Chapter 435: Numerical Overwhelm
"I see..."
From Asagiri's eyes, Nyx could tell that he was not bluffing.
He truly did not care how much destruction their battle might cause to the surrounding area.
"It seems I underestimated you. Neither your own death nor the deaths of others can shake your resolve."
"Very good... very good."
"In that case..."
Nyx raised its right hand, forming the same gesture used by the member of the Public Safety Devil Countermeasure Special Operations Unit earlier.
Its fingers resembled the head of an animal as it whispered,
"Kon."
The moment it finished speaking, an enormous fox head erupted from beneath the street.
Its massive jaws were filled with sharp fangs as it lunged toward Asagiri, who had already risen dozens of meters into the air.
"Persona..."
Facing the sudden attack, Asagiri extended his left hand and crushed the ethereal Tarot card drifting down from above.
At the same time, he drew a black gun shaped summoner with his right hand, pressed it against his temple, and pulled the trigger without hesitation.
He summoned two Personas simultaneously.
"Human Asura!"
"Ruiner Nergigante!"
"ROAR!!!"
The massive Ruiner Nergigante appeared, its body covered in razor sharp spikes and crowned with enormous horns.
The instant it materialized, it unleashed a roar that made the surrounding air tremble.
Its claws seized the upper and lower jaws of the Fox Devil.
The black muscles along its arms bulged.
Amid an almost maddened roar, Ruiner Nergigante unleashed its terrifying strength and tore the enormous fox head in half.
Blood rained across the street.
Only then did the surrounding pedestrians finally react.
Faced with this apocalyptic scene, they instinctively screamed in terror.
Most fled in panic, while others were so overwhelmed by fear that they collapsed onto the ground, unable even to stand.
"A Devil... Another new Devil..."
The ordinary people had clearly mistaken the enormous and intimidating Ruiner Nergigante for a newly appeared Devil.
Within their understanding of the world, a creature like that could not possibly be anything else.
"Roar..."
Asagiri stood atop Ruiner Nergigante's back and looked down at Nyx below.
He spoke with a light chuckle.
"The power of a Devil?"
"Is it genuine, or merely something you copied?"
"Do you intend to use this world's Devils to contend with me?"
"How naive. Truly foolish."
"Most of the Devils in this world indeed lack the power to oppose you, but..."
Nyx looked at the crowd fleeing chaotically through the streets.
Its face twisted with fanatical excitement.
"The most fascinating aspect of this world is that human fear can endlessly strengthen Devils."
As those words fell, Nyx's arms transformed into distorted, writhing tendrils of the Blacklight Virus.
They plunged into the ground and instantly expanded into enormous spikes.
However, their targets were not Asagiri, Ruiner Nergigante, or Human Asura.
They targeted every human fleeing nearby.
In a single instant, before anyone could even scream, black and red spikes erupted through the bodies of hundreds of people.
Blood covered the sharpened tips protruding from the mouths of the suspended corpses.
The surrounding street became as bloody and cruel as hell itself, yet the arrangement also carried an inexplicable resemblance to some grotesque religious ritual.
After completing the massacre, Nyx looked back at Asagiri.
It expected to see pain, anger, pity, or unbearable hesitation on his face.
Instead, Asagiri's eyes did not fluctuate in the slightest.
It was as though he felt nothing toward the brutal slaughter Nyx had just committed.
"No hesitation at all..."
Nyx murmured to itself.
Then madness spread across its face.
The Blacklight Virus tendrils extending from its arms began to writhe.
The hundreds of corpses suspended from the spikes rapidly fused with the black and red biomass.
In less than a breath, Nyx had created hundreds of low level Blacklight Virus Infected.
"Go."
The horde rushed toward Asagiri at astonishing speed.
Asagiri merely uttered a single word.
The moment he spoke, Ruiner Nergigante transformed into a dark blur.
Its massive body carried unstoppable momentum, like the wrath of a god descending upon the earth, as it charged directly into the swarm of Blacklight Virus Infected.
The Infected, who had gathered like a colony of ants, were sent flying and torn apart.
"And then..."
Asagiri's gaze passed through the horde of clawing Blacklight Virus Infected and settled on the Nyx Incarnation hiding behind them.
He slowly extended his right hand.
A massive black fan appeared within his grasp.
The next second, his figure vanished.
"He's coming..."
Like the previous Incarnation, this body of Nyx had fused with an extremely high concentration of the Blacklight Virus.
