Chapter 171: Special Division 5

The instant Nayuta's head rolls past on the belt, Denji loses it. Barem offers a frigid apology, framing his cruelty as a necessary sacrifice to save the world. Denji seizes him by the throat, and his own intestines burst loose and coil around his neck, kicking off his change into the Chainsaw Devil while tearing Barem's head clean off. Asa and Yoru stare in amazement as the transformation completes, before something pulls his focus away.

Atop a nearby roof, a commander finishes briefing several teams drawn from various Public Safety Divisions, then addresses his own unit of five Fiends. He warns that today's outcome decides their futures: bring down or pin the Black Chainsaw Man and they earn Public Safety's protection, fail and they get exterminated like any devil. He dangles endless sushi and liquor as a survival prize and kicks off the first operation of the newly reassembled Special Division 5.

The freshly briefed squad has no idea the Chainsaw Devil already stands among them. The chapter marks the debut of the Ear Devil. The volume edition again restores the mole missing from Nayuta's severed head on the cover page, and an altered panel on page seven, which originally showed Asa reacting to Pochita seizing Denji's body, was reworked for the English release to depict Denji yanking his cord with matching sound effects; the volume version retains the original Asa panel.