THRUM~

A deep and rich sound reverberated off the walls of the apartment, tickling the ears of one Kiryuu Aika in a not unpleasant manner.

The girl turned her focus from her phone game toward the source of the sound, a certain brown-haired teen with a purple bang who held a red-colored bass guitar.

THRUM~

Unlike previous attempts of his, where he seemed to be trying to be plucking the strings almost hard enough to pop them out of the instrument, the sight that Aika was met with was one of a focused-looking Issei seated on a loveseat, his eyes closed and lips moving silently as his fingers moved across the strings in what looked like a cross between butterfly-light plucks and soft caresses.

THRUM~

One of Issei's eyebrows rose as something changed, the almost unremarkable buzz that had been previously bouncing around the apartment turning into a sort of vibration that the girl could almost swear rattled within her bones in a pleasant manner.

THRUM~

Aika felt herself involuntarily sway slightly to the sounds of an indistinct melody that she could all but feel echoing within her chest, her head bobbing in time with the changes in the tune all the way up to the point where Issei strummed out one long, last note.

He opened his eyes and set the bass down on his lap before pulling out a pencil and the small notebook he had been using during all of his musical endeavors, a triumphant grin spreading across his face as he scribbled something down on it.

"Great success!" He clapped the notebook closed, before lifting the bass by the neck with one hand, "Guess I won't be needing this anymore."

He then proceeded to toss the instrument over his head in a haphazard manner, only for the brunette to deadpan at him as it landed square on the stand he had set up for it. She raised an eyebrow at him before returning to her game, drawing a frown from him before he spoke.

"No reaction?"

The girl ignored him, prompting him to move over to the couch she was lying on and start poking her cheek while speaking in a faux whining tone.

"Come on, react."

Aika simply kept playing her game, prompting Issei's eyes to light up in a devious manner, before he shrugged and stood up.

"Well, I guess I'm being ignored today."

The girl peeked under her phone as she heard his steps turning distant, watching him make his way to the kitchen. She heard the sounds of cabinets being opened and rummaged through, before the same happened to the fridge, only for Issei to shortly pop back into the living room with a bowl of ice cream in hand.

Issei took a spoonful of the Neapolitan-flavored treat into his mouth, letting out an exaggeratedly loud moan before speaking up.

"Oh my, this is some delicious ice cream. I thought about bringing some for my girlfriend as well, but she'd probably not accept it since she's ignoring me~"

Aika's eyebrow twitched at that, but she showed no other reaction to his words as she kept playing her game, trying her best to focus on finishing the level so she could gather the resources to try and pull the event's Starlight-bordered SSSR character.

"Oh, this is tasty~"

'I won't look!'

She pulled the phone closer to her face, doing her very best to block out anything Issei could pull-

SLURP~

"Ah~"

Only for him to moan right next to her ear, his cold breath tickling the skin on her ear and the back of her neck and causing her to break out in goosebumps.

"How delicious~"

Her mouth went excessively dry even as another part of her body picked up the slack in the moisture-generating department as her boyfriend's moaning right into her ear ignited a hunger in her.

Slowly, ever so slowly, the girl's head turned towards her boyfriend, only to be met with the sight of him flicking the tip of his tongue across the pink-hued part of the creamy treat with a level of speed and dexterity that had her legs shaking as her imagination tried to think of other ways that skill could be used in.

Licking her lips, the girl leaned towards her man's tongue, only for him to pull away from her and proceed to eat the remainder of his spoonful normally, before smirking at her.

"Hoh~ I thought someone was ignoring m-"

A sudden tackle and oral plundering were enough to silence Issei, whose eyes glinted in amusement and satisfaction as his hands traveled down the girl's back…

-X-

"YEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSS!"

Raynare jumped in surprise at the sudden shriek coming from her next-door neighbors', a light spear already halfway manifested as her body had reflexively put her in combat mode.

"OH! OH! OH! OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH~"

She sighed in relief at the fact that she wasn't actually about to be under attack, her light spear dissipating while her heart rate gradually slowed to resting speed.

"RIGHT THERE!"

The fallen frowned before turning a thoughtful look towards the wall separating her and her noisy neighbors. She'd been living with them for a good while now, and she'd been subjected to all sorts of sexual noises over that time period. Sometimes they came from the glasses girl, other times from the pink-haired short stack, and sometimes from both.

At first, she thought it all to simply be the girls faking to give the prospective sacred gear wielder she'd been put on watching duty over a confidence boost, but after suffering under so many hours of listening to furniture scraping and banging on and against the floors and walls, and many more hours of utterly pornographic sounds she barely knew humans to be capable of, she'd started doubting that assumption.

