68 Hollow

"Oh dear, I've been called many names but 'animal' is new. I quite like the 'monster' and 'savage' names these children called me as I tore their friends apart in front of them…" Giddy and ecstatic, the man bent over, his hands shaking from the bliss of the memory.

"You will never be forgiven."

"Who says I'm looking for forgiveness? I'm a thrill seeker, a tempter of morals. One who has reached an elevated plane!"

Haven stared at the man with disgust. How can someone be so twisted and cruel while believing that slaughtering innocent children as a form of art? Reaching to her wrist, Haven issued her orders to the teachers on standby outside.

"I've made contact. Alert all staff in the surrounding area to gather at the first year's dorms."

"Calling for back up? Are you that scared?" The man's mocking tone didn't faze Haven.

"Just calling people to clean up your corpse after I'm done."

Haven lunged at the man, her fist like a bullet. He dodged her punch easily while swinging his leg around to Haven's head. The kick was blocked by a strong invisible force. The man's eyes gleamed with joy at Haven's slyphir surrounding her.

"Ah, how beautiful. Maybe this time I can test my powers a bit?"

Countering with his own punch, the man coated his hand in dense layers of slyphir. Haven tried to avoid his hand but the head of one of the children managed to roll off from the pyramid due to the vibrating shockwaves of their fight. It rolled and stopped at her leg, the mouth of the child pulled into a sick smile. Haven shuddered and felt the man's grip around her arm.

"You-"

The man twisted Haven's arm and used his legs to knock Haven to the floor.

"An old woman like you won't be a match for me."

Haven clenched her arm, and the slyphir surrounding her became denser, it's color turning a deep green, the color of a dense forest.

"Green? Well, color me surprised!" Tilting his head back, the man laughed at his own terrible joke. "But 'green' won't be enough to beat me." From the man a milky purple mist surrounded him. Haven saw the light purple hue and couldn't hold herself back from laughing either.

"Ha, to have a purple color yet still so underdeveloped, are you sure it isn't a false blue?"

The man's face twitched. He increased his grip on Haven's arm but it wouldn't move.

"You, what are you doing?"

"Just a little warm up…" Haven easily freed her arm from the man's grip and pushed a palm out towards his chest. The man used both arms to block it but the small gap created was enough for Haven to leap away.

"So, it was just a bluff?"

Haven shook her head slightly, cracking her knuckles and stretching her arms.

"It's been awhile so I forgot to stretch. By the way, I never caught your name?"

The man sneered.

"Listen closely and listen well. I am A-"

"Just kidding, no one cares."

Haven leapt at the man again, her whole body covered in dense green slyphir. The man parried with his own milky purple slyphir, the blows shaking the halls.

Slowly, Haven began to push the man back. Her combat experience and slyphir control vastly exceeded that of the killer's. Where he prepared a feint, Haven was already attacking his weak spot. When he tried to collect his slyphir, Haven would expand enough of her own to disrupt his. Soon the man began to feel his slyphir running low, his body unable to keep up with Haven's techniques.

"Getting tired are you? You can't even beat an old lady like me, maybe that's why you prey on weak children."

Haven flicked her head to dodge a punch. She wrapped her arm around his and curled her body downwards, pulling the man down suddenly. As she kicked him away Haven noticed the purple hue fading from the man's body.

"Come on, it that all you got?" Haven walked over and picked up the man's head by his hair. "Don't blank on me yet, we've only gotten started." She punched his face hard enough to push his body to the wall. Walking over, Haven collected slyphir on her fist.

"Come on. Come on!"

Her fist brutally collided with the man's face. Again and again, each time her fist bloodier than the last. The man didn't move, his body sliding with each of Haven's punches.

Haven spat at the man.

"All that talk and this is it? Pathetic." Haven held her wrist communicator close. "This is Haven, I've subdued the target. Requesting a prison car with restraints for a transcendent low tier purple… Copy that, I will remain on standby." Haven switched off her comms and glanced at the man's body but something about it put her off. As she stared at it longer, his torso looked unusually large, his arms seemed longer as well.

