Chapter 30: Disciples of Yomi
Hikigaya had once been an elementary school student himself, but years later, when he stood in front of a group of elementary school kids, he instantly realized just how irritating he must have been back then.
Though he was confident he'd go on to irritate even more people in the future.
When a group of energetic elementary schoolers gathered together, it was practically a living zoo. The metaphor might not sound nice, but it wasn't meant with malice—because in terms of sheer noise, it was quite accurate.
The teacher leading the group seemed very accustomed to all this, calmly checking her watch off to the side.
After several minutes, the kids finally realized something was off and quieted down. Then came the customary teacher's speech, followed by the necessary introductions of the "big brothers and sisters."
Though Hikigaya thought introducing their group to these future flowers of the nation was borderline immoral.
Leaving aside the stiff-faced high schoolers and the idiot couple from Ryōzanpaku grinning like fools, introducing a bunch of Yomi disciples—who likely had thoughts only of dismembering people—to these kids was a bit too much.
There were five Yomi disciples in total. Hikigaya recognized two: his senior, the infuriatingly rich and handsome Raden Tidat Jihan, and the jokester little bear Boris Ivanov, a disciple of the Fist of Annihilation. The remaining two men and one woman were strangers to him, though from the manga, he remembered that among the nine fists' disciples, there was indeed one female.
Just like this woman, that one had a stellar figure and beautiful blonde hair.
Even though Shirahama Kenichi was here, Hikigaya felt these people's presence might be related to him. Given the nature of the Demon God Fist, the higher-ups in the Yomi should already know about his god-slaying. Whether anyone believed it, though, was a different matter. Hikigaya suspected that guy's credibility among his peers wasn't high.
But since this was a world where god-slayers existed, the upper echelons of Yomi likely knew about the existence of Heretics Gods. How long it would take them to confirm that Set had descended upon Japan was uncertain.
Hikigaya didn't really care much about the Yomi faction's business, but with these people around, he doubted he could achieve his goal of a relaxing day.
He might as well send them packing soon. After all, Shirahama Kenichi was right here, and sparks could fly at any moment. As far as the feud between Ryōzanpaku and Yomi was concerned, Hikigaya's stance was simply to watch the show, not take part.
This whole debate of killing versus not killing was ridiculous—just a bunch of overgrown middle school edgelords.
The elementary kids were already cheering. The girls in particular were very excited, while the blond pretty boy among the high schoolers stood at the front saying something.
Huh? Is the power of a pretty boy really that strong? Even elementary schoolers are charmed?
What a bunch of precocious little devils.
Hikigaya touched his own face. Speaking of which, his looks weren't too bad. And yet with this face, people still called him a shut-in. It must've been thanks to his extraordinary misanthropy and reclusiveness.
He wondered what it felt like to be a true pretty boy. He hadn't experienced it—just like he hadn't experienced being truly ugly either.
So really, becoming a true ugly person was just as rare an opportunity as becoming a handsome one.
Hikigaya had a bad feeling. Even with this face and a different personality, he still probably couldn't be a proper pretty boy.
He just felt like… something was missing.
"Alright, now the orienteering activity officially begins!"
The leading teacher's clapping snapped Hikigaya out of his thoughts.
The elementary kids were divided into groups of five or six and assigned to the big brothers and sisters.
Well, that's what was supposed to happen. In reality, the elementary schoolers meant for the Yomi disciples were all snatched up by the idiot couple from Ryōzanpaku.
They really went all out. But stealing his too? What the hell?
Despite how he looked, he actually had a lot of experience taking care of kids. And today, he had been raring to relax and enjoy a bit of daily life.
Forget it, he'd forgive the idiot couple. After all, the idiot's future wife had an eye-pleasing figure—swaying and jiggling in a way that pleased him greatly.
On another note, it seemed his own airheaded little sister had been assigned some kids too. Was that really okay? She could barely take care of herself.
Suddenly, his view was blocked by abs.
Looking up, he saw the goofy bear Boris Ivanov.
Despite the cutesy nickname, he looked nothing close to cute—just a full-on manly man.
But before Hikigaya could slap the bear and send him rolling through the mud, Boris spoke.
"Can we talk, Hikigaya Hachiman?"
"Oh?"
Hikigaya glanced around. The other Yomi disciples were all staring at him, unblinking.
Troublesome bunch. Maybe he really should pay the Yomi a visit. But before that, he needed to figure out what kind of Authority he'd actually gained.
It was weird. In the anime, Kusanagi Godou had understood his Authority the moment he killed a god. But it had already been a week since Hikigaya had done it, and he still had no idea.
Or maybe it was because he hadn't had a proper opponent yet, so his Authority was just playing dead?
Come on now, it was his Authority—it shouldn't be lazier than he was!
"Let's go. Somewhere more private first."
Hikigaya walked around Boris and headed into the forest.
After becoming a god-slayer, his body had become terrifying. The longer time passed, the more Hikigaya became aware of it.
It wasn't the kind of terror that came from being impervious to bullets or blades—but from his physical attributes.
His eyesight and ability to read movement allowed him to easily capture almost all of a martial arts expert's techniques, even someone as fast as the Demon God Fist.
His sense of smell had sharpened—not to some silly level where he could smell poop from hundreds of meters away—but enough to clearly detect the various scents around him, track them if necessary, or completely ignore the ones he didn't want to smell.
His physical strength was the most obvious. Just tensing his muscles slightly made him impervious to ordinary blades. Though he wasn't sure whether that was due to his martial arts training or just part of being a god-slayer.
But the most terrifying thing wasn't any of that.
It was that Hikigaya could feel things.
Other people's emotions—their auras—had become so tangible to him that he could identify them with perfect clarity. But even that wasn't the scariest part.
The scariest part was that he could sense the "activity" within other people's bodies—even the energy inside them. Ordinary people had sparse, scattered energy. But the stronger someone was, the more abundant and flowing that energy became.
The Demon God Fist's body held a torrent of energy, like a great river. Hikigaya could feel that he possessed that same energy, but his was far greater. If the Demon God Fist was a river, then Hikigaya was the ocean.
Was this magical power? Or what martial artists called "Qi"? Or were they essentially the same thing, just used differently and named differently?
As he walked deeper into the forest, he didn't need to turn around to know exactly where the Yomi disciples were and how far they were from him.
Their bodies also held far more energy than ordinary people—but compared to the Demon God Fist, they were mere trickles. And compared to Hikigaya, they were insignificant.
It was a strange feeling. Just a week ago, these people had stood above him in both status and strength.
But now, they were nothing more than ants in his eyes.
Hikigaya suddenly stopped, turned around, and smiled at the five of them.
"This is still too close. Let's go farther."
With that, his body shot into the deeper forest like an arrow loosed from a bow.