An extremist is typically very engaged with his own distorted reality, and Edgar Grey was no different in this regard. In May, earlier this year, he had moved to Russia after many months living in Europe, often investigating futile leads towards her murderer. There were times where he had felt he may not be able to complete his task, but, just barely, it was sometimes worth continuing.
For a year he had moved about the various cities of Russia, reconfiguring his face with Necromancer's extreme bodily control to disguise himself from students (who he often avoided murdering unless strictly needed). He had picked up many Russian phrases and attempted to naturalize himself in the country, as he felt any white immigrant should. In this time he lived in a self-inflicted poverty so that he might be better motivated to find her killer, to strengthen himself against the nicks & cuts of a life that had already exacted several upon him.
Soon he would track her murderer down to an odd village some hours away from Moscow's ring. Most of the locals knew the area contained a host with a mind control Revenant, matching the description Edgar was searching for, and given the host was an amoral and illegal male -- one needs not guess how this mind control was typically used. The few female students who did investigate this generally could not find him, and the men were not interested.
This irked Edgar, for he found this doubly repulsive; firstly because of the hedonism, and secondly, because Edgar was a bit of a Romantic. Yes, you read that right. He legitimately believed that there was something sacred to sex between a man and a woman. Both partners defiled themselves if they engaged in it recklessly or casually, and it should only be done in the context of a loving marriage.
And if it all sounds puritanically Christian, well: these types typically find God once no one else will speak to them. But he took pride in that he would soon finish his task with no harm brought to innocent people; by soon torturing and murdering this man, he would make it known to him that he was avenging her death, along with doing the world a favor by erasing those elements which no one else wanted within it.
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The following day, the four had burrowed underground for another three hours. Serena had asked if Mia could freeze the floor so they could slide the entire way back to Urasaria once they were done, but she refused, never letting Serena have any fun.
"But I had to carry the cooler this entire time!" said Serena, having had to carry the cooler this entire time.
"No." Mia kept spraying forward. "If you go out of Worldwide's protection, you'll end up having frostbite all over your body."
"I can handle it."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah."
Mia sprayed a puff of purple in Serena's face; she shrieked -
- as nothing happened and Yuruko & Samuel laughed.
"When you can survive that without me, then you can have your frozen slide." chimed Mia.
"Don't risk it." laughed Samuel.
"Okay." laughed Serena, stepping up again, " - but we could like, um - form a trap for him or something -"
" - I don't want us to fight underground." laughed Mia. "I doubt we'll even run in to him until we reach his father regardless."
"Still have no idea what his motivation is, either." said Samuel, glancing back. "Could he be a friend of Kirihara's?"
"What friends?" said Serena.
Mia looked over at Yuruko. "Yuruko, were you able to find anything more about him online?"
"Um, I did that." interjected Serena quickly. "Yeah, I was gonna mention it to you, umm..." She pulled it up on her phone. "There was an article about Urasaria students in border patrol militias. They mentioned him specifically."
"'Border patrol militias'?"Mia sighed. "Is this something else I need to be expelling people over?"
"Most likely." nodded Samuel. "I've heard of it before, but I don't know anyone in it. They usually stay near the southern border and kill anyone who crosses."
"Yeah, that's what the article says. He was working with ICE or whatever."
"So he's a racist homophobe." muttered Mia. "That's why he tried to assassinate me."
"Guessing so." said Samuel.
"Uh, why would that he assassinate you, though?" said Yuruko. "Urasaria's had a lesbian president for four years. Why would he only start now?"
Mia frowned. "…I don't know, actually. I'd like to get some fresh air and food to think it over."
"Sounds good." said Yuruko, and a puff of purple disintegrated a hole above, sounds of a highway following. Mia nodded to Samuel, and Outcast's armor formed as he leaped out first -
- and a tractor trailer smashed in to him at 70mph -
- but couldn't even move him as it crumpled right against him, launching the driver through the windshield as the entire truck folded -
- but ghastly hands set the driver back down on the ground, Samuel nodding to him as the other three climbed out. "Really should wear your seatbelt."
The four laughed as they went off to the side and Yuruko formed a picnic blanket. Serena set their cooler down and the four started eating, Samuel sitting next to Serena.
"Serena, can you check my laptop?" said Yuruko, patting its reinforced case on her back. Streams of fog flew in to it and Serena nodded.
"All good."
"Think that guy wants to yell at us." said Samuel, gesturing to the former driver clutching his crumpled truck ruefully.
"Um, I'll fix it when we're done." shrugged Serena.
"I'm not sure it's fixable."
Yuruko sighed as she looked down the highway. "Look. Revenant."
The other looked and saw two women hitchhiking, 200ft separating them & shes. Mia frowned, wondering out loud how he could've found them that quickly. "They may be random hitchhikers."
"Can't imagine many women would want to hitchhike."
"They may not have a choice."
"Maybe they want the Murderous Samuel to pick them up." whispered Yuruko and they laughed, remembering a theory he had once given: that the depravity of female fanmail Samuel received was in proportion to his own violence. And there was a degree of truth to it, as those types of women never mail one-off killers; they prefer the serial. "They're coming towards us."
"I'll plant a few scarabs." muttered Mia, and a few started burrowing ahead. A hundred feet separated them from the women.
"…I mean, there's not any way to tell, right?" said Yuruko, revolver forming. "That they're constructs?"
