Chapter 11
"You damn bastard! I'll rip you to shreds and mix you into a pure-meat salad!"
The incoherent rant, delivered in that grating, ear-bleeding voice, made Denji's brow twitch in annoyance.
No point in trading words.
As soon as his Slash cooldown cycled back, Denji raised his hand again, pointing straight at the massive silhouette in the dust cloud.
"Slash!"
The Bat Devil twisted desperately to dodge—but still couldn't fully evade. One entire arm, wing included, was sheared clean off.
Blood gushed like a broken dam.
Yet within seconds, amid the torrent, a fleshy tumor bulged and regrew from the stump.
What the hell?
Normal animal blood shouldn't affect devils at all…
Swallowing that many birds had barely patched its neck wound—already ridiculous.
Now instant regen on top? Something abnormal was definitely mixed in that flock.
Not just human blood…
While suppressing the pain at its wound, the Bat Devil's mouth suddenly elongated into a grotesque tube, aimed at Denji, and fired an invisible blast.
BUZZ!
The sonic attack hit like a silent cannon shell.
Denji—prepared—sidestepped effortlessly.
The missed shot gouged a curved trench in the ground.
Quick mental math: range, velocity, and impact size roughly equivalent to a cannon round—just no secondary explosion on hit.
Meanwhile, the Bat Devil's face paid the price. The single shot tore open rotten flesh; chunks sloughed off like wet paper.
That was the Zombie Serum at work.
Normally: infect → corrupt/assimilate → fully mutate into zombie state.
But devils aren't ordinary animals. Their core essence resists total takeover.
So this concentrated, single-target version of the serum—tweaked from group to individual—got stuck in an endless loop between infection and corruption.
Rotten flesh and fresh meat rejected each other completely—life and death clashing.
The Bat Devil could only watch its body rot while desperately digesting blood and siphoning power from… something… to regenerate new tissue.
Too slow. Too imprecise. Couldn't excise the infected parts cleanly—just regrow, get re-infected, regrow again, buying time against total collapse.
How pitiful~
Oh—right, it's my enemy. Never mind.
Between taunts, Denji dodged three more sonic blasts in quick succession.
Each evasion closed the gap by another step.
Three shots in a row left the Bat Devil visibly strained—its eyeballs were literally melting out with the rot.
Too much power funneled into offense; infection spread faster.
Advantage clear—but Denji stayed cautious.
He knew this thing had a certain "old friend." With its aura exposed this badly, if he didn't finish fast, it'd turn into a 2v1 beatdown…
"Is this a tomato or a ?"
"Bad fruit!"
Answer came almost instantly—memory from the first cast. Consecutive uses were losing potency fast.
"Heh. Guess I've got no choice—time to show a little real skill!"
Denji ripped his shirt open mid-dodge, letting the fabric flutter away on the wind.
Then he closed the final distance.
Hand raised.
Aimed.
"Slash!"
Multi-cast: Slash barrage.
"Slash! Slash! Slash!"
Pull-cord yanked. Hell's roar rose like a symphony—echoing, overlapping, relentless.
The Bat Devil—eyes already gone—perceived death through sound alone.
And that death didn't carry a scythe.
It carried chainsaws.
They descended again and again, carving the devil into smaller and smaller pieces.
Death came too swiftly for last words or even a final scream…
One slash—wound before blood could spray. Next slash—blood itself sliced mid-air, new wound opened. Again and again—like explosions of red. Blood flowed backward into crimson wings of death, then shattered into petals, crumbling into thick, broken black rain…
Most Devour-created skills lacked strict cooldowns—but activation still consumed something.
Each skill carried its own internal cost, with cooldown-like recovery.
One use: cost spent, cooldown starts. Chain use: supplement from elsewhere.
This time, Denji paid in blood.
Countless tiny fissures opened across his skin—seeping, not gushing. Roughly 200cc lost.
He flexed, checked his state. Manageable. Could do it again if needed.
Deep breath to shake off fatigue.
"Go, Pochita."
The Hellhound devoured efficiently.
In moments, the scattered meat chunks vanished from the ground.
Devour activated. Gained abilities:
Blood Authority (Fragment): A shard of the Blood Authority. (Authority-type: First judge fragment size/completeness, then amplify based on user stats.)
Curse Authority (Fragment): A shard of the Curse Authority. Trigger: "blood" or "fangs." Effect: "Plague." (Authority-type: First judge fragment size/completeness, then amplify based on user stats.)
Uh… these two feel way off from the previous ones… whatever. The earlier ones weren't exactly normal either.
Denji carefully felt the two new powers stirring inside.
Felt for a while… basically nothing noticeable.
Fine. Real combat will show what they do.
His gaze shifted to the horizon.
A wriggling "black dot" was approaching—growing larger by the second.
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