The world learned the name Chainsaw Man faster than it learned to pronounce it. Governments panicked. Japan had something new, something unstable, something that couldn't be negotiated with. America responded the way it always does when something feels threatening and far away — it outsourced the problem. Two million dollars to whoever brings the heart of the boy to them. That's how I ended up in Tokyo in 1997.
Japan wasn't kinder than home. Just quieter about its opinions. In America, if someone doesn't like you, they tell you. In Japan, they look a second too long and pretend they weren't staring when you notice. The "immortal" brothers were sent with me.
They didn't believe in patience. They believed in spectacle. I stayed on the rooftop while they rushed ahead, confident, rehearsing lines like actors who thought they were about to win awards. Below me, Tokyo moved as if nothing extraordinary ever happened here. Cars passed. A vending machine hummed. Someone laughed too loudly down the street.
Then a scream split the air. Something got hit by a car. Silence followed faster than it should have.
One brother lay twisted near a vending machine. Another lay on the sidewalk. The youngest had run away. I opened a plastic bag and ate convenience store bread while looking down at the bodies. Bob stood beside me. "They weren't ready," I said. Bob nodded. He always agrees.
I changed rooftops until I saw him — Denji.He looked inexperienced. Oblivious to how many governments had decided he was a problem.
I stretched once, rolled my shoulders, and watched the building below fill with movement. Too many dolls blocking the entrance. No clean approach. "Guess we're improvising," I muttered. Bob didn't answer this time. That happens sometimes. I chose the window instead.
Dolls flooded the entrance, bodies piling over each other in mindless waves. The Angel Devil stepped forward, lifting a katana that shimmered faintly in the dim light. One clean swing.
The front line split in half.
Limbs dropped. Torsos folded. The path cleared in a single, efficient motion.
For half a second, there was space.
Then the window exploded inward.
Glass rained across the floor as I stepped through the frame, landing lightly among the shards. Conversations died mid-breath. Two fiends. Several devil hunters. One devil. And Denji.
All of them turned.
I brushed a sliver of glass from my sleeve and took in the room like I'd just arrived at a meeting slightly late.
"Sorry about the window," I said evenly. "The door looked busy."
No one laughed. Angel's katana shifted slightly in his grip.
Steel flashed to my left.
"Left," Judas whispered.
I turned just in time.
Clank
The impact shattered the blade in my hands,
and I was lifted off my feet a bit before landing. I saw — white hair lady. I looked at the broken half of the katana still in my grip.
"I just got that."
Her foot cut through the air where my head had been a second earlier. I leaned back, feeling the pressure split the air in front of my face. That would have knocked my head off. The shock in the room dissolved, and everyone remembered their job. Two hunters lunged toward me at the same time.
Whoosh
I wasn't there anymore.
To them, I vanished. To me, I simply moved. The white-haired woman disappeared as well, heading straight for Denji. The room dissolved into chaos. A tentacle wrapped around her for a few seconds before snapping like thread. Someone crashed into a wall. Another hit the floor. A man entered holding two fiends as if they weighed nothing, speaking to her like they were familiar. I stepped onto a pillar and watched, calculating, measuring distances, exits, weaknesses.
Then I remembered the mission.
"I don't mean to interrupt," I said evenly, my voice cutting through the noise, "but what exactly is stopping me from killing Chainsaw Man right now?"
Silence. For a moment, they had forgotten me again. I turned and looked directly at Denji. He met my eyes, confused more than afraid. He tried to move. Too slow.
I closed the distance and drove him into the wall. Plaster cracked around him. The fiends slipped free in the confusion, bodies colliding, orders shouted too late. The fight restarted, louder than before.
.