Blood Demon Art

"Lost soul! Accept the glory of God!"

A believer reached out with a hand like a withered branch, trying to thrust a crudely made sheet of doctrine at him.

Kirishima Bupai swayed slightly, as though merging with a passing breeze, and easily slipped through the gaps in the believers' clumsy encirclement, leaving only a wisp of cold air behind.

The believers lunged at empty air and turned in bewildered circles, still muttering about bliss and the Pure Land.

He did not head toward the main entrance, instead circling around to a relatively secluded patch of shadow at the side of the building.

The tall outer wall might as well not have existed to him.

With a light tap of his toes against the ground, Kirishima Bupai shot upward as though freed from gravity's restraints and landed soundlessly beside a vent on the warehouse roof.

The Kasugai Crow cooperatively landed on the roof ridge above his head to keep watch.

Through the gaps in the vent, a foul mixture of blood, fanaticism, and an even stronger sweet fragrance washed over him.

The scene below made even Kirishima Bupai, accustomed as he was to slaughter, narrow his eyes slightly behind his sunglasses.

The warehouse's interior was enormous, its original cargo long since cleared away.

A heavy stench of blood rose from the center of the floor, where blood had been used to draw an enormous, twisted symbol resembling the divine image on the banners.

Hundreds of believers in deathly white religious robes knelt prostrate, packed tightly together.

"In some ways, Doma really knows how to have fun..."

Kirishima Bupai's brow twitched as he watched these lunatics.

Their bodies were severely emaciated from prolonged starvation and dehydration, their skin clinging to their bones like skeletons draped in human skin.

All of them kept their heads deeply bowed, foreheads pressed against the cold floor, repeatedly reciting low, hoarse scriptures like murmurs in a dream:

"Cast aside the mortal shell... embrace the true god..."

"Offer flesh and blood... sacrifice the soul..."

"The gates of bliss... open for the devout..."

A suffocating, deathly still fanaticism permeated the entire space.

There was no vitality, only a withered exhaustion that spent life's last shred of strength yearning for an illusory farther shore.

And at the center of the enormous symbol, three figures stood on a crude stone platform raised slightly above the floor.

They were not human!

In the middle stood a tall female demon with a bewitching face.

She wore white robes similar to the believers', but more finely made.

Her long, ink-black hair hung loose, and she wore a smile of compassion that was also full of temptation.

The fingers of both hands were unusually long and slender, and she was elegantly rubbing them together.

With her movements, wisps of extremely thin, almost transparent pink mist drifted from her fingertips.

"So this Blood Demon Art is what's controlling the villagers? Looks pretty useful. If you used this for a pyramid scheme, tsk, tsk, tsk."

Rubbing his chin, Kirishima Bupai's eyes gleamed. As he muttered to himself, he had already decided how to torment these three demons. Just kill them? That would be letting them off too easily!

The pink mist now spread through the air throughout the warehouse like a living thing, slowly settling and enveloping all the prostrate believers.

Every believer touched by the mist began to tremble slightly.

Their expressions grew even more dazed and intoxicated, and a trace of eerie satisfaction entered their chanting.

"Blood Demon Art: Intoxicating Peach Miasma!"

On the left stood a handsome male demon with a neck as elegant as a swan's.

His eyes were an unusual amber, now slightly narrowed, and his parted lips released a low, gentle, deeply penetrating hum.

The song had no lyrics, only a beautiful melody that burrowed straight into the depths of the mind, soothing away all unease, fear, and doubt.

It left only a peace and obedience that made one want to sink completely into it and abandon thought.

The song intertwined with the pink mist, forming even stronger mental shackles.

On the right stood a relatively short, stocky demon wearing an eerie wooden smiling mask.

The mask's mouth stretched into an enormous grin, revealing stark white teeth that looked unspeakably eerie.

Two empty holes served as the mask's eyes, with two greedy points of red light flickering inside.

The demon made no sound, simply standing there quietly, the eyes behind the mask's holes sweeping back and forth over the kneeling believers like a precise scanner.

Whenever that gaze fixed on a believer, especially a young female believer, the red light flickered slightly.

Seeing this, Kirishima Bupai merely nodded a little.

There was no need even to think about it. This one's ability was specifically for selecting young, beautiful women for Doma.

"Do you see, lost lambs?"

The female demon in the center spoke in an ethereal voice with a strange echo, reaching every believer's ears clearly as though sounding directly in the depths of their souls.

"Your devotion, your renunciation, have all been felt by the true god! Look, the divine light is descending to cleanse your filth and lead you into eternal bliss!"

As her words fell, figures seemed to move in the darkness.

Several lesser demons hidden in the shadows at the edges of the enormous symbol immediately began busily manipulating several huge bronze mirrors and reflected lamplight.

With their movements, patches of wavering, hazy light shone down from the dim warehouse vault.

The believers thought divine light was shining upon them and grew even more excited, desperately knocking their foreheads against the floor with dull thuds.

Just then, Kirishima Bupai keenly noticed something at the outer edge of the believers, in the shadows near a corner...

A middle-aged man who looked slightly more normal than the other believers cautiously raised his head.

His eyes were filled with indescribable pain and anxiety.

His gaze was now fixed on a slender figure kneeling among the crowd, also dressed in white robes.

That was clearly his daughter, who was working undercover.

His lips trembled silently as though he were murmuring a call, his tightly clenched fists pressed against the cold floor, his body shaking slightly as he suppressed overwhelming emotion.

He had to maintain his disguise to have a chance of saving his family, but watching his daughter wither little by little under sorcery and starvation made every second torture.

Yet this tiny, unusual movement did not escape the masked demon's "scan."

That hollow gaze instantly locked onto him.

The short, stocky body moved soundlessly like a marionette, walking with an odd gait straight through the kneeling crowd toward that corner.

Panic instantly seized the middle-aged man's heart.

He hurriedly lowered his head, trying to blend back into the fanatical atmosphere, but it was already too late.

The masked demon's towering shadow engulfed him, that eerie wooden smiling mask drawing close, its hollow eyes staring at him from a short distance.

"You..."

The masked demon's voice sounded like two pieces of rough wood scraping together, thick with malice. "Your heart... is not sincere!"

"No! No! Divine messenger! I am sincere! Utterly sincere!" The middle-aged man trembled all over, his voice choked with tears as he desperately knocked his forehead against the floor.

"I just... just thought I heard the true god calling me... I was too excited..."

"Heh..."

The masked demon gave a derisive chuckle whose meaning was unclear.

Rather than act immediately, the demon extended a withered finger toward the girl in the crowd. "She... is what shakes your faith?"

The words struck the middle-aged man like lightning, and his face instantly turned as white as paper.

"Heretic!"

The masked demon's voice suddenly rose, shrill and piercing, instantly drowning out all the chanting and humming.

The believers raised their heads in bewilderment like a startled flock of sheep, their vacant eyes turning toward the corner.

"This despicable false believer harbors ill intentions! His presence defiles the sacred ritual! Pollutes the road to bliss!"

Pointing at the middle-aged man, the masked demon roared with righteous indignation, "Use the sacred flames! Purify his filthy soul! Let his screams become his final repentance offered to the true god!"

"Purify! Purify! Purify!"

The female demon's inflammatory voice rang out at just the right moment.

The soul-soothing song also instantly turned into an impassioned, feverish melody, and the pink mist churned and surged.