Yo there guys! Not much to say other than this is the second to last chapter of Devil Apocalypse! Damn, has it really been nearly two years since I first published this fic? Time sure does fly when writing.
Here is the next chapter. Hope you all enjoy!
ONLY ONE CHAPTER LEFT AFTER THIS!
Chapter 24
The demonified Shidou growled as he charged right at Rei. Rei naturally froze up at the blur coming right at her, having not expected the man she considered her worst enemy to show up again, not only as one of Them, but a demonified one as well.
Shidou had evidently inherited a good portion of a Blitz's blinding speed, easily surpassing an Assault's. Combined with strength comparable to an actual Blitz demon as well and he was easily the strongest demonified zombie around, something that Shidou was unconsciously planning on showing to Rei, someone his undead mind somehow managed to recall upon seeing her. However, he didn't get the chance to crush her with his now outstretched arms for right before he made deadly contact, Takashi, with impeccable timing, threw himself right at Shidou's side.
Shidou had the air knocked out of him as he and Takashi went tumbling right past Rei at a diagonal angle due to the momentum that Shidou had built up from his lunge. Takashi quickly got up and went in for a punch, snarling at the man that had quickly become a very detestable person in the past. But much to his shock, Shidou actually recovered faster from the crash than expected and got up and lashed out at him faster than he could react. Shidou's huge fist slammed dead straight into Takashi's face, shattering his nose and immediately spilling blood across the ground.
Takashi went flying back from the surprisingly powerful blow, garnering the attention of the group. "Takashi-onii-chan!" Alice cried, Rei and Saeko looking just as worried as her. Shizuka, Saya, and Kohta looked about ready to rush after the air-born teen and help him when he lands.
Dante and Lady however had their attention focused on the Blitz-zombies for as soon as their 'leader' delivered the strike, they began to move forward. This drew the rest of the group's attention as well. "Shit!" Kohta yelled as he took aim with his machine gun. He knew right away that this was one fight they couldn't avoid; they were surrounded on both sides and in order to get to the port, they had to beat down the Blitz-zombies in front of them. Just fighting their way past them wouldn't be enough to ensure their survival.
At the sound of Kohta quickly reloading, the Blitz-zombie all fanned out and charged forward. Their speed, while not on the same level as Shidou, was still as great and even a little greater than an Assault's and so the group for the most part were taken completely off guard. It was only the knowledge that demons usually like to charge straight at them that saved Kohta, Saeko, and Rei from being split in two from the raging demonified zombies as they just barely ducked in time to save themselves from potentially fatal injuries.
As one of the demonified zombies, its hideous, rotting face still intact enough to reveal itself to have once been Yuuki Miku, a fellow student from Takashi's and co's school and Shidou's apparent right-hand girl, got back up after her failed charge at Saeko, Dante ran right up to her and whipped Rebellion off his back, an action that led into a perfect downwards slash. The demonified Yuuki growled as the massive blade cut right into her left shoulder. She would have responded in kind had Dante not chose to kick her back right after pulling his sword out of the now gushing wound he inflicted.
Yuuki tumbled back from the force of the hit, right back to Saeko who drew her own sword and aimed a slash right into the wound Dante just made, hoping to sever the arm. Right when Yuuki came to a stop and began to get up, ignoring the bleeding wound, Saeko managed to sink her blade right into the wound, but Yuuki's Blitz-like skin proved to be just as tough as an Assault's if not more so as Saeko only managed to cut several inches in, not enough to slice the arm off.
Saeko swore, a rarity, but it seemed rather appropriate for this moment as Yuuki merely shrugged off the extra damage and swatted Saeko aside. Saeko had the air knocked right out of her as Yuuki's Blitz-like arm smashed into her side and knocked her several yards away. She swore she felt something crack upon being hit, but couldn't be sure for she ended up quite disoriented when she hit the ground.
"Shit," Lady swore upon seeing all this. She pulled out a machine gun with one and a pistol in the other and unloaded a flurry of machine gun rounds into Yuuki, drawing her attention towards her. "Dante, deal with the demons catching up to us!"
Dante, who had been about to attack once again, paused for a second to look where they had run from and noted the demon mob getting closer, whatever hesitation they had before in trying to keep up now gone. Dante swore under his breath; demons always were good at taking advantage of situations.
Normally, he would have started a bit of an argument with Lady over how many demons each of them should take when on a job together, but he wasn't going to do so this time. Dante just gave Lady a bit of a mock salute and then ran off towards to the approaching demon crowd.
As soon as he bolted, Lady once more attacked Yuuki, aiming for her eyes with shots from the pistol. She knew that such a move really wouldn't matter given that zombies are practically blind already, but any damage counted towards putting the abominable Yuuki down. Lady was actually hoping that a bullet may be able to go right on through and pierce her brain to spare her one trouble.
Unfortunately, she was not that lucky as Yuuki, unconsciously sensing the potential danger, hopped to the right before charging forward at the heterochronic devil hunter, but Lady was ready for it. She rolled forward, going right underneath the demonified zombie and in the process of the roll, Lady took aim with the machine gun and fired off several rounds into Yuuki's exposed stomach. The demonified zombie actually howled as her stomach was still relatively humanish and as such was far more vulnerable than the parts of her that took after the Blitz. Yuuki doubled over in what could have been pain while still in the air and ended up rolling across the ground, but was able to quickly brush aside the five new holes in her stomach and get up despite the now slow, but steady dripping of coagulated blood from the holes.
Lady was also standing now and opened fire again with her machine gun, but Yuuki ran forward before leaping slightly to the side. She did the same thing again and again as Lady continued to shoot, moving not unlike an Assault normally would at times, but thanks to her speed compared to an Assault's, Yuuki was dodging the bullets much more often than an Assault would be able to.
