Tokyo bombing incident Nth time

"What's going on outside?" Why won't any of them just tell us directly?

"—" The new spirit seemed to sigh silently. Yuri neither heard the sound nor saw the movement (after all, the other party didn't even have facial features), but that's how he felt.

Then the other person spoke again, "—The woman who rode with you on the human-operated vehicle may be in trouble now."

"How do you know—" Yuri left the question unanswered, and before he knew it, he was already sprinting away.

The threat to "innocent citizens" seems like a distant, unreal thing, but the threat to "Kashizaki Akemi," an acquaintance, is a completely different matter.

The guards in the passage did not stop Yuri, and there were no spirits in the somewhat noisy station. The ordinary people seemed a little confused, but Yuri did not stop to study their situation.

He had already thrown away all the coins when he left the platform; being in spirit form made it easier to pass through the crowd. He could call home, but time was of the essence; a phone call wouldn't speed up Yuri's return to his lodgings, and he had to get back to meet up with Akemi no matter what.

Then, just as he was about to leave the station, he saw a scene he had never imagined.

A minor disturbance was breaking out on the streets. Several citizens lay unconscious on the ground in several unrelated locations. Bystanders, rescuers, and panicked individuals were interfering with each other, but there was no stampede yet; the crowd was simply stuck in place and unable to move.

What truly terrified Yuri was something else entirely.

A swarm of rats.

A swarm of spirit rats.

Clusters of smaller rat spirits swept through the streets like waves.

Immediately afterward, right before Yuri's eyes, a citizen who had just collapsed lost consciousness—her companions were frantically calling out to her.

This coma was unexpected for them, but Yuri could see it—she could see the swarm of rats rushing towards her and gnawing on something inside her body.

She sensed something was wrong, but not clearly enough, and couldn't shake the spirit off her.

Regardless of what they ate, the meal ended quickly, and the swarm of rats left the still-breathing victim behind and pounced on the next target.

That is, Yuri has arrived outside the station area.

Yuri quickly took two steps back—not to retreat into the station, but his intuition told him that direct contact with the rats would be very disadvantageous.

This was certainly not enough to deter the rats; they surged toward their prey without hesitation, with some of the more impatient or relatively stronger ones choosing to leap up and attack.

Their maximum speed is not as fast as Yuri's, but if it's just a single dive, it's slightly faster than Yuri's retreat speed.

The shield opened up before him, deflecting the rat that was about to touch Yuri. Yuri breathed a sigh of relief.

Just as they caught their breath, more rats rushed toward the shield, launching a fierce attack on it with their claws, teeth, bodies, and everything else they could muster.

Each attack was rather weak, but the number was… Yuri counted to twenty in his mind, then gave up. The shield was flashing rapidly, and he knew this was not a good thing—what appeared to be flashing was actually the shield's energy being rapidly depleted, forcing it to quickly transfer energy, and Yuri's observation of the energy indicated flashing—the shield was about to explode.

Each individual Rat Spirit is very weak, but when they unite, they can inflict damage on Yuri even faster than the Fire Spirits can attack.

Activate the second type of shield immediately. Yuri hopes this will work...it better work!

After breaking through the first shield, the rat swarm encountered the second version. Their attacks were less effective on this layer, but still not ineffective.

Only the luckiest rats had a chance to break through this defense. Their weakened attacks were weak and ineffective against Yuri, and Yuri could hardly feel any damage.

Clearly, this tactic is more effective this time, but it is still not invincible.

Yuri swung his limbs, knocking away the rats that tried to entangle him. On the one hand, the number of rats Yuri could reach was limited for the entire swarm; on the other hand, for those he did reach, Yuri's attacks were very effective, even too effective—some rats with less distinct shapes disappeared in the process of being swept away, not even surviving to the ground.

However, there are still many left. If Yuri really fights them to the death—or rather, if they really fight Yuri to the death regardless of their own lives—then Yuri can win, although he will most likely feel terrible afterward.

Yuri struggled again to shake off the rats on his body, jumped out of the rat swarm, and prepared to find a better angle to fight.

At the edge of my vision, it seemed as if some scattered rat spirits had appeared out of thin air, and they were converging on the various rat swarms.

Some of them came toward the one in front of Yuri.

If Yuri were to fight them to the death, he would be doomed with no chance of survival—their numbers are endless, while Yuri is constantly being worn down. How could he possibly fight them under such circumstances?

It's time to do what we were supposed to do in the first place.

The moment of swift retreat and advance had arrived—within half a minute of actual contact with the rat swarm, Yuri fled down the street.

He could easily outrun the swarm of rats following him with his running speed alone, but there was more than one swarm of rats on the street, and Yuri had realized the direct reason why the swarm had gathered.

First, the resonance in this area has been greatly enhanced—weak spirits from the Shadow Realm can easily come to the material world, and they have indeed come.

