Under Eous's lead, the group moved toward the exit of Hollow Zero.
"So, uh… mister." The investigator jogged up beside Tsutsumi, still a little breathless. "Once we're out of the Hollow, could I maybe get a quick interview?"
She already knew he was with Hollow Special Operations Section 6, his outfit gave it away. Black pants, white shirt, and that cyan and yellow Hollow Special Operations uniform draped around his neck like a scarf over his black coat. A strange look, but somehow fitting.
Although he looked too young to even be working at the Hollow Special Operations. But after watching him literally kick Nineveh out of the sky, she wasn't about to question credentials.
"Sorry," he said casually, eyes forward. "Not interested."
Outside the camp, Eous had been brought back by members of Section 6. The rest of the group followed close behind, exhaustion giving way to the slow relief of survival.
"This mission might've started in chaos," Harumasa said, folding his arms with a faint grin, "but at least it ended without any losses."
Today was a big win for Section 6; not only did they identify and neutralize a new Hollow Swarm, they also came across Nineveh and dealt massive damage to her. Even if most of the heavy lifting had been done by their Chief and her son, the results spoke for themselves.
He looked at Eous and chuckled. "Whether it's route planning or adaptability, this little one outperforms our standard Hollow Special Operations Bangboos. Equipped with exclusive carrot data? Or maybe it's a custom-tuned core? I'd love to meet your owner…"
Soukaku raised her hand, pointing one tiny finger toward the disheartened Agent Gulliver.
"Uh, you might want to rephrase that," she said dryly. "Our Bangboos are sensitive."
"I- wait, no, I didn't mean-!" Harumasa tried to backpedal, but too late. Gulliver was already storming off toward Miyabi.
"Enn-ehnn! Ennmh-ehnn?" (Please, Miss Miyabi, don't replace me! You're not kicking me off the team, right?!)
Miyabi: "?"
She was confused, wondering why Gulliver was being so sad all of a sudden.
But before she could say anything, Gulliver noticed Azu in Bangboo form was sitting with Tsutsumi, acting as a headrest for him.
By now, it is no secret to everyone in Section 6 that Tsutsumi is Miyabi's adopted son.
"Emmmh-ehnnh! Enn-ehn!!?" (It should have been me! Why!!?)
Gulliver idolizes Hoshimi Miyabi so much to the point that he would do anything to become her personal Bangboo companion.
But after seeing Azu, Gulliver ran off with digital tears, thinking Miyabi already had a personal Bangboo, not knowing that Azu belonged to Tsutsumi.
Miyabi: "?"
Tsutsumi: "?"
They both didn't understand what was going on to cause Gulliver to have such a reaction, but they both decided not to question it right now.
Tsutsumi put on his glasses, directly linking to Azu. He has commanded her to try and hack into Eous to find out how it ticked. He wasn't aiming for anything malicious; he just wanted to figure out what kind of technology let people link with artificial intelligence like that.
Technically, he could try to develop this system himself, but why work when he could just borrow the code?
"Master," Azu's voice chimed softly in his ear. "I've encountered resistance. An advanced AI is countering my every attempt."
"Oh?" Tsutsumi adjusted his glasses again, intrigued. "Then shift focus. Target the AI instead. That one's more interesting."
This new AI, which can match and block all of Azu's hacking attempts, is more valuable than a system that can link human consciousness to a machine.
Then a young man with silver hair approached, calm and sharp-eyed. The investigator quickly stepped forward.
"This is Wise," she said. "He's the investigation team's leader, and Eous's owner."
Harumasa's curiosity lit up instantly. "Ah, so that explains it." He offered a friendly grin. "I'd ask about your tuning specs, but… something tells me you're not gonna share."
Wise smiled politely, offering no response. That silence said enough.
Harumasa sighed in mock defeat. "Figures. Civilians outclassing half the official tech division again…"
Miyabi's voice cut through the air, calm but edged with authority.
"Thank you for your cooperation," she said. "Try not to break the law next time."
Wise visibly relaxed, offering a small nod. Clearly understanding that if they didn't agree to help them earlier, the Section Chief might really target them once they made it out of Hollow Zero.
After all, they knew about the Cunning Hares and Eous; it won't take much effort for the HSOS6 to have them track down and arrest them if they wanted to.
