Anime Crossover: Eating Evil in a Daily World — Chapter 27

Chapter 27: One Must Still Eat When It’s Time to Eat

The deafening thud of her own heartbeat hammered against Yotsuya Miko’s eardrums, nearly drowning out the casual, breezy tone of the boy walking ahead of her.

“This place was originally slated to be renovated into a high-end office building,” Yozora remarked, his voice carrying a light, almost musical lilt. “But about half a month ago, a string of accidents started popping off. A bunch of guys from the construction crew died in some pretty bizarre, inexplicable ways. The higher-ups got spooked and slapped a temporary halt on the whole project.”

His steps were steady and unhurried. He wore that signature frivolous, lazy smirk of his, looking for all the world like a guy enjoying a relaxing spring picnic.

But when the perspective shifted to Yotsuya Miko, the atmosphere was entirely different.

She was drenched in a cold sweat. She couldn’t even draw enough oxygen through her nose, forced to part her lips in shallow, continuous pants. Her golden pupils were dilated to the absolute limit. Never in her entire life had she stepped into a place like this unfinished concrete husk. It was completely infested.

If a literal hell existed in this world, it couldn’t possibly look much worse than this.

The truly terrifying part was that Miko knew from experience how ordinary Evil Spirits reacted to Yozora. They usually scattered the second they caught a whiff of his aura, running like prey sensing an apex predator, driven by sheer, instinctual terror carved into their very blood. Yet, the hundreds of grotesque anomalies swarming this building weren’t running. They weren’t attacking, either—they were just following closely behind the two of them in a silent, suffocating parade.

What did that signify?

It meant their power was on a completely different, horrifying level compared to the usual street trash. The miasma bleeding off the horde was so thick and pitch-black it had practically solidified, making it hard for Miko to even see the concrete floor beneath her loafers.

‘No, no, no.”It’s over, it’s over, we’re dead.”What do I do, what do I do, what do I do…’

Miko kept muttering in her mind, feeling her nervous system redlining, pushed to the absolute brink of collapse. Yet, in stark contrast to the tear-filled, fear-stricken screaming inside her head, her physical face remained a mask of absolute, expressionless calm. It was a bizarre survival mechanism, and the sheer contrast between her deadpan exterior and her internal meltdown gave her an oddly alluring charm.

“We’re here.”

After what felt like several centuries of agonizing torture, Yozora finally stopped in front of a heavy, rusted door.

“Let’s eat here.”

Hearing that word, Miko suddenly registered the lingering warmth of the plastic bag clutched tightly against her chest. She remembered what had transpired right before they stepped into this haunted meat grinder, and her stoic expression threatened to crack.

Right. She still had to eat her bento.

Wait a second. Yozora couldn’t possibly expect her to sit down and casually eat a boxed lunch while being actively stared down by hundreds of high-tier Evil Spirits, could he? Was that something a sane human being was even capable of?

“Oh, the door is locked.”

Miko instantly exhaled a quiet breath of relief and quickly spoke up. “Then maybe today we can just head back and—”

“Fortunately, I came prepared,” Yozora interrupted with a bright smile.

He fished a bent piece of iron wire out of his pocket, leaned forward, and smoothly slid it into the rusted keyhole.

Watching his actions, Miko was utterly stunned. Good grief, just how multi-talented was this guy? He even had lockpicking in his skill tree? She desperately wanted to ask if casually breaking and entering was a felony, but considering the literal army of demons breathing down their necks, worrying about trespassing laws felt a little naive. She wisely chose to remain silent.

“OK, we’re in.”

It took him less than five seconds to bypass the lock. Yozora pushed the heavy door open, and the two of them stepped into the room together.

The space was a massive, single-story expanse of bare concrete, interrupted only by a few thick load-bearing pillars. Dust coated every surface. But Miko wasn’t looking at the architecture. In the far distance, half-swallowed by the churning black mist, she saw the door belonging to this specific territory once again.

