Love, War, And 01

"So, do you two know any place where we could find a devil?"

Ayumu couldn't help but feel nervous as he spoke to the two... and lucky as well. 

As part of the exam to enter the Devil Hunter Club, he was tasked with finding and killing a devil. This task wasn't to be done alone of course, he had two partners with him who wanted to join the club too. And these two just happened to be girls, which was why he was nervous in the first place.

They were also first years... which maybe meant he was coming off as the cool Senpai!

Asa, the first girl, looked away. "Why would we?" She was cute.

Not supermodel cute or anything like that, but she was the type of girl that any guy would be happy to date. Though Ayumu didn't really know her personality just yet, so who knows if that thought would stand the test of time.

The other girl, Yuko, pushed her glasses up. "We just gotta look through the city until we find one." She was cute too.

Though less cute than Asa, in Ayumu's opinion. Still, if she confessed her feelings right there and then, he would accept it without any hesitation at all. Wait, didn't that make him come off as a bit of a loser?

He crossed his arms and began thinking. "What if we stumble onto a big devil though? Wouldn't we be in big trouble then?" 

Yuko shrugged. "Yeah, but it is what it is. I mean, what were you expecting when you joined the Devil Hunter Club?" Technically he had yet to join, but whatever.

He blushed. "F-fair enough. Then let's meet up after school and get to work. I-If that's okay, of course." Shit, he shouldn't be stuttering when talking with girls!

That definitely made him seem way more lame.

Yuko gave him a thumbs up. "Sounds totally good with me!" And then she looked at the other girl. "And what about ya, Asa? Or are you busy?"

Asa looked down. "I wouldn't have signed for this if I was busy..." 

Yuko chuckled. "Then it's settled! Tomorrow we hunt a devil!" Or a devil hunted them.

Still, the risk was worth it... after all, surely a Devil Hunter got tons of chicks?

 

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"So yeah, I got matched up with two hotties!" He grinned. "I'm afraid I'll leave you behind soon, my dearest friend!" Surely at least one of them would develop feelings for him?

They would be getting into fights and stuff, and people always grew closer in those situations. Or at least that's what popular media always seemed to say. Hell, maybe he would get even luckier than he already had and trigger a love triangle!

His supposed friend looked more annoyed than anything. "Really? Goodbye then." 

Ayumu didn't lose his confidence just because his friend was acting cool. "Okay then. I'll make sure to occasionally send you a letter or something. If I even remember you exist at that point, of course."

His friend's frown slowly got deeper. "Wait, you're telling the truth?"

And now Ayumu was confused. "Yeah. Why would I lie about something like this...!?"

His friend clicked his tongue. "You're always lying about stuff to try and look cooler." He couldn't really deny that... "But I guess you aren't doing that this time. Well, it's whatever, I don't care." He definitely cared.

And Ayumu knew that, so he just stayed silent for a few seconds until...

His friend's cool facade broke. "B-but hey, you wouldn't mind introducing one of them to me, yeah?" He blushed. "It ain't like you can get two girlfriends anyways, so..."

Ayumu chuckled. "Ah, Denji, you and I truly are brothers from different mothers."

He wouldn't say they had clicked immediately once they met, in fact, even now Denji seemed pretty grumpy whenever the two talked. However, Ayumu knew from the first moment that they were (platonic) soulmates. And he had been right, after all, nobody else in the school understood his desire for women like Denji did.

That's right, the two were the same type of virgin loser.

His friend snapped at him. "Just answer the question, bastard!"

Ayumu's grin just became wider as he raised a provoking eyebrow. "I don't know... I remember a certain guy mocking me once I said I would join the Devil Hunter Club to get laid. And now that same guy begs for mercy from his kind?"

Denji growled. "Damn it...! Look, I just said it's stupid because I have a way better idea that I'm cookin' up." Did he now? "And when it works, and I have a hundred girlfriends, I might just remember a guy I met when I was down, ya know?"

Ayumu pouted. "And that plan is...?"

"Can't say. It would ruin the plan." The same excuse as always...