It's because they agreed to help that Miyabi decided to look the other way this time.
Section 6 even transferred a tidy sum as a "field compensation." Enough for the Cunning Hares to restock ammo and patch their gear, but not a single Denny more.
Nicole had tried to haggle, of course, until Tsutsumi calmly started asking her to itemize every "damaged" piece of equipment and tell them when they were damaged during the time frame when Section 6 requested their help.
Ten seconds later, she gave up.
Once the members of Section 6 returned to headquarters, everyone immediately began writing their mission reports about the operation in Hollow Zero.
Yanagi, as usual, handled most of the work herself. Even the footage from Soukaku's body cam was carefully extracted, showing their encounters with both Arachne and Nineveh.
She made sure to cut out anything related to the Cunning Hares and the Proxy.
They had agreed to look the other way, but the higher-ups might not.
No point in stirring trouble when none was needed.
"Tsutsumi, I'm hungry! Please feed me!" Soukaku suddenly cried, opening her mouth dramatically and pointing at it like a child demanding dessert.
"There's nothing to cook," Tsutsumi said flatly, sitting cross-legged on the floor surrounded by lazy Bangboos.
They are slacking off at work again.
"Pretty please! I haven't eaten anything since lunch!" she continued, shaking his shoulders insistently. The fact that he was sitting made it easy for her to rattle him around.
"Soukaku," Yanagi said with a sigh, typing the refined version of their report, "once we're done with the report, we'll go grab dinner together. Be patient."
That instantly brightened Soukaku's mood. "Yay! You're the best, Nagi!"
Later, Section 6 arrived at The Sizzling Pot Co., a hotpot and grill house known for its lively atmosphere and ridiculous portion sizes.
Steam and laughter filled the booth. Plates of meat and vegetables surrounded a bubbling pot and sizzling grill in the center.
Tsutsumi, however, stood out, because while everyone else was eating, he was the one doing all the cooking.
"I know this is a hotpot and grill and all," he said, turning a slice of marbled beef with precision, "but why am I the only one cooking?"
"That's because your food is super super super delicious!" Soukaku said cheerfully, holding her bowl up expectantly as he placed the grilled beef into her bowl.
"Indeed," Harumasa added with mock solemnity, snatching a perfectly grilled piece of meat before anyone else could. "Efficiency and delicious."
"Sorry," Yanagi admitted reluctantly. "Compared to your cooking, anything we make just feels… substandard."
She glanced guiltily at the meat she'd half-burned earlier.
Still edible, but compared to Tsutsumi's precise timing and flavor balance, there was no contest.
Sitting beside him, Miyabi quietly reached over with her chopsticks, holding out a freshly grilled piece of meat toward him.
"Open up, dear," she said gently.
Tsutsumi blinked, then leaned forward and let her feed him. He chewed slowly, eyes flickering with something distant.
'Open up, dear.'
The same words his mother used to say.
It had been more than ten years since he'd heard them. Since he'd felt that warmth.
A small tremor passed through his fingers.
"Is something wrong, Ryoko?" Miyabi asked softly, noticing the moisture in his eyes.
"I'm fine…" He forced a faint smile, looking away. "The meat was a bit hot."
She didn't believe him. But she didn't press, either.
For a moment, silence filled the booth, only the sound of the boiling broth and sizzling meat between them. Then Soukaku broke it, happily slurping her noodles and humming, oblivious to the heaviness in the air.
Miyabi turned her eyes to Tsutsumi again. The boy kept cooking, quietly, focused on his work, while his shoulders faintly trembled in the steam.
She didn't ask anything else.
While the members of Section 6 enjoyed their meal in peace, the atmosphere inside the Hollow Affairs & Neutralization Department, or H.A.N.D. headquarters, was anything but calm.
In a high-security chamber deep within the main branch, the Department's upper council had convened an emergency meeting.
The latest report and combat recording from Hollow Special Operations Section 6 were projected across the large holoscreen at the center of the room.
There, they were able to witness the one-sided take-down of the Arachne, an Ethereal Swarm, one of the highest thread-levels an Ethereal can be labeled with.
These Ethereal Swarms require the active attention of entire military force regiments to merely stall or push back. Even Void hunters and Void hunter level combatants can not eliminate them and can only stalemate or force them to retreat.
