Togie City

In order to survive, theft was a necessity.

Like a large majority of the minian races, Kuuro the Cautious had been able to live out his youth without stealing. While he certainly hadn't been rich, the sounds and colors of the world were far more brilliant and vibrant than they were now.

The terror of the True Demon King had swept through, and he knew those days were eternally gone.

Everything given to him in his young days was now only obtainable by forcibly snatching them with his own power. The day's food. A safe refuge. Even his very lifeblood itself.

This was why he was currently fleeing through the outskirts of Togie City. His plan to make contact with Aureatia had been compromised. His pursuers were likely the muscle of loyalists of the former monarchies that

used the city as a base of operations.

The three kingdoms that governed this world fell to the menace of the True Demon King and had united to form a new nation called Aureatia. The Old Kingdoms' loyalists who sought to restore the nations of the past had a deep-rooted hostility toward Aureatia.

Figures there'd be a lot of minia in this district. I'm gonna stand out a bit. The characteristic boyish facial features and physique of the leprechauns should be a dead giveaway to the ones pursuing Kuuro the Cautious. Keeping his hands stuffed into the pockets of his dark brown coat, he remained vigilant about the crowds coming and going behind him, without once

looking back.

"They just crossed over the bridge. There's thirteen of them coming."

A young girl's voiced whispered to him from somewhere. Only Kuuro's ears could pick up the buzzing and her soft whisper.

She's wrong. I'm hearing fourteen people's footsteps.

Once he knew his enemies were near the bridge, Kuuro the Cautious was then able to accurately grasp the precise number of pursuers. He could do this simply by focusing all his senses in the bridge's direction.

He was in a market at noontime, with several hundred people of different physiques and gaits coming and going. Kuuro chose to flee in this direction in an attempt to lose his pursuers in the hustle and bustle.

This covert artifice was one of the skills he had cultivated before beginning his detective activities within the city.

Five of them are trying to move without making a sound. These ones are in front of the rest of the soldiers and slipping through the crowd. The fourteen soldiers are decoys to grab my attention and get a reaction out of me. These five others are the ones actually tasked with capturing me.

He concentrated his senses on one of the soldiers shuffling into the crowd. Kuuro cast his eyes downward as he walked, never dropping his pace and taking care not to move too quickly. He masked his presence by blending into the crowd. However, his aim wasn't to give his enemies the slip. He quietly

withdrew one of his hands from his coat pocket.

Pierce the windpipe. Sixth cervical vertebra.

With a metallic clink, a small vibration ran up his arm. The sound came from operating the small fold-out crossbow hidden inside his coat sleeve. The delicate arrow, constructed from a kraken's feelers, flew without a sound, encountering almost no air resistance at all.

"Hrngk!"

Kuuro was the only one cognizant of the soldiers' dying gasps. That was why he fired at the windpipe. It was to prevent them from getting a word out and alerting the others.

It was impossible to evade his techniques. His projectile moments ago had passed through the gaps in the underarms of two pedestrians traveling through the area. He hadn't even been facing his enemy, who had been fatally wounded with only the slightest movements of Kuuro's fingers.

There are rare instances when, among the massive number of people born among the minian races, individuals are born with visual and aural acuity far beyond others of their race.

Conversely, there are those individuals who, due to their talent and self-

discipline, gain an intuition that exceeds the potential of their five senses.

There are also stories about even more exceptional senses, such as sensing heat or magnetic forces, or synesthesia.

Kuuro the Cautious, too, experienced such supernatural senses. All of them, all at once.

Clairvoyance.

The name had been given to this remarkable gift, solely possessed by one individual, Kuuro the Cautious.

"One of them, he's turned his head this way," the young girl's voice cautioned.

Unlike radzio communication, he was only able to listen to the faraway voice with his extraordinary sense of hearing, but as long as Kuuro was the only one able to hear it, that was more than enough.

The man to the northwest. His breaths have become shorter. He's discovered me… I'll take advantage of that hat.

During the single moment when his pursuer's line of sight became obstructed by a passerby's hat, Kuuro shot him from over his shoulder.

The bolt opened a small hole in the hat, penetrating the target's eye socket and lodging itself in their brain. Once again, the soldier collapsed to the ground without even a groan. Kuuro didn't turn back to admire his work; however, he clearly perceived everything up until the final moment. He wouldn't feel safe otherwise.

Kuuro's eyes, which reflected the beauty of the world in his younger days, were now fixed solely on the deaths of his enemies.

"Kuuro."

