Chapter 400: Sneak Attack
"Harumasa! What is going on?!" Yanagi's voice broke through the chaotic din of the battlefield, laced with a rare, sharp urgency. Her piercing gaze darted between her subordinate and the floating, silver-haired mascot hovering nearby.
Her immediate, tactical instinct screamed that Harumasa had fallen victim to some insidious Hollow trap or an unknown ethereal spell.
Harumasa could not even form the words to reply. The very instant the glowing Silver Wrench phased into his chest, an indescribable, extraordinary sensation violently swept through his entire nervous system.
It began as a rush of absolute, crystalline coolness. It felt as though a stream of glacial spring water had been poured directly into his crown, cascading down his spine and flooding his limbs. Wherever that ethereal current flowed, the agonizing, burning sensation in his lungs—a direct result of inhaling hyper-polluted ether—evaporated. The deep, corrosive irritation that constantly clawed at his throat was scrubbed away, erased from existence as if it had never been there at all.
Hot on the heels of that soothing chill came a deep, radiating warmth. The brilliant light of the Golden Magic Circle rotating beneath his boots surged upward, flooding his veins with a deep, fundamental sense of biological nourishment and cellular repair.
The chronic, bone-deep lethargy—a lingering phantom from past physical modifications and brutal experiments—began to melt. Even the subtle, agonizing sluggishness that usually weighed down his internal organs loosened, dissolving completely under the gentle, radiant embrace of the golden light.
This was no mere medical treatment for corrosion symptoms. It was a fundamental restructuring. A complete, microscopic sorting and optimization rewriting his body from the very source code of his DNA.
Paimon's Optimization Power operated with the careful precision of a master craftsman. The floating companion was not just crudely flushing out the toxic trash in Harumasa's system. Instead, he was wielding a force that mirrored the very laws of the universe, carefully scanning a body that had suffered through improper modifications, uncovering every hidden fracture, micro-tear, and lingering defect.
With surgical grace, the power corrected those flawed, uncoordinated remnants, forcefully elevating his physical form toward a flawless, harmonious baseline state.
"I am... I am okay, Yanagi..." Harumasa finally managed to exhale, his vocal cords working smoothly for the first time in what felt like years. Though his tone remained slightly breathless, the violent, hacking cough was entirely gone. Instead, his words trembled with sheer, unadulterated disbelief.
"Paimon... is healing me. I feel... good. Better than I ever have in my entire life." He let his eyelids flutter shut, surrendering to the devastating yet incredibly gentle metamorphosis occurring beneath his skin. His usually composed features slackened into a dazed mask of absolute shock.
Catching Yanagi's lingering suspicion, Paimon puffed out his chest, his voice dripping with unmistakable pride. "I saw him coughing his lungs out and looking super miserable, so I decided to help him clean up his system! Do not worry, it is no big deal at all! Paimon has dealt with corrosion way, way worse than this!"
A deep shock rippled through Yanagi's usually stoic pink eyes. Just what kind of terrifying background did this group of mysterious interlopers possess? This Paimon—a creature that looked like nothing more than a harmless, floating mascot—actually wielded such miraculous, reality-defying healing abilities?
Right on cue, the blinding radiance of the Golden Magic Circle beneath Harumasa's boots began to recede. The ethereal phantom of the Silver Wrench spinning above his head slowly dimmed, shattering into motes of starlight before dissipating entirely. The optimization process had concluded.
Harumasa slowly opened his eyes. In that single heartbeat, the entire world seemed to shift into sharp, high-definition focus.
The Hollow's atmosphere was still choked with the acrid stench of burnt gunpowder and corrupted ether. Yet, as he drew a deep breath, his lungs did not burn. The stinging irritation was entirely absent. Instead, his newly refined senses could actually map out the subtle, ambient flow of energy drifting through the toxic air.
The guttural roars of the surrounding Ethereals and the concussive booms of distant explosions remained deafening, but his mind was a fortress of absolute clarity. The persistent brain-fog, the dizziness, the gnawing combat anxiety—all of it had been wiped clean.
His limbs felt impossibly light, as if a single step could send him riding the wind. A long-lost, surging torrent of raw physical power flooded his musculature. The shadowy weakness and the phantom aches that had haunted his every movement were gone without a single trace.
He could physically feel the difference in his ether circulation. The speed, the razor-sharp precision, and the sheer total volume of energy coursing through his pathways had skyrocketed to unmatched levels.
Moving as if in a dream, he flexed his fingers. He gripped his weapon, drawing the bowstring back to his cheek before smoothly releasing the tension. The motion was flawless, completely devoid of his usual micro-tremors, packed with terrifying, fluid power.