Those doubts only got more pronounced after the few times she'd come across the glasses girl in the building's laundry room shortly after those noise sessions. On those occasions, the girl always had that glowing, freshly-fucked look that Raynare often fantasized of being given by Azazel. Perhaps that might've still been the girl faking for the sake of her man's image, but the way her legs trembled as she walked looked rather genuine.

'Maybe… He really is that good?'

Raynare, as someone who generally despised humans, really wanted to be able to reject that possibility, however…

"ISEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

In the presence of overwhelming amounts of evidence, not even Raynare's prejudice would allow her to blind herself to reality. She had accepted, no matter how grudgingly, the fact that the oblivious idiot who wasn't even aware of the fact that his neighbor, one of his girlfriends, and many of his schoolmates were part of the supernatural world, was sexually competent.

'An idiot-savant, perhaps? Still… He kind of resembles Lord Azazel whenever he's staring at my tits or ass…'

The fallen never noticed the fact that her hands had made their way into her shorts, and were moving at the same rhythm as the scraping leg chairs coming from her oversexed neighbors' apartment.

"Ah." Koneko stared blankly at the empty milk carton in her hand. "I'm out of milk."

This was a novel experience for her. The girl was usually very organized and logistically savvy insofar as her snacks were concerned, as the thought of having to go without her cakes, cookies, assorted sweets, or her rich, creamy milk was enough to make her balk.

She'd had quite a bit in her mind lately, though. She'd been ordered to watch over a certain boy a while back, an assignment that she ultimately found to be of great interest and that ended up both teaching her some things and arousing some questions. Then, as she was preparing to see these questions answered, she was told that she no longer had to spend time observing him, and should instead turn her efforts toward fulfilling contracts.

She'd been given this newest set of instructions three days ago, and she'd already fulfilled a dozen different requests since. Between keeping up with her schoolwork, fulfilling the requests, and puzzling out the functioning of what she now knew to be called her libido without getting caught by her housemates/other peerage members, it was understandable for her to have lost track of her milk levels.

"...Need more milk."

Uncaring about the time, the girl stuffed herself into a thick coat and a pair of knee-high snow boots before trudging out into the snowy town.

She let her feet drive her to her objective while her mind wandered.

'Why did buchou suddenly decide not to recruit Issei-san? He's very nice and pretty strong for a human, so if he was reincarnated then he would probably become a very strong devil. Maybe he could be reincarnated into a rook, and I could help teach him his role, and how to use the extra strength. I could've even asked him more questions if he had become one of us.'

She acceded to a sudden and unexplainable urge to sigh out loud, her breath steaming in the cold night air before she looked up to the night sky.

'I wonder what Issei-san is doing right now. He's probably having sex with his girlfriends right now…'

That thought caused her to frown as she felt an odd feeling in her gut that somehow made her think of both sadness and desire at the same time.

'I read about this sort of feeling during Japanese literature classes. I think it was called… Yearning? Am I yearning for Issei-san right now?'

"...Koneko-chan?"

The girl blinked at suddenly being addressed, turning towards the one to have done so, only for her eyes to widen in surprise at the sight she was met with.

"Hyoudou Issei? What are you doing in my neighborhood?"

The teen raised a brow at those words as he spoke.

"I should be the one asking you that question."

"But I'm not…"

She stopped mid-sentence and looked around her, noticing the fact that none of the buildings around her were ones she was mostly unfamiliar with, with the sole exception being the apartment complex she knew her interlocutor lived at.

"...Oh."

That small utterance drew an amused smile from the older teen, who patted the girl's head as he spoke.

"So, what're you doing out on the streets at this time of night, Koneko-chan? Don't you know it's not safe for a girl your age to walk around alone?"

A small blush lit up the girl's cheeks even as she allowed herself a moment to silently luxuriate in Issei's affectionate touch before speaking up.

"Going out to the store to buy milk."

"Alright then." The teen shrugged before taking Koneko's hand in his and pulling the girl along as he walked. "There's a pretty great konbini nearby, let's go."

The blush on the girl's face greatly increased the moment Issei's hand wrapped around hers, and she found herself reflexively looking down at her feet even as she followed after him.

"I've not seen you around lately," Issei said, breaking the short silence they had fallen into, "Did you get bored of little old me already?"

"No! I-"

"Hey, relax," Issei gave her hand a light squeeze and turned a small smile her way, "I was just joking. Just like you had your reasons to follow me around, you probably have your reasons as to why you stopped."

He shrugged before the two elapsed back into silence as they walked the rest of the way to the convenience store.

An electronic jingle sounded out as soon as the double doors opened for them before an old man called out.

"Welcome- Oh, Issei-boya. Didn't expect to see you around at this sort of time." The old man then turned his gaze towards Koneko and gave her a kindly smile, "And who's this young lady accompanying you? Another one of your girlfriends?"

The old man's smile turned a little lewd as he leaned in and faux-whispered.

