Finally done with my freshman year of college! Hell yeah! Not bad, not bad at all. Makes me wonder how the next year will go for me. Of course, I'm going to have to get a job this summer… I just hope I can manage to get one without too much trouble; economy sure is tough these days.

Here's the next chapter. Hope you guys enjoy!

P.S. THIS FIC IS REACHING ITS CONCLUSION! ONLY ABOUT TWO CHAPTERS LEFT!

Chapter 23

The group made a run for it down the street. Behind them, the growls of several Assaults could be heard alongside the scrapping sounds of the Scarecrows as well as the moans of the zombies. All followed the group with a vengeance, the only exception to this being Them as they were only attracted to the noise.

"Don't bother shooting, just keep running!" Takashi said as he looked behind him briefly and saw Kohta about to turn and take aim with his machine gun. Kohta hesitated briefly, but put the gun away and just kept running.

Dante and Lady were keeping pace with Takashi and kept a look out for the sides in case there were more demons or zombies nearby that wanted to try and blindside them all.

"Damn it, there's many of Them…" Rei said, upon seeing just how many zombies were coming at them alongside the demons.

While the sheer numbers of Them did freak her out a bit, it did calm her just a little to see that some of the zombies seemed to be hobbling after the demons instead, no doubt due to the sheer amount of noise they were generating. And the demons were moving way too fast for the zombies to catch too.

Saya and Saeko, who were running right next to her, took note of this too. "At least there is a chance the numbers will dwindle," Saeko said, hoping that perhaps some demons will be surrounded by Them and be taken down, taking a good handful of zombies with them too.

As soon as she said this, the closest three Assaults roared and put on a bit more speed and moving much more aggressively. At first, they had just been running and hopping over cars and other obstacles that got in their way, but now they was brutally smacking aside any zombies in their way, the blows so devastating that, combined with the fragileness of the zombies' deteriorating bodies, made for much blood spatter and bone fragments on the ground.

"Careful what you wish for," Saya muttered at this sight.

"Just run faster!" Kohta yelled and the group sped up, the Assaults catching up little by little. The only thing that was slowing the approaching demons down were the number of Them that they kept running into. If not for that, the Assaults would have at least been within firing range. The group, mainly Dante and Lady, knew this.

So the two devil hunters decided to try a little trick. "Don't worry. We'll slow them down just a bit," Lady said to them, her hands taking hold of Kalina Ann, but not taking it off her shoulder just yet.

Lady looked at Dante, who nodded in response. Suddenly, Dante put on an incredible burst of speed, running straight to an abandoned car that was just a bit down the road. As Dante very quickly approached the vehicle, he slid, going right underneath the car. As soon as he made it to the other side of the car, he flipped back over it in an impressive display of acrobatic prowess, hands outreached to grab it. Once his hands got a solid grip on the top part of the car, Dante picked it up as he went on with the flip and with a slight grunt, hurled the car at breakneck speeds towards to the demons and zombies. As it sailed overhead, Lady stopped and turned around, taking Kalina Ann off her back. She took aim with it and waited until the car slammed hard into the Assaults in front. The car knocked them back into a bunch of Scarecrows that had somehow managed to keep a decent pace with them and before they all fell on their backs, Lady shot a missile right at the now exposed chassis at bottom of the vehicle. The missile struck it, making the car explode spectacularly. This combined with the explosion produced by the missile itself actually killed the Assaults hit by the car and heavily damaged the Scarecrows near the explosion. Zombies were blown into pieces and bloody mist as a result of it as well.

"Whoa!" the group said as a whole. They never expected the devil hunting duo to something like that, but it was definitely appreciated; the Assaults that were following them from the rooftops actually seemed to pause, stunned at the sight of their fallen brethren while the unharmed Scarecrows that had blade arms were having a bit of a hard time trying to get past the mess that the explosion made.

Dante, having landed perfectly after throwing the car, started to run again in the direction they were heading. "Hey kids, hurry up!" This snapped them out of their shock and they picked up the pace, not wanting to wait around for anything to catch up.

