Chương 75: CHAPTER 74 – The Platoon

Dense spurts of molten iron broke free from the luminous surface of the oval cauldrons, hanging from gigantic metal cables almost like the flesh of a slaughterhouse. The temperature made the air nearly heavy to breathe, burning the lungs with every breath. At intervals, the vats shifted, vomiting their blazing contents into gigantic moulds, each then guided by a conveyor belt in a different direction.

"The foundries? Decidedly much better organised than the ones I've visited." The scraping of the man's cloak, embroidered with old metal plates, echoed through all the fumes of the hall, ever more shrill and unsettling. It was no different from that same sound they tell children about to make them go to bed. The chains of a ghost ringed in the smoldering ambient.

"I can't erase the information between Dirac and me… Someone is here." He stopped, slowly turning the tips of his black boots toward a fan, a very ordinary metal grating set over an air duct. He adjusted his crumpled and threadbare military uniform, revealing for an instant the rusty, clumsily serrated knife. His black eyes fixed on that iron mouth, locked in wait for something.

He raised his finger, aiming it like a pistol at the grating, when suddenly an explosion was heard, and then the sound of something dripping. Malcolm's finger jumped away from his hand, sliding to his feet as spurts of blood splattered far, occasionally boiling where it neared the furnaces. A second followed, this time behind him. Malcolm spun around, shielding himself with the long dark cloak.

"This is a breath of fresh air." A faint grin formed on that unsettlingly pallid face before a series of bullets ricocheted around him, trying to burrow into his flesh. The earth beneath gave way, making him slide and throwing him off the trajectory.

"These were different from the first…" As soon as they stopped rolling, the metallic sound was replaced by the puffing of the furnaces. Malcolm raised his gaze as the iron grate fell right at his feet. A man, dressed in a long white robe with grey fur-trimmed details. The large furry collar hid part of his face, shaped at its foundations by a cauldron of hatred, rage, and revulsion. Partially hidden by the sleeve, a long, thin pistol with a slim reddish tube connecting it to the inside of the garment.

Under the heavy fur, a shining silver cuirass with purplish details gleamed among the reddish reflections. He spat a capsule to the ground, stained with reddish drops, letting it roll until it fell into one of the holes for the cooling system. He threw himself down, letting the robe open in the fall, as if it were dense raptor wings.

"Maverick Haia… How many years? You have the same hatred as that time, completely immaculate." Malcolm stared at him with those dark spheres on his face, rarely definable as eyes. The man raised his head, revealing the lifeless face, wrapped in a primal instinct so intense it made his neck and cheeks spasm. His pupils fixed on the drops of blood on the ground, causing a swift grin.

"I've waited far too long to see you bleed." With a snap, he revealed the two pistols in his hands, both connected to the inside of his cuirass by those thin, transparent capillaries. Malcolm let out a faint laugh, immediately drawing the rusty blade. They stared each other in the face for a single instant, as a drop of iron struck the rim of a cauldron. A barrage of iron began to ricochet off every surface, at times disappearing in a sea of golden sparks.

The noise began to become almost a concert of bells and cymbals, broken at times by the hissing of air and the thuds of machinery. Malcolm spun around sharply, splitting one of the bullets when one ricocheted directly into the lower part of his thigh. He immediately felt the heat staining his suit, forcing him to accelerate his handiwork. The blade danced between his fingers as he zigzagged through the bursts of metal. Even though he split them, they kept ricocheting, becoming furious, blazing splinters."

His ability has really evolved to this point? What a turn of events." Malcolm let the blade slip, raising the tip of his index finger toward the ceiling. Immediately, a discharge of black light wrapped him like a thin mist. The bullets fell to the ground, motionless, slowly beginning to dissolve. He caught the knife in mid-air, deflecting a second shot, this time much heavier. A new wound appeared on his shoulder.

"The barrier can't erase their momentum, and regeneration is slowed where they hit me…" Surrounded by iron, Malcolm smiled, vanishing and reappearing in the air as he watched his adversary point the two muzzles of death straight at his face. The tubes lit up red before detonating a new volley again.

"Now I understand! Truly cunning and horrid." Malcolm tried to vanish again, this time succeeding imperfectly and remaining lacerated on the flank. He gripped the knife's handle with a faint hint of a smile, letting the metal become covered in black slime." Verstoring …" A sabre of dark light with reddish edges hovered in the air, completely tearing apart everything in a line.

