The Psyche Diver Trilogy: Demon Hunters

by Baku Yumemakura

  “Make a sound and I’ll snap your neck,” Fuminari whispered into the man’s ear, flexing his muscles against his neck; the man would hear the bones in his chin and neck groan under the stress. “I’m sure you can tell I’m serious,” Fuminari said. The man could hardly struggle as it was, let alone make a noise. He was fighting just to breathe, eyes wide open, almost popping out of their sockets. “Tell me about Kurogosho. Where is he, what’s he doing?” As he whispered, Fuminari released his hold by a fraction.

  The man sucked air into his throat. “P...preparing for the ritual.” He swallowed loudly, continuing to gasp for air.

  Fuminari flexed his arm, preventing him from doing so. “A ritual...” Images resurfaced, seen in the mountains two years ago, men and women engaged in an obscene, mass orgy. And he saw the monster.

  “A ritual...on the 3rd August.”

  Before he could realize, Fuminari had relaxed his grip around the man’s neck. The man screamed at the top of his voice. Fuminari cursed and tensed the muscles of his right arm. The man’s neck snapped with a dry crack. His body flapped three times, like a dying fish, before falling limp. Fuminari cast the body aside and squeezed his huge frame through the window before leaping out to the grounds below. He sensed a bustling, people stirred inside the building. He charged across the grass, heading straight for the enclosing wall. He vaulted clean over it and found himself in the middle of woods. He ducked into the cover of the undergrowth and briefly extended his awareness to scan his surroundings. “He escaped!” He could hear shouting inside the estate. He was about to charge deeper into the woods when something made him freeze. Someone was there, in the darkness just ahead of him.

  “Who’s there?” He flicked on the torch he had grabbed from the man, directing the beam towards the shadows before him. The beam revealed two men. One with messy hair, the other...somehow feminine with stunning features. He was looking at Hosuke Kumon and Biku.

  Twelve

  Heruka’s Mandala

  1

  Senkichi Fuminari leapt to one side having already switched off the torch in the previous instant.

  He crouched low in the grass and made to conceal his presence. His huge frame blended impressively into the darkness. He felt his body tense; he ground his back teeth together. He bit down hard, attempting to control the instinct to fight that had welled up inside him. Senkichi Fuminari was a wild beast that had just escaped its cage.

  The two men he had stumbled upon just moments earlier had scattered to either side, extinguishing all signs of their presence with the same speed he had shown. But as they had done so, Fuminari marked the locations of the sounds they had made. They were just a few meters ahead, one to the left, the other to his right, both using the undergrowth for cover. Their reactions had been impressive. Fuminari was sure they were aware of his own position, just as he was of theirs. Are they the enemy? Fuminari asked the question as he lay in the dark, keeping still.

  It was clear that there was nothing ordinary about them. He had no idea of the location of the residence, but he knew that no regular person would have business skulking around such woods in the dead of night. And then there was the way they responded to him; instantaneous, only possible with a mastery of martial arts. The commotion inside the wall was growing in intensity. This was no time for idling around. “Who’s there?” Fuminari called again, keeping his voice low.

  There was no response. Not that he had expected anyone dim-witted enough to volunteer their name just because he asked. Fuminari reached down with his right hand, gently sliding his knife from the belt around his waist.

  “The din back there about someone having escaped, that’s you?”

  A man’s voice called out suddenly, from the darkness ahead. The tone was perfectly relaxed, as though he had asked the question while smoking a cigarette in a cafe.

  “Yeah,” Fuminari answered, knife in hand.

  “If so, then we have no fight with you. Probably.”

  “I know a guy that was killed for his money by someone who said they were on his side.”

  “Aha.”

  “I killed him.”

  “I see,” the voice returned from the darkness, still completely at ease. It was somehow out of place.

  “Okay so you’re not with the enemy, show me some proof,” Fuminari said.

  “Proof?”

  “You’d have a torch, right? A lighter if not. Turn it on and stand up, point it at yourselves. Together.” There was no chance they would comply. Absolutely none, Fuminari thought. They would have no idea if this stranger might be planning to attack them through the dark. He just wanted to see how they reacted to his request, gauge the response. When the response came, it was the opposite of what he expected.

