Human World, Japan, Kyoto, Youkai Sub-Dimension.
Even though she falls to her masochistic tendencies quite often and openly in front of James, Sarutobi Ayame is a highly skilled kunoichi who has been in her fair share of life-or-death situations. For that reason, as James cleaned up the cannon fodder members of the enemy forces Ayame lost her sloppy smile and rushed toward the ultimate-rank youkai among their enemies.
From a distance, Ayame threw a handful of shuriken at her foe. Unfortunately, his body coated in youki was too sturdy for the shuriken to do any considerable damage. Seeing that, she knew she was no match in a head-on battle. Using the fact that most oni are quick to anger, she threw another barrage of shuriken. This time targeting the oni's eyes. Just as she expected, the oni was enraged by this frail satori woman who was attacking like a coward from a distance. Once he lost his rationality and rushed in her direction, Ayame quickly relocated to a place with more obstacles.
"Damn it! Stand still you little bitch!" The oni roared before he realized the satori was fleeing.
'I need to find somewhere with a more advantageous terrain.' Ayame thought to herself as she switched the weighted end of her kusarigama for a second sickle blade.
"Running? Haha! Good, I like a good hunt! Haha!" The oni who had lost his rationality perceived the tactical retreat as if his foe were running away in fear.
After running for around half a minute, Ayame found herself in what she assumed was the training ground for the guards of this pocket dimension. Looking around the area, she found a flattened clearing with many striking posts surrounding it in concentric circles. Immediately, she developed a plan on how she would dispose of her foe.
Shortly after Ayame entered the training ground, the oni chasing her also entered. However, he was unable to spot Ayame. Even though he could feel her presence, like James in the past, he was unable to pinpoint her location. As he stepped into the middle of the clearing, a pair of kunai were launched at his left ear. Raising an arm to defend, the oni turned his head to the left and met eyes with the silver-haired, bespectacled woman he was chasing. Further enraged by her cowardly sneak attack, the oni charged at her.
'That's right. Step into my trap you big oaf.' Ayame thought to herself as she measured the distance between her and her opponent.
"Where are you going, bitch?" The oni roared as he chased behind Ayame. "Just wait till I get my hands on you!"
Once the oni was close enough, He thrust his arm forward. Although Ayame was surprised by the sharpness of the attack, she was not caught off guard. For a being to make it to ultimate-rank, they could not be unskilled in combat. Intentionally dodging with exaggerated movements, Ayame made a show of struggling to evade. Eventually, when the oni was in position, Ayame threw one end of her kusarigama at the oni's chest, which was easily deflected and stuck into one of the striking posts.
After that, for the next ninety seconds or so, Ayame, with the other end of her kusarigama still in hand, dodged the oni's attacks. Even though it was not as easy as she expected and she had a few cuts in her clothing and a scratch on her left arm, she was more or less uninjured. However, as everything had gone according to plan, Ayame let her demonic energy flow through her weapon which caused the chain looped loosely around the oni to contract. And with minute manipulation of the chain, Ayame managed to wrap it around the oni's arms and legs before she embedded the end she was holding into another striking post when the chain was fully taut.
"What the hell is this?" The oni shouted in anger and confusion. "What did you do, bitch?"
After that, with the oni immobilized, Ayame walked behind him calmly. Pulling a senbon from her belt, she pressed it into a pressure point that would render the oni unconscious. Once that was done, Ayame turned around casually and returned to the others.
At the same time as the others rushed toward their foes, Reya walked calmly toward hers. Though the calm was only skin deep. Inside, she was frightened. Outside of sparring, this would be the first time she fought an opponent that was as strong as she was. Also, it was the first time she had faced someone who wanted to kill her as bad as the oni in front of her wanted to.
As Reya reached the range where her magic would be most effective, she noticed several small fireballs fly toward her. In panic, she put up a barrier. However, as she was not ready to cast yet, her barrier's strength was not evenly distributed. The result of this mistake was that she received several painful burns on her arms and legs.
"I'm gonna die..." Reya whispered to herself as she felt the burning pain on her limbs. "No, I don't wanna do this. I gotta get out of here."
As Reya was breaking down mentally, she heard a loud shout in her mind. The voice belonged to Serafall. The words were something Serafall often told her during training.
'If you're scared and want to run away, just remember what will happen if I find out.' Serafall's warning echoed in her mind. 'My pupil will not be worse than Grayfia-Chan's.'
Then, the memory of Serafall freezing a large lake in an instant flashed past her mind. At that moment, the fear of the opponent in front of her was surpassed by the fear she had for Serafall.
"There's no way I'll run away and be flash frozen for it!" Reya screamed while sending her demonic power into the ground.
Once her demonic power had entered the ground, Reya did everything she could to patch up the weak points in her barrier. After tanking the oni's youjutsu, which is the youkai equivalent of magic, Reya's demonic power had finally reached her opponent. Once it did, Reya condensed it and changed it into freezing energy. Then, she let it explode upward. In an instant, the oni was frozen in a block of ice, a surprised expression frozen on his face.
"When Lady Serafall finds out how I did, she's gonna put me through even worse hell." Reya said as she sobbed about her fate.
