Devilman: The Rebirth

by Nanto99

Akira had lost everything: his friends, his home, the love of his life and at the end his own life. But what happens when fate decides to give him a second chance at life? Now, reborn in a similar yet completely different world, watch as Akira meets new friends, old enemies from the past and discovers his new place in this world. Watch the rebirth of Devilman.

34. Chapter 34

I'm just gonna go all out and say that i had so much fun writing this chapter. Mostly because of the scene with Lilith that is a reference to one particular scene of a certain PS1 game that basically invented a new subgenre of 2D action games :D.

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Chapter 34: Ghosts Of The Past

With the truth of how the Devil Lady came to be and the role she unwillingly played in Asuka's plan to achieve godhood behind them, Akira and Jun were now running through the research facility's main corridor, with many doors on its left and right that led to various storage rooms, dormitories, rooms destined for research projects such as a culturing room and an operating room and so on and so forth.

Paying no attention to those rooms, never to be utilised again, the two devilmen kept running forward until eventually, after coming through another door at the end of the corridor, they arrived in the same massive dungeon that housed the many dozen cages used by Satoru's henchmen to imprison all the beasts they had captured, Takeshi included. However, Akira and Jun found it empty, devoid of any sign of life. All the cages were opened, their metal bars cut apart and on the ground layed dozens of Lilith's minions, all brutally torn apart.

A satisfied smile made its way on Akira's lips as it didn't take him much to figure out what had happened. He then scoffed in amusement after seeing a large hole in the ceiling and remarked "Mmph. Well, would you look at that. Apparently she managed to arrive her before us and free them all. And from the looks of it, they seem to have fled through that hole." referring of course to the Demon Bird, while gazing upon said large hole, that was a good five meters wide, figuring out that she blew it with one of her telekinetic blasts.

"I just hope Takeshi didn't let his anger get the better of him." thought the half-devil, hoping that the light green skinned beast put aside his grudge towards the Demon Bird for nearly killing him eight days ago. He coudn't really blame him for resenting Sirene though, given what she was about to do to both Jun and him.

Jun didn't reply to Akira's words and simply began to walk forward, looking at the various slain demons on the ground. She then took the time to take a look at some of those cells and much to her dismay, not all of them were empty. Some of them had the corpses of beasts, not slain by claws or sharp teeth, but by the prolonged lack of food and water. She had to swallow her saliva after seeing that some of the bodies were so thin and malnourished that they nearly made some of the starved victims of the german concentration camps of World War II look healthy.

The demonic amazon scowled in utter revulsion and anger, hiding her horror and shock at what all those people had been forced to endure. From the signs of it, some of those beasts even looked like they starved for more than ten days. And the moment she saw the partially devoured corpse of a beast that looked like a mix of a rat and a gargoyle, her eyes widened even more. Could it be….. that some were even forced to eat each other just to make an example for the rest?

"Those heartless bastards…. How could they have done this without any shred of remorse….." she seethed in her mind, while balling her furred hands into fists and clenching her teeth slightly, her resentement and hatred towards the monsters responsible for this atrocity, the same ones who took away her beloved Kazumi from her, growing even more. Killing other humans was one thing but their own kind? And for what, for refusing to accept their nature and instead choosing to hold onto their humanity?! Was their imprisonment in those concentration camps not enough? Why did they have to endure this horror too?!

They had to be stopped here and now. They could not be allowed to do as they pleased. They deserved no less than death for what they put all those innocent people through. What Asuka did paled in comparison to all the horrible crimes they had committed, this one the latest of many.

Jun's anger didn't go unnoticed by Akira, who after taking a look for himself and seeing both the carnage left by those beasts when they were finally freed and got the chance to pay their captors back for what they did to them as well as a few corpses of beasts starved to death in some of the many dozen cells that filled the corridor, saw how the woman he loved clenched her hands in anger and outrage.

He frowned even more as he came at her side and saw the corpse of the half-rat, half-gargoyle beast, lying within the cell, in a pool of blood. Truth be told, after all the atrocities the demons committed, all the cruel experiments he witnessed with his own eyes in the research center from which he rescued Mico and all the people brutally tortured to death in the Anti-Demon Special Corps's Headquarters, including his adoptive parents, he didn't think it could get any worse. And here he was, in this barely lit dungeon, seeing creatures purposelly starved to death, locked in cages for God only knows how long without any food or water. He hadn't felt this shocked and outraged in a long time. Death from starvation was one of the worst ways to die, a death that could last for ten whole days if not a good two weeks. Two weeks of utter agony as your entire body would shrivel up, lose all of its muscle mass and fat, leaving you as nothing more than a husk of skin and bone until eventually, your organs would collapse and you would finally die. And all these people had been purposelly put through that ordeal just to force them to join those monsters's cause.

"Just when i thought it coudn't get any worse than that hellish skyscraper. How could they have stooped as low as purposelly starving their own kind to death in order to force them to join their ranks?" Seethed Akira in his mind, just as enraged as his lover. It truly was the vilest crime he had ever witnessed in his entire life. It was so horrible that it made the demons he fought for so many years, and even the maniacs who had killed Miki, look like saints by comparison.

He then saw just how angry Jun was, when he saw her face twisted in unbridled, homicidal fury, her sharp teeth gritted. She had never felt such anger in her entire life. She had always despised violence, always seeing it as a solution that in the long term would always achieve nothing. But never before had she actually wanted to kill someone this much in her entire existence. It wasn't enough for them to kill all those innocent people. It wasn't enough for them to hurt those she cared about just because they were associated with her, including Kazumi and her parents. Now they had even gone as far as starving others just like them for the simple crime of refusing to join them and live their lives as human beings.

"Akira….." she called out, only barely managing to keep herself from losing control of herself by sheer force of will "We have to stop them… We can't… We can't let them get away with this…Not after they… They….." her voice initially twisted by so much fury and hatred that she almost didn't sound human. But soon her anger gave away to grief, the grief of recalling everything they did to her and Kazumi. The grief upon recalling the mortally wounded Kazumi, once again confessing her love for her as she let out her last breath in her arms. And no matter how much she tried, once again, she coudn't bring herself to reveal to the man she had fallen in love with what those monsters had done to her first lover.

She was mere inches away from screaming in anguish as her rage and grief almost reached a breaking point. But mere moments before she could do that, Akira gently grabbed her furred left hand with his right one, causing her to gasp in surprise. She then turned towards him and her anger began to dissipate as she saw the emphatic and soothing look in his black eyes.

"I know. It's what we came here for, remember?" he spoke soothingly, once again acting as the emotional pillar that would grant the Devil Lady her resolve back, a role initially fulfilled by Kazumi. Snapped out of her recollection, Jun's golden eyes softened at her lover's voice, her new reason to live and fight. Just seeing that look of compassion in his eyes was enough to give her back her resolve.

"Let's go." he declared, earning a nod from her "There's only one last thing left for us to do here. And that is…" while beginning to walk towards the other side of the corridor but then…..

The sound of something slithering nearby stopped him in his tracks. Then he heard the faint sound of someone chuckling evily. And it seemed to belong to a woman.

"Something's wrong. We are not alone here." declared a worried Jun, having also heard that faint chuckle thanks to her enhanced hearing. The two Devilmen were now looking around left and right, trying to sense who was behind that faint chuckle but no matter how much they tried, they coudn't sense anything while the chuckle got progressively louder and louder until it suddenly stopped.

Then, in a rather unexpected turn of events, thousands of grains of a yellow substance began to fall all around Akira and Jun, apparently coming from the ceiling, startling both of them. They both tried to avoid it, but there simply were too many of those grains.

Jun then brought one of her furred hands forwards with her palm facing upwards and allowed some of those grains to fall on it. After taking a closer look at it, a puzzled look formed on her face.

"What's this? Pollen?" she wondered out loud in confusion, causing Akira to turn towards her. He then promptly pushed Jun's arm away and warned her "Don't touch it. We don't know what it does." snapping her out of her confusion….

Only to get his answer right away for as soon as the pollen stopped falling, what could only be described as a mist of energy that alternated between the colors lavender, green and blue appeared, surrounding the two Devilmen and causing them to gasp in shock.

"W-what the hell is going on?!" exclaimed Jun in even more confusion and anxiety, while frantically looking around left and right, unnerved by what was going on. She had never seen something like this ever since she became a Devilman. Not even when Asuka used her illusionary powers to conjure that illusion of heaven in order to….

