A Step Off the Chosen Path
Negative_Science

Meanwhile, Enshuu stands over the garbage disposal in which Kihara Byouri's body was dumped and sighs exasperatedly.

"Well, it may have been exactly what to expect from a Kihara but I really didn't want to do all that to Byouri-obaasan. Hn. Hn. I know she's still alive Amata-ojisan. It wouldn't be very Kihara-like at all if she were to die so easily. I guess I should think of what to do next then. As it is, everything should freeze over now that this place has been destroyed but I don't feel like that'll be enough..."

Her clothes were stained in the waste from the disposal as well as caked in blood and mud from her wandering around the city.

Enshuu may have a fragment of common sense leftover from when she had been separated from her family but she still remains a Kihara at heart in spite of both her own and well as everyone else's opinions.

As such, that tiny amount of common sense goes by the wayside as her phones light up around her neck to give her a bit of inspiration.

She runs through the various underground tunnels to reach her destination, the hotel in which Kihara Ranshuu was beaten half to death in. As she enters the room, the scent of blood comes on strong enough to dizzy the average man. But it's less of her nature as a Kihara and more lending to the fact that she had already gotten used to the obscene amount of blood on her own clothes that let her enter easily.

She didn't know the second man but she could recognize the unmoving body of Ranshuu laying on the floor in a dark red puddle. That fragment forces a stirring in her heart as she looks at him but the devices put her back on the improper path. After all, she was not here for him. Just for the inspiration he could give, even as he is now.

She gathers her materials and ingredients and begins her work. It was simple in it's concept but an entirely different beast to employ in practice. By adding the various elements to her test tube, she had created a form of agar, a cultivator for viruses and bacteria.

That was the simple part.

"...I can get this in about 30 minutes."

Being done with the initial preparations, she starts on both the finishing touches for this first stage as well as a refreshment in one.

A regular cup of black coffee.

Her intent was to create a bit of moldy air in which to capture whatever mildew came of it and utilize it in her biological weapon.

The city was already doomed but she was ready to snuff out even the remotest of chances with this. Such an incredibly cruel method was perfect for a Kihara, even for an unqualified one as herself.

But even then, she still didn't feel satisfied. Was it because of that strange boy? That may be it. After all, he had proven earlier that such methods are useless against him. There really isn't anything for it though. The others that got sent in with her have been killed or otherwise incapacitated. Other than perhaps the one that fought with Byouri, there really isn't anyone around that can take on such a monster as him.

Even as she thought about this however, she began to realize that this was not the source of her worries.

She sipped at her coffee with a frown.

What else could it be? He may have called himself a friend of his but she didn't see it that way. Besides, he betrayed her. Though, that betrayal hadn't really seemed to set her back any. Had it been a misunderstanding on her part then? Had he really tried to save her in his own twisted way?

This wasn't like a Kihara.

This was like a Kihara at all to be concerned over someone else's life like this. Their only goal in life was to pursue the limits of science and break through them by absolutely any means necessary.

Everything else was secondary and otherwise inefficient.

To worry about some guy she had only just met was far too...normal. Not for a Kihara, mind you, but for a regular person.

She couldn't understand what the true source of it was. Not her fault considering the life she had led up till she met that joker.

Serial killers and sociopaths rarely, if ever, consider that they have an actual conscience within them and hers had been dormant for quite some time.

It could be compared to a man that had lost use of his left arm, let's say, and had gotten used to life without the limb for 20 years of his life but suddenly had feeling return to it. It would be bewildering and confusing to regain something that you had lived so long without. But perhaps that's a poor example. Enshuu would be far more concerned if she knew the name to her new-found feelings. It would be just another thing to separate her from the rest of her family.

Though such a feeling would too be separated from that norm of the abnormal.

All these thoughts had completely distracted her from realizing that the three occupants of the room had just become eight. By their very nature, even if she hadn't been removed from her surroundings, she would never have noticed the ninja that entered the room.

Each of them were among the number that she had already killed before but had that event removed from their histories by the very boy she had been thinking of.

His luck may very well be rubbing off on her.