"Wow, Dante-san, Lady-san, that was cool!" Alice said happily despite the current situation. Zeke barked in agreement as he ran energetically next to the young girl.

Dante chuckled. "Glad to hear that," he said with a grin. Even Lady seemed to be smiling a bit at the praise. After all, it wasn't very often that people would actually compliment them for their work; usually, they complain about the property damage that was done, mainly as a result of Dante.

"Where to, Takashi?" Lady asked, deciding to get her mind focused again on this mess.

Takashi looked off into the distance a bit before answering her. "At the next intersection, go right!" He said. The group nodded and they tried to run even faster, but even with the adrenaline pumping through their bodies, everyone save for Takashi, Dante, and Lady, were starting to get a little tired; the past few moments were catching up to them hard and fast.

Takashi noticed this and worried slightly, but tried to reassure himself that the dock wasn't that far from where they were. Once they made their turn, it was pretty much just a straight shot all the way down the road. Taking the alleyways would have shortened this journey even more, but he didn't want to risk getting them all boxed in.

Takashi snapped out of his thoughts as he and the group heard a loud boom. He turned his head to see a Mega Scarecrow rolling down the street right at them, moving far faster than the Assaults up above were due to the momentum it had. Judging from the slight damage it had, Takashi concluded it to be the same one Dante knocked down earlier and now it was coming after them with a vengeance.

"Ahhhh! It's catching up!" Shizuka cried out.

Dante swore a bit under his breath and was about to stop running and charge at the demon instead, but didn't get a chance to do so when Takashi suddenly spoke up. "Turn right!"

The group, having reached the intersection, made their turn as quickly as possible, just as the Mega Scarecrow had managed to catch up with them. However, the demon hadn't expected the group to make such a sudden turn and it ended up rolling right past them as it started to try and stop itself.

The group would have taken some relief in this narrow miss if it wasn't for the surprise that awaited them when they made it onto the new street. Not that far down the road were nearly ten demonified zombies. Half of them had Scarecrows bits, namely leg blades that allowed them to hop about at a considerably faster pace than normal zombies. But the others seemed to be much more muscular than normal zombies. They seemed reptilian, with narrow faces and some scales showing on the bare skin that was shown. These zombies seemed to have made a meal of an Assault or two.

The group froze. Not far behind them was the small, but growing army of demons and zombies and now it looked like the demonified zombies were getting in their way. Things truly were getting worse for them.

But they snapped out of this mindset quickly for every second that passed, the demons and zombies were getting closer. The Mega Scarecrow could be heard finally being able to stop itself and began to lumber its way to them, not wanting to try rolling at them and missing again.

"Just move past them!" Takashi said and took off.

The group took off right after him, Shizuka almost comically being surprised at their sudden sprint and began to run after them. She didn't have to worry about them getting too far ahead because their movements attracted the demonified zombies' attention and the Assault-like ones charged right at them with surprising speed.

One went straight for Kohta, who cursed as he quickly pulled out the machine gun and fired off a short burst at the zombie. Thanks to the scales, the zombie didn't take much damage, only some of the bullets managing to pierce through the skin. Kohta immediately noticed this and while it certainly surprised him it didn't stop him from ducking in time to avoid its sudden leap.

Unfortunately, this brought the demonified zombie to land right in the center of the group, immediately forcing them apart as to not be attacked. The zombie began to get back up and looked over to Rei and Saeko, the two closest to it, only for Saeko to smack it across the face with her sheathed sword, taking it off guard. While it was somewhat stunned, she quickly pulled out the blade and swung right at its now exposed neck.

But the blade struck against the scales, barely nicking them. Saeko's eyes widened and she backed away. Her swings didn't simply pack the kind of strength necessary to get through the scale. The demonified zombie then got up, but was put down by a considerable amount of gunfire from Kohta, shooting it in the back this time.