She kicked him once and found that his chest gave in easily. Bending down, she placed two fingers to his nose.

Nothing.

He wasn't breathing but Haven could see the slight rise and fall of the man's chest. In the silent hallway, she could even hear his dry breathing.

"What's going on?" Feeling the unease growing, Haven released her slyphir once again. Expanding it around her till it filled the hallway. Since she was a Bane, expanding her slyphir far from her body was difficult. Something else in the hallway moved.

Haven surged her slyphir at the spot next to the window and found that it was repelled by something. Retracting her slyphir, Haven dashed to the spot and punched with her whole body. All at once, she felt a quick breeze of slyphir fly past her, her fist breaking something.

Confused, Haven stared behind her and saw the man she had previously beaten up leaning nonchalantly on the wall, his look the same as when she first found him. Clapping slowly, the man smiled.

"Well done! To think you'd break through this despite being one color lower, truly beautiful. Although, I'm also quite horrified by your brutality…" The man shook his head while clicking his tongue. "Those poor children. Even after death, they had to be mangled further… now my work is destroyed."

Haven looked back at where the man's body should've been and saw the grotesque pile of dismembered children had been smashed apart. Their skulls caved in, brain matter splattered. Haven looked at her shaking hands and realized that bits of their brains still covered her hands.

"N-no, I-I…" The weight of the children's blood suffocated Haven.

"And just so you know, I'm more of a Ghost than a Bane..."

Haven roared and lunged at the man. He swiftly dodged her mad strike and sidestepped her. Using one hand to punch at Haven's side. She felt the rock like fist twist into her side. The man's knuckles pushing hard against her ribs.

Falling to the floor, Haven tried to stand but found that the man's slyphir had changed from a milky purple to a stable magenta color. He pressed one foot on her back, his slyphir easily breaking Haven's.

"You were never my match." The man kicked Haven to flip her over. "Although I don't really like killing old women, you seem to have sparked inspiration in me! I think I'll call it 'Melancholia'. What do you think?"

Haven groaned and tried to move away but the man placed his foot on her chest, lining it with the middle of her ribcage. Haven felt like a mountain was standing on her.

Was all her efforts to train and strengthen her body useless? She believed that working harder than anyone else would allow her to overcome the barrier between slyphir levels, to break the norm of low-class colors being weak. To prove that color couldn't compare to diligence.

Gritting her teeth, Haven tried to raise her arms but the man's magenta slyphir pressed her down.

"Trying to move will only hasten your death. Now, how should I do this? Should I fan out your insides on the wall, sprouting from your severed head? Or maybe I'll do the opposite…" The man was in deep though about how to display Haven's corpse.

Haven spit out the glob of congested blood in her throat.

"You never told me your name…"

"Oh, now you want to know? Well, I guess it can be my last act of pity for you. Adler Reeves, the 'Reaper of the Hollow' as you guys like to call me." Adler smiled,with his back against the disappearing sun, his smile resembled a demon's.

Haven's body froze, fear quickening her heartbeat. Involuntarily, Haven's face paled. Not due to the pressure on her chest but because the man standing on top of her was an infamous serial killer chased around the continents.

His first kill was recorded in Jorgororo, an entire family murdered and displayed like kebabs, a scythe painted above them. The next one was in a neighboring country of the first kill. An entire tavern of people disappeared only to be found sticking out from the ceiling of an abandoned church nearby. His third kill in Jorgororo was one of the nobles in charge of chasing him down. The noble's family was slaughtered and served on bloodied platters.

As he moved on to Seruin, his crimes only piled higher and higher. Not even the land of dragons and dwarves was safe. Even elves were hunted by Adler.

His nickname given to him by his characteristic of hollowing out the insides of his kills, no matter who they were nor how small the body was.