Damn, has it really been a little over a month since I updated this? Goddamn… oops. Well, let's fix that, shall we?

But first…

[My Response to Reviews/Comments]

(Qoutev) TACO SENSEI: I am not convinced. Anyways, yeah, Aubrey is about to realize just how much of a mistake she made. It'll be very funny. Very, very funny.

(Ao3) Athing: I mean, he looks the part, yeah? Then again that could just be the art style messing with me. Either way, the man in the photo (Sunny's Dad) looks to be of Asian descent, so it would make sense if he's at the very least half-Japanese. Or, he could be half-Chinese, or half-Korean. We'll never know unless the creator confirms it tbh. If Omocat confirms it.

(Ao3) LilSkrunkle: Understatement of the century.

(Ao3) EvergreentheIceLeafDragon: Very, very interesting. Won't be for a while though. Like, a while a while. Also, neat concept but it probably won't happen tbh. I already have all the Devils, original or otherwise, planned out. Neat idea tho!

(Ao3) TrashDumpFack: : O … : ) !

Questorimperialis102296: My sister originally was going to draw an original cover for it, but she stopped. So unless I get really good at drawing (Ha, I wish) then that won't be happening anytime soon. Not unless someone goes out of their way to do it.

xxXXxxXXxx

When Sunny got up this morning, he didn't want to leave his new bed, and not because he was still dealing with his crippling depression or anxiety. Well, there was that aspect, but this was something else!

This bed was simply to die for!

A bit of context: he had everything delivered and unpacked last night, and thank god for that, as when the delivery men arrived, it was already almost midnight! By the time everything was unpacked and put in the right places, he had been dead tired, and all he wanted to do was to sleep. However, when he woke up this time around, he felt completely refreshed, instead of being a little groggy.

He theorized that had been because he had slept on Ms. Polly's couch. Which, compared to this master class of a bed, was garbage. Not to diss Ms. Polly, but he would never sleep on anything else ever again!

That aside, his morning routine was the same as it always had been: stare at the ceiling for about an hour, get up, put on a new change of clothes—aka the same stuff he wore every day, but clean rather than dirty—brush his teeth, have something to eat, do the laundry, then instead of going into his room like he used to do before "the incident", now he had a job to do.

And what was that Job?

Killing The Shadow Devil.

That was probably going to cause issues. Well, maybe not issues, but it was going to be a hassle. If The Wolf Devil had been as difficult as it had been, then this Shadow Devil probably wasn't going to fair any easier.

Well, difficult was a strong word. Painful was more like it. He lost an arm for christ's sake! Although he did regenerate it via blood drinking, that was neither here nor there. Not to mention with Kel now thinking that he was a monster—which he couldn't blame him for—he had no one to really back him up on this mission. It was just him, Grief, and their shared powers, which, while not bad, was not something he could always rely on.

If there was one thing that he learned after he had left his bedroom after the forced 4-year exaltation he had placed on himself, it was that having friends around meant a hell of a lot more than just "having friends." Friends watched each other's backs. Friends helped other friends when they were in danger.

But most importantly of all: Friends cared for one another.

And seeing as one of his friends had declared him to be a monster based solely on one thing he saw of him, he was now down on one of his two other available friends he could rely on, seeing as Hero was in The Big City at College. At least, until he had convinced Kel that he was still, well, himself, and not some monster possessing his body.

And also after he got to punch him in the nose for trying to wack his head off his shoulders with a metal baseball bat. Seriously, what was it with his friends trying to kill him as of late? First, it was Basil with the knife to the eye, and now it was Kel and the metal baseball bat to the head?! Like, seriously! What the fuck!

Sunny sighed, shaking away the thought as he looked down at his knife. The blade was a little bit stained on the sharper edge, probably from him slitting his wrist constantly.

God, that sounded awful out of context.

Actually, no. It was awful even with the context.