Ayumu sighed. "That plan definitely doesn't exist... but sure, whatever. I'll try to introduce you to one of them or a friend of theirs one of these days. Only after I have already started dating one of them though, I don't want any competition."

Denji was surprisingly handsome for a delinquent, so he had to be careful around him. That NTR thing was getting more and more popular these days!

Denji waved him off. "As long as it happens eventually, I don't care." He suddenly became completely frozen still. "Oh, and one more thing, Ayumu."

The situation suddenly seemed a lot more serious, so he couldn't help but gulp. "Yeah?"

"A beast should never trust a hunter. If you wanna kill devils, don't forget that."

Ayumu's eyes widened. "Denji, that's... such a cool line! Do you mind if I steal it for later!?" He basically had stars in his eyes. The boy didn't know Denji had such chuuni prowess hidden within.

The delinquent lookalike sputtered. "The hell man, I'm giving you serious advice here! So you and your way too strong cologne should listen to it!" Ayumu didn't use cologne, though. "How would you even use the line later anyways...?"

Ayumu raised a finger. "Before I fight a devil, I will look a girl right in her eyes and drop that line. She might fall in love with me right then and there, no?" 

"Oh...! That line is copyrighted now." For real!?

 

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"Ew..." What else was he supposed to say to such a sight?

Asa's locker was filled with meat. Not rotten meat or anything, but it was still pretty disgusting. Thankfully, filled was actually an exaggeration, it was more like someone had specifically put meat on her shoes for some dumb reason.

The girl immediately closed her locker. "I-I'm going home." Her expression had only twitched for a bit before she made her decision.

It was understandable, but Ayumu tried stopping her nonetheless. "Before you go, shouldn't we at least report this to the principal?" This had to be bullying of some kind, right?

Ayumu had never been bullied... in such a way at least. The maximum people had ever done in the past was ignore his existence. So he didn't really know what to do, but talking with the school's faculty was a start, right?

Asa almost completely ignored him and kept walking. "I'll talk with the principal tomorrow." He had a feeling she wouldn't be doing that.

Yuko was the next one to try and stop her. "Wait a second Asa, you're barefooted, so..."

"I'm fine." And Yuko was shot down just as fast as the boy.

The two just silently stared as Asa left.

Yuko tilted her head. "We should go after her, right...?"

He hesitantly nodded. "I-I think so..." 

Actually... wasn't this kind of a prime opportunity for him? If he could handle this situation, Asa would fall head over heels for him, and then he would get to date the cutest girl of their group. Yep, now that he thought about it, this was kind of like winning the lottery, so he would tell Yuko to stay behind and—.

And Yuko was already running to find Asa.

Ayumu sighed. "Man, that was way too scummy." He got so lost in his hero fantasy that it was like the world had stopped.

That definitely wasn't good, so he slapped some sense into himself and ran after the two. Catching up to Yuko was easy, he was a fairly athletic guy, and then afterwards doing the same to Asa was a bit more difficult, but doable.

The duo arrived panting. "A-Asa... S-shoe..." Yuko was the one who spoke first.

Asa's eye twitched. "What about it?" It's clear she was surprised someone had followed her.

Yuko smiled, now having regained her breath. "Well, it hurts walking like that, so let me lend you mine!" She began taking off her shoes.

But before she could do so, Asa stopped her. "Are you stupid or something? Then you would be going barefoot instead!" 

Yuko made a peace sign and giggled. "It's alright! I'll just give you one of my shoes, that way we can share!" It went without saying that that idea was absolutely stupid. Yuko was just trying to be nice, however.

Asa gritted her teeth. "Keep your stupid shoe."

Ayumu took this opportunity to interject. "Well, if the problem is Yuko going barefooted, then let me lend you mine instead." He knelt down and began taking them off. "I actually live pretty close here, so it's not an issue."

Asa snapped. "Are you two pitying me!? Who even asked for that!?" She immediately regretted her outburst, however, taking a deep breath to calm down. "Keep your stupid shoes, Ayumu. I'd rather be bullied than pitied."

