Reincarnated Into A Dead Woman's Body In Another World-Chapter 334: Arc 5, - 28: Headfirst

Utter darkness of a shadow, with hints of glowing purple—all four of them were practically blind and felt almost frozen in place as eerie howls wisped past their ears. To Fumeko, this was all too familiar a feeling.

Purplish-black shadows materialized above a large square atrium where sofas and coffee tables sat by the edges. The scent of coffee and perfume wafted into their senses, just like the dim yellow lights.

Their blindness faded away in a near-instant. "THUD!" "OW... ughhh..." the bruised, battered and broken Jotou fell onto the second floor of the company building. She sobbed on the tiles, wishing she would just pass out from the pain already.

"Ahck!" Hotaru bit her own tongue as she fell onto the tiles at the entrance of the building; she fell right onto her still broken tail. She panted her pain out and rolled onto her stomach.

"Puff." The sofa’s leg scratched back a tad as a brunette landed on the cushions. She stared to the ceiling of the building while the soft cotton soaked up the water trickling from her strands.

Fumeko glanced to her left and, "Cahgk!" spat out blood and sneezed. However, most bewildering was the severed arm with a wand in its grasp flopping around- "AAHH!" Fumeko screamed at the top of her lungs.

The doors to a few offices flew open and out came occupants of the building. "What the hell is going on out-" Morgana stepped out of her second floor office with a pistol in both hands pointing down to her feet.

She only took one good glance at Jotou to know what went on. She quickly strapped her gun back in its holster and crouched to pick the blonde up with a furrow of her brows. "Where’s Kinoshita," Morgana pulled Jotou along.

"I, don’t know..." Jotou hissed in pain.

Fumeko rolled onto the floor and backed away from the severed arm. It seemed to be severed by the elbow, but there was no gore nor blood.

Instead, purplish-black shadows still wisped at the severed joint. The bigger question was, where the heck was the owner of the arm!?

"Kid!?" Peter rushed out of his office, holding onto his bowler hat. Fumeko stood up and swivelled her head around. "Who did this? What happened?" Peter scanned over all the blood on her.

"C-cult," Fumeko’s brain was scattered and she raised her arms, "SOBI!? Asobi!?" she yelled and searched, but- "Cough-gh." The brunette wheezed and collapsed to the floor. Her vision was going hazy, she felt cramps and her head ached.

"Kid!" Peter lifted her up with ease and rolled her gently onto the sofa.

Hotaru groaned as she held her own tail with glowing blue water in her palms, "KehAH!" she tugged and straightened her own tail.

"Kira, get Namora on the line," Morgana snapped her fingers and a small wisp of light green whizzed up. She continued to aid Jotou down the staircase, "Ease off that foot," she advised.

Whilst Jotou mumbled with a broken jaw, "What do you think, I’m doing...?"

"Ease off the sass too before I drop you."

Hotaru held the door of the entrance and got herself up. Her ears flickered to the sounds of pain- Wait, huh? Hotaru wiggled her ears, but something felt, off...

Fumeko shook off the daze overwhelming her and held her hand to her head; only to feel a much bigger hand, that was balled up into a fist, touch her forehead...

Fumeko’s eyes ejected open and looked to her left hand... Only to realize it wasn’t her left hand in the first place. "AH!" she pulled her left hand away from her and stared in horror.

Purplish-black shadows wisped and warped around Fumeko’s wrist and it connected to a much larger hand with perfectly cut nails and the edge of a black garment near the wrist.

She had no control over the hand, but oddly enough, Fumeko could still feel her hand just fine as she tried to wriggle her fingers.

Suddenly, Jotou felt fingers wriggling on the left side of her hips. ’That’s weird.’ She was sure she was clenching her fist to endure the pain. But as Jotou looked down to her left hand, "The hell!?"

Around the blonde’s left wrist, purplish-black shadows encircled it. At the end of it, a much smaller hand was attached and wriggling its fingers.

From the upper floor, some man with black stubble and neck-length hair rushed over. Poking out of his head were two deer-like antlers as he gripped the banister and peered down, "What in the blooming hell has gone on?"

Hotaru walked into the scene and both Fumeko and Jotou turned to her; if they weren’t alarmed already, the sight of the redhead certainly did the trick.

Her crimson ears were on the sides of her head, facing upwards with wisps of shadow where they were once on her head. "Oh no, hang on!" water formed in her palms and she rushed to the closer Fumeko.

"Knock-knock-knock-knock, knock!" "Hello!? Let me in please! I need every detective, there’s danger in a warehouse, everyone’s missing!"

"That’s Asobi!" Hotaru’s ears pricked to the sides.

"I’ll get her, you patch her up," Peter let Hotaru do her work and rushed to the door to let Asobi in.

"Oh! Mr Werner!" the elf entered with a missing right forearm and shadows where the joint would connect. "Meko teleported us and everyone’s not here and I was across the street from the company and my wand’s missing!"

"That ain’t the only thing missin’..." Peter pulled her in by her left arm and shut the door.

Asobi gasped, "Everyone!" she ran in- "My wand! Wait," Asobi moved her right shoulder and her left forearm wiggled on the floor. "Who’s doing magic tricks? It’s not me," she squeaked.

Fumeko lifted her hand, "Can you heal this?" she coughed again and then her body went limp.

Hotaru began healing along Fumeko’s neck and was flabbergasted by the sight of her hand, "Huh!? T-that’s, Jotou’s hand!"

Fumeko’s head stiffly shifted, "I can see that...!"

"Wah! Aru, your ears!" Asobi pointed with an illusory forearm while the other flopped about on the floor.

