Anime Crossover: Eating Evil in a Daily World — Chapter 6

Chapter 6: The Evil Spirit of Entrapment

When Yozora strolled back into the classroom, he happened to catch Kazusa Touma red-handed, placing a canned drink squarely on his desk.

Caught in the act, Kazusa didn’t look the least bit flustered. Her expression remained an unreadable mask, and when she spoke, her tone was entirely flat.

“I don’t like owing people favors.”

Yozora walked slowly over to his desk. He stared down at the aluminum can resting on the wood, his face twisting into a mask of deep, complex betrayal. He shook his head slowly.

“Well played, Kazusa. I go out of my way to help you, and you repay my kindness with absolute malice, trying to poison me with Pepsi-brand toilet cleaner.”

He reached out and tapped the side of the can with his fingertips. Instantly, his pupils shrank as if he had just witnessed a cosmic horror. He yanked his hand back and gasped in sheer shock.

“And it’s room temperature!”

Kazusa had mentally prepared herself for a few different reactions. She figured Yozora might misunderstand her gesture and start pestering her, or perhaps he would just flat-out refuse to accept the drink. Honestly, even if he had picked up the can and tossed it straight into the garbage bin right in front of her, she wouldn’t have batted an eye. They had just gotten into a dispute that very morning, after all.

But this? This was the one reaction she genuinely hadn’t anticipated.

“Room temperature…” Kazusa frowned slightly. “Is there a problem with that?”

Hearing her question, Yozora looked at her with pity, his voice dropping into a matter-of-fact tone as if walking a toddler through basic arithmetic.

“Do you know what else Cola is called?”

“No idea.”

“Fat Otaku Happy Water.”

Yozora picked up the offending can of Pepsi. Reflected in his dark eyes was the heavy sorrow of the world’s impermanence, carrying the aura of an old sage standing at the edge of a cliff, sighing at the fading sunset of life.

“Listen to me. Even if this really were toilet cleaner, if it were ice-cold and paired with the aesthetic of early spring cherry blossoms drifting past the window, it might still possess a unique, tragic charm.” Yozora paused, his gaze hardening. “But if you’ll excuse my bluntness, soda that isn’t chilled is just a pile of crap.”

Kazusa’s elegant eyebrow twitched. She stared at him in absolute silence for a long, agonizing moment before finally letting out a flat exhale.

“Anyway. The favor I owed you—I’ve paid it back.”

Without waiting for another word of his dramatic nonsense, she slumped forward onto her desk, buried her face in her arms, and went straight to sleep.

“Those two are really a bit strange, aren’t they?”

“Not just a bit. They’re practically weirdos.”

“Shh, keep your voice down! Don’t let that guy hear you. I heard he’s a dangerous lunatic who carries a loaded revolver in his pocket.”

Catching the hushed, fearful whispers of his classmates from a few rows over, Yozora rolled his eyes.

Good grief, the rumor mill in this school was getting more ridiculous by the second. He had clearly only brought a dull Peach Wood Dagger that couldn’t even cut an apple, along with a perfectly ordinary, plain Silver Nail about twenty centimeters long.

How on earth had that mutated into carrying a firearm?

If this kept escalating before the final bell rang, would the whispers claim that Yozora, the eccentric student of First-year Class A, was walking around with a nuclear launch button in his blazer?

Tomorrow’s headlines: ‘Shocking! The True Culprit Who Shot Kennedy Was Sitting in the Back Row!’The day after:’Unbelievable! The Man Who Guillotined Louis XVI Revealed!’By the end of the week, they’d probably be saying:’Turns Out, When Pangu Split Heaven and Earth, This Kid Was the One Who Handed Him the Axe!”Public opinion really is a terrifying weapon,’ Yozora thought to himself. He glanced down at the lukewarm Pepsi in his hand, let out a defeated sigh, and shoved it into the depths of his desk drawer. Then, he mirrored Kazusa, leaning forward onto his desk to drift back into a peaceful, infant-like slumber.

Throughout the entire afternoon block of classes, Miko Yotsuya couldn’t focus on a single word the teachers said.

Her gaze kept drifting involuntarily toward the back corner of the classroom, landing squarely on Yozora’s sleeping figure.

This subtle, repeated action did not escape the notice of Yui Yuigahama, who sat in the adjacent seat. The moment the bell finally rang to signal the end of class, Yui leaned over toward the deeply pensive girl, flashing a bright, sweet smile.

“Hello, Yotsuya!”

Startled by the sudden voice, Miko snapped out of her daze. She looked up at the girl’s pretty, friendly face and asked tentatively, “You’re… Yuigahama-san, right?”

“Just call me Yui!”

Yui’s personality was the textbook definition of a social butterfly—instantly familiar, warm, and eager to bridge any gap.

Because Miko was constantly bombarded by the horrifying visages of evil spirits, she was forced to suppress her emotions and reactions at all times. This heavy mental toll naturally made her appear aloof, quiet, and difficult to approach. But beneath that defensive shell, her actual personality was just like any ordinary high school girl’s—leaning heavily toward the bright and lively side.

