I do not own Rosario + Vampire or Devil May Cry.
The four girls and Dante were still as they stared each other down, each trying to measure their opponent. While the girls had seen what he was capable of against Moka, they believed that Dante could not stand up to all four of them ganging up on him at once, especially after his suggestion to attack him as viciously as possible. Dante was trying to decide which of the girls was the most dangerous, and therefore had the highest priority to be taken down:
Moka was the physically strongest of the group, but she had no extraordinary powers beyond her superhuman strength and endurance, and he could easily dodge or counter her attacks. He could afford to deal with her last.
Yukari had her magic, but beyond her penchant for smacking people over the head with heavy objects and conjuring tarot cards for her to throw her file was vague on what the extent of her abilities actually were. Definitely a wild card; it would be prudent to eliminate her early.
Mizore's ranged attacks could present a problem, but Dante was confident that he could either dodge or deflect the ice kunai that the snow girl would throw; his true concern was her ability to snap-freeze people, which would leave him in a vulnerable position. Her ability to make clones of herself could also present a problem, distracting him with decoys while the others swooped in for the kill.
Though she was a melee fighter like Moka, Kurumu's ability to fly allowed her to quickly escape beyond the range of his fists as well as giving her a greater field of attack. Her illusion powers could also restrain him and leave him vulnerable to attacks. She and Mizore would the first for Dante to take down.
Kurumu and Moka made the first move, the succubus taking to the air while the vampire charged towards Dante. Halfway to her target, Moka took a running leap and somersaulted into the air, attempting to hammer her foot into the half-devil. Instead, he dodged at the last second and grabbed her by the ankle, using her momentum to spin around and throw her away tumbling roughly across the ground until she crashed against a tree. Mizore fired icicles from her wrists while Yukari shot razor-edged tarot cards from the end of her wand, but Dante easily dove around the projectiles, grabbing two icicles from mid-air and throwing them back at his attackers; Mizore summoned a thick wall of ice in front of her to protect herself while Yukari simply dove out of the way.
Having gained sufficient height, Kurumu fell into a dive bomb position, her razor-sharp nails bared. Dante ducked under the succubus' attack, instead swiping clean through a tree. As the tree began to fall, Kurumu swooped around for another attack. Dante dodged another barrage of ice spikes from Mizore and ran up the length of the tree. When Kurumu made to slash at Dante, he leapt over her and roughly planted both of his feet into her back, sending her crashing face-first into the ground while he landed gracefully on his feet, his hair fluttering in the wind caused by the tree's impact. Kurumu tried to get back up onto her feet, but a swift kick in the gut by Dante sent her rolling away and sapped away the remainder of her strength.
Dante tried to move away, he found his feet stuck fast to the ground. He looked down to see ice surrounding his feet and holding him down. He heard the thunder of footsteps pounding the dirt and looked up to see Moka rapidly charging towards him, murder in her eyes. Pulling with all his strength, Dante wrenched one foot free, a large clod of dirt clinging to the ice on his foot. When Moka was within striking distance, he kicked up, catching the vampire in the chin and shattering the ice imprisoning his foot; fortunately for her, the ice that melted against the heat of her skin was quickly absorbed into the surrounding mound of earth before it burned her. While she was stunned, Dante freed his second foot and planted a spinning kick into Moka's stomach, sending her flying into another tree.
His patience with Mizore quickly wearing thin, Dante charged towards the snow woman, leaping around icicles along the way. Leaping up, Dante pulled his fist back to pound Mizore into the dirt, and she barely managed to conjure a shield in time. The inch-thick ice shattered like glass against the silver-haired man's fist. Not giving Mizore a chance to recover, Dante drove a knee into her abdomen, forcing the air out of her lungs and making her cough out her lollipop. While she was doubled over gasping for breath, she felt him grab her by the hair and saw a black object flying towards her. Stars filled her vision as her face was smashed into his knee. As he made to deliver the final blow, a deep gong filled the air as a heavy brass washtub crashed onto Dante's head. Mizore wasted no time and while her opponent was stunned, she encased him in a thick block of ice.
"Moka, hurry!" the snow woman called out as Dante already struggled to free himself from his frozen prison. The silver-haired vampire unsteadily got on her feet and ran over to Dante. After raising her leg high she brought her foot down, delighted at the prospect of punishing the man that had beaten and humiliated her so, but just as her heel was about to touch the ice, a blinding flash of light filled her vision and for a split second and she was overwhelmed by such a powerful wave of youki energy that she nearly suffocated. Whatever Dante did, it forcefully shattered his prison as Moka felt the ice shrapnel brush against her face and she had to bite her lip to avoid crying out in pain. As her vision returned, momentum drove her heel deep into the cold mud where Dante once stood, but no sign of the devil hunter himself. Yukari cried out in surprise and pain when she felt a blow to the hand that held her wand, sending the enchanted stick flying. It was quickly followed by an elbow to the face for Mizore and an open-palmed strike to the solar plexus for Moka, sending both girls tumbling to the ground. Moka looked up at her assailant, his silver hair dripping with frigid water; unlike her own glare of rage, Dante only had a look of mild annoyance on his face. He raised his foot to kick her, but stopped when they both heard a roar of bestial rage coming from Tsukune and Ruby's position.
