The startled cry she failed to stifle exploded through the corridor.
Shinobu Kocho's hand still rested on the doorframe. She turned her head and met Mitsuri Kanroji's pale green eyes, wide as saucers.
Mitsuri held a bowl of restorative soup. Steam still rose from its surface, and the spoon resting against the rim swayed with her trembling fingers.
Her gaze lingered for a second on Shinobu Kocho's collar, its top two buttons undone.
Then it shifted to her pale neck, fixing for two seconds on the glaring red grip mark beneath her jaw.
Finally, it passed over Shinobu Kocho's shoulder and landed inside the room.
Yaha was crouching on the floor.
His black yukata hung half open, its sweat-soaked front clinging to his powerful chest. The dark gray Cursed Markings on his neck had not faded completely, tracing his muscles down below his collarbone and lending him an air of languid, post-exertion savagery.
He was wiping grease from the corner of his mouth with his sleeve. An empty three-tier food box sat beside him.
Farther to the side-
Several deep cracks split the solid wood floor. Four enormous claw marks gouged into the load-bearing wall, deep enough to lay bone bare.
Every lantern in the room had gone out. Only the morning light outside the window barely illuminated the wreckage.
Mitsuri's breathing instantly became erratic, her chest heaving as though she had just run ten laps around the Swordsmith Village.
A few hours earlier.
Outside the guest room. Being pinned against the wall, panting, and that low, hoarse, "Bite me if you want."
Now.
An open collar. Grip marks. Drenched in sweat. A shattered floor. Inhuman claw marks on the wall.
Twice in one night.
And in between, he had gone out and fought an entire battle against an Upper