The city was empty.
Shattered storefronts lined the streets, glass crunching underfoot as Team advanced through the city. Neon signs flickered erratically, their colors bleeding across puddles of rainwater filled with Blood.
Akira tightened his grip on his urumi's hilt.
The city was too quiet.
Ren cracked his neck, eyes gleaming. "Man… I don't like this kind of silence."
Kaito muttered, scanning the area with his scanner. "Stay sharp."
Ren led the charge at the front, fists ready, while the Misoke twins brought up the rear, moving like silent anchors behind the group. Ayla moved lightly behind Ren, daggers reversed in her grip.
Then
Clap. Clap. Clap.
The sound echoed from nowhere and everywhere.
A figure appeared atop a traffic light pole, balanced effortlessly on one foot.
The clown.
Its body bent like a marionette with broken strings. Its skin was unnaturally pale, almost translucent, Its costume was a patchwork of faded reds, purples, and sickly yellows, hanging loosely as if stitched from discarded nightmares. Its shoes were too large, curling at the toes.
Its smile… oh, that smile.
Painted wide, slit far past its cheeks, teeth jagged, gleaming wetly. Lips cracked, trembled unnaturally as if each breath could tear the skin further. Its eyes were mismatched—one a spinning spiral and the other cold, fixed directly on Akira as though reading every thought in his skull.
"Ohhh~!" the clown sang, voice high and playful.
"Visitors~! How delightful!"
Ren snorted. "That's it? I expected scarier."
The clown tilted its head.
Then vanished.
Akira's instincts screamed.
The air collapsed.
BOOM!!
A massive fist slammed down from nowhere, pulverizing the street where they had stood moments ago. The shockwave hurled them backward like rag dolls.
Another fist followed.
Then another.
From everywhere.
"Incoming—!" Ayla shouted, barely rolling aside as a gloved hand cratered the asphalt inches from her head.
Ren leapt forward, swinging his fists instinctively
only to be swatted midair and hurled through a storefront, his body smashing through steel shutters before skidding across concrete.
"Ren!" Akira shouted.
More fists rained down.
They struck with no warning—walls, ground, rooftops—each blow precise, brutal, laughing echoing through the city like a soundtrack to slaughter.
"HAHAHAHA~!"
The clown's voice drifted from nowhere.
"Missed~! Missed~! Too slow~!"
"We can do anything until we find the clown. " akira murmured. "DAMM IT."
Kaito slid behind an overturned vehicle, rapidly scanning.
"ME energy is concentrated at the east sect," he said sharply. "The clowns position should be there."
Akira clenched his jaw. "Then we move."
They ran.
Through shattered streets. Past abandoned cars. Toward the far end of the district.
The fists followed.
Each strike hit with enough force to shatter bone.
Ren took the brunt—blocking, redirecting, absorbing impacts that cratered the road beneath them. Even he staggered under the relentless assault.
Ayla was clipped mid-dodge and sent rolling, blood streaking from her shoulder.
Akira lashed his urumi to deflect a descending fist.
Pain. Pressure.
They reached the location.
Kaito checked his scanner again.
"…This is the spot," he said. "ME concentration is highest here."
An empty intersection.
No clown.
Silence.
Then.
BOOM!!
The ground exploded.
Large amount of fists erupted from nowhere, slamming Ren straight into a storefront. Glass detonated outward like shrapnel.
"REN—!!"
Before anyone could react.
BOOM!! BOOM!! BOOM!!
Akira barely raised his urumi before a blow smashed into his ribs, hurling him across the street. He rolled hard, breath ripped from his lungs.
Ayla was struck mid-step, sent crashing through a traffic sign, blood splattering the pavement.
The Misoke twins crossed their arms to block
and were driven to their knees, concrete collapsing beneath them.
The clown's voice rang out, cheerful and distorted.
"Wrong place~!"
"Wrong guess~!"
"Hahaha~!"
Another fist descended.
Kaito tried to dodge—
Too slow.
The blow crushed him into the ground, cracking the asphalt like glass. His scanner skidded across the street, sparking violently.
Pain flooded his body.
They couldn't see the clown.
They couldn't track it.
They couldn't fight it.
They were being toyed with.
Ren staggered upright, blood running down his forehead.
"Where—" he coughed, "—where the hell are you?!"
Laughter echoed from every direction.
"So eager~!"
"So helpless~!"
Akira forced himself to his knees, vision shaking.
This wasn't a fight.
It was an execution.
High above—
Akirawa watched from the rooftop, eyes sharp, unreadable.
"…Messy," he muttered.
Another fist slammed the Misoke twins backward, burying them in rubble.
Akirawa tilted his head slightly.
"Should I intervene…?"
He watched Ren fall again.
Watched Akira struggle to stand.
Watched Kaito bleed silently, staring at the ruined street.
"…Nah."
Below, the clown laughed louder.