The Psyche Diver Trilogy: Demon Hunters (53 page)

The gate imploded to reveal Hanko standing there, covered in blood. The beast was carrying a severed leg, torn and ragged but still recognizable as being that of one of the men from the outer perimeter. The man with Renobo had his back to the gate—he spun around. His expression froze as he took in the sight before him. Hanko was on top of him, poised to strike with a downwards blow having already hurled the leg into the dark sky. The man lunged to the side, grunting in an attempt to get clear of the attack. Like Tsushima, the man’s training would have made such a move possible under normal circumstances. But Renobo had him in her grasp. She pushed him forwards, in Hanko’s direction—timing it so that she pushed in the exact moment he tried to jump clear.

Hanko’s fist came slamming down, connecting hard with the roof of the man’s skull. Bone crunched and ruptured as the hammer bore into the man’s head, punching out his eyeballs with explosive force. Gray matter shot out of the two pits, pulped and sloppy like bloody excrement. Renobo spun around, screaming as she made a run for the building’s entrance. Hanko sped after her.

“That is enough!”

Enoh came down between them. The building was already full of light.

This is my chance…

Biku recognized his opportunity. One of the apparitions materialized before his eyes. They were suddenly everywhere—covering the grass and the night air around him.

5

Katsuragi’s expression kept changing as he stood transfixed by the changing tomography of the brainwaves projected over the screens before him.

The images were of Kurogosho’s brain activity, transposed across a spectrum of color and mass. There had been a sudden burst of red around Kurogosho’s frontal lobe, then the color had spread until it covered the entire projection. After this came glittering specks of blue that also began to multiply, originating from the interbrain. Where the two colors came together the picture threw up subtle gradations of blue, green, yellow and orange—the size and intensity of each color fluctuating through nonsensical patterns.

“What the hell?” Katsuragi said, his eyes lit up behind his glasses.

He had never seen anything like it. He checked Hosuke’s readings—there were no significant changes. The energy in the room had begun to crackle as the air filled with tiny percussive blasts. Something like human hair flashed into existence over the ceiling. It fell, hitting the ground with an audible thud. The haunts were taking physical form, a testament to the intensity of the energy collecting in the room.

The physical strands of hair wobbled in the air, kept from moving by their own weight. They began to dissolve, only to be replaced by more strands that spliced into two or three more. Another clump of hair materialized on Katsuragi’s shoulder. He yelped and hurled it to the floor. It had a monkey face inside it. The face expelled a rush of air, then brandished its teeth. Panicking, Katsuragi stamped on it. After he kicked it a few times the hair scattered and the face disappeared. He was about to scream when he noticed something moving inside his mouth. He retched and spat it out, it was shaped like a lizard. He saw that the room was full of similar disgusting apparitions, crawling over everything. Everyone else in the room was already on their feet. He was with his assistant, the monk Geshin and three of Kurogosho’s bodyguards—including Tsushima.

“Katsuragi!” Tsushima, the man whose arm Fuminari had broken, called out. “What the fuck is going on?”

“I…I’m not sure.”

Katsuragi turned back to the monitors. The colors were unreadable. Something enormous was attempting to enter the room, reaching through some kind of boundary. The air in the room was buckling under the pressure. Kurogosho was still there, lying on the converter bed. Suddenly, his eyes flew open. They were blood red.

“Master Kurogosho!” Katsuragi called, his voice muted.

All eyes fell on the prone figure. Geshin’s face began to twitch. Kurogosho’s red eyes were expanding—they swelled up to twice their original size, reaching out like something living. They tore through his eyelids. Then the flesh around his cheeks began to distort, blistering into bean-sized warts. His face grew even redder as the swelling continued, blood rushed into the gaps underneath the tumescent growths, pulling his skin taut.

The swelling was no longer confined to his face. Under his gown, his entire body had begun to grow. It was as though his frame was being stuffed with energy that was beyond the ability of the human frame to contain. His body was giving in to the force. His face had become a purple balloon, skin stretched so tight his wrinkles had all but gone.

It was extraordinary to watch. No one was breathing.

