"What the hell is this?!"
"A corpse with all its skin eaten off by flies."
"Get back. These flies eat people."
At Aki Hayakawa's shout, the police officers around him stepped back.
He quickly formed a fox-shaped gesture with one hand.
Closing one eye, he looked through the gesture at the dark swarm of flies overhead and shouted, "Fox!!!"
Boom!!
An enormous fox head appeared out of thin air.
Its gaping jaws swallowed the swarm in an instant.
"Ptooey!!"
"What did I just eat?! It stinks, and it's disgusting." The Fox Devil felt its stomach churn.
"Just a bunch of dead flies," Meng Fan teased.
"Dead flies?! You always make me eat disgusting things. Aki, the price of our next contract is going to double."
With that, the enormous fox head turned into a wisp of white smoke and vanished.
Once the swarm was gone.
The police officers nearby straightened their uniforms and caps and walked over.
Admiration filled their faces.
"Mr. Hayakawa, you're incredible."
"Mr. Hayakawa, that was the Fox Devil you summoned, right?"
"Don't celebrate too soon. Those were just the Fly Devil's offspring. The real Devil is still inside."
Meng Fan cut short their endless flattery of Aki Hayakawa.
"It's still alive?"
"When we arrived, we only saw swarms of flies flying around inside and attacking people. We didn't see any other Devils."
"The real Fly Devil must be hiding somewhere. Its relationship with the swarm is like a queen bee's with her workers. The little flies eat human bodies, then transfer all the nutrients to the Fly Devil itself. That lets it spawn even more armies of flies to hunt for food. Eventually, everyone in the city will become an all-you-can-eat buffet for the swarm."
"It's that serious?!" The officers realized things were bad.
They had thought this was just an ordinary Devil attack.
Now it had turned into a brewing citywide crisis.
"Master, you know so much."
"Of course. Your master has already grasped the true meaning of Halloween, after all."
"I don't know your name, but hurry up and kill them. Plenty of rich people live around here."
"Stay outside. We'll go in and take a look." Aki Hayakawa drew his longsword and took the lead.
"Hold on, Aki. You can't summon the Fox Devil now. Going in is suicide. Why not buy a few cans of bug spray or an extra-large flyswatter first?"
Having realized how serious the situation was.
Aki Hayakawa couldn't wait another second. He walked into the deli, heading straight into the sickening stench of rotten meat.
Seeing that Aki Hayakawa wouldn't listen, Meng Fan shook his head helplessly. "We'll talk later. We're going in to kill some flies."
After saying goodbye to the two officers.
Meng Fan strode forward with Denji.
Once inside the deli, Meng Fan remembered to pull down the rolling shutter.
That would keep the swarm from escaping.
"There aren't too many flies. The Fly Devil probably only appeared recently. The longer it's around, the stronger it gets."
"Where is it now?"
"Obviously, wherever there's the most meat."
"The cold storage room!!!"
With a destination in mind, they quickened their pace.
But the closer they got, the more clearly they heard a strange buzzing.
"Sounds like hornets."
"They aren't hornets. You'll see when we get there."
They rounded a corner and stopped in the corridor leading to the cold storage room.
The sight before them instantly made Aki Hayakawa and Denji break into a sweat.
What lay ahead wasn't a black fog.
It was tens of thousands of densely packed flies.
They looked just like hornets guarding their nest.
There were also three corpses by the cold storage door, gnawed down to bare bones.
They appeared to be the hostages the police had mentioned.
"Ugh!! Even more disgusting than the Zombie Devil." Denji dry-heaved.
Aki Hayakawa knitted his brows.
He clearly had no idea what to do.
"I want more! Bring me more meat!!!"
A roar suddenly came from inside the cold storage room.
The flies gathered around its entrance instantly stirred.
Bzzzz!!
Tens of thousands of flies beat their wings at once, producing a deafening drone.
Then they converged into an enormous black python.
"Run!!"
At Meng Fan's shout, they quickly retreated.
"Isn't there another way?"
"I told you to buy some bug spray before coming in. You were too impatient and underestimated the Fly Devil," Meng Fan scolded. "Denji, remember this: never rush in blindly. Before a fight, make preparations that give you an advantage."
