Chapter 26: war

The next day after, we were preparing for war. We had made it known that the spy had been Cheryl the entire time. Now every experienced grim reaper was going to be called back from the human world to help fight. I assumed Cheryl had figured her time as one of us was up as well. She had deactivated the force field that kept the city safe, and the only things keeping the demons at bay were my black spells. It was like a circle of repetitive landmines. Every time someone stepped on the trap wire, the entire wire would explode in roaring flames, over and over and over again. We knew that this wasn't a new spell to Cheryl, and that she would soon find a way to counter it and let the demons into the city. All the grim reapers that were unable to fight were sent off into the human world for safety's sake. It was more safe there than here, that was for sure.

I grabbed the headset from my desk as William walked up. I looked up questioningly. He nodded. This device would allow me to send a message to every grim reaper in the human world at the moment. It would be like a voice was speaking in their ear. We could use animal communication and use them as messengers, but there wasn't enough time, and animal reliability was doubtful. I spoke into the microphone.

"All Shinigami dispatch agents, report immediately back to the shinigami world. I repeat, drop whatever you are doing right now, it can wait, and head back as fast as you can to the shinigami world." I ended the connection and sighed. William and I both walked outside. Shinigami were coming out of portals near the library, all wearing a confused expression on their faces. I pointed north, to where a black mass could be seen. The demon army had finally broken through my last spell. I must say, it held longer than expected. It had bought us just enough time.

"If you want to modify your death scythes to make them better in combat, this is the time." I said. "It doesn't matter, legal modification or not. If you wish to add anything to your death scythes, do it right away. After the battle, you are required to turn them back the way they were."

Pretty soon, all the shinigami ran in to make death scythe adjustments. I was quite surprised to see what kinds of interesting weapons they all made. One had created a double sided axe that was nearly as tall as he was, another had made a weapon that looked so strange I couldn't even tell what the hell it was supposed to be.

I grabbed my death scythe and the army of grim reapers moved out to meet the demon army. We met in mid city, the place in the shinigami world with the high buildings of multiple stories. At the head of the army was Cheryl black and her coven of white cloaked people with the same strange symbol on their backs.

"So you still try to fight." Cheryl said, smiling.

"We do our best to defend our world from traitors like you." I said. "Why would you do something like this? Why would you betray your own people?"

"Betrayal?" Cheryl asked, and began to laugh. "You don't understand anything, do you, foolish girl? The shinigami society betrayed me! I am getting my revenge! I was branded as an outcast for no reason, as an impure shinigami from my very birth."

"For a reason" Grell muttered.

"I came to the point where I had the epiphany that all shinigami are impure souls! Those souls should be punished while those who are pure should rule! For a while, the shinigami world was mine. Then the stupid prophecy came along about the child of death bringing us down. There was no way I would allow all my hard work to be destroyed by a child of death! So I set out to kill everyone in district nine. However, it seems you three survived." She pointed at William, Grell and I.

"That was an error I didn't think would happen. Either way, you three die today. Grell, if you hadn't stuck together with Leah, I'd think of letting you live. William, it's sad that you fell in love with her."

William stiffened. "How so?"

"You could have ruled by my side along with her. You could have abandoned her and let her die and been with me instead."

"Somehow I highly doubt it." I said, my eyes narrowing.

"Leah's right. I'm not the type of person to abandon someone else. Nor am I the type of person to cooperate with demon filth like you have here."

Cheryl sneered. "Those demons will be the last thing you see today." She turned towards her army. "Kill them all! Kill all who dare oppose me!"

With that, the demons ran forwards and the chaos began. I ran around, hacking and slicing demons to bits, fighting my way through the crowd to get to Cheryl. I engaged her in combat, both of us circling around fighting each other.

"Child of death, you will regret the bullets you shot at me."

"I'm sure I won't" I replied. "I'd love to put some more holes in you."

"You won't get the chance!" She slashed at me. I sidestepped, flipping backwards and lunged again. The fight continued. I wanted to look around to see if William and Grell were all right, but I couldn't take my eyes off of Cheryl or I would lose. I could hear the roar of his chainsaw, so I was sure Grell was fine.

"My lady!" A voice yelled. A person in a white cloak tossed the golden oracle at her. Cheryl caught it and smiled, a triumphant grin on her face

"You lose" She opened the book and recited a spell. The book fired a beam of yellow energy at me. I dodged it and it left a scorching hole in a building. The building… I ran into the building, the beams of energy following me. "You can't escape us!" Cheryl screamed. I'm not running away. I smiled as I ran to the door and opened it. I ran out onto the roof. Cheryl followed me. I had been studying the previous children of death and what they had to do to activate their powers. I had a 50/50 chance of this working. If it didn't work, I would die.

I backed up until I was at the edge of the building.

"You have nowhere left to run." Cheryl said, aiming the book at me. "I'll give you a chance. One last chance. You can join our side and stay with us. You can have more power and more control. We can give you everything you want. Just come to our side."

"Not a chance."

"What other choice do you have?" Cheryl asked, smiling. I hated that smile. She thought she'd won. I smiled in return and closed my eyes. Cheryl's smile vanished as I closed my eyes. "Someone stop her!" She screamed. She realized what I was going to do far too late.

I took a step back and fell off the building.