Sunday's Melancholy III

Sunday, 19:00, Tokyo Tower

It took the quintet more than five hours before reaching Tokyo Tower.

At first, they hurried, almost ran, to their destination. However, when Rhyme noted that the death clip took place at night, they then realized that there was no need to hurry. Therefore, they then slowed down their paces, took a few rests, during which Neku explained to Eri and Rhyme who Joshua was, and even stopped once to fill their stomachs.

Beat and Rhyme also shared their new discovery - they tried to form a pact to fight against the demons appeared before when the kobold attacked Neku, but the pins couldn't do any realistic damage, so they gave up. All of them sighed when they found out that the pins they always carried with them were useless against the demons.

When they reached the Tower, the sun was already setting. The sky was stained blood red, and the threads of clouds, dyed in a brilliant orange, were swirling chaotically. The remnants of the sinking sunlight cast the shadow of the debris once known as Tokyo on the ground, only adding a sense of melancholy to the devastated city. The peaceful days were gone once again, and disaster awaits the whole world. Somehow, Neku couldn't help feeling that it was the sunset of humanity.

Then, he saw Joshua standing by the tower, his hand smoothly moving over its metallic base, as though he was examining it. The orange sunlight glowed softly on his silvery head, like the halo on saints in medieval paintings. Blocking the sunlight, his body is only shown as a contour to Neku. This reminded Neku of the Joshua when he was "sacrificing" himself to protect Neku against the "Level i flame" of Sho Minamimoto during the game – his hands stretched out, the dazzling light of the attack illuminating his body as though he was entering the heaven.

Upon seeing his dying friend, Neku at once rushed to him. The others followed.

"Joshua!" Neku exclaimed. He did have the thought that he could not see Joshua again, so seeing he was safe really made Neku relieved.

"Huh! So we meet again even after going that far away. What a coincidence! Or, is it our bonds that connected us and guided you here? Oh my, I cannot imagine that our bonds are so powerful!" Joshua teased Neku as always, complete oblivious to his imminent death.

"Now is not the time for random flirting! You are about to die!" Neku quickly pulled Joshua away, the holiness he just felt about Joshua completely evaporated. Neku did not know whether it was a good thing to see Joshua in his normal state. "Must…not…strangle…him…he…is…already…dying…" Neku had to control himself not to lose himself.

"What? You had my death clip?" The expression of Joshua immediately tightened. Even he was alarmed by his death.

After dragging Joshua away for some distance from the tower, Neku quickly described the death clip to him.

"That must be Dubhe… We have to run!" While Neku did not know what 'Dubhe' was, Joshua's words escalated his alarm. "If Joshua was alert to something, then it must have been really dangerous," Neku learnt it during his week with Joshua.

However, before they had the chance to move further away, an ice-cream-shaped silhouette appeared on the moon, which had just risen above the horizon.

"Damn it … it has already come… Neku, watch out!"

The creature, Dubhe, as named by Joshua, then descended to the ground, its impact so strong that it created a fracture stretching several meters long on the ground. Although Neku had already seen it once in the death clip, he was still intimidated by the sheer sense of power emanating just from the appearance of the monster.

Its lower cone was at the same time spinning and precessing like a spinning top, without any extra deviation of angle as it rotated. Its rotating speed was perfectly constant – 2π radians per second for spinning and 2/3π radians per second for precessing, if anyone could measure it then. The corners of its base were also perfectly level, and if it was put on ground inverted, all of them could touch the ground. The twelve rhombi composing of the cone were perfectly congruent, and the two pairs of adjacent sides had perfectly the same length. The power of god could not be demonstrated more wildly and conceitedly than through perfection ridiculous to men. Unfortunately, no one there, not even Joshua, could understand the hidden perfection.

The top cloud, on the other hand, was much more irregular, being designed for attack. It was a hemisphere, its center perfectly aligned to the axis of precession of the lower cone. However, the holes were irregularly spaced on it, and each hole had irregular size, shape, and depth, possibly as a result of the repeated explosion. Its surface was folded and wrinkled. However, such imperfection served only to give Dubhe an even more destructive-looking appearance.