As this went down, Takashi had intercepted the other demonified one and was currently overpowering thanks to it not being near the strength level of an actual Assault. It helped that he had Gilgamesh out as well. The zombie had made a grab for him, but he held it back by holding its arms. Takashi grunted slightly as he then twisted the arms as hard as he could and was rewarded with them breaking. Scales fell off as the bone under the skin broke and stuck out. A dark blood that had a light green tint to it seeped out from the open wounds now.

The demonified zombie would have been in horrible pain from this if it had been a normal, living human, but it wasn't and so this incapacitation didn't stop it from rearing its head forward to try and get a bite out of Takashi. "Whoa!" Takashi cried out when its mouth came a bit too close for his comfort. He was finding out that its narrow, somewhat Assault-like face gave this zombie a bit more of a bite reach.

He brought up a knee into its stomach, making the zombie double over due to the strength of the hit and it also raised it a few inches into the air so that its feet were no longer touching the ground. With that, Takashi took advantage of its now lack of footing and hurled it as hard as he could away from him and the others.

But he wasn't expecting the demonified zombie to suddenly flip around in mid-flight and land on its feet. His eyes widened in shock as it then propelled itself with a powerful leap. Takashi tried to move aside, but his reaction was a little slow due to the sudden surprise and so the zombie's broken, yet still strong arms made contact with him, knocking them both to the ground.

As Takashi began to struggle with the zombie on the ground, Dante had moved forward to put down the Scarecrow-like zombies while Lady was shooting down any zombies that approached from where they had run from. Saya was also helping out as well, having pulled out the gun that her mom had given her from one of the supply bags, and with some pointers from Lady, she was able to get some decent shots against the normal zombies, but the approaching demons proved to be far more agile than what Saya's shaky aim could keep up with.

Rei was standing in front of Shizuka, Alice, and Zeke, serving as their protectors of sorts while Kohta unloaded a short burst of bullets into the downed demonified zombie's skull. After blood began to slowly seep out from the several holes in its head, he and Saeko took a step forward to make sure that it was indeed dead.

"We got him. We finally got him," Kohta said, confirming what Rei, Shizuka, and Alice had hoped to hear.

Apparently, Lady and Saya heard as well. "Great, then let's keep moving!" Saya yelled almost angrily. She and Lady immediately backed away from the encroaching demon and zombie crowd and while a decent number of Them and demons – the latter thanks to Lady – were dead, the crowd was still coming and the Assaults on the rooftop above had finally caught up as well. They were just waiting for a good opportunity to jump down and attack as the crowd proved to be taking up took much space for them to take advantage of the terrain.

They all bustled about, heading off to their destination. "Takashi, hurry!" Rei yelled.

Takashi didn't reply, instead checking to see if the demonified zombie was dead. After it had tackled him down, he had managed to throw it off him and started to slam its head against the ground, tearing off the arms this time before doing so. It took several tries, but eventually the skull did bust open and blood and another liquid Takashi didn't want to think about slowly flowed out. But he figured that if a demon could be terrifyingly tenacious when near death then so could a demonified zombie. Thankfully for him, it really was dead.

He caught up with the group as fast as he could, noting the Assaults above on the rooftops looking ready to pounce now. "Shit!" he yelled as sure enough, once the group made it to more open area of the street, the Assaults leapt from their perches.

Takashi brought himself to a sudden stop just in time for an Assault to land in the spot he would have been in had he kept running. He sucker punched the demon as it seemed to raise its head in surprise at missing him and the Assault stumbled back from the blow. The teen then looked up very briefly to see five more Assaults coming down from the rooftops, three landing near Dante and Lady while the other two were too close for comfort to Shizuka, Saya, Alice, and Zeke.

Knowing that Dante and Lady could easily take care of themselves, Takashi charged at the Assault nearest to the three girls and dog, intent on getting it in a grapple hold. However, the demon sensed him coming and swiftly side stepped the incoming teen. Takashi's eyes widened at the action for as a result of this dodge, he was heading straight for Shizuka. He tried to bring himself to a stop, but only managed to slow his sudden and powerful charge enough to give the busty woman a chance to get out of the way, which she did.

