A layered shell of abjurative Demonic Energy quickly formulated around the strange suicide bomber before an explosion could blow. It shook faintly from the internal explosion, and then there was no response from within. Did he blow himself up without the ability to survive it? Oh dear.

I had no actual understanding or metric of damage to expect from a bandoleer of fragmentation grenades, let alone a single one, but it behooved me to take no chances.

Hopefully, I would not be blamed if the Oni masked cape technically blew himself up? I-

A blade pressed firmly into my back, cutting through my conjured costume, pointy and uncomfortable against my lower spine, unable to break skin or rend flesh. Like stepping on legos. Painful, but ultimately harmless.

"Who-" I turned to see the same Oni man. Crimson mask and all, twin green stripes gleaming on both sides of the mask like a strange attempt at face paint camo.

Duplication and teleportation? Was it separate or-

The hair on the back of my neck rose, causing me to duck as I took a leaning side step as I took stock of this second Oni offender. I snatched the arm from below and threw it forwards causing the two to collapse into a pile in front of me. One of the two in a twisting of limbs threw their knife at me, only causing me to flick my wrist in retaliation, a small gust of atmospheric manipulation deflecting the blade.

I slapped a trace on both before blasting a curse of decaying at the wall at the end of the hallway, the scent of grit and moist earth beginning to fill the hallway.

"Let's take this outside."

And launched a wall of crimson concussive force that blasted the two Oni outward, through the wall, which exploded into crumbling clay and damp mortar dust.

The two Oni began to crumble into gray ash as they fell and a new Oni appeared above them, grabbing the edge of the building next to ours, and swiftly pulling himself up.

I absentmindedly let a twin bouquets of seal serpent slip from my sleeves, informing them to protect the women in this building and bind up the men, feeling them slither backwards and away as I observed this new curiosity.

I could feel a trace marker on this one, but it was strange. As if a child had whipped it together on his first attempt and had butchered it. Instead of a subtle ping, it was more like a beacon, but lacked the feeling of Demonic Energy. It was closer akin to Senjutsu as it tried to suck the malice of the world as fuel instead of properly copying the Demonic Energy left behind in the trace. I was aware of Senjutsu on an academic level with very limited opportunities to see it in effect, and this appeared like a very rudimentary, or more possibly an incorrect, application of it.

Not only was it both a Cape power that utilized duplication and teleportation, it copied objects on their person, even attempting to replicate a magic spell, though woefully incomplete and wrong, but perhaps it adjusted for the spiritual? I would normally assume that this ability likely teleported the user forward and left behind a degraded autonomous copy, like a homunculus. After all, the inverse of teleporting a degraded copy forward and leaving the original behind to rot would be laughably and pointless. But that was what I had just observed.

The trace didn't skip forwards. Rather this bastardized version appeared… the original was long dead, only a semblance of himself being projected every time he used his ability.

What in actual hell was wrong with Cape powers? Should I be worried for my cute Bishop? What horrible things could it be-

I stopped my line of thought as the Oni, drunkenly swayed, holding a hand to the mask of his mouth. He twisted it to the side, pulled a black ski mask down from the lower half of his face and vomited the contents of his stomach onto the roof.

"...Note to self. Cape powers can't copy Demonic Energy. Makes sense, they're humans."

I flew up to the Oni, who pulled a combat knife and held it defensively in front of him as he twisted the mask back onto his face to protect his identity.

I let a new high-collared cape manifest via the light of crimson conjury, as I addressed the shell of the shell of a homunculus that just attempted to kill me.

I supposed it must at least keep the memories. Perhaps the poor thing even thought itself the original. How pitiably pathetic. A living, breathing, half-life lump of carbon.

"You there. Homunculus Oni. Leave, and I will wipe that mangled trace your power has replicated. If you do not, that is of little consequence as it is, feel free to let your body perform the equivalent of sucking on the tailpipe of a semi for the rest of your already short existence. Or keep depositing the contents of your digestive tract for the vultures as houer d'oeuvres afore your body gives out from that incorrect Senjutsu it is attempting. See if I care. I've already been delayed enough as is, don't think I won't take the extra ten minutes to watch on guard as it would require for your body to break itself down from within for more efficient ki generation."