The shock of the crowd when they saw the mysterious invader was apparent. Although most people had already seen wild demons, they hardly match the sheer power of Dubhe. Everyone's attention turned to the creature suddenly appeared. A dog hug by his owner abruptly jumped out of the embrace and barked at it. A girl presumably in primary school screamed and hid behind the back of her mother.

"Joshua, hold my hand!" Neku quickly decided this was the most effective way to prevent Joshua from tripping and took his right wrist instantly.

Then, like in the death clip, the top cloud of Dubhe started inflating. Bright white light was given out in its cloud like a disco ball. Some of the crowd remained immobilized out of awe or terror, while others fled away quickly. Neku and his company were caught in the escaping crowd. Fortunately, with the tight grip from Heku on his hand, Joshua managed to stand straight, and the group was pushed back by the crowd.

Then, Dubhe exploded. The light of explosion was so brilliant that Neku was blinded for a moment. Even though Neku and the others had already retreated quite far away from Dubhe, the heat was barely endurable, and he felt like his whole body was being baked. Neku tried to hold his breath so that he would not inhale the scorching air and burn his lungs, but he could still smell the barbecue-like aroma diffusing out from the source of explosion, and this made him nauseous. The shock wave from the explosion knocked Neku backward.

When the explosion ceased, Neku attempted to sit up, only to see a devastated view beyond the haze from the explosion. Joshua and the others were all knocked back in the explosion nearby. The crowd surrounding them already disappeared, and ashes could be seen all over the ground. The top cloud of Dubhe was gone, and the bottom cone was motionless. Neku could briefly see Ubelluris covering the group before the guardian was erased. Ubelluris was summoned out to protect the group as a last resort.

"Don't move! Dubhe attacks you if you do so!" Joshua gripped Neku's arm tightly, and all of them did not dare to move an inch.

Suddenly, the top cloud of Dubhe reappeared. It size was comparable to a bean at first, but it quickly inflated in just a few seconds back to its original size. Missiles were shot from the holes of the cloud at stunning speed and landed on the remaining crowd without an inch of deviation, creating a small explosion every time a missile landed. People screamed and ran, but none of them were able to elude from the projectiles from the monster. Within a minute, Neku's group was the only people surviving.

Then, Dubhe began to fire missiles around the group to probe its exact location. Every time a missile landed, Neku could feel the sheer heat emerging around him. "This can't last much longer," he thought.

"Quick! Summon your demons!" Joshua commanded. Shiki, Eri, and Rhyme immediately followed.

Nekomata leapt forward to Dubhe, evading the missiles swiftly, and scratched the surface of the cloud with her sharp claws. Meanwhile, kikimora and knocker shot force bullets to Dubhe from behind. Soon, the cloud was full of scars resulting from the scratching and hitting.

But then Dubhe launched its missiles again. Knocker and kikimora were too slow to evade and were defeated in a single blow. Nekomata was faster, striding around Dubhe and dodged all the attacks.

Nekomata then found a moment when Dubhe ceased its attack and jumped onto it, preparing to land a jump kick. But Dubhe was just luring it to do so – it immediately launched a shock wave towards the attacker, and then fired its missiles towards the undefended cat. Nekomata was wiped out quickly.

"Nekomata!" Shiki cried, foreseeing the imminent death of the whole group with no demons defending.

Dubhe then targeted the group with its deadly missiles and -

Suddenly, a giant blue magic circle appeared out of Neku. The magic circle was rotating, and dazzling light shone towards the sky. A strong gust of wind surrounded the cycle, and Neku had to struggle just to stand straight. His phone on his hand was running berserk, even giving out small sparks.

Slowly, a giant black wolf emerged from the magic circle, starting from his feet and up to its head. He was about three meters long and one meter high. Loose iron chains, supposedly used to entangle the wolf, were now merely surrounding his enormous body loosely. He was totally black except his eyes and nose, where blazing flames comparable to that of Dubhe erupted from. He stared at the moon and gave out a long howl, strong enough to shake the heart of Neku. If Dubhe is said to be an aesthetic weapon of perfection, then the newly summoned monster can be said to be an untamable beast of savageness.

Neku and the others watched in awe at the emergence of the demon, but Joshua merely smiled calmly, as though he expected Neku to summon such a powerful demon from the very first, "Beast Fenrir… Good job, Neku."

