Mitome Wolf
001
Saisaki Mitome was the descendent of a werewolf. In general, there’s a sense of familiarity that comes with using the term “wolfman” instead of “werewolf”, but since she was female, I suppose it should be “wolfwoman” instead. But anyway, she was a wolf while she was human, and she was human even when she was a wolf—unlike how I became a vampire, or how Suou Zenka became a mermaid, or how Kizashima Nozomi became a golem, instead of becoming a monster partway through her life, she had been instilled with a wolfish nature from birth, or perhaps from even before she was born.
Though I didn’t really have an understanding of the girl herself, other than her rough personality, it seemed she’d come from such a family… Her parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, and cousins all, more or less, had the same constitution—a constitution where, on the night of a full moon, they’d transform from humans to wolves.
It seemed that the wolf genes in Saisaki Mitome were particularly strong even among her family members, so even if she didn’t bathe in the light of the moon, she was still capable of transforming if she looked at any similar-looking round object—and to the opposite effect, even on a night with a supermoon, she was capable of restraining her wolf transformation.
Her constitution was completely under her control.
“If y’ask me, though, the feeling of ‘not transforming’ is what makes no sense. Since I’ve been living like this for thirty years.”
In the first place, if you ignored the unexpected point that she could “turn into a wolf”, Saisaki Mitome was mostly just a normal person—a normal person with slightly more power than a human, slightly faster legs than a human, a slightly better nose than a human, and slightly more fondness for fresh meat than a human.
For a girl like her, choosing the path of a police officer was extremely natural.
She simply believed that that was the best way to use her abilities to maximize her contribution to society—although, at the moment she had made that resolve, the idea of the Rumors Squad hadn’t even sprouted in the mind of Gaen-san yet.
So the path that she tried to walk was the path of what was technically still a proper police officer.
“I wanted to become a police dog. Since they’re cool. And the days where a wolf can live as a wolf are over now.”
I’m the Last Wolf now, she said, not out of self-deprecation but almost out of pride—actually, her time as a police officer was something to boast of, with many commendations given for her services.
With her physical capabilities easily exceeding those of a brawny guy even in spite of her supple body, she was brought into special forces as soon as she was sworn in—and when she had been my age, she had already been put in charge of an entire unit, carrying out large-scale criminal investigations and nationwide disaster relief efforts.
Gaen-san was also crazy for headhunting a hero like that… But from Gaen-san’s perspective, a member like Saisaki Mitome was indispensable for the Rumors Squad.
When I heard that, I had interpreted it as, “Aha, so basically that means we needed combat-ready personnel”—because even if they were on the level of rumors, the oddities we’d go up against weren’t guaranteed to be defenseless.
At the very least, we’d need to be able to protect ourselves.
However, this was just me jumping to conclusions.
What Gaen-san actually wanted was not the werewolf’s physical state, but the werewolf’s mental state.
Though you wouldn’t expect it from someone with a rough personality like hers, she had the steely resolve that made her unconditionally execute the orders that were given to her. And Gaen-san wanted to use that as an example.
She wanted the way of life of the “Last Wolf” to influence the team that had been entrusted with her secret—to take the strong wills of the declining werewolves and have them flourish out in the world.
And the wolf that had obtained this sponsor…
Was currently encircling a cat.
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