"You have successfully infuriated me," Sam growled, his voice taking on an increasingly animalistic tone. "Do you want to see what powers I've gained from those rituals? Then watch."
Sam's eyes turned pitch black as he spoke, and dark veins resembling spider webs emerged on his face, radiating from his eyes like ominous tendrils. His mouth split open to his ears, revealing rows of razor-sharp teeth.
With a grim sense of pride, Sam abandoned all pretense, displaying his newfound strength: level 2, Rank 1, Extraordinary.
Beside him, Kevin and Tyler also transformed, though less extreme. Their eyes mirrored Sam's pitch-black hue, otherwise, their appearances remained unchanged. Having performed the rituals fewer times than Sam, their strength and transformation were lesser. They were still mortals, but formidable, each possessing one Mastery in the intermediate stage, albeit at level 1 or 2.
Kevin and Tyler leaped down from the platform, deciding to deal with Colette and Drake themselves. Sam, however, remained aloof, deeming Drake and Colette unworthy adversaries for an Extraordinary like himself to engage with mere mortals.
Kevin squared off against Colette, while Tyler positioned himself to confront Drake. Tension hung heavy as each combatant readied themselves for the impending clash.
Tyler jumped towards Drake and swung his scimitar down on his head. Drake deftly dodged to the side. The scimitar landed on the floor and produced heavy clanging sounds.
Tyler didn't take a moment to adjust, he swiped the scimitar towards Drake to the left from the ground. Drake hurriedly blocked with his sword but the difference in skills was evident. Drake's beginner sword mastery was no match for Tyler's intermediate sword mastery. Drake barely maintained the upper hand with his intermediate perception mastery.
Tyler had done the ritual once like Kevin. His sword mastery was at level 1, intermediate stage, and was very close to level 2, the ritual increased it by one level to level 2 and gave him a strength boost too.
Tyler relentlessly assaulted Drake with his scimitar. Drake's hands felt numb as he had to block his assaults with his sword as his increased strength made all his attacks even more dangerous.
Tyler feinted to attack his torso but changed the scimitar's direction mid-air and attacked his face. Drake barely saved himself by pulling himself back in time, but a small cut still appeared on his cheek.
Tyler gave a disgusting laugh and licked the few droplets of blood from his scimitar.
Drake narrowed his eyes. He decided to fight seriously.
Drake used a mortal skill. He had also purchased and practiced a few mortal skills in the training room.
Tyler hurriedly blocked the sword strike. He felt his hand a bit numb for the first time in the fight.
His eyes widened as he exclaimed, "Mortal Skill!".
His eyes filled with greed. "Boy, how about you give me the mortal skill, and in return, I will give you a painless death," he said licking his lips.
Drake merely showed him his middle finger with a taunting smile, not even bothering to say anything.
"You!"
Tyler started attacking again relentlessly. He decided to remove his limbs and then torture the mortal skill out of him.
But Drake had enough of the fight. He continuously used the Heavy Strike skill and removed Tyler's head when he saw an opening.
On the other hand, Colette looked relatively relaxed while fighting Kevin. Her beginner staff mastery might not be a match for his intermediate hammer mastery, but with her intermediate perception mastery, fighting with him was not very stressful for her.
He had much higher strength than her, but his speed was much lower than hers. She easily dodged all his attacks.
"Stop dodging like a coward. If you have guts fight me head-on," Kevin provoked but it fell on deaf ears.
"Aargh," he swung the great hammer and targeted her head, but she easily dodged his attack, the hammer struck the floor and formed cracks in it.
Colette used that chance and struck his staff on his head. His head started ringing but he quickly stepped back with his hammer and barely dodged her second attack.
He shook his head and got back to his senses. He swung his hammer horizontally but Colette crouched down and dodged his attack. She thrust her staff and hit his right kneecap. After hitting she quickly rolled back.
"Aaah," Kevin screamed as his right kneecap cracked from her attack. He lost his balance but barely stopped himself from falling using his hammer as a crutch.
Colette didn't let go of that opportunity and hit his solar plexus. He spurted a mouthful of blood.
