The art of making a getaway

Gu Yanzhi stood in the library and methodically began cleaning up.

The body's original owner had been meticulous about this to an almost outrageous degree. When he had studied under Kenjaku a thousand years ago, the old monster with stitches across his forehead had emphasized neither offense nor defense, but cleaning up afterward.

"It isn't the strongest who survive, but the most cautious."

Kenjaku had said those words to the original owner in a courtyard during the Heian era. Now they flowed into Gu Yanzhi's mind through his memories.

First, he made a circuit along the edge of the Perception Barrier laid out in the original owner's memories.

The Cursed Energy nodes hidden in the corners of bookshelves and cracks in the walls were only the size of a fingernail. He had planted them one by one with telekinesis throughout the library's first floor. He extended a finger and touched the nearest node. With a gentle tug of Cursed Energy, the pale golden glow broke into tiny specks of light at his fingertip and vanished.

This was the Perception Barrier he had set up in advance. These nodes were his eyes, allowing him to track the movements of nearby Swimmers.

Next came the Amplification Barrier covering the library's exterior walls. He walked over to a wall, knelt on one knee, and pressed his palm against the cold floor tiles. Cursed Energy seeped along the wall into the barrier's foundation. An almost imperceptible hum sounded deep within the wall, and then the entire barrier silently collapsed like a tent stripped of its frame, dissolving into the air.

The original owner had known before the fight that he lacked sufficient Cursed Energy, so he had spent nearly half an hour setting up this barrier beforehand. Its boost to his Cursed Energy output was what had allowed Gu Yanzhi to win that battle.

Finally, he cleaned up the traces of Cursed Energy scattered during the fight. Only after finishing all of this did he straighten and let out a long breath. The library returned to dead silence, with only the wind pouring through the shattered windows and sending loose pages tumbling across the floor.

He walked to the window and looked up at the distant sky. Not long ago, blinding flashes of lightning had lit up that direction.

Hajime Kashimo's Cursed Energy signature was unmistakable. Even from halfway across the barrier, Gu Yanzhi could sense those violent currents. He had actually been fighting this whole time. There was practically no one inside this barrier who could last more than a few exchanges against Hajime Kashimo, so the guy must have been constantly hunting for people to fight.

In his previous life, he had often bashed Kashimo online with lines like "can't use Domain Expansion," "can't use Reverse Cursed Technique," "the strongest guy at the village gate four hundred years ago," and "diced mango."

But memes were memes. He could talk all the trash he wanted from behind a keyboard, but if he actually ran into old Kashimo, keeping his distance was the smart move.

He had finally managed to acquire a normal body, one that was even fairly strong. His first priority was earning causality points to benefit his future reincarnations.

So his first choice was obvious: meet up with Kinji Hakari when he arrived later, join the main cast, and see whether he could do anything in the main storyline.

As for the second choice-go kill Hajime Kashimo right now, which would definitely earn him plenty of causality points-why wasn't he doing that? Let's not go there.

Carrying his blade, he slipped into the alley behind the library, crouched low, and stealthily headed in the opposite direction from the lightning.

One landmark stood out clearly in his memories: the Abandoned Amusement Park where Kinji Hakari had appeared in the original story. It was near the edge of the barrier, toward the subway station.

He needed to lie low until the next day, November 12, then show himself after Kinji Hakari and Charles finished their fight and find a chance to meet up with them. Although he could no longer remember the plot details very clearly, he was still fairly sure of the general timeline.

After passing through several commercial streets that had been destroyed beyond recognition, he suddenly stopped.

There was a small café by the roadside. Most of its floor-to-ceiling windows had shattered, and shards of glass hung precariously from the doorframe, but the tables and chairs inside were still more or less in place. Dim yellow emergency lighting spilled out from behind the counter, illuminating a figure sitting alone in a corner.

His eyes were lowered as he stared at his reflection in a coffee cup. He radiated an almost palpable melancholy that seemed utterly out of place amid the surrounding wreckage.

Charles.

I actually ran into him here? Then I'll need to adjust the plan a little. If I stick with this guy, I should at least survive long enough to meet Kinji Hakari.

Gu Yanzhi strode into the café. Charles looked up and gave him a cold glance, his eyes hollow and exhausted, then quickly returned his gaze to his coffee cup, as though whoever had come in had nothing to do with him.

"I no longer have any desire to fight." His voice was hoarse, as though he hadn't spoken to anyone in a long time.

"Ever since Tokyo became infested with cursed spirits, none of the media outlets that publish manga have reported a single piece of news about it. Those celebrated authors and works I respected so much amounted to no more than that in the eyes of the world."

He lightly tapped the rim of his coffee cup with a finger. The crisp sound of his nail striking porcelain echoed through the empty café.

"If you insist on fighting me, then do me a favor-give me a reason to fight."

Gu Yanzhi froze for a moment at those words.

That did seem to be how it had gone. Charles really had been in this state in the original story. Looking at the exhausted manga artist clutching his coffee cup, Gu Yanzhi suddenly felt as though he were seeing his former self.

Back in the real world, in his previous life, he had been much the same kind of homebody-working overtime until midnight, spending weekends holed up in his rented apartment reading manga, arguing on forums about which character was the strongest, and trading dozens of replies with strangers over a single powerscaling thread.

He sat down beside Charles and propped his blade against the table. "Looks like I've found a kindred spirit. I'm not fond of fighting either. Why don't we just have some coffee, talk about manga, and enjoy life a little in this apocalypse?"

Charles raised his eyebrows and looked at him with pleasant surprise. At last, a faint spark appeared in his eyes. He turned his chair to face Gu Yanzhi directly, his movements showing a vitality that had long been absent.

"I never imagined it. I really never imagined I'd still find someone who loved manga in a world like this. I thought all those Swimmers outside were idiots with nothing but fighting on their minds." He paused, as though remembering something important. "What should I call you?"

"Gu Yanzhi."

"Charles." He held out his hand and shook Gu Yanzhi's. Then, as though a switch had been flipped, he began talking nonstop, starting with how he used to read manga for free at convenience stores in elementary school.

His hands gestured in the air, and his excitement gradually gave way to exhaustion. Finally, his account ended with his recent visit to Shueisha to submit his work, only to be rejected by those unremarkable nobodies.

Gu Yanzhi leaned back in his chair, holding a room-temperature can of cola he had just found behind the counter, and nodded from time to time.

He could tell that Charles didn't need a listener in the usual sense. He needed someone who understood why he was still persevering. He had bottled up so much for so long, and now someone was finally willing to sit across from him, drink cola, and nod along.

At last, Charles stopped. He fell silent for a while. The liquid in his coffee cup had gone completely cold. He stared at the cup for a long time, then raised his head and asked a question. His tone turned serious, less like casual conversation and more like a question whose answer could decide something.

"What's your favorite work?"

Gu Yanzhi looked at Charles, spun the cola can once between his fingers, and answered rather casually.

"Jujutsu Kaisen."