01x05 - A Monster of the Imagination

[bunniefuu]

Huh?

What on earthis Kurou doing here?

And the wayhe moves is so clumsy.

He has little to no experiencein sports or martial arts,

and yet he looks completelyunfazed, taking on a monsterlike that.

That kind of approachis so utterly cruel.

I figured something likethis might happen,

but right now the timingof this couldn't be worse.

Hey, you. Huh?What the hell is the big idea?

Your monster summons me, andthen you bail on our meeting.

Not to mention that pervyghost you left behind.

Why couldn't you have justwaited at the restaurant? Saysomething.

Huh?

Hurry. We have to save him.

Let things play out.He will be fine.

For what it's worth,I'm sure he's

even prepared to have his headsmashed in at least once. Huh?

Curro.

But why is Curro here? Get too

close and you might getcaught in the middle.

Let's just watch for a bit.

But it looks like hecould go down at any moment.

He's tripping over his own feet.

Yeah,but it doesn't seem like steel.

Lady Nancyis that much stronger than

he is. It should be simple,

especially if Kira's willing totake a steel beam to the face.

Huh?Even if he's close to death,

he'll be able to get rightback up in no time at all due

to the immortality he gainedby eating mermaid flesh.

Oh.

Huh? What's the matter? Is this

the first timeyou've seen Kuro die?

Of course it is. Really? Thenwhy'd you break up with him?

I saw a cut on his hand.Heal up immediately.

I watched his severedfingers grow back.

And when it happened,he acted like

there was nothingstrange about it at all.

Well, that's to be expectedwith an Immortal.

A man in perfect health.Couldn't she

just accept whata great husband he'd

have made that she'dnever have to worry

about him being injured or sick?No.

The way she's acting now,I guess not.

Is it so strangeto suddenly feel

scared at the thought ofbecoming family with someonelike that?

Am I not allowedto reconsider that marriage?

Dozens of his relatives havedied of strange illnesses orunusual causes.

Curro's the only one of themwho's living a decent life.

Looks like Hiro's comingto and back in action.

If he gets that close.She'll k*ll him again.

He stopped just out of rangeof the steel beams arc

Ku-ro and steelLady Nana say look

like they're followinga choreographed routine.

Everything seems calculated.I can't believe that he

grabbed her so easily.. WhileSteel Lady Nana say is just

wildly swinging the steelbeam without thinking.

The possibility of somethinglike this happening is actuallyrather high.

And if the odds are good enoughthat something will happen,

it's not at alldifficult for Kuro

to set that future in stone.

That's another one of Kuro'scapabilities. The powers of theProphet beast,

the Kudan whose fleshhe ate as well.

The powerto determine the future.

He said he'd never gotten thechance to tell Saki everything

about the secretsof the Sakura Ogawa's.

It all started aboutten generations before

Curro was born with the head of

the Sakuragawa familyat that time.

If your liver is faulty,consume the liver

of a creaturewith a powerful one.

If your eyes give out,devour the eyes

of a creature with great vision,then it follows.

If you ate the flesh of a kudan,

you could acquireits prophetic powers.

If I could lookunhindered into the future,

I could gain an unlimitedamount of wealth. The Kudan.

A yokai with the head of a humanand the body of a cow.

It can speakthe language of men,

and once it predicts the future,it dies.

Occasionally it wouldpredict good future, such

as good harvest or a windfall.

But most of its predictionswould be misfortunes.

And they were always accurate.He got

his hands on Kudan meat and fed

it to several in his household.

Some d*ed instantly after havinga bad reaction to the meat.

Some d*ed after beingbedridden for a month

and others d*ed afterthey predicted the future.

They say those predictionsturned out to be totallyaccurate.

The head of the clancontinued his experiment.

But even thosewho obtained the Yokai's

ability to see the future diedimmediately. Just like theKudan.

I'm so close.I'm so close. And yet now.

Damn it.

If.

And then he realized

those with the abilityto predict the future

simply neededto have immortal bodies.

That's when hestarted having those of his

line consume mermaid flesh alongwith the meat from the kudan.

Yet still the numberof victims skyrocketed

and the experiment he sacrificedso much for never worked.

Time passed by and suchnightmarish experiments wereeventually forgotten untilkurow.

Grandmother. Your dinneris waiting for you. Okay.

We are grateful.

Hey, brother. What's.

Grandmother.The others, they're all.

They? I think the foodhas made them sick.

Yes. And you. You feelcompletely fine, do you, mydear?

Any fever or nausea?No, I'm fine.

It's come true at long last.