Lady wasn't deterred by how easily her bullets were being avoided and actually ran forward a bit once Yuuki got within three yards of her. She put away her machine gun and then placed her now free hand on Kalina Ann, gripping it tightly. Lady then used her other hand, which still held the pistol, to fire off a few rounds at Yuuki's face, distracting her and that was when Lady struck. She whirled around, whipping Kalina Ann off her back with the hand that gripped it. The butt of the huge missile launcher sailed right into the left side of Yuuki's face, the weight of it combined with the surprising force of Lady's swing knocking Yuuki back and managing to slightly tear off the small part of her face that was still that of a very rotting zombie and not a demonified one.
Lady continued her whirl around and then put her pistol away, taking aim with the Kalina Ann at Yuuki, but before she could get a lock on the demonified zombie and blow her to Hell, Yuuki suddenly ducked and swiped at Lady's feet. The devil hunter was slightly startled at Yuuki's speed, but was able to jump high enough to avoid the massive arm, but not completely as Yuuki's arm grazed the bottom of one of Lady's feet, making her lose her balance and crash into the ground.
Lady grunted a bit in pain due to the weight of the Kalina Ann slamming on her side as she crashed, but she shrugged off the slight pain as Yuuki tried to punch her with her other arm. Lady barely managed to maneuver Kalina Ann in front of the incoming fist in time to block it, but the strength of the hit was still great enough to crack the ground beneath Lady.
Yuuki just kept her fist on top of Lady, pinning her down while she slowly raised her other arm to punch the devil hunter, who was currently trying to make the fist move. Lady was having no such luck and was about to attempt to whip out her pistol and shoot, but much to her surprise, Saeko, who had finally recovered from the powerful hit earlier, came running at Yuuki from behind and sliced as hard as she could into the shoulder wound.
The demonified zombie roared upon feeling the blade sink into the wound, making it even deeper and pumping out even more blood and she turned to swat Saeko away again, but Saeko was ready for it this time and pull her sword out of the shoulder in time to parry the blow, managing to deflect it away from her by slamming the side of her sword against the side of Yuuki's incoming arm.
Saeko then moved from her spot behind the Blitz-zombie and swung her sword across the side of Yuuki's stomach. The spot she struck was partially that of a Blitz and so the resulting cut wasn't much, but compared to what could have happened had she struck a more Blitz-like spot, it was enough to draw some blood and that was something that slightly raised Saeko's hopes. She went in for another slash, this time across the front of the stomach, cutting right across some of the bullet wounds Lady inflicted earlier.
Yuuki let out a Blitz worthy roar and took her arm off of Lady, allowing her to finally get some air as it had begun to suffocate her. Yuuki turned her full attention onto Saeko, who now stood just a few feet away from the demonified zombie, sword held at the ready.
"Are you alright?" Saeko asked Lady without taking her eyes off of her opponent.
Lady nodded as she quickly got back up. Holding the Kalina Ann tightly, Lady glared at Yuuki. "We have to take her down now. There's no telling how bad things could quickly be with zombies like her around now."
Saeko nodded in confirmation. She knew that demonified zombies were far more dangerous than normal ones, but she never expected Blitz-zombies like Yuuki or Shidou. They were even more dangerous than Assaults, a thought that definitely didn't put her at ease right now. The only reason why she was so calm now was because Lady was here to help her out.
None of the three moved at first, Lady and Saeko not doing so because they were thinking of the best way to attack while Yuuki was just waiting for one of them to make a sound to home in on. Several seconds later, Lady and Saeko took a step forward. Yuuki charged at the nearest one of them.
Meanwhile, Kohta and Rei were trying to fend off Shidou, who seemed almost obsessed with going after Rei. The two were practically pinned up against the closed gate to the port, Shizuka, Saya, Alice, and Zeke right up against it while the two remained in front to guard them in case Shidou changed targets. But he didn't and he proved to be relentless in his attacks and as a result, Kohta had a small gash above his right eye, the leaking blood obscuring his vision a bit as it got on his glasses. He also had bruises bigger than an average human fist on his arms and part of his stomach, his clothes were slightly torn and dirtied from how Shidou had been smacking him and Rei around the past few minutes and he was practically running on empty as far as stamina goes.
Rei was fairing just as badly as Kohta if not just a little bit worse, bruises on her arms from trying to block some hits, bleeding cuts on her legs from skidding across the ground from the hits, hair rather tangled out of place and a small part of her shirt was torn, exposing her bruised and bleeding left shoulder. Shidou made it a point to really rough her up.
Kohta and Rei breathed heavily, wounds taking their toll. However, despite all the damage they were taking, they were still able to fight relatively well as long as they pushed aside the pain so it didn't seem like anything was broken. Yet. And on another note, through teamwork, sheer willpower, and a little help from Saya and her decent aim with her gun, the duo were able to deal some small wounds to Shidou himself, bullet holes and stab wounds littering the few still human areas of his body. Blood poured out of some more than others due to how deep some were and while it didn't even remotely cripple the leader of the Blitz-zombies, it was still enough to show that they had at least managed to do something to him.
It had been hard though to inflict those small wounds, given Shidou's immense speed and strength. More often than not, Kohta and Rei had been unable to dodge his vicious swipes and punches, only able to land an attack after he had hit them, provided they recovered from the hits fast enough. Saya was able to give them more time to recover every now and then by trying to shoot Shidou in the face, irritating the Blitz-zombie and distracting him from his two targets long enough for them to go for his weak spots.
This led them to where they are now, Shidou wounded, Kohta and Rei more heavily so. Shizuka held Alice tightly, the little girl looking ready to cry while Zeke merely stayed in front of Alice, a snarl on his face. Saya was standing just a bit in front of them with her gun held tightly in her hand. Sweat rolled down the girl's face, mainly due to stress getting to her a bit and also having to nearly wave her arms around to get a lock on Shidou at times.