The homunculus didn't respond, reading another pull of the grenades on his bandoleer as he flinched, fell to his knees, and a vile liquid seeped from his mask with wet gushing, this time tinged with blood.

"Filthy." I grimaced, but I supposed this meant he was out of the fight.

I tore the bandoleer off his body as he swung blindly at me, bile and blood leaking from the eyes of the mask. I sealed the grenades away into a bubble of shields as before as I ignited the explosives from within, removing them as a factor.

My leg rose and fell four times in quick succession. Shattering shins, fragmenting forearms as that would prevent him from getting away properly with the way his odd self-replicating teleportation worked.

Normally removing a trace is the equivalent of lifting a small paperweight off of a stack of papers. Removing his duplicative power's attempt at one, was like tearing off a piece of duct tape.

It was sticky and messy, just not right. Only faint wisps of twisted, angry ki made up its formation, but it was enough to give a Devil goosebumps.

"Now, to actually take care of what I was- oh. Before I leave." I turned to the homunculus, twisted his mask askew enough for the vile smelling bile to leak out of the mask without letting met see much of his face. Apparently Cape culture was really touchy about potential unmasking. "I'm freeing those women in that building. Don't come back after any of them, or I'll do much worse to you."

The homunculus didn't respond, but his whole body tensed up, letting me know that heard the words that had come from my mouth, even as he coughed and snorted the vomit from his nose and mouth.

"Alright, good talk." I turned and floated back to the previous building, entering through the hole I had opened up in its side, the edges crumbling with wet clumps of clay brick and mortar. "Stay put up there! I'm sure as inept the law is in this town, medical assistance at leas shan't be far off."

It bothered me that I could only just now faintly hear the sound of sirens from the distance. Still, it would take a goodly amount of time for them to arrive.

"...Let's make sure the seal serpents have done their job."

I supposed there was a small chance that a female member of the ABB may have also been here for potentially any reason, and should that be the case they'd be ignored by my earlier orders. Seal serpents were as powerful as the Demonic Energy of their caster and were the rudimentary foundation for the culture that led to the development of familiars and thus served a similar purpose, but they lacked the intelligence that a familiar was expected to bring to the table.

They could only obey the letter of the command, not the meaning behind it, and for most their Demonic Power wasn't altogether strong enough for them to take on even mere humans.

As a Gremory known for our lineage of superior Demonic Energy reserves and casting talent, mine naturally overcame such base limitations.

The doors on all the rooms of the second floor had to be opened manually to check the safety of their contents, as the seal serpents lacked hands, they just burrowed through the bottoms of the doorway, leaving rough semi circles in their wake. I walked through the hallway, opening doors and peering in as I checked the aftermath of their work. I spied girls and women either trembling in fear, or kicking their clients while they were down while they were defenseless and bound by seal serpents. So this floor was secured enough. It seemed the room I had entered at the beginning was a standby area for the gangsters to wait as muscle in case a customer became too rowdy.

There was a third story to this building to check out, so I conjured another seal beast to guard against intrusion from the first floor, this time a large gorilla made of twisting runes as it crossed its arms and sat down on the floor of the second story stairwell.

The serpents had definitely made their way above, judging from the way they had left burrowing holes through the bottoms of the door here, eating through reinforced steel. The locks and hinges were on the outside of this door, however, suggesting that this is where some of the unfortunate dwelt.

I didn't have a key, but spellwork to cause the lock to open was simple.

The door swung outward and as a result of a miss Kuki Mizuhara, I had expected to see some comical sight, such as a girl with a chair above her head, ready to comically smack an unwitting intruder unconscious or such something to belong in a gag 4-koma.

But I saw nothing more that a large room that must have once been many rooms, judging from the missing walls, but fragments on the ceiling alluding to their once existing. Only the supporting pillars in said walls were left actually standing as the rest of it was filled up by what appeared to be a series of bunk beds, two sets of washer/dryers, and a section in the back with what I observed to be the ONLY CCTV cameras in the building overlooking a tiled section of wall and floor that was meant to be a shower.

