The view from the island is often disregarded and hidden behind the feeling of dread from across the strait dividing the two islands. In his dorm room, Kyuuto re-evaluate what had happened to him and his teammates recently. Recounting every instance of their adventures toward freedom. Is it all worth it? Will everything back to normal? What will happen if they win?
Or lose?
Kotetsu isn't himself anymore; Kuroyuki and Kitaro betrayed the warriors; Ishimaru was gone without a trace, and there's still an abundance of unanswered questions when it came to Yuukai and Raizen. Even the curse itself doesn't seem as straightforward as he thought it was. What if he was indeed the real enemy?
When he closed his eyes, he saw a vision of a group of people discussing something in a small meeting room. He then jolted awake thinking that must be Kurouzu's memory. Was that the original Aotori?
Feeling uneasy, Kyuuto decided to avoid sleep that night. He ventured inside the school as the moon was high up in the sky, hoping to find answers to his burning questions. When walked across the headmaster's office, he overheard a conversation between Yuukai and Raizen.
"There's no point in turning back, we have to keep pushing forward," uttered Yuukai, he laid a map and pointed to multiple points on it, "if we can lure them here, here, and here, we might get a better chance to defeat them all at once,"
Raizen sighed, then reasoned with him, "Listen, Yuukai. We can't keep forcing them to keep fighting the darkness without understanding their full threat. There's also Anrui... we're unable to seal Volkus if we stay separated like this,"
Kyuuto's chest suddenly hurt after the name Volkus went through his ears, it felt like he was getting punched and pressed right on the heart. He endured, and listened to some more of their debate.
"What if we tell him the truth?" Raizen asked.
Yuukai went silent for a moment then answered, "No. Not yet. Let him discover himself,"
Kyuuto was shocked and intrigued after hearing their exchange, as the pain in his chest was getting sharper, he decided to avoid the conversation and move to another part of the school.
In the kitchen, Kyuuto saw someone looking at a set of knives. The figure was cloaked in shadow, so he couldn't figure out who it was. He regrets the fact that he didn't bring his zodiac sword with him, so he carefully observed the figure.
After sneaking around to get a clearer picture of the shadowy person, Kyuuto accidentally stepped on a spoon and made a noise, "Shit!!" he cursed himself. The mysterious figure noticed, then fled using one of the windows.
Kyuuto wasn't fast enough to chase them, he then realized that one of the knives was missing from the set. They took it.
----
The following day, the warriors were alerted by a grim announcement in the center of the residence area. A man has been murdered in the dead of night, witnesses claimed they saw what seemed like a monkey hopping around at night.
"It's weird... because there's no monkey on this island. And what would trigger a random monkey to become a psychopath?" one of the guardians explained to Kyuuto and his team.
As the population on the island grew, so did the complexities among them. The guardians were essentially the police of this small civilization, their duty was to make sure the inhabitants followed a set of rules to live peacefully.
"Some of the witnesses even reminded of the gruesome murders before the Great Search, the Akazaru (Red Monkey) case," some of the residents gasped at that name, "if you didn't know, he was a serial killer on the loose, never been caught because of his agility... his appearance in the dark of night covered in blood resembles a monkey with red fur. Truly a terrifying sight,"
"The Akazaru killer..." Yato remembered something, "is he really here?"