Chapter 174 - Escaping the Trap

About an hour passed, before a call of halt came from Raven, resulting in the Party finally being able to stop their fleeing and settle upon a patch of land similar to the Plains which had once battled against those Archdevil Arm monstrosities. Each of them gradually descended upon the plain, planting their feet upon the fresh snow (although with the way things were the Party wasn't sure if it was actually 'snow' anymore) which, thanks to their momentum, resulted in some of them sliding across it to a halt… whilst others (nmely Neptune once she detransformed and the ever-klutzy Compa) fell onto their fronts.

"… This should be far enough…" the black-haired leader of Team Rail commented, humming asshe closed her eyes and tried to feel out any foreign presences near them. With the way that the Landmass was this action had proven an increasingly difficult task for her senses, but the black-haired warrior queen managed it, nonetheless. Opening her eyes about 10 seconds later, duringwhich the Party returned to their regular forms and regathered together, she then turned to the others to deliver her verdict. "Looks like we have lost our pursuers for the moment. For now, we should be safe from their grasp."

A heavy sigh escaped the panting Neptune as she looked to the rest of them. "Whelp…that was a bust, guess Lady White Heart's gone and sided with the enemy…" she commented, not sure how she should feel about this info. As a Goddess herself and as someone who'd been fighting Chaos for a whil, she SHOULD have felt revolted at the thought that one of he most prominent people in Gamindustri had stooped to such lows as White Heart had, however Neptune also remembered that she herself wasn't exactly the same as she once had been either, the Demonic Energy coursing through her being proof of that. "I wanna go on a tangent and say she's on the wrong path, but…"

"None of us can be considered saints, either." IF finished, frowning as she understood the preteen's point, similar emotions coursing through the other two CPUs as well who shared a look of complicated feelings to one another. "Each of us here no matter how you slice it, have become more 'monstrous' instead of reaining strictly human, so we can't say that we can really condemn her for this either." Another point then reared its ugly head inside of her brain too, one which came out moments later. "Heck, I can sorta get why she would do something like this, honestly…"

Compa glanced over at her with a confused expression on her face, not understanding the Spec Ops Agent's words. "Eh? What do you mean by that, Iffy?" she asked.

"Oh-h, are you talking aboutpossible food goods?" Neptune then interjected, bouncing up to Compa's side and leaning over her shoulder with her arms wrapped around her stomach. She ignored the surprised squeak the young Spirit girl released, alongside the 'are ou serious?' looks directed at her as she continued her words. "I mean, these guys have GOT to have some kind of goods then, cause one can't fight on an empty stomach. I wonder what kind of things those guys like to eat, heck do they eat even the same foods as normal folk? Hmmm, interesting, might have to ask about that some time…"

Seconds later, it was Lucy who answered the cream haired girl, ignoring Neptune's bout of randomness as she crossed her arms under her ample bosom, her features schooled into a stern expression. "She means that White Heart allied with the enemy likely because it would have spared her people from the misfortunes that plague the other Nations, well, from her point of view anyways." She replied, getting stunned and disbelieving looks from the others in return, like they couldn't believe what had just came out of her mouth as if it were some sort of heresy. Not like Lucy could blame them, since so far, they had only been exposed to the twisted, tyrannical ways of Khorne the Chaos God of Bloodlust and his many demonic followers. Who knows how the other Chaos Gods acted or how their followers operated either? "I can't say whether or not its true though since we haven't seen too many people recently." One she added this, Lucy DID end up thinking about those two boys they had encountered, but soon pushed their minor existence aside so she could continue. "But I can DEFINITELY say that there must be something bigger going on here, just look at the Abnormals running around here. So many we haven't seen or recorded in the Spec Ops Archives, which means that something must either br breeding them like all hell, or something else."

Cecil hummed as she mauled this over, cupping her chin under her right hand whilst doings so. Behind her, Berial rattled by itself, as if it were shuddering at the possibility of meeting those Soldiers again, displaying the classic Devil Arm lust for battle. "I can SORTA see why that'd be…" she began, trailing off as a look of uncertainty crossed onto her features. Ascosciating ANY sort of logical action with the likes of those 'things' clled Chaos Followers always left a bad taste in her mouth, but nonetheless she continued. "I mean, my dad is actually part of the governing council of my Village, and as his daughter he always says that people who are in leadership positions have to think about those under them more than their own desires. It could be possible that Lady White Heart doesn't want to have things remain like this but because of her circumstances she may not have any other option. We haven't gotten all the facts yet, so I'm not so sure yet." She explained. Honestly it didn'tmake sense in her eyes, for White Heart to be so scomfy with the idea of her Land being turned into its current state, so she believed that there was more to the situation at hand… though she doubted that she'd be so forthcoming given how she had literally sicked some Chaos Followers on them shortly after meeting them..

