Kafka's victory over the phasing Kaiju—now officially designated an 'Inter-dimensional Phenomenon' or IDP—sent shockwaves through the highest levels of the Defense Force. The ATU's confidential report, heavily redacted by Hoshina, described an enemy completely immune to conventional weaponry, defeated by a "highly specialized, non-physical counter-measure" deployed by Special Operative Hibino.
The masquerade had shifted once again. Kafka wasn't just a Kaiju powerhouse; he was now the military's sole expert and weapon against a new, terrifying class of ethereal threats. He had gone from a bomb, to a cannon, to a ghost-hunting skeleton key in the space of a month.
His value soared. His leash, paradoxically, grew longer. He was given more autonomy, more access to classified data on paranormal Kaiju events, and his 24/7 surveillance was subtly relaxed. How do you monitor a man who can step into his own shadow and disappear? The truth was, they couldn't. They could only trust the fragile, terrifying balance they had struck.
This new reputation, however, came at a personal cost. While his professional stock had never been higher, the chasm between him and his peers widened into a canyon. He was no longer just the powerful rookie. He was a practitioner of a kind of technological dark arts they couldn't even begin to comprehend. His teammates in the ATU now treated him with a detached, almost clinical respect, as one might treat a friendly but fundamentally alien AI.
The one person who didn't pull away was Kikoru. If anything, she grew closer, her sharp rivalry now completely replaced by an intense, almost obsessive curiosity.
"Show me," she demanded one day, cornering him in an empty training hall. "The shadow thing. Not the spikes. The... movement. Show me how you disappear."
Kafka hesitated. "It's not... something I can just teach, Shinomiya."
"I don't want you to teach me," she retorted, her golden eyes blazing with an ambition he knew all too well. "I want to see it. The power Sovereign put in me… it responds when you do that. It buzzes. It wants to learn. If I can understand how you do it, maybe I can learn to do it too."
He saw the burning desire in her eyes—the same desire for strength, for relevance in this new, terrifying world, that he felt himself. He sighed.
He stood still, concentrated, and performed the minor, localized phase shift he'd used in the steel garden. He didn't move. He simply sank an inch into his own shadow, his form blurring and becoming slightly translucent for a moment, before re-solidifying.
Kikoru gasped, her hand flying to her chest. "I felt that! It was like a… a vibration in my own cells. Like a key turning in a lock I didn't know I had." She stared at him, her expression a mix of frustration and exhilaration. "I can't do it. Not yet. But I'm close. I can feel the door. I just don't know how to open it."
Their relationship was changing. They were no longer just comrades. They were two students of an unwilling, absent master, trying to decipher the mysteries of a power that was remaking them both from the inside out. They were becoming a very small, very strange support group.
His nights continued to be a relentless grind. With his evasion and basic combat skills now at a level that could at least survive, Igris and Beru's lessons grew more complex, and more cruel.
Beru's training was no longer about simple pain tolerance. He was now a master of illusions, trapping Kafka's dream-self in complex psychological scenarios, forcing him to fight while being bombarded with images of his own failures, the faces of those he couldn't save. It was Hoshina's Cauldron, but on a cosmic, sadistic scale. He was being taught to maintain his focus, to find the eye of the storm, no matter how visceral the emotional distraction.
Igris, on the other hand, had moved from hand-to-hand to blade work. He would conjure a simple, spectral longsword for Kafka, and then proceed to utterly, completely dismantle him. Igris, even with a simple sword, was a force of nature. His movements were perfect, efficient, a symphony of deadly grace.
[You are clumsy,] Igris's voice would echo as Kafka's parry was expertly redirected, leaving him wide open. [You hold the blade as if it is an extension of your arm. Wrong. Your arm is an extension of the blade. The sword is the thought. Your body is merely the execution.]
It was a slow, painful, humiliating process, but just like before, Kafka was learning. He began to feel the rhythm of the sword, the pure geometry of combat. He was no janitor, no monster. In these dreams, he was a squire, being tutored by a legendary knight in the deadliest art form in existence.
And through it all, Jin-Woo watched, a silent, impassive observer. He rarely interfered directly anymore, content to let his marshals shape his chosen weapon. Kafka was a long-term project. An investment.
The next call to action came not from the Defense Force, but from the Monarch himself. It was late at night. Kafka was meditating in his room, trying to recover from a particularly brutal session with Igris, when the voice came.
[There is a development,] Jin-Woo stated, his voice devoid of any preamble. [A convergence of energies I have been monitoring. A splinter of the Architect's power, and something else… something ancient. Powerful. I cannot be in two places at once. You will be my proxy.]
A cold dread pooled in Kafka's stomach. A proxy for the Monarch.
[Location data is being sent to your device,] Jin-Woo continued. [It is a decommissioned geothermal power plant in the Hakone mountains. Deep underground. Go there. Observe. Do not engage unless absolutely necessary. Your primary mission is to be my eyes and ears. Report everything you see.]
'What am I looking for?' Kafka asked.
[The Architect is not a fool. His defeat in your R&D labs taught him that your technology is vulnerable. His defeat in Shibuya taught him his specialized creations can be overcome. He is searching for a new kind of weapon. One that is not of his own design. One that predates your entire civilization.]
The command was absolute. A direct order, reinforced by the unyielding pressure of the Shadow Vow. He had to go.
This was a different kind of mission. He couldn't report this to Hoshina. He couldn't bring the ATU. This was the first time his duty to his Master was in direct, undeniable conflict with his duty to the Defense Force.
He pulled up the location on his secure datapad. The Hakone Geothermal Plant. A place that had been sealed for fifty years after a catastrophic drilling accident had unleashed "unidentifiable geological pressures." A cover story. He cross-referenced the location in the Defense Force's classified archives, a privilege of his new rank.
His blood ran cold.
The official file was sealed above even Mina's clearance level. But the title was there.
Project Name: The Izanagi Protocol.
Subject: Subterranean Kaiju Relic. Designation: DAITETSU.
Status: Dormant. Contained.
The Architect wasn't just building new monsters anymore.
He was trying to wake up an old one. An ancient one. Something so dangerous that the Defense Force hadn't tried to kill it. They had buried it under a mountain and hoped the world would forget it ever existed. And Jin-Woo was sending him, alone, to walk into its tomb.