Yet, before their eyes, one young man tore through it alone.
The silence in the room was deafening when the footage ended.
"…Run that again," said one of the board members quietly.
The recording replayed, showing Tsutsumi Ryoko in motion, somehow cloning himself, shaping elements at will, switching armors mid-battle, moving faster than the cameras could track, even doing a kick into the air. When the recording ended, no one spoke for several seconds.
At last, the Head of the Department leaned forward, her eyes unreadable.
"Begin a full background search. Immediately."
The order spread through the room. Within minutes, his file was displayed.
Tsutsumi Ryoko.
No criminal record.
No special lineage.
Ordinary schooling history.
Adopted recently by Hoshimi Miyabi, Section 6's commanding officer, and one of the youngest Void Hunters in New Eridu's history.
That revelation caused a ripple of surprise to move across the room.
There had been some rumors about Hoshimi Miyabi having a child, but they were quickly dismissed, seeing how she was so young and still single. None of them has predicted that she would actually adopt a child, and one near adulthood at that.
The murmuring subsided as the Head of the Department raised her hand.
"Speculation aside, let's address the actual issue," she said sharply. "What is he?"
From the footage, it was shown that he can clone himself, create and manipulate fire, water, air, and earth. Switched armors, changed race, moved at super sonic speed, and even summoned weapons.
There was like no limit to what he could do.
To them, Tsutsumi Ryoko was like a one-man army. Both powerful and efficient, although a bit rough around the edges.
With time and training, they could smooth those edges.
"According to Section 6's reports and descriptions about him," one analyst began, "he's… difficult to manage, likes to slack off at work, though his workload is no different from some Bangboos. Doesn't know a lot of things about the Hollow. He charged straight into a Void without understanding what it was."
"That sounds like an undisciplined child," said another.
"And yet," the analyst countered, "the same report states that when reprimanded, he immediately complied with Chief Miyabi's orders. With no resistance. Although he would break it not long after and he still listened to her. He even lowered his posture, like a trained subordinate… or a real son."
That last part made several members exchange glances.
"Strange," someone muttered. "Someone with the strength to level an Ethereal Swarm, yet he follows her so obediently. Why?"
No one had an answer.
Clearly, he has been living alone for most of his life without any issue. So why does he listen and act like a child to Hoshimi Miyabi?
Although the report did show that Section 6 also crossed paths with Nineveh, and the Ethereal actually spoke after being kicked into the side of a ruined building.
The people in the room were still more focused on the fact that Tsutsumi, after taking out Arachne, could still fight and deal massive damage to Nineveh to the point that the Ethereal Swarm even cursed him out for it.
What followed was inevitable: the room split into two factions.
One side argued for diplomacy, grant him the title of Void Hunter officially, show goodwill, and keep him close under Miyabi's supervision.
The other pushed for control, turned him over for study, training, and conversion into a living weapon to combat the Hollow.
"He already surpasses Miyabi in raw power," one general stated grimly. "If he can do this without Hollow knowledge or training, imagine what he could become under our guidance."
Even without training or proper knowledge of the Hollow, he is already shown to have enough strength to surpass the current Void Hunter, Hoshimi Miyabi. While he only loses to her in experience.
"Or imagine what he'll do if we force him, and he becomes our enemy!" another shot back. "Hoshimi Miyabi is strong, but she has a limit. That boy doesn't seem to have any. You can't exactly cage a storm and expect obedience."
The Head of H.A.N.D. tapped her pen against the desk, then finally sighed.
"…We'll take the first route. Recognition, not confrontation. There is no reason to make an enemy out of him."
In the end, a decision was made.
The next day, news of Section 6 defeating an Ethereal Swarm was released to the public, and came the new Void Hunter, also from Section 6.
Everyone who heard about this was shocked, and many gathered at the ceremony to see who the new Void Hunter was.
Even the higher-ups themselves gathered, wanting to see Tsutsumi Ryoko in person, but he never came; instead, they only got a message politely requesting that the medal be delivered directly to Hoshimi Miyabi's residence.
At the front row, the Head of H.A.N.D. rubbed her temple and leaned toward her secretary with a tired sigh.
"…Is he really adopted?" she whispered.
The secretary hesitated, then simply shrugged. "Ma'am, I'm not sure either..."