14 Chapter 14- Hassle ⅰⅰ

"To bring a tactical weapon to a picnic, how ridiculous is that?"

The Nurarihyon did not sound exhausted as he casually remarked, a hint of amusement swimming within his gaze.

The man held Kimi by her neck, as the cat woman squirmed and exerted what little strength she could with her remaining hand. The cat woman was missing an ear and a hand. To their side laid Watsuchi, his eyes wide open, but the pupils weren't focused, but if one observed closely, the twitching of his fingers were evident.

Kuwa was relatively unharmed compared to Kimi and Watsuchi, but she too had minor injuries littered across her body. All of her premium arrows had been exhausted, and the remaining ordinary ones would've been enough to keep the Nurarihyon busy. But as she tried to knock another arrow on her bow, her already light-headed mind started getting glossing over.

Eventually, she aimed and released her arrow, but the arrow was too slow unlike before. The Nurarihyon simply held Kimi to the side and blocked the arrow with Kimi's body. The archer's senses didn't register that, as the illusory spell that got hold of her psyche registered it as a direct hit at the Nurarihyon. She stumbled forward and fell on her face, yet she had a content face as if she had won, and the whole mission was a success.

Evidently, Akio had become too exhausted to keep disturbing whatever illusory spells the Nurarihyon had been casting the moment the fight begun. Akio was still behind the protection of the barrier he had created, but the flickering light of the light blue runes along the surface told magnitudes of the exhaustion the caster was suffering, if that weren't enough, the throbbing veins on Akio's forehead, his nose bleed along with the visible veins on his exhausted eyes were proof.

The mortals, along with the children had been unfortunately caught up in the fight between supernaturals, huddled together in the corner. Most of them were frightened, but some of the children were looking at the ongoing fight with intensity.

This included a blond, who even when being in his aunt's embrace looked on at the fight. His eyes held fear and a slowly sprouting nascent determination. A fight that could very well be recorded along with the high-end fights of Japan's superhero community. A rabbit-eared girl was missing among the group though.

At that time, Youhara escaped from the hole he had dug. With a leap, he jumped at the crack in the dome. Fully intend on getting Aito out of here as soon as possible.

The Nurarihyon looked at the leaping figure of Youhara and sneered. Despite the man's bloodied face, there were no visible injuries on the man. His suit was cut in several places, with the knee down of his trousers gone and the right sleeve of the outfit entirely ripped off. Evidently, his superior regeneration had won out in the end.

The man threw Kimi to the side like a disgusting piece of garbage and started walking toward Aito and Youhara. His stride held no hurry, but a second later, he held his blade in a reverse grip. His eyes met with Aito's own for a brief second.

The Nurarihyon could feel Aito's somewhat minuscule yet incomparably pure Qi locking onto him as if observing and recording him from every nook and cranny. The feeling was unpleasant for the man, and he wouldn't've noticed this process if not for his superior sense.

"What a monster! make's me wonder if he's the son of that wretched Ortiz."

The man muttered under his breath, as he forcefully disrupted Aito's Qi sense with his vastly powerful Yoki. He held his foot forward, taking a stance as he threw his sword like a spear.

Back with Youhara, Aito's mind reeled from the disruption caused by the Nurarihyon, but the firewall that was Ciel absorbed all the damage and mitigated it with her overwhelming processing power, and the refined Qi.

Usually, disrupting someone's senses like this can cause some damage to the user like blasting a high-decibel sound on your ear, and destroying your eardrum. It could ruin your equilibrium and damage you, no matter how temporary it is.

Elites like Kimi and Watsuchi were trained to counter situations like these with a variety of techniques. So, they can put up a fight against superior foes like Nurarihyon. But Aito, as the sheltered son of Tao wasn't. He didn't even know that one could do something like this outside the speculations he had done with Ciel.

Even still, Ciel acting as the firewall spared him of any everlasting damage. Unfortunately, because of the sudden reeling, he missed the blade that was thrown at them. As Youhara noticed the blade, it was too late, and he only had time to move Aito out of harm's way and slightly shift his body.

The blade grazed past Youhara, cleaving through the right side of his midsection. Since the part that cleaved his right side was the rough side of the blade, the wound was rough, and Youhara was pretty sure that a part of his liver went with that blade.

He crashed onto the barrier as the angle of his leap was disrupted with Aito sandwiched between him and the barrier.

"Oof." A groan escaped from Aito's mouth as the air escaped his lungs.

Youhara tried grabbing onto the gap in the crack with his right hand, "Aargh." but the feeling of his lower body tearing off from his upper body made him quickly let go of it. They both fell onto the ground, but this time, Youhara made sure to keep Aito above him as they crashed.

The impact of crashing onto the ground was enough to damage Youhara further, and that small fall was enough to damage Aito's small frame.