"Wait a moment…" she thought in realisation, as soon as she began to connect all the clues. Then her golden eyes widened upon recalling Sirene's words.

"If you do come across her, do not let her illusions deceive you. Many demons have foolishly tried to claim her for themselves across the eons of time only to end up becoming her slaves."

Whoever that demoness Lilith was, this was all her doing. And without even knowing it, they had fallen right into their trap.

As the Devil Lady fully realised the gravity of the situation, she turned towards her partner and frantically cried out "Akira, we're in trouble! This is all that demoness Lilith's doing! We have to….. "

Only to stop upon seeing that Akira wasn't paying attention to her at all. Instead, he was looking towards the other exit of the corridor with his face twisted in shock and disbelief, his eyes wide open and his lips slightly apart. In front of him, through the mist of energy, stood an attractive girl in her late teens, that had short brown hair held in a headband and brown eyes. She wore a mini pink top above a white long sleeved shirt, a blue skirt but no shoes, leaving her feet bare.

"Akira?" called out Jun, not understanding why he was acting that way. But umberknowst to her, she could not see what he was seeing. And while that brown haired teenage girl appeared to be looking at Akira sweetly with her hands behind her back, the half-devil was completely frozen in disbelief and shock. He then could only weakly utter one name. A name that in his previous life, meant everything to him.

"M…. Miki?"

Meanwhile, on the upper floor

(OST: "Titans Main Theme" = Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam soundtrack = watch?v=R8fvEo5PHGY )

"This way! Follow me!" commanded Sirene to all the beasts she freed as they followed her through the hole she blasted on the ceiling of the lower floor. The Demon Bird flew through the seven meter tall and five meter wide corridor, decorated with all sorts of paintings while the beasts, led by Takeshi, Mico and Hitomi, were running as fast as they could, following their unlikely saviour.

Mid-way through their escape, all four of the cat beast's yellow eyes widened as she picked up not one but two scents that were familiar to her.

"These smells… it can't be…" she mused in her mind, bewildered by what she had smelled. One of them didn't belong to a beast at all and it was familiar to the one this harpy-like woman possessed. She remembered the day she met that young man that inadvertedly bumped into her and made her fall butt-fist on the ground. And then she learned from Takeshi that he was just like her: a Devilman.

But what really shocked her was the second one. As soon as she smelled it, all at once her mind retreated back to that night more than a year ago….. the night in which she unknowingly lost herself completely and tried to finally claim the object of her admiration for herself… the night in which…..

Her thoughts were abrutly cut short by many monstrous caws. Their escape had not gone unnoticed and soon the group found itself being confronted by dozens of Satoru's crow beasts that survived the earlier skirmish with Akira, Jun and Kaim. Sirene tried as best as she could to take out as many as she could but the crows numbered by more than four dozen. As such while some of them kept her busy in the air, most of them landed on the ground and rushed towards the escaping beasts, dead-set on keeping them from leaving this place alive.

"Dammit. There is not enough space here to fight them properly." cursed the Demon Bird in her mind as she cut yet another one of those humanoid crows apart in mid-air with her talons.

However the beasts were not going down without a fight, not after all the hell they had been put through. So they all roared and charged towards their captors and thus the bloody battle began.

"TIME FOR SOME PAYBACK!" bellowed Takeshi as he leapt in the air and tackled a crow beast that had taken off to attack him from above. He forcefully brought it back on the ground before punching through one of its large yellow eyes and through its skull, killing it instantly. Two more came towards him with a monstrous shriek as he pulled his arm out of the slain crow's skull and he only barely managed to avoid their sharp beaks and claws by a hair before he retaliated by backhanding the first one away and kicking the second in the face, causing both of them to be sent flying backwards.

At the same time on his left, with a monstrous mountain lion-like roar, Hitomi slashed another crow-beast in the head with her right claws, clawing out its eyes and blinding it. The crow shrieked in pain and clutched its now eyeless face, giving the two and a half meter tall cat beast the chance to quickly circle around it and pounce on its back, pinning it to the ground and allowing her to open wide and sink her sharp canines on its neck, crushing its throat with a quick bite. As she did so another one tried to attack her from behind, but having already taken notice of it, thanks to her second pair of eyes having a much broader field of vision, Hitomi's swiftly slammed all three of her lashing tails on the left side of the crow beast's body as it was about to stab her with its sharp beak. The impact of all three of those long and surprisingly muscular tails shattered many of the crow beast's ribs, causing them to pierce the organs held within the ribcage, and the crow spewed purple blood from its beak as it was sent flying towards the wall on the right, dying as it crashed into it as a result of both the force of the blow inflicted by Hitomi's tails and the impact against the wall.

But while Takeshi and Hitomi were holding their own against those monstrous humanoid crows, some of the other beasts greatly struggled against them as they tried to push through the horde of those avian monsters, mainly due to some of them having awakened only weeks ago. Nonetheless the female moth beast was able to repulse the crows that came towards her by releasing a dust from her wings that burned their skin, thus forcing them back, while others like the reptilian one with the sharp claws, the humanoid one that resembled a reindeer as well as the llama one with the vaguely human face all slashed, stomped and swatted away most of the crows that came towards them.

Most of them.

Soon, Mico found herself cut off from the rest by about a dozen crows. Having taken notice of this, and believing the young woman to still have not fully awakened yet, three beasts decided to shield her from harm by putting themselves in front of her, including the humanoid goat.

"What are you doing?! I can fight too!" she cried out in concern and frustration as more and more crows came.

One of them, a slender, purple skinned one with a short tail, a vaguely gecko head with red eyes and sharp blades instead of its forearms, glanced back at her after assuming a fighting stance and commanded "Stay back and let us handle these freaks!"

"We have a score to settle with these bastards too!" proclaimed its companion, a slender but well-built humanoid anteater that stood only slightly taller than the average human armed with five large recurved claws on its hands

"You don't seem to have fully awakened yet. Let's keep it that way." finally declared the humanoid, well built goat beast. And with that all three of them let out a roar and charged towards the dozens of crows in front of them.

"Wait!" was all Mico could exclaim, reaching out for them with a hand in futility. But even though she knew that those three beasts were right. Even compared to her fellow Devilmen back on her original world, aside from her acid, she wasn't very strong and her speed and agility was only slightly higher than that of a normal human. As such if too many of those crows would get close, she would be doomed.

Thus, all she could do was stand back and watch them fight. And for a few moments they held their own but soon they found themselves isolated from the rest of their fellow escapees by more than ten of those crows. No matter how many they kept slaying, more and more would just keep coming. Takeshi, Hitomi and Sirene were in a similar situation, the former two encircled by five humanoid crows each, while the Demon Bird herself was being attacked from all sides by no less than eight. The restricted space proved to be a massive disadvantage for them, since the smaller crow beasts were smaller and more nimble than most of those beasts.

Inevitably, the humanoid purple skinned gecko beast after cutting a crow's stomach apart, was stabbed in the eye by another one's sharp beak. It screamed in pain as it lost one of its eyes. Then a second crow maneuvered on its right and slashed its side with its claws, causing it to fall on the ground with two cuts on its side, blood already dripping out.

"MINORU!" cried out the humanoid anteater as it tried to come to its comrade's aid, only to be jumped on by three crows at the same time who raked its back multiple times with their claws before one of them sent him flying towards Mico by backhanding him in the face, the young Devilman being in the process of coming to the three beasts's aid when the humanoid anteater crashed on the ground before her.

But as the two crows were about to finish off the purple skinned gecko-like beast now known just as Minoru, the humanoid goat suddenly charged towards then, swatted the crows away with its long horns and promptly picked him up and threw him away towards Mico.

The unnamed goat beast then tried to rejoin its comrades when two more crows grabbed him from behind and outstretched his arms, immobilising him. Then a third one landed in front of him, grabbed him by the chest and all three crow beasts proceeded to take off with the immobilised goat beast held in their arms before divebombing back on the ground, slamming the humanoid goat on the ground with tremendous force, to the point many of the bones of its body broke on impact.