"Why isn't he moving?" Kohta whispered as lowly as possible to them as Shidou now appeared to just stand there a few yards away from them.
Rei shifted her grip on her bayonet gun. "Don't know," she whispered back. Shidou took a half step forward, startling them all, but that was all he did. He growled and began to move his head around, apparently looking for them.
Saya then seemed to figure out what was going on right now. "He can't see us, just like Them," she began to say quietly to them, "he relies on sound to find us and since right now, we're not doing anything really loud, he can't do anything."
"Then why isn't he going after the others? They're making plenty of noise," Rei said, gesturing quietly to Saeko and Lady, who now appeared to be getting the upper hand on Yuuki, Lady peppering her with bullets to distract while Saeko moved in and finally managed to slice all the way through the shoulder wound, severing Yuuki's arm.
"He mainly focused his attacks on you. I guess a part of his mind is still active enough to recognize you and want to kill you. And since he subconsciously knows you're not over there, he's not moving from here," Saya explained in a whisper.
Kohta spared a glance at Saya. "So then what? We just wait here?"
"I'm nearly of bullets and so will you soon enough if you keep shooting him. We're all dead tired and he's not. If you don't want us to die, then yes, we just wait here, at least until we recover some stamina," Saya answered, glaring at Kohta to reinforce her words.
Kohta didn't say anything back to that for a minute before speaking again. "Just how many of these guys are there?"
Saya looked around and saw that there were two tangling with Takashi over a dozen yards away from where Dante was at, who was currently killing off a good portion of the demon and zombie crowd. Three Blitz-zombies were hopping their ways towards him as well. "Including Shidou and the one Lady and Saeko are fighting, there are seven total. Two are taking on Komuro while the other three are heading for that damn idiot," she answered.
Rei suddenly found herself worrying for Takashi. "Is Takashi doing alright?" she asked, nervous for him.
Saya didn't even bother looking to see if he was okay. "Don't worry. He'll be fine."
Takashi however, wasn't really doing that fine. At first, when he was knocked back early on in this mess, one Blitz-zombie came at him and he was able to kick it away as he got back up. When he had done so, the same Blitz-zombie came at him again. Takashi had recognized it as the guy that stated on the bus not long after this whole zombie thing started – a time that felt so long ago right now – that he didn't like Takashi and had tried to hit him. Though Takashi didn't know his name, his name was Tsunoda.
Tsunoda, now a Blitz-zombie, had charged at Takashi when he got back up, but Takashi, thanks to his experience with Assaults now, was able to relatively easy duck and hit Tsunoda with a vicious uppercut. However, this had attracted the attention of another Blitz-zombie, this one formerly a person that Takashi didn't recognize at all. When the second one joined in, Takashi immediately found the battle quickly starting out much differently than he had hoped, leading him to get roughed up a bit. Which led to now.
Takashi had no wounds thanks to his regeneration, but that didn't mean he was unhurt; the two demonified zombies had landed several hits on him and he felt each and every one of them. His clothes were dirtied and his shirt was slightly torn across the left sleeve and chest area, exposing his entire left arm and part of his chest. His silver hair had a bit of dirt in it too from being knocked down headfirst into ground by Tsunoda. Some blood from wounds that have quickly healed were splatted on the lower part of his shirt, his pants, and a bit on the ground as well.
"Fucking shit," he swore under his breath as he took a boxer stance, the Gilgamesh gauntlets pulsing a bit as he clenched his hands. Both Tsunoda and the other Blitz-zombie circled about him, waiting for an opening to attack as Takashi kept on moving around in a bit of a circle to keep them in his line of sight.
Suddenly, the Blitz-zombie lunged at him, but Takashi ran forward to meet him and proceeded to bury his fist into its already ugly face. He heard it crunch under the strength of his punch and couldn't help but be thankful that its face was still relatively human. However, that didn't mean that it was dead; the Blitz-zombie ignored the punch as best as it could and punched Takashi in the stomach. Takashi had the air knocked out of him and his feet buckled a bit, but he didn't lose his footing, not wanting to give Tsunoda a chance to join in on the attack. Takashi pulled his other fist back and slammed it into the Blitz-zombie's throat, crushing it like nothing under the force. The Blitz-zombie stumbled back from the hit, coughing up a bucket of blood as it began to roar. Takashi cut it off with powerful kick to the same spot, crushing in the throat further before delivering one final uppercut that literally took the Blitz-zombie's head off as a result of the now drastically weak neck. Blood spewed out of the neck as the head went flying off into the distance, courtesy of the strike having been an a slightly charged one.
"One down, one to go," Takashi thought. He was pleasantly surprised at how weak that Blitz-zombie turned out to be, chalking it up to it having not eaten much of a Blitz and therefore didn't end up as strong as the other Blitz-zombies.
However, he didn't get a chance to further enjoy the moment for Tsunoda ran at him, coming in low and taking him off guard and off his feet with a leg tackle. Takashi yelled out in surprise as he ended up flipping onto the ground and crashed. Evidently, Tsunoda was one of the zombies to eat more of a Blitz and power up.
Tsunoda didn't give the silver haired teen a chance to try and get back on his feet, jumping high into the air and dive bombing right into Takashi's back. This had the effect of creating a large crater beneath Takashi, easily several yards in diameter and a few feet deep thanks to the height of the jump and momentum Tsunoda built up. Takashi spat out a considerable amount of blood due to effectively having his back smash right in and was unable to immediately try and move. This gave Tsunoda time to get off of Takashi, grab him by the leg with one of his massive Blitz-like hands and hurl him into the air several yards. When Takashi started sailing down, Tsunoda jumped and punched him hard in the side of the head, bloodying Takashi's ear and sending him flying back down to the ground.