But the Assault took advantage of this situation and slashed viciously at Takashi's now exposed back. The teen cried out in pain as the demon's claws sunk in quite deep. Blood spewed out from the claw wounds before they quickly closed up, which really didn't do much for Takashi as he was still hunched over from the pain of the hit and so left himself open for another one. The Assault obliged this with an overhead smash, planning to sink its sharper-than-knives claws directly into Takashi's skull.

The person in question managed to see the attack coming and brought up his hands to grab the Assault's massive fist and succeeded in doing so, albeit barely, the claws being a little less than an inch from his face. He grunted a bit as he tried to push back the claws and managed to do so just a bit before the Assault decided to try for impaling him on its other arm. But in an amazing display of flexibility and acrobatics, Takashi sensed the attack coming and managed to twist his body around the other fist and flip over the demon without letting go of its claws. With another grunt, Takashi used the little momentum he gained from the fast flip to pick up the Assault and toss it hard. Unlike the demonified zombie from earlier, the Assault had been thrown too fast and too hard to attempt a mid-air recovery and Takashi, Shizuka, Saya, and Alice watched as it crashed into and through a wall across the street loud enough to be mistaken for a grenade explosion if they hadn't seen this happen. Zeke gave a triumphant bark at Takashi's dispatching of the demon and Takashi couldn't help but shoot the small dog a grin before getting serious and motioning for them all to get moving.

At the same time, Saeko, Rei, and Kohta were bombarding the Assault that had also landed near the other three girls. It had been hoping to help its brethren out against Takashi, but the two girls and gun-toting boy didn't let that happen, Kohta having opened fire on it and not letting up. The Assault growled as the bullets bounced off its scaled skin. It then leapt to the right to get out of the way of gunfire as it seemed to instinctively know that it if took too many rounds, some may actually pierce through the scales and do some serious damage. The Assault then charged at Kohta, moving far too fast for the boy to dodge from, let alone track and he ended up getting smacked hard by the Assault, who had brought up its shield arm to smash Kohta's face in.

Thankfully for him, the strike wasn't enough to kill him or even knock him out, the demon having underestimated how resilient humans can sometimes be. It roared in anger and moved in to finish the job, but was stopped by a sudden stab from Rei. She grunted as the blade on her gun made contact with its scales and tried to push it harder in, only to take a step back when the Assault swiped at her, claws extended out. Like Kohta, she didn't possess the speed necessary to fully dodge and so the claws did clip her a bit, drawing blood across her side torso. She yelled in pain as this was her first time being hit by a demon, especially one that possessed truly monstrous strength, and she staggered back.

Saeko made her move, not wanting to give the demon a chance to take even a step forward as she knew she had no chance of keeping up with its speed and agility. She was a skilled swordswoman, but she and the others didn't have the experience that a normal human like Lady had against fighting demons and that was a major disadvantage that she clearly recognized.

The sword wielding girl drew her sword and tried slicing into the main area that Kohta had peppered bullets with, hoping that it had weakened its scales somewhat enough for her to cut through. But the Assault saw it coming and quickly moved to the side to avoid the sword. It then lashed out with its claws, but Saeko managed to bring her sword back in time to block them although barely. She nearly buckled under the strength of the hit and was actually surprised that her sword didn't break or at least chip under the blow; the hit was just that strong. She suddenly found her respect for Dante and Takashi rise more as they had managed to actually match an Assault's strength and even overpower it, quite easily in Dante's case.

With a grunt, she stepped away from the Assault, making sure to move her arms and by extension her sword away from it last as she didn't want to risk anything. As soon as she did, the Assault leapt right after her, but Saeko managed to duck under it in time. Upon landing, the Assault turned to try again, but at this time, Kohta had managed to recover from the massive hit he took, his nose appearing to broken now as blood gushed out. He stood up as quickly as he could and after pulling out the empty gun cartridge and putting in a new one, resumed his attack from where he left off.

The Assault actually back away a bit, raising its shield arm to protect itself from the bullet rain that Kohta was unleashing. However, Kohta crouched slightly, his aim shifting away from its chest and face, now guarded by its shield, to its exposed stomach, which he had shot plenty just a moment ago.

