014. The Art of Discipline

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“How much longer are you planning to stay there?”

Although Anritou had returned to human form and was sitting on the bed, his gaze was now every bit as cold and indifferent as it had been when he was an anomaly moments before.

Driven by an overwhelming sense of danger, Margaret obediently tucked her tail between her legs and fled down the stairwell.

The moment Anritou saw her leave, he threw back the covers and peered underneath, only to find himself looking directly into a pair of beautiful deep-violet eyes.

Hiiragi Sakurao stared back at him without blinking.

Anritou immediately dropped the blanket and looked toward the clock hanging on the opposite wall. It was nearly ten.

He lifted one corner of the blanket again, confirming that he was not hallucinating.

Driven by the dread of having to get up early for work, the office slave ignored the vast difference in their abilities and reached into the bed without the slightest courtesy, pinching the back of the strange creature’s neck.

As the witch struggled violently, the sheets that had been carefully arranged that morning rapidly became a mess, like a canvas sketch abandoned by an art student who had been working through the night until his mind gave out.

“Why are you in my bed?”

“After I woke up, I was locked inside a car.”

“That still doesn’t explain why you’re here.”

“I didn’t want to use too many spells, so I upgraded ‘the spell that can find Anritou’ directly into ‘the spell that makes me appear beside Anritou immediately.’”

“That’s an absurdly overpowered cheat.”

“Cheat?”

“I’m praising your extraordinary talent.”

“Mm…”

The little witch, carried away by pride, revealed a light, airy smile. The next moment, however, Anritou seized her by the back of her robe and threw her off the bed.

“Go sleep on the sofa downstairs.”

The shameless adult had just uttered something utterly devoid of morality.

Though it was cruel to make a fourteen-year-old girl spend a chilly spring night on the sofa without even proper bedding, the other party was an esper who had fused with the universal-concept anomaly known as a witch. Cold probably had no effect on her.

Apart from the basic moral standards expected of an adult, the main reason Anritou was so eager to throw Hiiragi Sakurao out was this:

She had spent an entire month sleeping rough, crossing mountains and rivers, and eating whatever she could find. She had climbed into bed without bathing, changing clothes, or even taking off her shoes.

Did she have any idea how troublesome it was to send the sheets and bedding out for cleaning together?!

After hurriedly chasing Hiiragi Sakurao off the bed, Anritou immediately turned over the covers to check whether they had acquired any dirt, grass roots, or small creatures with far too many legs.

But the expected footprints, dust, mud, insects, and everything else were nowhere to be found.

Instead, the bedding had the startling appearance of being completely spotless.

Anritou glanced sideways at the witch sitting by the foot of the bed, blatantly ignoring his instructions.

Hiiragi Sakurao sat on the tatami with her slender white legs stretched out, her back against the wardrobe and a stubborn expression on her face.

The black ankle boots, whose material was impossible to identify, were as glossy and new as if they had just come from a shoe factory. Their soles were perfectly clean, without the slightest trace of use.

“If I may ask, when was the last time you took a bath?”

Only belatedly did Anritou realize that using force against a witch was an extremely irrational choice. But Hiiragi Sakurao really was too obedient; at least in front of him, she could almost be described as harmless.

Sure enough, even after being roughly thrown off the bed, she did not become angry. She merely sat there looking somewhat depressed.

When she heard the question from the bed, Hiiragi Sakurao answered with complete cooperation and honesty.

“The last time I took a bath was when I was three.”

“...What?”

The answer was entirely beyond his expectations, but Anritou was gradually becoming accustomed to the witch’s supernatural peculiarities.

“I hate water.” Hiiragi Sakurao paused, then continued. “After I turned three, I learned the spell of self-cleaning.”

“That spell automatically removes every concept related to dirt. And because my body differs somewhat from a human body, bacteria, fungi, and viruses cannot attach themselves to me. The same applies to my clothes and anything I touch.”

Anritou felt a twinge of envy. A single spell that meant one never had to wash clothes or bathe, yet could remain clean and presentable at all times... It was a blessing for a solitary office worker.

“Can you activate that cheat for me too?”

Although Hiiragi Sakurao did not understand his words, she more or less guessed what he meant.

She pulled the broad brim of her witch’s hat down over her face, clearly unwilling to deal with such a shameless adult.

Soon, however, she remembered the night the Reaper descended—the irresistible pressure and terror Anritou had brought with him.

