When Dauma returned to the fighting, he noticed that, despite the utter chaos that was still going on, the Foxes had done their best to make sure no one else was getting hurt.

“All squads, what’s the update?”

Under Claine’s orders, they had safely evacuated the area the thing was going to rampage through before positioning themselves in safe spots, armed and ready to stop it by any means necessary.

“Arctic team, preparing restraining tools.”

Some of them had gathered in front of its path, holding what looked like the net launchers that Kara had used earlier but several times larger, while they also buried mines into the ground as a distraction.

“Fennec team, firers in position.”

Others were perched on the rooftops of the intact buildings, wielding special long-range sniper rifles, and aiming them all at its massive body.

“Red team, still on standby.”

The rest of them stood in the wake of its destructive rampage, with many of them hiding in the alleys, ready to move on his command.

As Dauma finally reached them, Claine immediately walked up and began to speak to him.

“How is she?”

“I’m not sure. At least… I believe that her condition isn’t worsening right now.”

“Tch, alright. That’s good enough.”

“What’s the situation?”

Claine raised his finger in response and lowered his voice.

“First, on my mark, we are going to trap the thing, then we will attack with all we have, even though I don’t think we’ll have long before it manages to break our restraints.”

“What do I need to do?”

“If you know of a way to restrain it better using your devil powers, please do so.”

“…I don’t really know how to do that.”

“Tch,” he clicked again, “then attack it with us later.”

“Got it. And Yuu?”

“The spirit girl’s in front,” he indicated with his other hand, “I’m planning to have her run in and try her soul power thing on it, see if that’ll work.”

“What?”

“She seemed to be insistent on helping.”

“…I see.”

“Shh,” he ordered before he stopped talking entirely, “any minute now…”

Meanwhile, the thing had been moving fairly easily without any issue whatsoever. Its eyes continued to dart in numerous directions and its mouths kept spewing a combined mess of voices together.

The only thing that seemed to be slight problematic to it were the continuous buildings that it had to completely demolish to get through. While it did seem like it would have had no problems doing so, what it was saying seemed to imply the opposite.

“Who left this here?”

“Excuse me!”

“What a mess!”

It was hard to tell if it was truly meaning what it said or it was all a bunch of random nonsense strung together in an attempt to pretend it had any logic or thought process. Either way, the noises were getting more and more unbearable to listen to.

“BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!”

Suddenly, the sounds of distant explosions rang out. It had come into contact with the ground mines and had temporarily paused as it tried to comprehend what it had hit, while it also began to sink a little into the ground due to the displaced earth and dirt.

“Ow!”

“Hey!”

“What?”

“All teams, go!” Claine roared in response.

“Yes, chief!”

As soon as he gave the order, everyone quickly got to work. The restraining team launched the giant nets from their launchers to try and trap it, the snipers took aim and continuously fired at it, while the rest ran in and provided covering fire for those going close and attacking it.

As he ran alongside Claine, Dauma could faintly spot a familiar face in the distance getting closer to them.

It was Yuu, who was running all by herself and rushing head-on towards it. Unlike earlier where she was approaching the rock creature slowly and cautiously, this time her gait was quick and strong, almost like she had left all her fears behind.

Huh, well… that’s good, at least.

Witnessing this development himself, he could not help but feel a sense of happiness. She seemed to finally be willing to step up and stand up for herself without his or anyone else’s help.

Now, he had to do the same as well.

He slowly began to pick up speed, overtaking Claine and the other Foxes, and as he leaped past crumbled rubble piles, he formed his sword, albeit a much longer one than he had ever created before, making it almost the same width as the thing itself.

This will end. It must.

He focused his gaze and leapt one final time when he was dangerously close to it, his long sword grazing the wall of a nearby building as he swung it diagonally down through it.

It has to!

“Squish.”

The blade sunk in a few centimeters with an disgusting squelching noise before stopping dead inside its body. The flames were completely extinguished as it entered. Nothing else happened.

“…seriously?”

The situation was almost comical, as he blankly stared at the sword lodged partway in its body before slowly looking up at one of its open eyes.

“That’s rude!”

“Who did that?”

“Get him!”

Damn it!

He quickly let go of his stuck sword and attempted to move away as the mouths began to speak again, but it reacted first, with one of its tiny hands quickly rushing towards him with surprisingly high speed.

I need to—

It slammed into him with incredible strength and force. Even though he had used his own hands to shield himself and resist it, he still found himself getting pushed and sent flying a lengthy distance away.

“!!!”

As soon as she saw what it had done to him, Yuu instinctively stopped just a mere few meters away from it.

She had already been preparing to attack it using her powers, so her hands were outstretched towards it, and her chest orb was rapidly pulsating, but now she could not move.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“…”

She stood frozen in the same position for a few seconds before she heard Claine yelling.