Kevin swung his great hammer again, but he was slower than before, Colette easily sidestepped and thrust his staff and hit the side of his head.
Then without giving him time to recover, she swung her staff and hit him squarely in the temple. She heard a clear cracking sound as her staff connected to his temple. He dropped dead.
Drake and Colette gave each other a look to check if they were okay and then turned back to Sam.
"Your dogs were too weak, they lost so quickly," Drake mocked with a smile.
Sam was spitting fire from his eyes. He had worked hard to create his power in the town but those cockroaches who refused to die destroyed his entire foundation.
"You think you are strong. I will show you what is meant to be Extraordinary. I will show you why Mortals should just accept their deaths in front of the Extraordinary on their knees," Sam growled.
His nails turned black. His fingers and nails elongated and transformed into sharp claws. He pounced towards them directly from the platform while letting out a guttural roar.
Drake and Colette smiled and simultaneously took out their guns and aimed at him, whose eyes widened watching the guns aimed at him.
BANG
BANG
The shots fired from the guns and Sam dropped down mid-way. He was hit in the stomach.
Ironically, his face contained the same pain and despair that he loved giving his victims.
"Why? Why? WHY?" Sam screamed hysterically.
"It was supposed to be my chance to overcome my mediocrity and become rule everyone."
"Why do you have guns? Why?"
"How can two nameless detectives have guns?"
"No, I can't believe this. This is not happening."
"This is a dream. A bad dream. Yes, it is a bad dream."
"Hahaha, I am dreaming."
Sam tried to deny reality and started laughing like a madman. But he stopped abruptly when he felt two ice-cold gun muzzles on his forehead.
"No, please don't kill me. I will share the ritual with you. We can rule the world together."
But no matter what he said, Drake and Colette looked unmoved.
Drake did not need a useless ritual when he had a system infinitely better than any ritual.
On the other hand, Colette only had justice in her mind. She would not use a ritual like that that sacrificed people cruelly.
Sam understood that they would not leave him.
"My God, please save your servant," Sam screamed as he pleaded to some unknown god.
BANG *2
But he only got two bullets in response. The back of his head burst open as he dropped dead.
THUD
Drake and Colette didn't use the guns before because they were wary of Sam. With their respective perception masteries, they knew that Sam was very strong but was hiding behind a mask.
After Drake asked Ivy to restore his abilities, he checked Sam's status and discovered he was an Extraordinary. They had that guess earlier, and when Drake confirmed he secretly signaled to Colette of the same.
They knew if they had used their guns earlier, then either Sam, Kevin, and Tyler would have run away or gang up on them together and tried to use the low-level thugs to consume their bullets.
But because of that, the fight ended anti-climatically. Though, no one complained. They were still not strong enough to fight Extraordinary head-on.
Drake and Colette checked if any thug was still alive and if found, those poor lucky, or unlucky individuals were swiftly killed.
After making sure that everyone was dead, they started looking in all of the rooms to find any other clues. They didn't find anyone else.
They found few property papers, lots of money, and weapons. Most of those weapons were made by Kevin and were of good quality.
"Drake, you might want to come and see this," Colette said cryptically.
Drake raised his eyebrows and followed her to a room. There, they saw a parchment closed inside a glass case. The glass case was locked inside a metal safe, that looked like it was opened by Colette. On the parchment, some gibberish was written.
"I thought that this parchment might be related to the rituals. But I didn't know if it was dangerous, so I didn't touch it. I thought that you had more knowledge about these things, so you might know what it was," Colette explained.
"It's good you didn't touch it, otherwise, you would be on a Demigod's watchlist," Drake told her in a joking tone.
But Colette didn't look amused. "By Demigod, you mean the God, to whom Sam was begging earlier," she enquired.
"Yep. Or more precisely, He is a sequence 2, Legend," answered Drake as he appraised the parchment.