One of the cauldrons split in two, pouring a cascade of dense molten metal among the cisterns, which slowly began to collapse and be absorbed by the metal. Malcolm returned to the ground, spinning immediately to evade a new shot that detonated a few steps behind his nape.

"Bullets jacketed with a Meta blood capsule… How much did you take from those two for this fight?" Maverick appeared from behind his cover, throwing the magazine to the ground and immediately inserting a new one.

"Enough to make you breathe your last." From the barrels of the two pistols, purplish blades snapped out, dripping red liquid. Malcolm stared at his reflection on the slimy edges of the knife, then dedicated himself completely to Maverick. The soldier lunged at him, aiming both sharp irons at his throat. A sudden exchange, where Malcolm's face was stained with dense, blackish blood.

"You've improved, but you remain inconclusive." A bullet was fired from under his jacket, penetrating Maverick's foot. He immediately withdrew, finding his view obstructed by a gigantic band of black light. The ground split into multiple sections, erupting molten metal and bolts on the verge of disintegration. Nothing remained in the path of that dart except an ineluctable cataclysmic scene.

"And you don't know when to quit your fatalistic bullshit." Malcolm's ear bled, yet he managed to react and close the distance with Maverick. Their weapons found themselves pointed at each other's forehead. The metal of each grazed the flesh on the brow, and their fingers moved. Click A sharp snap was heard among the mechanisms of the pistols, then blocked by a loud, unison laugh. An instant later, Maverick threw himself at him, sinking the metal of the weapon against the man's face.

Malcolm kicked him away, spitting blood to the ground and grabbing Maverick's arm. With violence, Malcolm hurled him away, making him crash and tumble among the pipes and blazing ground." VALKOIMEN VIIVA!" Maverick got up quickly, rubbing his thumb on the ground, tracing a strange and disorganised rhombus on the floor. Suddenly, a white light branched through the ground, making heavy square blocks erupt from the pavement. Malcolm slashed through them with the blade, noticing he was overshadowed."

Are the remains also marked by the brand?" A rain of rock and iron splinters tore through the battlefield as Maverick launched himself from one cistern to another, extracting a magazine from inside his coat. The iron casing was almost swallowed by the pistol, which resumed pulsing red.

"Just die once and for all!" Maverick detonated three shots, letting them rip through the dust haze. A metallic ring reached his ears, immediately causing a furrowing on Malcolm's face. Maverick leaned against an iron support, staring at the black smile emerging from the haze.

"Even your centuries-old evolution… Loses before the cataclysm." Malcolm waved his cloak, making the spent casings fall from the plates, which bounced on the ground before dissolving.

"A Fälschung?! How much Frequency must he have to imbue his ability into that fabric…" He spat blood, which slid slowly between the grates of the catwalk on which he was seated. Malcolm delicately laid the blade on his tongue, washing away the blood and metal residue.

"I imagined the blood chamber would be capable of penetrating my defences only once… The cloak is an extension of my barrier, built from the blood and destruction I sowed in that war, in our war." He waved the cloak, letting the bullets ricochet off its opaque, ruined surface.

"Don't lump me in with you!" Maverick said it with such fury that one might have thought his throat was about to tear open. Malcolm smiled, watching him as his hand slipped inside his garment. Soon after, a few dozen thin, oval iron plates fell to the ground. Maverick shuddered, bending the metal between his hands.

"Fred Malagaer… Theo Mastri… Ryakan Uszt…" One by one, those dog tags turned to ash, swept away by the mechanical puffs of the foundry. With every grain of dust that rose, Maverick's face sank ever deeper into the shadows.

"Alice Balyon…" Before the tag touched the ground, the cistern where Maverick was perched exploded, splashing iron and water everywhere behind him. Malcolm tried to cover himself with the cloak, but even a man like him, graced by Frequency, was unable to intercept it.

"DON'T YOU DARE NAME HER EVER AGAIN!" A mix of blood slid down Maverick's knuckles, clenched around what looked like a pulped bullet. His strong forearm was streaked with thin white lines, and a strange symbol shone on his chest. The pupils in his eyes were locked in a homicidal frenzy, and drool slid from his tongue. Malcolm fell directly into one of the furnaces, which promptly began to devour him with its flames. In that enveloping wave of heat, a single thought crossed his mind.

