Chapter 97

Uesugi Toru took out the doll that looked dull and foolish.

Immediately after, following the sound of extremely fine threads snapping, a familiar scent of white musk mixed with tobacco and mint wreathed around Uesugi Toru's nose tip.

——Nanjo Sister?!

Uesugi Toru's heart shook violently; before he could understand what change had occurred to the doll, that viscous and warm darkness had already fused into his shadow.

Then, inseparable from each other.

In an instant, Uesugi Toru felt himself embraced tightly from behind, a gentle voice ringing by his ear as if an auditory hallucination:

"You hang me at the doorway every day vigilant against that kind of monster, and for so long still haven't remembered, this big sister is all alone and very lonely and sad……"

He looked at the doll in his hand again, discovering a crack as thick as a finger had split open on its forehead.

Uesugi Toru recalled the Nanjo Doll's effect annotation——

【After use, "Nanjo Ai" will immediately appear behind you.】

That voice, almost identical to Nanjo Ai yet more bewitching and melodious, drilled into Uesugi Toru's ears once more:

"Rest assured, I am behind you."

——In the gap between buildings, the Nue that had been watching the three under the street lamp gave a doubtful hum.

"How come there's suddenly a feeling of unease."

It kept moving through various tricky positions, relying on powerful recovery to squeeze bullets out of its muscles, then make the slashed wounds stop bleeding and heal.

"Tch, forget it."

The Nue thought indifferently in its heart: "Living beings can die, but the Conversion Box must be retrieved; just right to use these few people and that one star Shikigami to fill tonight's Soul Ash quota."

Otherwise……

The Nue's body suddenly shivered with cold.

If by the deadline it hasn't handed in enough Soul Ash, no matter where it flees, it will absolutely be found and caught by the Masters, to serve as a warning to others.

It had already witnessed such miserable consequences once.

And after that "Tide" arrives, the first to be purged will absolutely be a stray Yokai like it with no support.

The Nue ground its copper teeth and iron jaws: "So this nomination certificate submitted to the Yokai Guide Association must be handed in beautifully, handed in perfectly……"

Stuffing the doll silently back into his pocket, Uesugi Toru pretended nothing had happened, giving no response to the puzzlement of the two beside him.

He gripped Kaga Kiyomitsu tight, abruptly raising his eyebrows——

It's here!

At the boundary of dim light and darkness, the Nue rushed on all fours, pouncing at extreme speed like flight skimming the ground.

Fishy wind howled; Uesugi Toru could judge from that gaze full of murderous intent that the target was himself!

Sharp claws scraped a string of sparks on the cement ground; the previous moment the Nue was still running in the road center, the next it had already arrived before Uesugi Toru bringing unmatched hurricane force.

Uesugi Toru merely held the sword, pupils shrinking slightly, as if he still hadn't reacted from the Nue's terrifying speed.

On the Nue's ferocious monkey face a successful savage laugh had already surfaced.

It simultaneously thrust sharp claws and long tail from above and below——aside from that girl's three inexplicable consecutive slashes earlier, there was simply no other means to prevent it.

In this hair's breadth instant, the shadow beneath Uesugi Toru's feet swelled wildly, churning and rolling as if boiling.

Dozens of viscous shadow hands soared up, firmly wrapping and locking the Nue's every key joint, forcing its claws that could slice iron like mud to freeze stiff one centimeter before Uesugi Toru's pupils.

Yet this one centimeter was like a heavenly moat!

Forcibly fixed in midair, the Nue continuously increased its physical output, tiger-sturdy limbs struggling to flap and tear.

Shadow hands kept being torn and crushed, yet the shadow hands drilling out from this spreading darkness grew more and more, more and more.

The Nue only felt its whole body locked tighter and tighter.

Shadow swelled and boiled, like an invisible giant hand clamping the Nue's neck, making it unable to breathe.

That ferocious ape face finally showed a trace of terror: "Damn it! What did you do!?"

Uesugi Toru had no intention of speaking to a dead person……no, should say a dead demon.

He just silently swung his blade.

Kaga Kiyomitsu's blade reflected that twitching ferocious ape face.

In the instant the blade fell, Uesugi Toru swapped "Kishin (Jakku)" for "Tonjinchi (Weak)".