Kurogosho’s mouth opened to reveal an inside that was bright red. He let out a torturous roar—it was impossible to tell whether it was from suffering or pleasure. As he screamed, teeth cut through his mouth, pushing through his skin in haphazard directions, some cutting straight through the skin of his cheeks. Needle-thin fountains of blood erupted from his face, each spurting twenty or so centimeters into the air before raining back down on him.

Kurogosho’s hands shot up. As though he had an unbearable itch, his fingers stretched up and began to paw at his face with overly-long nails. They tore through his flesh until his face was solid red. His head thrashed from side to side, bellowing the whole time. Groups of the newly materialized haunts swarmed over his body.

He sat upright, pulling half of the attached electrodes from his head as he glared around the room with hellish eyes. He reached down and pulled his loose gown open. Then he got to his feet and tore the garment from him—as though it was unbearably hot. He was wearing nothing underneath. Suddenly naked, his whole body was visible—distended and purple like his face. His cock was hard and swollen. It towered between his legs, pointing upwards so that it hit his stomach. Kurogosho’s head lurched back as he roared again, causing the walls to shudder with the vibration. The voice no longer contained any trace of suffering. The sound was of extreme pleasure, of intoxication. Whatever was before them now, it was no longer Kurogosho. There was nothing human about it. The powerful forces raging inside him had transformed the very cells of his body.

Something odd was forming over the flesh of his right cheek. A black object, burrowing upwards like an insect crawling from under his skin. It was a horn. His forehead split next, making a loud snap. Another horn curved through the flesh there, secreted with blood and skin. Each of the protrusions was around twenty centimeters long, sticking out at a grotesque angle from his forehead and cheek respectively.

“M…Ma…Master Kurogosho!” Katsuragi stuttered, backing up against the wall.

Kurogosho’s red eyes flashed in his direction, hitting him like a steel pole. Kurogosho’s mouth flared open. The sound that emerged was a demonic cry, anything but human. Katsuragi was shaking his head from side to side. The demon charged straight at him. Its right hand hammered into Katsuragi’s face—bone crunched as the back of the his skull smashed into the wall. He slumped downwards, his back leaving a vertical line of blood against the wall, a thick brushstroke. His head had been obliterated, nose smashed through with the frame of his glasses lost among the gore. Glass stuck out from the skin above his distended eyes. He crumpled to the ground and went through a couple of convulsions, knees dancing upwards. Then he was still.

Katsuragi’s assistant screamed and made a run for the door. The movement caught the demon’s attention. It dived in, violently attacking the man from behind. The man pitched forwards as his back broke, his upper-body snapping backwards to face up from a point halfway down the spine. The demonic creature kept moving, riding the man’s right-angled body into the door with a force that, with a bone-splintering crunch, folded him in two. The back of the assistant’s head came down to rest behind his knees. The demon fell into a squat and sank its fangs into the man’s neck. There was a wet sound as it tore away a huge chunk of flesh.

Hosuke came around just as the demon began its feast.

6

Hosuke sat up on the converter’s bed.

He frowned when he saw the state of the room.

“What the hell?”

The demon noticed him. Its head came up, smeared with blood, still chewing on the assistant’s flesh. It broke into a run, charging directly at Hosuke.

“Oh for fuck’s sake!”

Hosuke rolled from the bed. Something black soared past where he had been, smacking into the wall behind. It was the assistant’s head. The three men still in the room seized on the distraction to make for the door. The movement wrenched the demon’s attention away from Hosuke, it swung around to face them.

“Hah!” Tsushima’s arm came around, attempting to stall the monster. Bone snapped, forming a right angle between his wrist and elbow. The remaining two men kept moving, managing to get the door open. They tumbled through to see a man standing there, shockingly beautiful and with a cool grace like a young, innocent girl.

It was Biku.

One of the men he had caught unawares took a sudden blow to the back of his head, splitting it open. Blood sprayed over Biku’s pale features as the last man scampered by, shoving him into the shadows of the door. The demon pursued, bellowing loudly. From the door, Biku peered into the room beyond. He saw Tsushima, groaning on the floor. He took a careful step into the room.

“Uhh…”

Hosuke crawled out from under one of the beds, like a bear coming out of hibernation. His eyes stopped on Biku. “You!” he called out.