A single flicker in that cerebral darkness: satisfaction." Your hatred has matured to these levels?" The flames rose toward the ceiling, trying to escape that black, hateful aura that was devouring the very foundations of matter. Malcolm stationed himself at the centre of that vortex of malignancy, slowly tearing the metal from his path." His now isn't simple trajectory control… It's complete vector manipulation! As long as something has that symbol, he can modify any force it interacts with."

That thought transformed into a laugh, and the laugh into a grin. He stared at the face of that soldier, broken by the remorse of the past and the hatred of the present, and did nothing but grin, wrapped in a disturbing sense of morbid obsession.

"Show it to me… Show me how this hatred concludes! Let me construct the end of your cataclysm!" The palm of his hand vibrated, wrapped in black, before a thin thread branched from his index finger. Maverick moved instinctively through the air, jumping from one cistern to another. Anything in the trajectory of that dark thread vanished, simply severed from existence." That must be Hakmes, the ability that severed Maliard's arm. If it hits me, I won't be able to regenerate."

Maverick quickly grabbed the pistol, trying to aim, but found himself frozen, observing a horrid scene: around Malcolm's figure, dozens of black threads danced in the air, covered in an ethereal miasma." Zwerm …" With a snap of Malcolm's fingers, all the black erupted in every direction, annihilating everything in the vicinity. Maverick continued to dart through the air, each time closing in on that swarm of darkness. His cloak was grazed, forcing him immediately to throw it away." Tsk… It spreads like a disease."

He grabbed the last tools, compressed and reduced to cubes, resuming his flight. It was only then that he noticed the sea of molten iron raging beneath his feet. At that moment, a shiver shook his spine. Malcolm appeared above him, crushing his head with his heel and hurling him to the ground." Shit, the jammer must have been compromised by that technique…" Maverick tried to get up, but as soon as he met the gaze of that monster wrapped in darkness, an immediate warmth caressed his face.

A wave of iron exploded from his flank, ready to swallow him under that grim smile.

"So this was your plan?" Maverick disappeared under the weight of the blazing mass, buried while Malcolm watched in wait. Suddenly a spurt of liquid reached his shoulder, vanishing before it could cause damage. His grin became even grimmer and more malicious. A bubble began to expand from beneath the searing flow, growing larger every second. Slowly it reached all the way to the floor, revealing Maverick's figure, completely wrapped in those lines white as snow.

Every single drop that tried to graze her was redirected toward the other, creating a fountain of flashes." Everything that touches it has the brand for a single instant? He's modifying temperature and direction to make himself immune and dissipate the molten flow!" In Malcolm's mind, after an entire century of seeking the end, something had brought him back to his perpetual enigma.

"I WILL KILL YOU!!! HERMENSZOOOO!!! EVEN IF YOU HID FOR A MILLENNIUM YOU WON'T BE SAVED! I WILL SEND YOU TO HELL, DEMON!" Before his eyes was a soldier like many, a deputy in his platoon as he had already seen elsewhere. To him, he was nothing but a victim like many, destined to succumb sooner or later for one cause or another.

Around them, a conflict, craters, pits, bodies torn to pieces and cradled in the mud, columns of black smoke, the thunder of screams, the thin hisses of cannons, the hum of ships, the acrid taste of Taumite and dust, the sweet smell of death. Malcolm wiped the blood from his lip, then tore the bullet from his shoulder. Beyond the great cliff, the soldier kept screaming, spitting, and cursing as if his life depended on it." Why is he screaming? Is it for his comrades? Perhaps for that suicide?

I orchestrated it all, yet he knows he can do nothing." He stretched out his arm, completely bloodied and with the skin reduced to shreds, hanging from what remained of his hand." I could kill him, but I feel I would lose, that I could no longer extinguish it… That hatred." Malcolm pondered all the victims burdening his conscience, yet it was but a flash; for him, all of them had satisfied the requirements for the end, something completely natural and eternal, but for him, Maverick Haia, it was different.

His hatred was something Malcolm didn't understand; he had always seen it but never felt it, not even for the change he was so averse to.