"Well, whatever the case may be, it does seem that standing around here talking wouldn't be the wisest of choices, everyone." Vert then interjected as she cautiously looked around, not wanting to be idle too long. Since this land seemed predominantly controlled by the forces of Chaos, if the environment wasn't enough of an indicator for then she didn't want to think about what would happen if they stayed in one place for too great a time period. This place had already shown them some of the potentially COUNTLESS dangers lurking throughout after all. "I do believe we should plan our next move, should we not?"

Noire nodded her head in agreement as she performed similar actions to her fellow CPU. "Yeah, I agree. Standing around here doesn't feel like a bright idea. We'll have to try and make it to a city or something before we decide on what we should do next… Preferably after we've had a nice long rest." Noire didn't want to admit it, but she REALLY wanted to take a nap after all the stuff that had went down since the whole landing on Lowee thing. Her back felt like it was burning as if it were next to a large fireplace, whist her nerves desperately begged for her to sit down for a bit. However, she couldn't do any of that here, lest she want to potentially lose her head. "Which direction should we head in, Nico… Nico…?"

"?"

Upon asking a question to the first male in the Party and getting no answer, Noire blinked in confusion for a moment, an action shared by the rest of them. Silence dominated them for a bit, until they each looked around to see where the Spec Ops Agent codenamed DEATHSTROKE was, only to find nothing… he wasn't with them at all right now, something which took a few seconds for them to sink in…

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH?! WHAT THE?! WHERE'S NI-NI/NICKY/NICKY-DEAR/NICO?! HE'S NOT HERE WITH US!"

… Until they all let out a shared excalamation of shock at the realization.

"Wha?! When?! How?! WHY?!" A shrill shriek escaped Compa's lips as utter dread slammed into her gut, making it feel ike its weight had just skytrocketed whilst her body temperature felt like It had dropped to a level far colder than Lowee's atmosphere. The fact that Nico, the man who had her affections and had pretty much confessed to returning those affections (alongside the others too, but that wasn't something she focused on at the moment) had all but vanished from htheir sight, had been something she'd only noticed till now, not a thing she particularly liked. So many questions filled her mind about the male's possible location, what he wasdoing, why he was at wherever he was etc, basically the thoughts ofa worried wife waiting for her husband to come home but found he had been later than the usual time.

Noot only her, but Neptune wasn't any better either, as she frantically looked around for any sign of her crush with panic filling her eyes. "Nicky's NOT HERE, Nicky's not here, Nicky's not here…!" she muttered repeatedly under her breath like it were some kind of mantra. Heck, she looked like she was one step away from havinga total meltdown, with how she flailed her arms about like a wild lunatic as she darted from one place to another.

"Okay, okay hold up!"

BONK!

"Nepu!"

Fortunately for everyone's sake, IF calmed the preteen down by catching her with a couple of her newly formed Tentacles, dragged her back to her side, then delivered a fist to the top of Neptune's head. This elected a yelp from the young-looking girl, but otherwise she didn't make much noise. Satisfied that she had gotten her quiet, IF then looked to the rest of the panicked Party, their expressions betraying how they felt although the more composed members of the Party hid these feelings better. "There's only one place Nico would have gone to in a time like this." She told them, her words grave as she frowned, her eyes darkening with a rising killing intent. "I'm willing to bet that reckless guy got himself caught in some sort of trap back in the city, before he was able to escape with the rest of us."

"EEEEEEHHHHHHHH?!"

A unified cry escaped the Partys' mouths upon hearing IF's words, and the more the more rational ones thought about it, the more likely that the scenario IF had proposed sounded. For one, they never really checked each other out after they had fled the city to see if they had each made it out alive, instead they had simply focused on getting away as fast as physically possible. Therefore, if something had happened to Nico during that time, then there was zero chance that they would have been able to notice anything about it. Part of them DID wonder if something else was the case like him having gotten separated them after they'd fled the cty, but in that case they knew for a fact that Nico would have been able to at least contact ONE of them with his SHINGAN Ring before they got out of range, thus IF's theory seemed like the best one to go off on.

