Tokyo bombing incident Nth time

Yuri suppressed his inner scream and quickly left the platform. If he stayed any longer, he might not be able to resist fighting with that annoying guy, and then he'd probably be pinned to the ground and beaten... He hadn't forgotten that the camera spirit was a level higher than him—even if it didn't look like a combat type.

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.

After leaving quickly, Yuri found another problem that needed to be confirmed: whether the other party's surveillance cameras could actually see spirits.

Logically speaking, unless a camera has been specially modified (what kind of modification did Hojo Rei's camera undergo?), it should not be able to record a virtual body walking in the twilight.

But if you add a camera spirit, the problem seems to get quite complicated.

Unfortunately, even if you go back and ask, the answer is usually no.

The immediate priority is to find a reporter as soon as possible, and through her, inform Mingmei about the need to be aware of the cameras. Then, we need to head to the rendezvous point near the landfill.

Although there is plenty of time, the journey may not be smooth, so it is best to start as early as possible.

Chapter Ninety-Four: Nightfall

Akemi learned about the camera spirit via phone and then said she knew about it.

That's all I said, "I understand," without adding anything else.

Judging from the background noise in the call, she must have been speeding along on her motorcycle... Anyway, now that she knew about it, Yuri was relieved, and then he heard Akemi hang up the phone.

She seemed busy, but it didn't look like she was in any danger.

Yuri handed the phone back to the reporter, nodded in acknowledgment, and prepared to turn and leave.

"Are you leaving already? Have a safe trip. ...I forgot to mention before, don't forget you said you'd help me find information, don't die so easily, I've already added you to my friend list." The reporter nodded in return.

The same applies to Yuri, but obviously this time it's not Yuri's place to worry.

Yuri walked down the street, dodging swarms of rats.

Indeed, as mentioned before, the rats travel along relatively fixed routes between the junkyard and the veil node.

This allowed him to move freely over a large area.

If you weren't trying to avoid cameras, it would probably be the same as walking down the street normally.

He had already come to the answer to that question himself: if the camera spirits couldn't somehow see the spirits in the surveillance equipment, they shouldn't know that he and Mingmei were traveling together.

The answer is yes, they can, at least sometimes.

So Yuri is now avoiding every camera.

Fortunately, Mingmei had told Yuri the general locations of the cameras a long time ago. Although she didn't specify where each camera was located, Yuri at least knew where they were usually placed.

Try to avoid it as much as possible.

Upon closer reflection, Yuri wasn't actually that sure, but he preferred to believe he was.

But there was no other way.

Yuri, Yuri, stop scaring yourself!

Did you just walk right under the camera?!

Thus, Yuri's mind was racing with a multitude of different thoughts, which greatly slowed down his actions.

In the past, when he said that others had the happiness of ignorance, he mostly didn't actually think that was happiness; he was just being sarcastic. Now, he truly understands what the happiness of ignorance is.

While whether one must use pain as a contrast to experience happiness remains an unknown to Yuri, he now deeply feels the pain of having knowledge.

Yuri stopped, filled with resentment and complaints.

A swarm of rats was passing by on the street ahead, and as Akemi said, there was a large rat standing upright among them.

Yuri hid in the shadows and began to observe their actions.

Although they seem quite relaxed, not deliberately taking a few steps and then stopping to observe their surroundings, Yuri will still be spotted if he gets too close.

Then he would be chased around the city in a chaotic frenzy, greatly disrupting Yuri's plans.

Within seconds he decided to stay put and wait for the rats to pass before taking action.

Through this distance and the relatively sparse crowd in between, Yuri focused his attention on the largest one.

It knew nothing about it.

The information obtained was limited, and Yuri was quite certain that this was not due to obstruction, but rather because there was simply not much information about it to begin with.

There are three points that are most noteworthy.

Firstly, it has a weak connection with the surrounding rat population, making it difficult to determine its specific effects.

However, considering their behavior patterns, this connection likely creates an effect where, without any coercion, the rats are more inclined to follow him.

It is unlikely that the rat population will be further strengthened, as the connection is too weak.