"But of course… You are defying the End, you are trying to make it immortal. You are cursing yourself to strengthen your life!" A satisfied grin crossed his face, forcing him to turn his back, trembling with joy. At last he had understood something, had found a new enemy in his race toward extinction: the indelible hatred of a man.

"Have you stopped daydreaming? Focus, otherwise…" Malcolm was brought back to reality, with his eyes turned to the strange blue cylinder that hovered in the air a few metres from him. Its surface was jagged, and two small pyramids rose from the bases, shining red. Maverick raised the weapon, dripping with molten iron, and aimed.

"... You will die." A sharp explosion, and the cylinder split in two, releasing a purplish mist. Malcolm tried to move, but suddenly he felt wrapped in heat, something almost new for him now. A very violent detonation splashed away the flood of blazing liquid, sweeping away the cisterns and the fumes of the furnaces. In no time at all, the iron became a metallic film, almost robbed of all heat." Lambdite detonated in volatile form? Ingenious."

The metal seemed almost to distort, just to vomit out that black hand buried beneath the iron cap. Malcolm slowly re-emerged, staring at the soldier with his face slashed by the red of burns. If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

"You are a monster… Or maybe that's too reductive." The magazine slid to Maverick's feet, disappearing among the cracks in the ground. His agile fingers grabbed another from the pockets of his suit. Now that the coat was gone, his face was even sharper in all its rage." The jammer's gone to hell… Now nothing prevents him from leaving, but I'm sure he won't leave." Malcolm's smile gave him the only proof he needed: that man was enjoying this clash.

With a laugh, Maverick grabbed a piece of iron from the ground, tracing his mark on its surface with saliva and dust.

"Hit me here. As only you know how." His old general smiled, pointing straight at the centre of his own forehead. The stone shot from Maverick's hands, shattering against that veil of invisible malignancy that wrapped Malcolm.

"I'm not your little soldier anymore! You filthy worm!!" Maverick appeared from beneath him, sinking his knuckles against his chin. Malcolm laughed, being hurled into the air, his face bloodied. Maverick ran through the iron and wreckage, searching the few gaps for a single opening to fire. A dark halo flashed in Malcolm's eyes as he stared at his adversary darting through the maze of asymmetrical metal.

"I'll make things simpler for you." He vanished into the air, finding himself beside Maverick. He didn't manage to aim before Malcolm's fist crashed against his face like a club. Maverick's head slammed against the iron, only to be struck again by a new blow. He violently crushed his hand to the ground, feeling his fingers shatter. Yet with each impact, his gaze only became more lucid. Malcolm raised his hand in a knife-edge, wrapping it in the Cataclysm." Hak …"

Three shots rose from Maverick's weapon, piercing his leg. Malcolm stared at the blood spurting from his shin and knee. Maverick stared at him with a smile, gripping the smoking pistol with his almost purplish hands.

"You don't need to pull the trigger if you have enough energy to transfer to the mechanism…" Maverick laughed, piercing Malcolm's hand with the bayonet and brutally twisting it, bending the palm. He slumped to the ground, while Maverick's second pistol drew ever closer to his forehead.

"What do you want from Grayson Dirac…" Malcolm's face was irradiated by a sense of unnatural malice. Maverick pushed the blade even deeper, completely piercing the hand.

"Nothing… Dirac is nothing more than a by-product, something useful for distracting attention. I taught you the arts of war, after all." Maverick struck him with the butt of the weapon, always keeping his free hand aimed, still wrapped in black.

"Yours are machinations to kill, not to win!" Malcolm grabbed the barrel of the weapon, bringing it ever closer to his pale, smooth skin. The movement of his hair gave off an unnatural air, almost like that of a spectre.

"What do you think war is? A way to commit atrocities? A superior form of hygiene? No… War is nothing but humanity most pure manifestation." A gash opened between the two, unbalancing Maverick and allowing Malcolm to strike him full in the stomach. Maverick's back slammed against the iron of the pipes. The pistol slid between the grates, disappearing into the darkness.

"Shit!" He tried again to aim the pistol at him, but this time his attempt was immediately stopped by a kick. Malcolm grabbed his throat, hurling him beyond the cisterns. In those few seconds in the air, a dozen punches battered his face, stunning him. His eyes slid into the darkness, lingering for an instant on the glittering black cloak before him." I'm so sorry, Haia… I love you." A single boom resounded in his mind, immediately restoring consciousness.

