First Dead Supervillain
Almost a quarter of the Velan kingdom was outside the Adventurer Guild. In addition to the Velan citizens, countless silver and blue armored soldiers surrounded the guild from all directions.
Many carriages were stationed near the building while many were still approaching the building as fast as they could. The vicinity of the adventurer guild was chaotic, many people were murmuring constantly like bees, soldiers were placing barricades made of wood and metal and lastly, the king of Velan sent a platoon of fully armored knights with cannons.
The carriages and the citizens stood several yards away from the barricade and the adventurer guild. From one of the carriages, a young girl with striking red hair stepped out, followed by a young man carrying a blue tubular-shaped crystal in his hand. He was pointing one end of the crystal toward the girl. The girl was dressed in glistening blue robes. She had an oval face, porcelain skin, and a perfect hourglass figure.
"Give me the enhancer" the girl rushed the blonde young man as he took out a palm-sized orb from his pockets before handing it over to the girl
"Are you ready? How do I look? How's my hair?" the girl was bombarding the guy with questions,
"You look great Palm"
The girl who was named Palmela tapped the orb as the pearl white orb changed its color from white to emerald green,
"The enhancer is online" Palmela talked into the orb and just as she did that, the youngster tapped his right ear,
"Copy, works great"
Despite its look, the tubular-shaped crystal was very heavy. The youngster's veins on his arms bulged up when he placed the crystal on his shoulder.
The girl's playful smile quickly disappeared and in its place, a serious frown appeared. The frown wasn't the only thing that newly appeared, a holographic image of the girl standing outside the Adventurer guild surfaced from the ground and hovered in the air above the people.
Several holographic images resembling Palmela's materialized all over the air and each of them had someone carrying the same emerald green orb as Palmela. Some were young men, some were young girls but most of them were girls.
"This is Palmela of Daily News. We are live from Velan's adventurer guild. As the number one news source of Velan, we have a special pass to access the building along with the special unit soldiers' ' the girl reported while walking towards the building. The cameraman followed her behind with the crystal on his shoulder,
Just like Pamela, several other reporters were also reporting the news to their viewers. However, only Pamela's organization, the Daily News, had the special pass to accompany the special unit soldiers into the guild building.
"Maam, you can't go any further," a silver armored soldier who was standing behind the wooden barricade stopped Palmela,
"We have a pass sir" the young man took out a crimson red card from the shirt pocket. When the soldier saw the red card, he recognized its value. Therefore, he moved aside, letting Palmela and the cameraman inside.
The citizens who were watching the other live feeds changed their gaze to Palmela's feed.
"Miss Pamela is going inside!"
"Finally!"
"What happened inside?"
"Where are the adventurers?"
"I hope Black Knight appears'
The people started to chit chatter louder. Pamela's voice overpowered the chaotic chatter. Pamela walked through the gap between the barricades.
"The special unit is getting ready. I think they are going to break into the building in a few minutes" Palmela pointed at the completely armored soldiers near the cannon. They were rolling the cannon towards the guild door. Even with twelve soldiers pushing it, the cannon moved extremely slowly. It indicated the heaviness of the cannon.
The special unit of soldiers was formed of the best of the best soldiers in the kingdom. They had to go through deadly and rigorous training programs before getting admitted to the special unit. Each soldier in the special unit could fight a special human and some of the senior soldiers would even fight an Enhanced human.
The soldiers were armored from head to toe, in front of them, Pamela looked small because each of the soldiers was taller and bulkier than an average human.
As though they were instructed earlier, one of the soldiers handed Pamela a thin metal vest to put on when she came to them.
"Maam, please wear this. You too sir"
Ths soldier passed on another thin metal vest to the cameraman,
After the two of them wore the metal vest, the soldiers started to move slowly toward the main doors. The crowd chatter slowly died down due to the excitement. Everyone saw the special unit soldiers, Pamela, and the cameraman standing outside the door. The oak wooden doors were shut as they fixed the cannon just an inch away from the door.
"Anyone in there?!" One of the soldiers knocked on the door. As expected, they received no response
"Get ready to blast this door open"
"We are just a few steps away from the guild," Pamela reported, moving behind the armored soldiers just to be safe,
"We are still a few minutes away from learning what happened to the adventurers inside. Our sources told us that moments before the patrolling soldier alerted the barracks, the Clown was seen flying the building"
The citizens immediately gasped after hearing the name 'The Clown'.
Many who had smiles on their faces lost their smiles instantly.
"Maam stay behind and close your ears" the soldiers before Pamela alerted her.
Then a soldier lit the cannon's fuse,
"Any moment now viewers"
BOOM!
The cannon blasted the oak door to smithereens, creating a cloud of dust, wooden pieces, and dust that blocked their view of the guild's hall. The cloud settled down after a few moments but the moment they saw what was inside, the soldiers were startled.
"Follow me to the inside viewers" Pamela followed the soldiers inside, only to see the most gruesome scene she had ever seen. Everyone who was watching Pamela's feet felt a chill running through their spines.
"That's…That's…Argh"
"Oh my god, is that SCARFACE?!"
"No way!"
