Killing

Sitting on a reclining chair in the bedroom, Ethan started thinking about his next steps.

'As I have Charles' memories, I possess information regarding three wild Beyonders currently situated in Backlund. Those were targets Charles intended to kill after advancing to Sequence 8.' While thinking, Ethan started to organize his remaining complete sets of clothes, storing the two of them in the wardrobe.

'The targets were two men and a woman, from the Sleepless, Corpse Collector, and Spectator pathways respectively. They were people Charles wished to kill to sell the respective formulas and characteristics later.' Having finished storing the clothes in the wardrobe, Ethan left the room and descended down the stairs.

'The two men are brothers, they became Beyonders by using an inheritance their father, a man that had some connections to Charles' businesses, left them behind. The woman, on the other hand, is a famous actress in The Parrot's Elysium theater, the methods she used to become a Beyonder unknown.'

Reaching his house's front door, Ethan opened it and left the place, still carrying his suitcase with him. He then started walking towards the commercial area of North Borough.

'Considering both brothers reside in West Borough, it might prove difficult to kill them discreetly and rapidly leave the scene. The woman, however, lived a few streets away from The Parrot's Elysium, located in Cherwood Borough.'

Reaching the commercial area in North Borough in just a few minutes, Ethan entered a famous restaurant in the area, spending 17 soli for a good meal. After doing so, he started walking back in his house's direction

Standing in front of his house, Ethan produced his pocket watch and took a look, "9:46pm"

'At this hour, I doubt that lady would still be working, today's Tuesday after all, she must be going, or have already gone, to her home. Uhhh… I think this is a good opportunity.'

Before, Ethan might have loathed the idea of killing an innocent human being, but now, being an Unwinged Angel, he felt nothing, nothing besides the craving for the Spectator's powers.

Walking for some time, Ethan came to the street that housed The Parrot's Elysium, following a few streets after that, he finally found a small terrace house with blue windows.

The house's lights were off, and its curtains were closed. Looking at it for a few seconds, Ethan relied on his keen instincts to observe if there was anyone in the house.

Realizing the house was seemingly empty, or its owner might already be sleeping, Ethan came to the front door. As there was no one on the street at this moment, he had yet to don his handkerchief upon his face.

Using his long nails, Ethan was able lockpick the door in no more than thirty seconds. Firmly holding the door so as it wouldn't produce any sounds, Ethan soundlessly stepped inside.

Walking through the place, Ethan started to look for the main bedroom, after opening a few doors, he was finally able to find it.

Within the main bedroom confines, there were two people sleeping on the bed, one was a bronze skinned youngster, seemingly from Midseashire, and the other was a pure Loenese middle-aged woman, they were seemingly completely naked.

Seeing this scene, Ethan's expression didn't change in the least, he still soundlessly walked to the bed, coming close to the middle-aged woman.

Thinking of the best way to conduct the assassination, Ethan suddenly had an idea. He extended his pale palm towards the youngster's forehead, hovering it above him.

Ethan maintained this position for more than thirty minutes before he retracted his hand.

During this period, a few minutes after Ethan extended his palm, the youngster became increasingly restless, his whole body started sweating profusely and he continuously moved his head.

If not for Ethan's efforts to keep him in place, the middle-aged woman might have even woken up directly.

After retracting his palm, Ethan came to the middle-aged woman's side once more, extending his forefinger towards her forehead.

"Don't blame me for this." With the tip of Ethan's long, black nail touching the woman's forehead, he murmured these words.

Right when the woman's eyes shot up open and she was about to flail in subconscious self-defense, Ethan's nail pierced her forehead, his finger burrowing deep into her skull.

Her eyes were filled with an intense fear before her quick death. Waiting a few minutes for the Beyonder characteristic to manifest, Ethan finally saw what he wanted.

From the hole he made in the woman's skull, a wrinkled gray ball of flesh formed, seemingly made out of brain matter.

Picking the gray ball, Ethan directly took it into his mouth, swallowing it whole.

With the woman's humanity to cope with the mental imprints of the characteristic, Ethan didn't get to experience its origins, he, however, acquired all of the woman's memories, but they paled in value when compared to Charles'.

After completely absorbing all of the woman's memories, Ethan retched for a few seconds, throwing up the gray ball a moment later.

He now had all the powers of a Spectator and the woman's memories.