  “Sure, okay.”

  The response was relaxed to the point of being anticlimactic. Fuminari heard someone chuckle faintly, just as he saw a gigantic black shadow rear heavily upwards. He had revealed himself with utter indifference, lacking any sense of wary. Fuminari was dumbfounded, he had never expected anyone crazy enough to reveal themselves at the request of a potentially hostile opponent.

  “And the other one?” Fuminari asked.

  “Little choice but to play along, I see.”

  He saw a slender figure rise a few meters to the left of the big guy.

  “Your lights?” Fuminari lodged the blade between the thumb and forefinger of his right hand. It was the only knife he had. He intended to make short work of whomever was first to turn on their torch. Then he would make a break for it. He should be able to handle the other if he was alone. There was little time left, the people beyond the wall would be on them soon. He had to hurry.

  He had no real expectation that the men before him would just turn on their lights at his behest. He readied himself to throw the torch; he would use the distraction to run, or to move in and take them out with the knife. In the case of the latter he would direct the knife at one of them and charge the other, slamming him into the ground as the first reacted. The decision would be made the moment they reacted to the torch.

  Faint moonlight trickled over the ground beneath the canopy of trees. The stench of the undergrowth tickled Fuminari’s nose each time he drew in the dark night air. He had been here before...been a shadow in the dark turf, knife in hand.

  Memories of that night came flooding back. The night he had killed Muto and Kawaguchi of the Kokushigun and stolen the hundred million yen they had originally taken from Towa Bank. The night Fuminari and Kumiko had witnessed a group of people performing an outlandish ritual in the Tanzawa mountains, and of his clash with a monstrous beast-like creature. He had lain in wait, set a trap for the creature hunting them; he had made use of shadow, holding a knife in concealment. He had hurled the blade with all his might, but the monster had caught it mid-flight, sent it back at him. Fuminari felt a dull pain throb over his left hand, ghosts of the missing flesh of the fingers the beast had torn off and eaten. His forehead was slick with viscous sweat.

  A light came on in front of the larger shadow, a lighter flame. He saw a man’s face in the dark, his hair was long and in such a mess it was almost funny. In the same moment, Fuminari sent the knife flying in a beeline towards the man, Hosuke Kumon’s, head. The thin metallic flash burnished through the dark leaving a silver comet trail in its wake. The flame vanished with a sharp mineral click. Fuminari was already running, his back to the two men.

  He felt a powerful rush of hostile energy whip into the back of his head like a silk chord--a hissing of leaves from the branches above him. Fuminari pitched forwards, falling instinctively into a roll. He felt a burst of air scythe through the space directly behind his head in a razor whip. The force was enough to make his flesh crawl. Fuminari rolled back to his feet in a single, fluid motion. A shadow landed on the grass before him, readying to attack. It was the second man to have stood up, the slender one. Fuminari launched his right leg, thick as a log, sideways towards the man charging at him. The dark form ducked into
the grass, coalescing into the darkness. Fuminari roared as his leg buzzed through thin air, overshooting the man. The attack could have torn a hole in the darkness itself. A direct hit would pulverize bone.

  “You seem hellbent on being unfriendly,” the slender form spoke from the undergrowth. It was Biku.

  “That’s a schoolboy error, turning on the light like that.”

  “We did tell you we’re not with them.”

  “Fuck that! If that last attack had got me in the head I’d be a fucking corpse right now.”

  “I could say the same of yours.”

  “Huh.” Fuminari straightened up and spat on the ground.

  “You’re very suspicious,” Biku said, maintaining his crouch.

  “I trust only the dead, they don’t lie. It’s a policy I have, never make an agreement with the living.” Fuminari curved his thick lips into a daring smile.

  As he did Hosuke Kumon appeared, walking over the grass towards them. “Wow, you’re a veritable giant!” He cooed with admiration, twirling something in his right hand as he came to stand next to the still-crouching form of Biku. The man’s guard was completely down, if Fuminari were to attack him like that, he would not stand a chance. Fuminari saw that the object in his hand was the knife he had thrown. Its tip was buried in the man’s lighter. Hosuke flicked the lighter on. There was a faint pop as the orange flame flickered into existence. It was still working, despite being impaled by a knife.

