Yashakiden: The Demon Princess, Volume 2 Read online

  Author’s Bio

  “It looks like those planned three volumes have turned into five,” observes the author of Yashikiden: The Demon Princess with a smile. As with any masterpiece, the child has exceeded the parent’s initial expectations and continues to blaze a trail on its own. Forthcoming developments will only make his books all the harder for his readers to put down.

  Hideyuki Kikuchi was born in 1949 in Choshi, Chiba Prefecture. While studying law at Aoyama University, he participated in the college’s “mystery and detective novel” club. After graduation, he published stories in doujinshi magazines and translated science fiction while working as a magazine reporter. His debut as a novelist came in 1982 with the publication of Demon City Shinjuku.

  In 1985, the highly-anticipated Makaikou was published to great acclaim, propelling Hideyuki Kikuchi into bestselling author status like a rocket. That status continues to this day, making him one of Japan’s busiest and most popular writers.

  Yashakiden: The Demon Princess Vol. 2

  Yashakiden:The Demon Princess vol.2 - Yashakiden 2 (c) Hideyuki Kikuchi 1997. Originally published in Japan in 2007 by SHODENSHA Publishing Co.,LTD. English translation copyright (c) 2010 by DIGITAL MANGA, Inc. All other material (c) 2010 by DIGITAL MANGA, Inc. All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from the copyright holders. Any likeness of characters, places, and situations featured in this publication to actual persons (living or deceased), events, places, and situations are purely coincidental. All characters depicted in sexually explicit scenes in this publication are at least the age of consent or older. The DMP logo is (tm) of DIGITAL MANGA, Inc.

  Written by Hideyuki Kikuchi

  Illustrated by Jun Suemi

  English Translation by Eugene Woodbury.

  English Edition Published by:

  DIGITAL MANGA PUBLISHING

  A division of DIGITAL MANGA, Inc.

  1487 W 178th Street, Suite 300

  Gardena, CA 90248

  USA

  www.dmpbooks.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Available Upon Request

  First Edition: May 2010

  ISBN-13: 978-1-56970-146-1

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Printed in Canada

  Author’s Note

  As with any series, each new installment should be more interesting than the last, and Yashakiden: The Demon Princess, Vol. II should hopefully prove no exception to this rule. A crimson shadow has fallen across Shinjuku. There are no timeouts in this struggle to the death. Setsura has been badly battered and Mephisto is working overtime to keep it together.

  I didn’t originally intend to push the story into so many precarious corners. It developed that way naturally. The enemies this time around are strong and terrifying, forces that must be reckoned with.

  Victory was once assured for Setsura and Mephisto. Now the future is looking less certain. But I’m not the slightest bit displeased. Yashakiden: The Demon Princess has shaken off its bridle and is running free.

  Hideyuki Kikuchi

  Main Characters

  Setsura Aki

  The manager and owner of a Demon City senbei shop and a P.I. agency. A handsome man with magical powers literally at his fingertips, he defeats his enemies by wielding strands of sub-micron thin “devil wire.”

  Mephisto

  It is rumored that the “Demon City Physician,” as beautiful as he is feared, can even bring the dead back to life.

  Princess

  The Chinese vampire Biki—as gorgeous as she is evil—has wandered the world for four thousand years in search of a safe refuge for herself and her followers.

  Kikiou

  This crafty old warlock is Princess’s principal retainer. He desires to subjugate all of Demon City Shinjuku.

  Ryuuki

  A later addition to Princess’s retinue but also a vampire, he plays the mesmerizing ghost koto Silent Night and has a powerful, death-dealing qi at his command.

  Shuuran

  A vampire and servant of Princess, she can fashion killer vampire dolls from her own blood.

  Takako Kanan

  A college student specializing in ancient Chinese history, she is swept into supernatural conflict because of her obsession with the mysterious Daji from the Hsia Dynasty.