(Soundtrack Ends)

"INOSUKE, NO!" cried out the humanoid anteater as it tried to rush to its friend's aid only for the goat to scream "RUN! SAVE YOURSELF!" as the three crows that slammed him on the ground with a divebomb landed around him, joined by two more. Mico, Mamoru and the humanoid anteater could only watch in horror and helplessness as the goat-like beast, now known simply as Inosuke was stabbed to death by the two meter tall humanoid crows's sharp purple beaks, its cries soon becoming muffled by blood. Reluctantly, they had no choice but to leave their former fellow escapee behind and move on.

The death of Inosuke did not go unnoticed by the other beasts and all of them, incensed even more by the death of one of their comrades, began to attack the crows with even more wrath and ferocity

But the pitch black feathered avian beasts just kept coming and soon, six more of them intercepted Mico and the other two beasts that were running alongside her. Once again, Minoru and the humanoid anteater, put themselves in front of her in order to protect her as the former cursed "Shit, more of them?!"

Only for their faces to fill with great surprise as Mico, with a look of pure determination and anger, declared "Enough of this…" with pure, unbridled fury and hatred and put herself in front of them. This was the last straw. These monsters had gone too far. She will not let them have their way anymore. And she was not some kind of helpless girl, she was a Devilman for crying out loud, a member of the same army who fought the Demons until there was not a single one left.

"YOU WON'T HURT ANYONE ELSE!" and with that declaration filled with anger and resolve, she grabbed the front of her suit and ripped it open, exposing her upper body as well as her breasts. To the shock of the two beasts behind her and the crow beasts in front of her, Mico's breasts were no ordinary breasts: they were covered with a light red coral-like substance that extended onto her abdomen and most importantly, her breasts had a hole in the center where the nipple should have been. A third hole was also present in the center of her upper abdomen. And for some reason, smoke was coming out of them.

The six crow beasts in front of her shrieked in shock upon realising that they were tricked but it was too late. Mico roared "NOW TASTE MY ACID, YOU BASTARDS!" and then, multiple jets of a green acidic liquid were shot from the three holes on her body and at that range it proved impossible for the crows to dodge them. As a result, all six of them were hit one after another and all of them could only shriek in agonizing pain as the jets of acid gruesomely melted their flesh. Such was the power of that acid that it even melted the bones and as such, several of those crows's arms and legs detatched from them as the rest of their bodies melted. It was over in seconds and all six of those avian beasts were reduced to nothing more than pools of melted flesh and bones.

This turn of events grabbed the attention of all the combatants in the corridor. All of them were shocked to see what had happened. Sirene in particular was quite impressed by how powerful Mico's acid was. She had just cut down the five crows responsible for Inosuke's death when her blue eyes witnessed the devastating effects of the young woman's liquid.

"Interesting. That ability of hers is actually quite deadly. It seems i was wrong to think of her as yet another weak one." remarked Sirene in her mind, still hovering in mid-air. She didn't think much of that young woman aside from being empassioned by her gratitude for freeing her and the rest of those people. But as it turned out for the upteenth time, looks could be deceiving.

"No way….. she took out six of them at once…." mused Takeshi to himself, his yellow eyes wide open in shock and his jaw hanging slightly. He didn't know she was capable of something like this.

"I guess she wasn't a member of Akira's army for nothing." he admitted, not expecting someone as kind, sweet and emotional as her to also be capable of such bravery and belligerency. He also shuddered upon seeing just how powerful her acid was, to be able to reduce all six of those beasts to nothing more than pools of blood in the span of seconds….

"Mico…" called out Hitomi in awe for how selflessly the young Devilman had put herself in between those other two beasts and without a moment of hesitation, slew those six crow beasts in front of her to protect them. Her admiration towards Mico and her courage had grown even more. Only now had the four eyed cat beast begun to realise what a strong-willed woman she actually was.

All of them were pulled out of their thought by even more crows coming towards them landing in front of them one after another and forming a wall in front of them. As some of the beasts began to panic, Takeshi commanded "Don't move! If you scatter, they'll pick us off one by one!" he then put himself in front of all of them, facing the horde of murderous humanoid crows and bellowed "Stand together!" as Hitomi and Mico came to his side.

And with those words of resolve and determination, all the surviving beasts began to come close to each other, standing together and leave nobody separated from each other. Sirene landed in front of the assembled group, putting herself in between the freed prisoners and calmly looked at all the crow beasts in front of them with a cold and spiteful glare. Rather astonishingly, not one of them had managed to score a single hit on her, wheter with their beaks or claws.

"Incredible... She wasn't even hit once…." remarked Mico to herself in awe, upon seeing that there wasn't even so much as a scratch on that harpy-like demoness's pristine, pale skin. She coudn't believe how powerful she was. If anything, she was grateful that this demoness was helping them.

After glancing back at the corpse of the fallen goat-beast, then at the various beasts behind her, including Takeshi, Hitomi and Mico, she remarked to herself in her mind "To think that i would be forced to resort to such an attack by such poor excuses of monsters….. but i have no other choice. I will take out as many as i can in one shot." she then aimed both of ther arms towards the dozen of humanoid crows in front of her but as she began to charge her telekinetic bolt and the crows began their next attack…..

The ground itself began to tremble slightly, the sound of thunderous footsteps slowly beginning to echo through the massive corridor.

To Sirene and the beasts's bewilderment, many of those crows began to be flung left and right and the whole ground began to shake. Finally, a large, quadrupedal shape began to emerge….

And in the span of seconds, most of the crows in front of the beasts were suddenly and violently thrown into the air with great force, to the point that some of them were even thrown through the walls and windows of the corridor.

The culprit was none other than Kaim, who had managed to reunite with his beloved Sirene within the mansion, as the Demon Bird had hoped. While at first, displeased to see that a good chunk of his left shoulder was missing, a satisfied smile made its way on her soft lips as all the crows, not willing to risk being run through by the pachyderm demon's massive horns, having heard how easily he tore his way through twenty-five of their brethren, shrieked in defeat and one by one, they all left through the windows of the corridor, located near the ceiling. He had arrived just in time before anymore of those captive beasts would get hurt and most importantly aside from that aformentioned missing chunk of flesh that was slowly but surely regenerating, he was mostly unharmed.

As the foul avian beasts finally left, Kaim smiled softly as his yellow eyes once again met Sirene's blue ones. But before he could call out her name, another familiar voice came "Kaim! You're here too!"

The pachyderm demon turned his gaze towards where that overjoyed voice came from and promptly spotted Takeshi, in his true form, while the rest of the beasts were simply staring at him in awe and admiration, their jaws hanging open. Like Jun before them, they were marvelling at how majestic and imposing Kaim looked, including Mico and Hitomi. Likewise, the pachyderm demon was intrigued to see just how much variety there was in those beasts's appearances from the female humanoid moth one, to the humanoid well built anthropomorphic deer and even Hitomi.

Kaim promptly smiled at the light green skinned beast that resembled Akira slightly, began to walk towards him and the other beasts and politely greeted "We meet again, young one. And while it is a pity that circumstances could not have been more favorable, it pleases me greatly to see that you and most of your people are alright." he paused while stopping besides Sirene before declaring "And you have Sirene to thank for that. Without her, we would have never managed to succesfully besiege this stronghold." earning an equally soft and beautiful smile from his lover, while most of the beasts were empassioned by how kind Kaim sounded.

However, the same coudn't be said for Takeshi. The light green skinned beast's eyes and lips widened in shock as Kaim spoke those last phrases and he nearly exclaimed in disbelief, his voice faltering "Y-You….. You know her?!"

Amused by this revelation, Sirene smiled in delight at the beast's disbelief and replied playfully "Who would have thought, you two are actually aquainted. And i see that there are still many things he has not told you, young man." putting more emphasis on the last two words just for fun, while putting one of her eagle-like hands underneath Kaim's chin, rubbing his right cheek with her thumb and looking at him in the eyes with surprising tenderness and with a soft smile. The pachyderm demon's cheeks turned ever so slightly red at his lover's surprisingly gentle touch and Takeshi could only watch in even more disbelief at the Demon Bird's display of affection. He coudn't believe that not only was Kaim aquainted with the same woman who tried, and nearly succedeed, to kill him and Jun, they were even partners if not outright lovers.

"This just keeps getting better and better…." he remarked in his mind, this latest discovery having left him speechless, just like the rest of the freed beasts, who could only look in amasement at the brief affectionate moment shared by the Demon Bird and the pachyderm demon. He was also surprised to hear Sirene actually call him "Young Man". Was she actually starting to take a liking to him?