The demon actually let out what could be a pained cry as a few bullets then tore right into its exposed flesh and managing to puncture it just a bit. It roared and brought down its shield arm and instead prepared to fire off a few of its signature seed projectiles. It never got the chance for at that instant, Rei had managed to ignore the fiery pain in her side long enough to charge at it, bayonet on her gun sticking straight out and it sunk right into one of the holes now on the Assault's stomach. The Assault cried out once more, only louder as Rei's bayonet went in deep, evidenced by what sounded like a puncturing sound of an internal organ followed by a slow trail of light greenish blood oozing out from the now serious wound.

Saeko, not wanting to be outdone here, also joined Rei by rushing forward and stabbing her sword right into another bullet hole in its body. Unlike the short bayonet of Rei's, Saeko's sword of considerable length managed to go all the way through and go out the back of the Assault via the weakened flesh there. Blood gushed out from both the entry and exit wound, Saeko having managed to stab right through a much more important internal organ. The demon was no longer roaring in pain and instead gurgling its own blood, it having flowed up into its throat. That didn't mean it was going to just die easily. As Rei and Saeko tried to apply more strength to the stabs, the Assault brought up its arms and slammed them into the girls. The blows, although strong enough to nearly break a few of their ribs and in Rei's case, make the wound on her side hurt much more as well as dirty and slightly tear their clothes thanks to the claws, were losing its strength fast. The Assault was simply bleeding out too much to hit them anywhere near as hard it did earlier.

It tried to stay on its feet, but that was a battle of mind over body that the demon was losing quite badly. It didn't help it that Kohta came up next to the now hurting girls and shot several rounds into the Assault's face. The Assault managed to cry out, whipping its tail around quickly enough to smack Kohta in the side, disorienting him, before it finally slumped to the ground dead, the girls withdrawing their weapons in the process.

They were feeling quite tired now, adrenaline notwithstanding, but they ignored the burn in their muscles from all the running and fighting they were doing and pressed on, going off after Takashi and the girls.

Meanwhile, Dante and Lady had just finished up the three Assaults that had went after them. Dante had overpowered one with Rebellion before knocking it back and slicing it clean in two down the center, using more strength against it than he normally would, a sign that showed even he recognized when was a good time for him to stop screwing around. The other two had gone for Lady, the weaker of the two devil hunters, but that didn't mean she was weak herself. One had gone for her legs, but received the blade at the end of the Kalina Ann piercing right through the top of its skull for its trouble. It hadn't even had a chance to cry as it bled out before Lady pulled the trigger of his missile launcher as well. Normally, such an action would be suicidal given that this was done at point blank range against the demon and while it was on the ground too, but Lady was incredibly agile to say the least and was able to jump back enough to avoid the explosion when her missile slammed right into the Assault's bleeding head, killing it instantly as well as sending chunks of its upper body flying all over the place. the other Assault took some damage from the explosion as well for when its now dead fellow demon went low, this one had gone high and got blown back from the force.

Whereas the explosion utterly obliterated the dead Assault's upper body, this Assault was heavily damaged below the waist, its legs nothing more than slightly burned, bleeding stumps now due to its proximity to the explosion. Its misery was short-lived though for Dante immediately walked up to it and blasted its head with a powerful charged shot with the Coyote-A that he whipped out as soon as Lady shot the missile.

"Well what do you know, we're the last to finish," Dante commented as he looked and saw the rest of the group already running.

"Let's take that as a sign that they're getting comfortable fighting demons now, Lady remarked before she shot off after them, Dante following after with a snicker.

They quickly caught up with the group, Takashi calling out to them when he heard their approach. "Took you guys long enough," he said as he picked up his speed a bit.

"In our defense, we had more than one guest to entertain," Dante retorted casually. He caught up with Takashi and then slowed his running pace a bit. The group was silent, just running straight now while trying to ignore the sounds of the demons and zombies still a ways behind them. Dante rolled his eyes. "You'd think they be just a bit faster…"

"You sound as if you want them to catch up," Saya said to the silver haired devil hunter.

