Chapter 287: The First Demon Yuuta Ever Saw

Location: Yuno City

Place: Yuuta’s Apartment

He had finally seen Erza again after spending hours searching for her. He had spent the entire night regretting what he had said, begging an empty sky for her to come home, and now that she had finally appeared, he couldn’t simply sit here and wait for her to disappear again.

"I can’t stay here."

Yuuta tightened one arm around Elena while looking toward the direction Erza had gone.

"I have to find Erza."

He murmured the words beneath his breath before lowering his eyes toward the little girl in his arms.

Elena was still holding onto him tightly. Her small arms remained wrapped around his chest, and her fingers had gathered a fistful of his shirt as though she was afraid even the slightest distance between them would make him disappear. The terrifying roar had stopped, but her body hadn’t stopped trembling.

Yuuta gently rubbed the back of her head.

He couldn’t leave her here alone.

"Elena."

She slowly lifted her face from his chest. Tears remained around her eyes, and when she answered him, her voice was still trembling.

"Papa...?"

"Can you hold Papa like this for a little while?"

Elena looked confused.

"Why, Papa?"

"Papa’s going outside."

Yuuta expected her to ask where they were going or why they had to leave, but Elena didn’t argue. She only stared at him for a moment before giving a small nod and tightening both arms around him again.

"Okay..."

Yuuta kissed the top of her head.

"Hold on tight."

He didn’t waste another second.

Yuuta carried Elena through the damaged living room toward the entrance. Broken glass remained scattered across the floor, furniture had shifted from the force of the roar and the apartment was still without electricity. Even the front door had been damaged, its frame partially cracked by whatever pressure had passed through the building.

Yuuta stared at it for a moment.

Whatever had made that sound wasn’t normal.

Something powerful enough to shake an entire city had happened outside, and every instinct should have told him that leaving the apartment right now was a terrible idea.

But Erza was out there.

He had already lost the chance to stop her once.

He wasn’t going to sit here and lose her again.

Yuuta forced the damaged door open and stepped into the hallway with Elena still pressed tightly against his chest. The building was dark except for emergency lighting, and frightened voices could be heard coming from behind several apartment doors. Somewhere farther down the corridor, a child was crying while adults argued about whether they should leave or remain inside.

Yuuta headed for the stairs.

He began descending quickly, keeping one arm firmly beneath Elena while using the other whenever he needed to steady himself against the railing. His thoughts remained fixed on the brief glimpse he had caught through the destroyed balcony windows.

Erza’s silver-white hair.

Those enormous wings.

The direction she had flown.

Erza.

He descended another floor.

Please don’t disappear again.

By the time Yuuta reached the ground floor and stepped outside, the condition of Yuno City became impossible to ignore.

The road was covered in shattered glass.

Fragments from countless windows glittered beneath the emergency lights while damaged cars sat abandoned along the street. Pieces of signs and building materials had fallen onto the pavement, and people stood outside apartment buildings staring around in confusion despite the repeated emergency announcements telling everyone to remain indoors.

Sirens echoed from several directions.

Yuuta started running.

He didn’t know exactly where Erza was anymore. He only knew the direction she had flown, and for the moment, that was enough.

Elena bounced slightly against his chest with every step. Her arms remained wrapped around him while one trembling hand continued gripping his shirt.

"Papa..."

Yuuta didn’t hear her.

He ran around a damaged vehicle and continued down the street.

"Papa..."

Elena pressed herself closer against him.

Something felt wrong.

The city around her was dark and frightening. Strange sounds were coming from far away, people were shouting and Papa was running somewhere without telling her where they were going. Her entire body was still trembling from the roar, but the person she trusted most wasn’t slowing down.

Yuuta barely noticed.

His breathing grew heavier as he continued running through the damaged streets, carefully avoiding the larger pieces of glass and debris while searching the sky ahead.

His mind had narrowed around a single thought.

He needed to find Erza.

He needed to reach her before she disappeared again.

And with Elena clinging tightly to his chest,

Yuuta continued running deeper into the city.

He didn’t know how long he had been running. His breathing had grown heavier, Elena was still clinging tightly to his chest and the distant sirens had become louder with every street he crossed. He kept following the direction Erza had flown, refusing to slow down until he finally reached one of the city’s normally crowded districts.

That was when his steps gradually stopped.

