Yasuho and Josuke took their first bite of Rai Mamezuku's Romanoff cream, and the flavour was unbelievable. It was so good that the sheer bliss of it brought tears to Josuke's eyes. As Yasuho complimented Rai on the dessert, claiming that no bad guy could ever create something this good, the conversation shifted to the mechanics of his chairlift sanctuary.
Rai casually revealed that his living space was strategically distributed across the mountain's chairlift system, with each pole serving as a different room. The first pole housed his massive collection of analogue vinyl records. The second acted as a combined library and wine cellar. The third served as his wardrobe. And the fifth, where they currently sat, functioned as his kitchen and dining room.
Looking down, Yasuho pointed out that the orchard on the lower slopes of the mountain looked shockingly unkempt and overgrown. Visibly irritated by the critique, Rai explained the method behind how he cultivated plants. He deliberately left the bottom of the mountainside choked with weeds, so that the destructive insects and plant diseases flourished down there. Furthermore, when fruit trees sensed danger from other trees, they inherently adapted, producing larger, sweeter fruit to guarantee their survival.
Though Yasuho was slightly unnerved by Rai's botanical philosophy, another heavenly mouthful of cream instantly restored her and Josuke's joy.
Leaning back in his chair, Rai began to expound on the history of agriculture, a ten-thousand-year-old human tradition that had served as the catalyst for human progress. Despite millennia of agricultural advancement, humanity had made zero progress in cultivating eternal life. He argued that perpetual life already existed on a cellular level, where the human body constantly replaced dying cells in order to maintain its existence.
Rai theorised that Josuke's fused condition had likely painted a massive target on his back, attracting a dangerous new breed of enemies. These people did not just want to sell individual Locacaca fruits to eccentric billionaires. They wanted to reverse engineer the biological process of equivalent exchange on a massive industrial scale — a monopoly that would yield unimaginable, world-altering wealth. However, Rai admitted that he had no idea who was spearheading this specific attack, as any number of powerful factions would gladly kill to seize the hybrid fruit.
Intrigued by the setup of his house more than anything, Josuke asked what lay in the fourth pole of the lift, and Rai proudly opened the hatch to unveil his private gym, complete with a treadmill and a heavy set of dumbbells.
Down below, near the bus, a pair of local police officers pulled into the parking lot beside the chairlift. Spotting the unnatural ring of trees closing in around the abandoned cars, they went to radio for backup, but before they could, something hit them, and the two men were quickly riddled with microscopic holes, their bodies turning into husks of themselves within seconds.
Up on the lift, Rai spotted the flashing lights of the cruiser, but the officers were nowhere to be seen. Calmly, he mentioned that the eighth pole was where they were heading next, a spot where he kept specialised equipment that would be able to harvest the fruit of the dying branch.
Suddenly, striking from behind Yasuho, a tree tore its way across the earth and whipped its branches upwards, striking her. The impact knocked her completely off her seat, but Josuke lunged forward, barely managing to catch her arm in the nick of time.
Instantly the trees pivoted their aggression towards Rai, lathering his hand in a swarm of microscopic, crystal-like cuboids. In a flash, shards of the tree's roots were shot upwards like shrapnel, grazing Yasuho's leg. Instantly her wound was swarmed by the identical microscopic stands. Those same creatures then began boring deep holes into Rai's hand, drilling directly into his bloodstream.
Acting fast, Josuke summoned Soft and Wet, deploying his bubbles to safely plug the parasites off Yasuho's leg before using a powerful shockwave attack to smash the attacking tree to splinters. Rai himself quickly slapped his remote control, restarting the chair motor to force the seat further up the mountain.
But as he climbed back onto the bench, a deeply peeved Rai reminded Josuke of something. He had already broken his promise. While prioritising Yasuho's safety and choosing to protect her first, Josuke had completely neglected the appraiser's security.
Staring down at his own hand, Rai calmly analysed the infection. He noted that the microscopic stands were melting his flesh from the inside out, causing the holes in his skin to expand at an alarming rate. With chilling composure, he summoned his stand, Doggy Style, before unravelling his own left hand into a string and cleanly severing it to stop the spread. He reminded Josuke not to treat sacred things so lightly. Their first priority was to protect him.
Before Josuke could even process what he had said, Rai shoved Yasuho right off the moving chairlift, sending her plunging down onto the mountain floor below.
From above, Josuke watched, unable to do anything. But Rai's expression did not change. He simply wanted to test a theory. They did not have a clue where the enemy was, but if they used her as bait, they would.
When Josuke furiously announced that he was jumping down to save her, Rai cut him off with a reminder of their true objective. He snapped that their priority was survival and the Locacaca branch. Rai's indifference enraged Josuke, who stepped up and grabbed him by the collar, threatening to knock the plant appraiser right off the lift himself. Unfazed by the threat, Rai calmly estimated that the group's survival chances had risen to 23 per cent. The enemy was indeed a mystery, but now he had a front row seat to observe them in action.
Down on the slopes, Yasuho managed to push herself up, shaking off the impact and shouting back to Josuke that she was fine. Knowing that the enemy would strike her at any second, Josuke yelled down, instructing her to sprint towards the upcoming sixth support pole and rendezvous with them there.
As Rai activated the lift motor to continue their ascent up the mountainside, he noticed a bizarre phenomenon. A swarm of earthworms was frantically digging itself out of the soil in a panic. Deciding purposefully not to warn Josuke, he instead, as they rose higher, had a realisation. Because the enemy had the ability to manipulate and move trees from underground, there was a possibility that they might try to undermine the heavy concrete base of Pillar 6. If the enemy was able to get to the pole before Yasuho, and the wire lost its tension, it would cause the entire chair system to collapse.
Suddenly the ground near the sixth pole exploded. A massive, horrifying object erupted from the dirt, hurtling towards a defenceless Yasuho. Terrified, she turned and tried to run, but the terrain was working against her.
Reacting instantly, Josuke summoned Soft and Wet, launching a cluster of specialised bubbles down to her feet so that she could use them as a makeshift floating stairway. But before she was able to get high enough, a volley of rocks shot out from the earth, popping the bubbles. Yasuho plummeted back to the ground, and as she looked down, she was met by a mysterious masked figure who was himself lodged inside a massive, subterranean, tank-like object.
In a flash, the masked assailant whipped his hand out, wrapping a vice-like grip around her neck and instantly unleashing a horrific, flesh-dissolving microscopic stand onto her skin. Just as the parasites began to bore into her flesh, Rai told Josuke to move as he unpeeled his entire right arm. In an instant, the botanist rocketed his arm down from above and drove his survival knife deep into the enemy's shoulder.