Secondly, this giant rat that stood upright was indeed one or two levels stronger than the smaller rats, and its level was similar to Yuri's—but it was obvious that it was empty inside, lacked a sense of power, and possessed a kind of spiritual energy that did not originate from itself.

It's not that Yuri himself possesses any sense of power, but the feeling he's experiencing seems exaggerated, with a significant portion being inflated. — Akemi's judgment is likely correct; this rat spirit's level is abnormal.

Although it is still significantly stronger than level one.

Thirdly, they don't seem to be very intelligent.

Whether they are ghosts or spirits, the spirits that Yuri sees at the Level 2 level all have the intelligence of a normal person (considering that there are also mentally challenged people among the normal people, it is normal for some to behave in a more mentally challenged manner).

Mingmei claims that a higher rank does not mean higher intelligence, but only more experience—and this experience may not even be applicable, but a rank that is too low will indeed lack the ability to think.

Yuri suspected that lower-level spirits did not have the opportunity to develop their thinking organs—regardless of what they actually used to think, the structure might not be perfect at such a low level.

According to the current dividing line, the benchmark for perfect thinking ability is Level 2. Once you reach this level, you can't blame anyone else for not being able to think.

At least that's what Yuri thought before he saw these spirit rats.

Now, he judged that these spirit rats were probably quite unintelligent—Yuri had watched them shoo away rats that got too close, and then immediately pull them back with a squeak.

Based on the previous conclusion, they were likely newly promoted and had not yet effectively mastered their intelligence, perhaps at the same level as Yuri, who had just developed self-awareness.

In addition, there is one more inference, which Yuri cannot guarantee is absolutely correct, but is most likely true.

Based on Mingmei's experience and the spiritual energy they possessed, Yuri believed that they did not have outward-emitting spiritual energy.

Overall, these spirit rats are not as scary as they look. Their bodies have reached the lower limit of a level two spirit (tentative version, Yuri will revise it when he encounters weaker ones), but their supporting abilities are very insufficient.

Even Yuri should be able to handle three or four at the same time.

The problem lies on the other side: just how many of these cannon fodder did the Rat King actually produce?

If Yuri is not mistaken, the raw material base for this kind of cannon fodder should be inexhaustible.

We can only hope that it needs other materials or has other limitations... Otherwise, too many ants can kill an elephant, and the gap between Yuri and them is far less than the gap between an elephant and an ant.

The rat swarm is about to pass by.

With a little time before they disappeared from sight, Yuri put his last chance into figuring out the purpose of that spiritual energy.

It wasn't very successful; he got some guesses, and then the rats disappeared from sight.

Whoever the one wielding that spiritual power is, he must be stronger than Yuri.

While a stronger character's power isn't necessarily harder to understand, this was precisely the case. Yuri couldn't comprehend the principle behind this spiritual energy's effectiveness, let alone its detailed effects; he could only conclude it was an enhancement-type ability.

He believed he could manage to dispel it upon contact, but the cost was estimated to be substantial, potentially exceeding the cost of releasing the effect.

After mentally reviewing the surrounding terrain, Yuri abandoned the idea of ​​continuing the pursuit, as the risk was too great.

Yuri believed that his observation range was slightly larger than that of the rats, as evidenced by his encounter in front of Akemi's residence, but this range was probably not that large.

In a straight line, with nothing else to attract his attention (such as walls and corners), he lacked the confidence to keep avoiding the rats, let alone while also having to keep an eye on them.

To perfectly avoid the swarm of rats in this situation, he would need to find a way to turn himself into a shadow and stick to the ground—just thinking about it, who could actually do that?

Give up, there will be other opportunities later.

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.

He then continued moving until he encountered the rats again near the designated rendezvous point.

They were roughly the same number (estimated from their visual size), roughly the same speed of movement, and even the large rat spirit standing in the middle was roughly the same.

Fully mass-produced? That's truly... amazing.

Yuri found another suitable hiding place before the rats passed through the area.

Continue to observe the rat's spirit.

Unfortunately, there weren't many other gains.

Yuri was certain that he could dispel the spiritual force if he made actual contact.

If the previous analysis is correct, this will downgrade the opponent back to its original state; it might be a relatively strong weak spirit, but ultimately it will still be a weak spirit.

