Bang!
After the gunshot rang out, one of the Red Gloves was struck down by his own comrade and collapsed to the ground.
Seeing that his ability had worked, Lewis Wien no longer hesitated, and once again unleashed the same trick, using his "Invisible Hand" to seize control of another Red Glove, attempting to turn him against the others.
However, the Red Gloves quickly caught on to what he was doing. Not only did they swiftly restrain that member, they also pulled out a line of men and unleashed a volley of gunfire at him through the window.
Bang bang bang bang!
Bullets shattered the glass and shot toward Lewis, but the cloak wrapped around his body took effect at that instant, surging up to shield him immediately. The bullets landed on the cloak with soft thuds, entirely absorbed by it.
"Heh..."
Mr. X gave a light chuckle, and in that instant, an illusory book appeared reflected in his eyes, its pages slowly turning.
At the same time, his lips parted, and he spoke a lofty, elusive incantation of arcane depth: "I came, I saw, I recorded."
The Recorder!
The pages of the book slowly came to rest on a certain page, and in that moment, Lewis's presence surged dramatically.
The bloody scent clinging to the cloak grew ever more intense, making him look less like a "Traveler" and more like a "Shepherd"!
Whoosh...
The blood-red cloak writhed rapidly, gathering into a mass under his direction, and then he hurled it straight down at the crowd below.
Flesh and Blood Bomb!
Lewis watched with delight as the expressions on the Red Gloves' faces turned to terror.
The ball of flesh slowly split apart in the air, as if in slow motion, and from its center burst a violent shockwave.
With a boom, a huge chunk of the ground and street in front of the building was gouged out. Around the edge of the crater, many mutilated Red Gloves lay writhing in agony.
That single strike from Lewis had brought about massive casualties, and his confidence swelled. He thought the elites of the Church of Evernight amounted to nothing more than this. Even having the spirit world sealed off didn't seem like such a big deal.
Just then, he suddenly heard a voice.
It was a furious roar, laced with a terrifying, corrupting sense of erosion that tempted one toward depravity.
Just hearing it made one's soul tremble from deep within. Lewis was naturally quite familiar with this voice: it belonged to the "Saint Tenebrous" Kisma.
But familiar or not, he still couldn't withstand the erosive sensation carried within it, and immediately clapped his hands over his ears, feeling unbearable pain.
Then, right after,
Crack!
A crisp sound, like glass hitting the floor, rang out beside Lewis as some illusory thing shattered.
...
He opened his eyes and found that, at some point without realizing it, he had fallen asleep.
Outside, there was no trace of any explosion whatsoever. The street lay smooth and undisturbed as always.
The room was completely empty, and the people who had attended the gathering had all vanished, seemingly having fled sometime earlier.
So everything that had just happened was nothing more than a dream he'd had?
If not for the voice of the "Saint Tenebrous," he'd probably still be caught inside that dream!
Lewis's fury surged. He felt as though he'd been made a fool of.
He lifted his head and noticed that, at some point, two visitors had appeared in the room: a young man with black hair and green eyes, and a lady with blue eyeshadow at the corners of her eyes. The two of them were watching him warily.
"Aaaaah!"
Meanwhile, outside the window, Kisma was still roaring furiously.
Clad in black armor, he looked like a small black giant, and every swing of the massive blade in his hand cleaved apart whatever it touched with ease.
The Red Gloves were forced to keep their distance from him, and only the deacon leading them still stood his ground against him.
Though the "Saint Tenebrous's" presence was overwhelming, he seemed to have found himself in a difficult spot. That deacon, despite bearing the corrupting erosion, was somehow trading blow for blow with him.
I need to get to him quickly...
Lewis thought, and was just about to activate his "Flash" ability to descend, when he felt the space around him solidify, and only then did he remember that the surrounding spirit world had been sealed off.
But if he couldn't flash his way down, the only way out of the room was the single door in front of him.
He had just taken one step forward when he abruptly froze.
Whoosh!
An icy, bone-chilling presence brushed past in front of him: an invisible malevolent spirit, one that carried the most intense hostility toward living beings. Missing its strike, it immediately reversed direction and lunged at Lewis once more.
The one controlling the malevolent spirit was, naturally, none other than Miss Daly.
Bang bang!
Beside her, Leonard drew his revolver and fired shot after shot at Mr. X. Not only had Lewis failed to make a quick escape downward, he had once more been dragged into a grueling battle.
Damn it... this is all because of that bastard Botis. If he hadn't suddenly left, how could we have ended up in this state!
Lewis thought furiously.
What in the world was that guy off doing!
...
Meanwhile, near the Backlund train station, inside a hotel across from the station.
Knock knock, knock knock knock.
Fors stopped in front of a guest room and knocked in the rhythmic pattern of a prearranged signal.
A few seconds later, with a creak, the door opened from the inside. A man of medium build stood behind the door, his hair combed back, his arms absurdly muscular. He stepped aside to let her in, then quickly shut the door.
This man was none other than Fors's teacher, Dorian Gray.
"Teacher, why have you suddenly come?"
The moment Fors stepped into the room, she couldn't help but ask right away. She herself hadn't noticed that her voice carried a faint trace of unease.
Yes, Dorian's arrival really couldn't have come at a worse time.
Mr. Temperance was in the middle of surrounding and wiping out Mr. X and his men.
Instead of receiving the good news that the battle had concluded smoothly, she'd gotten an urgent message from Dorian instead. He had actually already arrived in Backlund, and intended to meet with her.
This was turning out to be more than a little awkward.
She knew all too well just how cautious a man Dorian was.
If he happened to run into Mr. Temperance today by surprise, the situation could easily spiral out of control.
And there was also the matter of Mr. World wanting to extend goodwill, which she still hadn't figured out how to convey tactfully to the other party.
Fors worried that the presence of those two would deal too great a shock to Dorian, causing him to turn and flee, never to appear again.
"I had to come."
Dorian's expression was grave. "Because my divination turned up bad news. It's about you."
"Me?"
Fors froze for a moment.
"That's right... The result of the divination shows that you're about to face great danger. Someone has their eye on you!"
Dorian said. He cared deeply for his outstanding disciple, and after divining this unexpected result, he had rushed over without a moment's hesitation. "So, do you have any idea what kind of crisis is looming over you?"
Any idea...
Fors was blank for a moment, then suddenly grew alert.
This recent crisis, it couldn't have something to do with the Aurora Order, could it?