Yuko cleared her throat. "And I don't care what you think—."

Ayumu stopped whatever speech Yuko was about to give. "Look, you're not gonna keep saying that when you step into a piece of glass. Or a nail. Or anything that hurts. So just accept it and then give my shoes back tomorrow... It's not like it's the only pair I have."

Seriously, it wasn't a big deal. Though the shoes might be a bit too big for her... they were shoes made for guys after all. So Asa would have to be careful to not stumble and fall.

"B-but..." Not willing to wait anymore, Ayumu basically shoved the shoes onto her hands.

A sigh escaped his mouth. "There. Problem solved." Except not really. He couldn't really do anything to her bullying though.

Actually, now that he thought about it, Denji was weirdly popular among girls, even if not in the way he wanted to be. So maybe he could say a word to his friend, and then his friend could say a word to someone... And somehow put an end to the bullying.

For a moment it seemed Asa was finally going to accept help, but that moment didn't last long. "You're... you're doing this because I'm a girl, right?" She hit the bullseye with no effort at all. "Guys are all the same. I don't need your shoes."

He didn't even have anything to say to that. He didn't know how she had found out his real motivations in the first place... His father did use to say that girls could smell these kinds of things from a mile away, and it seemed he had been right.

Now, what was Ayumu supposed to do? He did want to help her, lewd things aside, that was only natural. But now she wouldn't accept that help... maybe he could lie? That was something Ayumu did a lot, so...

He blushed and looked away. "Y-yeah, I'm helping you 'cause you're a cute girl. So what? Sue me." He ended up saying the truth.

"O-oh..." And now Asa was blushing as well.

So he took this opportunity to continue. "A-and I'm not the only one trying to help! Yuko is right here!"

The girl nodded. "Yup. I kind of want to back off now, though, since Ayumu is apparently a loser." Geez, no mercy at all huh?

Asa finally relented. "F-fine... I'll take the stupid shoes, but only because you live close to here." She scowled. "And don't think this is an invitation for you to try anything!"

He fearfully nodded. "O-of course." He wasn't the type who kept pursuing a girl after he got rejected.

Asa was now off-limits, he would just treat her as a friend. The same thing applied to Yuko of course, considering she called him a loser, she wasn't up to it. With that said, he would still keep on wanting to be a part of the Devil Hunter Club. Another girl might think he's cool because of it!

Slowly, Asa lifted his shoes to her nose and then muttered to herself. "Smells strong..." She had just sniffed them.

Why though!?

Yuko laughed awkwardly. "I mean, they are shoes..."

While Ayumu nodded. "Yeah. Sorry if they smell bad though."

Asa sputtered. "No, I mean...! Ugh...! Y-you smell strong!" First Denji and now this... did he really smell bad!?

Denji always talked about his supposed cologne however, that wasn't new. But he was also the only person who had talked about it in the past, so Ayumu had just assumed he had been acting weird. As it turns out, no, it was the other people in class who had been acting nice by saying they couldn't smell anything.

Ayumu wanted to die. "Look, if you want to keep the shoes, you don't need to kill me for them. Okay?"

Yuko patted his shoulder in solidarity. "Yeah, Asa. Also, there are easier ways to kill the guy."

"N-no! I didn't... Just forget I said anything!" He wouldn't.

From now on, Ayumu would take four showers per day... No, he would take at least five!

 

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Due to their little shoe-related adventure, devil hunting was delayed to the next day. And once that day came, thankfully no other problems arose.

Asa handed him a plastic bag. "Here, your shoes. Thanks for the help yesterday, you and Yuko."

He took it with a smile. "It's not a problem at all." In fact, it had been a godsend. With her comment finally making him accept his destiny, Ayumu had become a god of cleanliness. Without a doubt, he smelled just like an angel right now! 

She smiled. "Still, thanks." And then her expression soured. "Even if you weren't really doing it to be altruistic."

Yuko interjected. "Give him a break, Asa. All men are like that, Ayumu might be one of the better ones even." There was no way that was true.

