"What is this..."
The Demon's pupils shrank violently, trembling. The tearing sensation clinging to its sharp claws felt as if it were ripping apart its very soul.
At the severed wrist, writhing buds of flesh felt as though they were being gnawed over and over by countless fine teeth, unleashing unbearable pain. It had been many, many years since it had felt something like this.
It remembered when it was still a thief, tied up by villagers and beaten day after day. When hunger drove it to eat whatever it could find, the nights of abdominal agony that followed. Back then, it had been the same. Endless pain... and utter helplessness.
Those memories of weakness filled it with terror.
"Are you still human... What exactly are you?"
Huff...
Asuka let out a long breath. The cold air snapped his blood-loss-addled mind back into clarity. Streams of blood flowed from his forehead, forming savage, fang-like streaks as they dripped onto his tattered clothes and the serrated blade in his hands.
He lowered his head and looked at the serrated greatsword, muttering to himself, "Nugata... a name like some wild dog..."
The blade did not answer. Instead, it radiated a primal hunger, sending faint currents of heat through the hilt into his palm. The warmth flowed through his veins, barely propping up his unsteady body.
The wounds on his body still burned with pain, and the fury in Asuka's chest only grew stronger.
Bang!
He shot forward like a cannonball, charging through the snow. The accumulated snow around him exploded outward from the sudden burst of force.
The Demon was startled. The boy's speed was several times faster than before.
It hurriedly raised its two twisted, bamboo-pole-thin arms, instinctively relying on a Demon's undying body to block the attack. But when it saw the unhealed stump at its wrist, doubt crept in, and it wondered if dodging might be the better option.
In that moment of hesitation, Asuka's serrated greatsword was already upon it.
Shred—!
The blade came down with a sound that tore through the air, shrieking like a pack of dogs fighting over food.
The heavy blade dragged a blurred gray-black afterimage as it slammed into the Demon's crossed arms.
Riiip—! The sharp serrations bit deep into the Demon's tendons and flesh like the fangs of a rabid hound.
In that instant, Asuka clearly felt the strange sensation of the blade slicing through skin and meat, crushing bone beneath it.
Where the blade passed, flesh was not cleanly cut, but torn apart in a brutal, ragged mess.
The Demon's claws, tough enough to rend bear hide, and its hardened bones shattered like rotten wood the instant they met the blade. Both arms were split from the middle, drooping uselessly.
If the Demon had not reacted at the last moment and stepped back, its entire arms would have been severed outright.
"Uraaaah!!"
The Demon staggered back, letting out a heart-rending scream, far more miserable than anything before.
If it were only physical pain, it might have endured it. But the gnawing sensation at its wounds was steadily draining the Flesh and Blood Energy within its body, causing its once-proud regenerative ability to weaken and even fail entirely.
No good. This brat isn't human. I have to run!
The Demon's will to fight collapsed as it tried to turn and flee, but Asuka had no intention of letting it escape.
Enduring the dizziness and discomfort from continued blood loss, his eyes flashed coldly as he raised the heavy serrated greatsword and brought it down again.
"Roar!" The Demon's final ferocity was provoked by this relentless assault.
It twisted backward violently, narrowly avoiding the killing blow.
The serrated blade roared past its face, and the wind blades it carried carved several deep gashes into its twisted features, cutting down to the bone.
Ignoring everything else, the Demon swung its drooping, half-severed arms like twisted iron whips, smashing them toward Asuka's body, while opening its blood-filled maw to lunge for his throat.
"Die!"
What answered the Demon was Asuka's cold, low growl.
Slash! Slash! Slash!
In an instant, Nugata erupted with countless dazzling black flashes of light.
That was Asuka's own Spiritual Pressure. Driven by extreme rage, it unconsciously resonated with the serrated blade in his hands, roaring as it burst forth.
Spiritual Pressure was a primal power born from the essence of the soul, existing within every person and every living being. Depending on the density of spiritual power within the body, the strength it could display varied greatly.