The young girl's voice was very close now—she had cut through the crowded marketplace.

"The soldiers on the bridge spotted you, I think. We should probably run." "Then you shouldn't be making any conspicuous movements, Cuneigh." She looked like a little bird, small enough to fit in the palm of his hand.

From afar, most people would mistake her for exactly that.

However, this creature with the wings of a bird was even tinier than the leprechaun. Her body wasn't naturally born into this world, even with its varied and abnormal beastfolk.

"If the Old Kingdoms' folks find out about you, that's gonna cause me a lot of trouble later on."

"Tee-hee."

In Kuuro's hand, the young girl chuckled with embarrassment. "Kuuro. Hey, Kuuro, are you worried about me?"

"…I'm worried about everything. Everything that puts my life at risk."

Kuuro continued shooting his crossbow without looking behind him. One soldier had their diaphragm shot clean through and squatted down where they stood. They then served as an obstacle, disrupting the steps of the rest of the formation. Just as Kuuro planned.

He killed them in cold blood. Nevertheless, he killed only the bare minimum to serve his goals.

"Cuneigh. They're not going to ambush us at the meeting point, are they?"

"Nope. I looked! It's okay, Kuuro." "…I wonder."

Lowering his small frame, he raced off in an instant. He moved like a shadow, without brushing against the clothes of the pedestrians walking around. Moving across the plaza, he would sometimes pass through the street stalls as he moved on. Cuneigh curled herself up inside his coat.

Her second name was Cuneigh the Wanderer.

While she appeared to be a young girl, save for her tiny size, she was not a normal living creature.

She was a homunculus—an artificial race, similar to constructs, formed using a living minian body as a base. In contrast to skeletons and revenants, it was said that the simulacrum itself possessed latent knowledge from its base body. Additionally, by splicing together and modifying developmental-stage cells, it was even possible to create individuals like Cuneigh, who had both arms replaced with wings.

In part due to the advanced arts required, not many were created, and their individual lifespan was short. The average person didn't even know they existed. Moreover, Cuneigh had clearly been a failed creation, completely unfurnished with any of her base body's latent intelligence.

"We lost them, right?" "Not sure about that."

Kuuro looked back behind him one more time. Despite taking perfect precautions, he was far from relieved.

In the past, he had fought against an intensely powerful foe. Facing off

against this many Old Kingdom troops, he probably could have fought them face to face and won. However, he knew plenty of examples where that sort of presupposition could lead straight to death.

If he took the common rank and file lightly, he would die. No matter how unlikely the chances were, all battle was conducted with the possibility of death.

"They're chasing us knowing full well who I am. Don't you think they've sent along someone even stronger than I am?"

"…There isn't anyone stronger than you, though."

"There is among them, though. Each and every one of them is trying to kill me."

Kuuro the Cautious's exceptional gift was called clairvoyance. In the extreme chaos that was the era of the True Demon King, he had used this ability in service of a spy guild, racking up legendary achievements one after another as a champion of the shadows.

All of that was in the past.

"Cuneigh. Don't leave the cover of my coat." "Okay."

They arrived at the designated meet-up spot. Looking through each and every one of the carriages coming in and out of the marketplace with his supernatural visual acuity, Kuuro was able to spot the one with a rather small green seal engraved on the door.

With light movements only possible for leprechauns, completely masking his body weight, he slipped into the moving passenger carriage.

"I am Kuuro the Cautious. Are you the messenger from Aureatia?"

He announced this as he climbed inside the carriage. Inside was the lone passenger, a woman with an air of grace and elegance, with her chestnut hair tied up behind her.

"Yes. I am Aureatia's Seventeenth Minister, Elea the Red Tag. You have my gratitude for responding to our proposal."

An unseen threat filled Kuuro with a sense of foreboding.

…What was that?

It wasn't related to the woman in front of him.

"Seventeenth Minister… We're in enemy territory. I didn't expect one of Aureatia's Twenty-Nine Officials to come all the way here."

The supreme bureaucrats, twenty-nine in total, who ran the assembly in

Aureatia, the largest minian city in the world. Elea the Red Tag was a young woman of intelligence, exercising control over their espionage operations.

"Well, infiltrating into the middle of enemy territory like this is the job of spy units such as myself. Besides…Aureatia believes you're valuable enough to send one of the Twenty-Nine to meet you. The keenest sights among all of the Obsidian Eyes spy guild, Kuuro the Cautious."

"…I'm no more than a simple private eye now. More pressingly, I'm being followed. I tried to shake off my pursuers as much as possible, but there's no guarantee that they haven't blocked off the carriages."