"This... this is..." Harumasa stared down at his calloused palms, then slowly lifted his gaze to Paimon, who was watching him with a smug, expectant grin. Harumasa's eyes swam with extreme shock, childlike wonder, and a deep, heavy gratitude that felt like it belonged to another lifetime.
This was not just a medical treatment. It was a complete, biological rebirth.
He opened his mouth, momentarily paralyzed, entirely unsure of how to articulate the tidal wave of complex emotions crashing against his ribs. In the end, his countless words condensed into a single, deeply solemn bow. "Thank you. Truly... thank you very much, Paimon."
Paimon actually looked a bit flustered by the sheer gravity of Harumasa's gratitude. A faint dusting of pink touched the mascot's cheeks as he hurriedly waved his little hands in the air. "Oh, hey now, there is really no need to be so formal! We are friends, are we not? Though... if you really want to thank me..."
Those big, starry eyes darted around shiftily before locking back onto the archer, flashing that signature, mischievous grin. "Once we bust out of this creepy place, just treat me to a super-duper lavish feast! And I mean the good stuff! There has to be mountains of meat, and tons of sweet snacks!"
Having finally managed to process the initial shock of his bodily transformation, Harumasa let out a soft, genuine laugh at the incredibly Paimon-style demand.
The absolute lightness of his frame and the intoxicating fullness of his restored strength were so vividly real that, for a fleeting second, he completely forgot about the lethal Hollow surrounding them.
He nodded, his tone soft but etched with absolute sincerity. "Regardless of the price, I will engrave this favor in my heart. Do not worry. Once we make it out of here, even if I have to take an advance on my next three months of salary, I will definitely buy you the biggest meal in the city, Paimon."
"Really?! Heck yeah! That is what I am talking about!" Paimon cheered, doing a happy little mid-air twirl.
"Um..." A slightly timid, distinctly youthful voice cut through the celebration. It was Soukaku, standing just a few paces away. The mere mention of the words lavish feast had caused the oni-girl's stomach to let out a traitorous, highly audible growl.
She shifted her weight, looking between Harumasa and Paimon with a deeply embarrassed flush spreading across her blue cheeks. "Can... can I come along too? I promise... I can eat a little bit less than usual."
Her voice shrank into a tiny, self-conscious squeak, but the ravenous anticipation sparkling in her wide eyes betrayed her true desires.
Harumasa looked at Soukaku. The poor girl clearly wanted to gorge herself but was trying her absolute hardest to act polite and reserved. He immediately recalled the sheer, ungodly terror of her appetite during Section 6's usual team dinners. Her caloric intake was completely at odds with her petite, slender frame—she was, for all intents and purposes, a biological black hole.
He offered a helpless, slightly strained smile, already feeling his wallet weeping in his pocket. "...Of course, Soukaku. You are included too." He offered a moment of silent mourning for his future finances.
"Yay! Soukaku is coming too! The more the merrier!" Paimon cheered, practically drooling as if he could already see the towering buffet of delicacies laid out before them.
However, the suffocating malice of the Hollow never allowed its prey a single moment to breathe.
In that singular, fleeting microsecond of relaxation—brought on by the miraculous healing and the heartwarming promise of a future meal—
A lethal anomaly violently erupted from an absolute blind spot.
The ground directly beneath Harumasa's boots—a seemingly solid, undisturbed patch of ruined concrete and thick Hollow dust—heaved upward and violently shattered without a single fraction of a warning.
A hideous, chitinous scorpion tail exploded from the rubble. It was a sickly pale white, streaked with veins of foul, dark red ether corruption. Its razor-sharp tip, lined with jagged, serrated barbs, burst upward like a poisonous spear thrust straight from the depths of hell. It moved at a terrifying, supersonic velocity that completely bypassed visual tracking.
Its trajectory was flawless. It was aimed dead-center at the back of Harumasa's heart, striking in the exact millisecond his optimization concluded and his guard had instinctively dropped.
There was zero warning. No precursor tremor, no spike in ether fluctuations—at least, none that their heightened senses could possibly capture in time. This ambush was a masterclass in predatory instinct, perfectly using the deafening environmental noise, the chaotic sensory overload of the battlefield, and the inevitable, psychological defensive gap that plagues all humans after a moment of relief.
This long-lurking Spine-King Ethereal had clearly evolved the biological traits of stealth and one-hit assassination to their absolute, terrifying extremes.
Though its main body was only about two meters long—significantly smaller and more compressed than the hulking behemoths they had encountered previously—the hyper-concentrated toxicity and explosive kinetic power coiled within its condensed frame made it infinitely more dangerous. Combined with this god-like timing, it was a guaranteed death sentence.
Yanagi's pink pupils constricted to pinpricks. She was already locked in a high-speed engagement with a swarm of Ethereals on the opposite flank. Her naginata was mid-swing. It was already far, far too late for her to turn back and intercept.
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