One morning, Kuroko Togami visited the home of her crush, Kenji Saito.
The black-clothed bodyguards, who were usually by her side, were absent, and she was holding a piece of paper with the room number of the apartment she was visiting.
“Eto~…….. If I’m not mistaken, this is his house, right?
There was no doubt that this was her destination.
But from perspective of the lady who is used to live in the large mansion, it was too plain, a shabby apartment that looked like a storage room.
Although it was her personal opinion that would be rude to hear, but in reality, the storerooms in the Togami’s house were more expensive and splendid than the one room in this apartment, so you had to accept it after seeing it.
“Anyway, the doorbell is on, so let’s ring it,” she said.
But no matter how many times she rang the doorbell, there was no response.
As expected, this is not place for human beings live in, Kiroko thought so, but she shook her head when she remembered something.
“No, Saito-sama’s reaction was interrupted here. Even if this room isn’t where he lives, there’s no mistake that the shikigami watching him lost contact with him.”
There’s no need to hide it, this girl is an Onmyouji.
Therefore, in order to follow Saito, who was regarded as an important person in the mansion as well as her own crush, she always used a shikigami to keep track of his whereabouts while she was in Japan.
However, at a certain point, the shikigami suddenly became unresponsive and communication was cut off.
This was because Saito was using app to go on a journey to a different world, but the unbelievable truth is something that even a talented Omnyouji girl cannot grasp.
Generally speaking, there are two reasons why Saito’s communications are interrupted.
The first is straightforward method where he realize being followed and stripping the shikigami on his own.
The second is that the target you were following has had some kind of accident and has died or suffered a serious injury that concerned his or her life.
Kuroko didn’t think there was any possibility that Saito had stripped the shikigami by his own efforts.
But there was no sign of anyone in the room that did respond even after ringing the doorbell, and a slight uneasiness flashed in her head.
“No, it turns out that this is just an excuse. Even though I believe in Saito-sama’s power, and yet here I am, trying to get into his room for whatever reason…. How could someone like me think so naively about the situation……..”
She dismissed the second possibility on her own, feeling that she would die of shame if he found out about this naive idea. As she pondered this, her face turned red and she squirmed in agony.
However, it was rare to come to the room alone, and it would be too boring if nothing was accomplished.
After a short period of thought, Kuroko came to a certain conclusion.
“That’s right, if I can’t enter the room, I’ll just peek at it with shikigami.”
The girl in love hadn’t noticed that it was the same whether she entered the room herself or with shikigami.
For some reason, it seems all of sudden she invented a mysterious rule that says – as long as it was indirect, it was safe.
Then, with a general-purpose shikigami taken out of her bag in one hand, she chanted a spell and gave birth to a self-sustaining, provisional life.
It was like a robot that would act automatically at the user’s command until the infused spirit power ran out.
”Then, shikigamis, please check Saito-sama’s room to see if there was anything unusual in it.”
When the several born shikigamis heard the user’s order, they saluted neatly like soldiers and entered the room through the doorway.
Since the shikigamis themselves were paper cuts, they could freely enter and exit with a slight gap, regardless of whether the door was locked or not.
After a while, the shikigamis who had completed their task returned.
Clicking the lock on the door configuration from the inside, they took out what a book-like object from the target’s room and closed the door again.
Despite having become a complete thief, however the girl in love was still unaware of it.
Instead, she wondered if the book was some kind of clue.
“Good work. Please wait there.”
She opened the book in her hand and examined it carefully.
In the book, there were photos of Saito’s company trips that he had saved up over the past ten years, as well as occasional selfies of him and his subordinate, Miyagawa, taking a trip to the game hall with the highest score.
The photos are nothing more than a collection of self-satisfying record updates taken with a smartphone loaded into a computer and printed out on a cheap copier.
However, Kuroko didn’t expect the clue she got from Shikigami to be Saito’s photo album, and for a moment she felt a thrill.
Then she couldn’t take her eyes off of it, and she found herself cutting out a photo from the album.
That’s right, it was cut down, with a hand knife.
” …….. Haa!? What I’m doing!!”
Returning from unconsciousness, she was already holding a photo of Saito’s smug face that she had cut off with a hand knife.
It was the photo he had taken when he had miraculously recorded a high score in a shooting game that he was inherently bad at.
It was already worthy of the smug face of all smug faces.
It was even posed in a pretentious manner.
“So, so handsome…. No, no! ……..Really. Listen carefully, Shikigami-san. This is Saito-sama’s personal property. You can’t just take it away, right?”
These shikigamis were advised by the user, but they indifferently make whistling faces, and some even raise their thumbs, praising her for cutting down the pictures with her hand knife.
Because they were created by talented user, they are overly rich in personality.
It possible that they may have unconsciously taken out what the user really wanted, and then acted to make it happen.
In other words, a young woman named Togami Kuroko wanted a picture of Saito.
“Well, it can’t be helped…. this is the only practical joke I’ve ever had! Please return this album to its original place. It seems that Saito-sama is not in his room, so I’m going home,” she said, and stuffed the cut-out photo into her wallet, and went home as if nothing had happened.
Only the tone sounded angry, but her footsteps were light.
Though she would never admit it herself, it was the joy of unexpectedly getting a photo of her crush.
She came home with bright, or rather, a smiling in her face.