"It seems he has succeeded already. From his confrontation with Clare, we have confirmed that he is indeed corporeal, but exactly how he achieved this remains unknown..." Constantine said with a grave expression, shaking his head slightly.
"However, his aura isn't from hell; it's a kind of dark, chilling power, subtly exuding a malign presence. It's unclear where it comes from..."
"Dark and chilling power?" Robert furrowed his brows. He had encountered dark forces before; behind the Shadow Corps was the Dark Dimension, and Batman became even more ferocious after donning the Ica Mask, though his aura wasn't particularly cold.
"Have we pinpointed his location yet?" Robert quickly regained his focus. Whatever the dimension, finding him would clarify everything.
"Cough, not yet. He vanished into the night, and we lost him..." Constantine admitted sheepishly.
"Lost him?" Robert looked at Constantine oddly. Given their Guardian abilities with the portal, it should be difficult to lose track of someone once they had focused on him.
Even if the adversary was powerful and could potentially detect them, just surveilling from a distance should be low-risk...
Of course, another critical point was that even if they did lose him, Constantine had tracking magic. It shouldn't be hard to find the person again, unless Constantine, a magician, was afraid to pay the price?
"Cough, well, I do have quite a bit of debt..." Constantine caught Robert's meaning and added sheepishly, "Could you use your tracking magic?"
"I haven't even seen this demon king; how can I use tracking magic?" Robert retorted, annoyed. He had thought right; compared to Tony Stark, Constantine was far less reliable, almost shirking any cost himself and previously trying to transfer the cost of tracking magic onto others.
However, what Robert didn't know was that Constantine was already restraining himself because he knew he was no match for Robert and that Robert also knew tracking magic. Angering Robert would mean no escape, so Constantine was already suppressing his nature.
Still, this was before Robert could mention that he had been blacklisted by the magical dimension. Had Constantine known, he might have tried to shift even a bit more of the burden...
"Ah! Guess it's up to me again!" Constantine sighed and began using the tracking spell.
Truth be told, combining tracking magic with a portal was extremely effective: use the portal to spy on the target, remember their appearance, then lock onto their location with tracking magic, and use the portal to follow up—truly a full-service operation!
"Found him! Let's go!" Constantine's eyes lit up, and he turned to the others, "Who's coming?"
"You, me, and Tony. Tony wants some practice, and I'll back him up. You can come back after..." Robert could see that Tony Stark was more determined to handle supernatural events than Constantine, even possessing something called a sense of responsibility, so getting Tony accustomed to supernatural adversaries was no problem.
"Uh..." Clare wanted to join in, but after hearing Robert's plan, she sadly lowered her head, deciding to stay behind and watch through the portal, not wanting to hold them back.
After all, Clare knew she wasn't really a match for a demon king and staying could distract Robert from managing the aftermath...
With a "hum," the portal reopened, and Tony Stark, unhesitatingly scanning his surroundings for the portal's secrets, stepped through. Unfortunately, his advanced scanning equipment couldn't yet detect magical abilities.
Unlike Batman who utilized science to enhance his abilities and adapted various powers to develop different armors for emergencies, Tony was still primarily exploring the essence of scientific power, not yet integrating other forces into his armor.
Soon, Tony, having learned nothing new, appeared with Robert and Constantine at the entrance of a bar—the location locked by Constantine's tracking spell. For a place like this, Robert and Constantine weren't surprised; many supernatural forces, especially those leaning towards the dark and hellish, favored the slightly chaotic environment of bars.
However, Robert quickly frowned, sensing that the atmosphere inside the bar was indeed chaotic—to the extent that every living being inside was far from normal; it seemed like a gathering place for supernatural beings. Yet at that moment, these supernatural beings were losing their lives one by one, quite rapidly! Robert quickly locked onto the demon king Constantine had described, sensing a dark, chilling aura not just strong but stronger than Batman with the Ica Mask!
"He's killing people!" Bursting through the bar's doors, Robert paused, shocked by the scene before him—not just him, but also the well-traveled Constantine and Tony Stark were taken aback.
Inside, numerous fierce-looking vampires were trapped under blood-red nets, and one particularly savage figure wearing a mask was draining the blood of weaker vampires around him...
