The muttering didn't go unnoticed, but Barricade didn't ask him about it. Qilby's personality was just as abrasive as his own, so it was little wonder why they got along so famously.

The Kishin offered no resistance whatsoever, dying without so much as another pitiful whine. Its limbs quivered before stilling, and its entire body went limp, tongue lolling out past its shattered jaw. That was the drawback of consuming innocent souls and succumbing to Madness, he supposed. Turn into a monster, live in a cave, go crazy, get your neck snapped an old man. It kind of curbed his desire to see what would happen if he ate just one human soul.

Not long after the thing expired, the red soul appeared, waiting to be devoured. At that point Barricade transformed back to his root mode, the hydraulics in the claw hissing as they released from Qilby's hand. Why it so much easier transforming one way than the other, Barricade didn't know, but he'd be working on it. Without Qilby around to cry about it. The passageway lit up bright as day as his headlights returned, before he dimmed them and focused the beams on the kishin soul.

"That's it?" He bent over, tilting his head at the little thing that had caused so much trouble.