"Now, now."

Kuuro observed her demure reaction. He wished he could pinpoint the exact location of the threat.

To him, even her alluring smile and enchanting features were nothing more than a single layer of skin composing the surface of her minian face. There was an unnatural tremble in her muscles. Changes in the intervals of her blinking, and her demeanor.

The Old Kingdoms' loyalists in Togie City got wind of his plan to make contact with a messenger from Aureatia…

Or perhaps, Kuuro thought, Aureatia's side had deliberately leaked the information themselves.

Ever since he departed Obsidian Eyes, he had been working as a street investigator, unbeholden to any other power, which meant as soon as this current plan was found out, he lost any other path of egress, except to go with Aureatia.

Of course, Kuuro also considered that a more desirable outcome. Supposing that was indeed true, it meant that currently, Aureatia had no plans of disposing of him.

Being used wasn't the true threat.

He felt that the true form of this threat originated elsewhere. "I want to leave Togie City immediately. Are you ready?"

"But of course. My business here concluded the moment I picked you up. It doesn't seem we'll be able to avoid the checkpoints along the roads… Our only choice is to slip through the marshlands."

"It rained just a couple days ago. There's a chance we'll get stuck in the mire."

"While this may be shaped exactly like the standard large merchant

carriage, I'm using a horse skilled at off-road travel, and the frame's been hollowed out to reduce its weight. A shallow swamp won't be enough to slow us down."

"…The same style used by Obsidian Eyes, then?" "Indeed."

Formerly known as the largest spy guild, Obsidian Eyes acted behind the scenes during the war-torn age of the true Demon King and conducted any and all forms of espionage activity. Kuuro had heard that with the end of the era, many members resigned, with select personnel and technologies being onboarded for Aureatia's spy force. Exactly as he was being onboarded right that moment.

"Are you fine with leaving that homunculus girl back in the city? I heard that she always accompanied you."

"...So, you knew about her, too, hm?"

He sighed. Togie City had resisted Aureatia's control even before becoming occupied by the Old Kingdoms' loyalists, so he had taken solace in the fact that he had been able to hide her from Aureatia's eyes.

"You can come on out, Cuneigh."

The songbird of a young girl crawled out from inside his coat and looked up at Elea with wide eyes.

"H-Hello."

"Cuneigh the Wanderer. I'd like to bring her with me if possible. You have the authority to make that happen, right?"

Although they admitted a small number of beastfolk and monstrous races as part of the labor force, Aureatia was a nation of minian races. Given the ethical problems involved in their creation, much like with constructs, there was a high probability that he wouldn't be granted asylum with a homunculus accompanying him.

On the other hand, if they demanded he hand Cuneigh over to them for research purposes, he wouldn't be able to refuse. Kuuro was being hunted by the Old Kingdoms' loyalists and could no longer continue his detective work in Togie City as before. He had long been cut off from any other escape routes.

"How unusual. Homunculi themselves are rare enough…but I've never heard of any examples of one purposely being given wings. Why exactly was she constructed that way?"

"I don't know. I wasn't the one who built Cuneigh, and I haven't the faintest clue what thoughts were going through the crazy self-proclaimed Demon King Icareh's head. Maybe it was an attempt to revive the ancient harpies or something."

He heard that much like forests had elves, the mountains had dwarves, and the deserts had zumeu, there once used to be a minian race that claimed the skies as their domain. However, as the wyverns thrived, the harpies went extinct, and as a result, the minian race who achieved the greatest success were the ones who lived between these different domains—the Minia themselves.

"A simple constructed pet. She poses no danger like with the construct races. Up to you whether to believe me or not."

"I don't mind. If that's all there is, then we'll let you in under my personal discretion."

"Really?!"

"…Sorry about this. She may not look it, but she's a necessary part of my work."

It wasn't that Cuneigh possessed some outstanding power outside of her wings and small size. She didn't happen to be gifted with any intelligence. From Kuuro's perspective, her spycraft techniques were terribly indiscreet. Nevertheless, she had utilitarian value—at the very least, to help ensure Kuuro's survival.

"That's great, isn't it, Kuuro? We're together again."

"Employment extended. What do you want for compensation? Aureatia should have just about anything you could ask for."

"Huh? That's okay. I don't need anything."

"…Nothing more important than payment. Especially when talking about employment. Spend the time before we arrive thinking on it."

Disregarding Kuuro and Cuneigh's back-and-forth, Elea was looking out the peephole behind the carriage.

