Yu Yu Hakusho:Kōrudokēsu

Chapter 1 A Band of Demons

10:52 AM

The Young Spirit Detective watches from afar as the citizens of the Human World go about their business, completely oblivious to the constant, lurking danger which may befall them at any moment.
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A small grin forms on the sides of Romano Hideshi's mouth. He anxiously awaited the arrival of his assistant, excited for another day working at his "Dream Job".
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"Come on Botan... Where are you?" He thought to himself out loud, twitching in anticipation. Hideshi checked his watch again, 10:53 AM. "You said five till eleven Botan, so I'll hold you to that!"
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The good-natured Spirit Detective smiled as he gazed over the commuters in the streets from his high vantage point atop his apartment building.
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A few moments later, a familiar figure appeared in the bright, day-time sky. The figure was, as usual, riding her oar and headed towards Hideshi and an alarmingly fast rate. Even still, Botan wasn't quite moving fast enough for Hideshi.
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"What took you so long Botan?" the young, dark-haired boy slyly remarked to the staggeringly beautiful woman riding her magical flying oar while wearing her light pink robes.
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"I'll have you know Romano, that King Yama is very busy right now! More and more demons keeping piling into the Human World now that King Enki is planning to seal the passageway between Earth and Demon World by next week."
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"And that just means more excitement for me!" Hideshi jubilantly replied.
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Botan sighed slightly as she retrieved the list of names King Yama had presented her with earlier this morning for Hideshi to track down. "You're always so reckless, you do realize that?"
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"I know," Hideshi said as he eyed the list like a child were to watch a new toy as it were passing the checkout register at a store "and that's why I'm so effective at catching these guys!"
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"Just promise you'll be a little more careful, will you?" Botan asked as she slowly handed the list over to Hideshi.
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"Yea, ok mom!" the young man smartly replied as he took one cursory glance at the list of names, then jumping to his feet, ready for action. "I'll have these done for King Yama by the end of today! See ya babe!" Hideshi called back to Botan as he raced across the rooftop of his apartment building, then leapt off the side of it onto the streets below.
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All Botan could do was watch and shake her head disapprovingly. If only it were that easy with Yusuke...
She thought to herself before turning back towards the sky on her oar, racing back towards Spirit World.

"Alright then, let's actually look at this thing..." Hideshi said shortly after landing feet-first onto the asphalt-paved alleyway beside his apartment building. The ambitious Spirit Detective retrieved the list of names and information pertaining to the demons he was to track down today from his pocket, unfolded it, then began to read out loud.
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"Ginobly Atakashi, upper A class demon. Leader of the Ginobly Demon Gang. No reports exist on his whereabouts at this time... Blah, blah, blah... Ok then, let's have a look at another here..." Hideshi shuffled around the papers containing information pertaining to the other demons.
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"Raiza, another member of the Ginobly Gang. Recent Reports suggest he's hiding somewhere here in the Mavo area of Japan. Awesome! That means I won't have to look for too long and I can get straight to kicking ass!" The Young Spirit detective cheered excitedly.
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"Hold up there young man," An ominous voice echoed from out of nowhere in the alleyway "Are you sure you'll be able to defeat me? What does your cute little 'report' have to say about my strength?"
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Hideshi's eyes lit up excitedly. Yes! He's right here! I can skip the whole searching part altogether! This is gonna be a great day! he thought to himself as he read from the report again, this time a little louder. "Raiza, Lower B class demon. Whipping boy of the Ginoby Gang." Hideshi smiled mischievously as he added that last insulting line to the end of King Yama's report.
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"Well then detective," the voice echoed again from out of sight in the alleyway once again "It would seem as though your report is hilariously inaccurate in two aspects... For one, I'm nobody's whipping boy, as you'll soon discover!"
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"Yea...sure." Hideshi scoffed "And what was that second inaccuracy?"
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Raiza laughed maliciously as he began to materialize from a brick wall parallel to where Hideshi stood in the alleyway. The demon then reared his ugly head, one which was humanoid, yet had the eyes of a beast. His mouth curled into a devilish smile which stretched all the way to the side of his tattooed face. The demon also brought out a shiny, red apple from behind the wall. The demon grinned at the boy a bit more before taking a large bite from the apple and speaking to him with a mouth full of the fruit. "I believe that your accomplices in Spirit World have severely underestimated me. I'd consider myself an upper B class demon, maybe even an A class..."
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Hideshi just stood his ground and confidently smiled to himself, still retaining his cocky attitude, yet keeping a strange element of maturity behind his smile.
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"I don't know what to tell you there Raiza, if it makes your last moments any more enjoyable, I'll give the benefit of the doubt and kill you with an attack I usually reserve for A class apparitions."
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"Foolish boy! You're a human! You have no such power! Humans are weak and feeble creatures! And I shall break you as such!" Raiza angrily leapt out from the brick wall, his entire being coming out into open view. It was then that Hideshi saw it, what Raiza was carrying in his other hand. He waited until the demon raised up the knife above his head, letting it glisten in the rays of the sun before reacting.
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Hideshi took what appeared to be a defensive stance for a moment, but then, in the blink of an eye, it was over...
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Blood ran down Hideshi's arm as he raised it up skywards. He had managed to make contact with the demon, who began coughing up blood. "W-what did y-you do to me?!?" the demon demanded as he remained suspended on the Spirit Detective's arm.
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"Why don't you take a look?" Hideshi said in a cold tone, completely stone-faced as Raiza's blood began to drip onto his clothes some more.
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The demon turned his head towards where Hideshi's fist made contact with his stomach, then saw the gruesome scene. "N-no!" he turned his face away from the horrendous sight, twitching in fear and pain.
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Hideshi took an admiring glance at the work he had done and smiled to himself a bit. Raiza lie on top of his fist, half impaled at the stomach. Hideshi's fist glowed with a white, spiritual aura as he removed Raiza from his awkward resting position atop his arm.
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"Now then Raiza," Hideshi maliciously said as he knelt down to face the demon as he lie on the ground bleeding to death "I'll gonna need you to tell me... Where's Ginobly?"
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The demon looked away in horror from the spirit detective, he squirmed around a bit as if he were trying to get away, but he couldn't, his body had suffered a mortal wound.
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"Fine... If you won't tell me, I'm sure there are some other demons on this list who will..." Hideshi said as he stood back up, then turned to walk away from the dying demon.
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"N-no! Wait! You can't leave me like this!" Raiza called back towards Hideshi, who had his back turned to the monster as he strode away.
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Romano Hideshi took a couple more steps, then stopped in his tracks to turn his face towards the demon once more.
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"You're right..." Hideshi said as he quickly snapped his fingers, igniting some of the spiritual energy his fist had left inside Raiza's gut, the energy had the appearance of white fire as it engulfed the entire demon's body.
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Raiza gave one final shriek and the fell silent as the spiritual energy swallowed up what was left of his body and turned it to dust.
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Satisfied with his work, Hideshi turned away again, and resumed his hunt for Ginobly and the rest of his gang.