  Yakou

  A vampire who lives in Demon City’s Toyama housing project, he is the grandson of the Elder, who was defeated and killed by Princess.

  The Story So Far

  A vicious gang of four from China appears in Demon City. Nightly vampire attacks on the citizens of Shinjuku quickly follow. The victims are brought to Mephisto’s impregnable hospital, but these vampires are not deterred, invading the hospital’s layers of defenses and baring their fangs before Setsura and Mephisto.

  The blood-drenched battle for Shinjuku has begun. Along with her three retainers—Kikiou, Ryuuki, and Shuuran—Princess has surmounted four thousand years of space and time in order to seize control of Demon City.

  To fight these immortal enemies, Setsura and Mephisto have allied themselves with a clan of vampires living in the Toyama housing project, led by the Elder and his grandson Yakou. But Setsura is seriously injured by Ryuuki’s powerful qi and Princess slays the Elder.

  Now her evil claws reach deep into Mephisto Hospital, where Takako Kanan watches over the unconscious Setsura.

  Part One: Loving The Devil

  Chapter One

  The woman’s voice rose up from the depths of a dark land, filled with a kind of elation and malice that would make the blackest of hearts shudder with fear.

  “So this is Setsura Aki?”

  “You—you are—” Takako Kanan gasped. Red-hot fear shot through her. Her own voice sounded like it belonged to somebody else.

  Without giving her a second glance, the woman approached Setsura’s bedside. Abruptly she stopped. “You are Setsura’s woman?”

  Takako’s body shook. Terror ate at her insides like bad brandy, leaving her intoxicated with dread. It was the combination of the woman’s voice and the undamaged half of her face. The ugliness of the burned, inflamed part elevated the rest to an unimaginably haunting degree.

  As horrifying as the sight was, she could not look away.

  “You needn’t answer. You are not one of the attending nurses. You must be a relative or a friend. I wonder whether I should first make you my servant?”

  The woman fell silent, assessing her reaction, as Takako’s face turned a ghastly shade of gray.

  “Don’t worry. I prefer not to be waited on by those of humble birth. Though I’m not so discriminating as Kikiou. Serving as witness to this man’s death is a role that would suit you fine. And yet—”

  She raised her hands and gazed at the faint red rivulets running down her seductively fair skin.

  “These wounds to my neck and my legs. Still unhealed. Back during the Wei Dynasty, not even the sword of Zhao Yun could inflict such wounds. Ah, here is what Kikiou feared and what made Ryuuki retreat without accomplishing his objective.”

  Takako didn’t understand that the wounds had been inflicted by the defensive “fence” Setsura had woven around them. It entangled any object that drew near, mercilessly drawing and quartering anything that did not stop in its tracks.

  Nor could she comprehend the monstrous nature of the woman who’d calmly pulled it apart.

  “But all for naught.” She turned to Setsura, “In deference to such comeliness, I will allow you to die with your features intact.”

  All at once she was standing at the head of the bed. She slowly
pressed her hands down. The edges and ends of her mother-of-pearl-like fingernails at the tips of her alabaster fingers were honed like knives.

  The comatose Setsura was beyond salvation now. Her hand reached his neck. Takako tried to scream but her throat was glued shut. All she could do was watch.

  The woman gathered her strength in her hands. They shook slightly as they spread apart. A shiver ran down her fingers. Her nails touched the line of Setsura’s jaw, pressing into the flesh.

  Takako focused her consciousness on everything she was seeing. There was no way she could deal with this woman by herself. She had to call for help, but had only two options: the call button above the headboard or the micro-cell phone inside the cuff of her sleeve.

  The woman was standing right next to the headboard, so that option was out. The cell phone was activated by a switch and then voice controlled. Except she couldn’t move her hands or open her mouth.

  Takako pushed her consciousness down into her feet, staking everything on her ability to control her qi with her mind. A lukewarm sensation rose from beneath her feet, moving at a glacial speed. How long would it take to spread through her entire body?