For a moment, it felt as though the entire world had stopped with him.

Yuuta knew this place.

He had walked through these streets countless times before. During the day, the roads were usually packed with cars, stores remained crowded and pedestrians constantly moved between restaurants, offices and shopping centers. Even at night, there were always enough people around to make the district feel alive.

Now it looked like the set of an apocalypse movie.

Cars had crashed into one another throughout the road. One vehicle had been thrown onto its side while another sat crushed against a traffic barrier, its windshield completely shattered. Fires burned in the middle of the street, smoke rose between the buildings and broken glass covered almost every section of pavement Yuuta could see.

"What... happened here?"

Yuuta slowly looked around.

Then he noticed the people.

There were dozens of them lying across the road.

Some were beside abandoned cars. Others had collapsed near stores or along the sidewalks, while several more were scattered throughout the street as though everyone had suddenly fallen where they stood.

Yuuta’s heart tightened.

He immediately rushed toward the nearest person.

"Hey!"

A woman was lying near the sidewalk. Yuuta hurried toward her while keeping Elena firmly against his chest, then crouched several steps away.

"Ma’am? Are you okay?"

The woman moved.

Yuuta immediately felt a small amount of relief.

"Ma’am?"

She slowly pushed herself upward.

"I... I’m okay."

Her voice was weak and confused. Her hair had fallen across her face, preventing Yuuta from properly seeing her expression.

Yuuta adjusted Elena against himself.

"Are you hurt anywhere?"

The woman slowly raised her head toward his voice.

"But..."

Yuuta’s expression changed.

Her entire body began trembling.

"I can’t see anything."

Yuuta’s eyes widened.

The woman’s face was finally visible.

There were no eyes looking back at him.

Blood ran down her cheeks from the empty wounds where her eyes should have been, and Yuuta instinctively tightened his hold around Elena before turning the little girl’s face completely against his chest.

"Papa...?"

"Don’t look, Elena."

Yuuta’s voice came out quieter than he intended.

The woman raised trembling hands toward her face.

"I can’t see..."

Her fingers touched around her eyes.

"I can’t see anything."

Yuuta couldn’t move.

"Something happened to me..."

Her breathing suddenly became frantic.

"I CAN’T SEE!"

She screamed.

"AHHHHHHH! I CAN’T SEE ANYTHING!"

Her scream echoed through the ruined street.

Then another voice answered.

"Where... where are my eyes?"

Yuuta slowly turned his head.

Someone else was moving.

A man who had been lying beside an abandoned car pushed himself upright, frantically touching his face.

"My eyes..."

Another person began moving near a storefront.

Then another.

And another.

"What happened to me?!"

"I CAN’T SEE!"

"HELP ME!"

"WHERE ARE MY EYES?!"

The street erupted.

People Yuuta had thought were unconscious began waking one after another. A shopkeeper stumbled out of his ruined store with both hands pressed against his face. A man crawled blindly across the pavement while screaming for someone to help him. Several others remained on the ground, crying and calling out to anyone who might hear them.

Everywhere Yuuta looked, it was the same.

Their eyes were gone.

Yuuta pulled Elena completely against his chest and covered the back of her head with one hand, making sure her face remained buried against him.

"Papa... what’s happening?"

Yuuta couldn’t answer her.

The ruined street around him filled with screams as more victims awakened and discovered what had been done to them. Some called desperately for family members they could no longer find, while others simply screamed that they couldn’t see.

Yuuta stood in the middle of them with Elena held tightly against him.

He didn’t understand what was happening.

Every person he could see was the same.

Their eyes were gone.

Then laughter drifted down from somewhere above.

"Hehehehe..."

Yuuta’s body stiffened.

The laughter didn’t belong to any of the victims. It sounded amused, almost playful, and completely out of place among the terrified screams filling the street.

Yuuta slowly followed the sound.

His eyes moved upward.

Several figures were sitting along the edge of a building overlooking the street.

They wore long black robes that covered most of their bodies, but their faces were clearly visible beneath the night sky. Their appearances were hideous and unnatural, with distorted features that immediately separated them from ordinary humans. Most disturbing of all were their eyes, which glowed with an unnatural violet light as they stared down at the suffering people below.

One of them was smiling.

"This was enjoyable, don’t you think?"

Another demon immediately nodded.

"Very enjoyable."

They laughed together.

