Every step felt heavy.
Although Okarun continued chatting on the phone with Momo, Hideo could feel his heart slowly speeding up due to the oppressive atmosphere. Knowing the context of the place and why TurboGranny was there didn't make him feel any better, despite knowing the Yokai's intentions.
The darkness inside the tunnel was almost physical. It felt dense, heavy, and swallowed the moonlight that barely peeked through the entrance. The air instantly turned chilly, heavy with the smell of dampness, wet earth, and something else… something metallic and rancid, like old blood.
Hideo felt the hair on his arms prickling. It was one thing to read about a cursed place in the pages of a manga, but quite another to breathe its stale air.
"See? There's nothing here..." Okarun murmured, though his trembling voice betrayed him. He clung to the phone like a lifeline, the device's flashlight slicing through a nervous beam of light that danced across the graffiti- and mold-covered walls.
Hideo didn't answer. He was too busy scanning the shadows, searching for any anomalous movement. He knew what was coming. It wasn't a question of "if," but of "when."
"This is crazy," he thought, feeling the cold sweat on his neck. "What am I supposed to do? Shout 'Watch out, an old ghost woman is going to steal your dick!'?"
"Are you still there?" Momo's voice asked from the phone, with a hint of impatience. "If nothing's wrong, I'm hanging up. The aliens aren't going to summon themselves."
"Wa-wait! I just need a little more time to prove it!" Okarun retorted, moving deeper into the tunnel.
"Idiot, stay put—" Hideo wanted to yell at her. Instead, he gritted his teeth and followed, keeping a safe distance but still keeping an eye on him.
That's when the system screen appeared before his eyes again, with a faint glow that only he could see.
[Warning!]
[A high concentration of negative spiritual energy has been detected.]
[A main antagonist is manifesting.]
Hideo gulped, feeling a knot in his stomach. "It's manifesting." The sentence sounded so clinical, so cold, that it made it even more terrifying. Perhaps if he started running now, he would be able to outrun TurboGranny.
Just as he finished reading, a sound echoed from the end of the tunnel.
Clack... clack... clack...
It was a dry, rhythmic noise. Like something hitting concrete.
Okarun froze. The light on his phone shook violently. "W-what was that? A cat?"
Hideo knew it wasn't an animal. It was the sound of wooden geta.
But it was too late.
From the deepest darkness, a figure began to take shape. At first, it was just a small, hunched silhouette.
"I'll let you suck my tits. If in return, you let me suck your cock," spoke the strange old woman, with gray hair and empty eyes.
It was Turbo Granny. Just as he remembered her from the manga, but a thousand times more terrifying in the flesh.
"RUN!!" Hideo yelled, panic finally breaking his restraint.
Okarun didn't think twice before turning around, and they both ran as fast as they could.
But she was moving toward them at an unnatural speed, contorting in a way that defied all logic. She ran on all fours, then stood up, then crawled again, getting closer and closer.
Clack-clack-clack-clack-CLACKCLACKCLACKCLACK...
The sound grew faster, more frantic, accompanied by a low, guttural chant that seemed to rend the air.
"Dabadabadabadabada..."
Okarun let out a strangled scream, a mixture of terror and pure disbelief. The light from his phone finally focused on the creature. An old woman with tangled white hair, a grotesque smile that stretched from ear to ear, revealing rotten teeth. Her eyes, two empty sockets, were fixed on him.
Hideo was the first to emerge from the tunnel. He noticed his bike a few meters from Okarun's.
He climbed onto his own and began pedaling hard. Behind him, he saw Okarun climbing onto his own as the figure drew closer every second.
Okarun pedaled as if his life depended on it (and it did), his eyes bulging, his cell phone flashlight swinging uselessly in his hand.
"S-she's just a perverted old woman!! I mistook her for a ghost!!" he yelled in a broken voice, as if saying it out loud could change the reality devouring them from behind.
Hideo could barely process her words. Fear gripped him, but an idea pierced him:
"What if I lose too? Is he going to suck me dry like he did? Am I going to lose my balls for following the protagonist?"
Before he could think of a response to those thoughts, the sound tore him apart.
Clack-clack-clack-CLACKCLACKCLACK—
TurboGranny was on top. She moved like a rabid insect, her joints popping at impossible angles, her geta hitting the asphalt with a frantic rhythm.
And then, in the blink of an eye, he launched himself at Okarun.
Hideo saw it all in slow motion. The bony arm extending, the rotten teeth gleaming in the flickering light, the trickle of drool falling from that obscene smile.
The script was being followed to the letter. Okarun was seconds away from losing.
[Conditions met.]
[Reward unlocked.]
[D-rank Skill – 10% Pyronite DNA (Ben 10) has been integrated.]
The message flashed through his mind with an almost mocking tone.
Suddenly, scorching heat erupted in his right arm. It wasn't pain... it was worse. As if the skin was cracking from within, like volcanic rock splitting to release lava.
"Agh!" He groaned, gritting his teeth as incandescent lines formed on his forearm, orange and red, alive, pulsing like veins of fire. A smell of sulfur filled the air, mingling with the stale humidity of the tunnel.
He didn't understand anything. He didn't know if he was going to explode, if he was going to char, or if he was about to save him. But the body moved on its own.
"Hey, shitty granny…!" His voice boomed louder than he expected, firm, charged with a rage he didn't even know he had. "Get away from his balls!"
TurboGranny turned her head 180 degrees, her smile fading as she caught Okarun.
Hideo raised his hand. Perhaps out of instinct or out of power.
"Burn it" he thought.
And from his palm burst a sphere of fire, small but blinding, illuminating the place with a infernal glow.