"…Are those the pursuers you mentioned?"

Although the carriage was just about to clear the city, the Old Kingdoms' soldiers pursuing Kuuro had finally made their way through the crowds of people. Deftly mixed in with the merchant carriages, they were unable to identify the Aureatia vehicle.

"That's them. About a year ago, those Old Kingdom bastards started

making inroads in the upper echelons of Togie City. Even since Gilnes the Ruined Castle joined their faction, more and more soldiers join the cause… Judging by how their numbers are increasing, they're at the stage where they're gathering troops from other cities. They're preparing for come what may with Aureatia."

"We're quite aware. Their existence has been an even deeper-rooted problem than the New Principality."

During the age of the True Demon King, this world was brought to the brink of ruin, and all but a single member of the royal family perished.

The True Northern Kingdom. The Central Kingdom. The United Western Kingdom. The three kingdoms that once existed were all brought together under the name of the young queen to form Aureatia. However, a section of the Central Kingdom's power, which served the biggest foundation for Aureatia, were still trying to restore the Central Kingdom they all believed in. "I want some clarity on what's going to happen now. Is my job going to

be cleaning up these Old Kingdoms' loyalists?"

"All I can say is that it depends on the war situation. For example, do you know the current state of affairs with the Free City of Okahu?"

It was the name of the city ruled by the self-proclaimed demon king Morio. If Obsidian Eyes was the largest spy guild in the land, then the Free City of Okahu was the country founded by the largest mercenary guild in the land. They were known for being a group of elite soldiers who deployed their military might, rivaling that of an established nation state, unbeholden to any outside authority.

"Those warmongers, then? I heard they lend quite a number of soldiers to the New Principality."

"Presently, those two powers are the ones we need to keep an eye on, broadly speaking. If the current situation on the Free City front goes south, know that I could ask you to head over there, too."

"I want to settle on hard terms for my contract. Putting the Old Kingdoms' guys aside, I don't really want to make an enemy of the Free State."

"Ha-ha-ha. Naturally, you're right that the Old Kingdoms' loyalists are a high priority. Now, regarding Obsidian Eyes, then—"

"Wait. There are soldiers outside. Best to stay quiet."

They were no more than your garden variety soldier, of course.

However, Kuuro trusted in the foreboding premonition he had gotten when he first boarded the carriage. For him and him alone, his illogical gut instincts were more accurate than his logical train of thought. He possessed senses surpassing known knowledge and wisdom.

The carriage was just about to pass the soldiers meandering near the gate.

They weren't stopped for an inspection. "…A little too worried, don't you think?"

Elea spoke up a little while after they had passed through the city gate. "You and your clairvoyance are the only things capable of picking up a

conversation through a carriage's frame."

"Not so sure about that. Sorry, but I was born cautious."

"The Old Kingdoms in their current state shouldn't be able to set up a full travel blockade. Even after gathering all these soldiers here, they haven't placed the city under martial law. They don't have enough sway to do that. They're nothing compared to what the New Principality was like under Taren the Punished's command."

Kuuro could tell that Elea the Red Tag had some thoughts of her own regarding the New Principality's downfall. Nevertheless, he knew it wasn't something he should pry into too deeply.

The carriage continued down on the road with Togie City at their backs. The city was surrounded by woodlands, but on their right-hand side a wide marsh dominated the scenery. Deviating from the road, they continued on into the middle of the swampy mire.

"…Still, Seventeenth Minister. You're still one of the Twenty-Nine Officials at the end of the day. What were you planning to do if those guys on our heels did catch up to us? My skills aren't capable of taking a couple hundred opponents on at once."

"Would you believe me if I simply said that I prepared to make sure that didn't happen?"

"And those measures would be enough to beat back two hundred soldiers?"

"..."

"Then, what about out our safe passage through the swamp? You know the reason why there are no roads or checkpoints along this area, don't you? It's wurm territory. If we're unlucky, this whole carriage will get swallowed up in one bite."

Even now, he had a bolt loaded into the crossbow hidden up his sleeve.

However.

"Does the person in the cargo bed have something to do with it?"

"Ha-ha, the stories of that legendary clairvoyance were true, weren't they?"

An elegant smile appeared on Elea's face.

It was impossible to mobilize a large bodyguard force when not infiltrating an enemy city. However, the total weight limits this carriage structure could handle left room for one additional person, even when factoring in Kuuro's added weight.

Additionally, this carriage had already come through this stretch of marsh on the first half of the trip.

The splashing sound of the carriage wheels brushing the swamp echoed.

