[So the omen of danger had already appeared... back then.]
As her own awakened memories intertwined with Soga Yura's, Su Yuzu felt a sudden pang of frustration well up inside her.
Frustration at her own obliviousness.
Not that she blamed her sister for being the one who had first noticed the white fog spreading across the sea.
For a child of that age, noticing fog slowly creeping and blooming over the water's surface — that was nothing more than ordinary childhood curiosity.
Inside Su Yuzu's mind, the outline of what had happened twelve years ago was gradually, inexorably taking shape.
And then she recalled something else she had overlooked.
Iori's father had apparently gone missing around that same time — twelve years ago.
As much as she hated to believe it... Iori's father might well have been the mastermind behind that rebellion. Or at least one of them.
They had decided that Soga Retsu would not be coming back.
Or rather — they had decided they could handle Soga Retsu.
And so they chose that very day to make their move against Soga Yura and Su Yuzu. Perhaps not to kill the two sisters outright — perhaps only to take the young girls hostage and use them as leverage over the Soga clan.
But Soga Iori — who had watched over both sisters since birth and had loved them as her own little sisters from the very beginning — chose to run.
She had already made some arrangement with Soga Ishikawa Irube, it seemed.
That was why she had left Su Yuzu and Soga Yura by the roadside near the bay, then drawn the pursuers' hatred onto herself and driven away alone.
A city where even Tokyo Bay lay beneath the radiance of Saint Michael's light was, in truth, a safe place.
But sometimes, what was more dangerous than Aberrants... was people.
[If only...]
Su Yuzu's gaze remained fixed on the white fog spreading across the dark sea.
[Nothing had gone wrong.]
Her head was splitting — a pain so fierce she felt it might crack her skull apart.
It was exactly like those moments when she tried to dredge up fragments of the past — the fragments she had always assumed had been deleted from her memory by Soga Yura's failed Mind Control.
A tremendous terror detonated somewhere deep inside the girl, and she could not stop herself from trembling.
Soga Yura gently tightened her grip around Su Yuzu's hand.
Su Yuzu looked at Soga Yura, sitting before her.
Through Soga Yura's eyes, she watched the white fog spreading across the sea.
She knew it was nothing but a stage constructed by Soga Yura's ability. And yet she could not stop herself from wanting to cry out a warning to her past self.
[Be careful...]
[Please, be careful.]
She knew it was impossible. And still, Su Yuzu wanted to change what had already happened.
The girls — utterly unaware of what was unfolding around them — hid in the trees on the far side of the road. Su Yuzu held Soga Yura's hand in an iron grip, doing her best to soothe her.
Papa will come back.
Sister Iori will come back too.
"Then... what about Mama?"
When Soga Yura asked that question, Su Yuzu saw her past self's eyes flicker for just a moment.
"Mama has only gone to the Edge of Aberration. Sooner or later we'll meet her again."
So that was what she had believed back then.
The Abyss — a place not unlike the underworld, where all people returned after death.
Somehow... that didn't seem so bad.
Even so —
Su Yuzu's gaze had never once left the white fog creeping across the pitch-black surface of the sea.
Fog that should only ever appear at night was spreading now in the full light of day, growing in unnatural, eerie silence.
And before long it had crept all the way to the seawall and the road.
A chill swept through Su Yuzu — not through herself, but through... past Soga Yura.
"Yu... Yuzu."
"It's cold..."
By this point, her past self had already sensed something was wrong.
But there was nothing she could do except hold Soga Yura's hand and clutch the Holy Relic Soga Iori had left behind.
From within the white fog... the silhouette of a woman's body emerged.
Dark golden vertical pupils lit up inside the mist.
The woman — bare from the waist up — glided through the fog, surged to shore, and... well, glided. Because where her lower body should have been, there was a magnificent fish tail, like that of some great sea creature.
She was not an Aberrant.
She was a Beast.
The woman's expression was cold and sharp, her lips pressed into a thin line.
Her bewitching white curves bore a massive wound that sent a jolt of dread through the heart — ink-black blood traced across pale skin, carrying with it a kind of sacred, sorrowful beauty, like tears streaming down the face of a Madonna.
Soga Yura was so frightened she was nearly in tears.
The girl clung desperately to her little sister, and Su Yuzu clamped a hand over her mouth.
Su Yuzu could only pray.
Pray that 「Dreamless Regret」 could conceal the two of them — mask their presence, make the Catastrophe Beast overlook their existence entirely.
And then... Su Yuzu watched as the mermaid-form woman glided to stand directly before them and bent down, those dark golden vertical pupils gleaming with undisguised mockery as she stared at the one with the covered mouth — Soga Yura.
"How delightful —"
"I nearly overlooked you two entirely."
Her voice thundered through the girls' mental world like a detonation.
Su Yuzu watched her past self and Soga Yura — doing everything in their power to stay silent, holding their breath — exhale the tiniest wisps of breath that parted the white fog, and suddenly understood.
This white fog was the woman's domain.
Perhaps 「Dreamless Regret」 truly could conceal the two of them — mask their presence, hide their existence.
But... the breathing that was an unavoidable fact of being alive had still drawn the woman's attention.
She watched the woman reach out and lightly stroke Soga Yura's face — that bewitching, alluring face, magnificent and fearsome as a demon's, scales beginning to creep across its edges, curling into a monstrous smile.
Thump —
Thump thump thump thump —
Even now, Su Yuzu could feel her own heart hammering, faster and faster, refusing to slow.
Su Yuzu released Soga Yura and desperately tried to shove her away.
Through Soga Yura's perspective, Su Yuzu watched her past self fling herself directly at the Catastrophe Beast in its woman-shaped form.
Only now did Su Yuzu truly grasp the woman's towering enormity.
They were creatures from entirely different worlds.
Run?
How could she run.
How could she ever hope to escape.
Su Yuzu watched as her own point of view lurched violently upward — and there in the white fog, her young and still-childlike self wore an expression of pure fury, eyes nearly splitting at the corners.
The mermaid woman opened her mouth wide — as if she intended to swallow the girl whole in a single bite.
Su Yuzu could see what lay inside that open mouth: something grotesque — fleshy walls that seemed to writhe and pulse as though alive, and a tongue that darted out, lithe and sinuous as a serpent.
"Yuzu!!!" A voice choked with sobs.
Soga Yura stared in horror as the woman's tongue coiled around her own ankle.
"Let her go —"
A voice wrecked and hoarse from crying.
The mermaid — majestic and terrifying as some creature torn from myth — suddenly let a mocking look cross her face as she regarded this fascinating pair of twin sisters.
"Let... go..."
But the very next second, her expression collapsed into something utterly unrecognizable — absolute, primal terror.
"Ah — ah — ah..."
"You are..."
"You ARE —!!!"
The entire sky turned grey.
Swirling grey ash drifted down from above — falling, falling — and when it neared the surface of the sea it ignited all at once, transforming into dark-red embers.
Within the white fog.
The little girl stood like a sovereign descended upon the world.
____
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