"Wait, what do you mean? I was in recovery for the last few weeks on the island," Kazuki convinced his brother whose teammates were killed by his doppelganger.
"I know. But I just wanna make sure you're not him. It's clear to me that the doppelganger that killed my friends has met you before. He could be on the island the whole time," Hoshikawa then stood up, turned his head around to see his brother.
----
During the night, Kyuuto was alone on the hospital's roof. Overthinking about the recent happenings. Yato's death felt different than any other warriors. Even though he met him abruptly after Yamato was discovered, he considered him as a friend. He then thought about the doppelgangers that became a huge problem now.
The information from Hoshikawa confirmed that perhaps the doppelganger was on the island all along. And there's no way the warriors could detect them. Kyuuto then recalled what Kurouzu told him about Anrui, the god of living beings. The doppelganger could be him all along. But why? Why attack the warriors by imitating them?
----
The next morning, the warriors gathered inside the hospital building. There was a briefing about expanding the base and clearing the sector ahead of it. Ahead from the base is where the Ookami's house is located. Kyuuto then expressed his goal to come home, and gather as many clues as he could to beat the curse.
"That would be a suicide mission! Your house is still too far from the base, it may take a couple weeks to expand there," said one warrior, the warriors then murmured exchanging their opinions inside the bigger forum.
"Silence, everyone, one by one please!" Aosuke stood up from his chair, slightly hitting the table, he then turned his eyes towards Kyuuto and his team, "Kyuuto, please explain further,"
After taking a long breath, he then began to explain, "Kurouzu told me about it," as he considered that the warriors here hadn't realized that the enemy was actually inside him, he continued, "... he believed that somewhere in my house, there's a key to this whole mess. Perhaps in one of the rooms I haven't been in before,"
The crowd murmured once again, but Kyuuto kept on explaining, "You have to believe me for this. Back then I wasn't allowed to enter my oldest brother, and my parents' room. There must be something there, as they were the important figures in the Ookami curse. If I could explore those rooms... perhaps we could get an answer,"
After the briefing, the warriors were having different opinions about the result. The majority of them didn't want to participate in Kyuuto's treasure hunt mission, as his house was still out of reach. With the hunters roaming around, and the mysterious doppelganger, they didn't want to take the chance.
Kyuuto's team led this operation, while the other teams cleared the surrounding area for the expansion. The weather was nice with plenty of sunlight, few of the possessed were around, making the first part of the operation smooth sailing.
"A few blocks ahead is clear," Hikiri came back from his observation roof, "but I suggest we should take the roofs to be safe," the team then nodded and followed through. The situation was very calm, with a small number of the possessed roaming around and easily taken down by the warriors.
As the team jumped from their current roof to another, Rin asked, "What do you think we'll discover there?" to Kyuuto whose eyes scanned the area from left to right, "was your story really true? About some rooms you weren't allowed to enter?"
"Yeah. My father and Shin are always so secretive about their rooms. I mean-- I understand that even in normal circumstances you don't get to explore EVERY family member's bedroom in your house, but this felt different. Especially with Shin, I never went to his room ever. Don't even know what it looks like," Kyuuto answered while stroking his chin. His eyes then locked on a two-story building in the middle of a simple neighborhood, finally, he's home.
----
As the team approached the house, Kyuuto noticed something strange. Some part of the house was in perfect condition, but on the opposite side, it has been wrecked completely. Ishigaki then stumbled upon a destroyed beacon buried beneath rubbles of the front walls.
Upon closer inspection, Kyuuto concluded, "This means someone was trying to recover the house, but who? And why?" the team then guessed started from the warriors, to the darkness themselves, but didn't get to any conclusion.
"If it's the darkness, and they came with the same goal as us, how did they get their hands on the beacons?" Kazuki inquired.
"I guess they're from Base 27," Kyuuto guessed for the last time.