"In that case, we gotta head back! Nicky might be dying and his wifey isn't there to help him! How can I call myself that if I'm not backing my man up on the front lines?!" Neptune proclaimed, her proclamation quickly igniting Compa, IF, Lucy and Vert's pirits. Even Aiden and Ivan got pumped up from her speech, although they didn't view him the same way as the rest of them. Quickly spinning on her heels, Neptune turned towards the direction that they had come from in preparation to transform into either her HDD or Devil Trigger, she didn't care which at the moment. She didn't even notice the others following her in their preparations. Instead, all she thought about was getting over to Nico's side and helping bail him out of whatever trouble he had gotten into. After all, that was something only she, his wifey and a Goddess who swore to fight on the battlefield as a monster, could do.

"You guys…!"

BONK!

BONK!

BONK!

BONK!

BONK!

BONK!

BONK!

In one instant, a certain black haired tsundere Goddess snapped her fingers and activated her QUICKSILVER ability, slowing time down around her. She had then proceeded to do what IF had done previously and smacked them all upside their heads, not only cancelling their ransformetion processes but also sending them to the ground. With the amount of physical power she had under her belt, largely thanks to the abndance of Dragon Marks within her, Noire made sure to just just enough of it to mildly bruise them, and considering who her targets were she had to apply a LOT of power. Afterwards, her QUICKSILVER ability deactivated, letting time resume at its normal pace.

However, she didn't wait around for them to recover either, insteas she just started yelling at them with the loudest voice she could muster. "You freaking IDIOTS! You guys are thinking of going back THERE, where the enemy may have quite LITERALLY set up a trap for us? They'd likely have put up measures stopping us from getting anywhere near the city anyways, so it'd be pointless for us to go! Also, don't count Nico out, he's a lot stronger than that, he won't let something as trivial as a trap get in his way!" She bellowed, shaking a fist which sported a few veins at the recovering girls. Fortunately, she, Cecil and Raven had been the only members of this ragtag Party to keep their common sense here, otherwise she bet that they'd have ended up causing all sorts of problems later down the line.

Although, what she didn't say was that she had similar worries to theirs regarding the redhead DPU, though unlike them Noire herself had a combination of both her experiences from the Temen-Ni-Gru incident as well as multiple tenants within her explaining WHY going back there would be a bad idea.

"Yeah, I get that…"

"But still…"

Even though Noire had given them a bit of a lecture, Neptune and Compa still had concerned looks on their faces, the worry they felt for their crush evident in their eyes. Given how these two were, in terms of personality and temperament anyways, plus the depths of their feelings, Noire expected them to be like this despite her lecture. Although IF and the others managed to regain some of their clarity somewhat, they also held similar feelings but just hid it better than them. As such, an awkward sense of tension filled the air surrounding the Party as each of them wondered what to do next, though they couldn't say any of their thoughts out loud.

ROOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRR!

Soon the silence got decimated by a loud roar, one which echoed from a fair distance away from them that caused gasps to shoot through the Party, forcing them to look in the direction that it came from. Upon doing so, they found a MASSIVE hoard of Abnormals, too many to count properly but it seemed as though they numbered at least over 1000, stmpeeding across the plains towards their position. Each of them looked to be of different species, resulting in them being all kinds of different appearances, yet despite this all of tem moved like one big army intending to conquer the world, creating a rathe intimidating sight to behold.

"Whelp, looks like we have our own hands full at the moment." IF called out as she donned her Armour, morphing her arms into her Blades whilst releasing her Tendrils. She then got into her battle stance whilst activating her RYOKUGAN behind her helmet, her Implants switching on by her command to give her a rush of adfrenaline and numb any pain receptors. "Alright ladies, lets focus on these fuckers first, then we can worry about what happened to Nico afterwards."

"YEAH!"


SLASH-HACK-STAB-THRUST-STAB-STAB-PARRY-BLOCK-SMASH-CRUSH-SLASH-HACK-STAB-THRUST-STAB-STAB-PARRY-BLOCK-SMASH-CRUSH-SLASH-HACK-STAB-THRUST-STAB-STAB-PARRY-BLOCK-SMASH-CRUSH- SLASH-HACK-STAB-THRUST-STAB-STAB-PARRY-BLOCK-!

"Tch, looks like these guys just don't know when to quit…"

Muttering those words under his breath after clicking his tongue, one redhead known as the Spec Ops Agent Nico rolled his eyes as he saw two of his cloaked (only he could see them in this state by the way, with few exceptions) Rinkaku Tentacles impale two of his enemies, and before they could cry out the two Tentacles then erupted with spikes from their tips still inside them, resulting in them becoming human hedgehogs from the inside out. Furthermore, they too seemed to be under the influence of his Blackened form, which he had currently took whilst activating his Deathgod Domain which covered the entire ruined city. The enemy around him had obvious signs of being effected by this since they moved way slower than when he'd had yet to activate the ability himself, something which he'd used as part of his overall strategy.