He quickly put his thoughts aside as Kaim turned his eyes back at the group of beasts in front of him and declared "The path to your freedom is now clear. Follow me and i will lead you out of this accursed place." seeing no other choice and given how he single-handedly sent the rest of those monstrous humanoid crows away, all of the beasts simply nodded and one by one, after Kaim turned towards the exit of the mansion, began to follow him.

Sirene however, had different intentions in mind.

"I will rejoin you later." she declared, causing Kaim to stop in his tracks, followed by the other beasts, and turn his head towards her. As he looked at her in surprise, she pointed out "These people may have been freed but there is still one more battle to be fought. We have to do everything in our power to make sure such a heinous act will never be committed again." she then turned towards the other side of the corridor, spread her feathery white wings and finally proclaimed "Kaim…. take these people and lead them to safety. I will take care of the rest."

Heartwarmed for the resolve and the genuine concern for all those people in her voice, the pachyderm demon smiled, confident in his lover's abilities and replied "Very well then. Good luck, my love. May we meet again." earning a soft smile from his beloved Sirene before she took off and flew to the other side of the corridor, eventually dissappearing from view.

And as all the beasts, led by Kaim began to finally take their leave, an astounded Takeshi muttered in his mind "He just called her "My Love"…. So they really are lovers after all…." while taking one last look at the Demon Bird flying away. He had to rethink his entire image of her. She was genuenely concerned for the safety of all these people, including even him. And without hesitation, she had decided to turn back and face the monsters who had imprisoned him along with all these people when she could have just fled along with them. She hardly resembled the same bloothirsty and malevolent woman who tried to kill him along with the one who had saved the entire race of the Beasts.

"Well, you know what they say….What appears on the outside doesn't always reflect what's on the inside." he mused to himself as he ran away along with the other beasts, having finally gained a lot more appreciation for the demoness. And while she still had a lot to do to make up for trying to kill him, he was starting to forgive her for what happened eight days ago. Whatever may have happened in the eight days that followed, it was now clear to the green skinned beast that Sirene was genuenely trying to atone for her past sins.

And that was enough for him.

Earlier, in the underground dungeon

Akira thought his eyes were deceiving him. That what they were seeing coudn't possibly be true. There was no way that the one standing right in front of him just a few meters away was none other than Miki, the same girl whose family took him in and raised him as if he always were one of their children, the same girl who had always been for him when he would get teased and bullied by others…. The same girl who was his first love…..

But as soon as the girl spoke tenderly "Yes, Akira….. It's me, Miki…. I've come back for you…." something inside him began to break. Her voice was exactly the same as it was 20 years ago. She had not changed a bit. It was the proof that she was real.

That voice, being heard for the first time in all those years, froze the half-devil in place. He then sorrowfully called out "M-Miki…" and began to walk towards the girl,completely ignoring Jun who was trying as much as she could to bring him back to reality, given that she wasn't seeing what she was seeing.

"Snap out of it, Akira! What you're seeing is not real! You have to….." she called out in agitation while grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking him, trying to snap him out of what she believed was nothing more than a trance induced by whatever this pollen-like substance was. But then, at that very moment…..

"Jun…."

The Devil Lady froze, her golden eyes widening in dismaying shock. She thought she had misheard. For a moment she refused to believe to have actually heard that voice. It coudn't be. It coudn't possibly have been that voice, the one she hadn't heard for nearly six months…..

She was in for a rude awakening however when that voice came again "Jun?" followed by a soft and petite hand grabbing her left furred one which startled her and caused her to turn backwards. And as she did, for a moment, she stopped breathing. Shoulder lenght orange hair and light green eyes, framing a soft and kind face that belonged to a teenage girl that was wearing a grey school uniform with a blue bow under her neck, long white socks and brown shoes.

Her surprise turned to utter incredulity and with a gasp, she exclaimed "K-Kazumi?!" while taking a few steps backwards, her voice faltering and her eyes widening even more. The girl in front of her simply smiled sweetly, apparently overjoyed to have been reunited with the woman who stole her heart.

(OST: "Ceremony Commences" = Bleach Soundtrack:

watch?v=3WQkx4yW1Oc )

Meanwhile, Akira, after much hesitation, finally closed the distance between himself and what his eyes saw as Miki, towering over her by nearly a meter. He then, hesitantly reached out for her cheek….

And to his great surprise, found out that he could feel her skin with his touch. He wasn't just seeing things. She was alive, alive and well before him. And as Miki closed her brown eyes and welcomed the warmth of his touch, Akira saw, to his horror, that on her neck there was a scar. The scar from where she was decapitated.

As soon as he saw it, the dam within him finally came down. With his lips quivering and many tears beginning to freely fall from his eyes onto his cheeks, he pulled his hand back, weakly took a few steps backwards with his trembling legs and finally fell on his knees "F-Forgive me…" he weakly managed through pained sobs, while covering his face in a mix of grief and shame for his greatest failure "I….. I wasn't there to save you….." he coudn't look at her. He just coudn't. She died because of him. She died because he left her with her parents and told himself that it was for the better.

As he lowered his head downwards, Miki's soft hands gently cupped his cheeks and caused him to look back up towards her as she tenderly spoke "There is nothing to forgive, my love." while looking at him with unbridled love and affection, "I've missed you so much….." she sweetly proclaimed, pulling him closer to her and causing his black eyes to meet hers. The devil with a heart of a human finally broke down, his voice turning into incomprehensible cries as Miki pulled him into an embrance, allowing him to bury his head in on her chest.

At the same time, a few meters away, Jun was still standing still, frozen in shock, her lips apart in dismay and denial. It coudn't be true. She refused to believe that the girl who once meant everything to her was now standing in front of her, without so much as a scratch, looking exactly like she did that fateful night.

A worried look formed on the orange haired girl in front of her and she asked "Why are you so sad, Jun? It's me, Kazumi….. I've come back to ease your burden….." her soothing voice as gentle and kind that of a caring mother, comforting its child.

As she tried to reach out for Jun, the Devil Lady slowly shooked her head left and right in denial and slowly took a few steps back while weakly muttering "No….. You're not real….. I…. I watched you die….. I buried your bod-"

She coudn't finish. Her whole body froze in place, her eyes mouth widening as the teenage girl's soft and petite hand touched her chest, in between her breasts, feeling her heart. It wasn't an allucination. She actually felt her chest being touched. Which meant…..

"See? I can easily reach out and touch your heart without breaking a sweat." proclaimed the young girl in front of her, causing the demonic amazon to look her in her green eyes. The one who appeared to be Kazumi then closed her eyes, smiled radiantly and let out a sweet giggle.

And with that, every doubt left Jun's mind and her heart finally sank. The one in front of her truly was none other than Kazumi Takiura the same girl she had met a few years ago when she stumbled upon her agency and quickly recognized her as that famous supermodel she had always admired for not getting all decked up like many others while still mainting her radiance and for exhuding a mature attractiveness few models had. She remembered how they began seeing each other after that day….. How after becoming a beast she tried to keep her away from the brutal world she had been thrust in…. Only for her parents to be murdered for the sole crime of being associated with Jun as retribution for her perceived betrayal towards her kind….. How she sheltered her in her house after being orphaned… How their friendship slowly turned into love… and finally, that fateful day…

"K….. Kazumi…" weakly called out Jun, her eyes and her lips shaking, her voice cracking as tears of grief began to freely flow on her cheeks. Her legs quickly gave away to the sorrow that had built up within her and she fell on her knees and closed her eyes shut, not managing to look the girl in her emerald, green eyes due to all the pain and grief coming back with full force. It was all her fault. She was the one who dragged her into that hell. She lost her parents because of her. She was used against her because of what she was. She died because of her.

"Oh, Jun…" tenderly called out Kazumi, while reaching out for her cheeks with her soft and petite hands. As soon as they touched her, the Devil Lady looked back up and met the eyes of the girl she had fallen in love with, now standing the same height as her, who declared "You have no idea how happy i am to look upon your face again….."

Those passionate words finally broke Jun and she pulled her first lover in an embrace with an anguished wail, burying her head on the girl's left shoulder, nothing but pained, muffled cries leaving her mouth. It wasn't unlike when she tried and failed to save that poor girl, Remi, whose only fault was being too young to control the power over fire that had been so forcefully thrust on her. Like that poor unfortunate girl, she was too late to save her beloved Kazumi.