All throughout the fight, the two noncombatants observed from the sidelines. Fight, Ruby thought with a mental scoff, wincing when Dante delivered Moka a kick to the chin, more like a massacre. She watched as Dante viciously pummeled anyone in his sights, even Inner Moka who was the strongest fighter that the witch knew of, like they were merely children. Kurumu, being a flying youkai and therefore having a lower endurance than her friends, had taken the beating the worst and even when Mizore managed to encase the devil hunter in ice, the succubus had only just managed to summon the strength to push herself into a somewhat upright position and watch from her place of defeat. Ruby gasped when Dante somehow freed himself from his ice prison and dodged Moka's attack, feeling the brief wave of demonic energy wash over her. As she felt it, she thought fearfully, Is…that his youki?
All throughout the fight, Tsukune fought against the vines that bound him so that he could save his friends. The logical part of his mind wondered what he could to Dante when the man could easily swat aside Inner Moka like a fly, but it was silenced by the raw, emotional side of him. When Dante brought Moka to her knees and raised up his foot to stomp her, his mind became consumed with rage and gave an animalistic roar. His hair turned from dark brown to a dull gray, his brown eyes turning red and his pupils turning into slits. His transformation into a Ghoul was finished with a soft cracking sound as one of the links of his Rosario chain broke. He effortlessly broke free of Ruby's restraints and charged Dante.
Not expecting the sudden addition to the fight, Dante was barreled into by Tsukune and carried several feet until they both fell with the Ghoul on top. Without hesitation Tsukune began to pummel his fists into Dante's face, swiftly driving each clenched hand until they were covered with both Dante's blood and his own, but in his blind rage he ignored the pain. Tiring of the beating, Tsukune stood up and roughly grabbed Dante by the shirt before throwing him against a tree.
Unfortunately for Dante, that tree just happened to be the one that he had hung his coat on.
Everyone gasped when Dante was roughly impaled on his own sword, a disgusting squelching sound emanating when the handle and cross-guard of Rebellion tore through its owner and jutted out of his stomach, dripping in blood and guts. Even Inner Moka, who normally reveled in battle and the bloody carnage that ensued, felt nauseated by the sight, and Yukari had simply thrown up at the sight. However instead of giving a final shuddering gasp and slumping over dead as expected, Dante actually got livelier.
"Son of a bitch!" he shouted angrily before sending a glare at Tsukune. "What the hell is wrong with you, kid? Do you have any idea how much this freaking hurts?" Not waiting for an answer that would never come, Dante pushed himself forward, extracting Rebellion from the tree but still stuck within his body. With a sigh of annoyance, Dante grabbed both sides of the blade and began to push outward. Each push released a gush of blood until it was fully extracted and Dante's ruined coat fell to the ground, which was now soaked with what seemed to be nearly a gallon of blood. To everyone's shock, beneath the hole in Dante's shirt there was no gaping wound, not even a scar to indicate that he had just been viciously impaled.
Stabbing the blood-drenched sword into the ground, Dante turned back to Tsukune and shouted, "So? What do you have to say for yourself?" The Ghoul's simple mind could not formulate a response, only recognizing that its prey was somehow not dead and that it should rectify that. With a roar, Tsukune charged forward, fist raised. Dante cracked his neck and charged forward as well.
Both men's fists connected with each other's faces simultaneously, causing them both to stagger. Dante recovered first and grabbed Tsukune by the front of his shirt before roughly headbutting the teenager. He followed by a quick flurry of punches to the ribs and stomach before uppercutting Tsukune, knocking him cold. The boy's state of unconsciousness allowed the locket's magic to reassert itself, sealing the Ghoul back inside and returning him to his human form.
Dante, panting and drenched in sweat turned to the women, who all stared in shock.
"Lesson over," he muttered just loud enough for them to hear as he went over to his things. Holstering his guns, Dante gave a frustrated sigh as he inspected the large hole torn in his coat. Slipping the garment on, he flicked the blood off of Rebellion and stuck it onto his back before scooping up Tsukune in his arms and heading back towards his car. The girls soon followed, with Ruby and Mizore supporting Kurumu while Moka bent down to grab her Rosario, which had fallen out of Tsukune's pocket during the brawl.
