I Don’t Want to Be a Heroic Spirit

The sun rose, heralding the start of a new day.

Though Kiichi hadn't slept the entire night, she remained full of energy.

She recalled her high school days, where she juggled five morning classes, four afternoon sessions, and three periods of evening study—a grueling twelve classes in total. Despite this, she managed to sleep through ten of them, finishing her homework during the remaining two study sessions. She was also the first to sleep during lunch breaks and at night, earning her the nickname "Sleeping God" from her classmates.

Her homeroom teacher had even called her parents, suggesting they take her to a doctor to check if she had some kind of condition.

One particularly amusing incident stood out: one morning, her entire dorm overslept, and they arrived at class after the morning self-study had already ended. The teacher berated them, accusing them of sneaking phones into the dorm and staying up late.

The teacher wasn't wrong—several dormmates had indeed smuggled in phones—but when questioned, they all feigned innocence, insisting they'd gone to bed early. The teacher remained unconvinced.

Yet when it came to Kiichi, the teacher's attitude shifted entirely. Upon hearing her claim that she was the earliest to sleep every night, the teacher nodded without a shred of doubt.

Whether to feel proud or offended by this blind trust, Kiichi had never been sure.

Now, as a Servant, she could do things her human self would never have imagined—like writing continuously for 24 hours without stopping. Servants didn't need food or bathroom breaks, so she could truly work non-stop.

…Wait. Wasn't the dream supposed to be gaming for 24 hours straight? Why was her first thought about becoming a writing machine?

When Kiichi returned to the village, the sky was just beginning to brighten.

Instead of heading straight to Chika's house, she wandered around the village.

Her first priority, naturally, was the "protective formation" surrounding the village.

"Hmm… so that's how it is."

The formation wasn't visible to the naked eye, but for a great onmyōji like Kiichi, it posed no challenge.

Moreover, despite being an Assassin-class Servant, she possessed a B+ rank in Territory Creation, enhancing her understanding of formations.

"One main core and three subsidiary cores… This formation not only shields the village from external monsters but also conceals the dimensional space where the main core resides. Only by destroying the three subsidiary cores can the entrance to the main core's dimension appear. What a remarkable design."

Even Kiichi couldn't help but marvel at its intricacy.

She discovered that this sealed space contained a smaller, embedded sub-dimension.

The sub-dimension overlapped with the village, and its entrance would only manifest after dismantling the three subsidiary cores near the village.

She had already identified one of these cores—it was Chika's house.

As for the other two…

Kiichi raised her head and followed the flow of elemental energy. Her eyes locked onto two mountains to the east and west of the village.

"And there's an unexpected bonus."

Through her analysis, Kiichi uncovered a specific mechanism within the sealed space: once all three subsidiary cores were neutralized, every entity inside the space would be forcibly transferred to the main core's dimension.

This meant that she, Sara, and all the Abyssal Beasts would be transported together.

In other words, she didn't need to spend her nights hunting Abyssal Beasts one by one. By eliminating the subsidiary cores, she could lure all the monsters into one place and eliminate them en masse.

It seemed the onmyōji who designed this seal understood that containment was merely a temporary solution. They had placed their hopes on someone eventually entering the seal and dealing with the monsters inside.

Kiichi just happened to align with their intentions.

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As she strolled through the village, traces of human presence lingered everywhere, yet no people could be found.

It was as if some calamity had swept through silently, erasing the villagers and leaving behind an eerie stillness.

The absence of signs of deliberate escape ruled out the possibility of the villagers fleeing. If they had, there would have been clear traces—packed belongings, discarded items, or hastily abandoned homes.

But there were none.

Kiichi slipped through a window into one of the homes.

Technically, this was trespassing, something Fenhuan Yu wouldn't have dared to do for fear of fines or legal consequences.

But did Kiichi care? Not in the slightest.

Inside, she found no evidence of packed belongings, frantic departure, or even signs of abduction. It was as if the residents had simply stepped out for a moment and never returned.

If only one house were like this, Kiichi might have assumed the resident wandered too far and fell victim to the Abyssal Beasts. But every house was the same, which made the situation far more unsettling.

Surely this wasn't like the Nordic Lostbelt, where villagers were sent out at a certain age to be devoured by giants or beasts due to resource limitations.

Here, there were no such constraints. So why was Chika the only one left?

Unlike in the Nordic Lostbelt, she didn't have Sherlock Holmes by her side. If he were here, he'd probably have figured it out already, smugly saying, "It's elementary, my dear friend."

Of course, Kiichi knew Holmes well enough to know he wouldn't reveal the answer outright. He'd remain tight-lipped, performing a series of baffling actions instead. Even if asked directly, he wouldn't explain himself—just like he did to Watson in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.

That was the most infuriating thing about him: he only unveiled the truth at the very end, often accompanied by maddeningly cryptic remarks.

According to Holmes, it was to prevent his assumptions from influencing others' actions, even though his "assumptions" were almost always spot-on.

Spending time with Holmes was an exercise in patience. Not only because of his penchant for declaring everything "elementary" but also because prolonged exposure to him made you acutely aware of just how outmatched your intellect was.

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Hello! Thank you so much for reading this chapter. WiseTL has worked hard to bring these wonderful stories to you, and I'm so happy we could share this moment together! Don't you think stories are a little like dreams? Each one has its own colors and shapes, and they grow even brighter when shared with others.

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