"Get back here!"
The shout echoed through the narrow streets as a young boy sprinted with a focus that defied his twelve years of age.
Standing at approximately 140 CM with tanned skin and distinct golden eyes, he looked like any other student...
Except for the fact that he was hunting something born of a fever dream.
Kicking into a high gear, the distance was closed in a heartbeat. A playful laugh escaped from the boy's mouth as he vaulted over a low-level curse, using its head as a stepping stone.
"You guys are moving in slow motion! Did you miss your morning coffee?"
A fist slammed into a malevolent spirit, but the impact was fundamentally different from any standard strike.
A dark red electricity, a hint of raw Demonic Energy flickered around his knuckles.
The pavement beneath the spirit was pulverized, turning concrete into fine dust as if struck by a falling star.
The pack leader was a nightmare: a human head grafted onto a massive wasp's body.
However, a smile appeared on the boy's face. He reached into thin air, his hand tore the fabric of space, and three-sectioned ice nunchucks appeared in his hands.
"Emerge from darkness, blacker than darkness. Purify that which is impure."
A curtain of black ink fell from the sky, sealing the street in a mystical dome.
Within the dark shine of the barrier, Yoichi didn't settle into a defensive stance, he started to dance.
"Come on! Don't tell me the party's over!"
The heads swarmed, but a heavy swing of the ice chains met them.
Every rotation of the nunchucks sent out a shockwave of frost and demonic pressure that shattered the asphalt into frozen craters.
Death followed every freezing strike, but Yoichi was merely smirking, treating the Grade 2 encounter like a high-stakes game of jump rope.
The leader lunged with its stinger, but nunchucks were swapped in a blur for the massive blade.
Yoichi caught the strike on the flat of the greatsword, but he didn't just hold his ground.
A surge of demonic power streamed through the steel, and as his heels dug into the asphalt, the ground behind him exploded upward in a V-shaped trench from the sheer overflow of energy.
The wasp-spirit exhaled a foul greenish fog, but Yoichi simply flickered out of existence before the first plume could touch his skin.
Trickster was activated with a fluid grace, leaving the creature's laughter to die in its throat as it realized it was biting at shadows.
High above on a nearby rooftop, a man with striking white hair and black tinted glasses leaned against a railing, eyes widening.
"Well, now," the man murmured, a playful yet sharp grin tugging at his lips. "I see a mini-barrier, a disappearing act, and... wait. That's not just Cursed Energy. That weight... that's something much nastier! Color me impressed."
Suddenly, the roar of two handguns filled the alley. He spun the twin pistols in complex flourishes between every shot.
The demonic lead effortlessly annihilated the low-level curses, leaving smoldering holes in the brick walls with a dark light.
The wasp-spirit lunged again, but a fluid grace was maintained as Yoichi moved within a hair's breadth of the strike, mocking the monster with a wink.
"Too slow! You're boring me!"
His speed skyrocketed, leaving a trail of cracked pavement in his wake as he slammed the hilt of the greatsword into the creature's side.
The spirit tried to pin the blade with its grotesque limbs, but Yoichi simply let go of the hilt with a cheeky salute.
"Hold that for a moment. It's heavy, right?"
He reached into the empty air, gripping the hilt of the twin elemental scimitars. With the primal energy surging, he became a whirlwind of fire and wind.
Every slash ignited the very oxygen in the atmosphere, the devilish heat melting the street lamps and turning the road into a river of molten tar.
The boy came to a halt, the twin swords humming with a satisfied vibration.
With a practiced flick of the wrists, the purple blood was whisked from the blades.
The wasp-spirit let out one final, agonizing screech before its entire body fell apart, sliding into charred, perfectly sliced pieces.
A hand was reached out to retrieve Rebellion as the massive sword vanished back into the Akashic Records.
A huff of breath let out as the void "swallowed" the entire arsenal.
"Gosh, I'll have a hard time explaining this to Mom," a quiet mumble escaped his lips.
He looked down at his elementary school uniform, drenched in foul purple blood.
This was Yoichi Murakami.
At twelve years old, he occupied a middle ground between an innocent student and a hint of the legendary devil hunter. The white hair was no longer just a few stray strands; it now almost blotted his head in silver light.
A series of urgent hospital visits had been conducted by Kiyoshi and Michelle, yet the medical diagnostics returned a result that was normal as hell. In fact, a vibrancy and energy radiated from the boy that made even Asuka feel weirded out by the drastic physical transformation.
Behind the scenes, a whopping seven years had been spent grinding through the simulation.
He was now on the second half of DMC 3, having survived a gauntlet of nightmares.
Fighting against the Hell Vanguard, Cerberus, Gigapede, and the Agni and Rudra brothers had been truly tedious.
The freezing reach of Cerberus had crystallized the oxygen in the arena, while the tandem of the fire and wind brothers forced a smile onto Yoichi's face from the sheer difficulty.
As a result of these triumphs, his arsenal had expanded, the Devil Arms now bound to his soul.