"Don't worry….. It's alright…." tenderly reassured both Miki and Kazumi at the same time to their respective lovers, umberknowst to the two Devilmen, who coudn't see what the other was seeing.

"Miki… I'm so sorry… I…. I promised you….. That nothing would have ever kept us apart again… And yet i… I….." sobbed Akira uncontrollaly as his first lover held him like a mother would hold its child, caressing the back of his head.

"There was nothing you could have done. My death was destined to happen. But now i'm here. And nothing will keep us apart again." she declared, while pulling out of the hug and looking at Akira with the sweet and kind smile she had beneath her tomboyish attitude.

The half-devil caressed Miki's left cheek with his right arm and pulled her in an embrace of his own while proclaiming "Miki…. Thank you….." deep inside though, he was conflicted. On one hand, the girl he had known his entire life had now somehow returned from the dead. And on another hand, he coudn't just leave Jun after everything he did for her and after she healed his broken heart and brought back happiness in his life.

But as he was going through that inner conflict, Miki then spoke "But there is something you must know, Akira…. Something very important…." pulling him out of his thoughts. Still holding her in his muscular arms, he asked "Yes, Miki?"

He was completely unprepared for the words that were spoken next.

The brown haired teenage girl then inched her lips close to his left ear and whispered soothingly "Humans….. You cannot live with them. You can only hate them, do them harm for what they did to me….."

And all at once, as soon as he heard those words, Akira's black eyes widened in pure shock and he realised that something was wrong. Very wrong. He then forcibly broke himself out of the embrace, stood back up on his feet, distancing himself from Miki by a few feet and with his face filled with pure bewilderment and disbelief he could only mutter "W-What?" his eyes shaking, hoping to have misheard.

To his horror however, Miki simply kept smiling and once again reached out with a hand for the young man who had stolen her heart while continuing "Theirs is already such a hard lot. It's better to release them from their pain than allow them to live and compound their sins, woudn't you agree?"

And with those words, uttered with false warmth and through a fake smile, Akira realised that he was talking not to Miki, but to someone else, to an impostor. It was due to how casually the one in front of him had spoken them. Thus, as Miki's hand was about to caress his cheek again, the shock on Akira's face quickly gave away to outrage and with a quick and sudden movement, he shoved the hand away and exclaimed "No! It…. It wasn't like this!" while slightly distancing himself from her.

A look of hurt and confusion made its way on the brown haired teenage girl's face at this sudden gesture of rejection, which bruised her hand and she asked "What's wrong? Akira?" with what appeared to be concern, but the Devilman knew that it was fake.

As his outrage turned into anger, he looked at the one in front of him with contempt and stated "Miki never said such a thing…. Even when humanity was at its worst, her faith in them never faltered. I was that faith along with her family." recalling very well how in spite of revealing his true nature to her on that fateful day, when Ryo divulged false information of how demon possession worked by showing the tape of his first transformation into Devilman, how he was forced to reveal his true nature to Miki and how in spite of what he was, she embraced him after seeing that he was still human.

At the same time, with her face still buried on Kazumi's left shoulder, Jun managed through sobs "Kazumi… I'm sorry that i coudn't talk more with you…. There were so many things… That i wanted to share with you…. About me….." her voice still broken. By keeping her away from her, she had only delayed the inevitable. And now she deeply regretted it. Deep down, Jun realised that if she had not acted like that…. If she had trusted her more….

The orange haired girl merely tightened the embrace before whispering soothingly in Jun's ear "Have you forgotten, Jun? I have become exactly like you. I've become strong enough to protect you. There's nothing that can keep us apart anymore." her beautiful voice filling the Devil Lady's heart with joy and taking away most of the grief. How could she have forgotten? She had turned into a beast just like her the night she was used as a bait to lure Jun to the Crusaders's lair which allowed them to overpower her and almost torture her to death, surviving only because the newly awakened Kazumi carried her out of harm's way. Now that she had returned, they could finally be together. But at the same time, she coudn't just leave Akira, not after everything he had done for her. Not after he had managed to make her feel human again. Not after he had brought back love in her heart.

But what doubt that lingered in Jun's heart, what conflict that lied within her as she found herself forced to choose about her first lover and her second one, promptly dissappeared the moment Kazumi proclaimed "Now that i have become like you, now that i've let go of my humanity, we can be together forever….."

Normally such a phrase would have brought Jun unfathomable joy. Except for one little but crucial part.

"Now that i've let go of my humanity."

Jun gasped in utter shock the moment she heard that phrase being spoken and she immediately broke herself out of the embrace and stood back up, towering over the orange haired teenage girl again. With her mouth hanging wide open and her wide eyes shaking in disbelief, she could only say "W-What did you say? What do you mean by that?" nearly exclaiming due to how casually Kazumi had said it. She hoped that what she heard wasn't true.

Apparently confused by her reaction, Kazumi's face briefly filled itself with anger as she stated "The roots of evil are deep, irreversibly so in the hearts of men. It's their true nature, their destiny. I learned that the hard way when my friend, Chika was killed by them for the sole crime of defending me and the rest of her friends."

Jun shuddered not only due the sheer hatred and contempt that radiated from Kazumi's words but also due to the confirmation that what those girls, Takae, Misaki and Kyoko spoke of was true. She remembered what they told her. How Kazumi came to the realisation after witnessing the cruel way Chika was gunned down in front of her and her friends's eyes, that she would rather have been a beast, given how there was pretty much no difference between that horrible crime and all the atrocities Satoru and his henchmen committed. Jun never got the chance to talk with Kazumi about this painful ordeal. But even then…..

This was something Kazumi would have never said, no matter how much resentment she could hold towards mankind for what happened to that friend of hers.

Her greatest fears were confirmed when the orange haired girl smiled sweetly at her once more and tried to reach out for her cheek while declaring with utter nonchalance "But that doesn't matter anymore. We're no longer human, Jun. We are no longer bound by their flawed nature. By relinquishing my humanity, i've finally gained the power to protect you. And i will never leave your s-"

"No… You're not her…..." interjected Jun, taking a few steps backwards and shaking her head left and right, her face full of horror at the realisation that the one in front of her was not her beloved Kazumi even if it looked like her. It was nothing more than a doppelganger, a false apparition of the real one, like that humanoid grey and red lizard beast who disguised herself as her to lure Jun into a trap on the same night she would later go on to confront that gigantic frog-like beast. The false look of affection and desire in her green eyes made her realise so. Those were not Kazumi's eyes. They were the ones of an impostor.

Taken aback by the Devil Lady's reaction, a worried look formed on the image of Kazumi's face and she asked in concern "Jun?"

Now knowing without any more shred of doubt that the one in front of her was fake and that whoever it truly was, had used an image of her all along to deceive her on top of pretending to actually care about her, Jun's horror turned into raging fury. Thus she bared her teeth, roared "YOU'RE NOT HER!" and quickly snatched the girl by her throat with one hand and effortlessly lifted her off the ground much to the fake Kazumi's horror and shock.

"J-Jun….. P-Please, stop….. Y-You're hurting me…" weakly pleaded the illusion of the orange haired girl, looking at Jun with a look of hurt and disbelief, while putting her comparatively petite hands on the Devil Lady's furred hand that held her tightly by the throat a good meter off the ground, causing her to choke and frantically move her legs around in an attempt to free itself, to no avail.

But that false look and plead only served to infuriate Jun even more. Rounding her golden eyes, filled with homicidal wrath towards the green ones of the doppelganger, she tightened her grip even more, choking the illusion of the girl who was her first lover and furiously spoke "Did you really think i would have fallen for such a cheap trick?! Even if Kazumi did come to resent humanity for what happened to that friend of hers, she would have never thrown away that which made her human, even if it was to stay with me! You may look like her but you're nothing more than a fake! HOW DARE YOU USE HER IMAGE AGAINST ME!" she finally roared with so much rage that she didn't even sound human, before violently tossing the fake Kazumi away from her onto the ground.

At the same time, the image of Miki, hurt and incensed by what Akira had said, spoke in what almost seemed like indignation "What do you mean? I am Miki! Do as i say! Release them! Kill them and bring them happiness!" in one last feeble attempt to convince Akira of her actually being the real Miki, but it was useless. He had already seen through the deception.