"..." I sighed, snapping my fingers and pulling the seal serpents away from under the bunkbeds, where girls and women were huddled up together on their upper bunks.

"Don't fear. I had a Contract to rescue one Kuki Mizuhara. She then… well let us say she has formed a Contract with me and I will ensure your safety until the lawmen arrive. Should I be worried about anything on the first floor? I started from the second and I assume that my little helpers," I gestured to a serpent coiling by my feet, "are already taking care of some business, but I suppose it won't hurt to ask."

"...Kuki-unni?" A younger girl asked in Korean, her big doe eyes wide, "Th-then we're safe? Is she safe?"

"Safe as can me." I replied back in Korean, snapping my fingers as seal serpents merged into a large wolf, "I left two of these with her-"

"Doggie! Why is it so cute, but scary?"

…Had all the women here lost their minds from their dehumanizing treatment?

I shook my head.

Whatever they needed to do to survive, I suppose. I shouldn't judge.

An older girl in her younger twenties with a still healing black eye pulled the smaller korean girl back as she tried to jump off her bunk and reach out to pet the wolf.

"Caehful." she warned with a cantonese accent.

She said nothing else, but her word of warning was enough for the younger girl to stop squirming in her grip.

Finally, someone with a decent head on their shoulders here.

"I'll check and secure the first floor, and once we're done there, you'll be free to come down while we wait for the lawmen to arrive." I turned to leave, only for a call to wait from the cantonese girl with the black eye.

I turned around to face her.

"...Who ah you?"

"Ah finally, someone with a shred of decorum." I smiled widely. Not every girl in this building was crazy! And now some of them were giving me crazy eyes- OH!

That was on me. Turn down the charm, turn down the charm.

"Apologies. I should have introduced myself sooner." I took a full bow, bending knee slightly, my other foot tucked behind with toes to the ground, bowing as my left arm daintily held my cape to the side, the right held to my breast. "I am the Devil known as Maou. I have been contracted to save you all. The young lady Kuki has bartered for your freedom. She is the one worthy of your thanks."

I would have simply left them all here, after all.

I turned to leave, a satisfying swish of my cape behind me.

I now understood why Sirzechs so often wore a cape even when relaxing at home. It was fun.

Patting the seal gorilla on the way down, getting a grunt in response, to find the first floor disguised as a more normal massage parlor, had been emptied out as both patrons, male employees, and the gangsters overseeing the operation had been ambushed by a small flood of seal serpents, leaving them bound and painfully gagged on the ground.

I assumed some may have escaped, but that was no longer of consequence to me.

A blue metallic blur burnt rubber into the main street, the near silent whine of an electric motor (likely the Tinker-tech of this world) coming down to a low drone as it came to a quick but effective stop.

A man in midnight blue- god he wasn't just a sentai ranger, this was a living, breathing KAMEN RIDER. Rias… Rias would have been so jealous.

People that had crowded around the building began to back up as a streak of blue approached and parked in front of the establishment.

A man in midnight blue power armor quickly unmounted his bike, a long blue halberd humming with power as it faintly shifted forms, the blade head changing shape. The silver highlights flashed as the light of nighttime lampposts hit them, gleaming with intent.

Shame it wasn't a full facemask. Felt a bit wrong to see a Kamen Rider with his beard, as well trimmed and maintained as it was, poking out the bottom of a visor.

"I am Armsmaster of the Brockton Bay Protectorate. You are to stand down and report this situation to me, now."

"Ah, a member of the law. I was employed by my Contractor to save his sister. Naturally I tracked her down here and began to mount a rescue. Unfortunately, in the throes of comradery and companionship… well, she threatened to make things difficult for me and take her own life should I not ensure the safety of her fellows-"

"Did you kill anyone?" The halberd crackled intimidatingly, for a human.

