A month had passed since that conversation.
Life went on as usual: daily "Cogitation" practice to strengthen the Soul, training with Maki, attempts to get closer to this "iron lady," evenings with Mei, and of course, preparations to "Shibuya." To be honest, it was very pleasant to return to the times when, after a night out, I didn't feel dead, and I had so much energy and health that it seemed if I tried hard enough, I could move mountains.
However, for the last couple of weeks, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't "move the mountain," which in this case meant finding the curse User "Grandma Ogami." It's amazing how much one must fear Satoru to hide so deeply that even I find it difficult to locate her. On the other hand, what else to expect from an evil, greedy old woman who stoops to the lowest and filthiest schemes for profit.
Sometimes I think that if I truly anger Mei, in thirty years, there'll be a woman far more terrifying running around the world...
In any case, as much as I disliked Ogami, it was necessary to find her. As a Sorcerer with the technique of reviving Sorcerers, she was an integral part of my plan. To understand her importance, let's just say that without her, the plan is unfeasible. So, it was vitally necessary that she was alive and able to perform the "Binding Vow" that I would need to make with her.
Two months left until Shibuya... I needed to hurry.
On the other hand, parallel to such a foolish thing as planning to save the world, my personal life was not standing still. My relationship with Mei, which was previously a friendship between a man and a woman, between Sorcerers living every day with the thought that this mission might well be their last, became a bit strange. Due to my obvious interest in Maki, Mei started behaving like a real conspirator... And that, by the way, is my role. I think Mei herself didn't want to acknowledge the fact of these changes, because from the beginning, we agreed that she didn't want a serious relationship, but now, as I "shifted my attention" to the younger girl, pride or perhaps jealousy woke up in her. From my point of view, the problem was not in my interest in Maki per se, but in the fact that Mei initially didn't consider our relationship serious, but now, when there's a girl on the horizon who could end our "casual" relationship, possessive traits revealed themselves in her.
"Like teenagers, I swear," I muttered, leaning back in my chair and gazing at the ceiling.
"Did you say something?" Shoko turned towards me.
"I'm thinking about how adults can behave like little children," I replied, standing up from the chair, then turned my attention to two "corpses" lying on sectional tables. "But you probably wouldn't find that interesting."
"Is there mockery in your words?" Shoko looked at me with her perpetually tired gaze.
"I'm not the one who's a lonely woman in the prime of her life," I could only shrug, catching myself thinking that among all my acquaintances and friends, only I had an interesting "sexual life."
"Spend a decade in a morgue, and words like 'sex' and 'love' will end up in one of these sections," Shoko retorted, thumbing back towards the wall with the freezer units for corpses.
"What a dull and grey life," I shook my head. It was hard for me to imagine myself in such a role.
"It's strange to hear that from someone who asked to examine corpses," Shoko squinted slightly, causing the mole under her right eye to twitch upwards.
"It's the situation," I simply shrugged.
"You can start," Shoko sighed and stepped aside. That's what I liked about this woman, her ease.
"So, these are altered humans," I approached the right corpse, lifting one of its limbs, examining the texture of the skin, and trying to understand how their smell differed from that of humans.
"Yes. The bodies of these people were forcibly distorted by magic," Shoko nodded affirmatively.
"And their situation is different from the first three victims?" Although I knew the "canon," I needed to clarify the details.
"The first three victims were also distorted by Cursed energy, but these two, while still alive," Shoko explained.
"If you can call it that," I murmured quietly.
"Were filled with Cursed energy, like Cursed spirits," Shoko ignored my comment. "Most likely, it's some cursed technique of the killer."
At that moment, my eyebrows unwittingly Shokot up. As I mentioned before, my five senses were developed to such an extent that I could sense the smell of people, their footsteps, air currents, the direction of Cursed energy, and even feel Cursed spirits without relying on Cursed energy. And now, as my nose was filled with the unpleasant stench of death, to which I had become accustomed over ten years of working as a Sorcerer, a thought occurred to me. The smell I sensed was different from the usual, from the human. But how? Initially, it was assumed that this was due to the biological reactions of the victims' bodies, caused by the forced change by Cursed energy. However, at that moment, I thought differently: what if it was the smell of Cursed energy? Yes, normally Cursed energy has no smell, but sometimes, when I overdo it with Spiritual energy, my Cursed energy begins to acquire certain physical characteristics. That is, it could be seen by ordinary people, and I could feel its smell and the roughness with my skin.
"What are your assumptions about how this Cursed technique works?" I asked, opening the eviscerated abdomen of the corpse.
"All victims show signs of intervention in brain activity. Interfering with a person's consciousness is a very delicate and complex task, so if the criminal managed to distort even the brain with such finesse, then restructuring a person into something that can use Cursed energy is well within their capabilities," Shoko explained, pulling out a pack of cigarettes.
"I thought you quit smoking?"
"And you're one to talk?" Shoko stared at me.
"Then, at least give me one," I extended my hand towards her, not taking my eyes off the corpse.
"This is a morgue..."
"Well, it certainly won't make them any worse," I replied skeptically.
Taking a break from the physical examination, I lit a cigarette and pondered. If the smell of the corpses remains like this even after death, it at least suggests that the transformative power of this Cursed technique is simply incredible. And it's one thing to read about "Soul Manipulation" in manga, but quite another to see its results in real life.
Especially for me, a person whose power is inextricably linked to Spirituality and, consequently, the Soul. Therefore, I could no longer restrain the urge to use Spiritual Vision. In the next moment, I saw something as astonishing as it was horrifying.
What was it called again... Idle Transfiguration — the main technique of Mahito, one of the most brutal and insane Curses, allowing him to affect the souls of his enemies bypassing their bodies, and to mutate them by influencing their soul and brain. Morality aside, as a user of Spiritual energy, I was sincerely in awe of the power and elegance of this technique. Even after so many years, I still couldn't give a clear answer on how exactly the human brain, Cursed energy, and cursed technique were interconnected.
Of course, with "Spiritual Vision," I could observe and study how a Sorcerer's soul is altered during the use of a Cursed technique, but it didn't yield the results I had hoped for. But now, after so much time spent in "Reflection," numerous observations and studies of ordinary people and Sorcerers, I finally saw that last piece of the puzzle, in its most unpleasant form.
Normally, after a person's death, their Soul separates from the physical body and "goes" somewhere. Perhaps, like me, to reincarnation, or maybe it just dissolves into oblivion. But even so, in the realm of the Spiritual world, a residual Spiritual force is attached to the physical body of the deceased, which in its structure resembles the Soul, and is located in the area of the human brain.
As far as I understood, this serves as a sort of protective mechanism of the Soul, allowing it under certain circumstances to survive and become, of course, not a living being, but something akin to a vengeful ghost. However, this "Spiritual construct" in the corpse was so mutilated that it turned into a sheer mess, hard to even call a congregation of Spiritual energy, let alone some "construction." But it was precisely due to this atrocity that I noticed something similar in the region of the corpse's heart… Most likely, previously, when the Soul gradually dispersed, returning to the Spiritual world, I couldn't notice it due to it being very "subtle," so much so that even now I barely managed to notice it.
Looking at something so unusual, a question flickered through my mind: what did I really know about the structure of the Soul?