"NO! YOU'RE NOT MIKI! WHAT KIND OF DEMON ARE YOU?!" he roared in outrage and fury while swinging his right arm backwards, demanding to know who was the one who had used an imaged of his beloved Miki against him.

(Soundtrack ends)

All at once, the hurt on the fake Miki's face and the horror and shock on the fake Kazumi's face dissappeared. Then both of them with a fake worried expression spoke at the same time, umberknowst to the two devilmen who coudn't see what the other was seeing "My, my….. Fufufufufu….." and began to chuckle evily as a mischievious smile made its way on their lips.

Then to both Devilmen's horror, the illusions of their former loved ones began to cackle evily. Akira could only gasp in shock as the illusion of Miki's hair suddenly grew longer, turned from brown to orange and oustretched in all directions, while her body grew to twice its size. Her eyes turned from brown to black and finally crimson as her hair rose up and hardened into a flower like shape, her skin assumed a creamy color, her clothes faded away, revealing a black root like material that covered her lower arms and formed what appear to resemble a dress on her shoulders and chest. Her lower legs fused together and from them, sprouted a long green serpentine tail that soon divided itself into four. At the same time, Jun could only watch in muted horror as the fake Kazumi, still lying on the ground, began to twitch around uncontrollably as she cackled before her mouth opened much more than what a normal human one would. Soon the girl's clothes faded away as her body shrank, her arms and legs dissappearing as suddenly a green, vine like structure materialised in her legs's place. The only thing left of the green tentacle-like vine's former disguise was Kazumi's head.

At the same time, the multicolored mist of energy faded away and thus Jun and Akira were no longer under its effects and just as the former gasped in realisation and called out "Akira!" her eyes widened as she saw the one behind this ruse, cackling in delight.

(OST: "Influence Of The Deep" = Parasite Eve Soundtrack = watch?v=hhB8US4R47s )

"HAHAHA! You were both strong enough to break free of my spell! I like that!" gleefully proclaimed what once was the illusion of Miki, now revealed to be none other than Lilith, the demoness of seduction as she retracted the green tentacle-like vine with Kazumi's head still attached onto it, which soon turned into nothing more than a nondescript, decaying human face. Her upper humanoid body rested on four of those green vines like an octopus would with its tentacles on the sea floor and the tips of those vines were pointed upwards and were waving around like a rattlesnake's rattle.

"You….. You must be Lilith! That demoness Sirene warned us about!" exclaimed Akira, still thorougly shaken by what he and Jun had been put through.

In response, Lilith smiled in delight, turned towards Jun and replied with a devious chuckle "Fufufu….. I see that my reputation precedes me. And i see that time has been kind to you…. Amon." while narrowing her crimson eyes towards Akira in contempt. She then turned her gaze towards Jun and remarked "And you must be Jun Fudo, the fabled "Devil Lady"! Mmmmm…. You are even more beautiful than i thought you would be…..." while licking her fucsia lips, eyeing her from top to bottom with twisted lust and desire. She was amased by how much she resembled Amon which, coupled with her muscular body, only served to turn Lilith on even more. She was now eagerly looking forward to play with her.

The demoness's voice coupled with the way she was looking at her with those crimson eyes of hers, deeply unsettled Jun. One could almost call it soothing if it weren't for the sheer wickedness dripping out of each word that left her mouth. The flower demoness truly sounded like a succubus, and acted exactly like those supernatural creatures of folkore that would appear in dreams to seduce men.

Nonetheless she was enraged that this demoness had dared to not only use Kazumi's image against her, but also put Akira through the same process, as she could tell from what Lilith said. Thus, she bared her teeth at the demoness and roared furiously "YOU WILL SUFFER FOR THAT! How dare you use an image of our loved ones against us!" causing Akira to gasp, realising that Jun had experienced the same thing he did. Witnessing a fake image of the person she once cared about the most.

With pure homicidal wrath filling every inch of his face, Akira narrowed his black eyes towards Lilith, bared his teeth and proclaimed "You deserve worse than death for this demon!" while pointing his left index finger towards the flower/plant demoness.

Lilith grinned as her body changed again and grew to a total height of three meters, this time with the black root on her chest and shoulders dissappearing, revealing that instead of nipples, there was a red eye on her breasts. Her arms split themselves into two at the elbow, becoming four, each with two clawed fingers. And as the enclosed flower opened up and turned from orange to pink, revealing a cluster of anther-like structures on her forehead, she declared "Then give it to me, little devils….. Don't be shy…." while becoming them forward with a clawed finger from one of her left forearms.

With a furious roar, both Akira and Jun launched themselves towards Lilith, hellbent on making her pay for how she had callously desecrated their former loved ones. But they were forced to break off their attack as the pink petals that adorned Lilith's head like a crown suddenly turned into sharp tentacles and were swiftly propelled towards the two Devilmen, aiming to skewer them.

Akira was forced to jump in the air to avoid most of the tentacles, so he pulled out his wings and, after punching some of them away tried to sweep down towards Lilith, intending to finish her off with one swift attack. Jun, on the other hand, summoned her forearm Cutters and made short work of the tentacles that attempted to impale her, cutting many apart in a single blow. She then charged straight towards Lilith with a furious roar, eager to cut her apart for the vile way she had desecrated Kazumi's image.

"A pincer attack mmmm? A good tactic to be sure." she spoke out loud, ignoring the pain of her petal tentacles being cut apart by Jun as she could easily regenerate them. More importantly, she had quickly realised what their intentions were and had already anticipated their next move.

"But it will not work against me!" she declared, her voice becoming deeper and more monstrous while her second pair of eyes, which were blood red with a tiny little yellow pupil, opened up and her mouth widened and filled with sharp teeth. Now with two pairs of eyes, she could focus one pair on Akira and one on Jun at the same time. She then procedeed to shoot all of anther like structures on her head like bullets towards Akira while at the same time readying two of her green-vine like tentacles to strike Jun.

Caught completely offguard, Akira could only cover his upper body with his arms and hope for the best but as it turned out, the pollen projectiles that struck him were explosive and while not all them hit him, those that did, exploded and made him grunt in pain as they burned some of the flesh on his arms, chest and legs and caused him to fall back on the floor.

Gasping in shock upon seeing him struck, Jun cried out "Akira!" and was promptly struck in the chest and abdomen by the two vine-like tentacles which cracked some of the bones of her chest, causing her to spit blood, and hurled her straight into one of the now empty cells, crashing through its metal bars.

"YOU BITCH!" roared an enraged Akira as he got back on his feet and immediately charged towards Lilith, attacking her with a barrage of punches and claw slashes, only for the demoness to easily block all of his attacks with her four arms while her green vine appendages all fuse together in one long, serpetine tail.

Laughing, she taunted "Come on, you can do better than this, Amon! Or has living among humans made you that soft?" as she then parried one last one and seized the moment to jump in the air by contorting her lower serpentine body in a J shape and then thrusting herself off the ground. She then attempted to lash her tail towards him in a stabbing manner…..

Only for Akira to sidestep and immediately grab her tail with his hands. Lilith's crimson eyes widened in shock as he slammed her back on the ground hard, the force of the impact causing the demoness to spit blood from her mouth. As he then proceeded to lift her up by the tail again and slam her back down several more times, he proclaimed"You stupid demons still don't get it do you?" before picking her up once more by the tail, roar venomously "I AM NOT AMON!" spinning her in a semi-circle, smashing her head on several metal bars of the empty cells before throwing her away a few meters in front of him.

As Lilith hit the ground hard once more and propped herself back up with her arms, her second pair of eyes above her crimson ones closing up, Akira walked towards her and with his eyes narrowed towards her in disgust, he proclaimed "He's gone. I took him over and gained his powers. Is that so hard for you to understand?" causing the demoness to gasp in utter disbelief, her eyes and lips apart in shock. She coudn't believe what she was hearing. Why would he say something like that?

Unless….

"He speaks the truth….. Amon is truly gone…. That was why the illusion i conjured was not the one of Nike!" she realised, to her dismay. Her pollen had the ability to conjure illusions in the subconscious of those who would come in contact with it of the people that they held most dear, or in the case of men, beautiful women. She loved to use this ability to bring some sort of comfort or to seduce the her victims before converting them into her servants. Therefore, in Amon's case, he should have seen an illusion of Nike, the demoness he had fallen in love with. But then if all those rumors were true, and Amon had truly been completely overtaken by the human Akira Fudo and was gone forever….

