The ten giants right above them ceased to exist in an instant, the very essence of their beings destroyed so utterly that not even a single trace of them remained. Only their souls lived on, but only because he wasn't so cruel as to attune Hollow Technique: Purple to also destroy souls; Satoru was flashy and extravagant, but he wasn't cruel by any means. Denying someone or something an afterlife was just... unnecessary, no matter how annoying they were.
These giants were his enemies – not really. They just happened to get in his way. He was on the side of the rebels because he met them first. It was a matter of pride. If he hadn't made that promise to the little girl, for instance, in an act of pure impulse, then he wouldn't be fighting them at all, unless he absolutely had to.
The Hollow Technique: Purple had carved a massive, vertical tunnel that led directly above him, where an abandoned building had once stood – now reduced to chunks and ruins. Satoru leapt upwards and grinned as he was so generously welcomed by a hail of rocket-propelled bullets, grenades, and other things that would've shredded anyone else. He expanded the output of Infinity, however, into a bubble that expanded almost three meters from himself, keeping everything from proceeding beyond that distance; he couldn't be too careful, after all. Satoru had no intention of dying for a second time – not if he could help it, at least. Being dead sucked.
None of their weapons even came close to harming him.
The giants were not idle, however, and Satoru had to give them credit. Once they realized that their weapons had no effect on him, they immediately began a sort of retreat, covering each other with hails of bullets and grenades that detonated harmlessly. Their training was impeccable and it was clear that they were used to dealing with sorcerers or, at least, foes that were far stronger than they were. Yeah, if the survivors faced these guys, they'd all be dead within a minute – tops. Satoru moved forward. He had to buy some time for the survivors to find some refuge in the sewers. It'd be temporary, but every respite they'd find now would be brief, until the whole planet itself was liberated.
There were hundreds of them, but they'd made sure to scatter themselves about, preventing him from taking them all out in a single attack. Smart. Therefore, the best thing to do was to minimize his use of Cursed Techniques to deal with them. Grinning, Satoru surged forward, faster than the human eye could possibly follow, which was why it was mildly shocking that the giants did somewhat keep up with him – if only barely. The first of them, an Astartes with a massive fur cape, strewn over its shoulders, was sent flying through several walls and buildings with a Red-Infused Punch.
While such an attack might've been deadly for most humans, Satoru was pretty sure the giant survived it. He only broke through the armor, after all. His fist only barely touched human skin. Then again, he wasn't punching at full strength, either. Considering the heavy armor they wore, there was a very good chance that punching through them would result in his arm getting stuck in their flesh and that was disgusting but also potentially dangerous.
Right now, his goal was to stall for time by drawing all their attention to him – enough time for the survivors to maybe escape. Hurting and, possibly, killing these "Astartes" wasn't his priority, just a happy little accident that kept on happening.
Satoru crouched underneath a roaring, chainsaw sword – an awesome weapon, he'll admit – and countered with a punch to the Astartes' exposed side, a punch that just so happened to be coated in Cursed Energy. Satoru's eyes briefly widened as a surge of black lightning expanded from the point of contact – Black Flash – and the giant's torso exploded into large chunks of flesh and bones.. That had not been his intention, but he couldn't stop. Now that he'd made use of Black Flash, the chance of it happening again became much higher.
The giants were slow by any means. In fact, a single one of them could very likely stand toe-to-toe against a particularly weak sorcerer and maybe even win. A few of them were definitely as physically powerful as Yuji. The fact that they weren't exactly blurring meant that none of them were as fast or as strong as Toji, which was a relief, because fighting an entire army's worth of Tojis sounded like a nightmare.
Satoru pivoted and narrowly dodged the vertical swing of a lightning-cloaked axe, which carved apart the ground. He realiated
One, two, three, four, five – he stopped counting after the fifth one. Satoru punched and kicked again and again and again, a succession Black Flashes rendering several of the giants into bloody rivulets and bits of bone and plate armor. After the fifteenth death, however, the Astartes quickly adapted. A surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one. Instead of scattering as they retreated, they formed small groups of three; once that happened, it became much harder to harm even a single one of them. They worked in teams and moved in perfect unison. When one of them overextended, the other would cover for them. A few of them wielded shields clad in cackling energy, strong enough to withstand two attacks – once if he infused said attacks with Cursed Energy. Though, the shields broke easily if the Black Flash occurred or if he infused his fists with Red.
Satoru leapt back as a particularly large giant brought down a really big hammer, cackling with energy, down where he'd been standing, cracking and breaking apart the ground in a shower of dust and debris. Satoru grinned as he pointed at the lightning-wreathed hammer. The giants remained silent. "Sheesh... be careful with that; you might just hurt someone."
"Sorcerer..." The very big giant spoke, its voice distorted and heavy. "In name of the Wolf King, and my brothers whose lives you've taken, I shall snuff you from existence."
"I have no idea who that is." Satoru held out his middle finger at the giant as more and more bullets entered Infinity, hovering around him. Still his eyes narrowed. This was becoming tedious. There were more of them now. More than just hundreds. A great number of them was converging in the city, close to a thousand in number. Worse still was the fact that more than some of them were definitely Sorcerers.