Aito let out a cough as Ciel sent her refined Qi charged with the bioelectric current to heal Aito's minor injuries, and Youhara let out another groan.

The seriousness of the situation hadn't really affected Aito's psyche all that much considering the fact that all of this chaos happened extremely fast compared to a mortal's perception, even with the nuclear equivalent talisman... But the sprouting blood from where Youhara's liver was supposed to be did a great deal in cementing the seriousness of the situation to Aito.

He looked at the Nurarihyon, the previous incident making him too afraid to use Qi sense, if he did, he would've noticed Kimi's and the rest of the squad's state. (He previously didn't see them since he was looking at the imposter specifically and the time frame it happened was small.)

The Nurarihyon walked toward them with counted steps, His stride unhurried. It was the walk of someone supremely confident in achieving his goals.

For a second, A tingling sensation in his head, but it promptly went away.

The man raised an eyebrow, looking at Aito with surprise. But the surprise quickly faded as he mouthed something and picked up his pace.

[Aito!] Ciel Cried out in Aito's head, her usual unfeeling voice rife with emotion, fear of the unknown? [I don't know what he did, but he did something and I stopped it. But… but, He's still doing it. I don't know what this is. Wait! He's trying to wrap your perception. He's trying to make you unconscious. But I can stop it without much problem. Don't get injured though, I probably can't heal you right now.]

Aito couldn't respond to Ciel's what seemed to be a mental breakdown as the man opened his mouth to speak. A faint dark violet hue covering the man as his damaged outfit changed into that of pristine clean clothing without a hint of blemish.

"It's quite cumbersome to battle in this modern wear, but I like the elegance and fine details of this suit. I can see why the princess's extortion of human culture is having such a boom on the supernatural community." The man said as he tidied up the edges of his suit. Trying to look like a proper gentleman, but the nasty grin plastered on his face as if he had won did little to make the atmosphere pleasant at least from Aito's perception.

*cough

A cough escaped from Youhara's mouth as he tried to get up, but from that distance, the Nurarihyon waved his hand, launching a dagger at Youhara. With his injury, he couldn't react properly, but he managed to tilt himself enough to avoid a major injury. Aito was still held from harm's reach, save for the bruises and a small he received from being sandwiched against the World prison, which was already healing.

It took 3 minutes from start to finish for the Nurarihyon to finish off Kimi's squad.

That was how sad the power disparity between supernaturals can go, most of the elites of the supernatural were millennial old characters with ridiculous skillsets and experience under their belt.

Kimi and her team were greenhorns as far as the supernaturals were concerned, even considering the fact that the oldest member of the group Watsuchi was nearly a century old. Normally this single team wouldn't be in charge of Aito's protection, but considering 'Ron', someone with considerable power among Tao's people was acting as the core of the escort, they were put in charge.

But no one expected for Ron to be replaced by an imposter and remain undetected, even by Tao and Yuuki duo.

The wet thud of the dagger piercing Youhara's flesh, along with the persistent tingling sensation in Aito's head Ciel was battling made Aito's sense of urgency skyrocket. He had lots of questions about the situation, but he knew for a fact that he didn't want to end up in the man's hands.

He looked around for a solution, only to see the state of Kimi and the others. Since he wasn't using Qi sense, he couldn't accurately pinpoint their state, but to him, they looked dead as they could be, save for Akio, who was still standing.

Amidst the chaos, his eyes landed on something, something vital that could very well save his life. But Aito's eyes didn't linger on that even for a second, not wanting to do anything to expose it. His survival instinct kicking in as he looked at the Nurarihyon who at this point was less than twenty meters ahead of him, if one looked closely, they could very well see the droplets of sweat forming on the Nurarihyon's forehead and nose.

"W-who are you?" His stuttering and tone gave off the perfect balance of fear and anxiety, a few droplets of tear ran down his cheek as he looked at the man.

"W-where is Ron?" he continued, his voice taking on an accusatory yet fearful tone.

But as the man continued to approach, Aito leaned back, still holding onto Youhara's shirt as if fearful to let go, similarly. Youhara still had a hand wrapped around Aito, trying his bare minimum to protect Aito.

"D-don't come closer."

"Shhh, don't worry your highness. I'm here to take you to a better place."

The man said, coming closer and leaning in closer to Aito.

"A place where you can bloom properly, a place where you will be free to flourish into what you were destined."

"Now, how about I give you a choice," The Nurarihyon said while holding out his hand, "You will come with me regardless you're willing or not, But…" the man pointed his hand backwards, hinting at the fallen figures of Kimi and team. "If you come with me willingly, I'll leave your subordinates be."

"A-aren't they dead?" Aito asked, he was genuinely curious without his Qi sense he couldn't say for sure. But he was someone who knew to focus on the important bits first. Mourning and self-blame could come later.