“Don’t worry about him! Do it!”

“!!!”

His voice, piercing through the battlefield, spurred her into action again and she quickly placed her hands on it, with her eyes glowing a bright green.

“Who’s there?”

“Hello?”

“What’s happening?”

It appeared to have noticed her presence as soon as she made contact, but even though she was incredibly close to it now, it did not react violently to her at all.

However, something soon began to change. As she continued pressing up against its body, closing her eyes and concentrating, it began to roar and flail around in a wild attempt to get to her.

“OW! OW! OW!”

All its mouths uttered the same word over and over again as it screeched and howled. Its target had now changed, and its hands quickly rushed towards her from where it had smacked away Dauma earlier.

“!!”

“Fire at the arms, Fennecs!” Claine continued yelling as he noticed the developments, “don’t let them hurt her!”

“Got it, chief!”

“OW! OW! OW!”

As the shots hit its arms and caused them to deviate from their original courses, it was clear that it was thoroughly panicking now.

Its thrashing became even wilder, but try as it might, it could not move a single inch to try and escape. All it could do was repeat the same cry of pain.

Still, regardless of what it was feeling at that moment, all of the Foxes persisted in their attacks.

“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!”

Suddenly, the mouths all screeched loudly at once. It was a deafening scream, one that prompted everyone in the vicinity, even Yuu, to move their hands and cover their ears.

“Bye!”

“See you later!”

“Farewell!”

Seemingly seizing the opportunity now that her hands were off, it quickly decided on a possible direction it could go. Before the Foxes or Yuu could respond, it burrowed under the ground with the same amazingly fast speed it had used when it had attacked Dauma.

Very soon, the voices and tremors stopped as it burrowed deeper and deeper underground, only leaving behind a massive tunnel covered by the discarded nets.

“…”

Yuu slowly uncovered her ears as the other Foxes rushed over to look at the tunnel, their faces shocked and devastated at the escape.

“…shit! We almost had it!” Claine cursed before looking at her and asking, “please tell me you hurt it at least!”

“…?”

Being put on the spot, she frantically looked around and gulped before keeping her gaze only on him.

“Many… souls…”

“…I see, so it’s like that.”

He silently processed the new information for a moment before immediately giving his new orders.

“Listen up, we’re not going to be following the thing underground for now. Spirit girl, you need to track its progress. As soon as the thing comes up again, we need to be ready.”

“Roger!”

The Foxes all saluted and began to keep watch of their surroundings, waiting cautiously for any signs of its re-emergence.

“Spirit girl,” he continued as he turned to her again, “can you sense it?”

“…I’ll… try…”

She closed her eyes and focused again, with Claine standing beside and watching her closely.

“…”

If she made a mistake in where it would come out, it might mean trouble for all of them, so she put her best efforts into the search.

However, a loud voice interrupted her concentration.

It was Dauma, shouting from a far distance away from them.

“…ut!”

“??”

As all the Foxes paid attention to his voice, it gradually became clear what he was shouting about.

“It’s below you now, Yuu! Watch out! It’s coming up!”

“…!?”

Upon hearing the warning, she alarmedly moved away from her original position.

“RMBBBBBBBBBBB”

Unfortunately, her action was too late. With an even faster speed than before, before the tell-tale tremors could give them a heads-up in advance, it had already re-emerged from the ground, flinging her, Claine, and a few other Foxes up into the air.

“Found you. Found you. Found you.”

As its mouths uttered the same words in unison again, one of its arms reached out towards the falling girl.

“!!!”

As soon as she spotted the tiny hand waiting for her, she tried to change her trajectory as much as she could to avoid landing in it.

However, unbeknownst to her, there was another nasty surprise that it had suddenly obtained. Without any warning, its arm suddenly began to rapidly grow and lengthen towards her.

“Uh?!!”

She could not help but emit a shocked yell as the hand grabbed her in mere seconds and held her in a strong grip, refusing to let go no matter what.

“N…nhh!!!!!” she grunted as she futilely struggled and pressed her hands down on it, hoping to try and hurt its souls once again.

However, there was no point.

Now that it had her in its hands, it had secured the thing that had been hurting it the most.

“Fire!!!”

Even as Claine ordered the Foxes to fire at it again, it did not matter.

The mistakes it had made earlier had done something none of them would have normally expected from a creature of its caliber.

It had learnt from them, and from there, it could become better.

“Stay away!”

“This one’s mine!”

“Get lost!”

It angrily shouted as all its arms began to extend in length to reach even the furthest of the Foxes that were attacking it, and with multiple swings, they began to rain down heavy blows, forcing all of them to scatter.

