The silver blade was pulled out.
There was no bleeding, only the pain from the stab in the chest.
Shiki shook the knife as if trying to shake off the impure spirits clinging to it.
"You promised, right? To teach me how to use these eyes." Her calm words were filled with determination.
Touko nodded with a satisfied expression.
"Yes, but there are conditions as well. I will teach you how to use your eyes. In return, you must assist me with my work. I no longer have a familiar, so I need someone to help me."
Shiki didn't look back at Touko, but quietly let out these words.
"Is that... work that involves killing?"
"Ah, yes, of course."
"Then I'll do it, as you command. After all, I have no other purpose left."
Shiki, filled with sadness, slowly fell to the ground.
Was it due to the previous exhaustion? Or was it because of the reckless act of stabbing herself in the chest?
Touko lifted Shiki and gazed at her peacefully sleeping face. In her sleep, there was a slight warmth, and her face resembled that of a frozen corpse.
Touko gazed at that expression for a long time before finally speaking.
"No purpose, you say? That's truly tragic... You've misunderstood."
Shiki's breathing was steady. It seemed she was sleeping.
"An emptiness in the depths of one's heart, like the hollow of a temple, also means that it can contain more things. You fortunate fellow, there is no better future than this."
Touko lightly touched her upper lip with her lower lip.
"That kind of thing, I had already forgotten about it a long time ago. To speak from the depths of my heart means I'm not mature enough."
"Oh? How rare, you expressing such sentiments." The cloak unfolded, revealing a shadowy figure.
"Shinji... Since you've already arrived, why didn't you come out earlier?" Touko didn't look up, just complained, "You made us waste so much effort."
"Then wouldn't I have missed out on an exciting battle? Although I don't pursue any aesthetics of combat, that battle just now was truly beautiful and taught me a lot. This trip wasn't in vain, I learned a lot. The only regret is her line, if she changed 'I'll kill anything alive, no matter what' to 'I'll kill anything alive, even if it's a god,' it would be even more domineering."
That way, it would be worthy of her title as the "Root of Killing Gods".
Hearing Shinji's sigh, Touko couldn't help but show a trace of helplessness. "What does that have to do with anything? Have you been watching too much anime?"
Shinji rubbed his nose, suppressing the inner otaku heart that belonged to a moon chef, and carefully examined the girl who had fallen into a deep sleep. "So she's Shiki Ryougi? She's quite a beauty. Mikiya has good taste."
"Shiki has good taste too, falling for Mikiya. If she, someone who has died once, didn't have someone like Mikiya as an anchor, she might truly fall into an endless abyss." Touko sighed while pouting at Shinji.
"Have you seen the Eyes of Death?" Shinji understood, reaching for Touko's waist.
Don't misunderstand, he wasn't taking advantage of her, but taking out a cigarette from her pocket. Every time they talked about this kind of thing, Touko would want to smoke.
He took out the cigarette case, pulled out a cigarette, put it near Touko's mouth, and ignited it with flame runes. Everything happened so naturally.
"By the way, you said you would teach Miss Shiki how to use her eyes."
"Yes," Touko replied with a hint of ambiguity, the cigarette dangling from her mouth.
"Do you mind teaching one more person?"
"Again?"
That was Touko's immediate reaction. Every time Shinji found someone with anomalies like Fujino and Kirie, Shinji would want to throw them at Touko, and she was starting to feel numb to it.
"Whether you agree or not, I can tell you some information that you'll be interested in." Shinji squatted beside Touko and chuckled.
"Tell me, what kind of ability is it this time?"
"It's the same as this person, the Mystic eye of death perception."
"What? This kind of rare mystic eye that might not appear even once in a few hundred years has suddenly appeared twice?"
Perhaps too shocked, Touko's mouth gaped open, and the cigarette she had just taken a puff from fell. Fortunately, Shinji acted quickly and caught it before it could land on Shiki's face.
"Yes, and that's not even the main point. The main point is that the pronunciation of that person's name is also 'Shiki.'"
"Really?"
"Yeah."
"This is truly... a coincidence, no, it can't be explained by coincidence anymore, only by fate," Touko said, then pouted at Shinji once again.
This time, Shinji didn't respond. "There's something even more fateful. Do you want to hear it or not?"
"Go ahead, you didn't give me back the cigarette because of this, right? I'm mentally prepared for it."
"I remember you can create 'Eye-killer' to seal the mystic eyes, right?"
"Yeah, the glasses I wear are that. But the materials are hard to find. Why are you asking about this? Don't tell me you want me to make another one?"
"No, I just wanted to say that the other Shiki also has a pair of 'Eye-killer' glasses hanging on his nose."
"...Can you give me a more specific description?"
"Black, similar in style to the glasses Mikiya wears—though the craftsmanship isn't great, the details have your touch."
"...!"
"By the way, the appearance and temperament of that boy are also very similar to Mikiya. Some might even believe they are blood brothers."
For the third time, Touko pouted at Shinji, and after he handed her the cigarette, she took a deep drag and blew smoke rings in his face.
"You did that on purpose?"
Although Shinji coughed repeatedly from being choked, he nodded. "Yeah, I did it on purpose. I wanted to say it when you had two Shikis working for you. So, how about it? Are you interested? Do you want to go and take a look?"
That "I don't believe you won't take the bait" attitude made Touko blow out another puff of smoke. But the fact that she had this kind of reaction proved that she had taken the bait.
"You win. I'll go, no, you must take me. The same Shiki, a male resembling Mikiya, and the boy entrusted with the 'Eye-killer' by that idiot sister... Besides the time you showed me the 'Original Rune' and 'Seduced' me, this is the most interesting thing you've brought up."
"Should we bring the male Shiki and Mikiya together? It will be fun."
"Of course, I'm already looking forward to the scene when they meet," Touko raised an eyebrow.
"Oh, you're mischievous."
"Pot calling the kettle black."
The fact that they were quite close in terms of certain wavelengths was confirmed once again, with one being older and the other younger, and one being female while the other male.
"When Shiki stabilizes after being discharged, let's go see them together," Touko said as she princess-carried Shiki. Shiki's body was light, and even though Touko didn't exercise much, she didn't find it strenuous as her strength was not much different from an average person's.
"That's what I was thinking too." Shinji held onto Touko's waist, and with his winged shoes, he carried the two back to the single hospital room with the open window.
"Where is that boy? What's his name?"
"He's in Tokyo, and his name is Shiki Tohno!"
The protagonist of Type-Moon's classic work Tsukihime.
PS: Aoko is into shota, and Touko seems to have a thing for younger guys too. Well, Shinji benefits from being younger.
PS2: The original setting of "Tsukihime" was in Misaki City, but during the remake, someone at the studio decided to eat the book and move the setting to Tokyo. So, they adjusted accordingly. After all, "Witch on the Holy Night" also had its setting in Misaki City, and with the characters in that work present, the villains in "Tsukihime" wouldn't stand a chance.
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#G: Damn Dogman is Working
#TL: Shinji is Touko simp. xD