Ethan's laughter reverberated through the air, each note clawing into Stefen's mind. It wasn't just laughter, it was taunting, chilling, and relentless, sending him spiraling into a fury he couldn't control. With every echo, his rage intensified, and he felt his magic respond. He raised his hand, channeling his anger into a crimson spear of blood magic, the spell thrumming with black energy as it began to take form.
Just then, a voice slipped into Stefen's ear, mocking whispers tinged with madness.
"What are you looking at, you clown?"
Stefen whipped around, only to see Ethan grinning, face painted in grotesque clown makeup. His eyes rolled back, a magical gleam dancing in them as he stood nonchalantly, hands resting in his pockets. Before Stefen could react, Ethan moved, his body blurring into motion as he performed a bone-crushing axe kick to the back of Stefen's head. The impact forced Stefen through the floor, shattering it as he plummeted, his mind reeling with confusion.
'How did he…' He couldn't complete the thought as pain flooded his senses.
Ethan's laughter followed him down, a twisted melody of insanity. Once the weakest among them, Ethan was now overpowering Stefen with ease, pushing him further and further into fear.
Just before Stefen could hit the ground, his descent halted as he fell directly into Ethan's arms. Ethan held him there with an unsettling grin that stretched impossibly wide across his face, smudged with both makeup and blood.
"♫Hush little baby♫…" Ethan sang softly, a haunting lullaby that dripped with malicious intent.
With a sudden motion, he hurled Stefen through the air. Stefen barely registered the looming outline of the train before his body slammed into it with bone-cracking force.
CRASH!
"♫Don't you cry♫…" Ethan's voice sang on, sweet yet sinister, filling the silence left by Stefen's painful collision.
Somewhere nearby, Haydon wakes up, groggy and disoriented. He blinked, trying to make sense of the sight in front of him. Ethan, back turned, laughing as if he were possessed. Haydon staggered forward as he reached out, intending to place a hand on Ethan's shoulder to calm him, to understand what was happening.
But before he could, Ethan whipped around, his face twisted in a look of pure menace, eyes gleaming as he spoke in a low, mocking tone.
"Sit still," Ethan commanded.
Haydon's eyes widened, frozen by the sudden malice in Ethan's voice. In that instant, Ethan vanished, reappearing on the other side of the train, chuckling with an unsettling ease.
"Aww… he ran away," Ethan sighed, sounding disappointed, his expression slipping into one feigned boredom.
"It's a shame. I was just starting to have fun."
With that, he pulled several small objects from nowhere (smoke bombs) and started juggling them playfully.
One slipped from his grasp, hitting the ground with a Bang!
Releasing a thick cloud of smoke that obscured his face. When the smoke cleared, Ethan looked around, his face now free of the clown makeup, bewildered and coughing, completely unaware of what had just happened.
Meanwhile, in a vast, inescapable darkness, Blake Morningstar was irritated at his surroundings. This shadow prison was endless, stretching as far as he could see in every direction.
"I'm just gonna cook up a new ability called prison break real quick!" Totally bluffing, hoping they can hear him.
After the bizarre incident, Ethan woke up to find himself in The Agency, carrying a heavily injured Haydon. He stumbled, nearly collapsing as he dragged Haydon to the medical wing, depositing him onto a bed. The effort drained him, and he finally succumbed to his own injuries, collapsing to the floor as medics rushed in, lifting him onto the adjacent bed. Toki, too, would need extra time to heal after the brutal encounters they'd all endured.
Several weeks later, recovery magic had worked its wonders. Kai, Ethan, and Haydon were back to full health.
Fritz and Tatsuo decided it was time to interrogate Blake Morningstar, now captured and secured in a shadow prison. In the dimly lit room Fritz places the shadow prison on the table before him.
"Release," he commanded.
In an instant, Blake Morningstar appeared, sprawled across the table, Fritz wasted no time, grabbing him by the collar and slamming him down into a chair. Blake let out a mocking laugh, barely fazed, and raised an eyebrow at hostile glares surrounding him.
"Whoa, settle down there. Take it easy," Blake sneered, his eyes meeting Fritz's with a taunting spark.
As Blake moved to resist, Tatsuo raised his hand, weaving magic that pinned Blake in place.
"Tell us everything you know about demons, Stefen and Lucifer," Tatsuo demanded his voice ice cold.
The interrogation dragged on, but Blake's answers were evasive, offering little useful information. Realising that Blake knew next to nothing, Tatsuo and Fritz finally released him, warning him to leave before their patience ran out.
In another part of The Agency, Kai trained alone, his fists hitting the practice dummy with ferocious intensity. The recent events weighed heavily on him, it had highlighted how helpless he was in that life or death situation, this helplessness was stinging worse than any wound. He ran away in battle, but he vowed that would never happen again. No more hiding, he would stand by his friends, no matter the cost. Fueled by determination, he continued training, honing his combat with single minded focus.
After several hours, Tatsuo entered and spoke as Kai continued training
"There's something I forgot to tell you," Tatsuo said, his expression unreadable.
"It's about fourteen abilities, seven of which belong to The Seven Deadly Sins, and the other seven to The Seven Heavenly Virtues."
Kai stopped training as Tatsuo explained. "The Seven Deadly Sins were created by Lucifer, While The Seven Heavenly Virtues were crafted by Isiah, a spirit equal in power to Lucifer himself. They forged these abilities for their servants, mirroring their personalities, for the battles that would tear the world apart and split it into the continents we know today."
Tatsuo's voice took on an ominous tone. "When those servants died, their abilities lived on, finding new masters who shared their same traits."