what if I'm an undead! then so what?-Chapter 66: Hinata vs Vermilion

The Shinjuku alley reeked of damp concrete and stale city air, its walls streaked with grime under flickering neon signs that buzzed faintly. Hinata stood, her short pink hair catching the dim glow, her vibrant pink eyes scanning the figure ahead. The girl’s long, radiant pink hair shimmered, her presence stirring a faint memory—Eve, perhaps, or someone else from Masaru’s tales.

Despite the Witch Queen’s curse throbbing in her temples, Hinata summoned a gentle smile, her voice soft but curious, echoing Masaru’s knack for breaking tension. "Are you maybe Vermilion?" she asked, stepping forward, her boots scraping the wet gravel.The girl flinched, her stance tightening briefly before a predatory smirk curled her lips, her pink eyes glinting with cold intent.

"That’s an odd question to ask someone who’s about to take your life!" she snapped, her hands igniting with flames that blazed an unnatural blue. Hinata halted, her breath catching. The flames gave off no heat, yet her witch’s instincts screamed danger, sensing a power that warped the air, crumbling nearby debris to dust as if years passed in seconds. Her skin prickled, the alley’s mana hum amplifying her unease.

"Why so hostile?" Hinata said, her tone steady, masking the ache of her banishment. "Just answer, and I’d like to know who you are." Mana flared behind her, weaving glowing circles that birthed over a hundred ice shards, their edges sharp as glass, humming with destructive intent. The vibrations rattled the alley, a warning of the chaos she could unleash, her defiance unbroken.The girl’s smirk widened, unfazed. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

"Normally, I wouldn’t introduce myself," she said, her voice dripping with mockery, "but dead men tell no tales, so why not? You can call me AEGIS Reaper Number Three, Vermilion." Her flames surged, their eerie light casting shadows across the alley’s filth, her confidence a blade honed by countless hunts.Hinata’s eyes narrowed, recognition sparking through her fatigue.

"I see," she said, her voice low, carrying the weight of her exile. "You’re the AEGIS member who’s been cleaning up supernaturals in Tokyo since last week." Her words were laced with defiance, a challenge to the organization that branded her kind as threats.Vermilion licked her lips, her gaze predatory, like a hunter savoring the chase.

"Seems I’ve built quite a reputation," she purred, her tone thick with anticipation. "Now, why don’t you show me what you’ve got?" Hinata’s smile sharpened, her resolve flaring. "I thought AEGIS prioritized keeping humans ignorant of supernaturals," she taunted. "Fighting me here’s a spectacle. Or do you underestimate me?" Her ice shards pulsed violently, their hum deafening, the air crackling with imminent destruction.

"No way," Vermilion replied, her voice cold and precise. "I can tell you’re strong—a powerful witch. My first real witch fight, so I’m not underestimating you. I came prepared." She drew a metallic orb from her pocket, tossing it skyward. At twenty feet, it froze, casting a black light that cloaked half of Shinjuku in a shimmering veil.

"This veil," Vermilion said, her smirk returning, "transports humans outside and hypnotizes them to ignore damage. Now, I can go all out." Her flames roared, their heat spiking past 100,000°C, melting Hinata’s ice shards into mist. The ground bubbled, the air shimmering, but Hinata stood firm, her Mana Shield glowing, deflecting the inferno’s wrath."Your little ice shards got scared and ran from my flames," Vermilion taunted, shaping a blazing fireball in her palm.

"Aoi Akuma!" she shouted, launching it at Hinata, its hypersonic speed ripping through the air, a harbinger of annihilation.The Aoi Akuma fireball roared toward Hinata, its blue flames crackling with an eerie, timeless hunger, aging a Shinjuku block at 20 years per second. Skyscrapers crumbled to dust as if millennia had passed, the blast gouging a kilometer-wide crater, neon signs shattering, the veil trembling. Hinata stood defiant, her pink eyes glinting, but Vermilion’s instincts flared. "Chikaku Kozo!" she roared, slamming her palm to the ground. A 40-meter bubble froze time, air stilled like a frozen canvas, locking the world in silence, Hinata was frozen in place like a Statue.

Vermilion lunged, shouting "Eishoken!" Her Aether-charged palm strike surged hypersonically, aimed at Hinata’s chest, but it passed through her body, light distorting like a fractured mirror. The afterimage flickered, revealing Hinata had vanished, her teleportation leaving a decoy in the frozen moment.Hinata materialized atop a collapsing high-rise, her pink hair whipping in the wind, eyes blazing with defiance.

