Hoshino had always felt that something was off.
All along the way, it had felt as though someone had been watching her from behind. Even after officially entering Lungmen, that feeling had not completely faded. Instead, as time passed, it increasingly filled her with a sense of warning. She trusted Yae Sakura's beast-like intuition and believed it would never be wrong.
So someone really was spying on her in secret?
Several faces flashed through Hoshino's mind. Most of them belonged to Rhodes Island operators she knew well, and any of them could have done something like this.
Specter?
Specter had always been extraordinarily sensitive to heretics and highly proactive. She really might have followed Hoshino here to launch some religious assassination. But Hoshino did not believe she possessed such superb stealth abilities. Specter was the type to charge in headfirst with a circular saw—a battlefield meat grinder. You could smell the blood reeking off her from far away.
She was a warrior, not an assassin.
Specter was the first to be ruled out.
Of those remaining, Warfarin did want Yae Sakura's blood, but after so many lessons—and even losing a tooth—she should have learned to behave a little. Long-lived species might not be good at much else, but their patience was excellent. She probably would not do anything foolish again.
Warfarin was ruled out as well.
Hoshino began to feel puzzled. After passing through Lungmen's entry checkpoint, she returned to the shrine. The mountain gate remained badly damaged. Hoshino greeted Kallen, the gatekeeping AI, and did not immediately recall her Shadow Clone, lest the person lurking in secret notice anything suspicious.
After thinking it over, she decided it was probably Nightmare.
"Mayer said she'd restore my mountain gate to 1000% of its original condition. I wonder when she'll come."
Hoshino