He grabbed the air around him, launching himself upward, narrowly avoiding the black blade. Behind him, the cisterns and furnaces were decapitated, vomiting blazing fountains." Get it together, get it together, get it together!" Maverick slid over the pools of molten iron, grabbing from his own pocket numerous dark little cubes. Malcolm stared at him with crossed arms, awaiting a move with a satisfied grin." If he hasn't killed you yet, it means something is limiting him."

With rage, Maverick hurled his cubes into the air, which immediately crumbled, creating a cluster of small purplish iron beads. Immediately they lit up, detonating in a flaming cloud.

"This is your maximum? I hope you haven't spent a century of your life becoming this insipid…" Malcolm ripped through the cloud, which vanished into nothingness, devoured by the slime between his fingers, when something jolted his shoulder. He lowered his gaze, noticing one of Maverick's bayonets embedded in his flesh. The man touched the dense, clotted blood gushing from the wound. As he pondered what to do, Maverick clung to his throat, squeezing his bloodied fingers tight.

"I'll make you regret disturbing them again." Maverick swiftly pulled the blade from his adversary's flesh, slashing his face from the jaw to the eye. The right side of his face gushed blood onto his white hair, while Malcolm smiled. With a gesture of his hand, a gash opened on Maverick's chest, hurling him to the ground again.

"At last I remember. How strange… All these years have passed, and I can still recall the desolation on your faces." His feet delicately settled on the little floor left intact. He tore a piece from his cloak, which immediately regrew, and tied it to his shoulder.

"The fort of Aci Miaron… The assault on the Old Star… The Chockem orphanage. So many places, yet always the same emotion, something utterly disgusting." Maverick clenched the blade between his hands, beginning to bleed. His teeth chattered against each other, while blood dripped from the tips of his hair onto his forehead.

"Something that doesn't change cannot end, because the end is nothing but the last evolution of something. Perhaps that's why I killed them, because their stasis, their lack of naturalness, deeply wearied me. But with Alice it was different… That woman was just like water, perpetually wrapped in the sweet air of change." The moment that name was whispered, in that so malicious and degrading tone, Maverick felt his brain give way.

"Malcolmmmm!!!!!" The scream resounded everywhere, so much that the very earth where their feet rested trembled. Were it not for the peculiar structure they were in, probably anyone would have heard the hatching of that hatred.

"At last… Just like that time." Malcolm set his guard, but Maverick was faster. Between him and his adversary there must have been about twenty metres, but for him they were nothing but a distance to cover in the blink of an eye. Maverick's fist struck Malcolm full in the face, fracturing his nose and jaw. Maverick grabbed him by the arm and immediately was crushed to the ground.

"The barrier is not totally broken, Haia." A discharge of black pollen wrapped the soldier's arm, burning the skin from his fingers. Maverick lost his grip, being struck full in the face by the handle of an old pistol. Several shots were detonated, but none hit their target. Malcolm's bullets almost bounced when they touched Maverick.

"This one is in the way!" Malcolm grabbed the pistol, wrapping it in Cataclysm. The metal rusted quickly, falling to the ground like brown rain. He smiled, staring at Maverick's dark face, still bleeding. In a flash, he stretched his palm toward him, while his rival's eyes shifted slightly to the side. BANG A different bullet, longer and tapered, pierced his forearm, shifting the entire shot in the process.

Malcolm turned his gaze to the right, staring at the barrel of the long rifle suspended in the air, busy vomiting smoke from its metal mouth. It was an old model, slightly restored and modified with black iron parts and some finishing on the ducts, now overflowing with Taumite.

"I don't need a finger to shoot…" Malcolm turned again, but it was too late. Maverick grabbed his head with hands greasy with that strange mixture, aiming his knee directly against his jaw. A white glow coated his body, before a white veil formed around his leg. The impact was delayed, amply surpassing sound. Malcolm's face caved inward, almost as if the bones had gone soft. Maverick hurled him against the iron blocks and the gigantic moulds, and his eyes went dark.

"But of course… For him, I am the end of his life. Once I stop breathing, his soul will stop too. He is so addicted to my sickness that he ended up infected by it." Malcolm lifted his head, restored and fossilised again in that satisfied grin. Malcolm Van Jir, a demon among demons, had just rediscovered the feeling of satisfaction. His eyes snapped open, fixing on the bloodied soldier, limping on one leg and with his right hand clenched around the barrel of the sniper rifle.