They had thought their situation, once they came to, was rather puzzling but it made no difference to them if they could only get revenge on the one that had defeated them so soundly and return with the 'treasure' they sought. The ninjas had thought on how they were beaten and had come up with several counter-measures but with the way she is now, it may have been in vain.

But, again, it makes now difference to them.

The first of their five silently rushed up to her defenseless back with a standard short scythe aimed directly for the side of her neck.

With a blur of movement Enshuu had crouched down, grabbed her assailant's wrist, and flipped him over her back in a fashion not too dissimilar from a judo move.

She whirled around to face her enemies, devices flailing with the momentum and flashing a rainbow of glyphs and charts.

"Hn. Hn. Yes, Amata-ojisan. It would be in such a moment that a Kihara would get attacked. Sorry for ignoring you for so long."

The next ninja flashes a crowbar to her left while another swings a hammer for her tiny skull. At the very last second, she lashes out at the hammer wielder's left leg and sidesteps his flying form as he crashes into his comrade's body, sending them both into the wall away from her.

She quickly looks over at the last two, standing by for the most Kihara way of eliminating these walking dead men.

The oldest of them pulls out a small remote and presses hard on the red button on top before rushing into the fray, tossing it aside as she does so.

Her devices all go haywire. They flicker off as soon as they stop glitching out.

"An EMP?!"

In such a world, it wasn't unusual to hear of things like pocket-ready EMP devices. But to see it be used in practice was hard to accept.

Without her connection to the other Kihara personalities, a massive void filled her thoughts.

She couldn't remember a time when she had been without them. When she hadn't been able to rely on them. She was fighting with her figurative arms cut off from her.

The middle-aged woman gives no quarter as she plants a full-forced kick into her torso. Enshuu crashes into the wall with a hefty, dull thump.

"There. With that our revenge is complete," the woman says as she dusts off her hands.

The other ninjas had already gotten back up.

"So what now? Do we get back with Oumi?", one asks.

"She's fine for now. Let's just get some 'treasure' out of this Kihara girl. They have plenty of scientific knowledge that we can use," says another.

"That's just silly. It completely goes against our reason to be here. I will say though, it would be useful to get some insider knowledge to surpass them with," the third reasons.

As they all discuss what to do next with her as though she were some gilded treasure chest, Enshuu lays against the wall fiddling frantically with her phones to no avail.

Her connection was lost. Her connection was lost. Her connection was lost.

She can't act as a Kihara. She can't speak as a Kihara. She can't be a Kihara.

Her connection was lost. Her connection was lost. Her connection-

[But isn't it fine to be yourself?]

A voice comes to her thoughts, cutting straight through her panic.

[Do you really need to be like those other science lovers when you clearly meet the requirements already?]

These were the words replaying in her mind that boy spoke of a little bit after they had first met.

But she didn't agree with them.

She still wanted to be a Kihara but she knows she's only partially got the requirements for that.

[It's just the way things are.]

Yeah. That's true. But it doesn't help the situation any when she had been relying on those artificial traits for her personal needs.

[Maybe not. But I think that's fine.]

No it's not. Without that vital essence being supplied to her, she might die here.

[Say, do you know how other people get their powers where I come from?]

Their personalities or something if her memory follows? Enshuu can't really trust such-

[I'd say you're a special sort of Minus even among those guys.]

...

[You may not be able to act as a Kihara or whatever on your own but if that cruelty wasn't in you at all, then you wouldn't act on it. Even with some convoluted technomababber that beams their thoughts into your head.]

...

[It goes without saying, Enshuu-chan, that also applies to when you're without it.]

...Connection reestablished to new source.

She stands up, taking the phones from her neck and dangling them between both hands.

"She's back up again huh? Geeze she's tough."

The middle aged woman takes a few steps back to let her subordinates handle their weakened enemy.

[But that's where they messed up.]

Enshuu crouches as she readies herself for round two with these battle-hardened ninja.

[A Minus is never as dangerous as they are when the odds are against them.]

"Hn. Hn. I understand, Kumagawa-oniichan. At a time like this-"

They all come rushing in at her with a myriad of hidden weapons that can kill and maim in as many ways as they are varied between them.