"Atun does not know! And neither does Nike!" she stopped breathing for a moment as soon as she came to that realisation, her lips trembling in horror. Ever since that fateful day during the age of the dinosaurs, Atun had sworn to himself that he would defeat Amon and prove who was the strongest between them, this before his quest to surpass him turned into a quest for vengeance for all his fellow demons that died by his treacherous hands. However, the Demon Hero Amon was forever gone, taken over by a human.

He had to know. She had to tell him this. Lilith always feared that his obsession towards Amon would only bring Atun nothing but emptiness and ruin. Now that she knew the truth, she had the chance to snap him out of it, to finally making him realise how futile all of it was. To finally make him realise the love she felt….

She was violently pulled out of her thoughts by a monstrous roar and her crimson eyes widened as soon as she saw an enraged, almost feral looking Jun that leapt over Akira, much to his surprise, and beared down towards her, aiming to smash her skull to a pulp with her right fist.

Thinking quickly, a purple aura surrounded the entirety of Lilith's body before it suddenly vanished, causing Jun's fist to instead strike the floor, smashing a meter wide crater on it.

"Dammit! She can teleport too!" mused a frustrated Jun to herself in her mind as she looked around, eagerly waiting to make her suffer while Akira began to do the same in order to get a bearing on her new position. It didn't take long before suddenly a green vine tentacle shot up from the ceiling and coiled around his neck, strangling him and lifting him up, giving away the new position of the demoness, who had now clinged herself on the ceiling by dividing her green serpentine tail into six smaller tentacles.

As Akira put his hands around the vine around his neck, gasping for air, Lilith, who had fused her two pairs of arms back into a single pair, with the black root-like material covering it again, was about to slash the half-devil with her newly sprouted black root-like claws of her left hand when Jun, having sprouted her wings from her back, flew towards them, roared venomously "NOT THIS TIME!" and promptly slashed the vine in half with her right forearm Cutter releasing Akira. He then seized the opportuinity to unleash his fire breath on Lilith, but the demoness, once again managed to teleport away, but not before the flames burned some the skin of her upper body and much of her green vine-like tentacles.

As she reappeared back on the floor behind Akira, grunting in pain slightly from the burns she had received and clutching her severely burnt left arm with her right hand, she spat angrily "HOW DARE YOU BURN MY BEAUTIFUL BODY!" before turning her pink petals back into sharp tentacles and extending them towards Akira, aiming to skewer him with them.

Gasping in shock and with her eyes widening, a frightened Jun screamed in distress "NO!" and promptly flew towards where Akira was falling and pushed him away, before the tentacles would impale him.

The half-devil, forcefully shoved away towards the metal bars of one of the empty cells could only watch with his mouth agape as four tentacles ran Jun through. One of them pierced her left shoulder blade, a second struck above her right breast, piercing a lung, a third struck her in the abdomen and a fourth found its mark on her left thigh. The Devil Lady threw her head backwards and spewed crimson blood from her mouth, not even managing to scream due to the air being forcefully pushed out of her pierced left lung.

Lilith was caught completely by surprise by this selfless act. Just when she was about to greatly injure the human that had taken Amon over, this woman without a second thought pushed him away and took the blows for herself. Now her interest towards her had taken a new level. She had already been captivated by her strength and beauty when she witnessed the battle in the mansion's courtyard. Now she wanted to know more about her before making hers forever.

"My, my….." she mused, her voice returning back to its original soothing human-like tone, a soft smile making its way on her purple lips as she removed her pink petal tentacles from Jun's body, leaving her standing bloodied with four holes in her body.

"JUUNNN!" cried out Akira upon seeing his lover injured. He then promptly tried to reach her, only for Lilith to point her left arm towards him and extending it at great speeds towards him as if it was made of rubber. The half-devil tried to avoid it, but its five root-like fingers soon extended even further into five flexible tentacles that wrapped around his upper body and arms, immobilising him and lifting him off the ground before violently slamming him back on the floor and holding him in place with said flexible tentacles.

Too weakened to react and still in the midst of regenerating her four wounds, Jun weakly managed "N-no….. Let him go….." due to her lung still in the process of healing and pointed her two left index and middle fingers towards Lilith in the shape of a handgun, intending to fire her Devil Beam towards her, but the flower demoness, once again proving just how deceptively fast she was in spite of her body's form, lashed her green serpentine tail be towards Jun before she could charge the energy to fire her beam and firmly coiled it around her body, immobilising both her legs and arms and causing her to grunt in even more pain as it crushed her slightly.

Smiling in ardour and delight as she healed the burns on her creamy colored skin, Lilith gleefully spoke "Now i understand…. You two are actually lovers! What an amusing surprise, two traitors in love!" while effortlessly lifting Jun off the ground with her tail and retracting it, bringing the demonic amazon close to her while the pink flower that adorned her head closed back up and returned to its orange color.

Jun bared her teeth at Lilith in defiance and disgust as she tried to free herself to not avail as the demoness's serpetine tail tightened its grip on her. It had coiled in a way that it immobilised her arms, thus preventing her from using her Cutters. Then her golden eyes met the demoness's crimson ones. Lilith gasped as soon as she saw the primal bloodlust and fury in the Devil Lady's eyes: they were so primal, so animalistic… so beautiful that the mere sight of them aroused her.

Her lips soon twisted themselves into an ecstatic smile as she declared "Now i can see the secret of your strength….. it lies in those eyes of yours….." her voice filled with what would normally sound like tenderness were it not for the disturbing amount of lust and sensuality that dripped from every word that left her fucsia lips.

As she slowly reached out for Jun's chin with her black hand covered in root, the Devil Lady turned her head away in defiance, refusing to look in the eyes of the woman who had used the image of Kazumi against her but to no avail, as Lilith's fingers cupped her chin and forcibly made her look back into her crimson eyes.

Marvelling even more at how beautiful they looked, Lilith softly purred "Such primal bloodlust…..Such an ardent fire of determination….. Mmmmmm….. It is so captivating, so palpable that it makes my entire body flutter in pleasure…" with so much intensity and lust that it chilled Jun to the core. All at once her raging fury dissappeared, replaced a sudden sense of fright and dread as the crimson eyes of Lilith, in spite of the gentleness they appeared to have, were filled with so much wickedness that as they bore with even more intensity in her yellow ones, Jun found herself frozen in fear, not even managing to say a word.

"S…. Stop….." pleaded an even more enraged Akira as he tried to free himself from the tendrils that Lilith's fingers had become but to no avail. They were too strong. He had no idea that this demoness actually possessed this much physical strength. And thus there was nothing he could do but watch with his face pinned down on the concrete as Lilith took her time playing with his lover.

Noticing how Jun's expression went from one of animalistic fury to one of utter dread and fright, Lilith asked teasingly "What's wrong? You seem afraid." she then put her lips close to her right ear and whispered tenderly "But why should you? You are just as strong as you are beautiful. Unless….." her voice filled with false gentleness and care. The flower demoness withdrew her head and looked back into Jun's golden eyes, the Devil Lady glaring daggers towards her with her teeth bared again but it didn't even faze Lilith. After all she was the one in control here. As as she looked upon the demonic amazon's golden, cat-like eyes, her face stilled and her smile dissappeared. There wasn't just anger in them now. There was also doubt, uncertainty….

And fear. The fear of being alone again. The fear of losing someone she held dear again. The fear of being alone again.

Her serene smile returning to her fucsia lips again, Lilith caressed Jun's right cheek and spoke gently "You poor little thing….. You miss that girl a lot do you not?" causing her to gasp in shock, her jaw dropping. With those words her anger was suddenly replaced by a mix of different emotions, chief of which, pain, grief and fright.

At this point her wounds had mostly healed but the pain those words brought her was higher than any wound she could have suffered. She forcibly shut her eyes and turned her head away, her lips trembling as she pleaded sorrowfully "N-No… I….. I….." only for Lilith to cup her chin once more and making her look in her crimson eyes again. She then ran her thumb on Jun's lips as she declared "You and i are the same…. Two women desperate for love….. Two women who have been alone for a long time…." this time with a voice than to Jun's great surprise wasn't wicked but empathic and sad. In an instant the Devil Lady found a glimpse of a melancolic and crestfallen woman who looked like she had lost that which made her happy.

