Chapter 434: A Race Against Time Assault
"This... How is this possible...?"
Seeing the Violence Fiend torn in half by Asagiri, a scene that could only be called a one sided massacre rather than a battle, the six members of the Public Safety Devil Countermeasure Special Operations Unit stared in disbelief.
Among all the Fiends under the Special Operations Unit's control, the Violence Fiend was one of the strongest, perhaps even the strongest of them all.
Normally, when a Devil possessed a human corpse and became a Fiend, its power would decline.
Even so, the Violence Fiend's remaining strength was so overwhelming that it had to wear a mask that constantly released poison gas to suppress it.
But...
The Violence Fiend had been killed in an instant?
And the opponent had not used any special ability at all.
He had relied purely on strength and speed.
"Damn it..."
Panic appeared on the handsome young man's face.
He immediately raised his right hand and aimed it at Asagiri. His fingers formed a peculiar shape resembling the head of an animal as he prepared to utter the command that would summon the Devil he had contracted with.
Yuuki Asuna did not give him the opportunity.
Several flashes of sword light streaked across the rooftop.
The other five members of the Public Safety Devil Countermeasure Special Operations Unit were killed instantly, while the handsome young man's four limbs were severed in the same moment.
Her attack had been so fast that his body had not yet transmitted the pain to his brain.
"Necro..."
"Understood."
Iwanaga Kotoko raised her right hand toward the surviving member of the Special Operations Unit and spoke softly.
"Pale Domination."
A Pale Ghost Hand appeared from thin air.
Its five sharp fingers pierced directly into the young man's head and began extracting his soul to read his memories.
At that moment, Iwanaga Kotoko saw an illusion.
Inside a dimly lit room, a monster with six eyes was bound by tree roots. A massive eyeball occupied its abdomen, staring directly at her as it released a slightly deranged voice.
"Excellent... This is the future. Let me see your future..."
"Heh."
Faced with such a chilling and grotesque sight, Iwanaga Kotoko merely let out a cold laugh.
A mysterious light radiated from her violet eyes as she stared directly into the giant eye on the monster's abdomen.
"A mere inferior Devil dares to peer at me, a God?"
Upon hearing those words, the Future Devil, nailed to a cross, began to tremble.
It tried to close the opening in its abdomen, but discovered that it could not.
Originally, it had intended to peer into Iwanaga Kotoko's future through the soul of the Devil Hunter who had contracted with it.
Now, the positions had been reversed.
It had become the one being observed, and it was completely unable to escape Iwanaga Kotoko's gaze.
The connection it had initiated was forcibly seized by the God of Wisdom.
Iwanaga Kotoko now held the authority to determine when it ended.
The next second, dozens of Pale Ghost Hands appeared throughout the dim room.
They seized the Future Devil's body and began extracting its memories while violently tearing it apart.
The moment the Future Devil was completely shredded, the illusion before Iwanaga Kotoko's eyes vanished.
She looked toward Asagiri and smiled sweetly.
"I've obtained new information."
...
Fifteen minutes later, Iwanaga Kotoko shared everything she had obtained from the memories of the Special Operations Unit member and the Future Devil with her four teammates.
After listening, Asagiri revealed an interested smile.
"Although the Future Devil can only observe the future of this world, it could determine when its predictions became severely disrupted."
"That allowed it to calculate when we, Players from another world, would arrive."
"No wonder the members of the Special Operations Unit began searching for us shortly after we entered the Dungeon."
"But something is unusual..."
Yuuki Asuna recalled their recent encounter, which could hardly be called a battle, and frowned deeply.
"Nyx has already fought us once."
"Unless it knows nothing about the strength of the Special Operations Unit, it should understand that these people cannot even defeat mid to lower tier Players at the current stage, let alone us."
"What purpose is there in sending them to die?"
"To buy time?"
Kato Megumi spoke softly.
"I have a feeling Nyx wants us to focus our attention on the Special Operations Unit and the Devils, allowing it to gain time for something."
"I don't know what it is planning, though."
"Perhaps we're being too cautious."
Asagiri looked at the sky outside, which was gradually becoming brighter, and spoke softly.
"Instead of focusing on what we should do, let's consider the situation from another angle."
"What does Nyx truly care about more than these pawns?"
