Starting With The Sefirah Castle In The Anime World

Ren, who was being held, felt slightly stiff.

However, he could clearly sense Fujiwara Chika's fear through her trembling.

She was terrified, so much so that her body wouldn't stop shaking.

Yet, despite being scared to death, she was forcing herself to watch.

Ren sighed softly.

"...Hayasaka-san, continue."

"Understood." Hayasaka gave a slight nod and resumed the video.

The scene transitioned to the basement of the laboratory—a confined, enclosed space.

The entrance was sealed off with thick plastic sheeting.

Everyone knew instinctively: this was the critical part.

They held their breath and watched in silence.

The camera moved past the plastic barrier and into the underground lab.

As the lights turned on, the interior was revealed.

"…!?"

The girls couldn't help but cover their mouths.

What greeted their eyes were dozens of lab tables, each occupied by a corpse.

The victims spanned different ages.

There were elderly individuals, middle-aged men and women, and even children who appeared no older than ten.

All of them were strapped to the tables. The deep marks on their wrists and ankles painted a vivid picture of the unimaginable agony they endured before death.

Their faces were frozen in expressions of sheer horror.

Numerous needle marks were visible on their bodies.

It wasn't hard to imagine what kind of experiments these drug dealers had conducted on them.

The more emotionally sensitive members of the group reached their limits.

"Ugh...!"

Ran and Sonoko felt a powerful wave of nausea crash over them.

They scrambled for the trash cans that had been prepared beforehand.

"Ughhhh!!!"

Their stomachs revolted, and they vomited uncontrollably into the bins.

The sight, the stench, the implication of what had occurred in that lab overwhelmed them.

As Ran and Sonoko lost control, the others followed.

One by one, each girl grabbed a nearby trash can and vomited as their bodies reacted to the trauma.

Ren felt Chika's trembling intensify.

Without a word, he extended his hand and used his abilities to pull a trash can from across the room, placing it in front of her.

"Th-thank you... Ughhh!!!"

Her gratitude was cut short as she bent forward and emptied her stomach.

See? I told you it was better not to watch.

Even Ren himself felt uncomfortable looking at the horrific scene.

Those individuals on the lab tables had become addicts due to the experiments conducted by the drug dealers.

Their endless suffering had planted a seed of hatred so strong that many of their souls had likely turned into malevolent spirits after death.

The true perpetrators of these crimes were well-known to these spirits.

But because the village chief hadn't been present at the back-mountain base, those vengeful spirits remained trapped above the island, unable to exact their revenge.

Ren gently turned to the side and began patting Chika's back to help ease her nausea.

But in such situations, there was no way to stop vomiting until their stomachs were completely emptied.

The only one who seemed relatively stable was Isumi.

Her eyes burned with fury—but not fear.

It was clear she'd witnessed similarly horrific scenes before.

Everyone else was visibly shaken.

Even Kaguya, who was usually rational and composed, and Maria, who always maintained an air of maturity, were overcome by the shock.

No one had been spared.

After ensuring Chika could manage on her own for a moment, Ren stood up and walked over to grab some tissues.

He returned, handing a few sheets to Chika.

"...Thank you."

Chika accepted the tissues but immediately bent back over the trash can as another wave of nausea hit her.

The room remained filled with the sound of retching for another half a minute.

Not because the trauma had passed but simply because there was nothing left in their stomachs to expel.

The girls wiped their mouths with tissues, their faces pale and exhausted.

They all looked utterly drained.

But compared to the violent sickness from earlier, they now seemed slightly better.

"...Even children weren't spared."

Kaguya's voice was cold and trembling.

She had just witnessed the darkest depths of human depravity.

Drug dealers who would strap children barely ten years old to lab tables for their grotesque experiments had no right to live.

But then a thought struck her.

"Wait… Amamiya-sama," she said, turning toward him.

"Tsukikage Island isn't that big. How did the disappearance of these children go unnoticed?"

"…"

Ren didn't answer.

Instead, he silently raised a hand and pointed toward something on the projected screen.

Kaguya was momentarily stunned.

But she quickly grasped the implication.

Her gaze shifted toward the frozen image on the projection, her expression turning complicated.

It wasn't that the parents of the missing children didn't care about their disappearance.

They simply never had the chance to.

The drug dealers had already taken control of them.

And the reason behind it was painfully obvious.

Any parent who tried to raise concerns about their missing child would mysteriously vanish soon after.

On an island as small as Tsukikage Island, the pattern should have been suspicious.

But the drug dealers had prepared their cover story in advance:

"The family went on vacation."

A convenient lie to explain the disappearances.

The townspeople, not wanting to dwell on such unsettling events, chose to accept the deception.

"I see..."

Kaguya clenched her fists, her voice low.

"So this... is the darkness that exists in the ordinary world."

The others also realized the truth.

Their eyes returned to the screen, where the bodies of the tortured children remained on full display.

A heavy silence descended over the room.

They had never encountered this level of human depravity before.

This was their first exposure to it and it left a scar deep in their hearts.

"How does it feel?" Ren asked softly.

"A lesson you'll never forget."

Kaguya took a shaky breath. Her face was still pale, but she gave a small nod.

"This... was necessary," she admitted.

The brutality they'd witnessed had etched itself into her memory.

Drug dealers weren't simply criminals.

They were monsters who had long since abandoned their humanity.

"Amamiya... is the supernatural world like this too?" she asked, her voice trembling slightly.

Ren gave a faint, bitter smile and shook his head.

"In the supernatural world," he began, "with power comes the loss of restraint."

"Now ask yourself, how many people can still cling to their humanity when given absolute power?"

He gestured toward the screen.

"These drug dealers are evil, yes. But the supernatural world?"

"It's filled with hidden blades and constant, suffocating malice."

"There are countless people who will abandon their principles in pursuit of power."

"Compared to them... these drug dealers are almost tame."

The room fell into another long silence.

The truth weighed heavily on everyone's shoulders.

Kaguya's eyes remained fixed on the screen.

She thought back to the moment she had obtained the Ice-Ice Fruit.

Her first thought hadn't been about justice or responsibility.

It had been about freedom.

"...Like me," she muttered.

"When I got the Ice-Ice Fruit, I couldn't help but think of using that power to break free from the shackles placed on me."

Ren gave her an approving nod.

"That's exactly it," he said.

"Human nature is fragile."

"When you're trapped, you accept it because you have no other choice."

"But once power enters your hands—once you realize you have other options—"

"That's when the real test begins."

"Because under repeated indulgence... human nature shatters."

Kaguya closed her eyes and let his words sink in.

She had always thought of herself as rational and disciplined.

But the mere taste of power had tempted her to abandon that self-control.

The line between human and monster... was thinner than she'd realized.

***

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