Eldritch Horror Theatre

Even though Hayami Suzune's subconscious refused to analyze the flavor, a distinct, savory aroma still filled her mouth the moment the hot soup passed her lips. It was a scent that made a person want to drown in it.

'I actually drank that soup!'

Her ravenous hunger vanished almost instantly, but the sudden realization of what she had just swallowed sent her stomach into violent spasms.

"Not bad, right? Young people should try new things more often."

Across the dining table, the human fiend in the Scarlet Turkey Mask let out a string of low chuckles.

"Please believe me, I truly harbor no ill intent toward you. I just wanted to help you open a door to a new world—"

"Go! To! Hell!"

Anger, terror, and self-loathing—a torrent of intense emotions churned within Hayami Suzune. Like a balloon stretched to its absolute limit, she finally detonated.

Cold light flashed as a sharp Razor Blade shot from her hand.

Sitting in his chair, Fu Qian was decapitated once again. His head slowly slid off his neck and rolled away.

The strike had been so blisteringly fast that his headless body remained leaning back in the seat without toppling over.

Clearly not expecting it to be this easy, Hayami Suzune stared blankly at the scene for a few seconds before lowering her head to look at the soup bowl in front of her.

'Mushrooms?'

In the little broth that remained, she could clearly see that the floating chunks were not the human brains she had imagined, but slices of white mushroom.

'They're mushrooms! I didn't drink soup boiled from human brains!'

The moment that realization struck her, Hayami Suzune felt a massive wave of relief.

At the same time, she quickly recovered her wits and scanned her surroundings. Aside from the decapitated corpse, the living room looked perfectly normal; there was nothing strange about it.

Even outside the window, the dense fog had already dissipated.

She had indeed been trapped in a Nightmare-like hallucination just moments ago, but she had now broken free.

She had suffered no physical injuries, and the other party seemingly had no intention of making any further moves.

'Please believe me, I truly harbor no ill intent toward you...'

Recalling his final words, Hayami Suzune realized something—this guy might genuinely not have wanted to kill her. He only wanted to make her drink that bowl of soup inside the hallucination.

'Why? Purely for sick amusement?'

Amid her confusion, that phantom aroma seemed to ghost across her palate once more.

Staring at the turkey head that had rolled onto the floor, Hayami Suzune felt nothing but a profound sense of disgust and absurdity, intertwined with a faint sliver of dread.

Resisting the urge to crush it beneath her foot, Hayami Suzune forced herself not to dwell on the source of that dread. She bent down and yanked the turkey mask off.

Beneath the mask, a completely unfamiliar face was revealed.

'How is this possible!'

This shock was no small matter. Hayami Suzune hadn't anticipated such a twist at all.

'The person in front of me isn't Dancy. That actually makes his identity as a transcendent make sense. Is he a bodyguard hired by that bastard?'

'But setting aside the exorbitant price of a transcendent bodyguard, after I revealed my identity as a Night Watcher, it's hard to imagine any rogue transcendent being so dedicated that they'd stick around to finish the job.'

'Or... what if he isn't a rogue transcendent?'

A sudden thought made Hayami Suzune's heart skip a beat.

On Ye Island, apart from the Night Watchers, there was undoubtedly one other massive organization.

'Anjing Company is connected to this human fiend, and deeply at that...'

She had to admit, it was a very real possibility.

Hayami Suzune's mind raced. The previous string of clues faintly began to connect in her head, and she quickly realized a glaring issue—

'Never mind who this dead guy is. If Dancy isn't here, where did he go?'

The question visibly startled her. She subconsciously looked out the window and discovered that the sky was already turning dark.

'Just how long was I stuck in that hallucination?'

It was approaching six o'clock. Kisaragi Kana was about to finish her final Miracle Potion test...

Hayami Suzune hesitated no longer. She sprang to her feet and rushed straight for the door.

Stepping outside, she wasn't teleported to some bizarre location this time.

Confirming that the hallucination had truly lifted, Hayami Suzune had no time to enjoy the thrill of her narrow escape before sprinting directly toward the Anjing Building.

...

"Does Madam Suzune have more business with me?"

When the Night Watcher stormed into the Anjing Building in such a hurried state, she undoubtedly frightened a group of staff members.

Shortly after, Kisaragi Kana emerged with heavy footsteps. Seeing Suzune, she furrowed her brow, her already foul mood darkening even further.

"It's nothing."

Seeing Kisaragi Kana walk out perfectly fine, without missing any body parts, Hayami Suzune let out a long breath of relief and asked directly.

"Did you see Dancy today?"

"No."

Kisaragi Kana wore an unsurprised expression, her face laced with displeasure.

"If you're looking for him, why don't you go to his place? Didn't you take the invitation?"

That kind of place... Suzune truly had zero desire to ever visit it again.

Sensing Kisaragi Kana's brimming resentment, Hayami Suzune recalled her own recent ordeal.

"The preparations for his dinner party didn't go very smoothly."

'And the reason it didn't go smoothly was because he was missing his main ingredient—you.'

She kept that latter sentence to herself.

Hayami Suzune scanned their surroundings. She had a faint, creeping suspicion that the scum was hiding in some corner, staring greedily at Kisaragi Kana.

"I'll escort you back to your sister's place."

...

Kisaragi Kana was visibly averse to Hayami Suzune's offer.

However, the Night Watcher's icy tone kept her from daring to raise any objections.

...

[Current task completed. Entity designated 3-0530 successfully Contained.]

At the same time, in Dancy's living room, the headless corpse slumped in the high-backed chair twitched.

The next moment, flesh and blood wriggled as Fu Qian's head extruded inch by inch from the severed stump of his neck. In the blink of an eye, it reattached flawlessly.

'The plan proceeded very smoothly!'

Looking at the open door, Fu Qian nodded in deep satisfaction.

Without a doubt, Kisaragi Kana's testing had smoothly concluded, and she had been abandoned as a failed case.

But it was a blessing in disguise. Following that intense string of stimuli, he was confident that she would have a transcendent bodyguard keeping an eye on her for a very long time.

Combined with her relatively level-headed sister watching over her, it should keep her from getting herself killed for a while.

And the most brilliant part was that whether it was the Night Watchers or the Anjing Company, they would undoubtedly believe that Kunio was killed by Hayami Suzune—even Suzune herself believed it.

Considering she was completely in the dark about the situation, and the dead "Kunio" had seemingly only wanted to stall for time without displaying any murderous intent, the Night Watchers would likely not aggressively demand accountability for the incident.

As for the Anjing Group, a Miracle Potion test subject involved in illicit operations went missing, and the operative they sent to observe even lost his head. To them, this would clearly be interpreted as a dire warning from the Night Watchers.

Under this kind of pressure, he trusted they would behave themselves for a long time to come.

Thus, the current Kisaragi Kana was like a seed that had broken free from the farmer's control.

An observation project known only to him commenced. Codename: "Jiali 9527".

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