However, it immediately discovered something completely different from their previous battle.
During the last confrontation, its various physical attributes had been comparable to Asagiri's. Its stamina and regenerative ability had even been slightly superior.
But this time...
The dynamic vision of this body could no longer follow Asagiri's movements.
"Bang!!!"
Sensing danger from above, Nyx tore its left arm from the ground and rapidly transformed it into a thick black shield.
Before the shield had even finished forming, the edge of the Shura Fan in Asagiri's hand had already crashed down upon it.
"Crack!"
The force was terrifying.
Nyx's legs sank into the solid concrete as though it were soft mud.
Multiple bones throughout its body were pulverized instantly.
Feeling the absolute difference in power between them, Nyx could not even summon the will to fight Asagiri directly.
Its body dissolved into a flowing black substance and plunged underground.
All it could do was delay him for as long as possible.
However, when Nyx emerged nearly a hundred meters away, it discovered Asagiri already waiting there.
It was as though he had completely predicted its escape route.
"Annihilation Spear."
The moment Nyx saw the spear of light leaving Asagiri's hand, its expression changed drastically.
It immediately raised a thick slab of concrete from the ground, attempting to use it as a shield.
Yet the Annihilation Spear passed directly through the concrete as though the two existed in entirely different spaces.
It pierced straight through Nyx's chest.
"How is that possible...?"
Nyx looked down at the hollow opening in its chest, its expression becoming extremely ugly.
It could not understand how Asagiri's Annihilation Spear possessed such astonishing power.
Even this body, which had fused deeply with the Blacklight Virus, had been penetrated as effortlessly as fragile tofu.
This was the effect of Hunter Mark.
Every attack Asagiri directed at a marked target ignored its defenses and resistances.
The target also could not use any external object to block those attacks.
Whether it was a concrete slab or a Blacklight Virus Infected used as a living shield, Asagiri's attacks would simply pass through every obstacle.
They could not be blocked.
The only option was evasion.
However, the Annihilation Spear also possessed a tracking effect that locked onto its target.
Even dodging it was nearly impossible.
Just as Nyx prepared to repeat its previous tactic and escape underground again, it sensed an overwhelmingly dangerous presence behind it.
A dark hand seized the back of the Incarnation's neck.
Human Asura lifted Nyx with one hand and hurled it through the air.
Ruiner Nergigante, which had been frantically devouring the Blacklight Virus Infected, immediately raised its head.
Its enormous jaws opened.
In a single bite, it swallowed the Nyx Incarnation thrown by Human Asura.
...
Meanwhile, inside an underground facility somewhere in Tokyo.
"Hoo... hoo..."
Shido Masayoshi, who had become one of Nyx's Incarnations while retaining his self awareness, abruptly opened his eyes.
His face was covered in sweat, and lingering terror filled his gaze.
"That monster... Shadow's power... How could he have become so strong...?"
The shock in Shido Masayoshi's heart was beyond description.
After entering this world, he had become one of Nyx's Incarnations.
He had obtained powers he considered divine, including the Blacklight Virus and the origin power symbolizing death.
For a brief moment, he had even believed that he had replaced Shadow as the strongest Player.
But what the other Nyx Incarnation had just experienced shattered that naive fantasy completely.
Less than three minutes had passed between their meeting and the end of the battle.
Most of that time had been spent talking.
The actual fight had probably lasted less than twenty seconds.
One of Nyx's Incarnations had been killed instantly by Shadow.
During the previous battle, that Incarnation had been evenly matched with him.
Yet after only one month of growth, Shadow now treated it like nothing more than an insignificant minion.
"This is our final chance..."
Shido Masayoshi took several deep breaths before finally managing to calm his emotions.
Then he looked toward the nearby wall.
It was covered in blood and decorated with bizarre crimson patterns.
His expression turned grave as he slowly clenched his fists.
"As long as every step of the ritual is completed, those people will be dragged into Hell."
"No, they must be dragged into Hell."
"Only in that place..."
"Does an existence capable of opposing them remain."
...
A little later, on the rooftop of a building in Tokyo.
"Necro, did you discover anything?"
Hearing Yuuki Asuna's question, Iwanaga Kotoko sat on the rooftop railing and looked down at the city below.
A brilliant light shone within her violet eyes.
"I did find something, but I'm not completely certain."
"Tokyo in this world is enveloped by a Cursed aura that..."
Iwanaga Kotoko frowned slightly.
"I don't know how to describe it."
.....
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