While Kuro hunted his digital ghost, Hikari was preparing to deal with her physical one. Dr. Evan Reed, the W.A.O. Watcher was a loose thread she could not afford to ignore, especially with Maya now integrated into their lives. The risk of him observing the connection between the university's two brightest prodigies was too high.
Her plan was simple, elegant, and ruthless. It was a classic "Glass Cage" technique: isolation, disorientation, and extraction.
**Phase One: Isolation.** Posing as "Hana," she began to subtly manipulate Reed's social and professional life. An anonymous, well-researched tip to the university's ethics board about "potential plagiarism" in his early work would trigger a stressful internal review. A carefully timed series of network "glitches" would disrupt his classes and research, frustrating his colleagues. A fabricated rumor about a job offer from a rival university would create distance between him and his few faculty friends. She was methodically, invisibly, cutting every thread that tied him to his cover identity, making him feel alone and exposed.
**Phase Two: Disorientation.** This was her specialty. She began a campaign of subtle psychological harassment. His favorite coffee shop would suddenly be out of his usual order every morning. A book he'd placed on his desk would be moved by an infinitesimal amount, just enough to trigger a sense of unease. He would hear whispers of conversations that would stop the moment he entered a room. They were minor, deniable things, the kinds of details that would make a sane man question his own sanity. She was turning his own art of passive observation against him, making him feel like he was the one being watched.
The final move of this phase was a masterpiece of emotional manipulation. She discovered that Reed had a sister in a long-term care facility, his only living relative and his one true emotional attachment. Posing as a nurse from the facility, Hikari made a call to him, her voice filled with practiced, professional concern. She spoke of a "sudden and serious decline" in his sister's health, urging him to come at once.
It was a complete lie. But it was the key that would unlock him from his fortress. A Watcher's discipline was formidable, but the love for a sibling was a universal vulnerability. One she understood better than anyone.
**Phase Three: Extraction.** As Reed, panicked and disoriented, rushed out of his apartment that night to make the long drive to the care facility, a non-descript black van would be waiting. Berger's best men, experts in clean, quiet extractions, would be inside. They would not harm him. They would simply… acquire him.
Hikari sat in Kuro's dorm room, monitoring the final pieces of her plan falling into place. A part of her felt a cold pang of pity for the man. He was just a soldier, a remnant of a forgotten war. But her family's safety was absolute. It was not personal. It was a logical, necessary protocol. The gardener had found a weed in her garden, and it was time to pull it out by the roots.