However, a solid two years had been sacrificed just to overcome the overly motivated brother of Dante.
Fast, precise, and motivated. That's what Vergil is.
He's really the storm that is approaching.
And when the moment came, when Yoichi was stabbed through the chest by his own sword.
A catastrophic evolution occurred.
1st is the Devil Trigger. His Devil Form is just like Dante's, horns bent downward, and dressed in a red suit.
And the 2nd is the conversion of Cursed Energy to Demonic Energy.
That's right. He could now convert them.
The recipe looks like this: CE X CE = DE.
Sounds familiar? Yes, that's the conversion of Cursed Energy into Reverse Cursed Energy.
While Yoichi basically lost the ability to utilize RCE, the loss was negligible. Demonic Energy mogged RCE in every aspect—providing a healing factor that surpassed automated RCT, incredible strength, and speeds that defied the very concept of time.
Nonetheless, multiple problems persisted.
The conversion process was violent enough to fry his brain, even with the gift of Dante's physique.
Yoichi held the legacy of a god-tier demon hunter, but he was still operating within the constraints of a child's body.
Control wasn't the issue. Storing the energy was a life-hack given his lineage. The only true obstacle was the "processing power" required to keep the Demonic Energy from burning out his nervous system before he could reach his full height.
A lazy, confident smirk remained plastered on the face of the twelve-year-old as he spun Ebony around his trigger finger.
"I suppose my viewer had a wonderful time watching my performance!" The handgun was aimed toward the rooftop, the black muzzle of Ebony pointing directly at the silhouette leaning against the railing.
"Mind showing yourself? Or do I need to start charging admission for the front-row seats?"
"Whoa, chill out! Put the toys away, kid!"
A frantic yet clearly fake gesture of surrender was made by the man as he leaned back. "Do you know it's illegal to carry weapons in Japan? I'd hate to have to call the cops on a twelve-year-old for brandishing... whatever those sleek beauties are."
"And as if that would work for us as sorcerers," A dry retort came from Yoichi.
With a fluid motion, Ebony was skillfully spun around the trigger finger before being slotted back into its holster.
"Technically, they aren't 'weapons' if they're made of pure style," Yoichi added, crossing his arms over his ruined shirt.
A laugh escaped from Satoru's mouth as he stood upright, his long limbs unfolding.
"Style, huh? I like your confidence! Most kids your age are crying over scraped knees, and here you are, spitting that things with purple lightning and ice pops."
Months had been spent trekking through Chiba, Saitama, and Ibaraki, following a trail of anomalies, and now the source had finally been found. A report had surfaced of a child with monstrous Cursed Energy.
However, through the Six Eyes, the reality was fundamentally different.
The dense, uncomfortable energy the child exuded wasn't Cursed Energy at all.
It was something weightier, more primal.
Like an abyssal power that felt like it had been dragged straight out of a different dimension.
"But seriously," Satoru chirped, stepping closer with a grin that was way too wide.
"That energy of yours is making my head spin, and I'm the guy who literally sees everything. It's raw, it's crunchy, and it definitely didn't come from a textbook. You're a little box of mysteries, aren't you?"
He leaned in, his black-tinted glasses sliding down his nose just enough to show a hint of a playful, electric blue eye.
"So, tell me... Does your mom know you're out here turning the neighborhood into a demolition derby, or is this just a very aggressive after-school hobby? Because if I have to file a noise complaint, it's going to get very awkward."
"You've been lurking on that roof for a while, and now you're worried about noise?" An eyebrow was raised by Yoichi, matching the man's cockiness beat for beat. "I should charge you for the entertainment. It's not every day you see a Grade 2 get turned into sashimi."
"Lurking is such a heavy word! I prefer 'dedicated fan-boying,'" Satoru corrected, waving a hand dismissively.
"A name is usually the first step to an introduction, right?"
Even with the overwhelming presence of the man before him, no flicker of surprise crossed those golden eyes.
"Names' Yoichi, Murakami Yoichi. And I suppose I should welcome the 'Honored One' to my neighborhood."
Satoru smirked. "Oh? You know me? I didn't realize my fan club had reached the elementary school demographic already."
"Well, Gojo-san," Yoichi continued, a smile returning to his lips. "If you're as good at making excuses as the rumors say, then we might just get along."
"Are you... actually scared of your mom?" Gojo smirked, leaning down to poke at Yoichi's shoulder.
"I'm being practical," the boy snapped back. "She's really scary when she's mad."
"Adorable! The little monster is human after all," Gojo chirped. "Don't worry, pipsqueak. I'll be so charming she'll forget you even own a sword!"
"Just don't make it weirder than it already is."
"No promises!"
They set off immediately, an odd pair that somehow made perfect sense.
Gojo, perpetually bored at the top of the world, found a weird sort of kinship in the boy's chaotic energy. On the other hand, Yoichi was just thrilled to have a legendary meat-shield to distract his mother.