The citizens gasped in utter shock. The famous villain who was terrorizing the Velan Kingdom for almost a decade was hanging by his neck from the ceiling above a pile of dead bodies. However, none of the citizens could recognize Scarface by his face because there was no face. His head was caved in and he was beyond recognizable.
Pamela was taken aback by the sickening scene and the pungent smell of blood and gore.
"Zoom in, Zoo in on that body" Still, Pamela controlled her urge to throw up. She asked the cameraman to focus on Scarface.
"Defensive perimeters!"
The armored soldiers formed a defensive perimeter pronto.
"What is that?" Pamela pointed at the ceiling directly above Scarface,
"Scarface…" Pamela read the words written on the ceiling in red and soon, Pamela realized that it was not red paint, it was blood.
Flies and other flying tiny rodents were swarming the mount of dead bodies, emanating a low-pitched buzzing sound.
"Are you seeing this? It says Scarface…is he really the Scarface?" Pamela emphasized the word 'The'. Not only Pamela but every single citizen and soldier was stunned.
"The adventurers, are they dead too? Here here here…the soldier is trying to check on this adventurer" Pamela cautiously moved near the soldier who was squatting beside an unconscious adventurer,
"He has a pulse"
"She too"
"They are alive"
The soldiers whispered to each other,
"These are definitely Clown's men, the question is, is he really the Scarface? His body…" Pamela swallowed a mouth full of saliva, trying to calm herself down,
"Sweep the building and expect trouble" the soldier who led the team whispered to him,
"Maam, stay behind me" the soldier before Pamela was tasked with protecting Pamela and the cameraman so he stayed with the duo instead of searching the building.
Meanwhile, Pamela and the camera ma slowly captured everything around them,
"It seems like they were slaughtered. Who did this? Was there another supervillain here? Or was there another team?"
The citizens felt their stomachs churn looking at the gruesome display,
While capturing the pile of dead bodies, Pamela noticed the soldiers returning to the hall. In a couple of minutes, all the soldiers gathered in the hall once again. This time, their bodies were less tensed,
"We swept the building sir. We found no one, all these adventurers are alive, they are knocked out. It seems the Clown's work"
Pamela stood a couple of meters away from the soldiers, transmitting everything the soldiers were talking about,
"Sir we need to alert the king"
"And UFH. They were massacred by something inhuman. What if we have a new supervillain in our kingdom now?"
"Definitely a supervillain or a rogue mercenary team"
"I hope it's the latter. The last thing we need is another supervillain running around massacring people"
The soldiers were speculating,
"We have a job to do, bring the ladder and get him down. If it's the Scarface, we have a shit storm to face" the leader ordered the soldiers,
Pamela walked to one of the dead bodies. She was nauseated by the blood and gore, but still, she kept her game face. She was a newbie to the journalist job but she was a trained journalist nonetheless.
"All of their skulls were broken, it seems like the killer or the killers used some kind of blunt heavy weapon" Pamela looked around to find a broken club,
"Maybe this" Pamela poked the club,
"Take these adventurers outside and call the healers" the leader of the soldiers ordered another soldier,
Half an hour later, more and more soldiers, as well as citizens from every part of the kingdom, arrived at the square. Pamela recorded everything from the soldiers dragging out the adventurers to the healers to cleaning the bodies out. Finally, a soldier brought down a steel ladder to bring the last body down. The chatter dimmed out when the soldier was climbing the ladder to cut the ropes hooked into the body's back.
"Focus" Pamela ordered the cameraman as she walked closer to the scene,
"We are only a few seconds away from confirming the identity of this body viewers" She quickly pointed at the entrance as several women dressed in green robes strolled into the hallway wearing masks,
"The healers are here"
The cameraman followed the women to the body which had been finally brought down by the soldier,
"Sir, we have a note inside his pocket" the soldier's words drew everyone's attention right away,
Pamela ran towards the body but since the healers and soldiers were surrounding the body, she had to stand on tiptoe to get a better view,
She could barely see the soldier take a bloodied yellow piece of paper out of Scarface's inner pocket
The cameraman tapped the crystal as the citizens outside saw the letter written on the bloodied note,
'The cleansing has begun'
The citizens read the words with a heavy heart. Bad feelings churned in their guts reading those words. They were already stunned, what they heard from the healers next, was the banger of all,
"It's Minster Reagan Masters"
Minister Reagan Masters was Scarface's former identity before he went crazy and turned into a supervillain.
"It's confirmed!" Pamela immediately shouted,
"Breaking news kingdom Velan, Former Ministers Reagan Masters AKA The Scarface has been confirmed dead. Whoever killed him remains a mystery"
The entire kingdom was thrown into chaos in a couple of seconds. Every single citizen who saw the live news feed was terrified though some, however, celebrated. These were the victims and their families of the Scarface,
"What does this mean for Velan? Do we have another supervillain in our midst? Or the Clown was responsible for this? What does it mean 'the cleansing has begun?' Does this mean the killings are going to continue?" Pamela walked around the hall covering everything while bombarding the citizens with questions,
"And we all have to ask…" She paused, looking directly at the crystal as though she was talking to each and every citizen,
"Where is the Black Knight?"