"So many adult men have gone missing!!" "And most of them are virgins. Does this devil have a fetish for breaking in men?" Himeno looked genuinely surprised after hanging up the phone. "Don't tell me she's kidnapping missing men to build a reverse harem. The Great Power actually had that idea once: capture a hundred men, chain them up, and use them as mobile blood bags."
"Good thing I'm not of age yet, otherwise I might have been targeted too," Denji said. "Aki, you better protect yourself lately. Don't go missing on us." "I'm not stupid enough to get kidnapped by a woman." "With me keeping an eye on Aki-kun, I definitely won't let any other woman snatch him away," Himeno suddenly laughed.
"Say, do you just like having a death wish?" Power asked Himeno, chewing on a meatball. "Yeah, I like Aki." Himeno didn't shy away in the slightest, directly hugging Aki Hayakawa's arm. "Senior Himeno, stop making weird jokes." Aki's expression didn't change and his heart didn't skip a beat as he picked up a slotted spoon and scooped two meatballs out of the pot.
"Aki, I want to eat that one." Himeno pointed at the meatball he had just scooped out. Aki didn't say a word and simply dropped the meatball into Himeno's bowl. "I want Aki-kun to feed it to me." A blush crept across Himeno's cheeks as she hugged his arm even tighter, feeling absolutely no shame doing this in front of her juniors. The others just kept their heads down and drank their sodas, while Power was the only one laughing out loud.
"Senior Himeno, please remember your position." Aki would never do something like feed Himeno a meatball in public. He just stabbed a meatball with his chopsticks and ate it himself. "Hmph, Aki, you're so dense." Himeno had no choice but to let go and stab the meatball herself. "Haha, Denji, feed the Great Power a meatball." Power opened her mouth, seemingly trying to provoke Himeno.
"Oh." Denji swiftly and cleanly shoved a used napkin from the table right into Power's mouth. "Ptooey!! You dare shove garbage into the Great Power's mouth?! You stinky Denji, do you want to die?!" Power instantly jumped up, slamming one foot onto her chair as she roared. "If you want to fight, I'll take you on anytime. Unless it's Miss Makima, no one else is ever getting me to feed them."
"Aki Hayakawa, give me my brick!" Power rolled up her sleeves, looking ready for a brawl. "Hey, hey, just eat your food. If you two don't stop, I'm never bringing you out for a meal again," Aki scolded. Even though his raw strength was no longer a match for them, his commanding presence as their senior was still enough to keep them in line. Hearing that they might miss out on good food next time, Power and Denji temporarily declared a truce and quietly sat back down in their chairs.
"Why is the meat gone again?" Denji scooped with his spoon, only to find a few stray vegetables and meatballs left in the broth. Turning his head, he saw that the meat in Power's bowl was piled up like a mountain. "What are you looking at? Keep staring and I'll toss your eyeballs in the pot to boil." Denji just rolled his eyes and ignored her, lifting his drink and chugging it all in one go.
After finishing lunch, everyone walked out of the hot pot restaurant rubbing their stuffed bellies, while Aki stayed behind to foot the bill. Outside, Arata summoned a Mirror Gate, and the group stepped into his Mirror Dimension. Aki, meanwhile, drove back on his own. Once inside the Mirror Dimension, Kana Okura stared at the world inside the mirror in absolute astonishment and couldn't help but ask, "Senior Arata, where is this?" "This is my house."
"How was it created? Did you use a devil's power?" "You know, Kana Okura, you sure are curious about Arata. Even before he got back, you were asking endless questions. Tell me the truth, are you a spy?" Himeno threw an arm around Kana's neck and interrogated her. Even though she was clearly joking, it made Kana break out in a cold sweat. "N-No... I was just curious."
"Then why are you so nervous?" "I was just afraid senior Himeno might misunderstand." "As long as you stop asking so many questions, I definitely won't treat you like a spy." With that, Himeno pushed Kana forward and quickly ushered her out of the Mirror Dimension. The group traveled through the Mirror Gate and emerged straight into the lobby of the Public Safety Department for a quick return trip.
When they finally made it back to the office, a woman had already been waiting for a long time. "Who are you?" Himeno asked. "I'm Arai's mother," the woman hurriedly replied. "Arai's mother! What are you doing here?"
"I haven't been able to reach Arai, so I wanted to come to his workplace to check. Have you guys seen him?" "Arai didn't come to work today." "He didn't come to work? He told me he was heading to work today. Where else could he have gone?" Arai's mother asked anxiously. "Does that mean Arai got abducted by that woman too?!" Himeno looked at Arata in utter shock.
"It's highly likely. After all, Arai isn't the type of guy to just skip work." "How do you know my son was abducted by a woman? He's still a virgin, there's no way he'd just casually run off with some strange woman." "While we were at the hot pot restaurant earlier, we ran into another mother whose son also went missing." "Right now, it's not just Tokyo. Numerous cases of adult men disappearing have popped up in many different areas." Himeno proceeded to explain the recent string of disappearances to Arai's mother in full detail.
"Then you absolutely have to save Arai! When he left the house, I saw him get into a taxi heading for Public Safety Headquarters, but I never received a text saying he arrived safely, which is why I suddenly came looking for him." "Don't panic. We'll find Arai. You should head home first and wait for our news." Now that Arai had also fallen into the female devil's hands, the group couldn't afford to sit idle. They decided to head to the regular police department together to investigate any leads regarding this female devil.
Through more accurate police reports, they learned that this female devil had actually appeared a long time ago. She was referred to as the Succubus Devil. The name was coined due to her frequent habit of seducing male drivers. Her appearance had triggered the disappearances of several male taxi drivers in the past. At the time, Public Safety immediately used car radio broadcasts to spread the warning about the Succubus Devil seducing male drivers.
The tactic actually worked quite well. For a while, there were no new reports of missing men. It wasn't until recently that the Succubus Devil resurfaced, and the male disappearances became even more frequent than before. Listening to the police's account of the situation, Arata instantly remembered seeing a strange car on the road back when he was helping Power find a cat. At the time, there was a man and a woman in the car. The man's eyes were glazed and vacant, while the woman looked incredibly seductive and alluring.
Without a doubt, that must have been the Succubus Devil mentioned in the broadcast. Connecting the locations where the Succubus Devil had passed through with the radio warnings, Arata immediately pieced the clues together. He guessed that the Succubus Devil's hideout had to be somewhere in the suburbs. If they just kept following the roads leading out of the city, they would likely find her trail.
"Let's go. I've already figured out where the Succubus Devil might be hiding." "That fast? We barely just learned about her motives," Himeno said in astonishment. Even knowing that Arata's investigative skills were top-notch, she didn't expect him to be this ridiculously fast. Just casually listening to a few clues and he already had the answer. It genuinely made Himeno wonder if Arata had contracted the Detective Devil.
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