"You know that if you keep going at this rate, your hips will be worse than mine by the time you're 30?"

"Maybe it's the lack of use that made your hips this bad. You ever think of that, old man?"

"Feh! I'll have you know I used to be an absolute stud back when I had a full head of hair!"

"Sure you were. Anyways, what's the best milk you've got?"

"Whole, semi-skimmed, or skimmed?"

Issei turned his gaze towards the still blushing Koneko, prompting the girl to mumble.

"Whole."

The old man behind the counter smiled before speaking up.

"We got a shipment of XXXX-brand milk today. It's pretty rich and creamy and the customers have great opinions about it. Tends to fly off the shelves in less than two days. Bit of a premium brand though, so it'll set you back a bit. We also have XXXXX and XXXXXXX brands. They're not as highly reviewed as XXXX brand milk, but they're still pretty high-quality products and more in the price range of a high schooler like yourself."

Issei looked at Koneko before speaking up.

"You have any preference between those brands?"

The girl shook her head, prompting Issei to turn back towards the old cashier.

"Give me ten cartons of XXXX and two cups of hot choco-milk." He nodded towards Koneko. "Extra chocolate and sugar on hers."

Koneko removed her hand from Issei's so she could reach into her coin purse, only for the brunet to shake his head and reach into his pockets for his wallet.

"I'll pick up the bill."

The girl frowned slightly at that.

"But-"

"I didn't order the 10 cartons for you, Koneko. Aika finished our last carton today, so I'll be taking seven back home, and paying for three more won't really hurt my wallet." He raised an eyebrow, "Unless you were planning on buying more than three cartons?"

"No," The girl shook her head, "More than that would end with the milk in the fridge going bad. But still-"

The girl's words turned into a surprised squawk as Issei's hand once again fell on her head and ruffled her hair before he spoke up with a grin.

"Stop overthinking things and just let your senpai treat you this time, alright?"

Koneko's cheeks warmed up a great deal at the sight of his grin, prompting her to look back down to her feet before mumbling out an "Okay.", to the visible amusement of the old cashier.

The two stepped out of the convenience store a few minutes later and a couple of bags and a big cup full of steaming hot chocolate milk heavier.

With one hand holding the bags with the milk cartons and the other one holding his own chocolate milk, Issei offered an arm to the white-haired girl, who looked away from him in embarrassment while gingerly wrapping her own arm around his before pulling him towards her house.

The two walked in relative silence, with only the sounds of them sipping on their drinks and the background noises of the town filling the air for them, until they stopped at doors to what nominally looked like a townhouse, but was more fit to be called a mansion based on sheer size.

The brunet looked up at the big structure while one thought ran through his mind.

'Deja-vu.'

Shrugging that thought off, he turned towards Koneko and spoke up.

"Well, I guess you're home."

"Yeah."

The two fell into silence after that, but before she could speak up to break it, Issei passed the bag with three cartons of milk over to her with a smile on his face.

"Here you go, Koneko-chan."

The girl took the bag with her free hand before, thinking back to the konbini, she spoke up.

"Thank you… Issei-senpai."

The brunet's smile widened at that, but he only responded by patting her head once more before walking off, waving at her over his shoulder as he did.

Koneko closed her eyes as her hand went to her head, a small smile showing up on her face as she thought back to the warmth of Issei's hand before she made her way back indoors.

She shed her jacket and boots at the entrance before stepping in, her thoughts on the feeling of holding Issei's hand-

"Oh, Koneko-chan."

-only to end up bumping into Akeno.

"Didn't expect you to have been out at this time. Were you fulfilling a contract?"

The girl shook her head, before lifting the bag into view.

"Bought milk."

"Oh, alright." Akeno smiled kindly at the younger girl as she spoke, "Don't go to bed too late though, or you won't be able to focus on your classes."

"Uhm." The girl nodded as she placed the milk down on the nearest table, before looking around the house and feeling it to be particularly empty. "Where are Yuuto-senpai and Buchou?"

"Oh?" Akeno turned her focus back towards the girl, "They're out fulfilling requests, but they shouldn't take too long to return."

"Ok."

Koneko's gaze was still focused on Akeno even as the older girl turned hers towards her phone, multiple questions regarding her latest feelings at the tip of her tongue, only for her to think better of it and, after putting all the milk cartons in the fridge, head back into her bedroom and lock the door.

If a sound-dampening spell was cast within, well, who would know, really?

"...What is this?"

Issei raised an eyebrow towards an unimpressed-looking Suzushi.

"What is what?"

The Yuki-onna raised an unamused brow of her own before pointing her folding fan towards the stretching, tracksuit-clad forms of Aika, Motohama, and Matsuda.

"Oh!" Issei hit his left palm with his balled right hand, a look of enlightenment on his face before he responded, "That's called a warm-up. You do it when-"

"I know what a warm-up is," The girl gritted out between her teeth, "What I don't know is who they are, and why they're here!"