That aside, right now, he was sitting in the park, looking at the blade as the sun's light shone down on it. He saw his reflection in the knife, and it made him wince. It was funny how his powers activated through the slitting of one of his wrists, which was connected to a major artery in the body, which then in turn could cause a quick and painless death.

It was also a common form of suicide.

The irony in that was palpable.

He had no idea what he was looking for when it came to The Shadow Devil. Should he be watching the shadows? Should he be patrolling around town to try and find dark alleyways to see if they lurked there? It was a shadow, after all. Or, well, it could be a shadow. Honestly, Sunny didn't know, nor did he care.

Sighing, Sunny slowly stood up from the bench, as he watched several kids play in the park. None of them knew the dangers of the world, which was good. They could all live in peace knowing that. Not knowing that Devils were a thing.

Not knowing what he had to do for a living.

Sunny closed his eyes, before walking forward. He had to go find the thing he was tasked with killing. Sitting here all day wasn't going to help him much. And so, he left the park and began to patrol the town sticking to his idea of looking through dark alleyways.

Faraway wasn't exactly a big place. The population just barely tettered over 4,000, and as of late, it had been shrinking. Not many people were moving here. In fact, it was safe to say more people were leaving the town of Faraway for The Big City. Not that Sunny cared all too much about people leaving, but it did strike a chord with him.

Was The Big City really all that great that people would be willing to leave the quiet, remote town of Faraway to see the wider world?

Sunny bit the inside of his lip, as he turned a street corner. The boy yawned, drowsiness washing over him as he stretched. It was still only 10:30 in the morning. He wasn't used to getting up this early, having typically slept in till noon for the latter half of four years.

Whatever. He'd just have to get used to it, now wouldn't he?

As he walked the street, he passed by pedestrians, a few of which had to do double takes. Maybe the news of his "suicide" had actually spread across the town faster than he thought. No wonder why people were so confused when they saw him. He'd have to assume that most of the town knew that he had supposedly passed away.

Funny how a deal with a Devil changed all of that in a matter of moments. Or, well… days perhaps. Semantics if you asked him.

Dipping into an alleyway, he drew his knife, just to make sure he couldn't get jumped by The Shadow Devil, as he checked any dark spots. When he found nothing, he felt a little disheartened. "Seriously, I've been walking all over the place for about an hour now. Where the hell can this thing be hiding?" Sunny muttered to himself, as he stood up. When he did, he noticed that the whole alleyway had turned dark, and pitch black. Almost like it had been coated in the darkest colour of paint known to man.

Sunny blinked, then frowned.

"Oh. That's where."

Two giant hands appeared out of the shadows on each end of him, one with a pair of eyes, and the other with a giant open maw. Sunny shivered, a sensation of fear washing over him. God, he hated the darkness. It was like, one of his worst fears. And this thing was that made manifest.

But, it wasn't like he could ignore it. He had no choice. He had to kill this thing right here, and right now. For the safety of his town, and for the safety of his friends, he was going to kill this black stain on his town.

"HMM! I LOVE THE SMELL OF FEAR~!" The monster purred, as the two hands sped toward him like walls of a crusher. In a split second, Sunny brought his knife to his left wrist and, without hesitation, slit it to activate his Chain powers.

The transformation finished just in the nick of time, as the hands were inches away from him. He got into a crouch-like stance, with both of his arms crossed over his chest, as he lengthened his barbed chains out to the ends of his ankles.

He saw this once in a comic he had been reading, so he was going to try and replicate it, but swap out strings with chains.

The moment he felt the lips of the massive mouth graze against him, he whipped his arms outward, one flying into the mouth, the barbed chains stabbing into the back of its endless throat and out the other side of the massive palm, and the other stabbing through one of the eyes and out the back of the massive shadowy hand, as all the other chains slashed across the giant palms.

