The headquarters of the Public Safety Devil Hunters smelled of stale cigarettes, cheap floor wax, and the metallic tang of dried blood. It was a sterile, bureaucratic labyrinth designed to grind the soul down long before a devil could get to it. Tala walked through the hallways with a deliberate, rhythmic stride, the heels of her boots clicking against the linoleum like the ticking of a doomsday clock.
She wore the standard black suit, but she had tailored it to cling to her frame, the white shirt unbuttoned just enough to reveal the faint, pulsating veins near her collarbone—marks left by the Immortality Devil. Passing agents stopped and stared. It wasn't just her height or her striking, Filipina features; it was the aura she projected. To the sensitive, she felt like a void in the room, a pocket of anti-matter that threatened to collapse the building.
"Eyes forward, dogs," she muttered, her voice cutting through the hushed whispers of the corridor. A young recruit flinched, dropping a stack of files. Tala didn't even glance back.
She was headed toward the training hall of Special Division 4. Makima had been vague, as usual, about her "introduction" to the team. But Tala knew the subtext. In this world, hierarchy was established through blood and submission. If she was to be the Queen of the Apocalypse, she had to break the existing pack.
As she pushed open the heavy double doors of the training hall, the sound of a chainsaw revving echoed off the high ceilings.
The room was vast, illuminated by flickering fluorescent lights. In the center, a blonde boy with a manic grin was swinging his chainsaw-limbs at a practice dummy made of reinforced steel, shredding it into ribbons. Standing nearby was a tall, stoic man with a top-knot—Aki Hayakawa—and a girl with horns and a mischievous glint in her eyes—Power.
Tala leaned against the doorframe, crossing her arms. She let the Seven Deadly Sins stir within her. Envy was the first to react, eyeing the raw, chaotic power of the Chainsaw Man. Sloth followed, whispering how easy it would be to just end them all now. But it was Gluttony that roared the loudest. She was hungry. Not for food, but for the essence of these "heroes."
"So this is the brat everyone is afraid of?" Tala's voice carried across the hall, sharp and mocking.
Denji stopped mid-swing, the chainsaws receding into his arms with a wet, squelching sound. He wiped blood and oil from his forehead, blinking at the newcomer. "Huh? Who're you? Another one of Makima's sisters? You're way taller than her."
"I'm the one who's going to teach you how to sit, boy," Tala replied, walking toward the center of the mat.
Aki stepped forward, his hand resting on the hilt of his sword. He sensed it immediately—the unnatural weight in the air. "You're the one Makima mentioned. The survivor from the Philippines. I'm Hayakawa. This is Denji and Power. We don't have time for ego here."
"I don't have an ego, Hayakawa," Tala said, stopping inches from him. She was taller than him by a hair, and she used every bit of that height to loom over him. "I have a purpose. And right now, my purpose is to see if any of you are worth the air you're breathing."
Power puffed out her chest, her fingers twitching. "I am the Great Power! I do not take insults from lowly humans! I shall smell your blood and—"
Power stopped. Her nose wrinkled. She took a step back, her yellow eyes widening. "Wait... you... you don't smell like a human. You smell like... the bottom of a grave. Like something that's been rotting for a thousand years but refuses to stay dead."
"Smart girl," Tala smirked. She turned her attention back to Denji, who was staring at her with a mix of confusion and a very transparent, hormonal curiosity.
"Hey, if you're joining the team, does that mean you're gonna live with us?" Denji asked, his eyes wandering. "Because if you are, there's rules about the bathroom—"
Before he could finish, Tala moved. It wasn't a human movement; it was a blur of shadows. She gripped Denji by the throat, hoisting him off the ground with a single hand. The Death Devil inside her marrow hummed. She wasn't using its full power—that would turn Denji into dust—but she was letting him feel the concept of the end.
Denji gasped, his hands clawing at her wrist. His eyes filled with a primal, existential terror. For a moment, he wasn't looking at a woman; he was looking at the heat death of the universe.
"Listen closely, Chainsaw," Tala whispered, her voice a low vibration that seemed to come from the floorboards. "I don't care about your rules. I don't care about your dreams. You are a tool, and I am the hand that will learn how to swing you. If you ever look at me like a piece of meat again, I will strip the immortality from your bones and feed it to the dogs."
She slammed him back down onto the mat. Denji coughed, clutching his throat, his bravado completely shattered.
"That's enough!" Aki shouted, drawing his sword an inch. "We're on the same side."
"Are we?" Tala turned to him, her eyes glowing with a faint, violet hue. "I'm on the side that wins. Right now, you're all just casualties waiting to happen."
The tension was broken by the sound of rhythmic clapping. Makima stood at the entrance of the hall, her expression as serene as a saint's, though the calculated glint in her eyes told a different story.