The parchment recorded the ritual, but whoever used the parchment would be marked by the Demigid. The ritual was a way to prepare potions for a path related to the Legend. Increasing strength was merely a by-product if the pain and despair were consumed directly. As long as enough despair and pain were collected with the ritual, by mixing some other ingredients, a Rank 1, Extraordinary potion could be created. Even the potion digestion could be increased by sacrificing more people in the ritual. The ritual could be used till Rank 3, Extraordinary.
Colette looked solemn when she heard that. "Do you think it was that Demigod who did it?"
"Possible. But most probably, it was His followers who were doing it," Drake said.
"Then what about it? We can not just let it leave here. Even with the guards, it is not safe," Colette asked. She didn't want the murder series to start again in the town.
"What else, let's destroy it and be done with it," Drake proposed.
"But will it be dangerous? After all, it's connected to a Demigod," Colette asked worriedly.
"For someone else, yes. But for me, no problem," Drake said dismissively.
Colette raised an eyebrow seeing his confidence but could tell it was not baseless. He looked as if he didn't care about a Demigod.
Drake had no fear. With Ivy, there was no way some lowly Demigod would find him. He opened the glass cabinet and burned the parchment with a lighter.
As the parchment burned, strange pitch-black smoke came out of it. He hurriedly pulled back Colette. As the parchment burnt to ashes, the black smoke too disappeared.
—------------
"Thank you both of you. You have protected our town from a malignant tumor. On behalf of the entire Cornfield Town, please accept my thanks," Dan said as he bowed respectively to Drake and Colette.
Drake and Colette smiled hearing his sincere gratitude.
"No problem, Dan," Colette said as he got back up.
After burning the parchment. Drake and Colette shared the loot. He gave her most of the money and the property papers but kept all weapons and some money. He sent all the weapons to his mother for her guild.
After checking one more time that they didn't leave anything else, they called Dan who came with many guards.
Everyone was shocked to the core seeing more than a hundred corpses on the floor. Drake and Colette quickly explained the situation before they assumed the worst.
The guards were even more shocked as they saw Kevin, Tyler, and Sam, especially Sam who looked like a monster. When they found that they were cultists, everyone thought that they deserved to die. Cultists were hated by all because of their crazy ways of doing things.
Dan noticed that the money and other things were missing from the gang hideout, he knew that it was Drake and Colette who had taken them, but didn't ask them to return it.
After doing all the formalities, he took them to his office to properly thank them and gave them their reward for solving the case.
As Drake and Colette were leaving the office, he stopped them.
"I will try my best to help you but the higher-ups will not like that such contrabands are in the hands of civilians. So, lay low for a while," Dan reminded. He didn't ask them how they got the guns but advised them to stay under the radar for a while.
They nodded gratefully and left the town guards' office.
Outside the office, two motorbikes were parked. One of them belonged to Drake and the other was Colette's. They stopped in front of the bikes.
"I guess this is goodbye," Drake remarked with a smirk.
"I guess it is," Colette replied, her smirk mirroring his.
"It was great working with you, detective," Drake said.
"Likewise, detective," Colette responded.
He extended his hand, and she reached out, clasping it firmly as they exchanged a final handshake.
With a sudden and unexpected motion, Colette leaned in and planted a quick peck on Drake's right cheek before swiftly mounting her bike.
"Hope to see you soon, Drake," she called out over the revving engine as she embarked on another adventure.
Drake chuckled softly and said, "Hope to see you soon, Colette."
—------------
"Lord Bishop, one of the pawns placed in the Ravencrest Territory has been compromised," a figure draped in a black cloak informed the man seated, his chair turned away.
"Was he discovered by an Extraordinary?" the bishop inquired, his voice echoing authority.
"No," the cloaked man hesitated but relayed the acquired news, "He was killed by two mortals".
"They were armed with guns," he added, placing a file on the table.
"The loss of a single pawn does not derail our plan. Ensure its flawless execution. When it is accomplished, we shall emerge once more," the bishop commanded.
"Yes, Lord Bishop," the cloaked figure acknowledged before respectfully exiting the chamber.
As he departed, a sudden gust of wind swept through the closed room, causing the pages of the file to flutter and settle on a particular page. The page had snapshots of Drake and Colette sitting in the inn dining area.