When they made it to the car, they piled in and drove back to Devil May Cry; Ruby was carrying Yukari as the prepubescent witch was the lightest of the lot and Kurumu was in no condition to fly. When they returned to the shop Dante carried Tsukune upstairs while Ruby and Mizore helped Kurumu to the couch where she laid down.
"How are you feeling?" Yukari asked, worried for her friend.
"Like crap," the succubus moaned in pain. "I think I have some broken ribs," she continued. A few seconds later, Dante came back down with some clothes in one hand and a bowl of what looked like green orbs in the other. Setting the clothes on his desk, the half-devil went into the kitchen to grab a glass before returning.
"What's that?" Ruby asked in suspicion when Dante set the bowl and glass down.
"Green orbs," he replied as he grabbed one of the orbs, cracking it on the side of the bowl like an egg and opening it, letting the thick contents ooze into the glass. "It's a healing agent. I don't use them, but I keep them around for emergencies." He lifted the glass to Kurumu, who turned her head away. "If you drink this, it'll make you feel better," Dante promised. The blue-haired girl would normally not trust a strange drink from someone who just beat her within an inch of her life, but she was hurting badly so she took the glass and drank its contents, nearly gagging at the foul taste. True to his word, she immediately felt her injuries mending. "The same goes for all of you," Dante said, pointing the other girls that he had fought. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to take a shower," he continued as he stood up and grabbed his clothes before heading into the bathroom.
Ruby cracked a fresh orb into the glass and handed it to Mizore, who gulped it down and passed the cup back with a nauseous look on her face. The witch refilled it and handed it to Moka, who looked down at the cup's contents with apprehension. She thought about throwing it away, but the ache in her chest and abdomen prompted the vampire to drink the viscous goo. At the first mouthful, the vampire nearly spat the vile drink; it felt slimy on her tongue and had a strong bitter taste. Moka forced herself to swallow the disgusting fluid and immediately felt the pain in her body begin to dull. Hoping to finish the process as quickly as possible, Moka tipped her head back and chugged the remaining goo, trying her best not to gag, and practically threw the glass back at Ruby. As Yukari's injury was relatively minor, Ruby had healed her younger colleague's hand with magic on the way over.
"What the hell is that guy?" Kurumu exclaimed as she pushed herself up on the couch. "He did to Moka what she usually does to us!" she continued, waving at the vampire in question.
"He was fast, really fast," Mizore added as she unwrapped a fresh lollipop and slipped it into her mouth. "I think we were lucky that we managed to hit him at all today."
"And to think that he did all of that while in his human form," Ruby said, shaking her head in amazement.
"Human?" Kurumu scoffed. "Were you watching him kick our asses, Ruby? 'Human' would be the absolute last thing I would describe him as!" the succubus continued.
"I agree, but did you feel his youki in that one moment?" the elder witch asked. "He was more powerful than anyone I've ever seen before, even if I've never seen the Chairman's true form. I have a feeling that if he decided to reveal his true form to you, then none of you would have survived the match," she continued with a sigh.
"Moka, what do you think?" Yukari asked, causing all heads to turn towards the vampire. Moka scowled and pulled out her Rosario from her pocket.
"I think I'm tired," she said as she clipped the silver cross back onto her choker, sealing herself once more. Her body slumped over onto the couch unconscious as Outer Moka regained control and awoke a few seconds later.
"What happened?" she asked in a daze. While the others explained to the pink-haired girl what happened, Inner Moka was left alone with her thoughts.
The proud vampire felt few things beyond anger and annoyance to those around her, although she was building a sort of camaraderie with those her alter-ego called friends, as well as feelings towards Tsukune that she was unable to describe, but never before had she felt the sensation that she was feeling now, a feeling that she was quickly growing to hate: The all-consuming shame of failure. Never before had she lost a battle, even though on a rare occasion she was forced to accept assistance, and she never challenged her older sisters, knowing that they could effortlessly beat her. But this man, even with herself and three others bearing down on him at once, he beat them with hardly any effort. Even though Tsukune in his berserker rage had inflicted what would be a mortal wound for even the toughest of youkai, Dante had shrugged it off and beaten the Ghoul into submission as well. He had shown them all their places, and Inner Moka felt her ego shatter at the knowledge that she was no longer at the top of her own little world.
But as per the laws by which she had been raised, she would submit to the one that had proven himself her superior. She would listen to what he had to say, she would learn what he had to teach her, she would mend her wounded pride, and perhaps one day she would fight the devil hunter once more.
And if that day ever comes, she vowed to emerge victorious. Her pride demanded it.
And that was chapter three. Hope you liked it.
I originally wanted to write it so that the girls were completely incapable of touching Dante until Tsukune sucker-punched him, but I couldn't think of a way to do that without making them look like complete idiots.
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