Akio: "Holy shit! That is a horrible sight!"
Gawking at the battlefield the city of Kesley has become, he remarks so.
Halogen: "Indeed. I never would have expected this sight to be what would greet me when I reach here."
And even Halogen Dietrich, one of the vilest human beings alive, agrees.
Akio: "Did you know anything about this?"
Akio asks as he turns to their third and oldest party member, who also looks just as shocked as them.
Vaika: "I had no idea at all."
He says simply as his eyes refuse to turn away from that sight.
Vaika: "Who would do this and for what reason?"
Even though he asks so himself, he does not expect to get any answers, not from the two standing beside him and not from anyone else. And why would he anyway? This sight SHOULD be beyond comprehension.
Still,
Akio: "Whenever this happened, why didn't Rosevelt inform us?"
He could have, if he wanted to, tell them everything through telepathy. After all, he told Laurie Brown about it. So then, why didn't he tell them?
Vaika: "I … I don't know."
No one knows.
No one knows what goes on in the head of the Phoenix. And, even if they did know, they won't be able to understand his thought process, causing them only more confusion.
So, whatever may happen, they are going to be questioning it just like they are right now.
And it's not that they don't realize this simple fact, it's just that they can't let it be the end of their queries.
Halogen: "Wait!"
The fake priest says with some discomfort in his voice.
Halogen: "I am sensing someone really powerful in the city, someone who is neither Rosevelt nor Walter but almost on the same level."
Akio: "What! On the same level? Who the hell would that be!?"
Akio fails to think of anyone who can be on the same level as those two, as does Vaika. However, the same cannot be said for the fake priest. He realizes it.
Halogen: "Ha!"
And he scoffs as he realizes it.
Halogen: "The Spectres are here."
Akio: "!!!"
Vaika: "!!!"
Halogen: "And they have come with at least half of their forces, which obviously includes the legend himself."
He says with a smirk, making it obvious who the person emanating that strong aura is.
Akio: "Spectre Dyne is here!?"
Halogen merely nods and the other two look back at the city, also using Aura Reading themselves and sensing the same ridiculously powerful presence.
Spectre Dyne, the leader of the Spectres and an artificially created Ghost, is perhaps the one man every Hellfire would consider a force to be reckoned with. After all, he is someone Walter Schmidt acknowledged as a powerful individual, a person who is leading the strongest army in the world, a person who the Phoenix acknowledged as a powerful individual, a man whose strength is said to surpass Vaika Smith and has recently also become the man who ended Barry's existence, who himself had a big repute in the world of supernaturals.
After all of that, it wouldn't take a genius to figure out that he is someone it would be better not to mess with.
And this man, here in Kesley, is going to fight not just a fellow Hellfire of theirs but a person who has sworn to kill every last one of them. But, this is something that they are yet to find out.
And so, they still have the gall to go into the city.
*******************************
Walter: "..."
No words.
The strongest man in the world speaks no words when he witnesses Kesley's current state for the first time.
The fact that this carnage has been caused does not even begin to faze him.
The only things about all this that could faze him would be the fact that this carnage has been caused by none other than Ozyllus himself.
But, he does not know that - not yet.
Walter: "Rosevelt, is this what you meant?"
He asks a man to whom he knows the words won't reach, not without using any abilities, but he asks them anyway, fine with not getting the answer right then.
Or rather, he would prefer to not get the answer right away.
So,
Walter: "Either way, it seems I would need to get back to my research."
Mumbling to himself, he then turns back to the pile of books he needs to finish reading.
These aren't just any books though. They all contain the history of the world, both the history of the supernatural part of the world and non-supernatural part of the world.
Walter is going through them because he thinks he might find answers to the questions he has, or if not, he at least hopes to find some clues leading to those answers.
While the rest of the world engages in battle and the Vampire Kingdom eyes them from hiding, this is what the strongest man in the world decides to do. He decides to find out the root of the problem, something that has gained infinitely more meaning ever since he met Bronzer and was threatened by him, alongside being inferred about something.
However,
Walter: "Damn it!"
Meaningful though it may be, his quest hasn��t led him to any results yet, and there's no indication of things getting any better.
Walter: "I am beginning to think that I'll never find anything meaningful in here."
These books he is reading - obviously he has read them before. But, back when he had read them the first time, he didn't know a lot of the things he does now and he definitely hadn't had that encounter with Bronzer. Back then, he was just going through them for the sake of having gone through them once.
But now, he has a purpose, and he is reading these books with that purpose in mind.
So, away from the battles, the strongest man in the world spends his time in one of the biggest libraries owned by Vermilion, searching through the texts for any semblance of a few select words.
*******************************
The anomaly of a supernatural, the man who himself does not know what kind of supernatural he is, stops in his tracks all of a sudden.
The Hellfire Gabriel Washington, however, keeps going with his fists charged to bash his opponent's head on the ground, and rather rapidly as well. With this speed, within the time it takes for a person to blink, the Hellfire would already have destroyed his opponent.
That is, at least, how it would go most of the time.
The identity of his opponent in this battle commands enough agility to make it an exception.
