Inside the dimly lit room, Leo, Ray, and Chris sat on the sofa. Night had fully fallen over Berkyo Town. Chris sat in tense silence, his senses hyper-tuned to the surrounding atmosphere, scanning for any approaching threat. Outside the building, Floating invisibly in the night air were two ethereal humanoids crafted from a smoke so thin that they were completely imperceptible to the naked eye, continuously patrolling the perimeter.
Beside him, Leo's knuckles were white, his grip tightening instinctively around the hilt of his katana. Ray was equally poised, ready to draw his weapon at a moment's notice.
In stark contrast to the warriors, Felix and Anthony Ward were drowning in anxiety. Anthony stared blankly at his ticking pocket watch, his heart hammering against his ribs. Felix was aggressively biting his nails, completely oblivious to the fact that he had bitten down to the quick, drawing blood. His mind was entirely consumed by fear for his mother, Naomi Ward, and her unborn child. The only sound echoing through the suffocating silence of the room was the rhythmic, ominous tick-tick-tick of the wall clock.
As the hands of the clock finally hit 9:00 PM, Anthony's anxiety spiraled into pure terror.
A Brief Moment of Hope
Suddenly, the door swung open. Dr. Hench stepped out, looking utterly exhausted. His gloves were heavily stained with fresh blood. Anthony practically lunged at him, grabbing his shoulders. "How is my wife?! Is she okay?!"
Dr. Hench took a long, heavy breath before speaking. "She is stable. She lost a massive amount of blood, and I had to expend an immense amount of my own mana to keep her alive. Fortunately, the custom potions I prepared at your request worked perfectly. She is going to make it."
Exhausted, the doctor slumped into a nearby chair, pouring a cup of tea from the pot to soothe his frayed nerves. Just as he took his first sip, a sharp, fragile cry pierced the air from inside the room—the sound of a newborn baby. A wave of profound relief washed over everyone, turning their tense expressions into genuine smiles.
But the joy was brutally short-lived.
The moment the baby cried, Leo, Chris, and Ray simultaneously sensed a massive, hostile presence surging toward the building. Before Leo could even rush into the delivery room to secure the child, the wall of the second-floor apartment exploded inward with a deafening crash.
Through the dust and debris stepped a colossal, bulky cultist, his face entirely concealed by a thick cloth mask. As Leo spun around, the brute lunged with terrifying speed, clamping a massive hand over Leo's face and violently throwing him backward, sending him hurtling out of the shattered wall and down to the street below.
"Leo!" Chris roared, instantly unleashing his smoke magic.
Thick, binding tendrils of white smoke materialized in the air, wrapping tightly around the bulky cultist's arms and legs like iron shackles. Seizing the opening, Chris delivered a brutal, soaring kick straight into the cultist's masked face.
Meanwhile, Ray rushed past them into the delivery room, only to be met with horror. Dr. Hench's wife was unconscious on the floor, and Naomi Ward lay passed out on the blood-stained bed. The window was shattered, and the crib was empty.
Ray's voice echoed with sheer panic: "The baby is gone! They took the baby!"
Hearing this, rage consumed Chris. He channeled his fury into a devastating punch, the sheer kinetic impact sending the bulky cultist crashing through the opposite wall, flying out into the night.
Chris closed his eyes for a fraction of a second, expanding his sensory aura. He locked onto a magical signature moving at breakneck speed through the shadows. "They're taking him to the center of town—the Clock Tower! Ray, go! Now!" Chris yelled. Ray didn't hesitate, leaping through the shattered window to give chase.
Down on the cracked pavement of the street, Leo was already back on his feet, facing down the bulky cultist who had just landed. Before Leo could draw his blade, Chris dropped from the second floor like a meteor, driving his knee violently into the brute's face. The impact shattered the cultist's nose, spraying blood across the concrete.
Suddenly, a second cultist blurred into view from the shadows, launching a lethal kick aimed directly at Chris's head. Chris brought his arms up just in time, blocking the strike, but the force pushed him back several feet.
The second cultist stood beside the bleeding brute, a sickening, arrogant smirk evident beneath his hood. "Look at that, the night is young, and tonight, our Ninth Seal will finally break."
"That's never going to happen," Chris spat, his voice dropping to a deadly, venomous register.
The cultist laughed mockingly. "Oh really? You couldn't even protect your own base, Captain. How do you expect to stop this ritual? I still remember walking through your headquarters, hunting down the survivors one by one. Poor bastards were hiding in rooms, begging for their lives. It's a shame no one lived to see my face—I would have been a legend by now."
Hearing the slaughter of his comrades mocked, a thick, throbbing vein popped on Chris's forehead. His anger reached a boiling point. Dense, compact layers of smoke wrapped around his fists like gauntlets. Moving so fast he became a blur, Chris lunged to obliterate the taunting cultist.
But Chris miscalculated. He sensed a shadow looming above him too late.
The bulky cultist intercepted him, hammering a massive fist directly onto Chris's head. The sheer force fractured the ground beneath them, causing cracks to spiderweb across the street. Blood sprayed from Chris's nose, splattering onto the pavement.