He hit the ground hard and his body ended up skipping like a stone across it until he managed to bring himself to a stop by rolling. He looked up just in time to see Tsunoda land and run right him. When he was close enough, Takashi went for a leg sweep, the attack's speed amped by the slightly charged Gilgamesh grieve, but Tsunoda proved to be fast enough to react to it, rolling in the direction it was going in to avoid it. Tsunoda then tried to punch Takashi in the side of his ribs, but Takashi brought up his hand and actually caught the incoming fist, but it wasn't easy as the punch was strong enough to match the kind of power Gilgamesh granted him.
Takashi pushed the fist back, putting his body weight into it and Tsunoda stumbled back enough for Takashi to get some space. But that space between didn't remain for long as Takashi then went forward and sunk a knee into Tsunoda's gut followed by charging up both gauntlet covered fists and smashing them into the Blitz-zombie's now exposed back.
Now it was Tsunoda that found himself in the middle of a crater, one that formed just now from Takashi's hit and it was just as big as the one Takashi had been in not even half a minute ago. Unlike Tsunoda, who had grabbed and flung him, Takashi opted for something else against the downed opponent: repeated blows to the back of his skull. He charged up his right fist as much as he could and brought it down on Tsunoda's head, the impact creating a sickening crunch as it slightly caved in the back of Tsunoda's Blitz-like skull and made the crater a bit bigger. Takashi now charged up his left fist and did the same thing, with the same results only this time, the punch drew blood from Tsunoda's head.
Takashi would have felt a bit relieved that Tsunoda may now be dead with just a few more punches, but that wasn't so for before he could do it a third time, Tsunoda moved his head to the left, narrowly avoiding Takashi's fist. Faster than Takashi could react, Tsunoda spun around the ground, almost like a break-dancer, only if a break-dancer wanted to try and kill someone. His foot made contact with Takashi's head, followed by the other foot. This knocked Takashi away and disoriented him, enough so that Tsunoda could get back on his feet, charge and slam a huge shoulder into Takashi's gut.
The silver haired teen went skidding across the ground, but still remained standing, having been able to somewhat tense himself for it. But Tsunoda moved in on him and tried to him in the gut. Takashi was able to bring up his hands in time to catch Tsunoda's incoming knee, but only barely. Takashi pushed back as hard as he could and the Blitz-zombie lost his balance a bit due to the sudden and strong push, allowing Takashi to sink a fist into Tsunoda's stomach as payback. He watched as the Bltiz-zombie doubled over from the hit and then proceeded to slam his knee right into Tsunoda's now bowed head, the strike considerably faster than normal as he had charged up the grieve on his foot a bit to boost it.
This had the effect of knocking Tsunoda several feet into the air easily. He didn't stay airborne for long though, for Takashi leapt right above and dropkicked his opponent right in the face. He felt it crack under the force and blood flew out from Tsunoda's nose before he went barreling to the ground, which he hit hard.
The Blitz-zombie roared as he went bouncing across the ground a bit, leaving small craters at the spots he hit. Takashi landed just in time for Tsunoda to start getting back up. "Let's get this over with!" he said and then charged at Tsunoda.
As he did all this, Dante was currently having a bit of fun with the demons and zombies that had been following them like bloodhounds. During the time they had been occupied by the Assault-zombies and now the blitz-zombies, normal ones have managed to appear, attracted by the noise and now Dante had to watch out for any that got too close. The last thing the group needed was a zombie amped up by his power.
Dante was currently being surrounded by two Assaults and three Scarecrows, one of which had a leg blade, and other demons were quickly approaching. This would have had anyone else wetting themselves at being surrounded by such deadly creatures, but not Dante. He merely smirked and readied Rebellion. "Bring it!" he said.
At this, one Assault launched three of its seeds at him while the other moved in on Dante from the opposite direction. Dante waited slashed one seed out of the air and rather than do the same to the other two, he did a backflip over the incoming Assault from behind. Landing quickly, he booted the Assault right in the back, knocking right into the seeds. It cried out in a bit of pain as the objects struck its face and chest hard, hard enough to bruise the demon.
Dante didn't give it a chance to recover as he charged then charged forward with a Stinger, putting much more power into the attack than he normally did. Not even a second after performing the attack, Rebellion made contact with the Assault, piercing it right through the back and coming out the middle of the Assault's chest. It roared out in immense pain as blood flew out from both the entry and exit wound a bit, albeit a bit. That changed when Dante immediately pulled out the massive blade in order to block the other Assault, who had roared in anger at its hurt comrade and charged at the devil hunter, ignoring the now massive amount of greenish blood that spurted right out of the open wound. This prompted a last cry of pain out of the Assault before it fell to the ground dead. Even demons couldn't survive losing too much blood.
Dante pushed back the attacking Assault just in time for the Scarecrow to leap into the air and attempt to come right down and skewer him. The devil hunter, rather than dodge the attack, chose to meet it head on by swinging Rebellion at the Scarecrow's blade leg. The two clashed for the briefest of seconds before Rebellion overpowered the blade leg and proceeded to actually shatter it, prompting the black blood of the Scarecrow to spurt out a bit of the now stump of a leg.
The Scarecrow then fell pathetically to the ground and moaned, but was cut off by Dante, who whipped out the Coyote-A and blasted it in the face with a charged shot. The powerful shotgun blast completely blew off the demon's face, killing it instantly.
Had anyone from the group been watching this, they'd be surprised to see how easily Dante was killing the demons so far compared to earlier encounters with them. But Dante, despite the smirk still present on his face, knew that the situation was bad, very bad and as such wasn't exactly using the kiddie gloves against the still incoming mob of demons and zombies. And it seemed as if both of the unnatural sides have unconsciously struck a truce; demons and zombies weren't attacking each other anymore, instead just keeping a steady pace towards Dante. The only thing that they did to one another was just slow each other down due to how bunched together they all were. Which worked just fine for Dante; it made killing them easier.
