"We're saved... It's finally over."
After leaving the haunted hospital, the four of them returned to Eiko Hozuki's little van. The moment they got in, Eiko and Keitaro Gentoga collapsed into their seats like boneless lumps of mud, looking utterly drained.
This trip had truly scared them half to death. At the start, Xu Fu had said the evil spirit they were after this time was on the weaker side, and that had made them lower their guard a little. And to be fair, Xu Fu hadn't been wrong—the old woman evil spirit had only really been impressive at running away. But the giant evil spirit that showed up afterward and ate the old woman was genuinely terrifying.
Keitaro had even fallen into that giant evil spirit's mouth. It was certainly a one-of-a-kind experience, though he absolutely never wanted to go through it a second time.
"Come to think of it, we caused such a huge commotion on the fourth floor, and we even broke a lot of things, but nobody noticed," Eiko said from the driver's seat, finally voicing the question that had been bothering her. "The patients in the rooms and the doctors and nurses all acted like they hadn't noticed anything at all and just kept doing what they were doing. What was that about, Xu Fu-chan?"
Eiko's intuition told her that this abnormality had something to do with Xu Fu.
"Just a repelling barrier~, basic stuff," Xu Fu said, pulling a milk candy from her pocket. Noticing Yayoi Hozuki's gaze, she handed her one too, popped one into her own mouth, and continued speaking while chewing. "I planted a suggestion in their subconscious so they wouldn't notice anything happening over there."
In the TYPE-MOON worldview, the very first rule every magus had to follow was "Never expose Mystery to ordinary people." Doing so would lower its Mystery, which in turn weakened the magecraft magi wielded. That was why the first thing every magus had to learn was how not to expose Mystery.
Gas leak cover stories, gas leak cover stories, more gas leak cover stories, silencing witnesses, gas leak cover stories, repelling barriers, gas leak cover stories... and so on.
Why mention gas leaks so many times?
Because they worked, of course.
But those were rules magi had to follow, not Xu Fu. She was a Taoist from China, part of an entirely different system. The Taoism Arts and immortal arts they used were classified by magi as Chinese magecraft or Thought Magecraft—a school unto itself. There was no need for her to preserve Mystery the way those magecraft fanatics did.
"Wow... Taoism Arts really are convenient and all-purpose," Eiko said with heartfelt admiration. "And those broken walls and shattered windows too—you just went swish-swish and fixed them all, and they looked exactly the same as before they were damaged. It was like turning back time. With that trick alone, Xu Fu-chan, you could put every repairman in the world out of business."
Keitaro gave a wry smile at Eiko's wild leap from Xu Fu's Taoism Arts to professional repairmen.
That said, he did agree with part of what she had said...
The Taoism Arts Xu Fu had shown really were convenient and all-purpose.
"If it hadn't been for this bracelet, I really would've been in danger back then..."
He lowered his eyes to the gold bracelet on his right wrist. It was no longer shining brilliantly like before, and now it looked no different from an ordinary gold bracelet.
And while he was feeling relieved, even Keitaro himself didn't notice that there was also a trace of regret in his heart.
If, in the future, he ran into another terrifying evil spirit, and this gold bracelet protected him just like it had today...
Wouldn't that make it much harder for him to ever experience that thrill of fear, terror, and heart-pounding horror again?
Wouldn't that be... a shame?
Was this kind of ease... really okay?
Was this really what he wanted?
Keitaro was lost in confusion, without even realizing that he was.
Keitaro Gentoga, Eiko Hozuki, Yayoi Hozuki—each of them had their own reasons for approaching horror and throwing themselves into danger again and again.
But if that were the only reason, it would never have driven them this far.
The three of them shared something in common:
They all loved horror, loved it so deeply they couldn't pull themselves free of it. They thrilled at fears one could barely walk away from intact, and actively sought out that cold shiver crawling down the spine.
"Huh? Xu Fu-chan, you're looking for a place to live right now?"
