Angel, Akira, and Rashid huddled up in a nearby building.
Angel begins his explanation. “So here’s the plan; one of you two will serve as bait as we head towards where the strange fire in the sky was shot from. I’ll intercept any demons that attack. Once they’re caught off guard, the other one of you who wasn’t bait will grab the demon whilst they’re focused on me. This person’s role will be to hide in the shadows until that moment. We’ll take this demon hostage with us to the location and question it there.”
Akira raised his hand. “Okay first of all, I don’t mind going along with your crazy plan as long as I’m not the bait.”
“I’ll do it!” Rashid chose the role of bait.
“Second of all, why do you get to do all the cool leader stuff like deciding the plan?”
Angel responded. “Do you have a better plan?”
Akira couldn’t contest this as he was not very confident in his intellectual abilities.
“Third of all, how do we know there's not a mega demon waiting for us at that fire?”
Angel responded. “We don’t know, but I’m willing to bet that whatever is there isn’t a demon. If it turns out to be some sort of monster we can feed the demon to it and run away. If it ends up being a demon then we leave the hostage and run away. Either way this would be a good chance to get some information on the current situation. We don’t need to fight whatever's there. Also, there is a third possibility for what could be there, though this is based less on reasonable thinking and more on some feeling that I have.”
“That being?” Rashid asked.
“It could be Ren. I’m confident that he’s still here with us. Maybe he was able to set off some sort of flare and is trying to grab our attention.”
Akira was interested in Angel and Ren’s relationship. “You really seem to trust him a whole bunch for someone so cold and monotone. What are you guys to each other? Close friends?”
Angel made a small smirk that looked unnatural on his stoic face to Akira and Rashid.
“He’s my brother.”
------------------------------
The three began to make their way towards the source of the potential pseudo flare with Rashid running in the front, Angel following not too far behind, and Akira nearby trying to stay out of sight. They run for a while with no interruptions. Then, as they near their destination they are attacked. One of the demons leaps out of a window from a nearby building towards Rashid. Angel dashes to Rashid and jumps in between him and the demon. The creature is startled, jumping back to avoid Angel. Waiting behind it however was Akira.
“COME GIMME A HUG VILLAINOUS BEING!”
Akira bear hugs the creature and Angel and Rashid help hold it still. Angel was feeling uneasy.
‘Now we just gotta hope it doesn’t make us bleed out the fingernails or something crazy like last time.’
The demon struggled to get out of their grasp but the boys eventually tied it up. Akira found it odd how the moment they had tied up the thing it stopped moving completely. It just froze. Rashid notices that a nearby building looked as though it had been busted through. They were in what they thought to be the general area where the fire was shot from. The three walked through the torn up building and the burnt bushes behind it to find Ren and a creature they had never seen before. Akira screeches.
“WHAT IS THAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!”
Shula hides behind Ren. Ren can see that the others are frightened of her and tries to clear up some tension.
“There's nothing to worry about guys, she won’t hurt you.”
Shula is still behind ren. She softly tugs on him and points. “Which one is brother?”
Ren responds. "The mean looking one."
Angel is concerned but she doesn’t seem to be an enemy at the moment.
“So, what is that thing anyway?”
Ren stands up. “Guys, meet- uuuh, what’s your name?”
Shula peeks her head out from behind Ren. “Shula”
Akira screeches again. “IT CAN TALK TOOOO?!”
Shula hides behind Ren again.
“Akira you’re scaring her!”
“Ren, please understand...SHE’S SCARING ME!”
Angel and Rashid choose to introduce themselves. “I’m Angel.” “My name is Rashid.” Angel begins to look around.
“You weren’t attacked?”
Ren is confused. Then he noticed that Akira was holding onto a big black figure behind him tied in a rope.
“Is that what I think it is...Angel?”
Angel looked at the demon, then at Ren. “Yes. Yes it is.”
They throw the creature onto the floor and they all stand around it with Shula standing behind Ren. The group stands in silence for a moment until Ren begins speaking to the frozen bundle of fur in a disturbingly calm voice. His eyes focused and fist gripped tight.
“Y’know, I have so many things I wanna say to you. About how I was upset that I was powerless to stop you seven years ago. About how I was scared of you. About how that weakness ate me up inside. It took me forever to really make me think about what I want to do about you guys, but now that I’m here I know now…”
Ren crouched and leaned in.
“I will hunt you monsters down until I find Momoko and Hisa.”
At this point, Shula had let go of Ren. He became very scary to the rest of the group at that moment. Even Angel had never seen this dark and bottomless rage from him before.
Ren continued.
“Now let’s start off simple; what did you do with the people from Momo-”
All of a sudden the demon began to vibrate intensely. Then without using any limbs, the creature twisted it’s own head upside down and blood began to leak from the ox skull. Akira vomited, Rashid started to tear up, Shula was scared, and Angel was disgusted. Angel looked over at Ren whose face was calm, fists were clenched. He was enraged and his eyes were filled with darkness. Shula sniffed a bit before asking a question that threw them all off guard.
“Why was this human wearing a skull?”
They all looked at Shula in shock.
“Human? Are you sure?” Angel asked.
“Yes, this smells like a human.”
Ren removes the mask to see the face of a young woman attached to the fur corpse. Akira sees the head and vomits again. “These mindless slaves, they must be doing someone else's bidding. They definitely aren’t demons.”
Shula looks to Ren and asks if there were more like this and Ren confirms. She states that there are more people with the scent of the skull-masked creature gathered in town. Angel asks Ren what they should do since they now know kidnapping one of them isn’t going to work. Ren looks at shula.
“I don’t wanna leave her here.”
Angel sighs. “Yep, this is definitely in character for you. Getting emotional and making things complicated.”
Akira hits a tree in anger. “I’ve failed! I talked big but I can't do anything! How could I ever become a Pillar!”
Ren stops Akira. “It’s not your fault. You had limited information.”
“But the people of the town are gone! I said I would vanquish these beasts!”
“You can’t change what happened. Focus more on what you can do going forward. This isn’t the first time these things have appeared and I doubt it’ll be the last.”
Akira looked at Ren and then turned to the town. “Then I guess this is where we part ways.”
“I guess so hero.”
Angel throws his bag at Ren.
“I’ll go with Akira and Rashid towards the scents. I wanna see more of these things for myself. You focus on taking Shula out of here.”
Ren puts on the backpack. “When will you catch up?”
“We’ll meet up at Bethesda. It’s a while south from here but it’s a major city so it should be pretty safe. On foot it should take about a month to get there. I’ll try to only be a day behind in travel.”
Angel hands Ren the money he stole.
“How do you even know about the place?”
“Some infamous troublemaker died there trying to cause trouble.”
Ren looked at the pouch of money in his hand. “This’ll be our first time really being apar-”
Angel cuts him off. “Don’t worry, I’ll make it so just be in one piece when you get there and don’t cause too much trouble.”
Ren smiled. “See you in Bethesda.”
Angel threw up a peace sign and began to walk towards the town. “See you in Bethesda.”
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