Subsequently, due to some deeper factors, the rat spirits would begin to gravitate towards nearby large groups whenever they appeared. However, if they appeared in a relatively open area, they couldn't find the nearby large groups (perhaps due to poor eyesight?). So, a few scattered individuals would mistake each other for a large group and gather together, forming the initial core.

Yuri rushed off, trampling a newly formed swarm of tiny mice in the process. The surviving mouse spirits were taken in by the swarm that was chasing after him.

Why weren't all the rats gathered together? This question flashed through Yuri's mind, but he didn't have the energy to think about it now. If he couldn't come to a conclusion "immediately," he shouldn't think about it, because the rats following behind him would "immediately" pounce on him.

Another group appeared in front of Yuri, not yet aware of his presence—they had just "pounced" on a victim and hadn't yet turned their attention to him—but if Yuri continued charging straight ahead, they couldn't possibly remain oblivious.

They stopped, only to be overtaken from behind. Continuing forward, they were blocked in front. Turning right, they realized they hadn't reached the intersection yet. The side road on the right shouldn't be a dead end, but there was no room to maneuver. If another group came from the opposite direction, they were doomed. Should they turn left and cross the road? Not only were there rats on the other side, but as spirits, they wouldn't have much trouble following them, and there was also the issue of direction—

Damn it, why haven't any suitable vehicles passed by yet?

From the moment he began to advance, Yuri planned to use the long-unused method of jumping out of the vehicle to escape, but for a moment there were no trucks passing by on the road next to him!

This isn't a place with poor transportation; perhaps if we delay a little longer, we'll arrive soon enough. Perhaps Yuri can hold out against the rat swarm's attack until then.

—Maybe not, maybe Yuri is having a run of bad luck today, maybe the chaos on the road will slow down the traffic and reduce the total number of vehicles Yuri will encounter, maybe…

Another swarm of rats ahead had noticed Yuri's presence. They hadn't yet begun to approach Yuri at full speed, but they were shifting their focus.

Let's hold on a little longer and postpone it one more time!

Yuri made up his mind and charged headlong into the swarm of rats ahead.

Turning your head around will have the same effect, but what if the group in front of you is caught off guard?

Yuri is moving at full speed.

He could hardly remember the last time he went at full speed, and now he remembered it at the worst possible time: a spirit's full speed is not determined by its movements.

—Then go full speed ahead and wildly swing your limbs, shake off/stomp on as many as you can.

Provoked, the rats swarmed towards Yuri—not paying much attention to the pale face of the man lying on the ground, Yuri charged forward headlong, using the power of his shield and his own efforts to wade through the swarm of rats and inflict considerable damage on them—some spiritual energy was released, which might be an acceptable replenishment—but unfortunately, he couldn't stop to collect these spoils, because although the rats weren't attacking each other, they were equally eager for the spiritual energy left behind by their comrades' explosions, and the pursuers behind him were fast approaching—Yuri wasn't sure if the two groups of rats could exert twice the fighting power, but even a slight increase could break this fragile balance—so he continued running, not stopping even after passing through the swarm of rats.

At least a larger number doesn't mean a faster running speed, Yuri thought. Now he was being chased by two groups of rats that were indistinguishable from each other, or rather, by a larger group of rats.

The time it takes 100 people to run one lap is not faster than the speed of 10 people running one lap, because everyone has to run one lap. Thankfully, the world is still reasonable at least in places like this.

Of course, it would be even better if a third batch of rats didn't appear.

Yuri could easily have predicted that if he got past the third wave, a fourth wave would be waiting for him.

I quickly calculated the losses from just getting past the rat swarm.

It's actually not that big; the new shield is very difficult to actually be damaged because of its characteristics.

But the problem is that Yuri's body is slowly but definitely damaged.

These rats can certainly gnaw away at him like this, but he can't just be gnawed away like this.

We must find a vehicle to escape in immediately—even if there isn't a convenient truck available.

Chapter 81 Numerical Advantage

After abandoning the insistence on the most suitable vehicle, the situation became much easier.

While it's not exactly a sudden enlightenment or an easy solution, this isn't some desolate wilderness, and there's no shortage of vehicles...

Yuri, now in spirit form, ran onto the road, keeping pace with the traffic and accelerating as fast as possible.

This should make it easier to land on the roof after jumping and transforming back into a solid form—giving Yuri more reaction time.

Spirits have no inertia, while physical entities "may" have it; perhaps it's possible to combine the two...

If my guess is correct.

Yuri didn't intend to use inertia to exceed his original speed limit, but he hoped to use this process to skip the re-acceleration part.

Yuri inwardly berated himself for his stupidity. He hadn't further improved his proficiency with this process since the Hunter incident. How could he not have thought that he might need to use this trick again?

If we were to carve out some time for training... for example, by diverting time from shield training... that wouldn't be right. In short, there must be some time that's been wasted, and we should be using it now.

In any case, it's too late to regret it now, unless there's some secret that allows Yuri to turn back time and change his choices.