At that moment, Meng Fan seemed more like a veteran.
And Aki Hayakawa had become the rookie.
"What do we do now?"
"Don't panic. I smell gas. Run that way."
Meng Fan picked up speed and reached the kitchen.
Once they rushed inside, they quickly shut the door.
Bang!!
The swarm slammed into the door with a violent crash.
The wooden door cracked instantly.
Bang!!
Another impact followed.
The cracks in the wooden door widened.
"Denji, transform."
Vrrr!!
The sound of chainsaws filled the cramped kitchen.
Three chainsaws burst from Denji's forehead and arms.
The transformation made Aki Hayakawa freeze for a moment.
"Aki, how's that? Cool, right?"
"Cool, my ass. Hurry up and cut open the wall behind us."
"Sure, Master."
Vrrr!!!
All three saws went to work, cutting through the rear wall.
Bang!!
By then, most of the wooden door had begun to splinter.
Quite a few flies came through the holes.
Unlike ordinary flies.
The flies spawned by the Devil had sharp serrations on their legs that could easily slice through human skin.
Their needlelike mouths were even more terrifying than Nanny Rong's.
"Block the hole with a pot."
Meng Fan tossed a pot to Aki Hayakawa.
Then he scooped up a gas cylinder and put his hand on its valve.
"Denji, are you done yet?!"
"Almost, almost!!"
The deafening sound of sawing filled the little room.
Aki Hayakawa's ears rang.
Crash!!!
Chunks of the wall fell away.
Light streamed in, brightening the whole room considerably.
"You two, get out and hide."
"What about you, Master?"
"Don't worry. Your master has a plan."
Aki Hayakawa glanced at the gas cylinder in Meng Fan's arms.
Then he quickly grabbed Denji and escaped through the opening in the wall.
Meng Fan pressed his back against the opening, blocking it.
Bang!!!
The wooden door finally shattered.
A mass of flies surged inside.
For a moment, the room became unbearably crowded.
"Die! Ptooey, stay out of my mouth."
Meng Fan twisted open the gas cylinder's valve.
He let the gas fill the entire room.
Then his claws scraped swiftly across the metal cylinder.
Sparks flared, and a massive fireball engulfed the room.
In an instant, the swarm of tens of thousands of flies was reduced to ash.
Caught in the explosion, Meng Fan's face had already been burned beyond recognition.
Flames wrapped his entire body, turning him into a burning man.
He sprinted toward the cold storage room.
With fire covering his whole body, the masses of flies inside the cold storage room could do nothing to Meng Fan.
A Devil with a human body and a fly's head sat inside.
Its enormous, bloated body resembled a sumo wrestler's.
"Eat my Fire Punch!"
Meng Fan leaped up and punched straight through the Fly Devil's body.
Then he sliced off its head with his flaming claws.
Once the Fly Devil died.
The surrounding flies dropped to the floor one after another.
Meng Fan had no time to rest.
He bit his finger and used its blood to draw a circle around the Fly Devil's corpse.
"Master!!"
Before long, the sound of Denji opening the rolling shutter came from the entrance.
Both men were worried about Meng Fan's safety.
"He... isn't dead, is he?"
"No. My master is a Devil too. He won't die."
"By the way, I saw your master's bladed claws. Are you two the ones who killed the Rat Devil?"
"We killed the Rat Devil, and the Cucumber Devil too."
"Did you kill someone in the restaurant?"
"Do you think a murderer would take an explosion himself just to save us?"
Denji suddenly showed some brains, leaving Aki Hayakawa speechless with a single question.
Aki Hayakawa asked no more questions, and the two went to the kitchen together.
The kitchen was pitch-black, with no one in sight.
"Master!!" Denji cried anxiously. "Could he have been blown to pieces?"
"The explosion wasn't powerful enough for that." Aki Hayakawa thought Meng Fan must have left the kitchen. "Sounds like something's moving near the cold storage room."
"Could the Fly Devil have taken my master?"
Filled with unease, the two raced toward the cold storage room.
But the instant they stepped inside, a black figure sprang out and shouted, "Surprise!"
Startled, Denji instinctively swung.
A single slash cut the black figure clean in half.
Before you continue