Ripping them free, Nico watched as his Rinkaku deflected multiple projectile attacks whilst he stood, hands pocketed in his Trench Coat, as his Kagune literally went to town on these fuckers like a hoard of swinging vipers. Speed, power, precision, those aspects dominated the strikes his Rinkaku unleashed, whilst his Bikaku dealt with his aerial opponents by launching Talons at them, splitting up and reforming so that they could still launch more sets in a means to compensate for it's weakness.

To speak of his enemies, the forces currently surrounding the redhead right now turned out to be nothing but Abnormals, something which Nico felt oddly relieved by since I meant that he could respond in a manner he had been used to. Though, that was where things ended in terms of familiarity, since from the moment he first saw then Nico did NOT know what the heck these things were. These Abnormals, like the many that he had encountered since arriving on Lowee, took him aback the first time he had seen them, that time being when one of them had knocked him out of the skies before and tried to eat him only for his Bikaku to spear it from various vital areas, killing it instantly as his Kagune had torn it to pieces.

In order to accurately describe them, he would say that they the creatures followed a similar appearance to a human but being a few heads taller than the average adult male. Their skin colour seems to be shift between multiple different colours, but most of the time they seemed to possess a dark greenish tint to them, and whilst they had varying builds (from lean to bulky), a commonality turned out to be their large torsos and muscular frames. Not to mention the spikes on their backs combined with the sharp fangs in their mouths alongside their golden, cat-like eyes that glowed sinisterly. Some of them seemed to also possess bat-like wings, although in their cases their bodies ALWAYS had a lean build to them, likely to make flying easier. For weapons, regardless if they were winged or not, they had long spindly arms that ended in claws which had digits that could extend like tendrils to pierce opponents from afar, something which Nico had personal experience in.

In the beginning of the battle, Nico had heard some of those armoured soldiers call them 'Yoma', so he figured that to be their name.

Speaking of those soldiers, Nico couldn't tell if they were still here or not, cause right now all he could see were the shambling, speeding frames these Yoma possessed as they flailed about like headless chickens, their facs contorting into predatory rage and lust for blood. His blood to be exact… although the redhead wouldn't make it easy for them, as evident by his Rinkaku and Bikaku constantly going to town on their asses. The teen, in order to have a better tactical advantage, had chosen a medium sized rooftop to fight on, which didn't have as much room as he'd hoped since most of the buildings in this ruined City turned out to be shaped like Mushrooms. An architectural choice by the Lowee residents here, to be frank.

'Knew there was a reason why I didn't take too many Lowee missions…' Nico thought to himself in irritation as he hopped off the building, he had been on when the combined weight of all the slain corpses became too much for the supports to handle. This, as well as a few quick strikes from his Kagune, resulted in the entire thing collapsing in on itself, burying several dozen Yoma beneath it alive… although considering the hundreds which still remained this didn't amount to much. As he remained in the air briefly, Nico noticed several winged Yoma charging at him from his right flank, then three more from his left that he'd sensed from scent. As such, he quickly proceeded to apply some of the skills he had forgotten to use regarding his Rinkaku.

At once, his Tentacles each combined together, forming this single, tentacle-like mass which then split in two, their tips elongating and thinning themselves out until they managed to retake solid form. In the end, the Tentacles had been remoulded, becoming as thick as a tree trunk and their tips now having been transformed into these large, black blades with crimson edges and hilts which were curved so that it resembled pointed-down cresents. Their undersides had saw-like, serrated edges, which rivalled the lengths of a fully-grown adult male, essentially five foot 10. Funny enough, they made him think of the name 'king saw' for some reason. Furthermore, there were these mechanical segments running along the back edges of both blades, long enough to barely touch their main edges. These two blades then swished about in massive, wide-reaching arcs faster than anything could track, showcasing their signature speeds thanks to their biology and evolutionary advantages which resulted in every winged Yoma being diced to pieces. Though, was it just him or did they seeme to release some sort of fire from their back edges for a moment there?

