The enemy's appearance was over a hundred times stranger than the "Slit-Mouthed Woman" recently making the rounds in Misaki—
They were two faceless men with enormous crescent-shaped, bloody mouths.
Their heads had no features, and a huge eyeball rolled around inside each crescent-shaped mouth.
"Good evening. Is there anyone here who can understand human speech?"
The black-robed girl asked calmly.
The two Slit-Mouthed Men ignored her attempt at communication and slowly closed in, like snails.
Arisu tilted her head slightly. "...I see. So you're merely gravekeepers, and your only job is to keep watch.
"But judging from your appearance, you should already be full-fledged magic users. That's still too much of a burden for Aoko, though."
Under normal circumstances, Aoko would definitely have snapped back at her. But now—even the future True Magic User didn't dare breathe too loudly in the face of such terrifying enemies.
Arisu remained expressionless as a Glass Cat ornament, blacker than the night, appeared in her hand. Its eyes glowed with an ominous red light.
"!"
The first emotions the Slit-Mouthed Men revealed were wariness and fear.
"Goodbye, guests. Farewells last only an instant. Allow me to bid you farewell."
The witch's words filled them with bone-deep terror.
The Glass Cat pendant fell from the girl's hand. It wasn't an act of throwing or discarding it, but some kind of ritual—or perhaps a gesture carrying a certain implication.
The Slit-Mouthed Men didn't possess ears, mouths, or brains, yet even so, they sensed that at this very moment, and from this moment onward, some horrifying miracle would crush them to pieces.
Ripples spread from beneath the black-robed girl's feet, radiating throughout the forest. Everything here became her world, and a silent rhythm continued to spread.
"Come—let's play hide-and-seek, doll."
A bell-like nursery rhyme rang through the