Despite the blinding pain, Chris refused to back down. Even with the brute's fist still pressing him down, Chris whipped his legs around, driving a savage kick into the bulky cultist's jaw. Blood erupted from the monster's mouth, coating Chris's face, but the brute didn't let go. Instead, he tightened his grip, pinning Chris ruthlessly to the ground.
The hooded cultist watched, amused. "Don't worry, Knight Captain. We unleashed this beast specifically for you. He's been asleep for forty years, just waiting for a worthy meal." With those parting words, the hooded cultist vanished in a blur, reappearing right behind Leo.
The cultist threw a vicious kick aimed at Leo's waist, but Leo anticipated it, parrying with his katana to create distance.
"Where is the child?!" Leo demanded, ignoring the taunts.
"My comrades already have him," the cultist replied with a creepy, unsettling smile. "Don't worry, the ritual will be perfect."
Leo drew his katana fully, while the cultist unsheathed a jagged sword. They charged, their blades clashing in a shower of sparks. The cultist suddenly swept low, targeting Leo's legs and sweeping him off his feet. Leo reacted with flawless instincts, flipping backward to regain his footing, and unleashed a relentless barrage of slashes.
Yet, the cultist blocked every single strike with terrifying ease. In a desperate tactical gamble, Leo threw his katana high into the air. The cultist instinctively looked up, and in that split second of distraction, Leo drove a powerful punch straight into the cultist's stomach.
To Leo's horror, the cultist didn't even flinch.
"Well, that's just cheating, isn't it? Fight properly!" the cultist mocked. He countered with a devastating punch to Leo's abdomen. The impact sent Leo flying through the air. He smashed through a metal street lamp, shattering it, before crashing violently into the brick wall of a distant building.
Back on the ground, Chris was still pinned by the massive monster. Pushing his body past its limits, Chris ignited his mana. Billions of smoke particles erupted from his body, condensing into a massive, spectral hand that wrapped around the bulky cultist's neck, choking him.
The monster tried to claw the smoke away, but his hands passed right through the intangible vapor. Chris poured even more mana into the spell, making the smoky grip so dense it turned pitch black. The cultist's eyes turned bloodshot as suffocation set in.
Because of the massive mana expenditure, internal pressure built up inside Chris, and blood began to pour rapidly from his nose. Sensing the monster's grip loosening, Chris grabbed the brute's pinning arm, twisting it with a sickening CRACK to break it, and forced himself up.
The suffocating cultist stumbled back, his eyes glowing a manic, demonic red. Enduring the asphyxiation, the towering monster threw a desperate, lightning-fast punch straight at Chris's neck. The blow landed hard, breaking Chris's concentration and causing the smoky hand to dissipate.
Chris stumbled back, wiping a mixture of sweat and blood from his face. He took one long, agonizing breath.
"Smoke Enhance Magic," Chris whispered.
The smoke exploded outward, enveloping the entire block, before violently snapping back and absorbing directly into Chris's muscles. In a flash of instantaneous movement, Chris vanished, reappearing directly behind the bulky monster. He unleashed a punch so heavy it shattered the air, burying his fist into the cultist's torso.
The monster didn't even see it coming. Howling in agony, the brute spun around to counterattack, but Chris was relentless. A barrage of high-speed, mana-infused punches rained down on the cultist's face.
Refusing to fall, the monster roared, unleashing his own hidden power. Jagged, searing-hot spikes erupted from his arms, his fists glowing with thermonuclear heat. He caught one of Chris's incoming punches, trapping his hand.
The monster began hammering Chris's trapped arm. The heat damage was far worse than the impact—Chris's flesh began to burn and blister, turning an ominous shade of bruised purple as blood welled up.
Fighting through the excruciating pain, Chris covered his free right hand in a hyper-compressed layer of smoke, slamming it repeatedly into the monster's face. The sheer force tore away the cultist's cloth mask, revealing a horribly burned, grotesque face. The monster's forehead veins looked ready to burst, his oversized skull pulsing with rage.
Neither stopped. It was a mutual slaughter—fist for fist, blood for blood.
Finally, Chris channeled every single drop of his remaining mana into one definitive, cataclysmic final blow. At the exact same time, the monster's heated fist swung through the air, aimed at Chris's head.
Chris's punch landed first.
The impact cave in the cultist's face. Blood erupted from his nose, mouth, and ears. The monster's eyes rolled back, and his massive body went limp, crashing heavily onto the pavement, dead.
Chris stood over the corpse, panting heavily. The monster's hand had loosened, but Chris's left arm was completely ruined—turned a horrific shade of deep blue and utterly paralyzed. Gritting his teeth through the agony, Chris formed a sharp blade of solid smoke with his right hand and severed the dead monster's grip, tossing the severed hand aside.
As the adrenaline began to fade, Chris stumbled. Blood was dripping rapidly from his nose, his vision blurring from severe mana depletion. He looked up toward the center of town, his left arm hanging uselessly at his side.
The battle was won, but the race against the Ninth Seal had just begun.