'HAH, YA GOT THAT RIGHT, KINGY! ONE OF THE THINGS THAT CAME FROM EMBRACING ME AND THE NERD IN HERE, OUR KAGUNE'S BEEN MUTATED FURTHER BY THE DEMONIC POWER SHIT IN US ALONGSIDE THAT DELICIOUS GOURMET MEAT, RESULTING IN SOME SEXY ASS NEW THREADS! HEHEHEHEHEHE, OH THE FUN THAT'S GOING TO BE HAD…!'

'Huh, I see… interesting, whats also interesting is that these only happened when I embraced these powers to increase the connections between us, perhaps in the past the connection was too weak to allow this to happen, but that's no longer te case now.'

Glancing downwards, Nico pulled himself out his thoughts when he noticed his gradual descent towards the sizable hoard of Yoma down below. 'Hmph, not going to let them get the chance to strike first…' the male thought, already having a plan of attack in mind as his Rinkaku once again started to morph. His Bikaku, which had returned to its default four tails form, had still been in the process of restoring its Talon sets hence why he was relying more on his Rinkaku for offence. His Kakugan eye shone brightly beneath his hood, his Mask deepening the snarl that had escaped his lips. His Shades had been stored away in his Void Storage back at the Basilicom, but he'd be putting them back on soon enough, he felt.

By the time that he had thought this, Nico's Rinkaku had finished its transformation, the two blades having combined together to form…

A Cannon-like weapon, attached to a tree trunk thick Tentacle which took the shape of a cylinder, with several metal pieces over it to imitate the shape of a claw around the barrel. A rotating cylinder could be seen close to the weapon's base that was connected to the Tentacle by thin, but long strands, a single rock—like formation coming out the top of the base to form a Kakygan eye for aiming purposes. The shape oddly enough reminded him of that one anime where a girl ith the initials B, R, and S had a similarly shaped weapon she used against other girls. Getting his act together, Nico aimed the Cannon towards the ground below him, watching as the weapon's interior briefly gained a sinister, orange glow to it. This didn't last long, as the weapon spat out what looked like a crimson rock, coated in orangish red flames which Nico soon realized was his own Hellfire, meaning that had to be what had been released from his blades earlier.

'#WHISTLE# looks like my Kagune's appetite and devouring ability wasn't the only evolution I had after all…'

Looked like he had been right to delve more into his Ghoul side's abilities, he hadn't really noticed these new developments in past training sessions, thus he felt like an idiot inside for not seeing them sooner. The resulting impact created this blast of Hellfire and molten rock, spreading out across the ground and either incinerating the Yoma it touched with the Hellfire or just straight up shredded them to pieces with the rock debris. This allowed him to land safely, and the moment that his feet touched their corpses, Nico saw thei surrounding Yoma quickly gang up on him, launching their various claws at him in an attempt to impale him from afar. However, such things could not pierce through his flesh so easily, and as a result they only left minor scratches at best, allowing him to slice them all to bits with his Bikaku (which had regained all it's Talon sets by this point), before proceeding to find a new rooftop to fight on.

This had been his strategy since this little cage match began, to use the rooftops to limit how many attackers he would have to deal with at a time, thereby making his life much easier in the long run. When the buildings themselves showed signs of collapsing like that last one just did, he'd quickly hightail it off there and destroy the whole damn thing with 2 Bikaku Tails, therefore burying any surrounding Yoma before then proceeding to find another one, rinse, repeat victory. Even a few winged ones got hit by them, something which he definitely appreciated whenever this happened, these combined elements having resulted in him eliminating about 60% of the enemy forces according to his Avenger Package's Presence Detection.

Fortunately, it seemed these creatures lacked a sufficient amount of intelligence, as there had been little signs of actual cooperation between them whilst their attacks had the simplest of movements, making them easier to predict. The best thing they had going for them was their numbers, as whilst ordinary humans would likely lose in a fight against these things, superpowered beings like himself and his Party would be a completely different story. Heck, he found himself relatively comfortable with testing out his Ghoul side's prowess against them, and if he wanted to leave then under normal circumstances he could have.

The one thing stopping him however was his BIGGEST problem at the moment: that Barrier.

Seemed like the work of Wardcraft, Nico felt like when glancing at it's structure, with lots of complex arrays within it geared towards keeping things inside, as well as others out. Heck, when he had tried to assume his DPU form or unleash any of his demonic-based weapons, turned out that he couldn't due to something in the Array blocking him from doing so, hence making Nico resort to using his Ghoul side which, fortunately, didn't get restricted even with the influence of his more Demonic side. Thus, whilst he had to fight in CQC bare handed a few times, Nico still managed to deal sufficient damage to the enemy regardless of his current state, plus it wasn't like his powers were as linier as focusing on one specific aspect of himself. As much as he recently griped with being versatile, one had to admit that for situations like these, Nico had made the right call there.