"Do not be afraid. I can be her for you. In time you will forget and all that you have lost can be yours once again. All you have to do…." she declared serenely, while inching her lips closer to Jun's, her voice so soothing and earnest in spite of how alluring it sounded that it actually caused a single tear to fall from Jun's right eye as she considered the possibility. While it may have been nothing more than an illusion, this was the closest she would have gotten to be with Kazumi again…..

"Is accept it…" finally proclaimed Lilith, inches away from kissing the now broken Jun and injecting the pollen that would have forever enslaved her to the demoness's will.

Distraught by what was about to happen, Akira cried out "NO! LET HER GO!" his voice filled with anguish and terror at the realisation that Lilith was about to forever enslave Jun to her will. But as he watched as the demoness closed her eyes, mere inches away from planting her lips on Jun's…..

Something suddenly flew by at great speeds, causing his black eyes, along with those of Jun and Lilith to widen in shock. Then in less than a second, the flower demoness's right arm separated itself from her body and purple blood began to gush out from the stump connected to her right shoulder, cut in half mid-bicep.

(OST: "Destiny Awaits" = Bleach Soundtrack = watch?v=Q9X83cnAZ7A )

"WHAT?!" screamed Lilith in pain, while Jun could only watch with her mouth agape in disbelief, having been taken out by the spell the demoness had cast over her. With her arm now sliced off, the tendrils around Akira went limp and he managed to shake them off himself. As he got on one knee, he noticed the object responsible for what just happened and his jaw dropped. It appeared to be a yellow rotating buzzsaw and it appeared to be hovering in mid-air right in front of him before it suddenly flew back towards Lilith with a buzzing sound and it sliced off her tail, causing the demoness to throw her head backwards, shut her eyes and scream in even more pain as her now severed tail fell on the ground, still coiled around Jun.

"WHO DARES…" roared Lilith in outrage at being interrupted in spite of her pain. But as she spun her body around to see who was the fool that dared to attack her from behind, she gasped in shock as a hand covered by yellow scales and ending with five sharp recurves talons gripped her wrist, stopping her in her tracks. She momentarily stopped breathing as soon as her crimson eyes saw and recognised the one responsible for this transgression and she could only mutter, her voice faltering "You….."

Akira had already seen that object in action when he faced the one who came closer to killing him than any demon he had ever faced, with the exception of his former best friend, Ryo. Pure incredulity filled every inch of his face as he spotted and recognised its owner, the one who had just now caught Lilith by her left wrist.

After Jun fell on the floor and proceeded to quickly remove the now severed tail from her body, she reopened her eyes to see what had happened…..

Her jaw immediately dropped upon seeing who the one that had freed her and Akira and that was now holding Lilith by her left wrist, was. Then a familiar proud and arrogant voice came as soon as the object stopped moving, revealing itself to be a yellow eagle-like forearm before flying back and reattaching to the point in which it had detached.

"I have to say, you are quite the dissappointment Jun. I expected more from the so called "Saviour of the Beasts."

All the Devil Lady could do was look upon in utter awe and disbelief at the one who had just saved not just her, but also Akira, and call out "S-Sirene…" her mind recalling the one time in which her fellow Devilman, Jason Bates, saved her from that hideous two headed dinosaur beast who had dropped the pipe grids of the cinema studio in which she confronted it down on her, pinning her down with its sheer weight. Had it not been for the purple skinned, horned devilman with long blonde hair's intervention, that dinosaur beast would have had her head that night.

And now it was the Demon Bird herself that had saved her and much like Jason that night, she was looking down at her with her piercing blue eyes and a confident and reassuring smile on her soft lips, while holding Lilith in place with just one hand. With her face contorting in anger and outrage, the flower demoness demanded "You too have turned against your own kind?!"

With her grin growing even more, Sirene replied by pointing her other hand towards Lilith's face and it was only by pure instictive reflexes that she managed to teleport, mere microseconds before the Demon Bird shot a telekinetic bolt that would have, most likely, obliterated her entire head.

As Lilith reappeared several meters backwards, Sirene turned towards her, rounded her blue eyes on the flower demoness's crimson ones "I have merely found a new purpose in my existence." while putting herself in between both Jun, who had managed to get on one knee and Akira, who had gotten back on his feet. Both Devilmen coudn't believe their eyes: their former enemy had come to their rescue. She was the last person they ever expected to be save them and yet now she was, defending them from Lilith.

"Jun. Devilman." she called out, causing both of her former enemies to gasp slightly, their eyes slightly widening "Leave this one to me. A far more important battle awaits you both. This is your chance to put an end to this twisted conspiracy before it leads to more pointless bloodshed." greatly surprising the two Devilmen even more due to the actual concern in her voice. Akira in particular was astonished to actual hear her urging both of them to end this and that there wasn't even a tiny bit of hostility when she called him by the name she usually used to call him. Was what she saw in this corridor when she freed all those people what had sparked this sudden change in her usual confident and prideful character?

"But what about you?" asked a worried Jun as she got up, only for Sirene to glance towards her with a smile. Only this time it wasn't prideful and confident: it was reassuring. The Devil Lady realised from that look alone that she was returning the favor for expressing her worry towards her in spite of having fought nearly to the death slightly more than a week ago.

"You need not worry about me Jun. I am a warrior. This is what i live for. It is not my purpose to bring peace and balance to this world." she replied kindly, her voice so polite and soothing that it left Jun and Akira in awe. Never before had she sounded so kind to both of them. They both realised from those words alone, that possibly without even knowing it, she had changed. She was a far cry from the same bloodthirsty and arrogant demoness who had almost killed them both.

"Now go." she finally ordered both of them. Not needing to be told twice and with Akira feeling respect for the first time towards his former enemy and with Jun heartwarmed to see how far she had come in such a short time, they turned around towards the other exit of the corridor and ran away, eventually dissappearing through the shadows.

(Soundtrack Ends)

With them out of the way, Sirene turned back towards Lilith whose body had sprouted green vine-like tendrils from where her tail and right arm had been cut off that swiftly reached out and connected with said severed appendages, her blue eyes meeting the flower demoness's crimson ones as she declared with her trademark wicked grin "My, my…. What an unexpected surprise. The mighty Sirene herself, strongest of all demonesses, now fighting for the humans just like the traitor, Amon! Truthfully, i did not expect you, of all demons, to sink so low." her teasing voice causing a scowl to form on the Demon Bird's face.

"And i see that you have not changed in the slightest, Lilith. After all these eons you are still the same vain and lecherous woman you were back then, still desperately clinging to your pitiful delusions of love. Tell, me….." she declared at first with much contempt and ridicule before pausing for a moment, a wide taunting grin replacing her scowl as she asked "Are you really that arrogant to believe after all this time, that Atun really cares about you? You are nothing more than a means to an end for him."

The taunt only served to make Lilith laugh in amusement "HA! That's rich coming from you, Sirene, when your own arrogance is what led to your death in the first place. Did you really think you would have been able to bring Amon back, when he could not even take over the mind of a mere human being?" she replied, even more tauntingly than before as her right arm and tail reattached themselves to her body, her conceited and haughty voice causing the Demon Bird's scowl to return once more as she asked "Tell me, how did it feel to be slain by the very image of the demon you loved? To die mere moments away from victory after Kaim gave away his body for you in spite of his feelings for you having never been requited before?"

In spite of mainting her calm and collected exterior, inside Sirene was brimming with homicidal fury as Lilith mocked not only her own feelings but also the same demon she had loved. Her heart now belonged to Kaim but her love for Amon was unsullied and pure. And what almost sent her over the edge was Lilith chuckling evily and declaring "Fufufufu… i have to admit, i pity that poor fellow, living his entire life close to you and not even being noticed until….

"Do not misunderstand, Lilith." interjected Sirene while rounding her blue eyes, filled with tranquil fury, on the flower demoness's crimson ones "I am no longer the naive and reckless woman i once was. And i will prove it to you right now, by squashing you flat like the worthless parasite you are!" while taking a stance, ready to charge towards the orange flower headed femme fatale.

Eagerly excited to strip Sirene of her title of strongest of all demonesses, Lilith smiled in anticipation for the upcoming battle and proclaimed "Then by all means, you are welcome to try. But if you think you will have my head that easily, you are mistaken." while spreading her arms, becoming the Demon Bird to make the first move.