His grandmother was stillchasing her ancestor's dream.

She had been secretly gatheringcould on meat and mermaid flesh.Grandmother.

All the others arereally suffering. Please help.

Let's see. I'd love to know what

the weather will belike tomorrow, huh?

You should be ableto tell me that much.

I need you to die onceand go see the future.

And then his grandmotherin her madness,

tried various experiments,testing if he was

immortal and if he couldpredict the future.

She caught up hisbody and mortally

wounded him frequently until henearly stopped feeling painalmost altogether. Corral.

There are a lot of firefliesby the river. Out back.

Wanna come watch them with me?Sure.

Well, come along.

There's something wrong.

It's nothing at all.The dream of

the Sakuragawa hadfinally come true.

But the abilitiesobtained were slightly different

And while he's technicallyhuman, he became somethinginhuman.

Oh, Curro. The wayhe does something like that,

with no hesitation,is one of his charms.

I'm not looking for a boyfriendwho can snap a ghost neck.

this actually be the endof Lady Nancy?

Why am I not surprised?This means

we only have one optionleft on the table.

All right, Carol, that's enough.

We're going to need a..

New strategy to defeatSteel Lady Nancy.

Saki, what are you doing here,of all places?

I work as a policeofficer for the city.

And what is it that bringsyou here? Kuro? Oh, well.

Obviously, if yourdarling girlfriend asks you

to show up, you'll show up.

Even if it meansfighting a monster, right?

Something like that. Though Ihad no idea you'd be here. Saki.

Running into you is a surprisefor me as well.

I, for one, had no intentionof letting you see each other.

You mean to tell me she actuallyis your girlfriend? Yes.

This weirdo reallyis my girlfriend. Excuse me.

Kuro, Why do yousound like you hate it?

Because you're frustratingas hell. I'm sorry, Saki.

I'm pretty sure Iwanagacaused you some trouble.

FYI, Kuro AI actuallysaved Saki I will have

you know I don't deserve thiskind of treatment. Just say..

You're sorry. There is no wayyou didn't cause any trouble.

Oh, it's all right.I'm sure we both

caused each othera little trouble.

What we should be worried aboutright now is still lady nannies.

So, anyway,it's good to see you, Curro.

Yeah, it's good to see you,too, Saki.

Let's get out of here now.Lingering

in the lightof a vending machine

for too long is depressing.We're not moths, you know.

I knew I shouldn't have letthese two bump into each other.

How did I let this happen? It's

not like we could have talkedabout this at the restaurant,

and I was scared to gohome alone. But still.

Curro, are you staringat your ex-girlfriend

from behind while yourcurrent girlfriend is sitting

right next to you?You're delusional.

Not. I saw you.Oh, she's lost some weight.

I hope she's been eating right.I wonder

if she looks like skinand bones now because of me.

Well, her hips look really nice,though.

I can tell that's whatyou were thinking.

Quite impressive.That's exactly what I was

just thinking.Sookie is beautiful, you jerk.

How dare youadmit that so quickly?

And how dare you take that kind

of attitude after leaving yourpoor girlfriend alone for anentire week?

Why didn't you reply to anyof the messages I sent you?

Oh, those were from you. Ithought they were all spammessages.

At least look at me.You two get along great.

Of course we do.Just so you know,

we're usually waymore lovey dovey.

Saki, I'm curious. Are you stillunable to eat fish or beef?

I've been working onit and can eat some,

but my job is why I lost weight.

I'm sorry.No, Koro, this isn't your fault.

We broke up withoutstraightening things out.

I thought I'd be moreshaken up if I saw him.

I wonder if the reason I'mstaying calm is because of her.

Huh?

Well, so anyway,back to the matter at hand.

That said, she's still prettyintolerable. Yes, you are right.

So, Curro,were you really fighting style,

lady Nancy on direct ordersfrom Iwanaga. Oh. Huh.

I did come to MakurazakiCity because she asked me to,

but I just happened to runinto steel Lady Nanase.

When I got to the station,a goblin

cat that had been att*cked bySteel Lady Nanase asked forhelp.

Most of these creatureswould usually go out

of their wayto avoid running into me.

But after spending so muchtime with Iwanaga,

they started to seeme as someone

they could rely on in place of

their one eyed, one legged lady.

The Yokai soughtme out and started

asking for my help as well.

There was no timeto contact Iwanaga beforehand,

so I went to where StealLady Nanase appeared by myself.

Oh, well, that sounds nice.Maybe the coppa

won't run away fromyou next time you see him.

Then I'm comingto me all the time.