Yeah, no; he was strong, but taking on all of them by himself – at least, without preparation – would only end with him running out of Cursed Energy, even if he managed to kill most of them. He had to end this quickly, before things got out of hand. His grin fell and Satoru held out his right hand before him, pointed and middle finger entwined. "Domain Expansion: Infinite Void."
Infinity unraveled before them, catching nearly thirty of the giants at once – a good number. Every single one of them froze, senses overloaded by an infinity's worth of sensations. He had a feeling these giants had enhanced physical abilities, which meant the efficacy of Infinite Void would be greater against them. But that was just a theory. He wouldn't be staying long enough to test it. After a single second, Satoru ended the Domain Expansion and quickly hopped into the open hole that led directly into the sewers.
That should hold them in place for the next five decades or so.
He'd bought them enough time. Hopefully, they actually found somewhere to hide in.
Satoru closed his eyes and searched for the Cursed Energy signatures of the survivors. He frowned a moment later. They hadn't gotten far, it seemed, but they did find some solace in a dark chamber that lay further down the sewers – deep enough that the giants and their advanced technology hadn't detected them yet. Or something like that. He had no idea what was going on, but something suspicious was definitely up and it very likely involved that wanna-be sorceress. But, she didn't possess enough Cursed Energy to actually do anything. Eh, whatever; he'd cross that bridge when he got to it.
Right now, the only thing that mattered was keeping that little girl safe; his pride and honor were both on the line, after all. And he was not going to fail again.
Did he actually care about her, though? No, not really. Damn his impulsive self for making promises to people he didn't know. And damn his good looks for inviting all this danger and excitement.
The tunnels were dark, navigating such depths would've slowed them down. So, that was why they didn't make it too far. They were literally walking around blind. With Six-Eyes, however, no darkness and no shadow could ever impede his ability to see. And, with his speed, Satoru easily navigated the winding waterways and tunnels. He found the survivors without too much effort, honestly. Their Cursed Energies were easy to identify. The only problem now was that they didn't have much time. He'd incapacitated thirty of the giants and killed maybe fifteen of them; there were still close to a thousand of them. And it wouldn't take too much brain power for them to figure out that the survivors were hiding in the sewers.
"I'm here," Satoru said as he walked right into the chamber, where the survivors gathered. They kept the shadows at bay through a series of burning torches that hung from the walls. That was weird. Everything he'd seen thus far seemed futuristic; didn't they have light bulbs? Eh, whatever. "Did we lose anyone? No? Okay, that's good. We don't have a lot of time. So, sorcerer girl, please start drawing the ritual symbol. Don't worry everyone, I'm going to make sure no one has to sacrifice themselves and yada yada yada. We're gonna need some blood, though. So, everyone has to contribute."
The red-haired woman did not argue. Instead, she simply began rallying the rest of the survivors, grabbing a bucket from... where did she get that bucket? Anyway, she grabbed a bucket from somewhere and asked everyone to spill a tiny bit of their blood inside. Did she have a talk with the sorcerer-girl while he was away? It seemed like she already knew what she was doing. Eh, that made things faster, at least. Even the children contributed, cutting open tiny wounds on their biceps, which wouldn't inhibit them too much. "Ugh, okay, carry on."
The sorcerer-girl, whose name he never asked for or bothered to learn, sat atop a wooden crate. She spoke as he approached. "I'll start once there's enough blood. But, the ritual will not work, unless we sacrifice someone willing."
Satoru waved her off. "Look, I've been a sorcerer my whole life and I know a lot about rituals and the mechanics behind them. Almost all the time, human sacrifice is unnecessary. Trust the expert, mmkay?"
He ruffled her hair and turned towards the red-haired woman – Mergle or something... Magpie? Eh, who cares – who was walking towards them with a bucket halfway full of blood. Satoru raised a brow as he shrugged and turned to the sorcerer-girl. "You can start now, right?"
The sorcerer-girl nodded. "Yes, I'll start immediately. Everyone, please clear the center of the chamber; I need as much space as you can give me!"
Once the rest of the survivors moved aside, Satoru looked on with narrowed eyes as the would-be-sorcerer began to draw elaborate ritual circles on the ground. The symbology she used was... unknown to him, Satoru admitted, but he figured out how it worked quickly enough, judging from the flow of Cursed Energy within the blood itself, the mechanism that directed the flow of power, giving it function and form. The sorcerer girl had drawn three circles – one for teleportation, one for a power source, and another one for a willing sacrifice. The idea, Satoru figured, was that a Blue Daemon would act as the power source, while the willing sacrifice acted as an anchor of some kind to stabilize and probably bind the Cursed Spirit; once the two conditions were met, then the symbols around the teleportation circle would enable an instantaneous transfer of matter from within the circle to an agreed-upon location.
The agreement part had to come from the Blue Daemon, which would have have full control over the actual destination.
"What a stupid fucking ritual circle you got there."