Chapter 9: Kyoka Shimazaki

Somewhere unknown in this world, within a realm entirely constructed of consciousness and nestled inside a garden radiating a bizarre atmosphere, Tetsuya, the secondary personality, wore a somewhat ferocious expression as he glared with dissatisfaction at the cold-faced middle-aged man not far away, alongside a woman possessing an equally cold and gloomy demeanor.

"What on earth is going on here? How could the Alien Magin be targeted by the Deus that we control, and moreover, have it assigned as a mission to an agent?"

"Those conscious minds extracted from human bodies were meant to be used to heal my injuries! Yet they were utterly destroyed by a Deus agent. How on earth could you pull off such a left-hand-striking-the-right-hand absurdity?!"

The secondary personality appeared utterly furious. Back when he had successfully imprisoned Jin, he had seized the dominant power. Subsequently, following Seven's call originating from the Land of Light in Seven's original universe—summoning the power left behind in this world—he seized the opportunity to split his own consciousness. The majority of it traveled to the Land of Light alongside this summons and had once successfully possessed Seven's body.

His thought at the time had been to do everything in his power to acquire the energy of the Plasma Spark, pushing his own strength to new heights. However, he had fallen short of success at the very last moment. Due to the presence of the King of Ultraman, his consciousness had been destroyed, the backlash rippling back into this world as well.

The consequence of this incident was Jin's escape. To mend his injuries, he had formed a contract with the Alien Magin, purchasing energy extracted from human brains to recuperate. At the same time, he had also placed an order there for invasion weapons.

Who could have anticipated that such a bizarre internal conflict would suddenly break out, resulting in the current awkward predicament?

Yet, facing his fury—or rather, incapable of truly comprehending his emotional fluctuations—the middle-aged man and the middle-aged woman, existing purely as consciousness entities, still provided an answer to his interrogation:

"You know very well that we achieve dominion over the world through information," the middle-aged man stated expressionlessly.

"Including the task assignments for Deus agents."

The middle-aged woman stepped forward and picked up the thread, "As for this particular order, it was not issued by us. In fact, our information stream was intercepted; humans cracked our security protocols and arbitrarily altered our data."

"Who was it?"

The middle-aged man stepped forward again and said, "It is a resistance faction that has only recently emerged, and we have already made a preliminary identification of their leader. This person was once a Deus agent, but was later taken away following 'the ship,' and was subsequently rescued by Seven X."

"Under his leadership, the vast majority of social strays—those who have lost all hope in this world—have joined their organization."

Upon receiving information regarding this suddenly emerged resistance organization, the secondary personality froze for a moment.

The leader of this so-called resistance organization was R!

***

Delta Medical Center.

Yoshikawa Hiro, the chubby man, was still terrified of the man walking behind him. He kept glancing back from time to time, a persistent sense of unease gnawing at his heart.

A hand reached out from behind him and rested on his shoulder. Jin patted it gently and said, "Why are you so afraid of me? Is it because everything you said was a lie?"

The fat on Yoshikawa Hiro's body shuddered, and his legs trembling, he stammered, "N-N-Not at all!"

"That's good, then." Jin smiled, patting his shoulder again, "You just need to prove that you didn't lie to me, that's all. What on earth are you worrying about?"

Nodding like a chick pecking at rice, Yoshikawa Hiro quickened his pace, hurrying toward a hospital ward.

The "Hopeless" incident had already come to an end. Sometimes, Jin would still recall those people known as social strays, their numbness and resentment. Even when their stronghold was smashed and they were rescued, the looks they cast toward Jin and K were still laden with fierce anger.

Jin considered what he was doing to be in the name of justice, but how could people like them ever understand such a thing?

Society seemed to be forcing them toward their graves, never affording them a shred of a path to survive. As for Tamaru, the Alien Magin, although he operated under the guise of employment, luring people into helping him manufacture invasion weapons and even having their brain energy extracted, to them, it was still a mutually agreed-upon arrangement. They received corresponding compensation; they had the right to choose whether or not to work, and Tamaru had never forced anyone.

Compared to the actions of the government, the treatment Tamaru provided was vastly superior.

The factory had been sealed off, and the social strays were once again left without jobs. They had been liberated, but was this liberation truly what they had hoped for?

Lost in these thoughts, by the time Jin snapped back to reality, he was already standing outside the door of the hospital ward, with Yoshikawa Hiro gazing at him oddly from the side.

Pushing open the door and stepping inside, Jin saw a little girl sitting up on the hospital bed. Her frail, thin body was swallowed by a blue-striped patient gown, and her gaze was fixed out the window, seeming to yearn boundlessly for the days when she could play outside.

Hearing the door open, the little girl's gaze immediately fell upon Yoshikawa Hiro. She smiled and asked, "Big Brother Yoshikawa, when is big brother coming back? Kyoka misses him so much!"

Yoshikawa Hiro looked somewhat embarrassed, at a loss for words. The chubby man seemed thoroughly inept at lying; his eyes darted everywhere, trying to skirt around the topic and talk about anything else.

Jin walked over to the side of the bed, looked at Kyoka as she pouted in mild discontent