…Deep, even breathing. Shifted their weight. The sound of something hitting the floor… A shoulder, not a foot. Sleep.

A bodyguard of one of Aureatia's Twenty-Nine Officials, sleeping in enemy territory?

They're sleeping.

There was no longer any question in his mind—there was no other path available to Kuuro than yielding to Aureatia.

Supposing that right now, he fatally shot Elea the Red Tag. With Kuuro the Cautious's skills, he could do it in the space of a single breath, without even making a sound. He could most likely end the life of the driver, who was undoubtedly also a spy, without them realizing anything that was going on. Despite that, he was certain he couldn't react faster than the sleeping person in the cargo bed.

From the moment he snuck into this carriage, Kuuro had felt a foreboding premonition.

"Kuuro?"

At Cuneigh's words, Kuuro shifted his senses elsewhere. There was another threat from outside the carriage closing in.

"I know… A wurm's headed our way, Seventeenth Minister. Things are playing out exactly as I feared."

Looking outside the carriage, a torso, thicker than a thousand tree trunks put together and seemingly infinite in length, split through the surface before winding itself back into the ground.

It possessed neither wings nor limbs. Its evolution, progressing in the exact opposite direction of the wyvern, allowed for larger dragonkin to spend their lives underground. Its skull, which it used to dig into the hard-packed earth, was as dense as a dragon's scales. Similar to the principles that governed a dragon's breath, it could maintain Force Arts by vibrating its cranium.

Moving through the ground at will, as though swimming, and ravenously hunting for prey—these were the wurms. Only about one in twenty sightings happened so close to populated areas. Without question, this was a spot of bad luck.

"…Can you take watch over the backside of the carriage, Cuneigh?"

Kuuro muttered. He was tirelessly checking the mechanisms of his crossbow to prevent any kind of malfunction.

The bolt he loaded into the crossbow was not one used for assassinations, but a wooden-shafted bolt for sniping. Sitting in his head, Cuneigh worriedly looked up at him.

"What are you going to do?"

"When it opens its mouth, I might be able to shoot the nerve ganglion deep inside its throat. Even if I can't kill it, I think I'll still inflict enough pain to stop it in its tracks for a short while. The inside of a wurm's mouth is pretty tough, too, but… Either way, I'll just have to do what I can."

The wurm's silhouette drew close. Their enemy had clearly become aware of the carriage.

"No, Kuuro the Cautious." Elea murmured.

"That won't be necessary."

There was an explosive rupturing sound.

The sound of a foot stepping forward. The recoil from the person in the cargo bed jumping into the air sent the back part of the carriage sinking deep into the ground.

It was a man wearing red clothes, unlike anything Kuuro had ever seen before. A dull practice sword was slung atop his shoulders.

The man clearly shouted out just two simple words. "Killin' time!"

He sped through the swamp like a stone skipping across a lake. The wurm turned its colossal head toward him. There was a splash. He instantly pinpointed the locations of the wurm's lightning-fast fangs and dodged them with a leap. The wholly unfamiliar figure in red clothes made a half-spin in midair. Mid-spin, the man's shoulder collided with the wurm's scales. The blade dangling behind him wasn't keeping up with the man's own dexterous movements. However, this was all on purpose. He was building up strength like a wound spring.

The blade, which had been poised the whole time it was slung behind his back, released that pent-up energy from extremely close range.

The silver flash arced in a semicircle.

Before its body hit the ground, the wurm's scales were cut through to the flesh beneath. The wound was a fourth of the way down its body from the base of its head.

"…There's the heart."

Kuuro shuddered. Even with most of the wurm's body underground, unable to see its entire form, he was sure. The beating sound of the wurm's heartbeat was irregular. He could tell, even from this distance.

He couldn't believe the feat was something the minian, or any person of this world, could possibly try to match.

That blade length… At that distance, the slash that came right as their bodies came together should've barely been in range. Even then, it was enough to injure the relatively tiny right atrium. Not only that, but…

The swordsman landed on the ground and once again hoisted his blade over his shoulder.

The wurm stopped moving, and there was a pause—a single beat.

Its heart, with its extremely small yet fatal injury, burst open under the colossal body's blood pressure, and rivers of red gushing laterally like a crimson waterfall stained the marsh.

"Boooring. It was nowhere near the challenge I thought it'd be, c'mon."

Kuuro could hear his frustrated muttering, not directed at anyone in particular.

I can tell. That was this guy's first time killing a wurm. Like my clairvoyance, he was able to locate his heart from the outside…and instantly pieced together a plan to slice it open.