Despite this incredibly unfortunate situation, Enshuu let loose an uncharacteristic grin.

This was not due to her being fairly emotionless or even to the fact that she was about to take them on in a particularly Kihara-like manner.

Rather it was because with this method, she could discover a path all unto herself.

She could exist as something other than a 'Kihara'.

"A Minus would do this!"

Enshuu walks the snowy, frozen streets of Baggage City without any real direction to go in.

Her previous plans have been forsaken in favor of testing her newfound abilities as a Minus. Though, she hadn't gained any strange powers or anything so ridiculous that she was aware of. Getting powers after having an epiphany during a fight was something that only really happened in some shitty manga or anime and is best left to that particular genre.

Still, she did feel something during her fight against the ninja a few moments ago.

When she emulates a Kihara's or someone else's thought patterns, it only allows for her to have a blueprint of sorts, an insight into how that person thinks. However, this does not give her the intelligence nor the skills of that particular person. If she had the thought patterns of Einstein for example, she'd be able to solve equations and problems in an Einstein like way, if given the knowledge he had when he was living but not any more or less than that.

Which seems very misleading when she uses the thought patterns of Kihara Amata to use his methods of analytic combat to fight others. But it is only possible for her to use it since she has an approximate level of knowledge comparable to the late Amata. If she hadn't had that disposition as a Kihara, she likely would never be able to use his thought patterns in a fight.

This is what had made that situation at the end of the fight all the more bizarre. It shouldn't have been so easily possible to emulate people she only met within at least 5 minutes of the fight but she was able to use all three of her attackers thought patterns against them. A first for her, as she hadn't really used that method as a way to counter enemy attacks. But even that wasn't the truly strange part of it all.

As it has been explained, she can only use emulation to solve things in a manner equal to how the person she's emulating would have with the level of knowledge that she personally has acquired. In the last few minutes of the fight, she began to use the ninja's weapons with their exact level of skill and prowess. She had a precise level of insight into how they would attack and what they would do next. She even started to have flashbacks, as she was fighting them, to memories of times that she had never been through.

This may sound to be the same as how she was before but there is a key distinction to make between the two. Enshuu in the past would only be able to solve matters in a ninja like matter with her own skills as long as she was emulating them, if she did at all. But the Enshuu that fought the ninja had solved the matter without ever actually emulating anyone. She had fought in an Enshuu like way using the skills of a ninja. Skills that she hadn't known of until today.

She stops in the middle of the road and pulls out a shuriken that she had taken from one of the ninja earlier. A billboard for some sandwich shop sits atop a building nearby. Enshuu takes aim and throws the shuriken at the billboard. It veers haphazardly off course and crashes through a window on a neighboring building.

Yes. She hadn't retained those skills for much longer after she had beat them. All those memories and skills were completely gone. As though she had gained them entirely by accident and the universe corrected the mistake.

Which is exactly why she had wanted to further test this new system that she had found herself to be apart of.

She had figured that since she had made herself an enemy of all the inhabitants of this city that if she were to wander the place enough, she'd run into someone to test herself against. But no one had shown up so far.

As she walks past a shop, she looks into the window. A phone store with all the latest models borrowed from Academy City.

Enshuu had abandoned her phones back with her previous plans of snuffing out the remaining life in the city. The EMP blast had wrecked them up too much to be able to use them in emulating Kihara thought patterns. Without them, she shouldn't be able to emulate anyone's thought patterns anymore.

[Well at least you still have your complexion!]

Though even without a Kihara network to whisper advice in her ear, she still had other sources to rely on.

"But that doesn't really matter to me, Kumagawa-oniichan. I just want to see what I can do now as a Minus. Nobody is showing up to help me out with that so I don't know what to do anymore."

This was something that she had never really done before either. The Kihara thought patterns she used previously only transmitted their thoughts on her situation to her. She had only really spoken to them as one would an imaginary friend and similarly so, they couldn't really respond to her in any kind of a meaningful way. This was the first time her imaginary friend, as it were, spoke back to her.

[Hmm. Hmm. I see. How about this then?]

"Hn?"

