Chapter Eleven: Send In The Oni

Rather than going straight home after school, Ren took his bike through the city center. He stopped by a store for some groceries. With the bags hanging off his bike’s handlebars, he went through the alleyways of Tenshigurobu, glancing this way and that.

He didn’t spy any signs of the town decaying or history unraveling or whatever. It was questionable whether he would notice anything, though the castellan said that mahourangers were immune to being completely erased by any fraying leylines.

A boarded-up 7/11 loomed to Ren’s left. Was that an example of Tenshigurobu’s status in history decaying? Or had it been that way all along? On closer inspection, the front door had a message from the Ministry of Health and Labour. Well, maybe it was just a health snafu then.

Ren rode his bike back towards his home. The plan was to meet in the Temporal Fortress every other day for general training with a focus on squad tactics. It was a schedule much more lenient than any other club at school. Still, working his schedule around this new ‘club activity’ proved daunting. All he ever wanted to do was head straight home.

There wasn’t a lot of traffic in these back alleys around town. Ren passed by another boarded-up residential building, then another. The Japanese housing market was seldom particularly strong for previously-occupied single-family homes, but Ren was getting awfully close to his own home and he swore he’d passed through this neighborhood earlier in the week to find it thriving. He picked up the pace, pedaling faster, until…

A great, muscular hand painted a bloody red thrust out from behind the next blind turn. It was too close to brake, and the alley was too narrow to dodge. A second arm ran right through the front wheel of Ren’s bike. The ride came to an abrupt stop with Ren flying clear over the hanldbars.

+++

Groceries flew every which way. Ren curled into a ball on instinct, rolling on the pavement and coming to a stop, dashed against the wall. It was a maneuver he never would have thought to do mere weeks ago; his ranger empowerment was coming with a new slate of combat-related instincts.

A bright-red beast emerged from a garage. Twin horns sat on its head, though the rightmost one was cracked. Muscles were bulked up stronger than any bodybuilder and thicker than any sumo wrestler. Many of the living-liquid minions came sputtering out of every crevice to back this creature up.

“You’ve gotten upon the Kagehime Varjokuningatar’s radar,” said the big, burly beast.

“The who and what?” Ren managed.

The Kermes Ranger scrambled to his feet and adopted a defensive position. Despite no formal martial arts training, his body was beginning to act on instinct.

“The Kagehime’s goanna rule all the worlds!” said the giant troll. “The queen of all entropy. All shall bow at her feet, before their pathetic world lines blink from existence! Witness the results of her work and despair, mortal. Even you rangers are destined to be her prisoners, so you’d best get used to the idea!”

Ren ignored this screed. “What are you?” he asked.

His new foe was a good three meters tall. It was almost embarrassing that such a towering creature was able to get a drop on him.

“Prepare to get beaten down by the Red Oni!” the troll-like being announced. He pointed at Ren with a long, clawed finger. “Get him!”

A swarm of minions undulated around, limbs flailing, as they advanced.

Ren balled his hands into fists. He struck out, targeting the collars on these liquid beasts with punches, roundhouse kicks, and open-palm strikes. Cannon fodder melted away under his flurry of blows.

“Hi-ya!” Ren said, punching another minion. “Honestly, once you learn their weakness, these things aren’t tough at all.”

He kicked another into oblivion. Really, even without his ranger-augmented strength he could take on these things by the dozen so long as their necks were exposed.

“Why would you design elite soldiers with a glaring weak point, anyway?” Ren asked the big red Oni.

The Oni roared. “What’s wrong with you pack of lily-livered louts? Do we have to recalibrate the minion spawning pits!?”

The liquid minion-things fell away, cowed by Ren’s show of force. His transformation pendant was still around his neck. When the battle died down a bit, he grabbed it.

“I’m under attack!” he said.

That mental connection to the castellan established itself just like a two-way radio.

“Please stay calm. Please stay calm! The other mahourangers are already on their way.”

So long as someone knows I’m here, Ren thought. He pulled the pendant off his neck, then smirked at his gargantuan foe.

“Heh. You’re the reason this neighborhood’s going fallow, aren’t you?” Ren asked.

The Oni only gave an arrogant harrumph.

Decay in this neighborhood appeared to have occurred far faster than anything at the shrine. This oni was far larger than the nimble tengu. Still, it seemed a stretch to assume that only this one yokiai-like beast could cause so much leyline damage just by existing for, what, a few hours? A day or two at most?

“Stop deleting my hometown’s suburbs!” Ren told the oni. “I have to ride my bike through here on grocery runs. It’ll be weird living in a neighborhood with no neighbors!”

The oni took a step forward, smashing a carton of juice. He smiled a fanged, toothy grin.

“I’m just an ordinary high schooler trying to get by,” Ren said. “Stop ruining my grocery runs. Didn’t anyone tell you not to waste food?”

The oni ground his clawed red foot into the pavement, squishing the juice further. He just has the personality of a big high school bully! Ren though.

“Transform, ranger,” snarled the oni. “And let’s see what you can do.”

“So, come and have a go?” Ren asked.

The oni lunged, far more swiftly than his overlarge frame and musculature would have indicated. Ren’s enhanced reflexes were the only thing that allowed him to dodge! The front façade of an abandoned home disintegrated against the oni’s fist.

I can’t get hit by this guy, Ren thought. One punch would obliterate him. The other rangers wouldn’t find anything left. Ren held the transformation pendant aloft, then took a deep breath.

“Hen—” he began.

Only, something wrapped around him. Another pair of arms, these a more slender blue.

Of course. Oni’s often come in pairs. Ren scarcely had time to process this fact or look down before he was duplexed clear through the front door of a dilapidated house.