“Everyone, prepare for combat.”The voice burst out unevenly. Cha-cha-chak—!Chak!At that single short command, the soldiers instantly went on alert in every direction.I scanned among the bodies for any symptoms. ‘Malnutrition and dehydration, huh.’

The suffering inflicted by malnutrition and dehydration is a torturous process.The pain is just one element; the prolonged, brutal agony of the body's slow and inevitable shutdown is an unimaginable torment than other deaths.But there were several strange things.When hunger and pain combine, rational judgment becomes impossible — they should have shown some attempt to escape, but there wasn’t a trace of it.If you look closely, every one of them has their hands bound with what look like cable ties.If they’d been starving and dehydrated, they would have at least torn into the corpses of those who died earlier, but there weren’t even traces of that.‘Two possibilities.’First: they bound their own hands and waited to die, to preserve some dignity as humans.Second: someone else intervened.We have to consider all possibilities. It could mean there’s someone inside who did something malicious to other humans.There was one crucial factor to verify.The premise for all of this.‘They absolutely could not choose to go outside.’Citizens who eliminated the option of going outside.What reason could justify that?All the nearby people had been crowded into the subway tunnels.So why?Only one unsettling thought flitted through my head.‘Could it be a special mutant?’Was there a special mutant intelligent enough not to react to high-frequency sound?If so, it would roughly fit.When mutation starts, intelligence usually disappears, but some special entities retain it.And in those cases… ‘Need more information before rushing to a judgment.’I stopped the thought for a moment, heavy with unease.“From now on we’ll search the interior. Form teams of five; open fire if a crisis occurs.”““Yes—!””It looked pretty certain there were no mutants inside, but being careful couldn’t hurt.‘Ah.’A sudden realization made me turn and look at Eli.The sight of the scene would be a huge shock to an ordinary person.“Eli, are you alright?”“Huh? All of a sudden?”But she was surprisingly calm.Eli was simply examining the corpses carefully.“I’m not weak enough to be shaken by things like this.”“…Thank goodness.”Eli.She felt somehow different.On the surface nothing seemed changed from before.But subtle changes were showing up little by little.Or maybe that was to be expected.Given the situation, she might have become desensitized to stimuli too.“Hmm.”I dropped the pointless thoughts.I drew my sword Zero.Not for any particular reason.[‘Legendary Swordsman’ trait activated][‘Extrasensory’ activated]To pick up the parts I’d missed.Expanded senses.I focused my mind within that sense.“There’s nothing special.”The scene itself was peculiar, but there wasn’t anything in it that required focused attention.Separately, seeing such a horrific sight left a bitter taste in my mouth.‘If we’d come a little earlier…’Could some of these people have been saved?I knew that ruminating on that would eat away at my mind, but I couldn’t help thinking back.Hundreds of deaths.For some reason, looking at them felt unbearably heavy.But those fragmented feelings didn’t last long.“Captain.”Benjamin approached.“What’s the matter?”“You need to come see this.”His expression was impossibly grave.“This is—”The cause of the incident was revealed surprisingly easily.A single corpse in the power plant’s control room and a note he’d left.“I regret my choice. If I had wanted to live, I could have. Those of my comrades who died because of a vain delusion can’t even shriek now. I don’t have long left. If anyone reads this, I hope you don’t repeat my mistake.”“…That must have been hard.”When the soldier finished reading aloud, a hush fell.The situation became clear.An entrance sealed so even the man himself could not open it.And scratch marks from clawing at the entrance until his nails were gone.It must have been the choice he thought right, but in the face of his crumbling reason he ended by regretting it — the control-room chief’s fate silenced everyone.“Was it, in the end, the choice of those who wanted to die like humans?”I found myself inwardly feeling a little relieved at that thought.It was a prickly sensation on my tongue.“Any other content?”Even now I had to check again.We still didn’t know why they hadn’t chosen to go °• N 𝑜 v 𝑒 l i g h t •° outside.“Yes.”“There aren’t many details in the note, but there is a notebook that appears to be a diary.”A notebook presumed to be a diary…We had to read it.But I can’t read easily myself, so someone would have to read it aloud.That was awkward in many ways.At that moment Eli, who had been silent, took the diary from Benjamin and spoke in a soft voice.“Kyle, I need to say something for a moment.”“What is it?”“It’ll only take a moment.”I followed her and put distance between us and the troops.She calmly opened the diary and began to read.“October 12 — I realized I might die and left my record…”“Eli?”Could she have already known?She’d never told anyone, but she read the diary as if it were natural, and I was taken aback.She answered matter-of-factly.