Yes, a vampire was being drained of blood. Around them
, the bodies of vampires and humans alike lay, each drained of blood.
"Shadow Mask?" Robert frowned upon seeing the mask. He might not recall the exact look of the Shadow Corps masks, but this masked figure's aura reminded him a bit of Batman with the Ica Mask, minus the coldness, making Robert suspect it might be another Shadow Corps mask.
"Hmm?!" The masked figure, who had been feeding, stopped and turned as Robert, Tony, and Constantine burst in. Immediately, figures emerged from the darkness, confirming to Robert that these were indeed Shadow Corps masks.
"What the hell? They can fly?" Tony exclaimed as the figures took to the air.
The Night Bats, part of the Shadow Corps, were the only group with true flying capabilities, resembling the vampires around them with their winged forms and incredible speed.
"Swipe! Swipe! Swipe!"
The night bats rushed towards Robert, Tony, and Constantine. With a wave of his hand, Robert effortlessly dissipated the bats targeting him, not even needing to use an energy wave.
Tony, more straightforward, plowed through the attacking night bats with his Iron Man armor, shattering them on impact.
Only Constantine struggled a bit, reluctant to use his trump cards and relying on standard magic, which was barely enough to handle ordinary demons and somewhat effective against the night bats. But the problem was the sheer number of attacking night bats, especially as they increasingly targeted Constantine after finding Robert and Tony tough to beat.
"Are you really not going to help me?" Constantine, seeing the odd looks from Robert and Tony, muttered discontentedly, "I came out with the famous Saiyan and Iron Man, and I have to deal with these minions myself?"
Constantine hadn't intended to fight; he was just supposed to show the way. With so many night bats, even if he were to fight, he'd need to use powerful spells or trump cards, which Robert and Tony could handle effortlessly, so why should Constantine waste his energy?
With a hiss, Tony, unaware of Constantine's situation but still a teammate, decisively intervened, clearing the night bats around Constantine.
"You really are a good guy! Worthy of the great superhero Iron Man!" But what Tony didn't realize was that by doing this, he had shone in Constantine's eyes, who noted another good person he could approach for help if Robert wasn't around. Such a nice guy surely wouldn't refuse him, right?
"Who are you people? Why are you disturbing me?" As the first wave of night bats was cleared and before the second wave could emerge, the masked figure resumed feeding and asked in a deep voice, focusing mainly on Robert and Tony, dismissing Constantine as insignificant.
For Constantine, being ignored was a relief; it spared him from having to confront the figure and use his last resorts...
"Should we interrupt his feeding on those creatures?" Tony, still unfamiliar with the supernatural world, quietly asked Robert.
"You can interrupt if you want. Anyway, these blood nets seem connected to those vampires; interrupting him means these vampires are doomed..." Robert shrugged, "Of course, these vampires aren't exactly good people; it's no loss if they die."
"These are vampires? Vampires being drained of blood?" Tony was finally aware of the identity of the surrounding creatures, his heart filled with a strange sense of the bizarre. The supernatural world was truly full of wonders!
With a splat, Tony's words fell as the blood nets plunged into the vampires, turning them instantly into dried corpses. The nets shrank into a dense blood orb floating beside the masked figure.
"Interrupted my feeding, kill them!" The masked man, seemingly enraged by the disruption, his voice thick with anger, shot a beam of blood light from the orb towards Robert, seeing him as the highest threat.
"I got this!" Before Robert could react, Tony shouted and fired a repulsor blast at the blood light. Science clashed with mysticism, and the energies collided; ultimately, the scientific power prevailed, dispersing the blood light and continuing towards the masked man.
With a bang, the masked man, caught off-guard, was blasted into the bar's wall, seemingly motionless.
"He's trying to escape." Robert noted calmly, looking towards the wall.
"I know!" Tony's combat detection system had also picked up the masked man's escape attempt, especially as the blood orb moved towards the wall, indicating the masked man wasn't ready to give up on it.
With a whoosh, Tony quickly pursued, determined not to let his first supernatural combat end with the enemy escaping.
"Something's off..." Robert, following at a leisurely pace, couldn't help but mutter as he watched Tony chase after the masked man.
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