But one big issue that it still presented to him, was the fact that as long as it was there, then escaping this place would remain impossible. Since the Array covered the entire city, the redhead believed it to be like a full sphere and not just a dome like it showed itself to be on the surface, proof of this theory being how he had once tried to launch a strike through the earth beneath him to the other side, only to get a feeling similr to when he had been blocked the first time. Speaking of first times, Nico had made multiple attemps to crack the Array enough to make a hole trough with just his Ghoul side's physical force, only for the Array to repel him at every turn. It didn't take Biko long to figure out why that was, for it looked like whoever had constructed it had done so with restricting his Multi-Continent Class Demonic Power in mind which was still stronger than his Ghoul Side by a sigficant margin if one asked him.

'As much as I am reluctant to say this, Nico, we might have to try locating the one whom erected this Array in order to get them to lower it… preferably by knocking them out then eating their brains to gain their memories.'

'Lets save that for when we don't have other options, Biko…' Nico responded, his Demon Persona's comment being mentioned once the redhead had found another Building to jump onto, prompting his accompanying response. It wasn't like the redhead had reservations about eating people at this point, he was a monster right now and not a human, hadn't been a human for years by now, however to go and search for someone who would obviously be hiding in this situation would take WAY more time than he would have liked, plus if this person could make complex Arrays like this, then it'd stand to reason that, through other Arrays, this person could make it so that tracking him/her down through Nico's own multiple sensory means would prove just as tedious. Nico did NOT like to waste time doing that shit, plus he'd already mentioned his lack of patience with sime things, even if he had learned to be more so thanks to his accumulated experiences.

At the moment of him thinking his response, Nico sensed something approaching him from above, but didn't check on what it was, already knowingwhat it had been. Several winged Yoma tried to cleave his head ff with their claws from above, only for his Bikaku to shred them to pieces whilst his Rinkaku, which had reverted back to the default Tentacles, slashed away at theapproaching Yoma which did the dame thing as when he'd used the previous buildings: scurry across them like they were some kind of Spiders. He then switched their roles, with his Bikaku launching all it's Taon sets at once in every direction.

BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM- BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM- BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-!

Sounds of explosions rung out through the vicinity thanks to the Talons, each of them either impaling soft (to them) Yoma flesh and exploding or doing the second step after impaling parts ofother buildings, causing them to collapse in on themselves. This not only destroyed a good 10% of the offensive hoard, but it also caused various landslides to happen which buried another 10% alive, leaving about 20% remaining. Of course, Nico didn't let this stop him from slowing down his assault, as his Kagune (which oddly enough seemed VERY suited for this situation now that he thought about it) tore its waythrough the remainder, causing the redhead to smirk inside. 'Heh, with just my Ghoul side, this is becoming almost childsplay… I hardly feel threatened by these guys…' the male thought to himself…

All before proceeding to clench his conceaed teeth in surprise pain when something slammed into his left hip from the side.

"Guh!"

The hit succeeded in sending him flying across the rooftop, off it and to the hoard of Yoma down below. Actring fast after regaining his witsabout him, Nico gnashed his teeth together as he morphed his Rinkaku into a tree trunk thick Tentacle, with a skeletal-looking armoured clawed gauntlet reminiscent of the ones the CPUs wear. The Claw then launched itself towards the ground upon his command, slamming into it to allow Nico to flip himself back into the air and onto another nearby building. Once he slid to a halt and ended up grasping onto the Building with his Rinkaku gauntlet, Nico looked up to see what had hit him… and saw a particularly LARGE Yoma standing there, looming over what remained of the building he had been standing on… now crushed with a few Yoma corpses beneath it. 'Shit, how the fuck did I not see that one coming…?'

'Worse still, check your reserves out, Nico…'

Sensing the concern there, Nico did indeed do what his Demon Persona said, and soon found out why he had said so, his hidden lips curving upwards into a frown as his lone eye sharpened into a steely gaze. 'Shit, my RC Cell reserves are reaching the 30% mark. Must have been due to all the Talons I've been making and launching from my Bikaku…' the male thought, biting back the urge to hiss his dismay. Constantly generating and launching so many Talons for an extended time frame had no other outcome than his reserves of RC Cells being eaten away. Not to mention that he hadn't thought to replenish them with the corpses of his fallen enemies either unlike how he normally did so, which REALLY showed him just how cocky he had taken to this battle due to how easy it had been for him. How out of character for him, too… normally he wouldn't have acted this way, so what had been different here? A power high? Did he have a brief episode of power madness? He HAD heard of madness being brought from power before… Shit. If his mother or the girls were here, then Nico didn't doubt that they'd scold him mercilessly for such a blunder, especially his fellow Spec Ops Agents who knew from experience how much of a grave error on the battlefield that was.

