Chapter 312: Virgin Mary (Patreon)

Mara Tomie leaned against Amamiya Rin's shoulder and heard every word of it.

She let out a soft laugh, pressed her face a little closer into his shoulder, and spoke in a sweet, syrupy voice, pitched at exactly the right volume.

"They're so noisy, Rin~~ They never think about you at all. Not like me. I only ever ache for you, Rin."

Provocation! Without a doubt, this was pure, undiluted provocation!

"Ugh... I'm going to be sick..."

(What kind of cliché line is that?! Even TV dramas don't do that anymore!)

(Does she think she's cute?)

(...Disgusting. Seriously, disgusting.)

(Such a fake, syrupy green-tea act—)

To the other Tomies, Mara Tomie's little speech was unbearably affected.

But to Amamiya Rin, a Mara Tomie who always cooperated on her own the moment he needed something, without his even having to ask, was simply endearing.

As for Mara Tomie's real motives, Amamiya Rin didn't care. It was only sincerity returned for sincerity.

The other Tomies could feel the natural closeness Amamiya Rin showed Mara Tomie, and that was exactly why it irritated them even more.

Amamiya Rin smiled it off. He didn't step into their squabble, and began to review everyone's shared memories instead.

He had been unconscious for three days, and it seemed a lot had happened.

He skimmed Mara Tomie's memories first, then took a quick look through the other Tomies', and finally focused his thoughts on Swordmaster Tomie's.

A gray-white scene unfolded. It was Swordmaster Tomie's point of view.

A secluded street. She was on her way back to her residence when a middle-aged woman in a dark nun's habit came walking toward her.

A silver cross hung on the woman's chest. She had a vicious face, with high cheekbones and deep-set eyes, the very picture of a stereotypically spiteful woman.

"With that seductive face made for luring men, you really are the Antichrist!"

The spiteful-looking nun glared at Swordmaster Tomie and declared her hostility without any restraint.

(Idiot!)

Swordmaster Tomie didn't even slow her steps. Her gaze held a trace of annoyance, and the flick of her eyes was like shooing away a fly that was blocking her path.

But if the fly refused to buzz off, she would have to perform that common showpiece of a master swatting a bug.

"Shameless, filthy demon..."

The woman seemed not to sense Swordmaster Tomie's hostility, or else she simply didn't care. Venomous curses poured from her mouth.

"Cut!"

Before the word had even finished, Swordmaster Tomie's gaze had already swept across the woman's neck.

In an instant, a fierce flash of blade light appeared in the morning sun. It began at the left carotid artery and slid across the woman's throat.

"Agh!"

The spiteful-looking woman cried out in pain, clutching her neck, her face twisted into a snarl.

But that was all.

The woman's neck had not been severed in one stroke. She didn't collapse into a false death.

Swordmaster Tomie's pupils contracted slightly.

Had the Consciousness Slash failed? Or was the woman's willpower so strong that she had withstood it by sheer force?

Neither!

The reason was that her own thinking had become sluggish!

Only now did Swordmaster Tomie realize that her thoughts had come apart from the other Tomies'. She was thinking more slowly than they were.

That was exactly why the Consciousness Slash hadn't worked.

Wait! Why was her thinking slowing down?

As the thought crossed her mind, something in her left ear began to itch, like fine grains of sand rolling deep in the ear canal.

Then her right ear felt the same, as though something were inside it too.

She tilted her head, and fine gray-white granules slid out of her ear.

"Accursed witch! Do you dare defy God's judgment?"

The woman in front of her roared at Swordmaster Tomie. After the pain came shock, then fury, the rage of someone whose authority had been insulted.

She raised her right hand, palm aimed at Swordmaster Tomie.

"In the name of Mary! Witch! Become a pillar of salt, as Sodom did!"

A wave of white light swallowed Swordmaster Tomie. Her body stiffened and her mind grew sluggish. She tried to draw her sword, but her fingers had already lost all feeling. Her five fingers held the pose of gripping a blade, frozen in place.

Through the woman's eyes, brimming with hatred, gray-white patterns could be seen spreading across Swordmaster Tomie's body. In the blink of an eye, Swordmaster Tomie had become a human-shaped pillar of salt!

The memory stopped at that moment.

The image froze, a total gray-white.

Amamiya Rin frowned slightly.

"A cultist?"

His eyes swept the room and found his notebook on the coffee table where the TV stood.

"You don't need that, silly. She's the Vice Chairwoman of Tensei Academy, and the Chairman's wife. Tensei Academy is a religious girls' school, and it honors the Virgin Mary above God. The Vice Chairwoman, who's called the reincarnation of the Holy Mother, can call down the divine punishment of Sodom on a target."

Before Amamiya Rin could reach for the notebook, Mara Tomie dug the clues about the woman out of her memory and shared them with him.

"They're all ignorant, useless wretches, but their resources and connections are flawless. To deal with that impostor, the Shadow Government invited this old woman who calls herself the Holy Mother a while ago."

"After that, things went just as you saw, Rin. Swordmaster Tomie ran into the Holy Mother, was struck by the salt curse, and turned into a pillar of salt."

"The salt pillar has been sealed away. I do think that if we smashed it, that impostor might grow back out from the ends of her nerve threads, but nobody knows for sure. And you wouldn't agree to take that risk, would you, Rin?"

Mara Tomie asked, leaning against Amamiya Rin with easy affection.

Amamiya Rin nodded, approving of what Mara Tomie had done.

Still, it wasn't much of a problem. Tomie could live on in other people's dreams and memories. Once he found time to dream, he could bring Swordmaster Tomie back from the dream world into the real one.

"But a rule-type skill that can convert material structure and counter the immortal body? Just like the ice cream last time?"

Amamiya Rin couldn't help recalling another incident from before he lost consciousness, and his expression grew a little graver.

"What about the ice cream truck... What happened to the victims?"

More than the deathless, undying Tomies, Amamiya Rin cared about the innocent civilians.

Mara Tomie wasn't surprised by the question. A look of regret crossed her face as she answered, "A hundred and seventeen victims in total. All of them turned into ice cream. The weather was fairly hot, so they all melted into cream. Even with the Reanimator's Sword, there's no saving them."

A hundred and seventeen people... He hoped they would find peace in the underworld.

Amamiya Rin sighed softly, a trace of melancholy on his face.

No matter how much power he gained, he couldn't freely change what had already happened. All he could do was settle into the present.

The missed calls from the past three days, the Holy Mother, and the other unresolved incidents were what needed his attention next, not dwelling on the oversights of the past.