  Hosuke’s oddball features were thrown into relief by the flame, they were not handsome. He had a pug nose and his lips were thick-set. If anything, he fell on the side of ugly. But that did not mean he lacked charm. He was unwieldy, but Fuminari could tell there was something about the way he looked that drew people in. And the pug nose suited him perfectly. It was like a form of magnetism, something hardwired from birth. He was shrouded in a mysterious aura, something akin to warmth. At first he resembled a physical laborer, the type that hung around construction site canteens. He was dressed in a pair of dirt-encrusted jeans and a cotton shirt. His muscles were big, like he was built from solid rubble. He was watching Fuminari with eyes that somehow resembled the night-air itself, even as they reflected the lighter’s flame. Biku appeared to his side, his form gaining clarity nearer the dim light produced by the flame.

  “Are you a fucking woman?” Fuminari blurted. But he knew Biku was a man the moment the words left his mouth. Biku’s crimson lips parted in a slight, but evocative grin. The expression contained traces of innocence, like that of a young girl on the cusp of realizing her womanhood. His hair fell over his forehead in gentle waves. It was hardly surprising that Fuminari had momentarily confused him for a woman.

  “If I was, would you have considered raping me?” Biku spoke with a surprisingly powerful, male voice. He was completely covered in tight-fitting black cloth. His frame was slight in comparison to Hosuke’s, but there was no sense of frailty to it. Fuminari knew that tough sinews of spring-like muscle were coiled within his outwardly feminine frame. Otherwise, it would have been impossible for him to have attacked Fuminari as he just had. Biku slid one foot gracefully forward, the motion perfectly fluid.

  Fuminari felt a powerful, blast-heated energy stir inside him. He made no attempt to conceal the force as it broadcast from his frame. His size was extraordinary. He was two meters tall, weighing in at over 145 kilograms. He was in black trousers and a moss-green t-shirt. If Hosuke had been cut from smooth, natural stone, Fuminari was a roughly-hacked at boulder. His muscles gave the impression that someone had stuffed his t-shirt with oversized rubble. His shoulders were as wide as his chest was deep. The cloth of the t-shirt covering his upper arms looked tight enough to rip if he flexed even slightly. Above the muscular swell of his shoulders was a thick neck, above that, a rock-hard jaw. Like Hosuke, his lips were thick, but his frame was overall more balanced. He could put on a charming smile, attracting more than just a few women. But he lacked what Hosuke had in warmth. His face was a mask of lethal darkness. Never make an agreement with the living. His face was proof enough that he meant it.

  “When you came running, I thought it was that monster again,” Hosuke said, keeping his eyes on Fuminari’s enormous profile. Fuminari was a good couple of times his size.

  “Monster?” Fuminari’s face looked suddenly demonic. In his mind, he had just seen the gigantic, half-human abomination that tore off his fingers.

  “Yeah. They call it Hanko apparently,” Hosuke added lightly, as though reminiscing on an old friend. As he did, there was a sudden sense of people bearing down on them through the dark.

  “Shit,” Fuminari cursed. They’re coming. He would be lost if he had to face them from his current position. Especially if Enoh was among them.

  “So, what’s your move?” Hosuke smiled, apparently enjoying himself. He seemed to think nothing more of their predicament than he would a game of tag. The men from the compound had scattered to either side after crossing the threshold of the woods. They heard footsteps, two people closing in on them with incredible speed. “There he is!” One must have seen the light from Hosuke’s lighter.

  “A truce, then.”

  With the words, Hosuke flipped the lighter off. Fuminari’s last glimpse of Hosuke as his face melted into the darkness was of the man grinning. Fuminari kicked off the ground in the same moment, accelerating directly towards the incoming men. His huge frame moved with animal velocity. His right fist flew out, followed by his left leg. A sound of impacting flesh and crunching bone echoed through the night. Neither of the men had made a sound, only that of their bodies crumpling heavily to the grass. Fuminari had used the blade of his hand to effortlessly crush the neck of the first while launching a kick into the jaw of the other, sending the man flying backwards through the air as his lower teeth pierced his mouth. Fuminari was moving before they hit the floor. “We run, now!” he hissed. Biku and Hosuke were already in motion, speeding like wind through the dark.