Eiko had planned to drive Xu Fu home, only to learn that Xu Fu was currently staying at a hotel and was even thinking about buying a house.
"If you're buying a house, that'll cost a lot, won't it? Do you have enough money, Xu Fu-chan? And, um... don't you have any relatives or friends around here? What about your family? Are you living alone?" Eiko asked curiously.
"Xu Fu-chan's on her own~, all alone in an unfamiliar place. The only thing I never have to worry about is getting kidnapped by traffickers. If I ended up at a trafficker's den, the unlucky ones would be them. Might even do society a favor and clean out a few pieces of trash while I'm at it."
Xu Fu smiled faintly and said with great swagger, "As for money, there's no need to worry at all. To us, money is just an external thing. Any problem that can be solved with money isn't a problem."
She'd visited so many worlds by now—if she still had to worry about money every time she arrived somewhere, then all those years would have been wasted. In a place like Academy City, it might be more troublesome, but in a world like Dark Gathering, where Mystery wasn't especially high and the tech level wasn't especially advanced, Xu Fu had several ways to make money quickly.
And all of them were perfectly legal.
Because the law simply hadn't written them down.
Apparently, though, Keitaro and the others weren't thinking of Xu Fu as some kind of ungovernable outlaw. They were only thinking...
So being a Taoist is that profitable?
"Whoa! So Xu Fu is rich?" Yayoi said in amazement. "Then does that mean you have endless chocolate and little cakes?"
"If you eat that much chocolate and cake, be careful or you'll get high blood sugar~!"
"To say something that harshly realistic to a child... Xu Fu, are you a devil? Have you already been corrupted by the darkness of the adult world? In that case, it seems there is now an immense generation gap between us that can never be crossed."
Yayoi gave her a dead-fish stare, then subtly scooted her butt away from Xu Fu as if drawing a line between them.
"Xu Fu-chan, what kind of place are you looking for?" Eiko suddenly asked. "Yayoi and I might be buying a house soon too, so if you don't mind, we could help you think it over."
The house Eiko wanted to buy wasn't for them to live in.
It was for evil spirits.
The biggest difference between Graduates and ordinary evil spirits was this: Yayoi could safely keep dolls imprisoning ordinary evil spirits in her own room, but the same method could not contain Graduates. They were powerful evil spirits that could bring terrible disasters to the five houses around them, too dangerous to keep at home and requiring special restraints.
Since they couldn't be kept in the house, Yayoi deliberately stored Graduates in remote, deserted places, only retrieving them when she needed their strength.
Eiko felt that having to go all the way out there every time to retrieve a Graduate was too much of a hassle, so she proposed simply buying a house to use as a "dorm" for them.
Since Eiko and the others were willing to help her with ideas, Xu Fu naturally had no reason to refuse their kindness. Even if she had money, that didn't change the fact that she was unfamiliar with the area. When it came to information, she still needed to learn from locals.
"Once we get back, I can start making Eiko's bracelet."
"Wait, what?" Keitaro immediately noticed something off and turned around from the front passenger seat to look at Xu Fu in confusion. "Xu Fu-chan, didn't you say before that you didn't have the materials to make a bracelet right now?"
Xu Fu nodded. "That's right. I didn't then... but now I do~!"
With a bright smile on her face, she took out a bundle of black hair and a huge tooth. Both objects radiated a deeply evil power without end, making Keitaro's face go pale and his hands and feet turn cold.
"Xu... Xu Fu..." Keitaro said, the corner of his mouth twitching as he pointed at the two items in her hands. In a trembling voice, he slowly asked, "Those two things you're holding... could they be...?"
"That's~ right~! They're that giant evil spirit's hair and tooth! I picked them up~!" Xu Fu said matter-of-factly, completely unconcerned with Keitaro's feelings. "If it's a boss fight, then of course there have to be drops! Otherwise wouldn't that big boss have died way too unfairly~? Besides, that old woman evil spirit may have been awful, but she was still our loot, and then that giant evil spirit went and ate her. So is it really so outrageous for me to get a little gold back from her~? This is what Xu Fu-chan earned~!"
