Love Live and Kamen Rider 37

"Phantom, did you finish what I asked you to do?"

Silver Phantom, currently outside the Department Store, heard the voice of her master and spoke into his earpiece.

〖Rest assured, master. I have already dispatched the Flame Sparrow to monitor Ainosuke nearby. I will notify you the moment there is any movement.〗

"Is that so? Good. Where is he now?"

Hearing Silver Phantom's words, Senba Gari felt slightly relieved and asked her again through the earpiece.

〖He is currently in his own office. There are no abnormalities.〗

"Hmm, that's good. If anything unusual happens, remember to tell me."

〖Understood, master.〗

He then cut the communication with Silver Phantom and walked forward. Just as he passed a women's clothing store, Eli Ayase and the others happened to walk inside, and they missed each other just like that.

In a drink shop, Senba Gari was waiting for news from Silver Phantom while playing on his phone and sipping the milk tea he had just ordered. Suddenly, a news headline caught his attention.

<A male corpse cut in two was discovered in an abandoned factory this morning.>

Senba Gari stared at the photo of the corpse; it was a body severed at the waist. Looking at that picture, Senba Gari had an indescribable feeling, as if he had seen this method before. But the more he thought about it, the more uneasy he became, so he opened the communication with Silver Phantom and said to her through the earpiece.

"Phantom, hack into the police database and help me check the background of this corpse."

〖Understood, master.〗

After hearing Silver Phantom's reply, Senba Gari continued to fret, feeling depressed as he muttered to himself.

"It seems I took this matter too lightly."

While he was feeling troubled, Eli Ayase and the others happened to enter the drink shop. At this moment, Eli Ayase said.

"Nozomi, I'll leave it to you to find a seat. Arisa and I will go order. Is there anything you want? I'll order it for you."

Hearing Eli Ayase's words, Nozomi Tojo thought for a moment and said.

"Sure, then please order me a burger and a milk tea, Eli-chi."

"Mhm, let's go, Arisa."

Knowing what Nozomi Tojo wanted to eat, Eli Ayase took her sister's hand and walked toward the ordering counter.

"Oh my, it seems to be full."

Nozomi Tojo looked back and realized there were no extra seats. Just as she was feeling troubled, she suddenly looked at Senba Gari, who was sitting there in deep thought, and noticed there were three empty seats at his table. With a smile on her face, she slowly walked over to Senba Gari and spoke up.

"Oh my, isn't this the senior from the other day? We meet again."

Senba Gari, who had been deep in thought, was startled by the sudden voice. He looked up and saw that it was the shrine maiden from Kanda Shrine, Nozomi Tojo, and breathed a sigh of relief.

"Whoa! Who? Oh, it's you. You scared me to death. Do you need something?"

Seeing Senba Gari's reaction, Nozomi Tojo wore a smile and said playfully.

"Well, seeing you sitting here all alone, lonely and cold, I couldn't just stand by and watch."

Hearing Nozomi Tojo's words, Senba Gari's mouth twitched as he looked at the purple-haired girl in front of him, speechless.

"What 'lonely and cold'? If you want to share a table, just say so."

"So, does that mean you agree, senior?"

Nozomi Tojo sat down across from Senba Gari and asked with a grin.

"You've already sat down, so why ask me? Forget it, I'm leaving soon anyway."

Just as Senba Gari intended to continue his train of thought, Silver Phantom's voice came through the earpiece.

〖Master, I found it. The name of the corpse before his death was Jiang Zhiliu. Furthermore, I checked the crime scene photos of Inoue and the others, and discovered that their faces were no longer recognizable, and their clothes seemed messy, as if someone had changed them. Also, I heard that Ainosuke seems to have caught some kind of illness today; he has been covering his face. Oh, and master, I just saw that black sedan you mentioned earlier, and the owner of that car is Ainosuke. Master, are you listening? Master?〗

Silver Phantom's voice kept calling out to Senba Gari, but he was no longer listening. His brain was working at high speed.

Jiang Zhiliu was found dead this morning, the corpse's face was unrecognizable, the clothes were messy as if someone had tampered with them, Ainosuke has been covering his face lately, there was a strange sense of dissonance at the scene of Inoue's corpse, the blood-written characters... wait, Ainosuke, Phase of Sich, isn't that part of Ainosuke's English name? And why does it feel like we are being deliberately led to catch Ainosuke? And it's such a coincidence that Jiang Zhiliu died.