Gabriel: "Tsk!"
Clicking his tongue on a reflex as his opponent dodges his punch by a hair's breadth, the Hellfire focuses his impact that would otherwise go to waste towards the ground so the consequential gust of wind formed from the impact causes dust to fly in all directions - making it a battlefield harder to fight in.
Before the dust even reaches his eyes though, the commander of the Spectre army jumps away and lands at a good enough distance from the Hellfire.
Abgere, using the singular moment Dyne would need to rebalance himself after bringing his feet back to the ground, rushes him as well. But, unlike Gabriel, he tries not to punch him with high impact but to act like that's what he intends to do so he can blindside Dyne.
And he almost succeeds too.
By the time Gabriel's eyes are completely refocused on the Dyne's new position, Abgere manages to throw a rock aimed right at the Spectre's eyes without having him realize that is what he intended to do.
Dyne, realizing too late his opponent's move, can only try to dodge once more by jumping away just like before.
By a millisecond's difference, Dyne manages to dodge the rock and get further from Gabriel and also far from Abgere.
Gabriel: "Tsk!"
Abgere: "Tsk!"
At that moment, the two click their tongues because they realize that they missed an important chance and will now have to face not just that one man but the entire Spectre army.
But,
Dyne: "Stand back!"
Orders their leader with a voice colder than ice and words louder than thunder.
Dyne: "None of you is allowed to do anything to assist me or to harm them. You all are to just stand back and come up with the best strategy you can think of for finding the Phoenix."
As their orders were made clear, their words were lost from their mouths.
Dyne: "Also, if you can, try to get in contact with the other group."
And with that final order, Spectre Dyne stands straight up and looks at the two who just tried to take him down and almost succeeded, and says,
Dyne: "Pathetic!"
Gabriel: "?!"
Abgere: "?!"
Dyne: "You two are truly pathetic."
He says so with a straight-forward voice, giving no room to doubt the cold sincerity of his words and feelings.
Gabriel: "You really think so, huh?"
Gabriel realizes that the opponent he is dealing with isn't meant to have any unnecessary pride within him. It's unlikely for him to have been programmed with something like that in his mind. And, the seeming truthfulness of his words prevents it from being a lie meant to provoke them.
So, if he says these words, he truly means them.
Gabriel: "I guess that's another person I don't understand at all."
He says and readies his fists by charging them up with energy. Abgere, on the other hand, remains silent and vigilant throughout as he waits for the right opportunity to attack.
Dyne: "Ha!"
On one side, a Hellfire is ready to blow him away with constant attacks and on the other side, an anomaly of a man with multiple abilities is ready to take him out if his foot stumbles just one time. It's truly not an easy situation to be in, even for the leader of the strongest army in the world.
And yet, he scoffs as if he does not feel threatened at all.
Dyne: "You underestimate your death, fools!"
Says the Spectre in his usual voice as he stands firm without any defensive measures, waiting for the Hellfire to attack him.
But the Hellfire, seeing that, hesitates.
Gabriel: "..."
Thoughts of his opponent hiding an ace up his sleeve or having set a trap for him to fall into - they all lead him to back off for the moment and get more defensive while trying to charge up more energy in his hands but this time manipulating the heat around him as well.
However,
Dyne: "Well, what's this now? Guts, the one thing you had, is now gone too?"
Dyne asks him in the same straightforward voice with no mockery in his intent but an unmissable deriding look.
Abgere: "..."
Witnessing all this, Abgere says nothing either but definitely becomes more cautious. He, like anyone else, can tell that the Spectre known as Dyne has the power to back up that deriding and condescending look.
But, even so, that can't be the end of it.
So, finally being ready,
Gabriel: "I wonder how Ghosts deal with fire."
Gabriel Washington says so as he shoots a small ball of fire, a miniature sun in fact, at Dyne.
However, instead of dodging or defending against it, Dyne merely brings his palm up to the miniature sun, covers it slowly around it and encloses the sun in his hands, leaving all the onlookers gawking in surprise even though most of them had seen him doing things like this before.
Abgere: "Wha-"
His words get stuck in his mouth as he sees Spectre Dyne's hands burning but his hold around the miniature sun not weakening at all, as if the pain of burning isn't even being felt by him.
Dyne: "This is why I said it before - Pathetic!"
Says Dyne as he opens up his palm, revealing that the miniature sun is gone and his hands that took the damage are rapidly healing.
Gabriel: "..."
Abgere: "..."
It's no secret that he's powerful but seeing him in action would still leave most people gawking in awe just like his current opponents.
Ethan Kales knew this. He knew that this fight is likely to turn out this way. He knew that both his allies will be slapped back down to earth if they fight Spectre Dyne.
Even though his planning coupled with Sneha's well-timed execution of them worked back on the island, the one big factor working in their favour that time was that Dyne underestimated them.
He didn't underestimate their individual abilities. But, he underestimated their combined ability.
This time, he definitely won't make the same mistake.
Yet, even knowing all of that, there was no choice but to leave Dyne to the two of them. And so, he did.
But, already, the tables are turning, and it's not a very beneficial development.
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