Run, Denji

Tuning out the wailing Devil Hunter, Asa turns to Yoru for some idea of what Denji is actually attempting, since all he has done is jog laps around the lake. Yoru guesses he is simply fleeing from reality. The Aging Devil materializes in front of Denji and, certain he has run out of options, dangles a bargain: be consumed in trade for the lives of children. Denji calls them wicked and points out that Pochita might well want to protect those children too. The devil needles him, suggesting that bouncing back so fast from Nayuta's death proves he never truly cared for her, and Denji fires back that they understand nothing about what a relationship is.

He presses on, insisting that no matter what, he will recover and build a new family, then another, on and on without end, a body in ceaseless motion. The only way to truly wound his heart, he taunts, would be to hand him yet another family, a notion the Aging Devil brushes aside while branding him dumber than Pochita. Denji halts and flips the insult back: they are the foolish ones, because his scheme is already turning.

Asa and Yoru watch Denji run endless laps without explanation. The Aging Devil offers to be eaten in exchange for children's lives and tries to break Denji by mocking his quick recovery from Nayuta's death. Denji rejects the deal, declaring himself a being of perpetual motion who will always find new family, and reveals that his real plan is already in progress.

Run, Denji belongs to Volume 20 and the Aging Devil arc, with Pochita and Nayuta appearing only as mentions. The chapter leans on several callbacks to the Public Safety Saga: Denji again styling himself a perpetual motion machine as in the Eternity Devil fight, his vow to keep cycling through families echoing Makima's menacing speech, and his charge that the Aging Devil misreads Pochita just as Makima once did.