The boy-beast clung to the trees, limbs clicking, mandibles gnashing as threads of silk hissed into the air. He spun them frantically, a web glistening in the night haze, its strands thick as ropes. The forest quivered with each impact as he lurched forward, stabbing bark with spear-like legs.
Ranmaru met him head-on. His own limbs—blackened, barbed—raked the air as he carved through the webs. Each swing tore fibers apart, but the sticky threads clung, slowing his movements, dragging at his arms.
The Jorōgumo lunged. Mandibles snapped at his face, silk gushing to blind him.
Ranmaru twisted and slammed his palm into the beast's thorax. Qi thundered through his veins. The impact cracked trees behind the boy, splintering trunks like paper. But instead of falling, the yokai shrieked, twisting upside down, all eight legs gouging into wood as he scuttled in a blur—then sprang like a loosed arrow.
They collided mid-air.
Ranmaru's claws sank into chitin; the boy's fangs tore into his shoulder. Flesh burned, veins swelling with venom. His vision shuddered, his body boiling hotter. The boy thrashed, legs stabbing, silk binding Ranmaru's limbs with frantic precision. For every strand he broke, three more coiled around him.
Ranmaru spat blood, his grin manic. "Struggle harder!"
The yokai screeched, eyes glinting with savage hate. Its abdomen convulsed, spewing a mass of threads to cocoon Ranmaru whole.
But the hunter's Qi roared. Flames of yang devoured yin. The cocoon smoked, then ignited, bursting apart in a flare of white-hot heat. Ranmaru burst free, his body steaming, blackened joints gleaming with unnatural sheen.
His barbed arm lashed out—snapping one of the spider's legs like a twig. The boy shrieked, flailing, striking Ranmaru across the jaw so hard the ground cracked beneath his feet. For a moment, they were evenly matched, two monsters thrashing in primal frenzy.
Then Ranmaru leaned in, his strength doubling, then doubling again. His barbed limbs clamped down, pinning the yokai against a shattered trunk. Mandibles clicked inches from his throat, venom dripping, yet the boy couldn't move.
Ranmaru's claws dug into the carapace, cracking it like pottery. His teeth were bared, eyes wide, chest heaving as he loomed over the thrashing beast.
"Yield…" he hissed, his voice guttural, almost inhuman. "Or I'll tear that soul of yours from your shell."
The Jorōgumo writhed, shrieked, snapped at him—but its strength waned. Ranmaru's grip only tightened. With one brutal wrench, he could have split it in two.
Yet he stopped.
His body trembled with the urge to finish it, to feel its life shatter beneath his claws. But he forced himself still, panting, his gaze locked on the boy's many eyes.
The yokai hissed weakly, mandibles dripping, eyes burning with hate and terror. Its body released yin—or rather, Ranmaru's yang was drawing it in. His eyes narrowed as he looked at his own fingers.
They weren't just blackened. They had hardened—barbed, grown into a thick armor of exoskeleton around them. The transformation accelerated as his body devoured more and more of the spider-yokai's essence.
This… His grin widened. His grip crushed its windpipe. "It's actually working," he murmured, feeling more yokai essence flow into the furnace of his body. Along with it came the Jorōgumo's power. The creature began shrinking, shifting slowly back to a human form as it gargled for air.
While the opposite happened to him. His body ached, his back ripping open as long, bloody spider legs protruded. His eyes sharpened as he felt the life drain from the little yokai's body.
He was evolving—mind, body, and soul.
Ranmaru's claws tightened around the boy's throat, his grip like iron. The yokai's limbs twitched weakly, scraping bark, its mandibles opening and closing in silent panic as the last of its strength bled away.
"Pitiful," Ranmaru muttered, his voice low, guttural. "You thought to hunt, yet you never learned what it means to survive."
The boy's eyes rolled, his body spasming as the last of his resistance flickered. Ranmaru could have crushed his windpipe, could have ended the struggle with one flex of his claws. The urge to finish it thrummed in his bones, delicious and intoxicating.
But he held still.
The Jorōgumo's human face flickered through its monstrous mask—eyes wide, wet with terror. Then his body sagged, mandibles slack, breath rasping until he collapsed into unconsciousness.
Ranmaru let him fall. The boy hit the roots with a dull thud, reverting further toward a human frame, pale and trembling, threads of silk still clinging to his mouth.
Ranmaru straightened, his breath ragged. His gaze drifted to his own hands. The claws that gleamed in the moonlight were not his—no longer flesh, but jagged black chitin, barbed like the talons of some abyssal beast. His chest rose and fell, steam curling from his lips.
Slowly, he lifted one hand, flexing it. The exoskeleton creaked and split with terrifying precision, the claws extending and retracting as though born for killing. He slammed his palm into the trunk beside him. Wood shattered in an instant, the tree groaning before toppling in a thunderous crash.
His grin widened.
So this was the power of the Yin Devouring Yang Beast Technique when merged with yokai essence. Not merely borrowed strength, but evolution.
Yet even as the thrill surged, he felt it—a roiling mass of yin energy coiled inside him. The boy's essence, still unclaimed, still unsettled. It pressed against his meridians, begging to be absorbed completely. One path whispered of devouring it whole, weaving it into his Qi, strengthening him beyond human limits. Another path murmured of restraint, of holding it dormant within, to be burned when he wished—reactivating this monstrous form at will.
Ranmaru exhaled, forcing stillness into his body.
"Enough," he muttered, the words sharp, commanding.
With deliberate focus, he willed the technique dormant. The exoskeleton hissed and receded, his spider-limbs cracking, folding inward until they sank into torn flesh. His skin stitched itself raggedly as the monstrous silhouette shrank, leaving behind the form of a man—barely.
He stood above the fallen boy, chest heaving, body steaming. Yet the yin he had swallowed still swirled inside him, heavy and dark. He could feel it resting there, a second heart pulsing within his core, waiting for his call.
Ranmaru flexed his fingers, now human once more, though faint traces of black lingered beneath the skin. His gaze dropped...
Lowering to the unconscious yokai-child with unsaid thought.