On the other side of the battlefield, Akeno wasted no time in starting her attack. Mixing her fallen angel abilities with her demonic magic, she created lightning from her thunder magic and fallen angel light. Using a strategy similar to what she used against her clansmen the day she met James and Rias; Akeno wrapped her arms in lightning while using elegant footwork to dodge most of the oni's youjutsu.
"Fufufu." Akeno giggled with a sadistic glint in her eyes. "Is that the best you can do, little oni? I was hoping you would be able to make this fun for me."
Akeno's words and constant evasion infuriated the oni she was facing. And with that, the frequency of his attacks increased. As they did, Akeno was unable to dodge them all perfectly. Because of that, she was hit by some of the splash damage from the attacks when they exploded in her vicinity. As this happened, instead of only dodging, Akeno began to destroy the attacks she could not avoid safely with bolts of lightning fired from her fingertips.
"You've been a naughty little oni." Akeno said as the glint in her eyes intensified. "I think you need to be punished."
"What the hell are you talking about, bi... Ahh!"
At that moment, a bolt of lightning fell from above the oni. With the impact, he screamed at the top of his lungs. After falling to the ground, still conscious, he spasmed due to the lightning strike.
"Oh, I'm terribly sorry to interrupt." Akeno said as she covered her smile with the back of a hand. "Would you mind repeating yourself?"
"Damn it! I will ki... Gah!"
Once again, Akeno called down a bolt of lightning as the oni began to speak. As a matter of fact, Akeno had been waiting for the oni to speak ever since the battle had begun. There something she enjoyed about hearing the enemy's taunts and threats turned into painful screams that excited her.
'Mmm`! I'm going to have to find a way to get James alone tonight.' Akeno thought as she felt her panties getting wet with her juices.
After that, for the next few minutes Akeno dropped lightning bolts on the oni she was facing. Using just enough power to bring pain and not death. Eventually, Akeno remembered the competition to have a wish granted and she immediately stopped toying with her prey.
"Damn it! I lost control." Akeno said with a pout. "And since I got hurt, I have to hope that everyone else had harder fights than I did."
With that, she looked back and saw that there were only three people who were not at James side already.
"Damn it."
Sona, the last of the girls to fight, had little trouble with her foe. Once the battle started, she conjured a large amount of water. With it, she created several dragons and sent them to rip and tear at the especially large oni facing off with her. Standing at 12'5" (3.5 m) tall, he was a sight to behold. However, just as you would expect from a body as massive as his was, he was quite slow. Of course, this meant that most of Sona's attacks landed on the oni with no problem, however he was so big that she could not do much damage.
"Well, I guess I can only hope I'm the only one who ends up uninjured." Sona thought as she adjusted her glasses. "Let's just put him to sleep."
After that, Sona conjured a ball of water that was big enough to wrap around the oni's head. And with that, the waiting game began. The oni, with its head submerged in water, tried everything it could to free itself. Unfortunately, as soon as he would splatter most of the water, Sona would simply conjure more. After around eight minutes of continuous struggle, the oni finally lost consciousness.
*Boom!*
With a loud sound and an impact that shook the ground, Sona adjusted her glasses once again and strode back to the group while letting the ball of water around the massive oni's head to splash harmlessly to the ground.
"I guess I was last." Sona said. While looking over the other girls' conditions. "Flora is the only one uninjured too, huh? I guess all that training in hand-to-hand combat with James paid off."
With that, the girls finished their fights. Although a few were a little banged up, with Tsubaki's injuries being the worst, they were all victorious. A fact that James and Kunou were happy to see. Once all the girls were gathered again, James spoke.
"Congratulations, you've all improved a lot." James said with a smile. Then he turned his attention to Ayame and spoke again. "I couldn't see your fight, Ayame, but I could feel how you and the oni moved. Fill me in on the details later if you don't mind."
"Of course, Alaverus-Sama." Ayame said while bowing her head respectfully.
"*Sigh* How many times have I asked you to drop the Sama, Ayame." James said with exasperation.
"As your retainer, I'm afraid I can't accede to that request."
"Of course, you can't." James said with a shake of his head. "Then, instead of using my surname how about calling me James. I'm not the only Alaverus, after all."
"Understood." Ayame agreed happily. "From this point forward, I will refer to you as James-Sama."
"Is it just me, or does it feel like I just walked into that." James asked with a wry smile.
"It's not just you." Flora said with a smile. "It feels like she just led you by the nose."
"Ugh. To think I was manipulated by a pervert." James said, disappointed in himself.
At that moment, Ayame shivered and blushed lightly. James could only smile wryly at her reaction. After a moment, James took a deep breath. Then, he turned his attention to the karasu tengu standing on guard next to Kunou. After that, he stepped forward between Kunou and the karasu tengu with his hand extended for a handshake.
"Well, now that that's over, thanks for letting us know what we walked into." James said with a smile. Once the karasu tengu reached his hand out and shook James' hand, he continued. "So, would you mind introducing yourself, Mr. Traitor? Or would you prefer, Boss of the Rebel Oni?"