"After consuming her characteristic, I felt a strong sense of imbalance in my body, it was like a third of it was being weighed down."

Thinking about the previous experience, Ethan left the room and came to the woman's kitchen. After picking up a knife that seemed to have a similar width to his finger, he returned to the bedroom.

Piercing the same place on the woman's forehead with the knife, Ethan left it there. Turning his back to the body, he started leaving the bedroom.

After coming to the front door that he left unlocked before, Ethan opened it and left the house, locking the door with his fingernails once again.

After walking a certain distance from the house, Ethan raised his left hand and *SNAP, snapped his fingers.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" An indescribable shriek suddenly rang from the house he just left, it wasn't a shriek of fear though. No, it should be described as a scream of pure, undeniable anger.

Ethan knew that after he left this place, the youngster would wake up in, at most, a few hours. And he might then seek the police.

But what if instead of waiting the kid to wake up, he simply infused him with some false traumas using the his Curse of Insanity?

By then, the ones that would call the police would be the neighbors.

And when the police finally arrived, they would come to find the bronze skinned youngster continuously stabbing the middle-aged woman with the knife Ethan left behind.

They would see that man, that young man with most of his life still ahead of him, consumed by a dark, corruptive, and demonic madness. A madness that no common man should ever have to come across in their lives.

And were the authorities to use any form of divination to ascertain the matter, they would receive the same result: a poor young man, having been abused by a terrible lady, lost his mind thanks to the trauma, ending up killing her in a fit of his own insanity.

…

Having succeeded splendidly in his assassination, Ethan returned to his home, calmly strolling in the soothing crimson moon's light.

After taking that lady's life, Ethan did not feel any pleasure, nor did he wish to repeat the things he did for the sake of doing it.

This could be seen as an anomaly by other Cold-blooded, as when a human takes this Sequence 8 potion, they are unable to restrain their corruptive thoughts.

As they become increasingly consumed by their dark side, they end up changing into beings that are indistinguishable from monsters in human skin.

Ethan, however, directly absorbed the mental imprints of all the most powerful of entities that represented the true Cold-blooded.

He understood that being an Unwinged Angel wasn't about losing yourself in pure, unrestrained desire.

It was about 'apathy'. It was about looking at the chaos around you and using it to accomplish your own goals.

An Unwinged Angel was an entity that had the apathy of a 'god' and the desires of a human, but at the end of the day, they were able to maintain their state of mind.

These beings wanted to keep looking at the world with superiority, even when being a part of it.

That's why no human could ever become a true, complete Unwinged Angel, because they aren't capable of feeling true apathy.

They would lose themselves to their deranged desires without restraint, and the measly amount of apathy wouldn't be able to help them overcome it.

Which is why Ethan was able to become a complete Unwinged Angel, a complete Cold-blooded.

Having devoured so many imprints from creatures that had such simple desires like having more food and prey, allowing these creatures to have way more apathy than desire, made Ethan absorb far too much of their cold and uncaring nature.

And that's a true 'Angel of No Wings', an entity with few, but overly corrupted desires, that sees the world it exists in with detachment, arrogance, and superiority.

Ethan would still kill others to satisfy his desires, but he has only one desire worth killing for: power.

If something will give him power, if something will give him the ability to overcome this world's laws, he'll kill for that something.

Ethan concluded this desire for power comes from the imprints of the potion he consumed.

Every time he takes a potion or Beyonder characteristic, he'll acquire something more than just the powers in it.

Every time, he would consume a part of that which he eats, altering himself in the process. When he consumed Charles' characteristic, he absorbed the powers and memories in it, the same with the characteristic of the Spectator woman known as Elaine.

But when he drinks a potion directly, he'll consume the acting principles of the potion itself, devouring everything that makes that potion have the name it has.

And the most apparent desire that existed in the potion, the thing that made most of the characteristic previous possessors kill for, was power.

These beings wanted to bend the laws of the world, they wanted to restrain the entire world to their own will, and not the other way around.

That's why Ethan killed that woman with no hesitation, that's why he told her not to blame him.

"You should blame this world for its disregard for the weak. For its intense corruption and impossible to overcome rules. You should blame having become a Beyonder." Having reached his doorstep, Ethan proceeded to open the door, coming inside and closing it behind him.

"But at the end of the day, even if you blame me… It's in my nature to not care."