  2

  The Koshu Road.

  A single passenger car made its way down Route 20, heading for Shinjuku. The car’s headlights tore sharp lines through the night. There were hardly any cars passing from the opposite direction. Dawn was less than two hours away as they quickly approached the moment when it would be closer to morning than it was to night. Biku was behind the wheel. Biku was behind the wheel, Hosuke was in the passenger seat next to him, while Fuminari was in the rear, glaring forwards with a heavy scowl.

  “Miwa Ishibashi?” he said. His arms were folded together, cramped despite having the back of the car to himself. He had just discovered that the building he had been held in was Miwa Ishibashi’s Hachioji residence.

  “That’s right,” the answer came from the driver, Biku.

  “And who the hell is she?”

  “We would be happy to tell you, but not until we know more about who you are. You may not be our enemy, Fuminari, but that doesn’t mean you’re our friend either.”

  “Huh,” Fuminari huffed, grimacing slightly. “So what’s the relationship between Miwa Ishibashi and Akio Ishibashi?” he asked.

  “Ah, you’ve come across him.”

  “Sure, Toyama Shutaro’s secretary.”

  “You sound well informed.”

  “Something tells me you guys are digging into Panshigaru too, huh?”

  “Bingo! That’s it exactly. So you already know about them.”

  “Some stuff, sure,” Fuminari muttered before falling quiet. They drove in silence for a while until Biku eventually opened his mouth to speak.

  “We’d like to know what you were doing escaping her residence. Would you feel receptive to a little exchange of information? We can tell you what we know, and in exchange you let us in on what you’ve discovered.”

  “That doesn’t sound too bad, although it puts me at a disadvantage.”

  “How so?”

  “Look I’m in your car being taken God knows where. I wouldn’t call it a particularly conducive environment for having talk
s on equal footing.”

  “If this worries you, we’d be happy to stop the car and let you out.”

  “We’re not quite there yet, I’m happy to go along with what you say. But let’s have you go first, since it’s your suggestion. And don’t worry, I know I won’t be getting the full story. Just tell me what you can. Then I’ll tell you what I know.” Fuminari had just finished his sentence when he heard snoring, coming from the passenger seat. Hosuke Kumon had fallen asleep. The man was snoring heavily, without any apparent reservation. “You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me,” Fuminari muttered.

  “I’ve known him about a month now, this is pretty much how he rolls.”

  “You said his name was Hosuke Kumon?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who is he?”

  “He’s a Psyche Diver.”

  “Huh!”

  “You’ve heard of them, perhaps?”

  “Yeah. They dive into other peoples’ heads, search for stuff; huh, so this guy’s actually one of them.”

  “Yes, and an unlicensed one at that,” Biku said, his voice gave the impression he was enjoying himself.

  3

  Three men stood before the entrance of Biku’s apartment, Biku, Hosuke Kumon, and Senkichi Fuminari.

  During the ride over, Biku and Fuminari had finished their first round of exchanging information.

  Apart from the details regarding the theft of Kukai from Mt. Koya, Biku had provided Fuminari with an almost perfectly accurate rendering of what he knew. He had simply referred to the stolen property as being a ‘cultural artifact of national standing’. Fuminari, for his part, had given Biku the facts as he knew them, keeping almost nothing back. The only matter he concealed was that of his stealing money from the Kokushigun.

  There was a level of overlap in the information they shared, but each side had been able to harvest new data. It was from Biku that Fuminari learned that Miwa Ishibashi had written about Panshigaru in her book entitled ‘The Hidden Sangha of India,’ and that it was in her residence that he had been held prisoner. He had been surprised to hear that Mt. Koya was involved in all of this, but the greatest discovery was when he learnt that Hanko, the half-human monster that had eaten his fingers, was an abomination created by Enoh’s own hand; that Enoh was a beast master, or jushi.