Half an hour later.
Gokou Ruri hurried over.
"Sora, has Elf replied to your messages?"
Having worked on the game together for almost half a month, as they became more familiar with each other, Ruri no longer called him "Sora-kun" and simply used his first name.
"Not yet." Sora shook his head, his tone grave. "The messages I sent remain unread, and her phone still won't connect."
It was almost 8:00 PM. Elf wasn't home, her phone was unreachable, and her messages remained unread. It was highly probable she had encountered an unforeseen event she couldn't escape from—anyone with half a brain knows to go home when it rains or gets dark.
"Don't worry, Sora." Ruri exhaled softly. "I'll hire cats and dogs to help right now."
"We're counting on you, Ruri-san." Mahiru opened her backpack and said softly, "I've already prepared cat treats, canned food, and dog food."
While waiting for Kuroneko to arrive, Sora and Mahiru naturally hadn't been idle. The two of them first went to the convenience store to buy the canned food and other items needed to hire the cats and dogs. Then, they went to Elf's house to grab some of her intimate clothing for the doggos to use for scent tracking.
"Let's go to the shopping street." Sora suggested. "There are a lot of stray cats roaming the shopping street at night."
"Okay."
"Let's go."
"..."
The three acted swiftly. Before long, they found a stray orange cat rummaging through a trash can in an alley off the shopping street.
"Meow~"
Ruri stepped forward gently and negotiated in Meowian.
With the power of the Witch of Beasts, the employment deal was easily struck.
After heartily devouring a cat treat, the stray orange cat quickly jumped onto the wall and began calling its friends. Soon, it had summoned seven or eight stray cats.
Then, guided by the stray cats, the three found a stray dog in a dark alley. Ruri used her ability again, similarly employing it with food to help them work.
With this.
The cat and dog army officially assembled.
"Look closely, this is a photo of Elf." Ruri took out her phone, pulled up the group photo from Mount Takao, zoomed in, and showed it to the cat and dog army. "Everyone, make sure to memorize this. Once you find her, let me know immediately."
"Meow~"
"Woof woof."
The cat and dog squad responded one after another. Compared to certain humans who take money but don't do the work, the minds of cats and dogs are much simpler; if they eat the food, they really will help.
But a new problem quickly arose.
Angel-sama took out Elf's intimate clothing and offered it to the dogs to track the scent. However, the doggos just spun in circles on the spot, their doggy faces full of bewilderment.
"They say they can't track the scent in the air." Ruri furrowed her delicate eyebrows.
Hearing this, Mahiru gently pursed her moist pink lips and pondered softly: "It's probably because Elf's invisibility has a very high priority. Not only does she and her clothes turn invisible, but her own scent is also shielded."
"That's highly likely." Sora nodded in agreement. "Elf can't stay invisible forever. We verified before that the maximum duration of invisibility is twelve hours."
"To avoid sudden accidents, Elf wouldn't keep invisibility active constantly. Instead, she would periodically deactivate it to recover magic power."
"As soon as Elf deactivates her invisibility, her scent will appear."
"Since there's no scent of Elf around here, we'll expand the search area. As long as we find her scent molecules, we can track down where she is."
Angel-sama added from the side, "Sora-kun's point makes a lot of sense. Elf basically walks when she goes out to gather material, so her range of activity shouldn't be very far."
Ruri looked up and suggested softly:
"Shall we split up?"
"Hmm?"
"Although Sora's reasoning makes a lot of sense, we don't know which direction Elf is in." Ruri crossed her arms over her chest. "So splitting up, with each of us leading a squad of the Cat and Dog Special Task Force, will be more efficient... I can communicate with the task force in advance. It's okay if you guys can't talk to them. We'll use spinning in place as a signal. As long as they spin in place in front of you, it means they've tracked Elf's scent."
Sora hesitated for two seconds, exhaled softly, and agreed:
"Splitting up is indeed a good choice... However, I'll take one direction alone, and Mahiru and Ruri will team up."
"Eh?"
Sora's tone left no room for refusal:
"It's already very late. If you act alone, you might run into drunks or something. I'll only feel at ease if you stick together, lest we lose the two of you before we even find Elf."
Ruri muttered quietly, "The dark night is my home turf, I won't get lost."
"Then I'll team up with Ruri-chan." Angel-sama nodded gently, her voice soft as she carefully reminded him, "Sora-kun must also pay extra attention to safety when alone."
Ruri crossed her arms. "We'll contact each other by phone every ten minutes, Sora, don't forget."
"I guarantee I won't forget." Sora looked at the two girls. "Your phone batteries are fine, right?"
Angel-sama: "Fully charged."
Ruri: "My phone is fine too."
"Then it's settled." Sora stated decisively. "Let's begin the operation."
Kuroneko and Angel-sama teamed up, while Sora went solo. The two groups each chose a direction and led their Cat and Dog Special Task Forces to begin searching.
Time quietly slipped by.
An hour passed in the blink of an eye.
During this time, the three contacted each other every ten minutes, but unfortunately, they still came up empty-handed.
As the night deepened, there were fewer and fewer pedestrians on the street, and the worry in their hearts grew stronger.
"Where on earth could Elf be?"
After searching for half the day, Sora's mouth was dry and his throat was slightly sore. He stopped at a vending machine on the street to buy a chilled peach juice. However, downing half the bottle couldn't extinguish the worry in his heart.
"Woof woof woof!"
At that moment, a stray dog that had gone ahead to scout suddenly ran back.
Sora couldn't understand dog language, so he could only look on in confusion as the doggo panted with its tongue out while spinning in circles in front of him.
"Spinning in circles..." Sora's eyes quickly lit up. "You picked up Elf's scent?"
"Woof woof."
The working doggo continued to spin in circles.
Okay, the language barrier is real, but having hope is a good thing.
Sora rallied his spirits and downed the remaining half bottle of juice:
"Lead the way."
A moment later, Sora arrived in front of a convenience store, and the other stray dogs also started barking, clearly having discovered something.
Sora walked into the store and asked the clerk. The clerk confirmed they had seen Elf; she had clearly come into the store to buy something.
Having obtained concrete information, Sora left the convenience store and continued tracking behind the Cat and Dog Special Task Force. However, as they walked, the expression on his face slowly turned peculiar. He finally stopped in front of an incredibly familiar building and couldn't help but look down:
"Are you sure you didn't lead me the wrong way?"
The building that appeared before him was none other than the high school academy he attended every day.