"Can't have many more left." said Samuel as the women came fifty feet within, and in the next instant -
- ghastly hands threw Serena off to the side -
- just in time for a hundred red tendrils to burst up where she'd just been; their grip shot to Samuel's arms and pulled him through the ground, and in the next instant -
- he was laying in the middle of an unfamiliar forest, sighing as he stood with Outcast's armor formed, twin female laughter bouncing off the trees but no other sight yet. He checked his tablet and sent a ping to Mia, and in the next instant -
- he saw a sword slicing through one of the trees to his right, and out of it burst a woman shooting towards him, blade drawn with the momentum of one slash -
- that dented off of Outcast's armor as he stood completely still; staggering back, she slashed to her left, and a woman with a shield appeared by her a second later. Samuel glanced back and saw it was only these two as they started circling, ten feet separating he & them.
In solo fights, he was never inclined for offense; few Revenants could break Outcast quickly. Ghastly hands dug in to the ground and searched for roots, and he saw the shieldwoman's shield repair the swordwoman's sword, both of their eyes torn & with stitches on their torsos like they'd been sliced in half before.
Ahead, the swordwoman slashed down -
- and four jets of acid burst out of the tree behind him & towards him -
- but ghastly hands redirected them as he stepped to the side to dodge, one woman saying ahead -
" - h-h-how did f-f-filling it with b-b-baking soda go?!"
" - must've been for Serena." muttered Samuel, seeing her sword glow red as she slashed ahead, and in the next instant -
- the two reappeared right ahead of him; his grip caught her blade, but the other's shield bashed him in the chest -
- and he suddenly froze where he'd been struck, armor trapped to the barrier, woman slashing again ahead -
- but a swift unsummon & resummon of his armor happened just in time for him to step back, a second slash shooting for his neck -
- but ghastly hands ripped roots out of the ground and wrapped them right around her sword's grip, slowing her just in time for one Outcast punch to seek her throat -
- but he pulled it back as the other's shield expanded to try to block it; more acid blasted towards him, but ghastly hands redirected them back in to the shield, liquid solidifying to a solid wall as he stepped back. A bizarre scene met his stare ahead as the two women tried to walk through the acid, then screamed terribly as they swept back.
"Least they're stupid." he muttered, relevantly - but with no idea how to break through the barrier yet, he started running back. He stomped over roots and broke through the brambles as he ran, forest full of trees and hearing his two foes pursuing him behind. Glancing back, he saw the swordwoman slashing -
- and the two reappearing ten feet closer, bringing them closer even though he could outrun them.
"Space between the trees is shrinking." he muttered. "Guess she might actually destroy matter."
One idea came up in his head, but he was better strong than smart. As he passed by one tree, he ripped a branch off, ghastly hands sharpening it to a solid point as he turned and threw it, swordwoman slashing again -
- and she shrieked in agony as it shot right through her heart, then staggered back to slash it to bits, trees still growing closer with the walls of bark closing in -
" - range-limited." he muttered, seeing the ground shift where they'd first begun & back to its initial position, no worries for satellites to be redone. He realized he'd lost sight of the shieldwoman as the swordwoman slashed twenty feet ahead, and in the next instant -
- a shield bash from behind threw him right in to her glowing red strike -
- that only disintegrated the top layer of his armor, back frozen and trapped again -
- but another unsummon&resummon kept him free; he felt a dozen spikes hit his back but not trap it this time, and in a second sword sweep on the return -
- ghastly hands ripped another sets of root from the ground & pulled her legs back; she staggered and tripped -
- just in time for one Outcast-punch to blast her brainless skull out the back of her head and decorate a new tree, Samuel ruefully shaking his gauntlet as he rushed over the corpse, shieldwoman behind as he shouted -
" - you can try getting in close like that again after they glue you back in together - in hell!"
- and he was glad she didn't burst in to a thousand droplets of blood yet, wanting to prolong her death, hall of trees he was running through still closer than they should've been; behind, he saw the shieldwoman slowly advancing towards him -
- but the next scene was instant. He ripped up one tree from the ground, and hurled it -
- but her shield froze it in midair as soon as it hit the barrier; he caught up another and hurled it -
- and another -
- and another -
- and another -
- and another -
- and another -
- and she grunted as her shield started cracking from the pressure, solid wall of bark trapped up ahead as she swept back -
- and aimed her shield right just in time to catch another three that'd been thrown at her. Inch by inch, the pressure of the tree volley forced her further back; beside, the other woman just in to a thousand droplets of blood. She started swinging her shield wildly, previous volleys starting to unfreeze with no sight of her foe yet -
- and as one last tree sailed over her just as another three flew at her from ahead, she was doomed and didn't have the mental capacity to know it; ghastly hands grabbed the midair tree behind her -
- and smashed her spine in to twenty discs of bone as it hit her like a baseball bat; she hit the ground instantly, paralyzed from the neck down and shield dropping.
An Outcast stomp broke her skull and sent bits of bone spinning in to the grass. He had a desire to prolong her death, and stood on her chest with Outcast's armor. The weight was making her eyes crack and skin tear up.
"Take your time." he nodded. "Apologies I wasn't who you were looking for."
He jumped, and her body broke in to a thousand droplets of blood when he landed.
"I heard that one." said Yuruko's voice behind - with the speed of light he turned -
- and saw nothing but more forest, Serena & Mia laughing but distorted through static -
- and he barely managed to not frown as he realized it.
"Now he knows!" groaned Serena's voice. "Why did you -"
"- you, you accidentally called us, S-Samuel -" cackled Mia's voice - " - we had it muted until -"
" - they're gone now." he muttered plainly, muting his tablet.
He sighed as he sat down, feeling like a bum as he waited for Mia & the rest to pick him up.