"They're here."
The words were barely out of his mouth when the demon's jet-black hair spread like a tide across the ground, reaching all the way to the edge of the defensive line.
A few strands tried to slip in low, but the moment they crossed into the frozen perimeter, the cold turned them white, and they recoiled, shrinking back.
Noe went pale. She'd always thought a full head of long, dark hair was something every girl envied.
Now, watching it crawl at her feet like it had a pulse of its own, all she felt was revulsion. Her scalp crawled, like her own hair was trying to come alive too.
It moved.
Strands rose out of the ground in bunches, like spears leveled at the three of them.
Then they drew back, just for a breath, and the next instant, every spear drove forward at once.
Cold Cry could feel every one of them coming through the domain his cold aura threw out; no matter the direction, nothing crossed into it without him knowing. He'd shed the weighted gear for exactly this: less strain on his body, and a faster blade.
Even so, he had no real counterattack left in him. He'd known going in that even at full strength, this thing was more than he could beat. All that was left was to keep swinging and buy time until sunrise.
"Get behind me, all three of you. Watch both sides."
In that first exchange alone, Noe and Akino were already overwhelmed, cut open in half a dozen places. The hair was sharper than it looked; the lightest graze opened skin.
At his voice, the three of them fell back behind him, Noe to his left, Akino to his right, backs to his back.
Yuka watched the three of them fighting and felt something in her chest twist. She couldn't do anything but stand there, and Noe and Akino kept having to break off to shield her from the strikes coming in on both flanks.
Tears rose in her eyes, but so did a small, happy smile, right before she turned and threw herself down the mountainside.
By the time Akino registered what she'd done, it was already too late.
He turned to look at her, caught somewhere between confused and desperate, and in that half-second of distraction, hair caught his arm and thigh, opening both in a spray of blood.
Yuka only smiled and shook her head. She knew exactly what he was thinking. He'd stayed this long because of her, and now that she'd let go, she knew what came next for him too.
But he couldn't afford to give up. If she was giving up her own life to set him free, and he threw that away by giving up too, that would be a betrayal of everything she'd just done. She wouldn't allow it.
So she stood under the wisteria, back against the trunk, and smiled at the three of them, trying to give Akino something to hold onto.
He understood her completely. There was nothing left to do but fight and sort out the rest once dawn came, if it came.
The hair kept coming faster, sharper, no longer scattered strikes but a full black tide crashing against them.
Cold Cry kept swinging, feet planted, past feeling pain anymore. The sound had dropped away. His vision had started to blur. Only one thought was left in his head.
Swing the blade. Keep swinging.
The other two were faring worse. Every ounce of strength they burned came back to them as another wound. Only because Cold Cry kept absorbing the bulk of the attacks from the front were they still standing at all.
Noe, at least, hadn't taken serious damage in the earlier fight, and with her muscle running six times denser than normal, she was holding up far better than Akino.
Wave after wave broke against them and got turned back. But Akino was starting to fade, legs shaking, his form falling apart, his swings going weak and wild.
Then, all at once, the hair pulled back and rose in the open ground ahead, gathering into a wall several meters high like the open jaws of something enormous. It looked ready to swallow all three of them whole.
Noe, Akino, and Yuka stared, frozen, out of anything left to fight with.
Cold Cry kept swinging. There was nothing left around him to cut, and still he didn't stop. The others noticed, dimly, but had no room left to wonder about it.
"Akino , no, stop. Give up!"
Yuka screamed it, already running back toward them from under the wisteria, but she didn't make it in time. The black wave came down before she could reach them.
Only Cold Cry was still moving. The other two just stared into the dark closing over them, too hollowed out even to lift their blades.
Demons. What even were demons?
How could something this strong exist in the world?
Then, with the hair less than ten centimeters from him, a shaft of light broke through the canopy above and landed between them like something stepping in to call off a fight before it went too far.
The hair froze, then snapped back toward the figure's feet, carrying it backward into the dark until it was gone.
More light broke through the leaves overhead, scattering across the ground. Dust drifted through the beams like something almost alive.
It was over.
Noe and Akino dropped straight into the mud, blades falling beside them, hands too spent to hold anything.
Noe stared at the light pooling at her feet and started to cry, out of pure relief.
Yuka ran to Akino, wrapped her arms around his leg, and broke down sobbing.
Cold Cry was still swinging. Mechanical. The blade was cutting the air with a faint hum every time it moved.
"Cold Cry, we won. It's gone."
"Cold Cry, stop. Sit down. Rest."
Noe called out twice. Nothing.
Even at his coldest, he'd never once ignored her twice in a row. And the hair was gone, so why was he still swinging?
Something in her stomach dropped.
Akino and Yuka caught something wrong in the way he was standing.
Tick. Tock.
A slow, steady drip sounded out in front of them. They followed it down and found a spreading pool of blood in the mud beneath him, droplets falling off the hem of his pants into it, one after another.
Noe's ears started ringing, her vision going dark at the edges. She fought through it and scrambled to his side.
Akino reached him from the other direction.
Both of them froze at what they saw.
He'd already lost consciousness, still swinging the blade on pure reflex, eyes wide and unfocused, staring straight ahead, his white shirt soaked through with blood.
Noe's eyes filled instantly. Her hands hovered over him, shaking, not knowing where it was even safe to touch.
"Cold Cry, talk to me. Don't you dare scare me like this."
She was too far gone with panic to think straight, to do anything at all.
Akino forced himself to breathe, steady, and took control, pried the blade out of Cold Cry's stiff right hand, tossed it aside, and eased him down flat on the ground.
His whole body had locked rigid. No one could explain how he'd kept swinging like that, unconscious the whole time.
What kind of will did that take?
Yuka stood frozen for a long moment before she could even process what she was looking at.
"Both of you, move. Noe, check for a pulse, check if he's breathing. Yuka, get the bleeding under control, now."
Akino set to work on Cold Cry's legs, working the locked muscle loose as he gave the orders.
"I'm okay."
Yuka tore strips from her own torn clothes and pressed them against the worst of his wounds.
Noe watched the two of them work, wiped her face, and put a finger under his nose. A few seconds later she pressed her hand to his chest, and the tears she'd just managed to stop came flooding back.
No breath. No heartbeat.