The wind howled.
The rain roared.
Cold raindrops lashed madly against the Information Demon's battered body, pieced together from countless scraps of paper.
The paper soaked up water, growing heavy, sodden, unable to bear the burden.
It could feel its strength draining rapidly away beneath the scouring rain.
It had to flee.
Flee this city, flee this rainy night.
Flee that demon standing at the city's highest point.
It raised its head in terror and looked toward the tallest building in the City of Wind Chimes-that ancient clock tower.
The black-haired boy stood atop its pointed roof.
He let the gale whip his haori into something like black wings.
He let the downpour soak the ends of his hair and stream down his stern cheeks.
He had not pursued it.
He simply stood there, silently looking down at it as though looking at something dead.
That was not a hunt.
That was an execution.
A fear deeper and more primal than when the lightning net had pierced it began to breed wildly in the deepest recesses of every one of the Information Demon's "cells."
It could not understand.
Why wasn't he pursuing it?
Why didn't he kill it immediately?
And what did that ball of flame he had shot into the sky mean?
Countless questions surged wildly through its "brain" as it tried to analyze, calculate, and predict.
But all the information pointed toward a blank result that could not be deciphered.
Unknown.
Unknown.
Still unknown!
Just then, it saw.
The figure atop the clock tower slowly raised his left hand.
There were no hand seals.
Nor was he about to unleash any Ninjutsu.
He simply turned his palm toward those churning, pitch-black thunderclouds.
As though establishing some mysterious connection with the sky.
RUMBLE-!
The sky answered him.
A thunderous