Pov Narrator.
A completely free day.
That was the only thing Isagi had wanted after completing Mahoraga's Purification Ritual. And now it really was going to be a true break. No impossible plans, no checking his system stats. He simply wanted to relax, have a chill as fuck time.
And what better than going to watch a show?
And by show, of course, he meant watching the beatings Denji was getting. It was already almost noon and the sun beat down relentlessly over the cemetery. The heat made the air feel heavy, while the constant buzzing of crickets and cicadas filled the atmosphere.
"Fuck... Did you come just to watch this old man beat the shit out of me?" Denji asked as he wiped the blood from his nose after Kishibe broke it again with a single kick.
"Yeah, actually, that's exactly why I came." Isagi replied with complete calm, slipping his hands into his pockets as he watched the scene as if he had paid for a ticket. "You having fun?"
"More like having a shitty time. Yesterday the old man went to Aki's apartment looking for me and I ended up with a knife in my head." Denji said as he rubbed his forehead, remembering it, making a face as if he could still feel the pain of the blade piercing his skull. "This is bullshit. Why doesn't Power have to go through this? She's worse than me. She didn't do jack shit against the Bat Devil, that bitch Leech Devil, even less against the Eternity Devil, and nothing during Katana-Man's attack."
"I think that knife to the head activated your brain." Isagi replied with a mocking smile as he slowly nodded, as if he had just heard the smartest observation Denji had ever made in his life.
"Actually... that's not a bad observation. You're right, Power has been useless in most fights... or rather, in all of them." Isagi fell into thought for a moment. As unbelievable as it seemed, the retard Denji had made a pretty valid point. Surprising, to say the least. "But you're wrong about one thing. I also get pretty hardcore with Power. I let Lord Tablos take over my mind, rip that crybaby Power's intestines out, and eat them."
"Seriously?" Denji raised an eyebrow, clearly surprised and unsure whether to believe him or not.
"No." Isagi replied with a small laugh. "But I do break a few of her bones. In fact, you can ask her and you'll see I use her as a punching bag. And since she's a woman, it's easier for me to hit her." He said with a smile as he raised one finger, as if he were explaining a very important theory. "Power is gorgeous... but she doesn't know how to treat a man."
"On that, I agree with you, spiky-head." Denji also smiled as he let his arms fall to his sides. After so many days training with Kishibe, that ridiculous conversation was almost a break for him. "By the way... where's Power?"
"I left her taking care of my cat."
"Oh... you have a cat?"
As his only response, Isagi gave him a small smile full of mystery. He said absolutely nothing else.
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Meanwhile, with Power...
"Damn bastard! This isn't a cat!" Power shouted while remaining completely hidden behind a wall, barely peeking her head out. Her voice sounded much less confident than usual.
On the other side of the room... A deep, threatening growl broke the silence. Standing in the middle of the living room was an enormous tiger of imposing size, walking with absolute calm, as if it were the true owner of the house. In the center of its forehead stood out a completely open third eye, and on its chest could be seen the symbol of one of the Ten Sacred Treasures.
It was Isagi's Tiger shikigami. The enormous feline slowly turned its head toward the wall where Power was hiding. Power immediately ducked back behind it.
"No... no, it didn't see me..." she muttered quietly, trying to convince herself. The tiger let out another deep growl.
And Power swallowed hard. "...It saw me."
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A new day. And with it, new problems... or new surprises. The day of the operation to capture Akane Sawatari and Katana-Man had finally arrived. Several police patrols surrounded a multi-story building, carefully blocking every possible escape route.
Most of the Fourth Special Division had already gathered at the location. Near one of the police vehicles, Isagi held a small group of cards in his hands while Denji stared at each one with a frown, trying to guess which one was correct. They had started playing to kill time before the mission began.
The bet was pretty one-sided. Isagi had put up some Bimbo donuts. Denji... Well, absolutely nothing. For the moment, Isagi was winning without much difficulty.
"I already want to go home..." Kobeni muttered quietly as she nervously watched the massive police deployment.
She was standing just a few steps away from Denji and Isagi, who remained completely focused on their very important card game.
"Ah, shut the fuck up and just leave already. Who's stopping you?" Denji replied with obvious annoyance. It was already like the fifth time Kobeni had said exactly the same thing since they arrived. Right after that, he pointed at one of the cards with complete confidence. "This one!" Isagi showed him the card. It wasn't it. "Shit."
"Ha, this brat is still just as useless." Power mocked, who was also with the group and watching the scene with her arms crossed. Thanks to the special training she had received from Isagi, she walked with much more confidence than before. "Thanks to the special training I underwent, I've become much smarter and stronger. The Great Power will shine this time!"
She puffed out her chest proudly as she raised one hand toward the sky, completely convinced that this mission would be the perfect stage to demonstrate her greatness.
"Hey, Denji boy. What are you guys doing?" Himeno asked as she approached the group, raising one hand in greeting.
She wore a relaxed expression, very different from the atmosphere of tension surrounding the operation. When she reached them, she looked at the cards Isagi was holding and couldn't help but smile in disbelief.
"Playing before the mission? Wow... you guys really don't take anything seriously, even after everything that happened." She smiled lightly, resting one hand on her hip as she watched the two of them completely absorbed in their ridiculous game.
"If you're the best, you have nothing to prove, and we're the best. I'm the highest-quality Devil Hunter."
"Something like the strongest?" Himeno asked thoughtfully. "I thought the master was the one who held the title of Japan's strongest Devil Hunter. After all, he's trained hundreds of people."