It didn't take him long to come out of his thoughts though, and when he did so Nico noticed that the large Yoma, which rivalled a 3-story building in size whilst it leered at him with a ravenous hunger in its eyes, started stomping over to him. Glancing downwards, he also noticed how it lacked any care for its brethren, proof being the countless corpses that it left in its wake. 'Not giving a damn about its comrades, huh…? Now THAT's a good way to piss me off…' The male thought, gritting his teeth behind his Mask. If it weren't for the restrictions on his Demonic Powers, Nico would have transformed and then REALLY went to town on this fucker. Still, he had to force himself to keep his cool lest he lose sight of his overall situation, if he didn't figure out a way to get out of here, then it wouldn't matter if he were to beat this foe. He would still have to likely fight against stronger opponents in this Array without the aid of his stronger abilities as WELL as a weakened Ghoul side with little power left. Perhaps he could use the Corpses, but he wasn't too sure since he had never seen them or 'tasted' them before, so their value there was an unknown factor. Plus, fighting against a CPU as well as potentilly more members of Tzeentch's cult did NOT sound too appealing at the moment.

Just then…

"GUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHH!"

A loud roar filled the atmosphere, causing the area around them to tremble like it had been hit by a violent earthquake. The surviving Yoma, the ones which DIDN'T fall onto the ground like pathetic mongrels from lack of stability by the way, frantically looked upwards with panic, fear filled eyes to see what the heck the source of that roar was, and so did Nico. The moment that he saw a flying, draconian silhouette shooting down like a deity from the heavens above towards the Array's top, the teen couldn't help but let out a soft but hidden smirk, his Kakugan gleaming with an excited, sinister gaze. 'Urthemiel… Good to see that he's doing alright. I'd feared the worst when my connection with him got intercepted by the Array, making tracking his location through it all but impossible.' Nico thought, clutching his gloved hands into fists. 'I'd sent him along with my Primal Twin, whom I lost contact with due to similar reasons to the former, into the surrounding areas before coming into the city with the girls to check for any signs of traps such as long ranged weaponry, bases or Abnormals/Demons waiting to isolate this place to then attack, but all that ended up doing was separating us…'

'At least he is here, not to mention that it seems he has formed a plan of attack, too.'

Biko's words made the redhead teen look up to where the Archdemon was coming in from, and quickly got what he had been talking about. The closer that he got to the Array, the faster Urthemiel descended, quickly coating his body with flames to turn himself into a draconian drill of sorts, adding to this by tucking his Wings in and entering a spiralling motion. As a result, the moment that Urthemiel smashed into the Barrier like a meteor, it didn't take long for him to break right through like a freaking wrecking ball, the Array shattering like glass around the space he'd broken. Not stopping there, Urthemiel roared as he slammed into the large Yoma headfirst, knocking the creature to the ground whilst covering it with his flames. This resulted in the Yoma howling in absolute agony, flailing about like an absolute idiot which resulted in the flames catching more victims in the forms of the large Yoma's brethren, triggering more tormented shrieks, howls, roars and almost feminine cries from them that went unanswered thanks to the flames incinerating them to the last atom.

'Nico, the Primal Twin just showed me something through the connection between us, looks like there's a forest nearby where we can hide out till the enemy has lost our scent, there we should be able to lay low and recover our power with any Abnormals there.'

'Now THAT'S some of the BEST news I've heard all day!' No small amount of joy blossomed in Nico's chest when he heard those words, even his smirk hidden beneath his Mask couldn't be contained very much. With that hole in the Array, Nico felt his connection to his Archdemon and Primal Twin re-establish themselves, allowing him to check in on the latter's location through mental notification. Turned out that his Primal Twin had indeed found a forest close by but had only skimmed it in passing on his way to potentially a site nurturing a LOT of Demonic signatures. Still, it would have to do for the moment, and he wasn't going to be picky at a time like this.