"Ohhhhhh, you wanted to know who they are. Well, why didn't you just say that from the start?"

Ginei didn't even try to smother his amused snort at the constipated look on Suzushi's face. Seeing the girl clenching her fan so hard that veins throbbed visibly on the back of her hand all the while knowing that she couldn't do anything to the target of her ire gave him a nearly unmatched sense of schadenfreude.

A shit-eating grin spread across his face when said girl turned a baleful look his way, sneering at him before blowing out an indignant breath as she looked away.

Kasumi, who had been watching the byplay with her usual vulpine half-smirk, turned her focus towards Issei and spoke.

"At the risk of cutting this amusing scene short, I'm also rather curious about why you called us up."

Issei turned his attention towards the kitsune for a moment, before turning his gaze back towards the warming-up trio as he spoke.

"I called you guys here for a…" He smacked his lips before proceeding, "...Well, an induction is the best descriptor for what I have planned."

He cracked his neck before turning his body completely towards the usual dwellers of the Kuoh red light district, all of whom found themselves subconsciously standing straight under Issei's attentive gaze.

"We'll be scouring the back alleys for things that go bump in the night together. The ultimate goal is for them to pick up experience dealing with the nasties without too high a risk to their lives."

With the exception of Butsu, whose eyes were staring blankly at Issei as if everything he said had just sailed over his head, the others were visibly startled at his words. They were so startled that Kasumi found herself raising a hand like a student in a classroom before speaking up.

"Uh, is this really okay? If my memory isn't messing with me, aren't those two the guys we had to rescue just about a couple of weeks ago when they ran into a low-classer?"

"Indeed they are," Issei responded with a nod.

Suzushi was the one to speak up next, her tone frigid as the tundra.

"They're probably going to die if you go forward with this."

This actually got a surprised raise of the brow from Issei.

"I didn't expect you to care."

"Hmph." The girl snorted, her mien turning even colder if such a thing was even possible, "I'd just rather not go through the trouble of dealing with an empowered, satiated stray."

"Sure," Issei didn't even make an effort of seeming convinced in his response, before turning his gaze back towards the trio, "But you don't need to worry about them."

"Y-yeah!" Daichi spoke up, much to the visible shock of Suzushi, Kasumi, and Ginei, who had completely forgotten about the fact that he'd been present as well, "Issei-senpai can step in-"

"No." The brunet cut Daichi off before he could've finished his sentence, to the surprise of all listeners, "There's no need to worry about them because they're tough enough to deal with the average stray."

Everybody else stared at Issei with great incredulity, but he simply shrugged off the incredulous gazes and spoke up loud enough to be heard by Aika, Matsuda, and Motohama.

"We're moving out!"

He followed his words up by jumping up to the ceiling of a two-story building in a single bound, an act that was easily mimicked by Ginei, Suzushi, Kasumi, Butsu, and, much to the surprise of those previously mentioned, Daichi.

They looked down at the last three in curiosity as to how they would fare, only for their eyes to widen in surprise at the sight they were met with.

"Haaph!"

Aika and Motohama each ran a good few feet up the closest walls before easily clambering their way up by using the slightest protuberance or crease as handholds, shimmying their way up to the roof at a good clip, whereas Matsuda jumped over six feet in the air, the bottom of his right foot falling on the perfectly vertical brick wall before his whole figure blurred for an instant, only for him to softly land right beside Issei shortly after, a wrapped bundle resting over his shoulder.

Although they had moved first, Aika and Motohama only clambered over the lip of the roof shortly after Matsuda landed, the two of them easily rolling back to a standing position.

"So," Motohama spoke up, "Wha-"

He cut himself off at the sight of Aika's head snapping to the side, her irises lighting up with a purple glow before her brows furrowed and she spoke up.

"Stray."

Everyone else turned in the same direction as she did, only for the original red light dwellers to turn shocked gazes towards the girl when they, through their various personal methods, managed to notice the very stray the girl was referring to.

"Well then," Issei spoke up with a wide grin, "You all heard the lady. We have a stray to clean up."

-X-

A few minutes of high-speed roof-hopping had left the whole group standing pretty much above the stray, who seemed to be getting more and more agitated over time.

Its agitation was perfectly understandable though, as its attempts at securing itself a meal were thwarted by a mixture of Issei and Kasumi's efforts. Issei had, from the moment he had become aware of the stray, used small pulses of his Presence to redirect civilians away from any routes that would have them cross paths with the devil, whereas Kasumi had, as soon as she got sufficiently close to it, influenced it with her illusions, luring it to a more remote, isolated part of the town.

"So…" Ginei looked at the other members of the group, his gaze rapidly flicking to the new additions, before turning his focus to Issei, "Who's going down there?"