It knew this was it. It had never felt this good, not for a long time.

“Nggh! Nggh!”

And once that pesky thing in its hand was gone, there would be nothing who could possibly stop it again.

“Huh?”

Slowly but surely, it lifted the arm carrying its captive prey to one of its numerous mouths. It was time to end it.

“Have a nice meal!”

“Yummy!”

“Delicious!”

Despite her best efforts, with one single gulp, the thing had swallowed Yuu whole, as easily as a piece of cake.

“…come on!” Claine moved and responded after standing frozen and watching her go down for a few moments, “we need to get her out!”

“No! No! NO!”

However, it was not going to make it easy for them anymore.

A few of its already long arms began to stretch even higher and further, until they were disturbingly, disproportionally long. In fact, they were long enough to even reach the ceiling of the cavern at this point.

“Shit, it’s going to…”

Before he could finish his fearful prediction, it began to scrape away the stalactites lining the top before clawing away at the stone that lay above them, extending its arms further the higher it went.

“RMBBBBBBBBBB”

“Run! Take cover now!!!!!!!”

He yelled out his order to everyone who could hear him with all he had as he began to run away.

“RMBBBBBBBBBBBB”

With thundering crashes, the stone gave way, and the giant structures that it supported began to come down.

One building followed the other, again and again and again, creating a domino effect as large chunks of rubble rained down on the unprotected Foxes below.

“Shit!!!!!”

The weight of an entire city was about to crash down on all of them.

**********************

“Uhh… not again…”

Having been smacked with huge force away from the thing, Dauma traveled a great distance through the air before crashing into a building. Most of it had already crumbled down before, but his landing made the last bits that were left still standing go down instantly as well.

“Where… did I land?”

Quickly sitting up and looking around as soon as he landed, his eyes were drawn to the massive hole in the ground close to him and, more distressingly as he looked down, what appeared to be a small, pulverized body with copious bloodstains, squished insides, and a crushed box next to it.

“Oh…”

He was back at the same place the thing had come out from, where the whole mess had started from, and he wanted nothing better than to leave the area and re-join the fight.

I need to…

BA-DUMP.

As he slowly stood up on the uneven ground, something unusual suddenly resonated inside him and caused him to stagger.

What the hell?

BA-DUMP.

While the strange feeling was coming from inside him again, he was sure he had not felt it before.

It was not like the feeling he experienced when he sensed the nearby presence of any Particles, when he felt it in his core. This time, he felt it closer to his heart, beating almost like a regular heartbeat.

BA-DUMP. BA-DUMP. BA-DUMP.

As the sensations gradually grew stronger and stronger, his mind began to slowly piece together what they felt like.

It’s… underground. A… burning feeling. Fire?

The only fire he could immediately think of was the one from his sword, the one that could burn anything except for…

Hold on. Unless…

That was most probably it.

Somehow, someway or other, he was currently feeling the thing as it moved, and he immediately knew it had something to do with his sword.

…the cut.

He reached the revelation.

This was an entirely new ability, something that could be useful to him, to Anten, and to everyone else. If he could indeed track a subject using the cuts that he gave them, no one would be able to escape his sight.

As soon as the thing began to tunnel, he quickly focused his newfound ability to check on its underground journey.

Alright… where are you going?

It was moving at an impressive speed, but for some reason, it was going around in circles, deep enough into the ground that none of the Foxes aboveground knew where it would be.

BA-DUMP.

Another resonance. This time, it was much stronger.

As soon as he felt it, he quickly determined where it was based on that.

It was heading back up to the surface, and even though he could barely see where in the distance, he soon figured out who it was heading for.

“Look out! It’s below you now, Yuu! Watch out! It’s coming up!”

He shouted his warning to her as loud as he could to make sure she could hear it. However, even as he caught her and everyone else’s attention, it was to no avail.

“No!”

He watched as the tiny girl struggled in its hand as it brought her closer and closer to one of its mouths.

“I—”

“BANG!”

“…”

He stopped as a loud sound rang out, and a sudden burst of pain shot through his chest from behind.

What?

It did not seem as though his new technique had worked against him, but it was still a familiar pain he had felt before, one that he did not want to experience again.

…I got… shot?

“BANG! BANG!“

As two more shots rang out, he painfully stumbled forward. Hurriedly, he looked behind him to see where they were coming from.

“…you?”

The sight of the firer made him flinch, first in shock, and then later great disgust.

How is he…

Standing with a bleeding leg, with a pistol pointed towards him.

Wearing torn and stained clothes.

And with an expression of pure hatred on his face.

“Devil…”

Masse, the man who had hurt Kara, who had set the thing free, was still alive.

“…I will not let you interfere!”