Yuuta stared at them.

The first demon leaned forward slightly, resting his arms against his knees as though he were simply watching entertainment below.

"I especially like this poison."

"Me too."

The second demon grinned.

"First they don’t feel anything."

He pointed casually toward the screaming civilians.

"So we remove their eyes while they’re unconscious."

The demon beside him began chuckling.

"And then we wait."

"For the poison to disappear."

"Exactly!"

Both of them burst into laughter.

"HAHAHAHAHAHA!"

The second demon wiped beneath one violet eye as though the conversation itself had become too funny.

"And when the poison finally wears off..."

He looked down at the street.

"All the pain comes back at once."

Another scream rose from below.

"I CAN’T SEE! SOMEBODY HELP ME!"

The demon looked down at the screaming woman.

"There it is."

His smile widened.

"That’s my favorite part."

The demons laughed even harder.

Yuuta felt something cold move through his body.

His arm instinctively tightened around Elena.

They did this?

He looked from the figures above to the people suffering throughout the street.

Why?

There was no reason in their voices. No anger toward these people, no revenge and no hesitation over what they had done.

They had blinded an entire street of ordinary people because they enjoyed watching what happened afterward.

Yuuta’s breathing became shallow.

Who are they?

He had never seen creatures like them before, but something about their appearance brought back conversations he had previously dismissed because they had seemed so distant from his own life.

Erza had mentioned them.

Fiona had spoken about them.

Demons.

Yuuta’s eyes widened.

These are demons?

Until tonight, the word had only been something other people told him about. Yuuta had never actually stood before one, never heard one speak and certainly never witnessed what they were capable of doing to humans.

This was his first time seeing them.

And they were far more horrifying than he had ever imagined.

Yuuta remained frozen for several seconds, staring toward the demons sitting above the ruined street. They hadn’t shown even the slightest concern for the suffering beneath them. If anything, every scream seemed to entertain them more, and they continued laughing among themselves while watching the blinded civilians stumble around below.

Then one of them looked toward Yuuta.

Their eyes met.

Yuuta’s entire body immediately tensed.

Those violet eyes were unlike anything he had ever seen. There was something deeply unnatural about them, something that made every instinct inside him scream that standing there any longer was dangerous.

Yuuta didn’t wait to understand why.

He turned and ran.

Elena was still pressed tightly against his chest, and Yuuta immediately placed one hand over the back of her head as he rushed away from the street. He didn’t know whether those demons had even decided to attack him, but after seeing what they had done to everyone around him, he wasn’t going to take that chance.

Especially not with Elena in his arms.

They won’t spare us.

That thought alone was enough.

Yuuta ran as quickly as he could.

Back on the rooftop, however, the demon who had noticed him wasn’t laughing anymore.

The amusement disappeared from his face almost instantly.

His violet eyes remained fixed on the human rapidly disappearing down the street, and for several seconds, he simply stared as though he couldn’t believe what he had just seen.

Then his expression changed completely.

"Poison Warden!"

The urgency in his voice immediately caught the attention of the others.

A figure sitting farther back slowly turned toward him.

Among the group, the Poison Warden looked the closest to being human, but only from a distance. His body was covered beneath the same dark robes, while his exposed face looked unnaturally thin, almost as though the flesh had shrunk tightly around his skull. A sickly purple discoloration spread across his skin, giving him the appearance of someone whose own body had been poisoned for years.

"What happened?"

The demon pointed toward the street.

"There’s a human running away from us."

The Poison Warden stared at him.

"So?"

Another demon glanced toward Yuuta’s retreating figure and started laughing.

"He’s running like a rabbit."

A few of the others chuckled.

The Poison Warden looked toward Yuuta as well. By now, Yuuta had already put considerable distance between himself and the building, his back facing them as he ran with Elena held against his chest.

The Poison Warden’s expression remained uninterested.

"He’s just a human."

He looked away.

"He’ll die anyway."

"No."

The first demon’s voice stopped him.

The Poison Warden slowly turned back.

The demon wasn’t laughing.

His expression was completely serious now.

"That human’s eyes..."

The other demons gradually became quiet.

The Poison Warden narrowed his violet eyes.

"What about them?"

The demon swallowed.

"They were blood red."

The Poison Warden froze.

Every demon on the rooftop turned toward him at once.

"What?!"

To Be Continued...