Thus Kaga Kiyomitsu tore through half the Nue's body like slicing an empty skin bag——

The crisp clang of blade hitting ground echoed; Uesugi Toru could clearly feel the hand-feel of the latter half of this slash was completely different.

At the moment before it would have severed heart and lungs, the slight resistance originally still perceptible dispersed into nothing.

Missed again?

Uesugi Toru looked up——among the dozens to hundreds of shadow hands, only a bloody skin bag remained gripped.

The real Nue, dragging bloodstains all over the ground, had vanished into darkness, borrowing the wind that rose from nowhere to flee desperately into the distance.

"Ran away, huh."

A long sigh echoed in the empty alley, making the half-lying Shizuka Mami turn her head in shock and doubt.

Then she saw the ceaselessly rolling shadow beneath Uesugi Toru's feet gradually calm, the dizzying shadow hands converging toward the same direction, finally molding into that person she would absolutely not mistake.

"——Nanjou-sama!?"

No, that's wrong.

Shizuka Mami instantly reacted; the Nanjo Ai she knew would never show a smile as if wanting to swallow a person whole, nor such wicked Qi Fen.

Before Uesugi Toru, that pitch-black "Nanjo Ai" cast a glance at her, smiling knowingly: "It's that little follower."

Then she turned her eyes back, looking down at Uesugi Toru, gently lifting his chin with her hand: "Give the order, let me go catch that suicidal demon back."

Uesugi Toru gently brushed aside that warm shadow hand, asking: "Can you do it?"

"Nanjo Ai" revealed a wicked charming smile: "Easy Solution."

Uesugi Toru stared at the top of her head for a while: "What should I call you."

"Kage Onna is fine." Kage Onna stepped on Uesugi Toru's shadow, "Or, treating me as Ai's substitute isn't out of the question either."

——【Kage Onna (Remnant) (Two-Star Half)】

Nanjo Sister's Shikigami is truly unexpectedly powerful; the Kage Onna before me, who has merely manifested a part, can already reach Two-Star Half strength.

"Then, Miss Kage Onna."

Uesugi Toru said to her: "Could I trouble you to watch over Shizuku and Shizuka Mami here?"

Kage Onna pressed her hand on his shoulder with dissatisfaction, retorting in an unkind tone: "What about that Yokai? Just let it run away like this? That makes it hard for me to report back to Ai."

"I'll go kill it."

Uesugi Toru waved his hand to summon Nisun Adult: "Is the Curse down?"

Nisun Adult nodded: "The target is moving rapidly."

After finishing speaking, Uesugi Toru could clearly feel Kage Onna's gaze wandering all over his face, and finally heard her let out a light laugh,

"Brat, if you die, Sister won't be responsible, okay."

Having said that, Kage Onna moved her toes off Uesugi Toru's shadow, making his body instantly feel light.

Kage Onna's body melted once again, separately merging into Shizuku and Shizuka Mami's shadows.

"Go on, I'm here."

Uesugi Toru silently nodded, leading Nisun Adult to vanish from Shizuku's sight in an instant.

After Uesugi Toru walked far away, Shizuku then asked faintly: "With your power you clearly don't need to ask his opinion, why let him take the risk and go?"

Shadows churned, a wicked yet indifferent voice transmitted out: "Shikigami obey their Owner's command; even if he is only my temporary Owner in a sense, is that strange?"

"Miss Kage Onna, lying is boring." Shizuku closed her eyes.

The shadows stagnated for an instant, then emitted a tone of considerable interest.

"The same eyesight as Uizumi, interesting."

……

Uesugi Toru's reason for choosing to pursue and kill Nue alone was very simple.

——Let me monopolize the experience!

If Kage Onna were sent to pursue the fleeing Nue in the dead of night, the success rate would naturally be extremely high, but then the Soul Ash Box containing a large amount of Soul Ash wouldn't fall into my own hands.

On the dim Street, Nisun Adult held by Uesugi Toru spoke up to remind: "Toru-sama, the target stopped two minutes ago, right at the third residential building ahead on the left, fifth floor."

Uesugi Toru, who had long since transformed into Incarnation Prajna, was instead looking around; he discovered this Street was also unexpectedly quiet, not a single household had lights on at night.

Just like just now, even though Shizuka Mami's gunshot transmitted very far, the surroundings surprisingly had no residents startled awake.

Similarly reaped by Living Beings holding Soul Ash Boxes.