"No, no. You'll find that everyone that I've interacted with to be quite alive." I snapped my fingers and one of the seal serpents began wiggling out of the first floor with an obvious gangster in tow, tatted up and dressed in ABB colors, a pistol falling out of the hem of his pants as the serpent wiggled his body out of the building in full body binding, maw still latched over his mouth as a gag.

"Only injuries should be their pride as well as the new piercings in their cheeks. The ones up top, of course. Though I wouldn't deign to presume what they do with the ones below. Like I stated, all pacified, including the Homunculus in the Oni mas-"

"Oni Lee?!" His breath was almost a hiss as he gripped his halberd with an intensity.

I gestured to the roof above the neighboring building where I left him.

"Should be rather incapacitated. He became too sick to perform his short range suicide cloning and his limbs can no longer bear his weight-"

"You stay here." He demanded, grappling hook launching from his Tinker-tech weapon and launching himself up.

I frowned, knowing that my domino mask reflected my facial motions with clear expression.

I turned to a bystander recording the scene with their digital phone.

"Mortal." I called out to his stammer, "Is this rudeness normal of your… Protectorate? I believe it's called?"

"Oh, uh… no? I don't know man, uh, Cape-IMEAN, SIR!"

I waved him down with a casual hand.

"I'm just a Devil here to grant a wish. No need to call me sir." I chortled as I turned to re-enter the building and leave with Kuki. If this sort of rudeness wasn't protocol, there was no reason to stay.

Armsmaster landed with a thud, kneeling with one fist slamming into the ground, cracking the pavement in an iconic superhero landing.

"You! What is your name?"

"Me? I am merely a Devil here to grant a wish. My name is unimportant to you, but if you must, you may address me as Maou."

A blink of light shone across the inside of the visor, invisible to human eyes, barely even visible to me.

"Maou. Demon Lord. For your use of excessive violence in the incapacitation of the Villain Oni Lee, you are coming with me." He demanded, causing a series of rippling surprise and excitement to ripple through the crowd.

"His limbs are broken, yes. But he's quite alive and New Wave has gained a rather proficient healer of recent note. I hardly see this as anything worth detaining me over. Plus, I have a Contract to finish. Thusly, I refu-"

Before I could finish my sentence he lunged at me with full intensity, his boots breaking pavement as they lit up with mini thrusters.

Understandably, he understood that I could be dangerous and was operating as any Exorcist would. I held no issue with his actions, nor was I even annoyed at his impediment of me. He was fully justified from his perspective and the power of the law. The man was simply doing his job, I didn't fault him for that for a single iota of a second.

That did not mean he could take me on alone. Not at all.

I forced his halberd head up with atmospheric manipulation causing an intense updraft that jerked his arm up as I slammed my left hand into his central chestplate. It erupted with an explosive shock of electric discharge that blasted into my body, painful and uncomfortable as I released a flood of seal serpents to flood forth from my hand, forming the appearance of a blood red framework of a tree as it rooted to the ground and locked him in place, serpent heads rising into the air and beginning to hiss violently at him.

"Rude." I shook my arm, the clothes on my left arm having been blown away by the electric discharge, leaving my arm bare past my shoulder (luckily the cape survived) as the rest of my costume smoked faintly. "But understandable. Once again, my apologies. However, I'm simply going to take my requested target and leave. I can't keep a brother separate from his precious little sister for much longer. It's already been weeks for him, after all."

I smiled at the forming audience, the flash of camera lights flickering intensely.

"No worries, everyone! Ser Kamen Rider Armsmaster will be freed once I leave! But should you ever need a small wish fulfilled-" I pulled out a small stack of playing cards, their faces stripped of paint and replaced with a magic circle and the same instructions as the fliers. "My Peerage and I would be glad to do what we can to grant your desires!"

The cards scattered into the air, fluttering down like paper rain.

"Perhaps another night, we shall meet again!"

As an afterthought to the night, the reunion between Kuki Mizuhara and her brother was tender and sweet.

And it filled me with ugly, jealous desire.

It wasn't fair. I too wished for those happy tears.