She bit her lip, then pushed the brim back up.

“That spell only works on me. The cleaning of things I touch is merely a side effect. If I deliberately use it on something other than myself, it may change from ‘cleaning’ into ‘erasing.’”

“There are restrictions like that too?” Anritou was bitterly disappointed.

Hiiragi Sakurao swung her feet back and forth. The motion, combined with the short boots covering them, made her already petite feet look even thinner. Together with her small, fragile frame, she resembled a carefully sculpted porcelain doll.

She corrected his assumptions.

“My magic is not omnipotent. It is only a tool. I must want something very strongly before I can temporarily obtain the tool required to accomplish it. And every tool has limitations. My magic cannot do anything beyond what the public understands a ‘witch’ to be capable of.”

“For example...”

Her voice suddenly weakened.

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“For example, I can’t bring the dead back to life.”

“Because people generally believe that witches are evil, I can’t do things like save my family or friends...”

Anritou noticed the gloom and sorrow that flashed across Hiiragi Sakurao’s face and decided to drop the subject.

“Do you want me to go downstairs and prepare a proper place for you to sleep on the sofa?”

There was still a spare set of bedding in the wardrobe.

Hiiragi Sakurao shook her head. Like a stray cat that had wandered into a human home to escape the rain, she slowly turned onto her side, hugged her knees, and curled up on the tatami beside Anritou’s bed.

“I’ll sleep like this.”

She used her mysterious white hair and the crushed witch’s hat as a pillow, then closed her eyes almost immediately. Her breathing soon became even.

Anritou remembered that she had fallen asleep just as quickly at the dining table that afternoon.

Was it because there was no one in the world capable of threatening her?

As he observed the fairy-like girl, Anritou vaguely realized that even the slightest trace of hostility from him would instantly provoke her to retaliate.

But Anritou could never feel hostility toward Hiiragi Sakurao. Apart from the overwhelming disparity in their abilities, he had no reason to harm a child who had taken the initiative to show him goodwill and was, by all accounts, obedient and sensible.

He looked once more at the clock on the opposite wall.

With a sigh, he climbed out of bed and walked over to Hiiragi Sakurao.

“Move over.”

Hiiragi Sakurao, who had been asleep only moments before, immediately opened her eyes. Still hugging her knees, she edged backward until she became a tiny little bundle.

Anritou opened the wardrobe, took out a set of bedding, and spread it across the tatami.

“You’ll sleep here.”

Hiiragi Sakurao hesitated, then nodded.

“Take off the cosplay outfit.”

“Cosplay outfit?” Hiiragi Sakurao encountered yet another incomprehensible word.

Although the girl possessed a level of understanding of cognitive thaumaturgy equal to that of an expert, she was desperately lacking in common sense.

Without the power of the witch, she might not even have been capable of basic survival.

Anritou explained, “I mean the witch costume you’re wearing.”

Hiiragi Sakurao removed her boots, then the cotton ankle socks as white as snow. She sat down on the bedding, took off her cloak and hat, and placed them beside her.

Her uniform from the junior high division of Sakura Shrine Private Academy was now visible.

The uniform was very small, probably the smallest size available, yet it still looked slightly oversized on her.

The buttons on the uniform shirt had been fastened carelessly, with several of them misaligned.

She looked at Anritou questioningly.

“Do I need to take this off too?”

“If you take off anything else, you’ll only be allowed to visit me in prison from then on.”

Hiiragi Sakurao did not understand what “prison” meant, but she could guess that it was somewhere very unpleasant.

She asked no further questions and quietly crawled beneath the bedding.

Then, apparently finding it comfortable, she quickly narrowed her eyes. The tip of her nose quivered faintly, as though she were smiling.

“Anritou, this place smells like you.”

“Don’t say that ever again. It could get me arrested.”

“Oh...”

With a motion even more characteristically feline than Margaret’s, Hiiragi Sakurao sniffed the bedding once more. Then she turned onto her side in the sleeping posture of a cat and drifted off.

Had she inherited some kind of cat-monster bloodline from her ancestors?

Anritou found the switch for the attic’s ceiling light beside the headboard and pressed it.

In the darkness, everything became quiet.

The room was only six tatami mats in size, making Hiiragi Sakurao’s breathing easy to hear.

Fortunately, Anritou did not regard her as human in the first place.

He therefore accepted her staying the night without much thought.

