Before the Storm

Determined to earn a spot on the Gun Devil taskforce, Aki hauls the unwilling Angel Devil along on a hunt; the Devil would sooner sit and eat ice cream until Aki threatens extermination for refusing to help. A flashback has Makima present the Angel Devil as the strongest hunter short of Kishibe, able to drain the life from anyone he touches and shape it into potent weapons, having consumed a whole village when first found. After a kill, the two find a freelance hunter dying nearby; Aki asks for a merciful end, but the Angel Devil refuses, insisting humans ought to suffer as they die, so Aki finishes the man himself. Both accept they will never truly get along.

Back at the cafe, Denji lingers, still unsure where his heart belongs, and Reze notes he has shown up daily that week. She pulls him to her table; he admits he cannot read and can only scrawl the word for balls, which makes her laugh. Edging nearer, she invites him to attend night school, and a red-faced Denji says yes. Somewhere else, a man whose body is covered in scars and stripped to the waist peers into a sink. To the Typhoon Devil he puts a question: what drives the Devils to crave the Chainsaw Devil's heart? The voice answers that it is none of his concern and recites their pact: endless use of its powers in trade for Denji's heart. He then brags of slaying a dreaded Chinese hunter by abducting, killing, and skinning the man's family.

Titled Arashi no Mae in Japanese, this Volume 5 chapter ran in 2019 Issue 45 on October 7, 2019, during the Bomb Girl arc, and was adapted in the Reze Arc film. Makima, Power, Kishibe, Pochita, the Gun Devil, and the Ghost Devil turn up in flashback, mention, or voice.