"What are-" Hotaru touched the top of her head and raised her brows. She touched the sides of her head to feel them.

Jotou was carried over and the blonde slumped next to the sofa. "Quinn, get to Namora on the line, Kira’s dialling!" Morgana shouted up and pointed to her office. With a nod the deer-man sprinted across the upper floor.

"Ya sure ya don’t need a hospital?" Peter rushed over.

Hotaru immediately switched to more grievously injured blonde, "I should be fine, just give me a couple of hours. Fumeko, you need to end the spell!" she checked Jotou’s wrist which had the brunette’s hand attached.

"End the, huh?" Fumeko could barely form thoughts with her drowsy head. "My mana..." no wonder she could barely move a limb, she was still being drained. "How do I, end it...?"

"It’s your spell!" the wolf-girl gave a panicked shout back.

"You, have to force it, detective," Jotou hissed as Hotaru healed her broken jaw.

Fumeko winced her eyes shut and grunted. She curled her fingers in and lifted her head before she slammed it back on the cushions. With some essence of concentration, Fumeko dispelled her botched teleportation spell.

Purplish-black shadows wisped around the room from the various detached and reattached limbs. Jotou’s and Fumeko’s left hands swapped back, Asobi’s forearm connected itself back and Hotaru’s ears went back to their proper position. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

Fumeko sighed—her tensed up muscles felt free in her limp body. She panted roughly, with crimson coating the insides of her mouth...

"So," Morgana took a look at them all impassively and folded her arms, "This happen often?"

_

Kazuo stood with crossed arms with his rear against his office desk. Silent he was, after rushing to the company in a panic—he already had his fill of worrying and checking up on the injured Fumeko.

The stroke of midnight had gone by and he stood, facing four mostly healed adventurers. Morgana and Kira stood beside the desk, her arms folded as she glared daggers.

...

...

"You investigated the body," Morgana broke the silence with a chilling tone.

No one replied.

"Found some key information regarding the number of nails on the corpse," Morgana continued.

All four of them avoided eye contact.

"Decided to follow the lead without any notice to us."

Hotaru’s ears had folded down, Fumeko stared to the floor, Asobi twirled her wand in between her fingers and Jotou had crossed her arms—her brown eyes glaring to the side.

"Found what you assume to be the cult’s ongoing operations in a warehouse across the city from the damn crime scene."

Jotou’s eyes sparked. Kazuo closed his eyes in silence.

"Then decided to infiltrate the operation with no prior preparations and end up in a fight."

...

"In which, you killed several suspects who’ve gone missing by your account, and then proceeded to lose the fight—only to flee as a last resort till you were all at a brink of death... Have I got that right?"

Merely the ticking of a clock filled the room.

"An expert team to handle certain situations, hm?" Morgana now eyed Kazuo.

"We get it," Jotou voiced out with knitted brows to the woman in blue.

"Do you have any sense of responsibility?" Morgana snapped back to the blonde. "How recklessly you threw your and your pals’ lives?" her piercing green eyes widened. "Did we or didn’t we warn you about how dangerous the cult is?"

Jotou took a deep breath and looked away, her eyes still sparking.

Hotaru, who stood right beside her, watched the blonde seethe quietly and held her hand.

"You thought cause you were the Thundering Blade, you could overcome a situation you didn’t even understand? You got too cocky.

I get it, you’ve survived so much before you got to Burnetrout, you think you’re invincible now and can face any challenge by throwing your body at it."

Jotou’s throat choked up and she clenched her fists. Hotaru gripped her hand tighter.

"It was something risky, but we didn’t know people that powerful would be there. It’s not Jotou’s fault, and even if it is, it’s mine too. We got the jump on the cult," Fumeko defended.

Morgana glared to Fumeko, "You witnessing it doesn’t constitute as hard proof, you can ask a lawyer to know that. The cult was meticulously prepared for everything.

A, they were being secretive and banked on the body not being found so soon; Alicia got the jump on that.

B, even after the body was found, they expected there to be an investigation to take place by procedure; that would’ve given them a few more days. You did the investigation as soon as possible.

C, based on what you’re saying, the nails on the body must’ve been an indicator for the cult members to rendezvous at a specific location to carry out an operation and figured only the cult members would notice it and follow the directions.

Meaning the authorities might’ve not even regarded the number of nails as evidence. You all figured that out.

D, even if, anyone puts this all together, they wouldn’t expect anyone to immediately run off and break into their operation where it would’ve been extremely dangerous for them.

By all accounts of logic, they were four steps ahead with their countermeasures. But those countermeasures don’t work when some people so daftly defy all logic and leap headfirst into danger.

Oh sorry and E, even if someone did break through their countermeasures, they knew they could handle whatever may come. Which is exactly what happened," her eyes never left the brunette...

Fumeko furrowed her brows.

Morgana stepped closer and towered over Fumeko, "This was a mistake from the bloody start. You came away with nothing—not a single bit of concrete evidence.

If you wanna be a detective so badly, you need to think things through—know when the risk’s worth it, not risk it all. You’ve lost several leads, you’ve ’handled’ absolutely nothing and came back with bruises."

"Mona-"

"Don’t Mona me," Morgana raised a finger to Kazuo behind her.

"Enough," Kazuo voiced.

"Dad-"

"Kid, you and your friends tell us everything that happened in detail—the warehouse, the people you fought—then you go back home," he couldn’t look her in the eye.

"Dad!"

"Please," he breathed out. "You’re done."

The room fell to silence and Fumeko stood still... Her heart sunk and from her shocked eyes came a trickle of tears.