Issei rubbed his chin, a pensive look on his face, before speaking up.

"Matsuda, you're up."

"Alright." The baldie responded with a nonchalant shrug before jumping down to street level, much to the shock of most of the group.

"You're just going to send him down alone like that?" Suzushi asked cooly.

"Hate to agree with the ice hag," Ginei interjected, ignoring the derisive snort from said hag as he continued, "But I don't think it's a good idea to just send him down like that. I mean, that stray doesn't feel particularly strong, low class at best, but still… Wouldn't it be better to pair him up with one of us, or at least send someone out to figure out how it fights and what tricks it's got up its sleeves before sending him down there?"

"What's the use of a whetstone if you completely smooth out its grit out of fear of chipping your blade?" Issei gave Ginei a look that had the college-aged young man feeling slightly embarrassed before crossing his arms over his chest and turning his gaze down towards the face-off between the bald teen and the stray as he proceeded, "Figuring things out on their own is a skill every warrior needs to learn since there is no guarantee that they'll always have backup, information about their enemy, or even hold the initiative in battle. Adaptation is the name of the game, and you don't learn that by having your hand held every step of the way."

Now read into Issei's intent, the whole group turned their gazes down to the confrontation, solemn looks on their faces.

-X-

Tap.

Matsuda came off of a 10+ feet drop with a level of lightness that just a few weeks ago he didn't even imagine to be possible, his hand gripping tightly onto the wrapped bundle he was carrying as he gave the creature across him a good look.

The thing was around 7 and a half feet tall, with a burly upper body with extremely broad shoulders, long, thickly muscled arms ending in oversized fists, and grey fur resembling that of a gorilla's, while its lower body sported legs that seemed normal in shape for a bipedal from the waist to the knees, only to then flare out into a reverse-jointed disposition, something akin to a vertically-standing horse.

Its face looked like an equine snout if equines had evolved as particularly vicious carnivores, with a wide maw full of wickedly sharp hooked teeth, each of which showed many sharp serrations, a thick tongue that was hanging so far out of its mouth as to reach its stomach, and saliva that seemed to be at least 70% foam.

Two blood-red eyes fell on Matsuda with great malice and hunger, killing intent filling the alley, before the stray suddenly appeared in front of the baldie, having crossed the distance of a dozen feet between them in the blink of an eye and reaching out for the teen's shoulders with its outstretched hands, each finger of which was tipped with a hooked claw in the vein of snake fangs, all the while the wicked maw headed straight for the neck.

Matsuda's feet stayed anchored to the ground, his body completely immobile except for his eyes, which widened in great shock at the occurrence.

-X-

The original members of the team turned anxious looks toward Issei, only to be met with the sight of the brunet looking down at the scene with his arms crossed over his chest and a complete and utter lack of concern on his face.

Ginei's hand had reflexively wrapped around the hilt of his blade, his legs tensing in preparation to move, only for a shocked gasp from Suzushi and Kasumi to prompt him to turn back towards the conflict, resulting in his own eyes widening to the size of saucers at the scene he was met with.

-X-

Matsuda's eyes widened in shock at the stray that was suddenly in his face, his gaze going from the menacing eyes to the fangs and claws, all the while a single thought went through his head.

'So… slow.'

The bald sprinter acknowledged the fact that relative to himself just a month or so ago, the monster he was faced with might as well have been moving at the speed of sound. Now, though, after weeks of suffering the torture that Xinthia called training?

The stray might as well have been wading through molasses.

A single thought had his body bathed in Tantric Energy, his legs lighting up with a mild purple glow as he ducked under the stray's leap, before reflexively retaliating with a kick to the neck that sent the thing flying until it smacked into a brick wall hard enough to crack it.

The stray easily jumped to its feet, revealing the fact that it had taken no real damage from the kick, before rushing right back at Matsuda and releasing a wild barrage of swings and swipes of its claws.

The bald teen reacted to the continued assault by not being in its path, each attack being avoided with a shuffling step that almost made it seem as if he were dancing out of the way of the stray's attacks.

The stray tried to surprise Matsuda by suddenly shifting its rhythm in the middle of its barrage, turning one of its downward swipes into a handstand before lashing out with one of its feet at a speed at least twice as high as that of its previous attacks.

BANG!

The stray's eyes shone with malicious glee at the sensation of its foot making direct contact with something, the hit so hard that the cracked chips of brick from its flight into the wall were further crushed, resulting in a cloud of dust the result of its attack.

"Not bad…"

Glee turned into incredulity as a voice came from behind the curtain of dust, before a stiff breeze dissipated the visual obstruction, revealing the fact that Matsuda was still whole and hearty, his wrapped bundle held in a defensive two-handed grip in front of him, with some of the bandages torn from the previous attack.