"You’ll need to aim better, Vermilion!" she taunted, mana crackling like a living tempest, her voice slicing through the chaos. Vermilion’s feral grin widened, her sub-relativistic reflexes snapping to Hinata’s position. "Koro no Hana!" she called, radiant blossoms blooming around Hinata, each petal detonating with atomic force, their shockwaves slowing her in shimmering stasis bubbles.

The blasts melted Shinjuku’s streets into molten rivers, storefronts vaporizing, but Hinata’s form flickered, light distorting as she reappeared behind Vermilion, however her teleportation seemed to had be slowed down by Vermilion’s prcios attack as it took a whole second more to both disappear and reappear giving Vermilion enough time to react.

"Surprised?" Vermilion taunted as she reacted to Hinata’s teleportation easily while landing a powerful punch reinforced with Aether to Hinata’s guy sending her flying backward crashing through multiple buildings.

’what just happened? Was my movement speed slowed by those explosions?’Hinata thought to herself as she got back to her feet. Just then three illusory phantoms of Vermilion flickering into existence, each of them dashing towards Hinata at high speed but nothing to fast that she couldn’t react to, with a powerful kick aimee at one of the phantoms it was sent flying crashing though a building, however Hinata remained still after attacking one if the phantoms.

"Something’s wrong, u felt my punch collide, I saw it crash into the wall, but something’s off!"Hinata said to herself as she stared at the unscathed building which would have been destroyed NY the impact of the collision.

However with not time to wait she dodged the attacks of the remaining two before conjuring spears if ice attacking the two relentlessly, however the more her attack connected the more her doubts increased.

"Illusion perhaps? Her tricks make her a difficult foe!" Hinata mubmled as she stared at vermilion who had a wicked smile on her face. "Confused are you? I’ll make it simple for you, they all illusions that affect the mind, for the last five seconds you’ve been attacking nothing, it was too funny to not laugh!" Vermilion said with a burst of laughter, however immediately after she roared"Hakyudan!" An Aether pulse detonated, its shockwave flattening Shinjuku’s skyline, towers collapsing in a thunderous roar that shook Tokyo.

Hinata simply enveloped her self I’m Mana shield while creating a unique had gesture, she placed her two hands together however with enough space in the middle that she could see Vermillion, just as her figure was withing sight through her hands a doppelgänger emerged, a half-strength Vermilion, its aura a menacing echo, startling Vermilion. "Aoi Akuma!" the doppelgänger roared, weaker flames erupting, aging Vermilion’s barriers at 20 years per second, crumbling them to ash.

"What’s that?!" Vermilion snapped, unaware why her defenses decayed so fast. She countered with "Tensho Sometsu!" A vortex of Aether swirled overhead, unleashing a beam that erased matter, slicing Shinjuku’s horizon like a divine blade, its light blinding.

The beam carved a canyon, threatening to cleave Japan, but Hinata’s Tidal Wave met it—a mana-fueled tsunami, waves cresting a hundred meters, clashing in a steam explosion that shrouded Tokyo in scalding mist.Hinata flickered again, light distorting as she flanked Vermilion, her Flame Surge roaring, a country-level wildfire engulfing the battlefield, its heat rivaling a star’s core.

"Is that a clone of myself, why is it so weak?" Vermillion teases as she saw the Blue flames burning around the Doppelganger arms, it was an exact replical of herself however wekaer. "You’re right it’s weak but the main point is that it has all of your abilities also I now know all of your abilities, to think you’re a Yaminmoshas, that’s what explain your strange abilities!" Hinata said causing vermilion to flinch for a bit. While the doppelganger of Vermillion disappeared.

"To think you found out my secret, in other words you should know I was holding back a great deal, why don’t you just turn yourself in!" Vermilion said perhaps nit wanting to reveal too much of herself. "I’d also love the end the fight since I already have a pretty solid idea on who you are."Hinata said easing herself a bit as the tension in the air seemed to be dying.

"Oh! Is that so? Why don’t you tell me about my self, I’d like to know!" Vermilion self with her hands folded behind her back, she herself was curious about what the witch had to say about her, after all what she had said when they first met was still stuck in her mind.

"So, let’s see! how do I begin?"