The chains dug into and through the monster's flesh, as he jumped upward using all of his superior physical strength to lift himself upward, before layering the hands on the floor, blackish blue blood spraying all over the place. Once the hands were layered on the floor, the monster's cries of agony deaf to the world, Sunny, with a monstrous smile on his mutated face, slammed down onto them with the heels of his shoes, digging into the blackened flesh, as more blackish-bluish blood sprayed around the alleyway.

The monster screamed in agony, and just as he was about to wrap the hands in the massive web of chains he had begun to produce from his arms, the hands freed themselves from his chains, and slithered away into the darkness, disappearing along with the darkness and blood that had coated the alleyway. Sunny felt a growl bubble up from his throat, as he deactivated his powers on instinct.

The bastard had the gall to run away?! And JUST AS HE WAS ABOUT TO FINISH IT OFF TOO!

He felt an uncharacteristic level of anger rise in his very soul, something he hadn't naturally felt in a very long time. As it bubbled and broiled, he felt his fingers dig into his palms, drawing blood as it pitter-pattered to the ground. His teeth ground against one another, as his shoulders rose above his neck. If steam could come out of his ears, he'd be an industrial factory.

And then, that anger finally boiled over to its fullest, as Sunny roared with a ferocity so loud, so extreme, so booming, that it caused the birds in the park a literal mile away to fly away in panic and for those manning their stores to look out the windows to see where the booming, anger filled voice came from.

"ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!"

It was gone. The Shadow Devil was gone. It had completely disappeared without a trace. It showed up, attacked him, realized it was losing, and fled like a goddamned coward! What made matters worse, or perhaps better, was that there was no one around who could've seen where it could've gone, not that that would've been possible, either. Sunny inhaled sharply, letting his frustration falter.

Just how close had he been to killing it?

Just how close was he to have beaten it?

Just how close was it to almost being snuffed out so that it could no longer torment the people of Faraway?

Oh, he wasn't just angry. He was furious. And now, this was personal. Something running away from a fight… for some reason, it was annoying him. It was pissing him off, and he had never been this pissed off before.

Maybe it was because he was getting paid to do this.

Yeah, probably…

And then, he heard the sounds of footsteps above him, which drew his attention to above him, specifically, over to his right.

And what he saw made his eyes widen.

He saw that someone was running away.

Someone had seen him attack and fail to defeat The Shadow Devil. He didn't know why, but a part of him wanted to give chase.

And so, he did.

Sunny didn't even think twice, as he slit his wrist again, activating his chain powers, and using one of his hooked chains to act as a grappling hook. Once he got to the top of the roof—that being of Othermart—he landed on the flat surface, only to watch as a flowing river of pink hair dropped down from the other side of the building.

Sunny's "eyes" widened even further, as he stood at the edge of the roof, watching as the ends of a familiar white and gold jacket fled into the woods just off in the distance. He knew that Devils could be contracted to others, but he didn't know the different types of contracts there were.

And he recognized that coat and that hair from anywhere….

"Aubury?" Sunny's distorted voice came out, as his powers receded.

There was only one thing that this meant, and a part of him didn't like the connotations that spelt out for him and his next possible encounter with The Shadow Devil.

Aubury was contracted with The Shadow Devil.

He had to kill The Shadow Devil.

So, that begged the question….

"What would that mean for Aubury?"

[Aubury POV]

She had run out of breath after she made it to a denser part of the forest, fear still having engulfed her body as her body shook, blood from her hands dripping to the grassy terrain. Her hands were covered in cuts and gashes and shook in both pain and anxiety. The reason why they were so banged up was because of her contract with The Shadow Devil, which meant that it wanted to see her bleed.

Which meant any damage done to it, would be applied to Aubury.

And it hurt like a mother fucker.

But there was one thing that allowed her to ignore the pain.

And that was what she had just seen moments ago.

"What. The Fuck. Was that thing," Aubury thought as her breath shook. When Mr. Wright told her that Sunny was apparently a Hybrid, Aubury didn't know what that meant. Now she knew exactly what that meant, and holy christ on the cross it was goddamn mortifying.