[You were right to try to seek out people that you've made enemies out of but most of those people are probably just a bunch of meat popsicles now. And even if they had somehow made it, they wouldn't be of much use against you. But! The ones that may have survived are likely privy to you and how you think by this point, so if you want to fight them then all you have to do is think about how you were going to act before you decided on the Minus route!]

"Hn. I understand, Kumagawa-oniichan. If it was the old me, then.."

She runs to the top of a nearby building for a better look at her surroundings. Her head swivels back and forth until her eyes settle on a plant factory in the distance.

"That's where I'd be. Are you sure they'll be there?"

[Of course! You're a Minus so even if you aren't there, those Abnormals will go looking for you wherever you are but at least there you can lay out the playing field as you like. Remember, with our luck we can't afford to let the house deal the cards as they please. We gotta stack the deck, count cards, do some slick stuff by swiping cards into our sleeves whenever they aren't looking. Whatever we can do to win, we have to do since the odds of us winning are so low anyway. But that's just as well since having Lady Luck on our side is too foreign a concept for us to cope with. So do your best Enshuu-chan! I'll be rooting for you!]

She smiles a little at this. She doesn't seem to comprehend or care that he isn't actually there.

Kiharas aren't the sort of social animals that act in packs. They may work together if their goals are aligned but it wouldn't be unexpected for them to betray one another when it suits them. Or even just whenever they feel like it. But even so, it was always comforting to have that whispering influence be there to support her. Especially when it actually wishes for her success like Kumagawa does.

Though it's hard to tell if he could ever be anything like a good influence to anyone even when the Kiharas had so clearly been a bad one for her. No matter how much goodwill his ghost of a personality wants for her, he's still the best, worst Minus to have ever existed. He can't possibly be good for her.

The factory wasn't all that far away. Her original intention was to use it's facility's equipment in order to cultivate her biological weapon. She would have then had her specimen divided between the containers that were out back so as to have something of a counter-measure against sabotage. If her enemies truly did understand how she would act, they would come here soon enough.

Rather than the biological weapons, she had made some home-brewed explosives to pack the storage containers with. Oil was spread around as well so she could ignite it to have the containers slide around and fall onto whatever opponents she would find herself at odds with. Having them fall would be well within expectations for her past self but she likely wouldn't have done anything as reckless as detonate her plans just to take them out. That element of surprise could be used to her advantage. She even used the leftover explosives to create a minefield of sorts.

Within the explosive chaos that she was making out to be her battlefield was where she intended to snatch her victory from.

There were no safety measures. No back up plans. Nothing that she could use to escape from the situation should it go south. The standard things that a Kihara would think of, she hadn't bothered with.

She felt that somehow increasing her odds would just lead to her failure somehow.

Besides, she hadn't come there to be a Kihara. That had already proven to be a dead end for her. She wanted to see how different things would be as a Minus.

But that was easier said than done. She had been so much more focused on being a Kihara that any other way of living was alien to her. Never mind the fact that she didn't even have access to any of them right now.

She sips on a can of black tea despondently. It has to constantly be warmed up with her lighter as she does so.

[Hey! Hey! I thought I told you that stuff doesn't matter! Maybe you can't solve things in a Kihara like manner but that's your edge right now. The ones that'll come after you will be expecting to fight a Kihara, not a Enshuu. Granted, you probably can't stray entirely from those patterns that are common to those guys but even so, you can definitely find a way that none of them could ever handle.]

"That's easy for you to say. You haven't helped with any of this so what good will you be when they come?"

[None at all!]

The answer comes with no hesitant whatsoever. In fact, his confidence was so great that, were it possible, his response would have come long before she had ever asked about it.

"Ehhh. Then why-"

[I'm sorry. The number you have reached is out of service. Please hang up and try again.]

"But-"

[I'm sorry. The number you have reached is out of service. Please hang up and try again.]

She puffs out her cheeks and rewarms her tea for the 45th time since she had been out there.

It's something that she really should have expected. Even if he was there in person, his answer would have been the same. That's the type of guy he is. Never willing to put forth the effort to help but always willing to steal the spotlight at just the right time.

A new voice echoes outside the container Enshuu was in across the frozen desolation.