There was a sickening difference this time, though. The twisted, otherworldly door she had seen in the alleyway days prior had only been cracked open a sliver. The door she saw this time was half-open. It was a deep, warped void that seemed to physically drag her gaze toward it, radiating a pure, absolute darkness that mirrored a black hole.

“Let’s eat first.”

Yozora didn’t give a single damn about the thick layer of grime on the floor. He plopped down directly onto the concrete, popped the lid off his convenience store bento, and immediately frowned.

“What kind of garbage are they peddling these days? This sad excuse for a meal cost me six hundred yen? Absolute highway robbery.” He then glanced up at Miko, who was still standing frozen by the entrance like a deer in headlights, and let out a soft chuckle. “Miko-chan, grab a seat.”

If Miko didn’t already know for a fact that Yozora was a psychic with vision far surpassing her own, she would honestly assume he was completely blind to the supernatural. Actually, no, that wasn’t right either. Even a completely normal person without a shred of spiritual awareness would feel the freezing, oppressive dread hanging over this unfinished building. Looking at the relaxed slope of his shoulders, Miko got the insane impression that he was actually enjoying the ambiance.

Swallowing down the panic in her heart and the overwhelming urge to sprint out of the building, she smoothed down her pleated skirt. She pulled a few tissues from her bag, laid them out over the dusty floor, and carefully lowered herself down.

The moment she popped the plastic lid off her bento, her heart did another violent flip.

“Chop… chopsticks?” she stammered.

“What, did you forget how to use chopsticks?” Yozora asked, raising an eyebrow.

“N-no, that’s not it.”

“Then we’re good. Hurry up and eat, the food’s getting cold.”

Miko took a deep, shuddering breath. Her right hand trembled violently as she snapped the wooden chopsticks apart. She tried to pinch a small fish ball from her rice, but her fingers were shaking so badly that the smooth surface kept slipping from her grip no matter how hard she tried.

“Can… can you see me?”

Her erratic movements instantly drew the attention of the surrounding horde. A grotesque entity, entirely deep purple with long, greasy black hair obscuring everything except a pair of blood-red, hyper-dilated pupils, slithered right up to Miko’s face. Its bloodshot eyes rotated wildly in their sockets, locking onto her pale profile from mere inches away.

“Can… can you see me?”

Miko’s mind went completely numb. How the hell was she supposed to eat under these conditions!?

Just then, from a pitch-black corner of the ceiling, a massive, sickly black-green tongue shot out. It was coated in a thick, rancid layer of slime. With lightning speed, the disgusting appendage violently licked the entire surface of Miko’s bento. The motion was sickeningly careful, as if the spirit were actively polishing her food with its saliva.

A split second later, the long tongue whipped over and performed the exact same thorough licking motion across Yozora’s open bento.

Miko gagged, her stomach doing somersaults. Yes, technically, Evil Spirits couldn’t interact with physical objects in the living world. There was no actual saliva on the food. But after watching a rotting, black-green demon tongue carefully slather her lunch with her own two eyes, who in their right mind could possibly take a bite!?

“Hmm, tastes pretty good.”

Under Miko’s utterly horrified, incredulous gaze, Yozora didn’t even blink. He casually reached his chopsticks into the polished bento, picked up a fish ball, popped it into his mouth, and chewed thoughtfully. He nodded in approval.

“The flavor is decent, but it’s still not worth six hundred yen. Sure enough, it’s way too easy to scam students out of their pocket money.”

Miko sat there, absolutely paralyzed.

‘He… he can actually eat that?’

She stared at the boy sitting across from her, a deep, almost terrifying level of respect welling up in her chest.

[Inorin’s Note: The raw text states the bento cost “thirty yuan,” which is a common machine translation artifact where Chinese authors use their local currency. For immersion in a Japanese setting, this has been localized to “six hundred yen,” which is roughly the equivalent price for a standard convenience store bento.]