And that was how Kujo Hinano ended up standing here now.
She knew perfectly well that Ren Kuroda wouldn't be thrilled about this, but Yuzaburō had no better options.Between "making Ren unhappy" and "risking certain death," Yuzaburō and the others chose the former without hesitation.
Even Hinano—who until yesterday had stubbornly refused to believe in anything like "monsters"—now fully understood how powerless ordinary humans were after witnessing the rat demon with her own eyes.
And she understood something else: they hadn't helped Ren at all last night.If anything, they'd just gotten in his way.
If possible, they didn't want to be a burden this time either. If Ren was willing to help, letting him tackle the case alone would be ideal.
But because of the rat-demon incident, the Non-Natural Countermeasures Division now regarded their unit as "capable," and this case had been deliberately assigned to them as a test. They couldn't run from it.
Their captain had sent Hinano specifically to ask for Ren's help—and she had assumed he would gladly agree.
After all, when they encountered the rat demon, Ren had volunteered to help before she could even ask. Hinano had gotten the impression he was the heroic, ready-to-assist type.
She'd even admired him a little.If she had Ren's strength, she wouldn't have been a burden to him last night.
But what she expected to be a simple errand turned into nothing but frustration. She never imagined that the Ren who had been so enthusiastic before would be this indifferent now.
But the reason was simple.Ren had only been so eager yesterday because the rat demon had appeared close to where he lived. And his sister, Ryuhime—despite being a powerful half-demon—had no combat experience, making her an easy target.
Of course he'd rushed in.
But the company Hinano described was several streets away.Ren wasn't a superhero. He didn't have infinite time to deal with every supernatural problem that popped up.
"From what you're saying, that monster doesn't sound malicious," Ren said flatly. "Even the weakest yokai could kill an unconscious human if it wanted to. If it hasn't, then it's just the prankster type. Danger level's extremely low. I have no reason to kill something like that.
"Most importantly, I work part-time every weekend. I don't have time to help you."
Hearing that the monster posed no threat had already killed Ren's motivation. Learning that it only appeared on weekends—the time he depended on for part-time jobs—made him even more uninterested.
As he'd mentioned before, Ren's mother, Tenjōin Masami, was ill, and the family relied almost entirely on Ren's part-time income.
For a normal high-schooler, that would've been crushing.
But Ren was a half-demon. Working multiple part-time jobs a day was nothing to him; in fact, he treated it like physical training.
"How much can you make in a day doing part-time work? I'll just buy out your entire weekend."
Hinano planted one hand on her hip, pointed at him with the other, and announced with all the swagger of an entitled young mistress that she could hire him.
As the only daughter of the Kujo Group's chairman, Hinano firmly believed that money could solve everything.
But right as she said it, she remembered—Her family had cut off her allowance when she insisted on becoming a detective.
Now she only had a small stash of saved pocket money.And she'd heard that real "onmyōji" charged outrageous rates.
She'd even seen the so-called masters her father hired—white-bearded old men demanding piles of money just to wave incense around and recite feng-shui babble.
Thinking of Ren's abilities from last night, she suddenly panicked.Would her pitiful savings even be enough to hire someone like him?
Ren looked at the girl posing confidently in front of him—a hand on her hip, finger pointed, breasts practically defying gravity—and couldn't help feeling disdainful.
Aside from her… assets, nothing about her screamed "rich girl."And yet she was talking about buying out his entire weekend?!
"Don't underestimate me just because I'm a student," Ren said. "I work hard. I make at least twenty to thirty thousand yen a weekend.
"So if you want to buy out my whole weekend, you'll need to pay at least fifty thousand."
In reality, he made maybe ten thousand at best—but to intimidate this ridiculous girl, he threw out a deliberately inflated number.
"Fifty thousand yen? Are you sure?"
Hinano's eyes widened—not because the price was high.But because it was absurdly cheap.
So cheap she thought she'd misheard.
She had originally worried that if her allowance wasn't enough, maybe she could at least hire him for one hour, since this monster was supposedly much weaker.
But after confirming that Ren's fee truly was only fifty thousand yen, Hinano's confidence surged back instantly.
She reached into her cleavage, pulled out her wallet, fished out one hundred thousand yen in cash, and triumphantly declared that she was buying out not only his daytime hours but also his nights.
She also silently concluded that her father had definitely been scammed. Those so-called feng-shui masters had zero real power yet charged tens of millions of yen for empty nonsense.
Compared to that, Ren's price was practically pocket change.She even thought about introducing him to her father someday—Ren's abilities far outclassed those useless old men.
At that moment, Ren could only stare, dumbfounded, at the ten crisp 10,000-yen bills she held out to him.
He didn't even bother wondering how she'd managed to pull the wallet out from her chest.
"How do detectives earn money these days? Aren't you still a trainee? Or are you actually some kind of secret rich girl?"
Ren felt the limits of his own poverty squeeze around his brain.He had never imagined someone this willing to throw around cash existed.
A perfectly good young lady like her could be living a comfortable life, yet she chose to work a dangerous job as a detective?
And seeing how casually she'd produced 100,000 yen, Ren instantly regretted not quoting a higher price. She probably wouldn't have even blinked.
When Hinano saw Ren hesitating, she assumed he was dissatisfied with the payment.And honestly, she had given too little.
But she didn't have much left.
So she added quickly, "Actually, you can get a bonus for helping us solve a case. It's not a lot, but it's definitely more than any part-time job pays."
The moment Ren heard the words "additional bonus," he snatched the stack of cash from her hand faster than lightning and promised he'd be there on time that weekend.
It wasn't about the money.What truly mattered was Ren Kuroda's greatest passion:
Slaying demons and monsters.
As if a mere part-time job could ever stop him from pursuing justice.