“Long time no see,” Biku answered.

“You finally showed, huh?”

Biku smiled a little awkwardly. Hosuke looked completely drained.

“What was that?” he asked.

“That was Kurogosho,” Hosuke muttered. “Err… it
used
to be Kurogosho.” Hosuke’s eyes were distant, he let out a shallow breath. “And whatever used to be Kukai.” He looked suddenly exhausted.

“Kukai?”

“Yeah, Kukai.” Hosuke scratched his head and turned to the shriveled form of Kukai’s
sokushinbutsu
, still connected to the Psyche Converter. “That thing’s an empty husk, now.”

“An empty husk?”

“Like I said, Kukai possessed Kurogosho. Although it might be the other way around, Kurogosho that’s possessed Kukai. Either way, the man’s lost his fucking marbles,” Hosuke scratched his head, agitated. “Anyway, what brings you here?”

“I snuck into the grounds, then there was a bit of a commotion—so I just strolled in.”

“A commotion?”

“
Another
commotion, I should say.”

Just then a gunshot rang out from somewhere deep inside the building.

“That one?”

“Perhaps. It appears that Hanko is on a rampage.”

“Hanko?”

“Yes, determined to kill Renobo. Enoh’s trying to intervene…it’s quite a show.”

“Renobo—she’s Miwa Ishibashi, right?”

“Exactly. It turns out she reverts to being an old woman if she doesn’t fuck for three days. I believe she’s out there on the prowl right now. Stark naked—she tore off her own clothes. She’s throwing herself at any man she sees, but no one seems to be taking her up on the offer. They all know Hanko’s following from behind.”

Biku smiled beneath the blood staining his face.

7

A woman raced through the huge building in a naked frenzy.

“Where are all the
men
!?” Her screaming was almost musical. “I need someone inside me!” She kept running, her gaunt arms and legs trembling. The place was littered with corpses. Bloody clumps of hair clung to the walls. Men—killed by Hanko, Biku and the demonic Kurogosho. “
Men…
”

She turned a corner and found one—Kurogosho, transformed into a demon. The demon’s head was buried inside a man sprawled across the corridor, feeding on his entrails. The sound echoed across the dimness, fangs tearing flesh from bone, the demon’s tongue lapping blood.

“At last I find one,” Renobo said, her voice a whisper.

The demon rose, it turned to face her. It cried out. Horns protruded from its head in grotesque angles, over a dozen of them. Kurogosho, or Wanioh Ishibashi. And Renobo, or Miwa Ishibashi. Brother and sister faced each other, stark naked. Kurogosho’s bulging, bluish frame had already doubled in size. His cock bulged between his legs, over twice its original length. Renobo’s eyes were full of lust, fixated on it.

“Mmmm,” she moaned, her voice liquid. She was instantly hot, wet between her legs.

The two of them charged down the corridor, demon and lusty demoness, roaring in unison. She took its enormous appendage in her hands as the demon sunk its fangs into her shoulder, tearing away a huge chunk of flesh.

“
Heeeeeeee!
”

Renobo let out a blood-chilling scream. Yet she continued to hold onto the demon’s frame, tugging its cock towards her open legs. She began to ride it. The demon continued to tear at its sister’s flesh—even as the sound of it reached her ears, she began to moan.

“Yes…yes! Oh yes! Oh..!” Mixed in with the cries of ecstasy came shouts of pain—
it hurts, it hurts, it hurts!

The demon’s jaw clamped down over her other shoulder. Meat came off in chunks, spraying red flesh and revealing white bone underneath. The demon took her disheveled hair in both hands and
pulled
. The hair came loose, skin with it. Renobo’s hips continued to pump regardless, mounting a crazed frenzy even as screams of pain and pleasure tore from her throat. The demon’s purple head jerked from side to side as pale-blue columns of flame burst from its face. The scene was something from a Hell Scroll. A reproduction, even, of the scroll that depicted Heruka mating with Varahi—perfect in every detail. They were lust incarnate, entwined together as the physical embodiment of all the base desire that lurks inside the human form.

Something was approaching them, an immense power creeping in from around the corner.