Some zombies near the front of the crowd managed to move forward and started to hobble towards Dante, but he didn't even bother letting them get several steps towards him as he whipped out Ebony and Ivory and started shooting. He ignored the bit of blood that went flying from their skulls and put away the twin guns before holding Rebellion in a reverse grip.
"Come on!" he yelled at the group as several Scarecrows started walking over the bodies of the fallen zombies, ten other zombies and several Assaults falling behind. The Mega Scarecrow from the beginning of the chase wasn't too far behind the advancing demons and zombies and off in the distance behind it, another Mega Scarecrow could be seen coming. The closest one, which had been lumbering forward, stopped and spread its legs out with two of its blade arms raised.
Dante recognized its pose; it was about to try and jump over the demons and zombies in its way to try and crush him under its body. He wasn't about to let that happen. He gripped Rebellion tighter and in doing so, it began to glow a fierce blood red. A few of the Assaults behind the zombies started to run forward while another prepared to fire off some seeds. The Scarecrows for their part, tried to pick up their pace, but all of this was for naught as Dante then performed his Drive attack, swinging his sword with an unbelievable amount of force forward. A red wave of sheer energy launched forward at the incoming enemies, who were too slow to dodge it, though some Assaults were able to raise their shield arms in time to try and block it. Unfortunately for them, their shields made no difference as the wave cut them like a hot knife through butter, splattering their blood and the blood of the zombies and Scarecrows all over the place. Some of the blood even mixed together to form something that Dante unconsciously referred to as a weird swamp in the middle of the street.
The Drive attack was such that it cut down all demons and zombies between Dante and the Mega Scarecrow. The Mega Scarecrow itself was also hit, but was considerably more resilient than its smaller brethren, and so it survived the attack, albeit with a diagonal gash across its front, black blood spewing out. It cried in pain and stumbled back. Dante chuckled. "Nice new look you got going for you. Suits you," he taunted. However, that was when the three Blitz-zombies that was heading for him earlier suddenly decided to attack.
The Blitz-zombies had actually been there, not far behind Dante for just half a minute or so, but didn't bother attacking, unconsciously deciding in their rotten, undead minds to attack when the devil hunter relaxed his guard. Which was now. One charged right at him from behind and Dante barely sensed him in time to whirl around and block an incoming punch with the flat side of Rebellion. The Blitz-zombie was considerably stronger than the one that Takashi had easily dispatched, but was still nothing compared to a real Blitz, a fact that was shown by Dante easily knocking it back. However, one of the other Blitz-zombies came at Dante from the side in the form of a tackle. The tackle actually connected and the Blitz-zombie managed to push Dante back a bit before Dante brought Rebellion down on one of its arms, slicing cleanly off and then proceeded to slam an elbow into its back followed by a knee to the stomach and then pulling out Coyote-A to blast it in the face. This didn't kill the Blitz-zombie, but it got him off of Dante.
But the first Blitz-zombie along with the third one, a female that had her shirt torn open from her metamorphosis from a normal zombie to a demonified, exposing her now grotesque looking breasts, both charged at Dante, the male one slamming into his back while the female one jumped over Dante, her foot kicking him in the back of the head as she did so. Upon landing, she slammed right into Dante's stomach, depriving him of air momentarily. But Dante shrugged it off as best as he could, having taken much stronger hits in the past. He looked down at the female Blitz-zombie and his eye twitched. "Never thought I'd see the day where I'd actually like a girl to cover up," he muttered upon seeing her twisted, somewhat sagging breasts.
He got over this sight quickly though and pushed her away before back flipping over the male one tackling him from behind and midway through the flip, he attempted to skewer him with Rebellion. Much to his surprise, the Blitz-zombie was fast enough to dodge to the left, avoiding the blade, but did get slightly grazed. Dante landed and then went in for a slice across the torso, but was interrupted by the other male Blitz-zombie, who tried to blindside the devil hunter. Dante swore, getting pissed at how persistent these Blitz-zombies were proving to be. He leapt away and put Rebellion back on his back and prepared to pull out a different Devil Arm, something he hasn't done since his fight at the mall with the Blitz due to enemies since then being relatively weak. But even he could tell that things called for some more variety of attacks here.
Dante was about to summon Pandora, but at that moment, the Mega Scarecrow chose to come rolling right at him, forcing the Blitz-zombies to move aside to avoid being crushed. Dante swore once more quite colorfully and sidestepped the massive demon as he pulled out Pandora. He whirled the deadly suitcase around above his head for the briefest of seconds before activating PF422: Grief. As soon as the suitcase transformed into the deadly disc-like form, Dante hurled it with great force at the Mega Scarecrow and watched as it started to spin around the demon, slicing it nearly a dozen times at rapid speeds before quickly returning to Dante, whose right hand was outreached to catch it.
The Mega Scarecrow groaned, having several new cuts on its large body, some of which being across its thin limbs, putting the demon at risk of losing a few if it made a wrong move. Dante decided he could put it down for good in just a bit as he heard the Blitz-zombies coming along with the demons and zombies still standing after the Drive attack and the Mega Scarecrow's rolling. He spun around, Pandora morphing once more, this time into its PF594: Argument form. Dante took aim at the three Blitz-zombies once firmly seated in the now mobile missile battery and fired. The closest Blitz-zombie dodged to the right as Pandora fired off several missiles at it, only for two to deviate from their straight course and go right for the Blitz-zombie. It cried out as the missiles struck head on, the resulting explosion of said objects blowing off half of its body. Its head was still intact, but it was far too damaged now to be of any threat. The other two also attempted to dodge, the female one leaping over one missile heading for her, but the missile flipped itself over and struck the female right in the back, the explosion blowing a big hole through her torso big enough for a child to curl up in. The female roared and started stumbling forward only for it to regain its balance for a brief second before collapsing. The last Blitz-zombie leapt back and then rolled to the side, but the missile persisted in following it and after lunging forward towards Dante was the missile able to catch up with its target and blast off its head, sending very small pieces of its skull towards the devil hunter, who took a few steps back to avoid getting it on his shoes.