"I wanted to see if I could beat you with my body alone, but I guess I'm still far too weak to do it. In the end, it all still comes down to this…"

Having said that, one of the teen's hands grabbed one of the torn ends of the bandages before pulling, causing the bundle to start slowly unraveling.

-X-

"Isn't that the thing he got from uncle Andre?"

Kasumi and Suzushi, who had not been at the bar when Andre had bestowed the boys with some weapons, turned their gazes towards Daichi, who was looking down at Matsuda in surprise.

"Seems so, but…" Ginei interjected, a serious expression on his face as he spoke. "Is he capable of wielding it properly after so little time with it in his hands?"

Curious, Kazumi and Suzushi turned their attention back towards the fight, their gazes falling onto the scene of Matsuda revealing his weapon to the world.

-X-

The wary stray's legs tensed in preparation to bolt, a bad feeling settling in its gut as it watched the bald teen across it forcefully tugging on one of the cloth bandages, causing the whole thing to unravel in such a manner as to altogether obscure sight of his figure.

WOOSH!

GLKHT!

The stray jumped back as fast as it possibly could, newborn urgency flashing in its eyes as one of its hands clutched at the gushing, fist-sized hole on its left shoulder.

"I missed…"

The last of the bandages fell completely to the ground, revealing to all a rather striking sight.

Standing across the nervous-looking stray was Matsuda, his stance relaxed as a black blur moved around his torso. His hands stopped their movements, revealing to the previously unaware the full sight of his weapon.

"It seems I could use more training."

A 6 feet length of black metal was held in both of his hands, its width around half that of a soda can. Its body was grooved in such a way that, paired with its color, easily evoked images of iron rebar, and its general shape was somewhere between a pike, a spear, and an overly long stake, with its body from the butt up being mostly uniform, only for the last foot and a half to change into an extremely sharp double-edged blade, which tapered off to such a fine point that, were one looking down the length of the thing, they would get the impression of a dot suddenly widening into a rod.

A flick of the wrist from Matsuda had the spear spinning fast enough for the resulting wind to clear the bandages from around him, ensuring that he wouldn't accidentally trip on them before he stopped it on a two-handed grip, the tip of the spear pointed at the ground in a 30-degree angle, with his left hand wrapped around the shaft close to the bottom third of the spear, while his right hand occupied a similar position but closer to the point.

Matsuda's footing shifted, his right foot set in front with the toes pointed towards the stray and his left foot at the back at around a 90-degree angle, while his torso leaned towards his opponent.

"Hah…"

The bald teen exhaled once before an absolutely shocking amount of Killing Intent permeated the area, the slightly metallic scent of blood filling the awareness of all those present, so thick as to make an average person's stomach churn.

The cloying smell caused even the stray to rear back in shock before the sensation of all of that Killing Intent settled onto it specifically turned wariness into fear.

Said fear quickly turned into desperation, prompting the stray to lash out at its enemy, mobilizing every last drop of demonic energy in its body and rushing towards its assailant at least twice as fast as it had previously moved for the entirety of the fight.

Its vigor seemed to have been renewed under the effect of such abundant power, causing its muscles to bulge with great power, its eyes to glow as if backlit, and a new gleam to come from the edges and tips of its claws and fangs.

"Die."

None of that made a difference as Matsuda suddenly appeared a dozen feet behind the stray, his body still in the stance he had taken just shortly before.

"Brain, throat, heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, spine… Humans have a series of points that if struck directly result in an instant kill."

The stray's neck, slowly and with great difficulty, turned so that it could face its bald opponent, its eyes showing nothing but shock and incredulity as he did.

"I have no idea how your biology works, though," Allowing his previously accumulated killer intent to dissipate, Matsuda stood back up to a regular stance, holding the spear over his shoulders in a one-handed grip as he turned towards the stray. "So I just stabbed all of them."

The stray's mouth opened-

SPURT!

Only for multiple gushing holes to open throughout its whole body, right before its eyes rolled back into its head and its body fell over like a sack of rocks.

Letting out a relieved breath, Matsuda's legs bent under him before he jumped, his leap this time allowing him to land right next to the group that had been watching him.

"So," The bald teen twirled his spear before slamming the butt of it on the roof underneath him. "How did I do?"

While Ginei, Kasumi, and Suzushi were far too stunned to respond, Daichi was still trying to still his heart after being subjected to such intense Killer intent and Motohama and Aika responded with simple thumbs-up, Butsu was the one to surprisingly break the silence.

"You kill good."

"Thanks, man!" Matsuda sheepishly rubbed his bald head. "I kind of got into the habit of aiming only at vitals, so-"

"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT!?"

Everybody turned towards Suzushi, whose face flushed in embarrassment at her uncharacteristic explosion.