"Is it... the Incarnations it created?"
"Yes. The Incarnations."
Asagiri pondered for a moment before continuing.
"Why did Nyx forcibly suppress the Game system the moment we entered this world, even at the risk of exposing the location of one of its Incarnations?"
"It doesn't know that I possess Hunter Mark, but it already lost to us once. It should be acting more cautiously this time."
"If its only goal were to buy time, then couldn't it have achieved the same effect through the special prompts and main quests normally issued by the system?"
"You mean the system's prompts would have exposed one of Nyx's secrets, so it risked revealing an Incarnation to prevent that?"
"Yes."
Asagiri nodded.
"It's even possible that the Incarnation it exposed was merely bait intended to redirect our attention."
He carefully considered the information Iwanaga Kotoko had obtained.
After more than ten seconds, he spoke again.
"This world should normally be filled with various Devils, yet during the past month, nothing has happened."
"There have been no incidents of Devils harming humans, and no new Devils have appeared in the human world."
"That is far too abnormal."
"Considering the structure of this world, whatever Nyx is planning..."
A thoughtful light appeared in Asagiri's eyes.
He raised his head and looked at Yuuki Asuna and the others before saying something they had not expected.
"Let's split up."
"I'll hunt down the marked Nyx Incarnation as quickly as possible."
"Huh?"
Yuuki Asuna immediately frowned and objected.
"You're going to eliminate that Nyx Incarnation alone?"
"Don't forget that there are four others, along with whatever traps Nyx prepared in advance within this world."
"But what if the opposite happens?"
"Eh? What do you mean?"
Seeing Yuuki Asuna's puzzled expression, Asagiri chuckled.
"What if I make a great show of hunting that Incarnation, yet Nyx does nothing?"
"What if it doesn't even attempt to stop me?"
Yamauchi Sakura hesitated.
"That... shouldn't be possible, right?"
"Although Nyx lost last time, it possesses five Incarnations now. How could it simply abandon one of them?"
"Unless it's plotting something else."
Asagiri shrugged, his tone relaxed.
"If it truly makes no attempt to stop me, then our theory will be confirmed."
"It will mean Nyx is carrying out another plan and is willing to sacrifice one of its Incarnations to gain enough time."
"What we need to do next is simple."
"We start a fire."
"A fire?"
Seeing that Kato Megumi, Yuuki Asuna, and Yamauchi Sakura had not yet understood, Iwanaga Kotoko, who had already grasped Asagiri's meaning, explained with a smile.
"There's a saying. If you want to know what someone treasures most inside their home, watch where they run first when a fire breaks out."
"Nyx claims to be the embodiment of the Will of Death, but as long as it possesses thoughts, it cannot completely escape habitual behavior."
"Asagiri will move to eliminate the marked Nyx Incarnation and test his hypothesis."
"Meanwhile, Kaguya's team and ours will become moving fires."
"We know that we haven't discovered anything yet, but Nyx doesn't know that."
"It will only see us suddenly splitting up and assume that we have uncovered its plan."
"I see."
Seeing that Yuuki Asuna and the others understood, anticipation appeared in Asagiri's eyes.
He smiled eagerly.
"Then let's begin."
...
One hour later, on a street in Tokyo.
A pale faced man dressed in a crisp suit moved among the morning commuters.
He appeared no different from an ordinary office worker, with nothing about him that seemed particularly noteworthy.
At that moment, a dark shadow suddenly descended from the sky.
The pedestrians on the street froze in astonishment.
"I found you..."
Asagiri lightly brushed the dust from his clothing.
Despite descending from such an extreme height and speed, he had not stirred even a single speck of dust.
His gaze passed through the crowd and landed directly on the pale faced office worker.
His voice carried a smile.
"Nyx."
"Shadow."
Fine blood vessels spread across the office worker's eyes.
A ferocious smile appeared at the corners of his mouth, identical to the one Asagiri had seen when first entering the Dungeon.
"Do you intend to fight me here?"
"These people are innocent. They are just as innocent as the humans in your world."
"You claim to resist me for the sake of humanity."
"Do their lives mean nothing to you?"
However, Asagiri's reaction completely exceeded Nyx's expectations.
He merely looked at Nyx as though he were staring at an idiot and replied in a matter of fact tone.
"Why not?"
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