Nue's bloody smell in the air was abnormally thick no matter front, back, left, or right, as if deliberately spread, making it impossible to judge the escape direction through smell.

Unfortunately, this move has no use against Nisun Adult who can precisely position from a distance.

"Good, then let's strike while it's sick and take its life."

Stowing Nisun Adult, Uesugi Toru shuttled through the dense Apartment Buildings like a ghost, reaching the fifth floor of the Apartment Building Nisun spoke of in a few seconds.

But when Uesugi Toru crouched on the wall, he shockingly discovered there was actually a room on the fifth floor with its light on.

He peeked out from the side without curtains, discovering that even at three or four in the morning, the hooded youth at the desk was still diligently bent over studying.

Judging by the look of the problems, it seemed he was solving a system of quadratic equations in one variable.

"When did middle schoolers have to grind this hard too……"

Uesugi Toru cursed in his heart, just about to check the remaining rooms, but inexplicably felt a sense of violation.

He recalled the formulas on that youth's homework notebook.

——Because he was clearly solving quadratic equation system problems, yet what that youth wrote were all trigonometric function formulas about sin and cos!

Something's wrong, look again.

Uesugi Toru peeked again, confirming his guess——not only was the problem solving completely mismatched, that youth was now even frantically writing "sos" on the homework notebook.

He squinted and scanned the places within sight outside the window, discovering no other abnormalities, not even a trace of blood stains left.

But both the windows and room doors were tightly locked, and curtains also blocked half……

Then, what about that homework page corner constantly trembling in the wind?

Uesugi Toru was already clear in his heart.

He crouched on the Apartment Building wall, nearly soundlessly, taking a deep breath.

Then, like a cannonball, he smashed into the youth's room.

Amidst the shattering glass fragments flying in all directions, the indifferent Incarnation Prajna exchanged a glance with the bloody, ferocious ape leaning in the corner gasping with difficulty.

"To actually only send a mere One-Star Incarnation Prajna to hunt me down." Nue couldn't help but let out a cold laugh, "Truly being looked down upon."

"Dead demon, don't speak more."

Uesugi Toru first used his body to hard-block Nue's claw strike that lacked strength, then grabbed the youth's collar and threw him hard out the door,

"Brat, scram out of here!"

The youth cried out in alarm, crashing through the flimsy wooden door and tumbling into the Living Room, while Uesugi Toru felt his Constitution rising a notch due to injury, revealing a grim smile,

"Just this?"

Nue was just about to smash the wall behind it to continue fleeing, but saw the sword at the Incarnation Prajna's waist.

——Vermilion sword sheath!

This is the Onmyoji who summoned those shadow hands just now, and not a Shikigami Incarnation Prajna dispatched to hunt it down!

Nue instantly revealed an extremely ferocious expression; it knew it had no way to escape, perhaps those eerie shadow hands were waiting for it to flee in panic and then strangle it from the darkness.

The only way to survive, was to kill the Onmyoji disguised as Incarnation Prajna before it in an extremely short time!

One's life and death would be decided in the next few seconds!

Realizing this, the Nue let out a howl far exceeding the ferocity of lions and tigers, and with its body of exposed flesh and blood, it lunged forward.

Sharp claws hissed and thrust from left and right, tearing the floorboards along the path into sky-filling scraps, and that long snake tail had even unknowingly wound around behind Uesugi Toru, stabbing straight toward his heart.

The Nue's still-unhealed flesh, bone, and wounds all split open simultaneously from the sudden exertion, spraying blood outward with a hissing sound; the scene was as bizarre as it could be.

And in this cramped room of only ten-odd square meters, still filled with many miscellaneous goods, even the Kaga Kiyomitsu in Uesugi Toru's hand seemed a bit too long.

This fatal series of three strikes could almost be said to be impossible to block.

"Come well!"

But Uesugi Toru shouted explosively; with his 270° vision, the Nue's little movements were all laid bare.

Since the opponent had staked everything from the start, he also had no need to hold back.

The suppressed, accumulated Corona Qi inside his body erupted with a bang, instantly raising the air temperature in the cramped room by several degrees.

Corona Breathing Technique, Fifth Form!

Uesugi Toru, with near-godlike speed, used the sword hilt to knock away one of the Nue's sharp claws, then borrowing that massive recoil, flipped the sword blade and sliced off the other attacking claw as if cutting paper.

