Chapter 124

"The first person to tell me where the scientist is keeps their head," the Cambion said.

My bleeding hand bubbled as muscles rejoined, bone mended, and flesh covered them. The process cost me a chunk of my strength, but we were determined to buy as much time as Banner needed to power down the reactor and set up our bait with Mystique.

"You didn't think it would be that easy, did you?"

"We don't negotiate with terrorists," the Captain firmly said.

The Cambion narrowed his eyes, and I felt a shiver run down my spine. He didn't seem like the type to bluff, but I remained resolute, as did he, apparently.

His hands blurred, and it happened. Two blades of shadow struck out, nearly too fast for the Cap and I to dodge. Cap shifted to his left, letting the hit slide off his shield while I swung, punting the sword to the side.

It was a big mistake.

Six blades of darkness struck out of my shadow faster than I could blink, spearing through my hide armor like tissue paper.

The pain made me wish I'd insisted on something sturdier, but my armor slowed the most dangerous ones down enough to ensure my survival.

Four went through each of my limbs, the fifth one through my stomach, and the sixth was supposed to go through my heart, but it stopped just shy of it.

"Kid!" 

The Captain staggered back in surprise, staring the Cambion and then at me, face white with horror. My strength fled me as energy poured into my regeneration to stymie the blood loss.

"Are you okay?"

"He's alive," The Cambion cut me off before I could answer, dismissing the Dark blades he was holding. "His horrid armor saved him. I am sorely tempted to remedy that. Resistance only wastes your time and mine, Captain America," he said. "When the countdown ends, hundreds will die if you've not yet surrendered, as will every last person in this building. It's my job to personally make sure of that."

Captain America looked genuinely conflicted. With my life on the line, he looked to be considering it--giving Banner up to the Cambion.

Large bursts of energy filled me as the rest of the team mopped up demons. It was enough to help me free myself, but I feared the Captain was hesitant to risk my life.

I shot him a look that aptly communicated how I felt, and after a long sigh, he tapped his comms, eyes meeting the Cambion's.

"He was stronger than we anticipated," he proclaimed. No response came from the other side. "Did you hear me, Natasha, Clint, Wanda, Kurt? We have to give him what he wants."

"Roger," Kurt's voice sounded on the open channel, and I internally smirked.

Kurt appeared with Wanda in tow behind him, and she swiped down, burying him in an avalanche of psychic energy, but before the attack hit, the Cambion and I locked eyes, and that was enough time for it to make good on its threat.

The darkness spear in my heart flared, finishing the job before abruptly retracting along with the remaining five. I collapsed to the floor, gasping, clenching my bleeding chest.

Wanda

"No!" I screamed as my psychic energy redoubled, and I hoisted the battered Cambion up and threw him to my left, sending him through multiple walls.

Kurt ran over to Rin, who was losing blood at a frankly astonishing rate. His wounds were trying to mend themselves, but the residual dark energy flowing within them made it an uphill battle.

"We need to kill more demons," Kurt suddenly announced, drawing his knife. "It's the only way we can save him."

"Stop," he commanded. "That asshole is the priority. I knew the risks…"

Rin coughed up blood and routed in his bandolier for something before yanking a grenade free and offering it to Kurt. "Get this up close. It will do the job."

The blue-skinned teleporter's eyes misted before he accepted it.

I looked at the strange little grenade and the kid who was about my age, grinning in the face of his death, and the grief hit me. If I had been faster, stronger…

"Tell the bossman I'm really bummed that I didn't get to try that Ultra Sword he was making for me," he said to Captain America, "And go get that son of a bitch."

The Captain looked like he had a million things to say but settled on patting him on the shoulder and facing the direction I threw the Cambion.

I was the last to pull away.

"I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault," he said. "You didn't shove the spike in me, the asshole did. Make sure it hurts when you kill him."

His last words were clear and weak, absent of all mirth. He slipped into unconsciousness as darkness blanketed the room.

Dante

Isha's startled scream ripped through the air, and she swept her giant wings, unleashing a storm of razor-sharp wind and pinions that drove the Nether fire away and banished whatever little of the purple flame remained.

The storm swept right through my intangible body as I stood there, partly surprised and disappointed by how the fight was going. Isha was conventionally faster than me, but I could see her moves before she made them, which made her predictable in the most painful ways.

It was slowly dawning upon me how absolutely busted I was becoming. In our previous fight, using Angel Evade barely mattered. She was fast enough that each dodge barely helped. Now that I could read her mind and had many supplementary techniques to boost my speed and perception considerably, her speed didn't matter. Unless she had something truly unexpected up her sleeve, fighting her would be a high-stake spar at best.

Still, I wasn't so eager to end it all. There was a lot of information to gain from reading her.

"I did try to warn you," I said idly. "I legitimately feel bad for your side if you're the best they have to offer."

"You know nothing!"

Apparently, there were hundreds upon thousands of demons in Limbo, a scant few of which had enough strength to eclipse her. Isha was also the fifth strongest Cambion.

The gulf between each runner-up was substantial. Domina was at least twice as strong as she was and number four. The Second Born, Enrique, was number three, and a kid named Minos was number two. Corvus was obviously number one.

"I'm tired of hearing you speak," she barked, flaring her claws as she charged me. My Fire Cloak and Gust swaddled me, and Osiris remained firmly on my back. Demon Energy surged out of me as I exploded forward as claws and shortswords met. Her attacks came blisteringly fast, and I rapidly juggled my skills. Moment of the Sage, Burst, Parry, and my Precision Runes worked overtime. We ate up the landscape as we fought, and I taunted.

