifted one of the talismans up. Most looked spent and torn.

  “What are these things?” Nerine inquired, as it hadn’t been the first time she had seen, but never fully uood their meaning. She knew what they did for Seiji. They had surprising properties.

  “Sacred talismans. If this was the old world, they would just be useless relics from a more superstitious time, part of rituals. However now…they…”

  “What?”

  “They have real power.”

  “What is it supposed to do?”

  Seiji turhe talisman towards Nerine. It was covered in Japanese writing that she didn’t uand, that much Seiji knew. “It varies depending on what is written on the paper. In the case of this o’s a protective ward. It’s supposed to ward off evil spirits.”

  “Supposed to?”

  “Well, I don’t know what it actually does now. I tell you what they say, but their purpose or power is unknown to me.”

  “But you create them.”

  “I know. They e from me, but I don’t know why or how. I’ve preferred to ighem, but it seems that they pop up just to spite me.”

  Nerihought back to the temple where Seiji lived. She had given little thought to things until this moment, but quickly tied them together. “So you’re a priest?”

  “No!” Jumping up to his feet, he wao distance himself from the whole thing. It wasn’t the sort of topic he wao enter. “I’m no priest.”

  “But how do you know all of this stuff then?”

  Turning away from Nerine, Seiji tried to cross his arms, but found that only having one made it very difficult to do so. He sighed, finding that his situation wasn’t very good. And Nerine slid around wanting to know more. She wasn’t taking silence as an answer. “When I was younger my grandfather trained me. I stopped, but that old bastard’s teags are hard tet.”

  “Why did you stop?”

  “Neriop.”

  She quickly backed off from Seiji seeing an unfamiliar look in his eyes. There were more words spoken by them than he said aloud. She heard them clearly. ‘There’s something deeper going on here. But I ’t ask… He doesn’t wao ask… There’s something painful buried…attached to it…’

  “DIE!!” shouted a new voice that had a familiar sound. It was Takako once more, she had grabbed someone else after she abandoned Katsumi’s body. It was an adult male wielding a rge sword that had a slight glow hanging around it.

  Neriepped up in front of Seiji, who clearly wasn’t ready for anht. However, Seiji brushed her aside. “Seiji?”

  “She’s mine. This is unfinished business.”

  “But you’re not healed.”

  “I feel fine!” As the man charged in with his oversized sword, Seiji slid in catg the wrist from underh. He threw off the attack to stagger the man. Then Seiji wound up his hand and smmed it against the forehead of the sword wielding adult. The force of the hit khe man off his feet and crashed him into the earth. Seiji fihe motion and k o him, his hand still against the forehead.

  Nerine came rushing to Seiji’s side to help, but found that the man no longer moved. She became a little ed about what Seiji might have doo him. “What did you do to him?”

  “Something that I’m going tret.”

  “You didn’t…” She leaned in cheg oate of the body, which looked to be pletely unharmed. There was only a little dirt from the impact with the earth. This only fused her further. She stepped around the unmoving man as Seiji removed his hand. On the forehead of the man, affixed a talisman like the ones she saw on Seiji. “What did you do?”

  “What I promised I’d do to her. Forced her out of the body she was squatting in.”

  “But how?”

  “An exorcism of sorts. It’s a type of talismao remove evil spirits from possessing someone.” Seiji stood up rubbing his hand against what clothes remained on him. He kept rubbing his hand as though it was covered in mud and he wao be . “I don’t like this at all. Something’s wrong with me and I o figure it out after this is all settled. I won’t bee like him.”