In a dark brown royal outfit complimented by a black cloak covering everything at his back and a devil mask on his face to hide it, the man known as Abgere awaits his prey.
He can hear footsteps, those footsteps that signal the arrival of the four dragon bodyguards. And as he hears them, he runs forward and jumps on the wall at his right only to hit it with a leg and let his impact take him left, towards the four dragons.
He lands right in the middle of the four and the first thing he does is punch the genitals of the two dragons in front of him, and then proceeds to put his hands on the ground and use them as support to lift his legs and give a kick at the genitals of the two behind him.
Holding their private parts, the four crouch down in pain. Abgere uses his arms more as he bends over his legs to land blows on the heads of the two previously in front of him and then uses their heads as support to grab the heads of the two in front of him now and bashes both their heads on the floor.
He then quickly steps away. What the four dragons completely failed to notice is by making sure to touch all of them with his hands, he has rubbed a little kerosene on them. All he has to do now is turn a lighter on and thrown it in the middle where his hands had touched the ground to start the fire. And he does exactly that as he runs ahead trying to find the only remaining team of bodyguards, that of the three ghosts.
He hears the shouts of pain as the four dragons behind him burn, two of them even losing control and turning back to their dragon forms. Hearing those cries of pain that he is the reason for, he stops for a moment, but then,
Abgere: "Hah!"
He takes a long sigh and,
Abgere: "Sacrifices are necessary."
He confirms so to himself and starts running again.
*******************************
Gin reaches an intersection in his house and sees on his left a fire spreading out.
Gin: "Goddamnit!!"
He yells as he uses psychokinesis to bring a fire extinguisher to himself and then uses it on the rapidly spreading flames in front of him.
Gin: "Go out! Go out!"
He keeps saying in frustration as he sprays the fire extinguisher. And then flames lower a bit, only to give the view of four half-transformed dragons' corpses.
Gin: "Tsk!"
He clicks his tongue and tries to keep his focus on extinguishing the fire. Since there is a possibility that this fire is caused by kerosene or petrol or something like that, he can't risk using hydrokinesis, the ability to control water, on it.
Soon enough, the flames reach the point where they can't be called anything more than a flare and then Gin gets a look at the message Abgere left on the floor in the dragons' blood before he left the place.
"WHAT'S WRONG? A HELLFIRE SHOULDN'T HAVE THIS MUCH PROBLEM AGAINST A MERE EMBER."
He was mocking Gin, alright? He clearly was mocking Gin. If his purpose was to make Gin's blood boil, then he was succeeding very nicely.
Gin: "That SON OF A BITCH!!!"
He yelled on the top of his lungs and started running in the direction the message was written in, in other words, the direction Abgere went in.
Gin: "He'll pay for doing this! He'll pay for mocking me!"
*******************************
Abgere, outside of the house that can very well be called a mansion, now faces the three ghosts assigned to guard the Hellfire named Gin Hanks.
Abgere: "Pathetic!"
He remarks as he sees the three writhing in pain from mere fire.
Abgere: "I was worried that you three might actually pose a problem but I guess it was all for nothing. You guys can't even challenge me."
He isn't being self-centered or stupid in any way. He is just saying the truth. The three ghosts in front of him can't do anything when they are feeling the pain of being burned.
Abgere: "Still though, while I'm positive you people may have done your fair share of crimes too, I can't be sure of that. And so, I have no excuse to let you suffer like that."
He says in a bold and unhinging voice as he puts a hand in his cloak and takes out a knife imbued with the special energy composition needed to sever a ghost's existence. With that knife in hand, he proceeds to cut the throat of the nearest, then proceeds to the middle one and then the furthest.
And just like that, he has successfully wiped out all 20 bodyguards sent to protect Gin Hanks.
Abgere: "Now the only one left …"
He turns around slowly as he hears the voice of approaching footsteps, which obviously can only belong to one person at this point.
Abgere: "is my real target."
He throws away the knife he had taken out earlier as there are no more ghosts left for him to kill. The only one who is left now is a psychic, albeit one of the most powerful psychics in the world.
Abgere starts building aura in his body, especially in his hands and legs.
The sound of footsteps stop as the cause of it comes in Abgere's line of sight after stepping out of his house from the front door, only to end up straight in front of Abgere. The man named Gin, for the first time, gets a look at Abgere.
Gin: "So you are the one who did all this?"
He asks while trying to withhold his anger for the sake of the possibility that the figure in front of him might not be Abgere. But,
Abgere: "Yeah, I am. I am the one who freed all your bodyguards from the sickening job of protecting you."
Abgere answers in a matter-of-fact tone, to which Gin tightens his fist forming fire on them.
Gin: "You messed with the wrong person, kid."
Abgere: "HA! HA! HA!"
Abgere laughs a dry laugh and says,
Abgere: "Do I look like a kid to you?"
He says as he points to his tall figure, which is probably no less than 6'3.
Gin: "You ARE a kid."
Gin says as the fire on his hands keeps growing bigger and had started to look like some comic book superpower.