The reason Asuka could sense the Demon's presence was because of the abnormal Spiritual Pressure emanating from it.
Several jagged, serration-edged Spiritual Pressure slashes burst from the blade like starving dogs fighting over prey. Disorderly, frenzied, and violent, they collided and crushed against one another, carrying tearing wind pressure as they rushed straight at the Demon at point-blank range.
Puff! Puff! Puff! Puff!—!!
A series of dense tearing sounds rang out.
The Demon's chest, legs, and abdomen were instantly shredded by the savage Hungry Hounds, sending flesh flying everywhere.
Large chunks of meat were ground apart by the raging Spiritual Pressure storm. Twisted skin was peeled back in sheets, exposing stark white bones beneath.
"Damn it! Get away! Get away from me!!"
The Demon's entire body was blasted backward by the strike, slamming heavily into a massive ancient tree. It spat blood, desperately using its broken arms to beat at the increasingly intense gnawing sensation ravaging its body.
Asuka leaned on his blade and limped forward, gasping for breath.
His vision was already failing him, blurring in and out, darkness creeping in.
Yet he did not stop. It was almost as if raw anger alone was dragging him onward, making him advance on the Demon like a god of slaughter.
"No... don't come closer..."
The Demon's body could no longer move. The Flesh and Blood Energy within it was completely exhausted, and its wounds no longer had the strength to heal.
It let out terrified, desperate pleas, hoping to awaken even the slightest hint of mercy in the human boy before it, or to seize a final chance to counterattack if he let his guard down.
Asuka stepped in front of it without a word, his icy gaze devoid of any compassion.
He raised Nugata high. The serrated blade reflected an ominous cold gleam under the moonlight filtering through the dense forest.
Drawing upon the last remnants of strength within his body, along with the faint, burning life energy flowing through Nugata that had been seized from the Demon, he poured everything into the blade.
"It's over."
Asuka's voice was cold and exhausted.
Slash—!!
After a dizzying spin, the Demon's terrified eyes saw its own headless body, along with the trembling back of the boy who was barely able to remain standing.
"Hmph... hmph...." It opened its mouth uselessly, the light in its eyes rapidly dimming.
It wanted to struggle. It wanted to cry out. But no sound came.
Under Asuka's final strike, its vitality poured away like a breached flood, never to recover.
Hiss...
After a few seconds, under Asuka's wary gaze, the Demon's body began to wither, black smoke hissing as if it were self-immolating.
A foul stench spread through the air as its body broke apart into countless tiny gray-black points of light. Together with that filthy, hideous head, it turned to ash.
All that remained was a patch of snow soaked through with tainted blood.
The wind and snow continued to fall, and silence reclaimed the forest.
Thud!
Asuka could no longer hold on. He fell backward onto the ground, quietly feeling the life ebbing from his body.
I won... right...
He did not know what had just happened to him, but wounds this severe were likely impossible to heal on their own. Perhaps he really was going to die.
As he collapsed, the heavy serrated greatsword let out a low, mournful hum. The serrations along the blade gradually faded, and it reverted to that rusted, unremarkable broken longsword, lying quietly beside Asuka.
His body heat drained away rapidly. Melted snow mixed with blood soaked through his thin clothes.
The biting cold pierced into his bones as darkness completely swallowed his vision.
Asuka's final awareness was the old man's stern face, handing him a bowl of hot porridge, and a vague thought:
"Well... at least I avenged the old man..."
The wind and snow howled as they fell, trying to bury this brutal battlefield and the frail figure lying upon it.
Moments later, several young people wearing dark uniforms with the character "Exterminate" on their backs appeared at the edge of the forest.
Following a loudly cawing black crow, they ran swiftly across the snow, seemingly searching for something.
When they saw the blood-soaked snowfield, heavy with lingering Demon aura, they all froze.
Vast swathes of crimson. Savage tearing marks carved into tree trunks. And the scorched stench left behind after a Demon had been slain.
And that boy in the pool of blood, barely clinging to life.
"What a brutal battle..."