"Yeah, he's trained hundreds. But I'm not among those hundreds." He shrugged with a smile full of confidence. "Work's coming, so we gotta train to failure."
As he finished arranging the deck, he stretched slightly. Himeno simply shook her head, somewhere between amused and resigned. Sometimes she didn't understand where Isagi got so many strange words related to aesthetics, quality, volume, or, for some reason, arm size.
"By the way..." Himeno said after a few seconds, watching him with a small curious smile. "Do you like Makima too, Isagi? You seem to spend more time with her than with anyone else."
"No comments." The response was immediate, but his expression didn't change in the slightest.
Himeno let out a long sigh.
"I see..."
And there went another one. She still couldn't understand what exactly so many men saw in Makima. In Himeno's opinion, that woman was a fucking bitch. Or well, at least that was usually her opinion whenever she was completely drunk.
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A few minutes later...
The operation to capture those responsible for the attack against Public Safety had finally begun.
The Fiends of the Fourth Special Division were also actively participating in the battle. Among them were the Shark Fiend, the Violence Fiend, the Angel Fiend, and the Spider Fiend.
Beam, the Shark Fiend, moved through the ground as if it were water. That was his ability, allowing him to "swim" through concrete. Every so often he would suddenly emerge, transforming his head into that of a gigantic demonic shark to devour several zombies in a single bite before diving back underground.
"Zombies, zombies, zombies!" he shouted with almost childlike excitement as he continued swimming through the ground from side to side, completely happy to be fighting.
The Violence Fiend, on the other hand, was quite curious. Despite the name he carried, he was a surprisingly polite and calm man. His fists moved with incredible speed, and one or two punches were enough to rip the heads off the zombies.
The Angel Fiend... wasn't doing jack shit. He simply stood there with an expression of absolute laziness, as if participating in that mission represented the greatest effort of his entire life.
The Spider Fiend, on the other hand, was actually helping, eliminating enemies and supporting the rest of the team without drawing too much attention.
Isagi yawned. This was turning out to be far more boring than he had imagined. He had expected a true season finale battle, full of dangerous enemies and life-or-death situations. Instead, there was just a bunch of zombies.
His combined shikigami: Divine Dog: Totality, the fusion of the white and black wolves, was in charge of eliminating the zombies. Every swipe of its claws completely tore apart several rotting bodies, ripping off limbs and splitting the zombies into pieces before they could even get close.
Totality had been able to injure Hanami, even if only slightly. Compared to a Cursed Spirit of that level, those zombies were absolutely nothing before its claws.
"You know, Denji? I was expecting a season finale battle worthy of a manga, but instead we're stuck in the middle of a poorly made Resident Evil tutorial." Isagi said as, with a single kick, he sent the zombie that had approached from behind him flying.
"Yeah... fighting zombies isn't that big of a deal." Denji replied as he swung his axe and split another zombie's head open with a single blow. "At least the first time I did it, the bastard who created them was there. That made it a little more interesting." Another zombie tried to pounce on him. Denji simply buried his axe into its forehead and kept talking as if nothing had happened. "But that sideburns asshole and the snake bitch are still around. Though, from what I heard... didn't you even style your hair while beating the shit out of Sideburns?"
"Hell yeah." Isagi replied with a proud smile. "That's why I'm telling you. This isn't the final battle I was expecting. I guess this is the downside of being so strong, no... of being Employee of the Year."
At that moment, he extended one hand to the side without even looking. A powerful invisible force suddenly caught a yakuza who had just stepped through a doorway intending to shoot at them. The man barely managed to pull the trigger before being violently hurled against the hallway wall. The impact was so strong that it left a crack in the concrete, and his gun fell to the floor with a metallic clang.
"Work gets easier over time." Isagi concluded.
"Well, if Sideburns seems that easy to you... leave him to me." He clenched his fists as a huge grin full of sharp teeth appeared on his face. "I want a rematch with that bastard for putting a bullet in my head."
"Hey, the Fiends will take care of things here. Fighting these zombies is just a waste of time." Aki raised his voice slightly so he could be heard over the chaos of battle and, with a single swing of his new katana, cleanly decapitated one of the zombies. "We need to go after Katana-Man and the Snake girl to finish this."
His tone was completely serious. As he spoke, he gradually moved away from the group of zombies, leaving the Fiends to continue clearing the area. There was no point in wasting any more time there when the real targets were still hiding somewhere inside the building.
"And do you have any idea where they are?" Denji asked while resting his axe on one of his shoulders. He looked around with obvious impatience. "Because if I knew, I'd go after that bastard right now."
"No. But we'll split up. Miss Himeno and I will go together. You three check the upper floors; we'll take the lower ones. That way we'll cover the building much faster."
He finished giving the instructions and began walking toward the end of the hallway without breaking stride. Behind him, the Fiends continued eliminating the last of the zombies with overwhelming ease, allowing them to move forward without worrying about their rear.
Isagi simply gave a thumbs-up to show he understood. If he was being honest... he felt like he had come here almost for nothing. With Himeno alive, the situation had changed completely compared to the story he remembered. Akane could no longer use the Ghost Devil to overwhelm Aki the same way.
Himeno still retained Ghost's support. And Aki now wielded a new katana and, on top of that, had the Future Devil's contract.
With both of them fighting together, Isagi was quite sure they would be more than enough to deal with the Snake girl without too many complications.
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End of the chapter.