Gin: "You know why you are a kid? It's because only a kid would be foolish enough to do something like this?"
Gin can barely hold himself back as the fire on his hands grows so much it would have started to burn the roof if there was one above him at the time.
Abgere: "Don't make me laugh, Gin Hanks. You are the kid here, who has come to face me even after seeing what I did to your bodyguards."
Abgere says as he smiles, which Gin is unable to see because of the devil mask that Abgere is wearing.
Gin, now ready to attack, launches himself at Abgere who's only 10 meters away from him.
However, before he can reach Abgere, he finds the bones in his legs cracking and he falls down to the ground.
Abgere: "That time I appeared behind you outside of your bedroom wasn't just to give you a good scare."
He says while casually walking forward towards the fallen Hellfire.
Abgere: "I had thrown micro-electrodes at your legs, and I just activated them. Thus, you got an electrical shock in your legs targeted at your blood vessels and the bones broke as a result of that."
Abgere, without worrying that Gin might still be able to attack, explains his strategy to him.
Gin: "You BASTARD!"
Gin yells in frustration as he tries to use psychokinesis to hit Abgere with anything nearby that can deal him some pain, but before he is able to do that, he finds his hands being blown off in the air.
Gin: "AHH!!! GAAHH!!!"
He yells in pain as Abgere chops his hand off but even yelling isn't allowed as dirt is thrown in his mouth.
Abgere: "I don't want to hear your disgusting voice, you bastard."
Abgere says while twisting his face in disgust. Gin spits the dirt thrown in his mouth and looks at Abgere with the greatest anger he has ever had towards a person and asks,
Gin: "Why the hell are you doing this!?"
Abgere: "That's simple. I'm doing this because it's the only way, because there's no other way to bring Vermillion to justice than to kill the ones who have corrupted it."
He doesn't hesitate a bit in answering, leaving Gin unable to respond for a moment. And in that one moment, he continues.
Abgere: "Well, I had planned on doing this for a while now but I didn't because I had a friend in Vermillion who told me that things will change for the better."
His eyes stop blinking.
Abgere: "I didn't think anything like that would actually happen but I wanted to value his words because he was my friend."
He says in a cold voice, devoid of emotions.
Abgere: "That friend was killed while on a mission a few nights ago, shot in the stomach by someone apparently."
Gin looks at him in surprise.
Abgere: "I got an SOS by him that night but by the time I reached the shed he mentioned, only his dead body was present there."
Even as he hears it loud and clear, Gin finds it hard to believe.
Gin: "Are you … talking about the Ember … Ro Garland?"
Gin asks in disbelief, to which Abgere replies in a surprised voice,
Abgere: "Oh? So you knew him? That's a surprise."
Gin: "He … was killed by ... Ethan Kales."
Abgere: "Ethan … Kales?"
This is the first time Abgere has heard this name.
Abgere: "Well, I'll remember that name. After all, he's my only target except the 10 Hellfires and the Phoenix."
Abgere says as he grabs the hair on Gin's head.
Abgere: "You have outstayed your welcome in this world."
He says as he lights his head on fire and chops his other arm off. Ignoring all his cries of pain, Abgere looks straight into Gin's eyes.
Abgere: "DIE!!!"
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Sneha: "So can someone explain to me how …"
She looks at the scene in front of her.
Sneha: "a fish is supposed to help us get out of here?"
And as she says that, our newest comrade (temporary though) seems to share the same concern.
Ro: "Yeah, I want to know too. How are we getting out of this island from this pond?"
We are, at present, surrounding the pond and the golden fish seems to be listening in on all our conversations. For whatever reason, she is not responding.
Wait! Was that attitude only for me? Or maybe she is afraid of Sona and so is not saying anything? Well, probably the later.
Sona: "Hah!"
She sighs exasperatedly and says,
Sona: "We are all not going to get out of here together. Only I, a spirit-user, can use something like this to get out of the island."
Sneha and Ro are looking more confused now that they have gotten the answer to their questions.
Sona: "I will go out of the place and bring or send an aircraft here for the rest of you."
Sona seems uninterested in the whole conversation as if it's pointless but Ro is too cautious to take the same approach.
Ro: "And we are supposed to trust you with that?"
He furrows his brows and asks so in a doubtful tone.
Sona: "Yes."
She says in a matter-of-fact way, to which,
Kais: "Well, I trust her."
I add to make the conversation end. Ro seems like he wants to retort so,
Ethan: "Yeah, I trust her too, though it's more like me being able to see her true intentions through my eyes but who cares?"
Our fifth member, the one who had unexpectedly been silent this whole time, speaks while his hands are folded and his voice is plain, devoid of emotion. Ro, surprised by our answers, turns to Sneha to see how she answers and,
Sneha: "I guess I trust her too."
And with that, all our real members agree that we will take this approach. Ro, who is just tagging along to be honest, knows that he doesn't have much of a say at this point in time and so he takes a long breath and,
Ro: "Fine!"