"That," Issei spoke up with a mixture of glee and amusement at the Yuki-onna's reaction, "Was one of my bros showing that he is built different. Now, I'd appreciate if the lot of you followed me to the next target of the night."

Having said that, Issei moved, with the rest of the group following after him.

-X-

Once again the group overlooked a confrontation between one of them and a stray devil.

Rather than Matsuda though, the one staring down the stray was Motohama.

A quadruped wolf-like stray with needle-like fur and a thick constrictor snake coming out of its abdomen to rest over its back stared back at the glasses-clad young man. The stray's fur bristled and its teeth were bared in a way that wolves usually did only when they felt threatened, despite the fact that Motohama had yet to attack the thing a single time.

Teen and monster stood there, silently staring each other down, before Motohama sighed, scratching the back of his head as he spoke up.

"You're really just going to settle with staring me down? Can't you see all of this delicious human meat waiting to be gobbled on? The sweet, fresh blood that will make your taste buds sing? The… Uh…" He paused for a moment to think of something else to taunt the stray with, "The… Bones you can gnaw on and then bury only to dig out at a later date? What do murderdogs even like?"

Seeing that the stray's response was to keep growling at him, Motohama shrugged before lifting the right side of his shirt, revealing a box-like holster attached to his belt, with what looked like bits of wood and metal showing over the rim.

A quick reach into the holster and the bespectacled young man was then holding a pair of dark wood angles connected to one another by a metallic chain.

"Hooooooooooooooooooo~" A sound akin to the characteristic cry of a certain chinese martial artist of great fame left the young man's lips, before he started swinging his weapon around, small adjustments of his wrists causing the chain to change the speed and path of travel of the wooden handle not within his grasp. A blur of dark wood moved all around his body as he swung left, right, and center, around his waist and torso, and changing hands as he swung underneath his armpits, before one last move allowed him to keep a good grip on one of the handles, the chain stretched taut as the other one was trapped between his torso and the bicep on that same side. "Nunchaku, bitch!"

-X-

Suzushi, Ginei, and Kasumi could only stare blankly at the display, all the while Matsuda and Aika folded over in raucous laughter, Daichi tried his best to suppress his own out of politeness, and Issei kept his own reaction to an upward twitch of the corner of his lips.

-X-

Seeing that the stray seemed confused and shocked by his magnificent display of martial prowess, Motohama rushed in with the intent to swing right at its eye, only to find himself altering the course of his swing so that he could deflect a charge from the snake head that apparently was not as susceptible as its wolf companion to distractions.

Having successfully deflected the snake's attack, Motohama tried to move around it so as to have free access to the stray's backside, only for the creature to show the way it was different from the average, mundane wolf by turning at a speed much too fast to be naturally possible, before leaping at its opponent, its slavering maw streaking towards the teen's throat.

CLINK!

The metallic chains of the nunchaku were the only thing to stop the wolf from successfully clamping its jaws around Motohama's neck, but they did nothing to stop the creature from using its clawed forepaws to try and eviscerate its target.

POP!

A loud popping sound issued right as the claws were about to make contact with Motohama's stomach, resulting in the teen and wolf being sent flying in opposite directions.

The two turned their midair tumbles into aerial somersaults before lining their feet up with the ground, only for the wolf to be forced to slide for a few feet to bleed off its momentum, whereas Motohama stopped altogether the moment his toes touched the ground.

"Whew, you almost got me there!" The teen said while miming an exaggerated wiping of sweat off of his forehead, "Without my stacked air pocket and unidirectional energy dispersal spells I would've been toast. Not sure how I'll survive another attack of yours now that they're all spent, though."

The stray eyed its enemy warily, its four paws setting it on a slow circling motion all the while the snake head bobbed left and right as if trying to find a different vector of attack from its lupine partner.

Setting his feet, Motohama sent strength to his legs before his right arm reared back-

"HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH~"

And he struck out with his nunchaku. Unlike what one would expect though, rather than simply swing at air due to the distance between himself and his opponent, Motohama's attack was made viable by the fact that the chain of the nunchaku suddenly extended, allowing the handle to hurtle through the air towards the stray.

The stray jumped out of the way of the surprisingly fast attack, only for both of its sets of eyes to widen to the extreme as the wooden handle slammed into the concrete floor hard enough to make a small crater.

Said handle quickly flew back towards Motohama as the chain contracted back to its regular size, but the stray didn't get the opportunity to attack as the teen swung again, forcing it to jump out of the path of the dangerous attack.

Rather than retract the chain again though, Motohama swung his arm in a different direction, causing the handle to fly straight towards the stray's underbelly, only for the thick serpentine body to intercept what could've been a debilitating strike.

The stray's sense of urgency increased as it noticed the handle moving with increased speed and more power with each swing. It had even tried to disengage and escape multiple times, only to receive a good smack from the thing that forced it back into the area of the confrontation.