"That's it! I know what the dissonance was!"

As if he had figured something out, Senba Gari shouted in excitement, then said to the startled Nozomi Tojo beside him.

"Sorry, I have something to do, I'm leaving first!"

After saying that, he hurried away, simultaneously speaking to Silver Phantom through his earpiece.

"Phantom, tell me quickly, where is Ainosuke now! I know who the killer is!"

〖Is that so! Master, the target is currently in the underground parking lot.〗

"I see. I understand."

He then accelerated his pace and ran toward the underground parking lot, leaving a bewildered Nozomi Tojo behind.

"Nozomi, what's wrong?"

At this moment, Eli Ayase walked over to Nozomi Tojo with Arisa, holding two burgers and two cups of milk tea, and asked.

"Ah, nothing. I was just startled by someone just now."

"Oh, I see."

Eli Ayase didn't say anything else, simply placing the items on the table before sitting down with Arisa in the seats Senba Gari had just vacated.

--Scene Switch--

At this moment, in a dim underground parking garage, a middle-aged man wearing a mask and sunglasses was walking along when Senba Gari's voice suddenly rang out.

"Finally found you, Ainosuke. No, I should say, Jiang Zhiliu!"

Seven-HBrute Hagoromo Gitsune!

"Finally found you, Ainosuke. No, I should say, Jiang Zhiliu!"

Upon hearing Senba Gari's words, the middle-aged man—Jiang Zhiliu—visibly stiffened. He removed his mask and sunglasses, then turned back to look at Senba Gari with a beaming smile.

"What are you talking about, young man? I don't understand a word you're saying."

Hearing Jiang Zhiliu's response, Senba Gari let out a disdainful chuckle and said.

"Heh, it seems you're still struggling in your death throes. No matter, I'll lay it all out for you."

He raised his left hand and held up three fingers.

"There are three suspicious points about this whole incident that also serve as evidence pointing to you as the culprit! First, all the victims had gathered together on the night before they were murdered, and from that night on, they died one by one under mysterious circumstances. Then there is the second point, which was your one fatal mistake. I discovered the English letters left behind by Inoue before he breathed his last at the scene of his death, and they happened to spell out Ainosuke's name. After I learned that Inoue had been split in two by a collapsing stone pillar, I felt something was off. It wasn't until later that I realized: if Inoue had been crushed in two by a falling pillar, that pillar should have been stained with blood. So why was there not even a single drop of blood on the stone pillar?"

At this, Senba Gari turned to look at Jiang Zhiliu, noticing his eyes were filled with shock as he stammered a rebuttal.

"B-but so what? That only proves it was Ainosuke who did it."

Hearing Jiang Zhiliu's words, Senba Gari grinned, revealing his white teeth.

"Oh, so you're admitting that you aren't Ainosuke?"

"So what if I'm not? In any case, it definitely wasn't me."

Having heard Senba Gari's trap, Jiang Zhiliu realized he had been exposed and could only struggle in vain.

"Is that so? Still refusing to admit it? Well, here is the third point. Originally, I thought you were the killer, but this morning I received news of your own death, and the method was different from the others. Then I remembered the English name Ainosuke that Inoue left behind, but I thought about it again—that information seemed too blatant, as if it were intentionally left for people to find. Furthermore, the faces of all those corpses were destroyed to the point where even their own mothers wouldn't recognize them. That made me wonder: why destroy their faces too? It wasn't until later that I thought of a possibility: it was you! Jiang Zhiliu—no, I should say, the Mlortha who has been masquerading as Jiang Zhiliu all this time, right? I suspect the sudden collapse of the building earlier was actually caused by another Mlortha, and that Mlortha was Ainosuke!"

"Hehehehe, it seems there's no need to keep up the act. I didn't expect the current wielder of Divine to be quite so capable."

After hearing Senba Gari, 'Jiang Zhiliu' began to laugh, but the voice shifted into that of a woman. Black mist covered 'Jiang Zhiliu's' body, and as it dissipated, a stunningly beautiful, classical girl in a cherry-colored kimono with black hair and purple eyes appeared before Senba Gari.

The girl performed an ancient greeting toward Senba Gari, wearing an elegant smile as she spoke.