Malcolm had a subtle flashback to his old life, trying to imagine his uniform on his old comrade. He raised his hand, keeping it turned toward the ground." Ruine …" A serpent of black light fell from his pierced palm, spreading through the cracks in the ground. It vanished as rapidly as it had appeared, leaving space for the consequences of its appearance. The ground cracked, making Maverick slip, as columns of earth and iron rose and fractured, in a scene of total apocalypse.

"Human madness shines brightest at the dawn of the end. It's when everything is about to conclude that the spark of empathy ignites something in people's souls, perhaps to face the sins committed, or as a fundamental natural law? But in conclusion, human beings shine most brightly when the sun sets." Maverick stared at him with eyes injected with red, as he rose on one of the few intact ruins.

"And you cannot imagine… How beautiful it is to see that little spark extinguish!" Malcolm stretched his fingers toward him, releasing a swarm of dark, dense threads. The black cords burrowed into the ground, piercing anything and leaving only dust. Maverick vanished from their trajectory, hovering in the air with the rifle aimed at his neck.

"Do you know why I gave the order at Chockem?" Malcolm dodged to the side, avoiding the bullet. Rotating his entire body, he guided the long black claws upward, trying to slash him. The blades eviscerated the ceiling, making heavy blocks of red cement collapse.

"I wanted to see some movement in those souls! I wanted to lift them from the quagmire of immobility." A second bullet grazed his neck, while his claws continued to dance in the air, erasing it with a deafening hiss.

"When I saw Alice with vomit and tears, I noticed there wasn't a single trace of beauty on that face greased with mucus and mud… However, for me, that was truly the moment she was most radiant." Maverick appeared before him, bringing with him a breeze of burning wind. Every muscle in his face was contracted into a maximum expression of rage and disgust, almost as if it had become a theatrical mask. Malcolm laughed, blocking his knuckles with his own.

"But you followed the orders! You moved well beyond morality and saw the End in the eyes of those poor bodies martyred by fire!" Malcolm spat blood as Maverick's knee sank into his abdomen. Despite the barrier, the sequence of information was such as to overload even a monster of his calibre.

"You are like me, a being consumed by desire… A VERWINDER!" Malcolm grabbed his arm, driving the blade of his knife directly through the bone. Both stained themselves with blood, while around them rained the wreckage and pieces of the foundry. Maverick pulled the bayonet from his pocket, aiming at his throat. With violence, the purple iron shredded the throat, this time spraying a dense black liquid around them.

"You must be wondering why I don't go directly to Grayson Dirac, and maybe you think you've even found the answer." Maverick threw himself backward, trying in every way to calm the tremors spreading through his legs and arms."' Maybe he fears him?' You'll have thought that to convince yourself, but you're far off. It doesn't matter if that boy is a god incarnate or the true manifestation of physics…"

The ground beneath his feet erupted with violent columns of black Cataclysm, while all the wounds on his body began to heal. Eight lights, mixed red and violet, appeared from under the uniform.

"Because every single thing has a beginning and an end." A black aura wrapped his body, dancing in the air like a torch. Maverick gripped the rifle, letting out a sigh. His lungs seemed to tear with every movement of his chest, but he clenched his teeth, adjusting the lever on the device on his back.

"DISCHARGE PROCEDURE START-UP. LIMITER REMOVED." The mechanical voice distorted at the end, making Maverick's figure even more spectral. Scars white as snow came to stain his face, while his hair stood on end. The symbols on his back and chest shone white. Malcolm smiled, violently planting his foot on the ground, fracturing the floor.

"Here before you is me… And I assure you, my hatred is eternal." Electricity began to flow from his legs up to his shoulders, emitting a faint crackling.

"The End or your soul… I will enjoy investigating the boundaries of both." Malcolm and Maverick vanished, clashing in the air, in an eruption of sparks and black lights. The outside night illuminated the few greenhouses left intact by the slaughter. Large glass domes, filled with colourful fields of every single species of the archipelago and beyond. Golden flowers, trees with dark red leaves, and even strange purplish creepers. Within that idyllic space, greyish mist pressed against the glass surface.