And just as he says that, the fish makes a big splash of water right in the middle of the pond, as if she had been waiting for this conversation to finish.
Sona: "That's the signal."
She says and points to the waves in the pond that are flowing out from the center forming beautiful circles that keep growing wider. Seeing that, in a plain voice, Sona explains,
Sona: "Now, by stepping in this pond, I'll find myself at any place in the world that I have in mind, provided I have already been to that place at least once."
That is how she is supposed to get out of here. And by doing that, she will then book a private jet (or she could just steal it) then bring it here and finally we will all be able to get out of here. If nothing else, it's going to take some time.
Ethan: "Well then, what are you waiting for? Go."
He keeps his arms and folded as he goes onto lean against a tree and say that in the same plain voice he has had for a while now.
Sona: "Of course, but there's just one thing that I want to confirm before going in."
Even if her voice at this time is also plain, her words grab all our attentions.
Sona: "I'm fine with Ro tagging along with us but what about the other two? Where are they?"
It's not hard to guess that she is referring to Walter and Dyne.
Sona: "Who's to say they won't try to do anything while our group has one member less?"
A valid question but,
Ethan: "I can assure you they won't."
With a little smile back on his face, the greatest contributor to our recent victory against the two monstrously powerful people says in a somewhat deep voice.
Ethan: "Barry told us that there's a thing called Knight's Code among Spectres. If they lose a fight that they considered to be fair, then for the next 72 hours of losing that fight, they can't hurt their opponent."
Yeah, that's chivalry alright. I can't help but notice that Ethan regained a bit of his 'evil' side when this topic came up, as if he's trying to mock their code despite the benefit it's giving us. Well, I'd do the same to be honest.
Ethan: "This code gets nullified if their opponent hurts them but we are not foolish enough to do that."
He continues in a slightly gleeful tone, probably gloating over the fact that his strategy worked against the two of them.
Sona: "Yeah, that takes care of Spectre Dyne but what about Walter Schmidt?"
As he hears that, the faint smile on his lips grows wide enough for anyone to call it a malicious grin.
Ethan: "Oh, him. He's the honorable knight who suggested for there to be this Knight's Code among Spectres."
That's … surprising. As I scan the surroundings, I see that my reaction is shared my Sona, but not Ro and Sneha. I guess when Barry, Ro, Ethan and Sneha were discussing thing back on the beach, this topic had already come up and so the two of them already knew about this.
Ethan: "He's a true knight in spirit. He won't do anything either."
Even as he says that, it seems Sona still harbors a little doubt.
Sona: "Are you sure though?"
She says while narrowing her voice and speaking in a slightly anxious tone.
Kais: "Don't worry, Sona."
So I say that to assure her.
Kais: "It'll be fine. You just need to bring a jet to this island within the 72 hours and everything works out."
At times like these, the best thing to do, instead of assuring the person with your own strengths and guarantees is to leave the burden on them. At least, that's how it works for people as skeptical as me and Sona.
Sona: "Hah!"
She sighs and says,
Sona: "Fine, I guess I'll have to trust you with that."
She says while closing her eyes and then takes a long breath. After which, without saying anything further, the spirit-user steps in the pond without opening her eyes. Hence, the four of us are the only ones who witness how it looks like when she is dissipating in the water as deeper as she goes in it.
Well, I did do the right thing by leaving the burden on her shoulders. That is to say, I did the right thing for her. For me, I don't know. I am getting more and more worried about her the more I see her body looking like it's gently evaporating into the water. But, I can't stop her. This is bigger than any one person. I can't let my worries drag all of us back.
*******************************
Walter: "You sure about this, Dyne?"
Walter Schmidt says in a melancholic voice to his friend who is sitting on the beach staring at the sea.
Dyne: "Yeah, we should follow the Code and let them go, for the next 72 hours at the very least."
Dyne replies in an equally melancholic voice to his friend also staring at the sea besides him but while standing and having his arms folded.
Walter: "Well, I guess that's that."
With that, they decide that they won't attack the four people that'd be left on the island. And no conversation on the topic is to be brought up again within these 72 hours.
Dyne: "But anyhow, what about us going back?"
Dyne shifts his gaze from the sea to the man diagonally above him.
Dyne: "Our jet is safe and we can just leave. Why don't we?"
Walter shifts his gaze to look back at Dyne with a questioning look.
Dyne: "I mean, well, it's not like we have anything to do in the tomb now that even Sagax's soul seems to have left the place. And besides that, this island isn't much of a tourist spot, is it?"
Dyne becomes a bit sarcastic towards the end but he is asking the question seriously.
Walter: "Yeah, you are right about that."
Walter scratches his head as he says.
Walter: "We should probably leave."
He says blankly as he looks at the clear blue sky filled with clouds that look like they are within a hand's reach but aren't. And on seeing that,
Walter: "No, we should definitely leave."
He says with a smile on his face.
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And if you liked this story, please support it by voting with power stones, grading the chapters, and/or giving a review.
Stay healthy!
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