"This will work!" Yuko said, feeling a sense of determination.
Yuko placed the liquid on the nearest table by the window overlooking the baseball field before returning to her classroom, where the first lesson was about to begin.
An hour later, everyone was in their classroom. Yuko asked the supervisor for permission to step out, and as she left, she dropped a note on Shimada's table.
"I need to talk to you urgently. You'll find me in the lab," read the note.
The lab was dimly lit as Yuko waited for his arrival, standing by the window with the liquid she hoped would serve as her weapon placed on the nearby table.
"What did you want to talk to me about?" Shimada asked as he entered the room.
Yuko didn't have the courage to turn and look him in the eye. "I'm sure you didn't notice me before, but I thought you were a really cool guy. I've been watching your every move, so... I've seen you. I don't want to consider you different from the rest of us, but if the rumors are true... if you are one of those monsters that kill and eat humans…"
She said all of this with a high degree of tension, her thoughts scattered, hoping she was wrong about him.
Upon hearing the last part of Yuko's statement, Shimada interrupted her, saying, "What if I am one of them?"
"If... if you are, then I want you to go to the police and turn yourself in. Innocent people are dying because of you. Or at least, go home and don't come back," Yuko said. Her emotions and admiration for him were enough to mask any crimes Shimada might have committed.
Yuko hesitated, reaching for the bottle of antimony fluoride, but in the end, she didn't have the courage to take it from the table.
"I don't want you to kill anymore!" she added.
"Have you told anyone about this?" Shimada asked, sensing Yuko's weakness in his own twisted logic.
Finally, Yuko turned to face Shimada. Without fear, she took a few steps toward him and then shouted in refusal, "Do you really kill people??"
"Why me specifically? There are others older than me among you, and you've done nothing to drive them away," he hinted at the existence of others like him, frustrated by Yuko's words.
"What? Are you trying to justify your crimes by pointing out that many others commit the same heinous acts of tearing human flesh?" Yuko said, not catching Shimada's implication.
With his head bowed and no response, he simply fell silent, staring at the ground.
Not far from the lab, Migi sensed an aggressive energy emanating from the parasite and alerted his host, Izumi.
Unusual for him, Shimada's once soft eyes now bulged, veins throbbing as his teeth transformed into jagged, saw-like edges.
"This is bad," Shimada said in a terrifying voice that sent chills down Yuko's spine.
Trembling with fear, she struggled to say, "Shimada..."
The handsome face she had admired for so long was now a horrifying visage that prevented her from even lifting her eyes to meet his.
Shimada's transformation continued, morphing from human into humanity's worst enemy at that moment—a creature that tore apart human flesh. His face cracked randomly at the edges, stretching out, with a neck connected to long, spiked teeth. Multiple eyes of different sizes scattered across the limbs, and a dangling appendage in front of Shimada held a huge spiked stone, while the tips of the other limbs ended in sharp blades on both sides.
"That idiot...!" Without warning, Izumi stood up and shouted in the middle of the classroom, where everyone had been focused on their work.
Ignoring the presence of others, Izumi raised his right hand to eye level and sharply demanded, startling everyone with his behavior, "Where is he?"
"Are you okay? Did you just wake up?" the class supervisor asked, surprised by Izumi's sudden outburst.
Despite Migi's vigilance, he recognized that what Izumi was asking him to do in the middle of the classroom was a mistake; it was clear that Shimada had not emerged, and he was right about that.
Heading toward the exit, Izumi walked amidst questions from the class supervisor and some students.
"Where are you going?" "Come back here!"
"I advise you not to move; you'll only hurt more if you do," Shimada said, addressing Yuko.
For the first time, Shimada was changing his approach to ending someone's life, appearing almost merciful! Could it be due to Yuko's kind treatment of him? Even now, she was willing to overlook all his crimes!
Like any person clinging to life, Yuko struggled to breathe, involuntary sounds betraying her intense fear. Her legs couldn't bear her weight and began to tremble; she was on the verge of collapsing backward in unsteady steps.
Shimada waved one of his limbs toward Yuko, resulting in a small portion of her hair being cut off by one of those sharp blades.
Shimada didn't miss his target when he attacked; it would have been easy to sever Yuko's neck instead of just a few strands of hair. However, his behavior was incomprehensible, and he might regret it later.
That miscalculated strike caused Yuko to stumble backward, crashing into the table behind her. Upon hitting the table, the bottle containing the antimony fluoride solution fell, and Yuko quickly reached for it. Without thinking, she hurled the bottle at Shimada.
Shimada didn't dodge the bottle! Instead, he shattered it with one of the blades on his limbs as it came down over his head!
Yes, it was a corrosive solution... The result was a rising cloud of white vapor after the liquid splashed onto his body. Shimada let out a hysterical scream from the intense pain, his body thrashing randomly.
His body began to melt and swell due to the reaction of the liquid with his flesh, but since he was not like ordinary humans, the liquid didn't take him out immediately. The parasite fought with all its might to survive...
Noticing his unsteady movements, Yuko realized Shimada couldn't see what was around him. She seized that moment of confusion, quickly getting up from the ground and heading toward the window in an attempt to escape. Fortunately for her, there was a ledge outside the window separating the two floors, allowing her to crouch down and buy some time to salvage what she could.
One of the players training on the baseball field spotted a student about to commit suicide and pointed her out to his friends. Voices rose, with some trying to convince Yuko to reconsider her decision, while others rushed to bring a bed in case she jumped.
It seems that the antimonic fluid wasn't enough to kill Shimada, as he returned to attack, launching his limbs like arrows toward the glass windows in search of Yuko. Trapped by Shimada's burnt and pale limbs, with bloodshot eyes, he stared through them for a while, analyzing what was happening. The cessation of some of the parasite's cells affected his reaction.
Yuko didn't have many options; she had only one choice, which she made, preferring not to die at the hands of a monster. She jumped from the top of the building onto a tree that softened her fall and finally onto a bed that the players had brought.