"These plant factories run on electricity. The lights, air conditioning, and circulation of the nutrient liquid have to keep going 24/7. A car battery isn't going to cut it. They must be drawing electrical power from an external source. Each and every one has to do that."

It was the maid she had knocked out earlier. Enshuu moves to look into the system of hanging mirrors she had set up before for surveillance. As she peers into one of the mirrors, she sees that the maid walking alongside a woman in a blue dress.

"Oh, that's the one that nearly killed you Kumagawa-oniichan."

[Well, not just nearly but I won't split hairs right now.]

The two Abnormals stop towards the middle of the area as they announce their plans to nobody in particular.

"We have our answer. It looks like my pride can swell once more. If we destroy this external power source, the black lights emitting the ultraviolet rays will all stop! Kihara Enshuu will be unable to complete her biological weapon!"

There really isn't anything that earns a Minus's ire like the cockiness of the elite. Thus, there was only one response that could be given.

"Idiooooooots."

[Idiooooooots.]

Enshuu pushes the mirror aside as she walks out into the open. At her appearance, they start whispering amongst themselves. She can't hear them but she can guess based on how they have been so far.

"Sorry. But I'm going to have to disappoint you guys."

She moves hunched over with her hands behind her back and a slight smile in her voice.

"I know you guys must have thought reeeeeaaaally, really hard on how to beat me but I've decided not to go with that plan anymore. I'm sorry. I do feel bad about it."

Saflee scoffs, "Oho? And why should we believe you anyway?"

"Never expected you to. That's what I was counting on," she says as she suddenly crouches down with her canned tea in hand.

"Huh? Stop trying to bluff your way out of this. We know what you're up to and we're not going to let you kill what few people are left in this city!", Maria screams.

Enshuu gives her a sidelong smirk as she responds, "Then I take that as to mean that you don't mind if your lives are taken in their place?"

The murder in her eyes puts a momentary shock to their systems. This definitely wasn't the lukewarm, hesitant girl they were expecting to take on.

Maria narrows her eyes as she takes this new information with increased caution, "This isn't how you normally are. What happened to you?"

Enshuu chuckles, "And what is it exactly that you know about how I am normally anyway? I just found a different way of living than what I had been going after before is all. My plans before were sacrificed so I could figure out how exactly I'm meant to live in walking this path."

"...This is exactly how that guy would've acted."

Maria looks over to Saflee's horrified expression. Her legs shook nervously.

"What are you talking about?"

"Maybe not exactly the same but...there was a guy that I met yesterday. He was in the tournament but he wasn't on the same level as the rest of those guys. With him, I doubt even Academy City has a way of fighting that monster."

"So what then?", Maria sneers back at Enshuu, "You think that by emulating somebody like that, you'll be able to win here?"

Enshuu stands as she ponders this.

"Hmm. What do you think, Kumagawa-oniichan?"

[Dunno! I'm glad that a pretty girl like her remembers me, the sort of guy that has a personality of wet cardboard, but it's not like I'm that dangerous. I'd lose to an infant in a game of rock, paper, scissors even if I was seriously trying to beat it. Whatever. These sexy gals can get screwed for all I care.]

Of course, this part of the conversation was only acknowledged by half of the current audience.

"Who is she talking to?"

"I don't know. She typically uses the phones that used to hang around her to somehow use the thought patterns of Kiharas but maybe she found some other way to use them? It doesn't really matter either way, considering what we have to do."

They speak as if the matter is already settled. Protagonists don't really need to concern themselves with mid-bosses after all.

[These to really have no intention of taking you seriously huh? Rude.]

But this was no longer a situation that could be contained to such simple storytelling terms and cliches.

"Hn."

[These girls are the twin incarnations of Lady Luck, my little Miss Fortune.]

"Hn. Hn."

This magically scientific world could no longer be saved from the influence of the best, worst Minus.

[They are the victorious, brutal and without mercy. You are worse. Trip and despair until you've won.]

"I understand, Kumagawa-oniichan. I'll kick the silver spoons from the mouths of these gilt-edged whores!"

With this battlecry, both parties charge at one another with reckless abandon.