"Go and get Dubhe!" Neku ordered his new demon to destroy the invader.

Fenrir leapt forward, dodging all the missiles from Dubhe. Dubhe attempted to evade the swift attack of the wolf, but he immediately turned his direction of attack, and lacerated the upper cloud of Dubhe with his claws, first with his left foreleg, then with his right one. Dubhe attempted to force the fierce attacker away with its shockwave so that it could inflate itself to launch another explosion, but Fenrir could maintain his balance with ease and were only pushed away slightly. He then growled wildly and threateningly, and fires began to burn around Dubhe. Dubhe did not give up, and launched a round of missiles again, but Fenrir dodged all of them and landed a finishing blow on the persistent invader with his claws. Dubhe then annihilated, without leaving a trace.

But before Neku could finally relax, he saw a missile just a meter away from him, flying towards him -

Just then, a demon – or angel, to be exact – shot down the missile with a thunderbolt. He had the appearance of a human male. He had a green hair, and his face was transcendentally beautiful. Pure lights glowed from his eyes. His body was naked, showing his pink skin. He was levitating above the ground. He was leaning slightly to the ground with his legs curled up to his body. His arms were folded over his chest, and his left hand held a silvery horn. At the end of the horn was a white flag with blue borders and a blue cross in between. A pair of wings grew on his back. The feathers were orange on the outer side, and pure white on the inner side. The wings covered his body like a shell protecting its embryo.

"Hah… just in time," Joshua sighed in relief. With the threat gone, everyone finally collapsed out of exhaustion, both physically and mentally.

"W-what the hell you two summoned, yo man?" Beat was the first to break the silence. Not only Beat, but everyone else except Joshua was also amazed by the sheer power of the demons just summoned.

"What Neku summoned was Beast Fenrir, a giant wolf creature of Nordic lore and the son of the evil god Loki. According to the Nordic tale, he is destined to kill Odin at Ragnarok. On that day, his magical bindings will be broken and he will rise against Aesir in combat. And what I just summoned to save Neku was Divine Remiel. He was one of the seven archangels serving God, and his duty is to spread their instructions. The words he conveys appear as visions to people. According to the Revelation, on the Day of Judgment, he knows which souls will be saved and which will be destroyed. His duty is to guide the souls that will be saved," Joshua said, like reciting a piece of tale. Neku knew that Joshua was very knowledgeable in virtually every field, but he did not expect him to have learned even the western God Tales. But that may not be too surprising – he was a Composer, an angel, after all. But others clearly did not expect this detailed answer, and struggled to find something to respond.

"Wait … what are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be watching Shibuya? And why can you leave Shibuya, anyway? What the hell is happening? And how could you die? Why couldn't you use your angelic power?" Neku then suddenly remembered all the doubts he had, and began to bombard Joshua with all the questions. Not that he expected a clear answer, though – he knew that Joshua would most likely be beating around the bush.

"Calm down, Neku. It is too complicated for me to explain the situation in a few words. Put it simply, our dear God, Polaris, is playing a little game with the world. The world will gradually be swallowed by the Void in this week, and Polaris will be sending the seven Septentrions, one each day, to destroy any remaining life. Septentrions are angels that will attempt to destroy the world. The monster we just saw, Dubhe, was the weakest of them. The demons we just summoned were the only means to defeat the Septentrions. To add up to his majesty's entertainment, every reaper, including me myself, has already had his power taken away. Therefore, now, I am just a human." Joshua explained to Neku. However, Neku and the others, especially Eri, could barely understand what he was talking about.

Suddenly, strong flashlights were lit towards them. They turned around to see that they were surrounded by men wearing identical uniforms. In the middle of them was a man with white hair. He was slightly shorter than the men next to him, but his majestic aura clearly stated that he was the leader. His face was perfect without any defects, like an unapproachable god. His iris was violet, and his eyes were condescending. "Enough chit-chat. We are special government organization, the Japan Meteorological Society, also known as "JPs". Now you are being taken to custody," the men commanded.

The others were fazed by this command, but Joshua merely looked back with a smirk, almost having the same power as the man, "So you are Yamato Hotsuin, then? Alcor told me about you."