Unseen by Motohama, a ruthless glint shone on the stray's wolf eyes as it once again turned its back on the human and started running. A swing of Motohama's arm had the handle once again slamming into the stray with the intent to pull it back to his preferred range of combat, but the devil had been anticipating that move, having wrapped the snake body around the entirety of its torso to reduce the damage from the hit, and then using the power of said hit to project itself towards Motohama, his jaws once more spread wide and poised to clamp around his throat now that he no longer could block him with his nunchaku.

A victorious gleam shone in the stray's eyes as its mouth flew through the space between itself and its target-

"Nope."

Only for a cloud of particulates to slam into its head at the last second, draining all the power of its body all at once and leaving it writhing on the ground in utter agony, blood flowing down the sockets of its clenched eyes while the fur on its face sizzled away, revealing blistered and burned flesh.

"I'm pretty weak, you know." Motohama's tone was utterly casual and nonchalant as he spoke, "I may be technically considered supernaturally fast, strong, and all that jazz, but I don't really have the raw stats to keep up with my friends. The fact that I'm specializing in magic is theoretically enough to bridge that gap, but it'll take me a while to build up to that point, and well… Can't escalate if I'm dead, can I?"

He walked up to the writhing stray, shrugging lightly as he addressed it.

"That means that I had to figure out a way to deal with stuff like you until then. I did figure out a way, and that way is called 'playing as dirty as feasibly possible'."

The snakehead suddenly unwound itself from around the wolf body and flew at Motohama in an attempt at a surprise attack, only to be met with another handful of the same thing that had left the wolf body in the nasty state it currently was in, causing the thing to hiss and writhe in pain as its scales seemingly melted off, revealing inflamed red-raw flesh.

"Case in point, my 'Evil Begone' powder, which is pretty much just crucifix shavings and kosher salt blessed at a Buddhist temple. A handful of minor weight manipulation spells, and I get to carry a bunch of it on my person without any real damage to my movement capabilities."

A move of his shoulder and a tug of the handle in his had had the expanded chain tightly wrapped around the body of the stray.

"Mix that with a few dozen minor inorganic material replication spells for the chain and a similar amount of minor momentum amplifying spells on the other end of the nunchaku, and all I need is to bait you into eating a faceful of 'Evil Begone'. I thought about trying to rush in and actively throw it at you but you were looking pretty wary from the start and I didn't want to risk revealing my secret weapon in an ineffective attack, so setting you up to come at me was my best shot."

A small, yellow-colored magical circle appeared on the back of Matsuda's hand, right before a small jolt of electricity ran down the chain of the nunchaku and into the already pained stray, causing it to writhe even harder.

"Feel that? That's the strongest thunder spell I've managed to learn so far. I've had a bit of a hard time directing the generated electricity though, resulting in a few burned fingers. That stops being a concern when you have a conductive metal through which to channel the spell, though. With that being said…"

What had been a single magical circle turned into two, then into four, then eight, then sixteen, all the way until Motohama's entire arm was covered in sparking yellow energy.

"In the name of the father, the son, and the holy ghost, I command you to die."

All of the circles discharged at the same time, a mass of yellow energy traveling through the yellow chain before absolutely lighting up the downed stray, all in the blink of an eye.

The magical electricity died out around 30 seconds after it had first manifested, revealing the stray to now be nothing more than a smoking corpse.

Cracking his neck, Motohama whipped his arm back, causing the chains to unwrap from around the corpse, before launching it towards a high-up set of emergency stairs on the back of one of the nearby buildings and allowing it to contract, resulting in him being reeled up the building, before swinging himself back towards the building the group stood on, ending things in a shoulder roll to shed that extra momentum before hopping back up to his feet.

"Done! So, how did I do?"

While Kasumi, Ginei, and Suzushi once again stared in open-mouthed shock, Matsuda, Aika, and Daichi tried their very best to suppress their giggles at his funny noises, while Issei gave him a thumbs up.

"Not bad, Mathemagician. Or would it be Mathemonkgician now?"

"Heh," Motohama flicked a thumb over his nose, "Multi-classing for the win."

After staring at the nunchaku wielder in silent shock for a few minutes, Ginei spoke up.

"So… I guess we're done for tonigh-"

His question was interrupted by a pair of strays, who had been secretly watching the battle between Motohama and the wolf-snake devil, and decided to lie in wait until every member of the group was at their most inattentive before striking.

Experienced in the matters of supernatural violence, Ginei, Kasumi, Suzushi, and Butsu started moving as soon as they noticed fast-moving objects headed their way-

BANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANG!

Only for the two strays to turn into pink mist mid-flight, courtesy of the smoking hand cannon in Aika's hand.

"Now we're done," Issei said with a mild smile.

-CHAPTER, END!-