As Enshuu runs toward them, she shakes her can of tea with a thumb covering the opening. She brakes suddenly as she chucks the can at them. Just before she walked out, she had stuck a small bit of her explosive into the can. Once it's wet, all it needs is a short amount of time from when it's exposed to air before it explodes. It's only enough to startle someone though, about the same as the sort of fireworks that kids will cruelly tie to an animal's tail really.

Saflee stops immediately while Maria cartwheels to the side of it's path through the air. In the middle of her cartwheel, she changes the direction of one of her legs to go swinging for Enshuu's head but the sudden explosion right beside her forced her to instinctively change her direction away from the danger.

Her instincts in this case however, were way off. A hand grazes against the trigger for the homemade mine, once more causing a change in direction. The next explosion sends debris tearing the sides of her stomache and piercing her left thigh. As she lands, her sluggish body movements show that the damage had been done. This wasn't Enshuu's aim exactly though.

"Though I'll be hard-pressed to complain."

[You should though! Things are going way too well for you!]

"Hm? Just because I'm a Minus, doesn't mean that I'll stick so strictly to how you live that life."

The flames from the last explosion ignite the oil trails leading to various container piles around them. Without the variable of friction to add to the equation, the large containers that weighed a ton each fall everywhere within sight. Several of them have the explosives within get set off, more land on top clusters of mines and get sent flying, and even more hit the surrounding buildings, causing debris to shoot straight through the metal of those containers. The entire environment was trying, with no small amount of effort on it's part, to kill all three of them.

A Kihara would certainly have calculated a safe spot in the chaos to monitor everything from.

A Minus would throw caution to the wind and charge right into the chaos, risking everything.

Which does the unqualified Kihara and newbie Minus choose?

The old and familiar? Or the new and untested?

Hopefully that's a point made clear well enough about her change in character.

She darts through the destruction, avoiding the violent, heavy death thrashing it's rage all about the place with on the spot calculations on where and when she should dodge, duck, dip, and dive.

A path clears somehow between her and Saflee, who was desperately trying to escape.

Enshuu had read up on many of the contestants on the plane ride to the city. There was little hope in taking on a woman of her caliber in a physical fight, especially with her weak, frail self.

[If you really want to see what a Minus is capable of, then you'll have to test your nerves against her.]

"Geeze, Kumagawa-oniichan. I'm already dancing around explosions and debris that weighs as much as a car. Now you tell me to fight someone that has the physique to crush me just as well as these containers can. You're really unreasonable you know."

[Hey now! You're a Minus and all but you really shouldn't pull the tsunyan act at a time like this!]

In spite of her complaints and the situation she put herself in, her smile is one that suits her age. If only she had been at an amusement park with friends or had received a positive response during some confession with a boy she liked instead of fighting in a cold, nearly dead city while in the middle of a battle where certain death is nipping so much at her that it can taste her and maybe the grin she wears now could seem less psychotic.

She runs up to Saflee's side with a multipurpose lighter that had been modified to be essentially a handheld flamethrower. A seeping swath of flames ignites some oil that burns a searing wall just behind her, burning her dress a bit. Saflee panics a little at this but not enough to completely rattle her. Her leg flashes like lighting for Enshuu's body. At the last second, Enshuu grabs onto her leg and throws her over her head. Saflee plants her arms onto ground as she lands hard and twists her other leg against Enshuu's neck, forcing her to join Saflee on the ground. A leg kicks out from under the blue dress and smacks the lighter out of Enshuu's hand. Saflee pounces on her tiny, defenseless body with her toned arms and begins to attack with all the ground and pound techniques of a mixed martial artist.

Or at least, that's how it should have gone.

At this point, the unexpected is to be expected. The impossible becomes possible. After all, once it has unequivocally been proven that there are an infinite number of universes with an infinite amount of possibilities for each one, then it also proves that the only thing that is impossible is the concept of impossibility.

Enshuu reverses the pinned hold Saflee had her in and begins lashing out with elbows and fists.

Her strength and technique in doing so was not anything like the weak amateur that she should've been. Many times, she usually had made up for a difference like that by using Amata's thought pattern. Without her phones to allow her access to that network, she should have been completely overwhelmed by a physical oriented person like Saflee. Her attacks weren't that of a master however neither was Saflee's for some reason.