“Um, Yui,” Miko asked softly, “did you need something from me?”

Yui giggled, bringing a hand up to cover her mouth. She sneakily pointed a finger toward Yozora in the corner, giving Miko a highly meaningful, teasing look.

“I noticed that during class, you seemed to be stealing glances at him constantly. Could it be that you two…?”

Miko froze for a split second before her face flushed. She waved her hands frantically, offering a wry, desperate smile. “Yui, how could you think that? It’s completely impossible!”

“Why is it impossible?” Yui tilted her head, her soft pink hair shifting as she gave a cute, airheaded look of genuine curiosity. “Yozora’s personality might be a bit… different from most people, but he’s certainly very good-looking! Besides, didn’t the two of you go out together during the lunch break?”

Hearing this, Miko blinked.

‘So that’s how it looks to everyone else… I guess she has a point.’

Listening to Yui spell it out, Miko finally took a moment to actually register the boy’s appearance. Yozora’s features were indeed incredibly striking. It was just that her entire focus had been utterly hijacked by his terrifying, logic-defying ability to casually devour grotesque evil spirits, causing her to completely overlook his face.

From the perspective of an outsider like Yui, it wasn’t surprising at all that she would jump to a romantic misunderstanding. After all, Miko had practically dragged Yozora out alone during lunch on the very first day of school.

“You’ve really misunderstood,” Miko said, shaking her head with a gentle smile. “The relationship between Yozora and me isn’t what you think at all. We only went out alone during lunch because of… well, because of some private matters.”

“I see.” Yui nodded, though she still looked a bit unconvinced. Then, a sudden hint of gloom flashed through her bright eyes, and her smile turned slightly forced. “Um… since you can talk to Yozora so easily, could you help me tell him that I want to apologize?”

“Apologize?”

“Yes. Because this morning, I got scared and left without saying goodbye to him. That wasn’t very nice of me.”

Miko frowned slightly, shaking her head as she spoke in a soft, reassuring tone. “You really don’t need to take that to heart. He’s probably forgotten all about it by now.”

Knowing what she did about the boy, Miko found it entirely impossible to imagine that someone with Yozora’s unhinged, spirit-eating personality would lose sleep over a trivial social slight. Was Yui perhaps just a bit too gentle, to the point of being overly sensitive?

Just as Yui opened her mouth to say something more, a female classmate suddenly walked over to their desks.

“Yotsuya, Shizuka-sensei wants you to come to the faculty office.”

“Oh, okay.” Miko stood up, smoothing out the pleats of her skirt, and gave an apologetic nod to Yui. “Then, Yui, let’s talk more next time.”

“Mm-hmm, go ahead!”

Leaving the bustling classroom behind, Miko handled the hallways, heading toward the third floor where the teachers’ offices were located.

However, just as she reached the top of the stairs, she caught sight of Shizuka Hiratsuka’s familiar figure disappearing around the corner of the next stairwell—heading directly up toward the rooftop.

“Shizuka-sensei?”

Miko tried calling out, but the woman didn’t stop. She couldn’t tell if the teacher simply hadn’t heard her, or if she was intentionally ignoring her.

Confusion pooled in Miko’s chest. Wasn’t she explicitly called to the office? Why was Shizuka-sensei walking up to the restricted rooftop?

Highly puzzled but obedient, she quickly followed the teacher up the final flight of stairs and pushed open the heavy metal door to the roof. The cool afternoon wind immediately brushed past her.

There, standing near the edge, was Shizuka in her signature white lab coat. She was leaning against the chain-link railing. But as Miko looked closer, a cold dread began to pool in her stomach. The teacher’s eyes were completely devoid of emotion, staring back at her with a dead, freezing intensity.

“Shizuka-sensei…?” Miko whispered, her voice trembling slightly.

The woman didn’t respond. She simply raised a stiff, unnatural hand and beckoned her over with a slow wave.

Caught in the social reflex of a student, Miko instinctively nodded in response.

In the very next second, the air pressure on the rooftop plummeted.

The figure of Shizuka Hiratsuka suddenly began to violently distort. Her flesh tore and expanded, her face twisting into a grotesque, sickening mass as her body erupted outward, transforming into a massive, horrific spider-like monstrosity that instantly blotted out the sun and filled nearly the entire rooftop.

“What!?”

Miko’s pupils dilated to their absolute limits in pure, unadulterated shock. Her body felt as if it had been plunged straight into an ice cellar. Her muscles locked up entirely, freezing her in place, completely unable to move a single inch.

On that distorted, terrifyingly massive face, four bulbous, bloodshot eyes rolled downward, staring coldly at the paralyzed schoolgirl.

A voice that sounded like grinding bones and a demon crawling straight out of hell echoed directly into Miko’s mind.

“You… can see me.”