  This woman could kill Setsura a hundred times over in the meantime.

  The woman’s white hands traveled from his chin up the sides of his face. Takako felt a small start in her chest. The shock of pure surprise. The woman was stroking Setsura’s cheeks the way a loving mother would her child.

  “How handsome.”

  Takako couldn’t believe what her eyes and ears were telling her.

  “What a lovely man. Enough to excite even me.”

  Her voice filled the room like a winter mist. Setsura’s cheeks deformed beneath her hands, his nose and mouth shuddered. The vampiress caressed him with an otherworldly passion, as if to inscribe his entire being into the memory of her skin.

  Takako was seized by a profound feeling of disgust. She directed her thoughts to the qi gathered around her ankles. Rise, she commanded. And it rose. To her knees, to her thighs.

  “But you must die. If I let you live, you will become our most terrible enemy. If I let you die without tasting death, my heart would never be at peace. I could never tolerate that in myself.”

  The woman pulled away. Her mood shifted in a flash. She drew her brows and curled her lips. Her nature had prompted another change, and this was the look of the blood-starved demon. To Takako, it was as if blinds were being drawn across her shining eyes.

  Takako’s qi had reached the small of her back. From there it should suffuse her spine and circulate through her entire body.

  She was seized by despair. The woman’s form—that Takako could see only from the back—cast off a blindingly demonic vibe as her head swooped down toward Setsura’s throat. Fear and despair forced the qi through Takako’s veins. Her hand reached the device in her sleeve. Her mouth mumbled the words.

  The woman straightened. Takako’s eyes were drawn to Setsura’s throat. There was no trail of blood. The china-like skin remained unmarred by the accursed wounds.

  A strange and unforeseen change blossomed within him. Takako’s countenance dissolved into a rapturous expression. The woman’s also. Setsura’s soul had somehow detected the true nature of his enemy and had aroused the only defensive safeguard left to him.

  Setsura’s face seemed to glow. Create the ultimate ideal of beauty and it would subjugate every heart and soul presented to it. Held up before the eyes of a woman who denied every article of philosophy, religion and ethics, and even she would have no choice but to submit in ecstasy.

  Just like the servants who watched over the vampire’s casket.

  Struggling against the invisible spell of this beauty, the woman raised her right hand up to her face.

  “This night—” Her voice shook with sorrow and joy. “This night I have seen the worst of all my days. But I shall not be defeated by this mere fledgling! Look!”

  She raked her hand across her brows. A mist of blood erupted from her face. In order to release herself from the curse of Setsura’s beauty, she had torn out her own eyes.

  In that moment, Takako felt the unearthly hold on her falling away. Replaced by the bloody physical grip of the woman’s hand seizing her wrist. The ghastly, gruesome face smiled. The blood from her eye sockets poured down the scorched side of her face.

  In turn, the unscarred side of her face—now stained red—was all the more entrancing. It left Takako breathless.

  “I had no use for you from the start.” The blood dribbled into the corners of her mouth. “But I have underestimated my enemies in this city. Ah, I hear the security guards coming. To the extent that you are related to Setsura, you will prove useful in luring him to hell.”

  Like a cold, mechanical arm, her free hand tilted back Takako’s chin. She brought her ravaged face against Takako’s left carotid artery.

  No fear or pain—just a brief sting—and then something thick and warm spread through her veins. A fleeting sense of sorrow grazed her heart. It felt like the time when she was a child and got separated from her parents in the bustling crowds of Asakusa in Tokyo.

  The woman pulled her head away. The door opened. The security guards rushed in. They aimed the paralyzer guns in their right hands, but hesitated, startled by the terrifying expression on her face and unable to decide whether the blood-smeared woman was the enemy.

  That moment passed. Three voices chorused together: “Freeze! Don’t resist or we’ll shoot!”