"Mhm! Xu Fu's right!"
"See~? Yayoi thinks so too."
Unlike Keitaro, Eiko wasn't frightened by the hair and tooth Xu Fu had brought out. What concerned her was something else.
"Xu Fu-chan, are you saying... those two things are the materials for the bracelet?"
"Mhm~!" Xu Fu nodded.
Keitaro's pupils trembled violently.
"If you're making Eiko's bracelet out of an evil spirit's hair and tooth... then mine is...?"
"Oh, for yours, I used the skull mokugyo from that monk evil spirit we ran into at the abandoned temple as one of the materials." Xu Fu smiled and gave Keitaro a thumbs-up. "Well? Pretty useful, right? If you think it's good, don't forget to leave Xu Fu Art Studio a nice review, dear customer~!"
Keitaro: "..."
He suddenly didn't find his gold bracelet nearly as reassuring as before.
If anything, it had become kind of terrifying...
"And by the way, if you dare leave a bad review..." Xu Fu kept smiling as sweetly as if she'd been soaked in honey, while casually rotating her wrist one hundred eighty degrees until her thumb pointed downward. "I'll send evil spirits to your room to throw a party, so you can have a different nightmare every night, dear customer~!"
"What kind of shop threatens its customers like that?! And how can you say something that terrifying with such a bright smile on your face?!"
"Tch~! You really don't understand Xu Fu-chan's good intentions at all, kid." Xu Fu clicked her tongue, then started explaining. "I'm doing this for your own good, okay?"
"For our own good?" Keitaro raised a brow, finding that hard to believe.
"Of course. Didn't we agree before? If you want to get a bracelet from me, then you have to pay for the materials. Using part of an evil spirit's body as material is the easiest and most cost-effective method."
Xu Fu rolled her eyes. "If you two can get your hands on treasures like thousand-year-old water-sunken wood, thousand-year-old lightning-struck wood, meteoric iron, or ten-thousand-year cold iron, then sure, I can make it without these two things. The question is, can your wallets survive that?"
"..."
This abrupt burst of harsh reality was not something they had expected.
It was true that they had both said that if they could resolve or suppress the curses on them, then no matter how much it cost, it would be worth it.
But neither of them was rich.
There was, in the end, a limit to how much money they could afford to spend.
"If you use those two things as materials... nothing bad will happen, right?" Keitaro asked uneasily, though the truth was that Xu Fu had already shaken him.
"Come on, have a little more faith in Xu Fu-chan, would you~? Why would I take something that would harm you and use it on you? What would I even gain from that?" Xu Fu frowned slightly. "Don't worry so much. Those two are only supporting materials. The main material is something else. Didn't the bracelet I gave you, Keitaro, have none of that evil aura on it at all?"
That was true. Keitaro had never sensed anything like the evil presence of an evil spirit from the bracelet. If anything, its power had felt holy, warm, and deeply reassuring.
Now that Xu Fu had gone this far in explaining it, there was no way Keitaro could keep doubting her. If he upset her and she decided not to make the bracelet after all, that would be a real problem.
At first, Eiko hadn't actually wanted to get rid of the curse on her. In her eyes, the curse lingering in her hand was proof of the bond between her and Keitaro. It brought her pain, yes—but it also linked her to him.
The thought that Keitaro would continue exploring horror and fighting terrifying evil spirits in order to help lift her curse...
That always made her heart race.
But on second thought, the bracelet Xu Fu was making wouldn't actually eradicate the curse in her body. She would still keep exploring supernatural incidents together with Keitaro after this, so there didn't seem to be any need to resist the idea so much.
And besides...
If the two of them were both wearing the same bracelet, then wouldn't that make them a matching pair?
Just thinking about it made her a little excited.