Dante then put Pandora away for the moment and rushed forward to put the last two Blitz-zombies down for good, first heading straight for the female. He whipped Rebellion right off his back and with clean motion, cleaved the female straight in two. He didn't even give its now dead body enough time to split into its two bloody halves before running towards the male one and did an upwards swing that deprived him of the top part of his head.
The top part of the head didn't even sail that far through the air before the Mega Scarecrow decided to just forget about its critical wounds and jump high, intent on taking down the devil hunter even if it meant losing a limb or two in the process. Dante noticed its shadow on the ground and proceeded to whip out Pandora again, changing it into its PF398: Revenge form. Pandora quickly shifted into the powerful laser cannon and Dante just as quickly took aim at the now falling Mega Scarecrow. "Good night ugly," he said as he fired. The Mega Scarecrow actually seemed to give a look of fright and whimpered just before the beam struck it in the bottom, blowing a huge hole right through the demon. The wound was cauterized due to the intense heat of the blast and so no blood flowed out, but that didn't change the fact that the massive damage it delivered was enough to end the demon for good.
The Mega Scarecrow's body fell to the ground with a heavy thud, a blade launching out of its body to try and impale Dante, who just deflected to the side with Rebellion. He then turned after that to still see a considerable amount of demons and zombies heading for him. His eye twitched at just how many there were. It seemed like when he took down the Blitz-zombies and Mega Scarecrow, at least a dozen new demons, mainly Assaults and blade armed Scarecrows showed up along with a handful of zombies. He could even see several Scarecrow-like zombies off in the distance, hobbling their way towards him.
Dante sighed. "What is this place? The bloody palace?" he wondered aloud. Then again, this was a city they were in so it was expected for there to be so many demons and zombies around, he realized immediately after his words.
He looked at the now rapidly moving Assaults, now that the Mega Scarecrow was out of the way along with the frontline demons and zombies that Dante had taken out. "Looks like I'm going to have to do it huh?" Dante said to himself as he brought out a different Devil Arm: the twin swords Agni and Rudra.
"Look brother, Master Dante has decided to finally use us in battle!" Agni said. As if in excitement, the talking blade pulse very briefly with fire.
His sword brother Rudra seemed to be feeling a little elated too, evidenced by the strong wind that swirled around the sword. "Indeed! It has been a long time since we have last been used!" Rudra responded.
"A very long time!" Agni agreed.
Dante, annoyed by their talking, spun the sword around and smacked the talking hilts together. "Enough already! You're already giving me a headache! Let's just get this done!" Dante said in all seriousness; it never ceased to amaze him how these two could frustrate him with their always excited and somewhat formal manner of speaking. That and he hates people talking more than him, something they proved to be by their first encounter with the devil hunter.
"As you wish, Master Dante!" the two said in unison before falling silent.
Dante thanked his lucky stars that they became quiet so quickly; it would seem they did listen to him sometimes. "All right let's get this over with fast," he muttered and he charged at the incoming mob, Assaults roaring and Scarecrows letting out shrill battle cries of their own at the devil hunter.
Dante plowed right through the new front line of demons and zombies, decapitating two zombies at once with a horizontal slash with Rudra while stabbing a Scarecrow nearby with Agni. Blood spilled from the wounds inflicted, but Dante ignored this and whirled around to face a few Assaults. He went in low and then slammed the pommel of Agni right into the chin of an Assault before slicing upwards with Rudra, cutting open the demon's stomach and spilling out its innards. The devil hunter then jumped back to avoid another Assault jumping over its now deceased brethren and shoot a seed at close range at Dante, but Dante pulled up both blades in time to block the seed and then moved a little closer before performing a downwards cross slash on the demon, leaving an x-shaped wound on the Assault's chest. The two swords actually gave a bit of a cheer at being used to slaughter enemies like this, but Dante smacked the two together again to get them to shut up before flipping over the wounded Assaults and delivering a deadly flurry of diagonal and horizontal slashes across its back, cutting the Assault so much that the new wounds quickly took their toll and it fell forward dead.
Dante was about to turn and deal with last Assault, but it got the jump on him, hitting him as hard as it could in the side of his torso with a fierce right hook. At the same time, Scarecrows approached and as Dante staggered forward from the hit, two of the nearest Scarecrows moved forward, one intent to slice his head off with its arm blade while the other, which had a leg blade, moved forward to do a back flip with its blade, hoping to open up Dante's stomach. Dante recovered fast enough to block the Leg bladed Scarecrow with Rudra while bringing Agni up to parry the slice for his neck before moving a bit forward, spinning around the Leg bladed Scarecrow to get at the one with an arm blade. With one swift motion, he spun Agni around and cleaved the demon in two with a diagonal attack. The Scarecrow stumbled back crying in pain as black blood spurted out from the wound.
"Alright, enough of this," Dante thought. He was starting to feel a bit overwhelmed here with the vast number of enemies he was going up against. He was thankful that no zombies had been able to get close to him just now otherwise they might have been able to get a bite out of him while had been staggering from the Assault's hit.