It was as though she had taken on half of Saflee's talents, skills, and overall fighting power.

Saflee squints through the blood trickling down her face as she strikes a savage hook on Enshuu, sending her tumbling off of her. Enshuu tries to press her attack once more but a silver flash from the side forces her to step back. She tries to look for where it came from but it isn't as though things around them were calm enough for that luxury. Enshuu and Saflee fling themselves out of the way of a container that was being tossed about by the explosions. Enshuu dodges yet another flash that grazes her cheek, blood trailing from the fresh wound.

Now it was clear that this wasn't just some coincidence. Someone was attacking her a distance away from the battlefield, it seems. But this isn't quite a situation where you can just worry about snipers when other problems, currently in the form of a cartwheeling, container-bounding Maria. She bounces around the thrashing environment with the agility of a dancer. She lands on her hands right in front of Enshuu.

Enshuu doesn't even have time to react before Maria begins to spin, her legs flailing about. She ducks under them and goes to kick Maria's face but the maid lightly jumps off her hands and swings her right leg down on her, landing on the same leg after scoring a hit. The blow to Enshuu's shoulder sends her toward the ground with Maria's left leg chasing after. Despite her swiftness, her attack missed due to Enshuu's body unnaturally changing it's direction.

Suddenly she was no longer in that fiery, frozen city. It's a house. Sunlight beams through the windows, dust motes float down their path onto the beige carpet, and a sweet smell fills the air. The scent was difficult to place but it somehow filled her heart with a warmth that she hadn't known before. Or perhaps that's mistaken. It was familiar to her and yet not at the same time.

A voice, warmer than the scent, calls to her.

"Maria! Time for lunch!"

"Coming Mama!...Mama?"

The blistering cold wind rakes across Enshuu's face as a sudden chill runs up her back. Though this wasn't some form of alarm running through her lizard brain, it was only the snow that she finds herself laying on.

All was calm now. No more explosions or earth-shattering crashes to echo across the dead city. Just the cold silence and dull pain running through the left side of Enshuu's face. She tries to touch it gingerly but the sensation forces her to pull away.

Looking down on her was Kumokawa Maria.

"That...was a lot more difficult than what I thought it was going to be. I could hazard a few guesses as to why but if you hadn't spaced out for long enough to let me land a hit on you, then I really might have lost back there. It kinda hurts my pride a bit to admit that but it's over. You've lost, Kihara Enshuu."

She lost. Yes. This was expected once she had accepted the path of a loser. Something cold runs down her injured cheek.

[I'm sorry, Enshuu-chan. I did try to warn you.]

"...Yes. You did. It was well within expectations that I would lose. But...why Kumagawa-oniichan?"

Maria tries to remark on how useless it is to try to emulate anyone at this point but she blocks that out.

[Why you lost?]

"No. Why does it hurt so much?"

[...Because you tried. As hard as you could and with everything you could, you tried. But that's never enough for a Minus. Our destinies were predetermined from before we were even born. Against these sorts of guys, we will always lose. That's how it is.]

She bites down on her quivering bottom lip. She was a failure as a Kihara and as a Minus. That was how she felt about it. She felt that she had nothing left.

[Well, come on now! Cheer up!]

"Kumagawa-oniichan?"

[For starters, it's pretty much the main qualifier of being a Minus that you fail. So in that sense, you succeeded! That's the sort of contradictory people we are!]

Enshuu's awareness of her surroundings returns from the dullness that stagnated her mind. Maria, now joined by Saflee and the ninja girl that she fought earlier, dart their eyes and heads every which way. She props up her body in sudden realization as she turns around.

[Secondly, you've got me don't you?]

The voice she had been hearing wasn't simply in her head. It was just outside everyone else's perceptions. Or perhaps it'd be more accurate to say that his presence was made to never exist to anyone else but Enshuu.

[And with that, your favorite oniichan will save you from these elites!]

Dressed in nearly all black outside of the white scarf blowing out behind him, Kumagawa Misogi enters the fight just at the right time to steal all the spotlight.