“I already know. That Kyle has dyslexia.”“How did you know?”"If you spend enough time with someone, they'll start to notice. That's why I prepared a separate space for you; it seemed like you didn't want anyone to know."Maybe she had a knack for these things.Hearing her speak with such certainty made me suspect some already knew.“Hmm.”One of my weaknesses had been discovered, but oddly I felt grateful.The person who knew was Eli Wayless.If it was her, she was now a comrade I could trust.And I felt thankful for her consideration.“I didn’t think you knew. Thanks for looking out for me.”“Dyslexia can make geniuses sometimes. Nobody can be perfect.”Even that dry response was part of her consideration.A small, more mature smile slipped out of me.Eli raised one eyebrow at the smile and continued reading.“I’ll finish it.”I left my gratitude as an emotion and refocused.Through this diary we would soon learn the whole story.I wiped my face, emptied my thoughts, and nodded.“Please.”The diary’s opening was heavy from the start.[October 12 — I realized I might die and leave my record. There was a large-scale power outage. This facility, a major installation, had been fine even during previous outages, but for some unknown reason the reactor stopped, and then this place became no different from outside. Patients began appearing in large numbers.][October 13 — Monsters appeared. Both outside and inside were full of monsters. It’s presumed to be a zombie virus. We first decided to lure the internal monsters outside…]It described specimens appearing and the successful lure of the inside mutants to the outside.Then they gathered food and water in one place and decided to manage them centrally.Then they took in refugees and, with scarce internal supplies, people began to turn on each other.Various entries continued.Most of it was the ordinary stuff people in that situation might have experienced.But the entry for the 16th was quite different.[October 16 — The moment I first saw it, I realized. We are doomed to die trapped here.]‘This is the part.’I focused on Eli’s voice.I was sure the continuing entry would contain a clue.[It was something I’d seen in an article before. A creature that had become a real monster. But it’s different from the monsters we knew. It’s clever. It doesn’t leave; it circles around.]The words revealed themselves.My face tightened without me realizing it.As Eli continued, my breath hitched.[Its identity is a bear. A creature of a size that should not exist…]I couldn’t help but sigh.“Haa.”The thought that one of the most vicious special specimens might be around here made my head throb.Arctotherium.A bear said to be the largest in history, already long extinct. Adults reportedly reached near four meters. Humans had somehow resurrected that behemoth.In some ways it was a triumph of humanity applying genetic cloning.But there was one problem: the cells used for cloning weren’t complete.So humans searched for ways to supplement the unstable clone.In the end they chose the easiest method.Implantation.Like patching fabric with new cloth when a teddy bear gets a hole…Humans grafted countless implants into Arctotherium bodies.The problem was that among those implants were artificial brains.Predatory instinct.Superior intelligence.They grafted those two incompatible things together at will, and the Arctotherium became a mutant specimen, but because of the artificial brain made of organic matter, it retained intelligence.So it earned the title…‘Sneaky.’[Sneaky], meaning cunning.Among special specimens, excluding [Behemoth], the most powerful was [Sneaky].The thought  that thing might be nearby made my head pound.‘Since it doesn’t get picked up by the crisis detection, maybe its activity range is completely different…’What made it terrifying was its particular cunning trait.If it deemed its opponent strong, it would never reveal itself.It exclusively targeted weak spots and slaughtered humans.The reason it’d hidden here was likely because it knew all the food inside the reactor complex had starved.‘As expected, special mutants are the biggest problem at the start.’We couldn’t predict that it was active here.That wasn’t prediction — it was luck.Because their activity areas were almost random each time, predicting the locations of special mutants was nearly impossible.“Now I understand.”“Yes?”“Nothing.”Everything had become clear.So I judged the situation rationally.‘Prepare, but don’t waste too much mental energy on it.’I had no intention of burying myself in worry over an uncertain threat.Worry alone wouldn’t get us anywhere.Everything has priorities.I shook off my head and the old worries with it.“Let’s proceed with the original plan.”“But is that okay? According to what’s written here…”“I don’t think we need to be frightened in advance.”“Hmm……”Eli swallowed a small silence.Passing her, I headed toward the plant’s core.I didn’t forget to leave one remark.“We’re fighting extinction. Isn’t it too soon to be disturbed by things like this?”“Kyle.”Would I look too reckless?But I had worked out the contingencies.So it wasn’t blind action.“Restart the reactor. Repairs are still underway, but we should be able to restart it now without problem.”

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