When he sensed some odd fluctuations of Demonic Power nearby however, mostly above him, Nico set about looking up towards the hole, his eye widening when he saw it starting to close. 'Shit, we don't have long! I have to preserve my remaining RC Cells in case I'm dragged into another fight again!' the male thought, quickly hopping over to his Archdemon whom now stood proudly before him, no longer cloaked in his Primal Flames. A quick mental command later, and after Nico mounted his back Urthemiel roared joyously into the skies above as he flared his large Wings, proudly displaying them before he took to the skies, shooting through the Barrier RIGHT before it could close up again. Nico had to bury his head down just so that he could fit through the rapidly shrinking hole at that moment, and during that time his heart had felt heavier than a castle wall.

'Phew! Now THAT was a close shave! Now then, to the Forest, Urthemiel!'

To that end, his Archdemon obeyed, quickly shooting towards the forest… and unknowingly, AWAY from the Party's location.


"Whelp, looks like the guy managed to escape after all."

"Took him long enough, I was about to go in myself and shred that asshole's soul into oblivion."

Far from the scene above the clouds, which were being used as cover so that pesky dragon didn't find them (they concealed their presence/energy just in case), two figures shrouded in silhouettes conversed between them, watching the events within the city unfold. They had seen everything, from the start when the Party of fools (albeit fools with a rather extensive ability arsenal) entered the city to the point where their lone 'target of interest' managed to finally break free from the restriction Array on top of his little pet. The two silhouettes judged it all in their minds, each coming to their own conclusions regarding things, especially regarding the escaping redhead.

The first to comment turned out to be the silhouette to the left, its voice identifying its gender to be male. "So far, seems like those stupid bitches don't have as much brains as they should, despite the overwhelming powers they possess. Three of them feel like CPUs, whilst one feels... oddly familiar to me." he mused, frowning as his brows furrowed. "Kind of reminds me of those things the Goddesses used to make way back when, what were they called? Can't remember."

"Doesn't matter if they aren't as intelligent as us, they still have some strong survival instincts." The other silhouette commented, admonishing his (yeah he's male too) partner. "Perhaps they could be of use to THEM when they have enough numbers, I mean for the time being we have to rely on those pathetic excuses for monsters we got from that shifty Leanbox Noble. He DID say these were the weaker batches, and the stronger ones won't be ready till a couple days from now, but seriously, they were pathetic with only their numbers working for them."

In response to these words, the first silhouette turned to address his partner. "You DO realize that everything on this island is simply a means to an end, even that stupid Goddess our Boss seems to keep close to him. Don't know why, since all those wenches are good for is to warm the bed for us, but hey its not like I'm going to complain."

"Of course I do." the second silhouette replied, his arm reaching out in a blur to strike at the first, only for the first to deflect it with just as much ease. Seemed like these two regularly got into scuffles like this if they had these kinds of reflexes. "In any case, lets leave the kid alone for now, if that bitch will act as she's told to then she will locate where those cockroaches are hiding for us, then we can make the relevant 'parties' deal with them whilst we deal with that guy Boss wants dead. Honestly, that bitch is next to useless if you ask me, she SHOULD have been made aware of that guy's powers by the Boss, yet she only developed an array to suppress his Demonic Side, I could TOTALLY see ways it could have been improved so that it could have completely suppressed him." After that short rant, the silhouette gave a resigned, weary sigh. "This is why I don't work with those weaker and more incompetent than me."

The first silhouette nodded his head in agreement to this, before the two of them then vanished, simply blinking out of existence like they were never even there in the first place.


Chapter end

A shorter chapter than before, but I simply wanted to cover the escape for Nico and the girls in this one. A bit of an action packed chapter, but hopefully its still enjoyable. The girls almost went full on murder crazy mode when they found that Nico had been trapped back at the city, but thankfully Noire had the sense to keep them in line. Something which I feel is s natural part of her character. She's good at ruling a Nation, so she HAS to be experienced with tense situations and keeping her head clear to sort things out. That's a skill which ever Leader needs to have. Their actions affect many after all.

But as you all are aware, Nico's a true badass, one measly army isn't going to be enough to stop him, nor is a barrier that restricts his Demonic side. I just realized, but its somewhat becoming a thing where one aspect of one's abilities are suppressed to weaken them, but the other is still active and kicking ass. Guess Nico must feel PRETTY good with how versatile he truly is then, as otherwise he would have massacred EVERYTHING and reduced the city to a smouldering crater.

Then there's those two silhouettes, who seem to have a remarkable grasp of the situation on the landmass, yet are simply playing the role of observer for the time being. There's going to be a bit of mystery about them for the time being, but eventually those questions will be answered, don't you worry bout that.

Anyways, hope you enjoyed and see you all next chapter.

Peace Out!