Send You to See God

Just as the female Judgment officer called for an ambulance, she happened to glance over and saw Rod approaching the injured.

"Th-this gentleman, please do not approach the injured, to avoid causing further harm." The female Judgment officer's voice still trembled slightly; clearly, she had yet to recover from her panic.

Still, she could not allow an unrelated person to touch the injured and risk worsening their condition.

"Don't worry. It'll be over soon." Rod stopped before the three injured officers and casually tossed out three clusters of positive energy cursed power. To the others, however, the shapes of those cursed energy clusters were completely invisible.

What happened next utterly overturned the worldview of the three women present. The three wounded Judgment officers, who had been covered in injuries, had their blood flow back into their bodies as if time had reversed, while their wounds began healing at a visible rate.

Even more unbelievable was the most severely injured Judgment officer, whose arm had been blown off. Bones began growing back from his shoulder, followed by flesh and skin, until an entirely intact arm had somehow regrown.

The miraculous sight left all three women too stunned to close their mouths.

"Th-this is an esper ability!?" Frenda cried out in shock. It was no wonder she was surprised—Rod had never shown the Reverse Cursed Technique to the four members of ITEM before.

After all, Accelerator had not even been able to force Rod to use the Reverse Cursed Technique in their fight.

"Mr. Rod!? Hm? Mr. Rod?" Saten Ruiko called out excitedly at first, only to discover that Rod had vanished from the store.

"Was he afraid of trouble?" Saten Ruiko scratched her head in confusion, though a sense of pride welled up in her heart. She was proud to know someone with such extraordinary power, someone kind-hearted who asked for nothing in return.

But where was the kind-hearted Mr. Rod now?

In a dark alley, a gloomy young man watched the scene inside the convenience store, excitement appearing on his pale face.

"That's it. This is perfect. The power is in my hands now. Whether it's those useless Judgment officers or those delinquents, I can blow every last one of them to death! Hahahaha!?"

The more he spoke, the more excited and unhinged he became. Yet he failed to notice the large hand that had already landed on his shoulder from behind.

"Boom!?" A deafening crash rang out. The youth felt as though he had been struck head-on by a massive truck. Every bone in his body was dislocated, and pain flooded every inch of him. Once his brain finally processed what had happened, a heart-wrenching scream erupted from his throat.

His pig-slaughtering shrieks echoed through the alley. He could not move a single inch, because his entire body had been embedded in the wall so deeply that he could not be pulled free.

"How does it feel? Being attacked out of nowhere?" A deep voice came from in front of him. The youth's glasses had been destroyed in the earlier impact, and with his nearsightedness compounded by his muddled mind, he could not make out the person before him at all.

"...Who?" Kaiho Noriyasu asked tremblingly. His mind was a complete blur; he could not even activate his ability. He had become a lamb awaiting slaughter, unable to resist.

"When the brave are angered, they draw their blades against the strong. When cowards are angered, they draw their blades against the weak. You really are beyond saving." Rod's indifferent words seemed to pronounce Kaiho Noriyasu's doom. As if sensing something, Kaiho Noriyasu coughed desperately, ignoring the blood spilling wildly from the corners of his mouth as he screamed hoarsely.

"W-wait... I-I was wrong! Forgive me!?"

Rod slowly raised his hand and placed it on Kaiho Noriyasu's shoulder. Thinking Rod had decided to spare him, Kaiho Noriyasu forced out a faint smile, though boundless hatred and rage surged within him.

"Forgiving you is God's job. Mine is sending you to meet Him." Rod's words were the final straw. Realizing that he was about to die, Kaiho Noriyasu completely snapped. Ignoring the blood gushing from his mouth, he shouted hysterically like a madman, trying to draw the attention of people nearby.

"Don't get worked up. Take a deep breath. Feeling dizzy is normal." Rod consoled him as he activated his technique. Idle Transfiguration.

With the sound of flesh bursting apart, Kaiho Noriyasu's entire body exploded like fireworks, blood and flesh scattering everywhere. Rod controlled the blood and sent it flowing into the sewers, erasing all trace of him.

Kaiho Noriyasu—dead.

Rod condensed Kaiho Noriyasu's soul into a ball of cursed energy. It radiated dense negative emotions: rage, repression, fear, and despair.

The soul was formed from the gathering of the heart and consciousness. It was the appearance of the heart, the movement of the heart. The heart existed within the soul, and the soul existed within the heart. The heart was spirit, and spirit was heart—thus, the psyche.

The soul carried the psyche, containing a wealth of emotions.

Every world possessed souls. Souls were the source of human life; as long as one was human, one had a soul.

Rod possessed a technique that allowed him to manipulate souls. Combined with the extensions of his other techniques, perhaps the fusion of Idle Transfiguration and the Ten Shadows Technique would allow Rod to create an undead calamity.

With that thought, Rod stored Kaiho Noriyasu's soul sphere in the Ten Shadows Space. A soul of this caliber could at most serve as enhancement material; it was not yet worthy of being controlled and tamed.

Rod felt no burden over killing a piece of trash. He casually took a recording device from his bag. This should be the Level Upper.

Rod returned to the convenience store and found that a cordon had already been set up outside. The female Judgment officer, who had been speaking with the Anti-Skill officers, immediately led the three Judgment officers over to thank him upon seeing him. Watching them bow solemnly—and even kneel on the ground in grateful tears to kowtow—Rod merely waved a hand and asked casually, "Which way did those two girls go?"

Following the direction indicated by the Judgment officers, Rod soon found Frenda tightly hugging Saten Ruiko's leg, tears and snot streaming down her face as she said, "Wait, what happened just now was an unfortunate accident."

"I need the remaining canned food for my recipes, and besides..."

Saten Ruiko dragged Frenda forward, then abruptly stopped and turned to glare at Frenda with an unfriendly expression before continuing, "I have no sympathy to spare for someone who wastes food."

With that, Saten Ruiko walked away without looking back. Seeing this, Frenda immediately changed tactics. She quickly rubbed her little hands over her mouth, smeared her saliva beneath her eyes, and put on a pitiful, tearful expression.

"Waaah~ Japanese people are so cold. I only wanted to use the taste of my hometown to ease my homesickness, at least..."

Seeing that Saten Ruiko ignored her completely and continued walking ahead, Frenda could no longer sit still. She pounced at Saten Ruiko again like a starving tiger.

"Isn't it too much to just ignore me like that?"

Driven to her wits' end by the noise, Saten Ruiko said helplessly to Frenda, "Enough! You can come to my house for dinner, okay? Uh, Mr. Rod."

Saten Ruiko had been somewhat angry, but the instant she saw Rod, she instinctively became restrained. She brushed the hair by her ear, a blush rising to her face.

No way, Mr. Rod saw me lose my temper just now. Will he think I'm rude? No, no, no—however you look at it, this is that girl's fault!?

Saten Ruiko instinctively glanced at Frenda, only to feel that someone had appeared behind her. Frenda was hiding behind her like a quail, as though she were avoiding some terrifying beast.

"Mind adding one more person, Saten?" Rod asked with a light laugh.

"Of course not. Mr. Rod, you can just call me Ruiko." Saten Ruiko replied excitedly. Rod now shone like an idol in her heart; how could the girl not be thrilled at the chance to have dinner with her idol?