  “Get out of the way,” came the return command. More of a rebuke.

  Struck by her natural elegance, her majesty, and the overwhelming power of her demonic presence, the three men unconsciously retreated several steps.

  One managed to come to his senses and pull the trigger. At the same moment a whirling white wind raced among them. The throats of the three erupted in a shower of blood.

  Even blinded, the extrasensory abilities of this enchantress were the equal of a normal person’s eyes.

  From the moment Takako raised the alarm, the scene from the hospital room was being displayed on the security monitors. The surveillance room supervisor watching the monitors goggled. The monitors didn’t show the woman standing by Setsura’s bed. He’d dispatched a patrol more on the gut feeling that there was something off about what he was looking at.

  He watched the girl’s body stiffen, as if held tightly by some invisible force. He watched the three guards rush in and suddenly come to a halt, their attention focused on somebody—or something—other than her. And then a second later, watched as the blood sprayed from their throats.

  Security immediately went to DEFCON 1.

  Guards encased in mechanized body armor suits raced toward the room, while every critical entranceway and exit on every floor was sealed off with a force field that could repel a battle tank. The nozzles of heavy-grade paralyzer guns and tranquilizer gas jets jutted from the ceilings and walls.

  Banned elsewhere, the military weapons in the armory—principally the neural pathway and DNA disruptors—were powered up by compact nuclear batteries.

  After this SSDL (“Super-Science Defense Line”), the SPDL (“Super-Psychological Defense Line”) engaged, though only on the upper floors. After that, the SLDZ (“Spiritual Last Defense Zone”)—whose actual functioning only the hospital director truly comprehended—awaited the intruder.

  Everything was in perfect working order and ready to go. Except that the worst disaster to befall Mephisto Hospital was not an invading force. It had been born in its very heart.

  The military-grade mechanized exoskeletons were equipped with 1,000 horsepower engines powered by a thermo-electric nuclear furnace. The 10mm high-grade silicon composite armor could withstand a direct hit by 120mm smooth bore anti-tank munitions.

  Embedded in the armor were tranquilizer guns, multi-beam lasers, and staking missile launchers. Any one of these weapon systems was an equal match for at least three squadrons of the commando units held in such high regard at poli
ce headquarters.

  It took no longer than a snap of the fingers for ten guardsmen to strap on their mech suits. They rode the emergency elevators from the armory to the floor holding Setsura. And there encountered the beautiful woman coming down the hallway.

  They couldn’t believe their eyes. A single blast from one of the sonic paralyzers lining the hallway would knock out a whale. The woman must have received a thousand hits already.

  With the captain taking the point, the guardsmen spread out in a flying V formation. But the woman didn’t stop.

  Such a horrible—and beautiful—countenance.

  The contradictions bubbling up from their most primal memories threw their minds into confusion. In response, the metabolism monitoring devices strapped to their right arms squirted two-milligram doses of beta blockers into their veins.

  “Freeze!” the captain ordered.

  She didn’t.

  “Number two team, engage with paralyzers. If that doesn’t work, three and four teams, use lasers.”

  The orders flashed through encrypted signals to the rest of the team. The captain aimed and focused the paralyzer on the woman’s chest.

  The colorless, odorless ultrasonic wave wrapped around her body.

  She stretched out her arm. The fear and the drug-induced sense of calm combined to slow the captain’s retreat. Her hand struck the breastplate of his mech armor—a quick, willowy movement that seemed to bend the air.

  Along with his mech exoskeleton—that weighed a ton—the captain was sent tumbling through the air. The captain’s mech struck the one behind him, and the two of them together cartwheeled—as if in slow motion—into the third team.

  Following after it, the woman broke through the third line of the flying V. The force imparted by that hand alone was difficult to fathom.

  Red laser light painted her body from every angle. A single thousand-degree pulse that could vaporize a diamond didn’t raise so much as a cigarette burn on the woman’s fair skin.