"Excellent," Makima said. "It seems you've all met. Tala, your first mission begins tonight. There is a report of a demon gathering in the Red Light District of Kabukicho. It's an unusual case—multiple disappearances, but no blood left behind. It's being called the Famine Devil's Spawn."
Tala felt a jolt of electricity go through her. Famine. One of the four horsemen. One of the pillars of the Apocalypse she was destined to embody.
"You're sending me with them?" Tala asked, gesturing to the disheveled trio.
"Precisely," Makima smiled. "I want to see how the Apocalypse plays with its food."
Night fell over Kabukicho like a heavy, velvet shroud. The neon lights flickered in the puddles, casting distorted rainbows over the asphalt. The district was unusually quiet. The barkers and the tourists were gone, replaced by an oppressive, hollow silence.
Tala walked at the front of the group, her senses dialed to the maximum. Beside her, Power was uncharacteristically quiet, sticking close to Aki. Denji followed behind, still rubbing his neck, occasionally glancing at Tala with a look that was now more fear than lust.
"Something's wrong," Aki whispered, his hand on his sword. "The air... it feels empty."
"It's not empty," Tala corrected. "It's hungry."
She could feel it—the Pact of the Seven Sins was vibrating in her chest. Gluttony was recognizing its kin. They turned a corner into a narrow alleyway, and the temperature dropped twenty degrees.
At the end of the alley stood a figure. It looked like a woman, but her limbs were impossibly long and thin, her skin stretched tight over bone. She was hunched over a pile of what looked like discarded clothes. But as they got closer, they realized the clothes weren't empty. They were humans, or what was left of them—shriveled, dehydrated husks, every drop of moisture and nutrients sucked out of them.
The creature turned. Its face was a void—no eyes, no nose, just a massive, vertical mouth filled with needle-like teeth.
"Famine," Tala breathed, a dark thrill running through her. "Or a very hungry piece of it."
The creature shrieked, a sound that bypassed the ears and hit the stomach, inducing an immediate, agonizing cramp of hunger in everyone but Tala. Power fell to her knees, clutching her belly. Denji groaned, his chainsaws flickering but failing to start.
"I... I need to eat..." Denji gasped. "So... hungry..."
Aki tried to pull his needle-sword, but his arm shook with sudden weakness. The demon's aura was a localized field of starvation.
Tala, however, stood perfectly still. She felt the hunger, yes, but to her, it was an old friend. She had starved in the pits of Hell for years. She had eaten the shadows of her own despair.
"Is that all?" Tala stepped forward, her footsteps echoing in the silence. "You think you can starve the end of the world?"
The Famine spawn lunged, its elongated claws reaching for Tala's throat.
Tala didn't dodge. She didn't draw a weapon. She simply reached out and caught the demon's head in both hands.
"Pact of the Seven Sins: Gluttony," she intoned.
The sigils on her arms flared white-hot. Instead of the demon draining Tala, the flow reversed. Tala's mouth didn't move, but a metaphysical maw opened within her soul. She began to drink. She drank the demon's hunger, its essence, its very history.
The creature shrieked in a new kind of terror. It tried to pull away, but it was locked in Tala's iron grip. Its thin body began to wither even further, turning to grey ash.
Tala's head tilted back, her eyes rolling into her head as she absorbed the power. It was intoxicating. It was better than any drug, any touch. She felt the Apocalypse within her grow a fraction more complete.
"More," she whispered into the demon's void-face. "Give me more."
With a final, sickening crunch, the demon disintegrated into a cloud of black soot. The oppressive hunger in the alley vanished instantly. Denji and Power slumped against the walls, gasping as their strength returned.
Tala stood in the center of the ash, her chest heaving. She looked down at her hands, which were trembling with a dark energy. She felt... incredible. She felt like she could tear the sky open.
She turned back to the group. Her expression was no longer one of a hunter; it was the expression of a conqueror who had just tasted her first province.
"You... you ate it," Power whispered, her voice trembling. "You ate a devil."
"I am the Apocalypse, little brat," Tala said, her voice dripping with a terrifying sweetness. "I don't kill devils. I consume them."
She walked toward Power, who was still on the ground. Tala reached down, not to help her up, but to tilt her chin up, forcing the blood devil to look into her violet eyes. The Domination aspect of her sins was peaking.
"You look pale, Power," Tala murmured, her thumb brushing over Power's lip. "You should be careful. I might get hungry again."
Power froze, her breath hitching. The fear was there, but beneath it, a strange, dark fascination began to take root—a spark of the submissive bond Tala was destined to weave.
Aki watched them, his brow furrowed in deep concern. He had seen many things in the Public Safety, but Tala was something else. She wasn't a devil, and she wasn't a human. She was a catastrophe in a suit, and Makima had just invited her into their home.
"Mission accomplished," Tala said, standing up and smoothing her suit. She looked toward the end of the alley, where a black sedan was waiting. Makima was watching from the shadows of the car.
Tala winked at the distant silhouette of the Control Devil.
The game is on, Makima.