As his palm pressed down, the handle turned.
The door felt like it weighed a thousand tons.
A single thought crossed Kairo's mind as the crack between the doors widened:
I've killed demons before, maybe I can learn how I did it.
He stepped in.
The air inside was cold.
Unnaturally cold.
Before he could take another step, something cold and sharp kissed his neck.
It wasn't sweat.
It was steel.
"Who are you?"
The voice was female, low and controlled. Her breath tickled his ear, chilling and firm.
Kairo's breath caught in his throat.
"RIP," he muttered.
Slowly, he raised his hands. "I, I don't mean any harm."
Though honestly, what demon would listen to that?
He turned his head ever so slightly to see her, and the blade scraped his neck. He flinched.
"I said don't move," she warned again, voice as sharp as the blade itself.
But when he finally caught a glimpse of her face,
He paused.
No fangs. No twisted features. Just a girl.
Was he wrong? Was there no demon here?
Yet the scent still curled into his nose like smoke, bitter and demonic.
Maybe she's hiding her true form? Just like those two back in the office?
But something about her felt off in a different way. Not demonic, just felt wrong.
Then she spoke again. "What are you doing here? Why aren't you at the party with the rest?"
Kairo blinked. "I came to get away from the noise," he lied, voice shaking.
She narrowed her eyes at him, suspicion clear, but said, "This place is occupied. Leave."
He gulped. "Uh, as long as the sword's off my neck, I'll gladly go."
She paused, then slowly withdrew the blade. Kairo exhaled shakily and turned, finally getting a full look at her.
That's when he saw it, he saw blood.
Running down her arms, her side, soaking through strange, combat-like clothes.
But it wasn't demon blood.
The scent he was picking up wasn't hers.
Then who?
"Move aside," she muttered.
A heavy impact slammed into his side before he could even react.
BOOM.
Kairo flew like a ragdoll, crashing into the metal bleachers at the side of the basketball court.
Wood cracked. Metal screeched. Dust exploded outward.
Pain screamed across his ribs and back as he groaned, breath knocked clean out of him.
His head rang like church bells during judgment day.
When his brain finally started rebooting, he sat up, still coughing in the thick cloud of dust.
The air had changed.
No longer still, and in that something crackled. Like sparking wires.
Like electricity.
He squinted, blinking through the dust and lights.
At the center of the court, there it was.
A storm was gathering.
Lightning, pure white coiled and hissed in a whirlwind.
It wasn't random. It was centered.
Focused.
And inside the light.
A girl.
Her feet hovered slightly off the ground, white hair floating upward as if caught in a storm.
Her eyes had turned a glowing, otherworldly white.
The lightning danced across her skin, radiating from her.
Then suddenly, it reversed.
The lightning began pulling inward, condensing into her outstretched palms.
Kairo's eyes widened.
She was compressing it.
Folding it into a glowing orb the size of a basketball.
It hissed and whirled violently inside the ball like a captured thunderstorm.
Her arms were shaking. Her hands burned raw and red as the energy ate through her sleeves.
She winced, but her expression didn't break, pure focus.
Then, she did something strange.
She turned to the basketball net.
"What is she doing?" Kairo whispered.
She threw it.
A full-body hurl, as if she was Michael Jordan aiming for the most demonic slam dunk of all time.
BOOOOOM.
The thunderclap shook the entire gym.
The lights above flickered.
The orb struck the net.
Except it didn't go in.
It erased the pole.
Shattered the glass backboard.
Obliterated everything behind it.
Kairo covered his face. Wind and dust blasted out from the impact.
Then something slammed into the wall behind the net, it slammed it hard.
For a moment, he thought it was the lightning ball.
But then the dust settled.
And he saw it.
A massive creature, half-buried in the wall. Its long, dark, glistening body trembled.
A serpent.
Or it used to be.
Three necks, but only one still had a head.
The other two were severed.
One clean, like a blade.
The other burned, lightning still crackling around the open wound.
Kairo stared, frozen.
A demon.
And it had been hiding the whole time.
Invisibility? Concealment?
That's why he couldn't smell it directly. It must've been cloaked.
The girl must've sensed it at the net and struck without hesitation.
Years ago, demons with abilities like this were the rare strong ones.
Strong enough to level buildings.
If this was what's sneaking back into the world.
Kairo's gaze shifted to the girl.
Lightning crackled faintly around her. Her expression looked dazed.
Was she one of them?
A demon hunter?
The Demon Hunter Corps, the organization that once repelled the demons off Earth.
He thought it was gone.
He thought demons were gone.
Wrong on both.
As Kairo slowly stood from the rubble, pain crawling through every joint in his body, he realized.
He couldn't do anything.
He wasn't strong. Not yet.
While the demon and the girl faced off, he could only run.
He turned, heart pounding, feet crunching on debris.
But then,
Thud.
He froze.
The girl, she collapsed.
Lightning flickered out like a dying spark.
Her body hit the floor.
Damnation, Kairo thought, clenching his fists.
Now what? Leave her?
Or die trying to help?