Dante glanced at the girl over his shoulder. "Nah, but it is kinda weird."

Saya raised a tired eyebrow, hoping that the port Takashi spoke of was not too far away now. "What do you mean by that?"

Dante adopted a serious expression. He didn't say anything, but Lady did in his place, her expression just as serious. "I can understand the Scarecrows and the zombies being slow, but there are still some Assaults in that little mob of theirs. They should be right on our tails, especially after our little distractions, but they're not."

Some of the group turned behind them to see that the Assaults remaining were keeping relative pace with the Scarecrows and zombies in the front of the group. Not that far behind those demons were two Mega Scarecrows as well, spinning right at them, but nowhere near their normal speed due to being surrounded by so many of their demon brethren. The zombies didn't slow them down much at all judging by blood spatter and bones that could be seen slightly flying through the air, but the massive demons didn't seem as eager to accidently roll over its smaller cousins.

"That is odd," Takashi said.

Kohta nodded, huffing badly now. "It's almost like they're waiting…"

Rei looked at him nervously. "For what?"

No one answered her; they didn't want to know themselves if it was something that could make all of these demons keep their distance, albeit not enough to comfort the group.

"How much farther, Onii-chan?" Alice asked, getting very exhausted now. The rest of the group save for Takashi, Dante, and Lady were now really feeling fatigued especially Kohta, Rei, and Saeko thanks to the hits they took from the Assault.

"Not too far," Takashi said, smiling what he hoped was a reassuring smile to calm the girl; she looked ready to collapse from exhaustion, either that or simply start crying due to how perilous things were looking right now.

Takashi looked away from the tired girl, hoping that he was right. He has come this way to the port several times before, but this time around it felt much farther away. He couldn't help but worry if they'd make it there before something even worse happens or if the boats there were gone or destroyed. If that turned out to be, then they were screwed as they'd just be boxing themselves into one area.

But as soon as he thought that, Takashi immediately dismissed it for when he looked down the ruined road, he saw the familiar gate to the port. "It's not that much farther at all! It's just right there!" he exclaimed happily.

Some of the others strained their eyes as much as they could to see if this was true and sure enough, they saw the same thing Takashi had seen. "Thanks God!" Rei cried, feeling so happy that for a moment her pain and fatigue disappeared. Saeko and Kohta felt similar as well.

The group picked up their pace, their energy renewed from the joy they were now feeling. They were just minutes away from reaching the gate to the port, only to receive a big surprise.

A whistling sound, one akin to when something heavy is falling fast, can be heard, bringing them to a dead stop. They were right to do so for something or rather several somethings landed not too far in front of the port gate. Dust had been knocked up into the air thanks to the objects landing hard and it spread far enough to make some of the group cough to get the dust out of their faces.

A few seconds later the dust settled and the group was shocked to see what was in front of them: a group of Blitz-zombies. What surprised them more was that some of the ones in front were familiar to the group especially the foremost one.

"I-i-is that-" Kohta stuttered out, pointing at the apparent leader of these Blitz-zombies.

Rei next to him dumbly nodded. "Shidou."

The Blitz-zombies had finally caught up with them, the main cause of all the noise around them. The undead Shidou seemed to look right at them despite him being practically blind. Yet despite this, he seemed to recognize them, signified by the very Blitz-like growl he let out.

His fellow Blitz-zombies responded to his action and growled themselves at the group. Then they leapt right at them, Shidou in front. And he was heading straight for Rei.

Whew, that certainly took some effort to think through! I had so many ideas on how to do this chapter that I ended up giving myself a bad case of writer's block at some points throughout the writing of this.

Well, not much else to say other than I plan to take about a week or two to plan all of the smaller details of what I want in the next chapter before writing it so that I won't have to worry about getting writer's block and forgetting what I wanted to happen next. So chances are it'll be about a month or maybe even longer before the next chapter is posted.

Anyways, thanks for reading and please be sure to review!