Tennen Rishin-ryu · Tiger Tail Sword!

The scalding fresh blood spraying from the Nue's arm obscured Uesugi Toru's vision.

And in the next moment, that bloody ferocious ape mouth had already smashed through the blood curtain, bringing a violent fishy wind to seal off Uesugi Toru's mouth and nose, causing his breathing technique Qi circulation to stagnate for a moment.

"Good!"

In the void, fine lightning fell, causing that sneak-attacking snake tail to likewise pause.

Uesugi Toru shifted his body accordingly, letting that incomparably sharp tail tip pass through his armpit, only taking a piece of skin and flesh that was neither painful nor itchy.

But that ferocious ape mouth had already arrived; one could see those sharp teeth were about to bite Uesugi Toru's throat!

"Want to eat? I'll let you eat your fill!"

Prajna gave a ferocious grin, and at this most critical moment, released the Kaga Kiyomitsu in his hand.

Then, he forcibly shoved his own left arm into the Nue's mouth.

All the way, straight to the heart!

Under the blessing of Greed, Anger, and Ignorance, Uesugi Toru's arm was like a red-hot branding iron; in just a moment it shattered most of the Nue's teeth, then effortlessly dissolved the flesh and blood inside its body.

"Damn! Damn! Damn!"

Sensing the condition coming from inside its body, the Nue grew even more startled and angry, waving its sharp claws to continuously leave streaks of deep or shallow bloody marks on Uesugi Toru's body.

Some wounds were even deep enough to reveal bone, yet this Onmyoji didn't have half a bit of the emotional fluctuation a human should have!

The more it was startled, the more it inflicted injury on Uesugi Toru, the more it felt that arm which had almost pulverized its neck become even more scalding, even more powerful!

"You're not human...... Damn it! You Prajna, what grudge do you have with me!" The Nue's struggling amplitude began to shrink.

Its throat had already been completely burned and could not make a sound; it could only use its wind control ability to emit fine vibrations: "Same kind of Yokai, why do you help those humans do things......"

And Uesugi Toru, who had witnessed his Constitution break through the 60 threshold all along the way, did not reply, merely picking up the Kaga Kiyomitsu to the side and lowering his head to ask: "Last words?"

The Nue stared at those black pupils devoid of joy or sorrow, and finally felt fear from the bottom of its heart.

This Prajna's gaze looking at it was completely like looking at an item, and not an enemy or kin.

Such a gaze, it had also clearly felt when kneeling under that round table.

"You are...... You are the Master of the Yokai Guide Association......" The Nue let out a miserable blurred laugh, "I can't even complete such a simple request...... Truly is......"

Slice.

Kaga Kiyomitsu swung down, completely severing the Nue's long neck.

"Too much talk."

Uesugi Toru pulled out his left arm, pitted and corroded by stomach acid; looking at his arm's bizarre appearance, the corner of his mouth couldn't help but twitch, and he poured the remaining drop of Awakening Spirit Mist into his mouth.

Yokai Guide Association, Master......

What organization or force in Chang Shi is this again?

Tch, this world is really getting more and more chaotic; a wave rises, and all kinds of monsters and demons run out from dark corners.

Uesugi Toru glanced at the youth he had thrown into the living room; after confirming the other party had called an ambulance and was temporarily in no life danger, he carried the Nue's corpse and left this place.

Feeling his injuries gradually improving, Uesugi Toru first found a deserted alley, took a deep breath, and opened the prompt.

——Let the Yokai Guide Association or whatever go to hell first!

【You killed the heavily injured Two-Star Half Demon "Nue", gained 262 Soul Ash!】

【You used Kaga Kiyomitsu·Imitation to slay "Nue", Kaga Kiyomitsu·Imitation's quality slightly increased.】

【Your skill, Corona Breathing Technique proficiency +107!】

【Your skill, Tennen Rishin-ryu proficiency +92!】

【You gained, Yatagarasu's Heart!】

【You gained, Conversion Box full of Soul Ash (Special Prop)!】

It's this!

Uesugi Toru immediately took out this Soul Ash Conversion Box, feeling a heavy weight in his hand different from before.

Only 5k today, sorry meow

But still asking for subscriptions and monthly tickets!

Because next chapter will be——Gacha Pull, activate!

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(End of Chapter)