Yuri didn't think the other party could put up any resistance during this process. Of course, it could attack Yuri, but it couldn't avoid contact with Yuri by fighting with only its body, fangs, and claws. The difference was just how much damage it could inflict on Yuri before the effect wore off... probably not much.

The question is, how much energy would be required to dispel this spiritual force?

In this duel, Yuri's actual opponent is the caster, the mastermind behind it all—the Rat King himself. Its strength is clearly far superior to Yuri's. Even if Yuri manages to subtly intervene in situations where the Rat King isn't particularly focused on, neutralizing its spiritual power… it would likely be extremely taxing. This could even exceed the losses from a normal head-on battle.

Unfortunately, to avoid alerting Yuri, he couldn't conduct the test here immediately.

Yuri arrived at the rendezvous point after the rat swarm left.

He was the first to arrive; Mingmei and other possible reinforcements were probably still on their way.

Yuri carefully concealed himself, trying his best to reduce his presence and overflowing spiritual energy—he didn't know if this would work, but he decided to struggle for now.

Yuri had some doubts about whether he had been doing things like "I don't know if it will work, but I'll give it a try anyway" a lot lately.

It seems we were indeed unprepared for the possible environment. Perhaps starting today, raising our preparations to the level of anticipating the apocalypse would be the best course of action... No, that would be too exaggerated.

Yuri wouldn't believe any nonsense about the world repeatedly exploding; that's just cultist ramblings, and it doesn't make sense in terms of probability.

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.

Yuri regretted that the agreed time was too late.

He probably set off around 7 p.m., and it took him about two hours to get there (it definitely wouldn't have taken that long if he had taken a straight line, but he didn't). It should be around 9 or 10 p.m. now.

He initially greatly overestimated the density of the rats and cameras, giving himself twice the time.

The agreed meeting time was midnight.

There were still two hours until the future—he had to crouch for two hours in a place where the rats could pass at any moment.

Even if Mingmei's chosen meeting point is no longer on the rat swarm's planned route, the fact that it's near the starting point means that a slight error could lead them through this area.

This is not a good sign.

Perhaps we should retreat for now and find a safer place to observe this area.

Yuri looked around, searching for a suitable place to take refuge.

The open space about fifty meters away offered no cover whatsoever, and was even less sheltered than the carport where we were currently sitting.

The alley about 100 meters away is out of the question; it seems quite possible that the rats would pass through there directly, and if they did, they would have virtually no way to escape.

Even though it's a narrow alley, the rooftops of the houses on both sides of the alley are out of the question because the view is too poor. And if you can see what's below, you can also see what's below, which would be too close.

After eliminating several points in sequence according to this principle, Yuri selected the target.

A tall building about 150 meters away... about ten stories high.

Once Yuri gets to the top of that building, his field of vision will be roughly right here—but he has to be careful, as Yuri has been to rooftops before, and some high-rise buildings have surveillance cameras installed on the rooftops.

He had to act quickly. Just as he was looking for a suitable new hiding place, two groups of rats passed by him. One of them even became suspicious of his location—these guys were quite sensitive when they got close. Was it because of the ticket?

Seizing the opportunity, during the interval between the rat swarm's departures, Yuri quickly slipped out of the rendezvous point and headed towards the target.

The journey went smoothly, and Yuri was quite certain that he had not been discovered.

I circled the building, using the wall as a cover to avoid the obvious surveillance cameras, and peered through the window at the guardhouse...

Although he couldn't see clearly, Yuri was certain that he had seen part of the rooftop scene.

He knew it wouldn't be a good thing, but he had already come up with a plan.

It floated up the wall to the top floor, but instead of going up to the roof, it stayed on the wall outside the window on the top floor.

Yuri felt a bit like a gecko, so he turned around and lay flat on the wall.

That should do. It's high enough to avoid the rats while still allowing you to see the meeting point.

They could even see some things inside the junkyard, which was an unexpected surprise. Yuri wasn't entirely without hope, but the distance was indeed a bit too great.

When you're close, you don't notice much, but it becomes much more obvious when you're further away.