Dante was about to be hit by some surrounding Scarecrows and the Assault from earlier along with four new ones that joined it planned to get in on the action as well, but they were all blown back by a powerful explosion of energy; Dante had activated his Devil Trigger just as the attacks were about to land. There amidst the surrounding and still growing crowd stood Dante in his Devil form, a reptilian-like being with spiky edges on his head, cracks that seemed to radiate energy on his chest and his signature red coat appeared to take on a more synthetic look, some parts of it looking like something akin to fins. "Alright, it's time to finish this crazy party," Dante said, his voice sounding a bit distorted, but nowhere near the level of some other demons.
Dante then held Agni and Rudra above his head and started to spin them around violently, Agni aglow with powerful flames that quickly began to spin outwards. Dante had just performed his Twister attack, the flames of Agni spreading out fast until they covered everything within thirty feet of Dante. Demons and zombies alike that were within range burned, their bodies now covered with the deadly flames, but Dante wasn't done just yet for a second later, he leapt into the air and flipped around so that he was upside down now and performed the next part of his attack: Tempest. A powerful gust of wind was then generated by Rudra and fanned out, blowing the flames outwards than they already were. This completely destroyed the demons and zombies already on fire, reducing them to little more than ash while the demons and zombies, both normal and demonified, that were out of range at first now had their turn at being made into charred bodies.
The other members of the group, despite the situation they were in, couldn't help but look in shock and awe at the sight of the deadly flame twister. "What's that?" Saya yelled out.
"Dante's finally getting serious," Lady said loud enough for them to hear without her eyes wandering away from the still standing Yuuki. The Blitz-zombie was proving to be one of the most annoying things that she has ever come across. Saeko nearby seemed to share the same sentiment.
"Wow, Dante onii-chan is so cool!" Alice said, stars in her eyes at the feat Dante performed. It was like something out of a superhero show to her. Zeke barked in agreement while Saeko looked on in amazement.
"Dante-san," she whispered to herself in a tone of what could best be described as affection or simply lust. The man just never ceased to amaze her, what with his confidence, his words, and actions.
Saya, Kohta, and Rei were just as amazed as the others, the latter two looking a bit slack jawed as they wondered why Dante just didn't do that in the beginning. Saya seemed to guess what they were saying if her sudden words were anything to go by. "Tch, typical of him to laze around before finally doing something," the short tempered girl said, though there was a small smirk on her face.
Shidou seemed to be interested in the devil hunter's power as well for he turned away from Rei and the others towards where Dante was. Although Shidou was blind, it looked to the group that he really was seeing Dante finish up his Tempest move and move further down the street after landing to attack the Mega Scarecrow far off in the distance.
Saya saw this as an opportunity. "Now's our chance!" she whispered quickly to the others near her, "try to get this gate open and to a damn boat!" she finished saying, mainly directed at Kohta who she usually told what to do. And he certainly didn't have to be told twice here.
The gun otaku spared a brief glance at Shidou, the Blitz-zombie still focused on all the noise Dante was making, before quickly moving past Saya and gently pushing Shizuka, Alice, and Zeke aside to try and get the closed gate open. "Hold this," he said to Shizuka as he handed her the machine gun he had in his hands. The busty nurse looked shocked that Kohta was suddenly giving her a gun to hold and was afraid of accidently shooting it, but Kohta didn't really give her a chance to protest as he thrust it into her hands before he tried to reach into his pocket for something that he could use to pick the lock. He could have shot it off, but didn't want Shidou to turn his attention back on them.
As Kohta began to pick the lock, Lady and Saeko were trying to finish off Yuuki. After they had managed to slice of her arm earlier, Yuuki seemed to try and dodge everything they threw at her, her speed and strength seeming to increase just a Blitz's would when they were covered in a red lightning shroud. Thankfully for the two of them, Yuuki had no shroud, but that still didn't make her any less easy to hit. Lady had taken a few hits from the Blitz-zombie, her arms with some bad bruises and her glasses had a bit of a crack. Her clothes were also slightly dirty, but not torn anywhere. Saeko for her part, seemed relatively fine as well aside from small cuts and bruises that now littered her legs, courtesy of Yuuki aiming her attacks low. But the two were growing very tired now and Yuuki wasn't. It was only a matter of time before they were too exhausted to try dodging or blocking anymore.
Yuuki took a step towards Lady who had a pistol in her left hand while the other tightly gripped Kalina Ann, ready to swing it at the Blitz-zombie if she got up close. Yuuki then charged at her and Lady started firing away at her as fast as she could with the pistol. Yuuki didn't bother to dodge the bullets as they were took weak against the Blitz parts of her body. Lady ran out of bullets just as Yuuki appeared in front of her, but she was quick to smack Yuuki dead center in the face with the butt of the gun, taking the Blitz-zombie by surprise so much that she staggered back enough for Saeko to rush at her from her position and slash Yuuki across the stomach. Yuuki roared as this was seventh cut she took the stomach and despite her rather tough body, the damage was accumulating now. It would take just a few more slices there to open up the stomach and have her insides fall out.
Lady seemed to notice that too for she quickly put away the empty pistol, not bothering to reload it, and instead pulled out her machine gun and opened fire on Yuuki's midsection. The Blitz-zombie sensed the danger and moved to right, going low to avoid the rain of bullets that Lady was unleashing. She weaved back and forth, dodging most of the bullets though there were some that clipped her backside and actually made some holes there. As she fired away, Lady moved closer to the Blitz-zombie and once she was within seven feet of her, she pointed Kalina Ann at Yuuki with her right hand while she kept firing the machine gun with her left. Lady fired two shots to Yuuki's left, forcing her to go right and that was when Lady fired her missile launcher.