"Your ability surprises me. Few resist the mist for this long." A voice echoed from the grey, addressing a rather portly big man, with the shredded remains of a waistcoat. Bound on his chubby face, a disturbing mask of tendrils and leaves coated with an oily film.

"You're not the type for conversation, I suppose…" The voice murmured again, before a dart of iron shot out of the haze, impaling itself in his shoulder. The man knelt to the ground, gathering leaves and smearing them on the wound.

"Plants are sensitive to air movements… That's enough for me to find you." With a wave of his hand, a swarm of roots exploded out of the ground, heading toward a point to his right in the mist. There was a boom, and the mist thinned, revealing the figure of Edvard Ross, still wrapped in a thin layer of greyness.

"Not bad… You finally managed it." With a smile, he tore the plants from the blade. The portly man stared at him, turning slowly between puffs." Has he lost weight, by any chance?" The figure, compared to the start of their clash, had definitely slimmed down. The fabric on his shoulders had become less tight, and his movements had also improved.

"Ed Guin… That's my name." He answered, leaving Edvard momentarily stunned, who furrowed his brow. The tip of his cane slid across the ground, severing the roots that were slowly making their way toward him.

"I imagine I don't need to introduce myself?" Ed nodded his head, leaving a bitter expression on the nobleman. The plants around them grew ever larger and at times alive, dancing in the glass dome." I understand… The plants are connected to him, but their Frequency is unaltered. That means there must be an external source!" A smile launched itself against him, slashing through the tendrils and flowers barring his way.

With a lunge, he tried to tear off his mask, but immediately the metal was intercepted by a slimy piece of pink flesh.

"I appreciate nature, Mr. Ross. It's limiting to think that only plants can arouse splendour when life forms exist in every corner of the globe." The tentacle tightened around the blade, making the suckers smack against the cold surface. Ed raised his hand, clenched like a hammer, ready to crash onto Edvard's forehead.

"I'm not very fond of calloused foods…" Edvard took a deep breath, blowing a cloud of dark mist. The tentacle released its grip, allowing him to retreat a few metres away.

"Analysing him takes time… And he definitely has more than me." A shadow fell over them, forcing them to raise their gaze toward the dome. A yellowish globule, surrounded by a lilac halo, obscured the moon, rapidly approaching the greenhouse. A rain of glass shards crashed down on the two, as the figures splattered to the ground in a puddle of sharply distinct colours.

"I want immediate explanations as to why you're here and what you want." A woman emerged from that mixture, dressed in a tight uniform of a peculiar black plastic material. Her shoulders and knees were covered by a thick golden plate, and a small cape of the same colour stretched from the nape of her neck. She watched the lardy man, with flames dancing in her multicolored pupils.

"Lexa Worhol… Angel must have run into trouble if you're here." A yellowish blade flew near Ed's face, felling a tree behind him. The puddle had vanished, and now two tall figures, one yellowish and the other lilac, rose behind Lexa. Their appearance was identical in every way to Lexa's, except precisely for the colour and the small droplets sliding from their hips and faces.

"I'll ask the questions, dog." Edvard stared at her, bewildered, slowly approaching her. He spun around sharply, meeting her face with a faint grin.

"You're here too, Edvard Ross? A bit of luck on my side as well." A shiver ran down Edvard's spine, but he decided to return the woman's smile with his own. Ed stared at him, regenerating his wounds with a strange mixture of plants and dark plates. Lexa turned again, while the yellowish copy stretched its arm, transforming it into a blade.

"You held me back with shadows, yet you weren't able to intercept my copies. Did this Angel guy perhaps have to deal with Lance Klint?" She smiled, staring at the big man, who promptly lowered his head in assent. Edvard blanched for an instant, remembering the gigantic explosion he had witnessed before meeting Ed.

"Now I understand… It's a good thing I left Black and White scattered around the facility." Lexa clicked her tongue, stroking the two golden plates on her shoulders. Immediately they opened and twisted, becoming two heavy batons"What's happening, Lexa?!" Edvard's noble composure shattered for a miserable instant. She turned, staring at him as severely as he had ever seen her in his life. With a sigh, she pointed at the tower, and Edvard understood.

"Lance Klint's signal has disappeared…" These words preceded the silence in the greenhouse, now aware it was about to become an arena for the clash between the director of Machinamentum and two Kontrolle.