Isn't much better.But that said, steal

Lady Nancy wasn'tafraid when she saw me.

Well,to Yokai Kuro does look like

a horrifying eviljumbled mess of a creature

that's an unsightlymix of a human

mermaid and kudanto any non-humans.

Unfortunate enough to look uponhim. It makes sense they'd bescared.

Basically. Even the monstersconsider him a monster. Huh?

So tell me,Iwanaga if steal lady

Nanase didn't reactto Kuro that way,

what does that make her?She's a monster.

I could see that.I'll rephrase. Is

she somethingthat we can defeat?

She is. The reason that I wanted

to meet with youtonight was to discuss

that steal Lady Nanase isdifferent from a normal specter.

She was createdfrom the delusions and desires

of modern day humans.A monster of the imagination.

I hadn't plannedto tell her everything,

but at this point, I'll tell her

as much of the truth as I can

so she canstart to comprehend how

vastly different ourworld is from the

one she lives in every day.

I'll show her howradically different we are

from what she knows.That's the best plan.

The traditional Yokai Monsters,Specters, Mononoke and Beastsfrom Urban Legends,

the ones we're familiar withhave monsters of theimagination.

It may all startoff as something trivial,

like somebody saysa super creepy pale

lady wearing a mask came up to

me, but she was so frightening.

I just ran away. That's howthe story would start.

And then what happened?But the story

on its ownisn't very interesting. So,

uh, when I took a closer look,

I realized her mouth wassplit open under the mask.

I got so scared, I ran away,

and she came running afterme as fast as she could.

Whoa, That's super creepy.And now a lie

has been added to the story.

And before long,that story starts to spread.

Mask asked,Do you think I'm pretty?

But under the maskher mouth was.

But under the mask,her mouth was this.

For now, this..Is all still just a story.

It only becomes a problem whenthis fiction is given a name.

The Slit-mouthed woman.They give that story

a single namewhich manages to generally

describe what it endsup looking like.

That weaves together all thevarious strands of vague rumors,

finally solidifying theminto a uniform image.

At first it wasjust make believe.

But now that the fictionhas a name and a shape,

it implants itselfinto the minds of thousands,

tens of thousands, perhapseven millions of people's minds,

which in turn gives it flesh and

blood,turning it into something real.

People's imaginations managedto create a monster.

Do you honestly expect anyone tobelieve this happens every day?

You ask that after seeinga cop and a ghost.

Under normal circumstances,monsters of the imagination

are nothing to be afraid of.

Their popularity wanes, and evenif they gain a form, it's weak.

And usually they disappear soonafterward. The Slit-mouthedwoman disappeared,

as did the human face dog.

In that case, still,Lady Nancy seems

rather different from the othermonsters of the imagination.

This monster's been giventhe name Steal

Yes, precisely.How did this thing manage

to gain a form less than a year

after Carey Nancy's death andthen become as powerful as itis?

There is, in fact,a way to make that possible.

Usually, these monsterrumors take time to spread.

So what can spreadthese ideas instantly

where countless eyescan see them?

Only certain media outlets evenbothered reporting the accident.

Seems like it was only reallypopular on the Internet, huh?

Right. The culpritis the Internet. The Internet

can relay information allaround the world in an instant,

and billions of peoplehave access to it,

and it's ableto gather and consolidate

an immeasurable amountof varying ideas in one place.

In one place.I see like that Steele

Lady Nancy Wiki page I found..

So you know of it. That'lldefinitely make this easier.

That site is the reason her name

and description areso well defined and why

it spread at suchan alarming rate.

And with the illustration of heron the top page of the wiki

that gave her a form that'sdifficult to attain from rumorsalone,

defining her look in an instant.

That drawingof her you remember.

Don't you think the Steelelady on that page

looked like the one we sawdown to the finest detail?

Now that you mention it. Yes.So what do you think?

It's possible to illustratea specter made

up entirely of rumors and to do

so precisely withouteyewitnesses? That's quiteimprobable.

Thus the opposite happened.How so?

The image in that drawingwasn't modeled after the ghost,

but because so many peoplesaw that illustration,

they imagined Steel LadyNancy actually looked like that.

So it wasthe form the spirit took.

Huh? It's backwards.The wiki wasn't created

because there wasan actual ghost.

Instead the ghost was bornbecause the wiki was created.

You could call this website.The true

source of the SteelLady Non-ac phenomenon.

Steel lady Nancy maintainsher immortal form

thanks to many people'simaginations to defeat her.

We must create a tale that will

surpass an actualstory of a spectre.

What we need to face her head

on is next time,Logical fiction.