Yuuki practically moved right into the spot Lady aimed at, but she heard the missile incoming and attempted to move back and was able to do a bit, but the missile struck the ground quickly and the explosion it generated was enough to severely damaged Yuuki, blowing off part of her upper right shoulder and a bit of her neck as well. Yuuki went sailing back across the ground, her head now an easy target for Saeko, who had moved clear of the Blitz-zombie and Lady once Lady had started advancing towards Yuuki.
But now Saeko was clear to move in and she did so, running at the down Yuuki and with a bit of a battle cry, Saeko did a something of a running crouch and once she was within a few feet of the still down Yuuki, she swung her sword right into the heavily wounded part of Yuuki's neck with all her strength and with the momentum she built up from running, Saeko was able to decapitate the Blitz-zombie, ending her unlife. Yuuki's head went rolling across the ground from the force of the swing and Saeko watched it go. Standing shakily to her feet, she couldn't help but smile at her and Lady having been able to overcome such a dangerous foe. Compared to when she first encountered demons, she was doing much better now, something that pleased her a bit.
Lady looked like she was pleased too, but didn't show it as well. She instead turned to go after Dante and help him trim down the numbers of demons and zombies even more, but this proved to be a bad move on her part; Shidou nearby had heard the sound of Yuuki's head rolling across the ground and somehow had enough sense to realize that it was down to just him and Tsunoda, who was in a stalemate with Takashi right now, the two boys dodging each other's attacks while trying to find an opening to go for.
Shidou recognized that things were going bad for him and just like when he was still human and had his full intelligence at the time, he right now felt this need to hurt the group where it hurt. When he had been human still, he had attempted to attack Rei at Saya's mansion, but had been stopped by Dante's and Lady's intervention. And right now Dante was busy with the demons and zombies and Lady was heading off to join him. His undead mind realized this and decided to try and succeed where he had failed earlier. Only this time he wasn't heading for Rei.
"Saeko one-chan!" Alice cried out as she, Shizuka, Saya, and Rei watched as Shidou suddenly lunged for the tired Saeko. Saeko, who had been looking away, heard the warning and turned just in time to see Shidou get within several feet of her and throw an absolutely vicious right hook. On sheer instinct, Saeko brought up her sword and attempted to block the incoming punch with the flat side of her blade. Her reflexes, although slightly dulled from exhaustion, were still great enough to bring up the blade in time to block, but the strike was powerful, far more powerful than anything Yuuki had thrown at her and everyone, even Lady and Dante who had heard Alice shout, watched as Saeko went flying through the air helplessly.
"No!" Takashi yelled as he watched from where he was at after having dodged yet another of Tsunoda's punches. He watch as Saeko came flying in his general direction and landed on the ground with a very heavy thud no more than twenty yards away.
Tsunoda took advantage of Takashi's focus on her to run forward and slug the teen hard in the gut, making him puke up a little blood. Takashi skidded back from the punch and doubled over a bit before collapsing on one knee. He grunted in pain from the blow as he tried to stand back up. "Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!" he said over and over, not liking this one bit.
He looked up from where he was at to see Shidou go from standing where he had punch Saeko to running right at the down Saeko, his huge fists intent on grinding the girl into a bloody smear on the ground. Shidou moved at a speed that easily surpassed that of the other Blitz-zombies and within a split second, he had reach Saeko. Rearing back his right fist, Shidou was just about to punch the girl to oblivion.
Takashi and the others looked on in shock that this may be Saeko's last moment and all couldn't help but feel helpless at the situation; Dante and Lady were surrounded by too many demons and zombies to do anything and the others were nowhere near fast enough to save Saeko.
Takashi looked at Shidou's fist approaching Saeko's face as she registered what was about to happen to her. He watch as her eyes widened in shock and he saw the fear in there. "No!" he thought to himself, though it seemed as if he may have yelled it too; he just wasn't sure anymore. He completely ignored Tsunoda who was slowing move towards him with arms extended out to the side, intent on charging at Takashi. And he did, but Takashi still ignored him.
"No! No!" Takashi thought over and over again. He was not about to lose one of his friends, not when they all were so close to getting away from this whole damn mess. He felt a power begin to well up inside him, one that felt both alien yet familiar to him as if it were always a part of him. "NO!" he said both in mind and aloud. At this one word, an explosion of power suddenly came from him, knocking Tsunoda back and even taking Shidou by surprise enough to make him stop and take several steps back from Saeko. Everyone else looked on in shock. The power that just suddenly burst forward from Takashi wasn't anywhere near as strong as the power that Dante emanated when he activated his Devil Trigger, but it was still powerful nonetheless.
They all looked on at Takashi, whose eyes now glowed a blood red. Behind him stood a spectral image, one that looked remarkably similar to Dante's Devil Trigger appearance, only this one was mainly black in color rather than red and was missing the fins Dante had as well as the chest cracks though it made up for that with more spikes atop its head in a manner similar to Takashi's wild, spikey silver hair. Its hands were that of the Gilgamesh gauntlets, also black in color and seemed to glow the same color as Takashi's eyes.
"Get back from my friends, you mother fucking bastard," Takashi growled out in a distorted voice.
Dante, Lady, and the others couldn't believe just happened, none moreso than Dante; Takashi had just awakened his own Devil Trigger.
And there we go! Yeah, I know I said that this chapter wouldn't be out for a while, but not long after I posted the last chapter I just got hit with a sudden thing of motivation for some reason (probably from listening to my DMC4 soundtrack after so long) and ended up just doing this chapter. And boy oh boy, did this chapter turn out good in my opinion. And long too, easily the longest chapter I've done yet; over 9,000 words! No DBZ pun intended ha ha ha.
If this sudden motivation lasts, I'll try to get the next and final chapter out relatively soon, but chances are it may be a few weeks depending on how things go. And I also have a bit of a one-shot that relates to this fic planned as well. I hope you guys enjoy that when I get to it.
Thanks for reading and please be sure to review!