Hollyhock Green Cypress

Panting heavily, Ross spread his hands toward Chen Guan, his tone carrying the giddy bravado of someone who had just survived a deadly ordeal.

“That’s it?”

“So the Kamitani Academy’s top student is nothing special after all.”

Chen Guan ignored him. His gaze passed over Ross’s shoulder and landed on the paper talismans scattered across the ground, not one of them damaged in the slightest.

“You’re celebrating too soon.”

The moment he finished speaking, the forest rang with the dense rustling of paper.

The yellow talismans scattered over the rotting leaves were pulled upright by invisible threads. They swayed unsteadily into the air, gathering, folding, and interlocking.

In the space of a few breaths, more than a dozen paper samurai nearly two meters tall took shape out of thin air. Each wielded a razor-sharp paper blade, their blank paper faces turning toward the two men and radiating a cold, mechanical killing intent.

Ross’s Adam’s apple bobbed. The relief he had just felt was squeezed tight once more.

“You take the left. I’ll take the right.” Chen Guan barked the order, already charging forward with his scythe clenched in hand. He swung it at one of the paper samurai.

The scythe blade collided with the paper sword, producing a harsh metallic clang. The immense recoil left his wrist numb.

The paper was far harder than Chen Guan had expected. It was nothing like ordinary paper effigies.

On the other side, Ross’s metal storm battered the paper samurai, but could only send sparks flying and leave behind pale scratches. It failed to inflict any meaningful damage.

“Chen, I can’t cut these things!” Ross shouted for help as he awkwardly dodged a paper blade.

“Use your drug.”

Chen Guan’s voice betrayed no emotion. He sidestepped a lethal slash, then used the momentum to drive the butt of his scythe upward, smashing it hard into the joint connecting the paper samurai’s limbs.

The fragile folded structure snapped on impact, and half of the warrior’s body collapsed.

“I can’t. If I use it, I’m done for.”

At this point, Ross hesitated instead. That injection was his last trump card for saving his life.

Chen Guan paid him no further attention. He darted through the encirclement of several paper samurai, using his scythe to block some attacks and the weapon’s handle to strike others. Every blow landed on the fragile structural joints, calmly dismantling the killing machines piece by piece.

“Hungry, hungry.”

Baobao had somehow dealt with the stragglers. It was now circling a fallen paper warrior, its purple eyes filled with curiosity. Tentatively, it stretched out a paw and scratched at the iron-hard paper shell, producing an earsplitting scraping sound.

Then it opened its mouth and bit down.

The crisp sound of chewing was especially jarring amid the battlefield.

Ross’s eye twitched. “Does your pet have a steel stomach?”

Chen Guan kicked away a paper warrior that had lost its balance and answered without missing a beat.

“Maybe it’s deficient in trace minerals.”

Before the words had even left his mouth, the remaining paper samurai stopped attacking. They retreated in perfect unison, then converged and fused together in midair.

Layer upon layer of paper piled up. When it finally landed, it had formed a gigantic paper general several times larger than all the warriors combined. Clouds of dust billowed around it as it gripped an enormous paper blade shaped like a door panel, its icy killing intent locking onto the two men in the clearing.

Six hundred and sixty-six—and there was still a third round.

Chen Guan stared speechlessly at the paper figure that had grown yet another size larger. He had only one thought.

Hiiragi Qingbai, you’re playing dirty!

“This is bad. This time, I really am going to need the drug.” Ross stared at the paper general radiating a terrifying pressure and raised the genetic serum in his hand in despair.

“Stand back.”

Chen Guan’s voice came from behind him. Ross turned around and saw that Chen Guan had already raised his scythe before him.

“Use your ability. Take it apart.” Chen Guan’s commanding tone left no room for argument.

“What?” The expression on Ross’s face froze. He couldn’t understand how Chen Guan had seen through his plan.

“Stop pretending.”

Chen Guan’s gaze swept over the scraps of metal swirling around Ross. “Those things are only the most rudimentary application of your power.”

“Your ability isn’t limited to controlling scraps of junk. Don’t forget—we’ve fought before. You weren’t nearly this gentle with me last year.”

Ross’s face shifted from pale to green. How did this kid have such a good memory?

He watched the paper general advancing step by step, then finally gritted his teeth. Looks like he would have to trust this Coffin Boy a little after all.

“You win.”

He put away the genetic serum, raised his right hand, and aimed it at the enormous paper figure.

The space before Ross’s palm rippled and warped like the surface of water. The paper general’s charging foot suddenly came to a halt.

It lowered its head and looked at its calf, which had been compressed from countless sheets of paper. The leg was disintegrating at a structural level, collapsing into the most basic fibers and drifting down in a rustling shower of powder.

The paper general’s enormous body crumpled, kicking up a cloud of dust.

Chen Guan said nothing. He merely watched Ross in silence.

The forest fell quiet once more. The only sound left was Baobao crunching away at the paper figure’s remains beside them.

A moment later, a gentle voice came from the canopy overhead, amusement woven into every word.

“Gentlemen, my little guests—was the welcome satisfactory?”

A white figure drifted down from the dense canopy. His kariginu was untouched by even a speck of dust in the shadowy forest, and he landed without a sound. Hiiragi Aoba held a folding fan before the lower half of his face, revealing only a pair of crescent-shaped eyes brimming with laughter.

His voice was gentle and courteous, like a greeting exchanged between old friends.

Ross’s body tensed instantly. Cold sweat almost immediately soaked through the back of his combat uniform as he stared fixedly at the smiling young man before him.

“Satisfactory, my ass.”

Ross practically spat the words through clenched teeth, the final syllable carrying a tremor he himself failed to notice.

Without making a sound, Chen Guan shifted the black coffin behind him and tightened his five fingers around the scythe’s handle once more.

Hiiragi Aoba’s gaze passed over the two men and settled on the mangled remains of the paper figures Baobao had chewed apart. The smile at the corners of his mouth deepened.

“My shikigami told me that two interesting guests had arrived.”

Chen Guan broke the silence in the forest. “You’re the chief of Kamitani Academy?”

“I’m afraid I don’t deserve such a title. I’m Hiiragi Aoba, merely an ordinary fourth-year student.”

Hiiragi Aoba bowed modestly, but the folding fan in his hand snapped open with a sharp sound. Painted across its surface was a sinister scene of the Night Parade of One Hundred Demons.

“Since my welcome was less than satisfactory, allow me to see you off personally. Your match ends here.”

The instant the last word left his lips, his wrist flicked. Several invisible blades of wind burst from the fan, slicing soundlessly through the air as they shot straight for the two men’s vital points.

“Watch out!”

Ross roared, thrusting both hands forward. The air before him immediately rippled in visible rings.

The wind blades struck those ripples and were broken down on the spot, dissolving into a stream of pure particles.

“Not bad.”

Hiiragi Aoba praised him softly, as though admiring a work of art. The smile on his face remained unchanged, but the warmth in his eyes abruptly vanished.

Mechanic-type monsters like this were the most irritating.

Ross’s heart hammered in his chest. Just blocking that single attack had already left a cold sweat beading at his temples.

His disintegration wasn’t omnipotent. The other man had merely flicked his fan, yet Ross had needed to exert every ounce of strength just to neutralize the attack. The gap in their power levels made his scalp tingle.

No matter how good a gimmick was, it couldn’t stand against overwhelming stats.