"Nice to meet you, new wielder of Divine. I am Hagoromo Gitsune of the Seven-HBrute."

When Senba Gari heard the name Seven-HBrute, his expression twisted into a snarl as he shouted at Hagoromo Gitsune.

"So it was you! Tell me! Where did you take my father?!"

Hearing Senba Gari's interrogation, Hagoromo Gitsune simply covered half her face with the wide sleeve of her kimono and said softly.

"Ara, shouting at a young lady like that is terribly rude. As for your father, hehe."

"If you won't tell me, I'll beat it out of you!"

Hearing Hagoromo Gitsune's laughter, Senba Gari could no longer suppress the rage in his heart and pulled out the transformation card for Divine Fenrir.

"Appear!"

As soon as Senba Gari finished speaking, a silver light flashed at his waist, and the silver Beast Soul Driver appeared. Senba Gari inserted the card into the right side of the driver, and an image of a running wolf appeared on the LCD screen as the driver emitted several synthesized mechanical sounds.

〖Vehicle Armour Appear〗

As the first mechanical sound faded, silver-gray phantom armor appeared around Senba Gari's body.

〖Armed〗

Following the second mechanical sound, the silver-gray phantom armor equipped itself onto Senba Gari.

〖Divine Fenrir〗

Once the transformation was complete, Divine utilized the speed of the Fenrir form to dash toward Hagoromo Gitsune. Just as he swung his hand, tipped with sharp claws, toward her, a fluffy tail swatted him into a nearby stone pillar.

"Ugh."

Divine groaned in pain, clutching his chest as he looked up at Hagoromo Gitsune, who had just retracted her tail behind her. That single strike had broken one or two of his ribs.

"Oh my, it seems I used a bit too much force."

"Don't look down on me!"

Hearing Hagoromo Gitsune's mockery, Divine struggled to his feet and charged at her once more.

However, just as Divine was about to reach her, Hagoromo Gitsune revealed four more tails. Together with the one that had attacked him earlier, they wrapped around Divine's neck and limbs, hoisting him high into the air.

"Urgh, let go of me."

Divine struggled, twisting his limbs, but he was held firmly by Hagoromo Gitsune's tails, and he could feel his spiritual power draining away rapidly.

Hagoromo Gitsune was currently absorbing Divine's spiritual power. A brown, humanoid Mole with massive, sharp claws on its hands appeared and said to her.

[I have hollowed out the foundation here; it will collapse in a moment. Let's go.]

Upon hearing this, Hagoromo Gitsune released her five tails from Divine and vanished into a cloud of black mist, while the Mole Mlortha burrowed into the ground.

"Thud."

Divine crashed heavily onto the ground from mid-air; his spiritual power had been almost entirely drained by Hagoromo Gitsune, leaving him exceptionally weak.

"Boom!!!" "Boom!!!" "Boom!!!"

Suddenly, the surrounding stone pillars began to crack, and the ceiling above started to collapse. Slowly, Divine was buried by the falling debris, and the department store he was in crumbled before everyone's eyes.

Outside the collapsed department store, Hagoromo Gitsune issued an order to the Mole, Mlortha, beside her.

"He won't die that easily, so take advantage of his weakness and go kill him."

[Understood.]

At that moment, the knight and the girl he had once saved met again.

"Woo~ woo~ woo~"

Around the collapsed department store, countless sirens wailed as search and rescue personnel combed the ruins for anyone who might still be alive.

Victim Divider-

"Clatter~"

"Bang!"

Deep at the bottom of the collapsed building, Divine struggled to push the stones off his body before deactivating his armor.

Finally, Senba Gari clutched his injured left hand and leaned weakly against a wall that had been reduced to a mangled mess, and the voice of Silver Phantom reached his ears through the earpiece he wore.

〖Master! Master! Are you alright!〗

Upon hearing the voice of Silver Phantom, Senba Gari said weakly.

"Cough, cough, Phantom, I'm fine. My spiritual power is just exhausted and I've sustained some injuries, but it's nothing serious. I just need to rest for a while."

〖Very well, Master, just stay where you are for now. I am sending a few helpers down to assist you.〗

Then, Senba Gari clenched his fists tightly and said with unwillingness.

"Yeah, by the way, Phantom, tell me, am I too weak?"