"Is it me, or are you slower and weaker than you used to be? I guess a bullet to the chest will do that to you?"

"I'll show you weak!" She roared as she swiped her claws at me, sending six near-invisible waves of wind energy. Isha might seem enraged on the surface, but she planned three moves ahead, which worked in my favor. Much to her frustration, she'd noted that she couldn't harm me with fire anymore. Somehow, I'd become immune, and it was driving her insane.

So, she had to resort to predominantly wind attacks, relying on the blinding effects of her bright Storm fire to blind me and set up her tornado attack that was sure to weaken me.

As you can imagine, the fight went a lot differently than she envisioned.

I activated the protection runes on my chest plate and arm guards, tanking wind attack, and fired off a Nether-Fire axe head at her. The runes on my forearm guttered out immediately, and I was a bit surprised by the strength of the attack, but I pushed on.

She exploded in a blinding flash of light as I closed in, strafing to the side to dodge the axe head as she rapidly gathered wind. I went off in an explosion of Nether Fire, mirroring her attack inches from her face. Isha flew backward, but she still tanked the brunt of the attack. It scorched her skin and distorted her wings.

She ejected wind again, extinguishing the fire before she fired a tunnel of wind at me while I healed my eyes with Angel Energy.

Although I knew it was coming, the speed of the attack still surprised me, but I still managed to leap to the side with Moment of Sage, Gust, and Burst.

In a random fit of inspiration, Isha decided to switch tactics.

She fired wind attack after wind attack, forcing me to burn increasingly more energy to keep up. I noticed she kept an eye on my energy expenditure and estimated that I'd run out long before she did if I kept dodging the way I was.

Her attacks had me pressed, but honestly, I was more excited by the growth of my skills. Moment of the Sage, Burst, and Gust were going off every other second, and Gust was coming up on its Adept Tier upgrade. Telepathy was miles behind, but it was becoming more intuitive to use.

Seconds after the ordeal started, she sped up again, drowning me in razor winds and ripping the tower, the dead bodies of the demons, and the buildings nearby to shreds. I went intangible when the pressure became too much and just stood still, putting the pieces together.

She wanted me to use Angel Evade and become intangible, but why?

Looking into her mind brought answers. Isha's wings, which were blisteringly white now, had started to charge up an attack called Storm Fire Cannon, which was as dangerous as it sounded. It was a concentrated ray of Storm fire, traveling at over 32,000 miles per hour.

Her plan was to get me to tire myself and become and stay tangible long enough for her to get the attack off. She knew I had backup energy fillers like my stims, but she was banking on my mind and limited control of energy giving out before she exhausted her frankly monstrous reserves.

I considered running, but she already planned for that as well. She planned to give chase, even if it meant ripping apart the city in the process. She'd picked up on the fact that I cared for people and seemed ready to milk that as well, going as far as to cause collateral damage like her sister.

I scoffed at the entire situation. While it was true that she had me beat in the energy department, she was underestimating how long Angel Evade could hold out. Two minutes was a long time to keep firing high-energy wind projectiles. She'd run out sooner than she thought, but that was not the main issue.

If she couldn't outlast me by some miracle, she was determined to fire at Times Square after an exaggerated wind-up to lure me out. Seeing how compassionate I'd been with Pietro, she was certain I wouldn't let New York die if I could take the blast for it instead.

She wasn't completely wrong...

Fucking Hell.

Three months ago, I would've said Fuck New York and saved myself, but now...I'd grown too fucking attached.

Her plan sobered me up, and my demeanor changed.

Dozens of strategies flashed through my mind until I settled on an unconventional one, and I hoped somebody was close enough to pull it off. I closed my eyes and expanded my mind until I found a mind just at the outer limit of my range. It was Pietro, and he was watching our fight from a few buildings away with a complicated look and a squint on his face.

"Didn't I tell you to get out of here," I said, and he spun around surprised before he realized I was in his mind, not his ear.

"You can read minds?" I asked, frankly baffled.

"Does that surprise you?"

 "No," he admitted, "not really."

"I need your help," I got straight to the point. "Isha wants my head, regardless of the cost, and I'm sure I can take her out, but it just might cost me a chunk of New York. I'd prefer that not to happen, so here's what I need you to do. I need you to call a number and tell them I need a Mirror Dimension raised in my location."

After I gave Pietro the number, he had a thousand questions, all of which I ignored and promptly cut the connection.

I didn't have the time to play twenty questions.

Drawing in a deep breath, I summoned my new prototype armor--Twilight Sentinel.

Unfortunately, it was not a named armor, so I couldn't upgrade it with Red Orbs, but it was made from my first attempt at making the same caliber of metal Eva, and Sparda used to make Rebellion and Yamato.

Since all of the infernal metal I had was previously treated with demonic energy, I couldn't properly fold both of my energies into the metal, and it ended up more white than Red, leading to a pinkish-reddish coloration.

It came out nearly twice as durable as normal Infernal metal. I pimped it out with a mess of Storage runes on its chest plate, giving it a core of a sort containing about 300 DE and 500 AE. I also slapped on ten protection runes and a pair of impact and precision runes on each leg.

When I finished the design, it looked like an off-color form of the armor of Blood-Red General, Igris, from Solo-leveling. It had a ludicrous durability rating of 700.

Isha, who always had some inkling of my location whenever I used Angel Evade, suddenly tensed up at my energy change. My storage runes showed I had more energy than I should, and I sensed she was several seconds away from fully charging up her bullshit attack, so I acted quickly.

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