"Soujirou the Willow-Sword. That's his name."

Elea mumbled next to Kuuro.

"Aureatia requires fighting strength. Strength like yours and his." These people…

The New Principality of Lithia was no more. The official story given was that it happened in a great conflagration caused by their wyverns going out of control.

Old Kingdoms' loyalists. The Free City of Okahu. In this age, where many threats had been destroyed by the True Demon King, there now remained only a few rivals to threaten Aureatia.

The royal games…

What was Aureatia's purpose behind consolidating these abnormal and irregular abilities?

In the Queen's name, a great tournament to determine a single Hero was about to begin.

They needed to host the tournament without interference.

They're intending with this next phase to clean up all of their opposition.

Several days later in Aureatia, a figure in a dark brown coat traversed through the amber lamplight.

He was noticeably shorter than the other minian people around him, and the being he embraced in his arms was even smaller than that.

The bustling streets, far more bright and cheerful than those in Togie City, were filled with numerous conversations, bustling footsteps, and shadows perfect for an ambush. These were the only things Kuuro the Cautious picked out from the scene of the busy avenues.

"You enjoy the Aureatian play?" "…Kuuro, you slept the whole time."

"Hey, I was awake. I can't react to a surprise attack if I let myself fall asleep completely."

"Are plays not fun for you? What about singing? Food?"

"What's any of that got to do with me? You're the one who said you wanted to see a play."

Kuuro employed the small homunculus girl. Given that she was unable to

show herself in front of other people, giving her a monetary reward was meaningless, and Kuuro tried to give her whatever she asked for as much as possible. Including a request to see a play together.

"It's just, you only ever eat food that's cheaper than mine, and you never smile, so I thought about what might make you happy…"

"Being alive makes me happy."

Kuuro had no pride left. He had left Obsidian Eyes and kept a low profile in Togie City to make sure no one knew he was there, and now that Aureatia had discovered him, he obeyed them. There was a chance that if he was told to sell Cuneigh to them, he would go right ahead and do so.

Death was terrifying. It was the end of everything.

He remembered the scenery he had seen with his immensely powerful clairvoyance.

"…I know. No matter how much fun you have, no matter how lavishly you live, death comes for all, and swiftly at that. I've…always lived my life on the razor's edge. That's just how it's always been."

He had no ties to Cuneigh outside of their employment arrangement. There was no past relationship, nor did he remember ever doing her a favor to be repaid. After he broke away from Obsidian Eyes, he had encountered her by coincidence. But now, Kuuro couldn't help but depend on Cuneigh.

Everything he gave her was not because he cherished her. It was solely out of fear of betrayal.

"There's no longer any clairvoyance in me."

Assassinating important figures. Massacre as a diversionary tactic.

Incinerating villages where the Demon King's Army had spread.

He could still recall all the scenes he had witnessed with his all-sensing and wide-reaching clairvoyance.

Being ordered around by an organization, urged on by the terror of the True Demon King—he was fed up with it all.

Living in constant fear of death and stealing to survive had worn Kuuro's spirit down.

He didn't want to see people die. He didn't want to hear their screams. And so it was. From around the time he passed age twenty-one, Kuuro had slowly been losing his clairvoyant perception.

He couldn't tell whether or not there was an ambush ahead.

He hadn't sensed the movements when the wurm was closing in.

Though he possessed senses far keener than the average person, the world Kuuro saw now was no longer the same rich and robust world he had felt in the past. He had lost the delicacy that could once individually identify grains of gravel, and he could only follow movements outside of his line of sight by concentrating all his focus on them.

Continuing onward, he had arrived at a large bridge outside of town. A world for him and him alone. By now, these were the only sorts of places that would bring Kuuro the Cautious any comfort.

Kuuro placed his hands on the railing and stared at the city lights. "…Cuneigh."

Cuneigh was not unhappy. The lifespan of a homunculus was particularly short, with even the most generous estimate giving her only five years to live. If she died, what would happen to Kuuro?

To him, Cuneigh's was an existence he should have loathed most of all, and also the one most necessary to him.

"I've got a hunch. A hunch that everything will be for naught." Ultimate clairvoyance. That was all in the past.

It was withering away to the point that he needed to leave all observations outside his immediate focus in the hands of this small homunculus.

Nevertheless, though he could no longer be certain about this vague threatening premonition, he had no choice but to trust it.

"Something awful is about to happen."

There were thirty-eight days left until the disaster's arrival.