Let's stop dreaming. Yuri probably wouldn't feel like he could suddenly master this ability until he's meditated to the point of forgetting who he is... and he doesn't even think he'll be able to master this ability in the foreseeable future.

Banishing the chaotic thoughts from his mind, Yuri refocused his attention on the traffic behind him... and the swarm of rats that were still relentlessly surging toward him.

Yuri had initially increased the distance between them, but since Yuri could no longer move at full speed and had to start aiming, they caught up.

Without much delay, he jumped up and transformed back into his physical form in mid-air.

As he landed on the back half of the roof, several thoughts entered his mind.

First, materialization is not a real physical body, so physics does not always apply, as it did not in this case—he should have known this long ago, but did not test it enough.

Note: If you have a brilliant idea, you should test it in a safer environment first, rather than preparing it at the last minute when you're about to die.

That's why he suddenly lost speed between materializing and landing on the roof of the car—he should have maintained his speed and continued moving forward, but he failed to regain control of his body in time when switching physical forms.

Second, the rats couldn't actually climb onto the car; they weren't materialized, and the car wasn't fixed to the ground, so there wasn't a spirit version of it. But they could jump high enough to knock Yuri off the car.

Third, if he doesn't move forward immediately to steady himself, the tether he's using to steady himself might break the rearview mirror, not to mention the possibility of being spotted by the driver.

Yuri wasn't sure which of the three scenarios was the worst: "the driver panicked when he saw something strange in the rearview mirror, causing the accident," "the shading strap broke the rearview mirror, causing Yuri to fall from the back of the car due to loss of leverage," or "it was daytime, so the shading strap dissipated quickly and broke on its own."

As for the driver of the car behind seeing me... let him be, I can't worry about that now.

Regardless, he exerted his strength in the air, turning himself from floating in the air into being stuck to the roof of the car.

After sprawling awkwardly onto the roof of the car, he let go, dispelling the shadow that his instincts had conjured. In the heat of the moment, as he watched the car hurtle past beneath him, he somehow decided to steady himself in this way.

The result was good, but the process almost scared Yuri to death.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

The rideshare didn't take Yuri directly back to his residence, but most of the journey was along the same route.

Along the way, Yuri saw many groups of rats, with the largest number near the station. Although the number in other areas was not as large as at the station, a new group would always appear just after Yuri thought he had found the boundary.

This may be because the station is, after all, a convergence point of spiritual veins. After the overall resonance is strengthened, weaker spirits will appear there first, while other places may be overcrowded and diverted.

Faced with the rat swarm's attack, the humans along the way failed to mount any effective resistance... This was to be expected, as they were unaware that their fallen companions had been attacked by spirits.

In fact, rat swarms seem to only target people with a certain level of intelligence... perhaps because they don't yet have access to other, ordinary, average humans.

According to Yuri's previous estimates, inspired people make up about one to one-twentieth of the general population, while comatose people make up about one percent or less of the total population.

Perhaps the remaining people could put up an effective resistance, perhaps they were not strong enough or weak enough, perhaps it was just that time was not enough, and not everyone was attacked.

...Yuri ruled out the possibility that they solved the problem on their own strength. Perhaps there were such people, but if there were many of them, Yuri should have encountered ordinary citizens beating up the rats more or less.

But Yuri didn't see it. The only guy he encountered along the way who clearly reacted was a middle-aged man frantically fleeing from a swarm of rats. He seemed likely to succeed, as long as he didn't run into another group of rats blocking his way.

Yuri didn't watch or get out of the car to help; he stayed on the roof, eager to get back to his lodgings.

Akemi Kakizaki clearly belongs to the best of these people, so she would naturally be a target.

Although Yuri felt that Akemi might not need his help, but...

In short, no, I have to go back and check.

As the vehicle turned onto another road, Yuri jumped out; getting out was much easier than getting in at the perfect moment.

Yuri, who immediately materialized into a spirit form, began to run towards his residence.

As he passed the recycling center, he glanced inside, just in case there were a thousand rats inside preparing to ambush him.

No, there are no rats inside.

Yuri slowed his pace; something was wrong.

Thinking about it carefully, Yuri hadn't seen any rats since he got off the vehicle.

He had considered the possibility that the rats might only appear in a few specific locations.

Although it was rejected multiple times, perhaps this place just happens to be outside the scope of amplified resonance...

No, all previous indications suggested that this place was within the range of the expanding resonance.

Perhaps the resonance here was weakened after the actual event?

The decision to rush out of the train station instead of calling Akemi first now seems less wise.

But upon closer examination, there's no reason why the resonance should be weaker than before, and there's no reason why the rats in the recycling bin should suddenly disappear.

Doubt filled Yuri's mind, but fortunately there was a way to solve the problem, and it was very close by.

Yuri sped up again; all he needed to do was find Akemi.

Turn the corner, enter the residential area, and approach the building where your residence is located.