Even among his class, it was well known he and Denji were scummy losers. Denji because he let girls sit on him if they paid, and Ayumu because he tried to pay for girls to sit on him. With very limited success, of course. And by that he meant no success at all.

Asa huffed. "If everyone was wrong, would people then say it was okay to be wrong? This kind of attitude taken towards people's behavior isn't something we should accept. Not to say Ayumu is a serious problem or anything, but—."

"We get it, Asa." Yuko cut her off. And then she raised a hand to the skies. "Now let's stop wasting time and go hunt devils already! We might even become the next Chainsaw Man...!" She was clearly very excited.

More importantly, however, this was time to use his secret weapon. "Right, you two should just keep one thing in mind..." He smirked. "A beast should never trust a hunter."

"Oh! That sounds really cool, Ayumu! Can I use it?"

"Sorry, Yuko, but apparently it's copyrighted."

 

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Hunting devils was complicated work. At least on their level.

As students, they didn't have the resources professional Devil Hunters did, so even finding a devil in the first place was super hard. Though now that Ayumu thought about it, only big, strong devils got reported to Public Safety anyways, and they obviously couldn't go after those, so it didn't matter much.

Instead, they were hoping to find something small, like an Apple Devil or anything else that nobody would fear.

Devils could be anywhere, so they went anywhere. That is to say, they walked around like bumbling buffoons. However, they did try prioritizing emptier places, since a devil was more likely to be hanging around there.

Yuko let out a groan of annoyance. "Ugh! This sucks! Isn't this mission way too hard!?"

Asa sighed. "Well, we do have a whole week to do it." That still didn't feel like enough if Ayumu was being honest. So he was on Yuko's side.

He complained. "I don't really want to waste my whole week." Maybe he should have joined a sports club instead. "Honestly, what I wouldn't give for a devil to show up right now..."

A wall close to them burst open immediately, as if the universe had been toying with Ayumu's words.

"Shit...!" He screamed, almost falling down as he was hit with dust and debris, but barely managing to stay up.

He could also hear Yuko's screams, though they were quickly silenced. The girl had fallen to the ground and passed out. He could only hope she wasn't too injured.

Asa too was able to stay up. "T-that's..."

Both she and Ayumu were looking at the demon who had emerged.

He was a gigantic bat, and so Ayumu could only assume it was the Bat Devil. The monster was currently holding a man, and slowly, with his teeth-filled mouth, he ripped out that man's head. It went without saying that the trio would be next.

And amidst this, Ayumu heard a strange voice, weak, but there. "No good... take... body... scared..." It sounded like Asa, but she wasn't speaking at all.

In fact, she looked like she was about to hyperventilate. And considering Ayumu was hearing voices, maybe he was about to do that too.

"Kill... it doesn't matter which... weapon..." That voice that sounded so similar to Asa's rang out again.

But Ayumu didn't pay much attention to the voices. He couldn't, stricken with fear as he was.

Especially as the Bat Devil slowly shifted his gaze towards him... and sniffed the air.

"For real?" 

This was bad. His showers hadn't done anything to quell the fact that apparently he smelled really bad. Or good, considering the Bat Devil was looking at him as if he was the most delicious lunch to ever exist.

His heart stopped beating. His lungs froze. His vision whitened. Every survival instinct in his body, all carefully honed through evolution to make him live another day, was telling him that the end was here. Nothing could be done.

And in that case... "Asa, take Yuko and run. I'll distract the thing." At least he could act as bait. That was better than nothing. Yeah, even if the monster killed him quickly, the time it took to eat him should give Asa a few moments.

"W-what!?" He didn't bother listening to her.

Ayumu stepped forward, glared at the Bat Devil, and—. 

The monster pounced, and he died. 

 

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"Huh?" He opened his eyes, still trembling with fear, and found himself in a strange place.

A library, with books of all sizes as far as the eyes could see. And a desk, on that desk sat a well-groomed European man. That man's voice was strangely comforting.

"Ah, the Messenger. You finally showed up!"