[The wheels of time rumbled along the tracks of the years, and the shadows of history quietly overlapped once more before anyone realized it.]
[This was also the pivotal year in which Rika Orimoto would suffer that fatal car accident, and Yuta Okkotsu would unconsciously knock on the door to that forbidden power amid despair and grief.]
[But when it came to handling Yuta Okkotsu, you, having already gone through this several times in simulations, took an entirely different approach this time.]
[You did not choose to intervene forcibly as you had in past simulations, nor did you personally appear before that still-immature boy who knew nothing of the cruel hidden world.]
[Even the fully independent cursed corpses under your command, the Great Sages that represented absolute military might, had never openly entered Yuta Okkotsu and Rika Orimoto's sight.]
[The Great Sage you had secretly dispatched was like a ghost that had blended completely into the city's bustle and shadows.]
[It lurked at the edges of the two children's daily routines, silently clearing away the low-level cursed spirits breeding in their area while devoting the vast majority of its processing power and attention to their physical safety.]
[This protection naturally fell short of round-the-clock, close-range surveillance without blind spots. Rather, it was precisely layered over the points in their lives where accidents were most likely to happen, such as when they passed busy intersections together on their way to and from school, or when they arranged to visit parks or the countryside on weekends.]
[The Great Sage's cold eyes constantly assessed every trace of danger in their surroundings from the shadows.]
[Within your cold, precise, computer-like rational logic, the hidden danger surrounding Yuta Okkotsu was divided with extraordinary clarity into two core components: one was Yuta Okkotsu himself, whose talent