For context, she had been following Sunny since he went into town after leaving the park, and had stalked him till he got to an alleyway. She figured that she could jump him using Shadow without having to worry about any retaliation because she figured that someone being contracted with The Chain Devil didn't necessarily mean that they were going to be powerful enough to take on and attack literal car-sized hands.

To do that, she had climbed to atop the roof of Othermart using Shadow's Shadow Grip technique and had laid low until he looked as if he was defenceless. Once she found her opening, she used the hand gesture that summons Shadow, wiped the blood from her nose, and watched as Shadow closed in on the boy.

It should've been an easy knockout. It should've been an easy defeat. For all of her life, Sunny had never wanted anything to do with conflict, and he would physically break down if he was sized up for a fight.

But that wasn't what happened here.

No….

What happened was the complete opposite. Not only did Sunny draw a weapon, but then he did the unthinkable….

He baited Shadow into an attack, then he activated his ability.

Then she watched in horror and disgust as Sunny's head peeled like a fucking banana, revealing a literal cacophony of chains morphed into a vague head shape, red glaring, slanted eyes that looked more alien than human, and rows and rows of knife-length, pointed teeth that looked like they belonged to a reptile more than a human. His hands sprouted what seemed to be an infinite variety of chains, some barbed, some hooked, and some just regular old-fashioned chains.

He used them like he was some sort of string-based supervillain to cut up Shadow as if it was as easy as putting two and two together!

It was almost like he had been using them for years.

Like he was one with the ability.

One with The Devil he contracted.

And then… there was how he activated his ability.

He slit his wrist with a butcher's knife. And the fact that he showed no hesitation toward it… like he was more than willing to do so without even a hint of hesitation. It sickened her. Sure, she put him in a situation that made him act fast, but the fluidity of the movement, the assuredness in his eyes.

It was like he didn't care.

There were no thoughts about self-preservation in those eyes. Just heaps of guilt, anger, anxiety, and strangely enough, bloodlust.

It unnerved her, more so than her bleeding hands.

Aubury slumped against one of the trees, as she grabbed some gauze from her jacket pocket that she had stolen from home should she ever get injured to the point of needing it. Well, now she needed it and without so much as second-guessing herself, she wrapped some gauze around her hands—after disinfecting the wounds, of course—and securing the gauze with medical tape.

After the fact, Aubury did some breathing exercises to calm herself. And she needed it after seeing what she saw. And now that she knew what she was up against, she had to think about how to defeat it, because she knew she couldn't just rush in. Not after what she saw Sunny do.

She was up against a literal monster of a fighting machine. She had to somehow capture it. But how? How was she going to capture it? She could only summon some of Shadow. Not all of them. That wasn't in their contract.

If she was going to capture Sunny, she was going to need to take drastic measures. Her life was on the line, and she knew the cost of what it would take to summon all of Shadow.

"Shadow…." Aubury muttered as the small dark whisp appeared in her own shadow.

"Yes?"

"If I…. sacrifice my mother. Will you allow me to summon all of you?"

The Shadow Devil laughed, its smile going ear to ear—if it even had ears. "Oh, Aubury…. Did you even have to ask?"

Aubury felt a stabbing pain in her chest. For as much as she hated her mother, the idea of sacrificing her was heart-wrenching. She was the only family Aubury had left, but… at the same time….

She didn't want to die.

So… she was going to sacrifice her mother. And then… She was going to capture Sunny. She would get paid, and then she'd be able to rent a new house for herself without having to stay in that disgusting pigsty she called home.

And so, she went home early that day…. So that she could gain full access to The Shadow Devil, beat Sunny, impress Mr. Wright, and live without fear of him.

All she had to do was sacrifice the useless sack of flesh sitting on that couch back at home.

Even if it hurt her to do so.

-To Be Continued-

I'm sorry for such a short chapter, but this one is more or less a build-up to the final chapter of this mini-arc. The next chapter will be more action-packed and have more to it than just this. Till next time everyone! Peace!