Just as he could tolerate the cat monster downstairs, his professional training as a member of the S.T.F. taught him that neutralizing anomalies and temporarily containing them were both part of his duty.

He had to get up at seven to go to work. He needed to sleep immediately.

Anritou closed his eyes and forced himself to forget this day of endless surprises.

...

The night deepened.

From time to time, the sound of cars passing in the distance drifted through the darkness, accompanied by a drunken man kneeling at the roadside and shouting at the sky as he vented his emotions.

Hiiragi Sakurao, who should have been sleeping as soundly as Anritou, slowly opened her eyes.

She threw back the covers and walked toward the stairwell.

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Margaret, who had been rolling around on the counter, went rigid from head to toe.

“Are you not going to sleep?”

“I slept enough at noon and in the afternoon.”

Hiiragi Sakurao’s daily rhythm seemed to be becoming more feline by the day.

Margaret trembled.

“Did you come looking for me specifically?”

“Rita, take human form.”

Hiiragi Sakurao spoke in a commanding tone.

It was an arrogance she had never displayed in front of Anritou.

Cats were cunning creatures. Faced with a powerful enemy, they could only hiss in fear and fury, or turn and flee in desperation. But when confronted with prey that was even slightly weaker, they enjoyed tormenting and playing with it until they grew bored, at which point they would kill it outright.

Hiiragi Sakurao would not kill Margaret.

Although Margaret was the cat monster she disliked, she was also, like Sakurao herself, a resident of this place.

In Hiiragi Sakurao’s worldview, strength surpassed everything and determined one’s status.

Hiiragi Sakurao was powerful because, after the universal concept of the witch had spread further through the internet, public awareness of it had increased to an absurd degree.

Even when she had traveled around the world alone to deliver her father’s ashes to China and see the Terracotta Army, she had encountered several strange figures flying through the air on swords. They had all acknowledged that she was powerful.

Even when she went to the Vatican, the armored, winged people inside the church did not stop her.

Though she had slept rough along the way, people often took the initiative to bring her delicious desserts.

Hiiragi Sakurao had seen the Reaper. It was the strongest monster she had encountered so far.

She had been unable even to conceive of resisting it, yet the Reaper had borne her no hostility. It had even given her a comfortable place to sleep.

And Anritou was her kindred—a human who was half anomaly, the only one in the world.

Naturally, Hiiragi Sakurao wanted to remain by Anritou’s side.

In her eyes, the hierarchy within the café was:

Anritou > herself > Margaret.

Margaret was far too weak. To Sakurao, she was so fragile that she might shatter at the slightest touch. Naturally, she should be treated like a servant and ordered around at will, just as she had been at the Hiiragi estate.

...

Hiiragi Sakurao looked at Margaret, who had been frightened completely senseless, and repeated her command.

“Rita, take human form.”

Only then did Margaret tremblingly leap down from the counter.

As a cat monster from tales of the supernatural, skilled at luring humans with her beauty before killing them, she naturally possessed the ability to assume human form.

With a violent ripple of distorted perception, the black cat in reality transformed into a delicate little girl.

She looked even younger than Hiiragi Sakurao.

She wore a classical maid uniform that suited the style of the café. Tears glimmered in the corners of her eyes. Being forced to assume human form was clearly a terrible humiliation, but she did not dare raise her head to look at Hiiragi Sakurao.

Hiiragi Sakurao examined Margaret from head to toe. Seeing such a young and frail appearance, perfectly in keeping with her expectations, she nodded in satisfaction.

Then she began ordering her around even more brazenly.

“Rita, help me straighten my clothes. The buttons are uncomfortable.”

“Wha—?!”

“You refuse? Very well... It’s nighttime already. You may quietly disappear.”

“W-Wait! I’m coming right away!”

With a tearful expression, Margaret approached the monster who had slain countless great demons during the three days of the Night Parade of One Hundred Demons.

Her small hands reached toward Hiiragi Sakurao’s collar, trembling uncontrollably.

She was genuinely terrified that one careless movement might offend Hiiragi Sakurao, causing the other girl to tear her apart in an instant.

...

The next day.

When Anritou woke up, Hiiragi Sakurao was still sleeping soundly on the tatami beside the bed.

Only...

“Who are you?”

He looked down at the black-haired cat-eared maid who was crouched at Hiiragi Sakurao’s feet, biting her lip and sobbing uncontrollably.

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