Ghouls began pouring into the bar from every direction, quickly filling the already cramped space. Their greedy eyes locked onto Shiro Sakamaki, and saliva dripped from open mouths, staining the wooden floor with a sickening sheen. Even a special-class investigator would have been overwhelmed in this kind of situation.
But in the middle of it all, Shiro Sakamaki remained perfectly calm—his expression unchanged, almost amused.
"I suggest you all calm down," he said lightly. "If you get hurt, don't say I didn't warn you."
Itori scoffed from behind the bar. "Hmph. Even if you are a Transcendent, do you really think you can stand against this many of us?"
They had two SSS-rated ghouls, three SS-level, eight S-class, and the rest were A-rank—numbers and power that could easily overwhelm even Hiratsuka's task force, if not for her alone.
"Frogs in a well," Shiro murmured. "You see I'm not running, and think that means you have a chance?"
The shadows at his feet suddenly surged upward, transforming into dozens of sharp black spears that pierced the ghouls in an instant—too fast even for Itori or Kaya Irimi to react. Their famed skin defense was rendered completely useless.
Dozens were impaled midair, writhing and screaming, their bodies twitching as they were pinned like grotesque trophies.
Itori and Irimi exchanged horrified glances.
They had counted on their numbers. Even against a Transcendent, they thought they had a fighting chance.
Before they could regroup, Shiro raised a hand again.
A sickening crack echoed through the room.
The black spears exploded into writhing thorns, shooting out in every direction from within the ghouls' bodies, turning them into something unrecognizable—hedgehog-like corpses riddled with barbed spikes.
Not even the infamous regenerative power of ghouls could save them from that kind of devastation.
Shiro watched with a neutral expression. There was no hesitation, no pity. Each of these creatures had taken human lives—his only regret was that he couldn't kill them twice.
Itori and Irimi were frozen. The sheer brutality, the utter ease of the massacre—they were nothing to him.
Irimi managed to speak first, her voice trying for charm but landing somewhere between fear and surrender.
"Handsome... you must want information, right? Ask. We'll tell you whatever we know."
Smart move. Shiro appreciated when people knew their place.
He repeated his question from the day before—about the origin of ghouls, particularly their appearance in human children.
Unsurprisingly, they didn't know much either. But Irimi mentioned something: she'd once looked into the appearance of young ghouls herself, purely out of curiosity. Her investigation had led her to a few interesting conclusions.
Ghouls had only appeared in the last hundred years, and only in Japan. More specifically, they were heavily concentrated in Tokyo.
That aligned with Shiro's suspicions, but it didn't explain why.
He nodded, filing the information away for Akihiro Kanou to investigate further. As a member of the Clown organization, Kanou probably didn't have access to the core secrets either. Still, he was a step closer—perhaps the Washuu family would need to be his next target.
The bar, once chaotic, now lay silent. The air reeked of blood and death. Shiro casually avoided the corpses and picked up a tattered SS-rated kagune—damaged, but intact enough to serve its purpose. Without hesitation, he tossed it into his mouth. Worthless to him, but a formality nonetheless.
Turning to Itori, who hadn't moved from her spot behind the counter, he spoke again.
"I still have some preference for women, so I'll ask: do you know anything about my question?"
She shook her head without hesitation. "I don't. Sorry—I'd rather stay alive than go digging into secrets like that."
Shiro studied her face. She wasn't lying. Her survival instincts were sharper than most. He respected that.
"Good. I wasn't expecting much anyway. Actually, the main reason I came tonight... was for you."
She blinked, caught off guard. "For me?"
"I want your intelligence network. I need someone on the inside who can provide me with information when I need it."
Her lips parted, the instinct to refuse on the tip of her tongue. But one look at Shiro's eyes froze her in place.
"Alright," she said with a dry laugh. "But I don't have much reach into the Transcendent circles. I can only do what I can."
"That's fine," Shiro replied. "If you tried poking around in that world, you'd be dead in two days."
She nodded silently. He wasn't wrong.
"How will I contact you?" she asked hesitantly.
"You won't," he said, walking toward the exit. "I'll come to you when I need something."
Behind him, Itori cursed silently. With so many ghouls dead, her bar was finished. She'd already decided to disappear and relocate before the CCG came knocking. If Shiro couldn't find her later, well... not her fault.
But just as he reached the door, Shiro paused and turned slightly.
He looked at the small storage room near the entrance and smiled faintly.
"Come out, Nino. I know you're in there."
The door creaked open, and Nakano Nino stepped out, face pale as a sheet.
The overwhelming scent of blood in the room assaulted her senses, and the moment she took a breath, she turned to the side and vomited.
Earlier that evening, she'd come to the bar with a classmate who'd mentioned it was "interesting." They never made it past introductions.
She'd spotted Shiro from across the room, started walking toward him—then the shadows rose.
In an instant, her classmate was among the dozens nailed to the walls, lifeless eyes staring into nothing.
She was the only one untouched.
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