"Eager to rule them out, are we?" The man chuckled and let out a sigh. "No, they're very much alive, although they would be if we delay further. How about it?" The droplets of sweat forming on the Nurarihyon's forehead only intensified as he forged and altered various spells to Aito's psyche to put him to sleep, which was battled promptly by Ciel.

The Nurarihyon was confused, he couldn't succeed in putting Kimi's squad in an illusion because of their trained mind along with the wretched formation master deconstructing his spells. That alone had occupied the wizard for the better portion of the fight, but the wizard had been too tired to continue doing that same now. Likely, he was stretching his heart thin by still holding onto the barrier, let alone trying to protect Aito's mind.

'Is he truly resisting my spells with his ability alone? The hybrids really are insane. No wonder the organization wants him so desperately.' The man could've used physical force and Aito would've folded like a paper, but he had his reservations. The same reason Aito wasn't allowed to get any formal education on Qi usage and such.

"Can I say something?" Aito asked, his voice very low, as if he had made a decision.

"Yes." The man perked up his ears.

"Fuck you."

"That's very rude of you, your highness." The man frowned, clearly displeased at the grin covering Aito's face. He reached out his hands to touch Aito, as Aito leaned back to avoid the touch.

But before the Nurarihyon could Grab Aito, he felt something tapping his back. The man's eyes widened; he clearly hadn't sensed anything approaching him. he looked back instinctively, a dagger appearing in his hands.

But for a second, the man felt his body stiffen, as energy from the parchment slapped on his back enveloped his whole body. It only lasted for a second though, as he was able to break free from the restriction within that second.

But that slight delay was enough for a kick to land squarely on his face. Launching him several tens of meters from Aito and Youhara. He used the same trick he used before to stall his momentum, as the atmosphere stretched to halt him.

On the place where the Nurarihyon was before, a rabbit-haired mutant appeared. She looked amazedly at her leg, as she was never this powerful. She could feel the amazing power coursing through her body, although temporarily, she felt like the feeling of helplessness she felt during the raid on the underground colosseum had vanished.

[Stall him as long as you can.]

A voice entered directly into her mind, and without giving it much thought, Rumi kicked the ground and launched directly at the Nurarihyon, who was trying to launch himself forward.1

Behind his flickering mana barrier, Akio smiled. His plan was simple, to stall the Nurarihyon with the mortal. To do that, he had dropped defending his already fallen friend's psyche and showed off the signs of weakness. He didn't even try to defend Aito's psyche, mainly because he knew of Aito's partial immunity to illusions and such.

'He was unaffected by the trade centre's illusion formation; he should be fine.' That was Akio's reasoning. He used the mortal mutant's willingness, to cast a buff type and concealment formation on her, which would temporarily boost her power with a cost. But that cost was little if he could secure Aito. From his perspective. 

Akio had to drain his already empty resources dry to multicast while preparing another spell and conceal all this from the Nurarihyon, but he willingly, without any hesitation, burned through his essence to do so.

All this stunt would give them at most ten seconds and Akio had to use it efficiently. He gave up on trying to cast the spell under concealment and did it openly. Sending out the last bit of his essence without killing himself at Youhara. Making The Nurarihyon notice his efforts.

He cast the same spell he cast on Rumi on Youhara, but since Youhara's level of existence was higher, it nearly cost Akio his life to do so. Akio collapsed onto the dirt, the barrier he cast to protect the mortals disappearing as if a mirage. Only the clearcut green patch of land remaining to prove its existence.

"Motherfucking bastard." Youhara cursed Akio for casting that wretched spell on him, as he felt his body getting rejuvenated with Vigor. His wounds temporarily closing as he stood up with lightning speed. He picked up Aito with one hand and spoke.

"Young master, please keep your hands and legs closed and try not to spread them."

Aito who had a slight grin from seeing the Nurarihyon getting kicked in the face was roughly handled as he was thrown in the air.

With a scream, he was thrown through the open hole in the sky, which was only big enough for his small body to pass through. As soon as he passed the invisible layer separating the atmosphere of the outside world with world prison, the rune on the T-shirt's rear lit up, sending a message to Tao.

The major part of the plan to get Aito to safety was done. And Youhara forcefully dispelled the spell that was keeping him upright, making him fall face-first into the ground.

Needless to say, Rumi was manhandled by the Nurarihyon, and the Nurarihyon was rushing to dispel the world prison and capture Aito. His mind went awry as their plans went out of hand like loose sand.

The major part of their plan was a success and Aito was securely out of the world prison. the only problem being, Aito freefalling from the sky.

Aito screamed as he flailed his arms in the air, forgetting all about the rune on his T-shirt that would protect him from anything fatal.

Fortunately for him, a moderately big man with an orange hoodie and some accessories stood where Aito was about to land.2

...

throw them stones