"Nox, are you sure it was a good idea to send Hoddchin there?" Aiden asks, sipping tea as he sits within the abandoned cathedral.
"Eh? What's the problem? They somehow managed to beat Kang, so might as well send the final boss there!" Nox says with a mischievous snicker.
Confused by the terminology, Aiden sets down his teacup. "Final... boss?"
His cheery giggle echoed in the cathedral. "Think about it! Kang was like a tutorial boss in a video game! The boss that tests the waters for the players! If we send Hoddchin there, it would be like sending the final boss right after they beat the tutorial boss! That would be super funny! Ah, wait—wouldn't I be considered the final boss, actually?"
"Okay, but using video game terms for this is quite ridiculous for your age. It sounds pretty corny."
"SHADDUP! YOU CALL YOUR STUPID TEA 'LEAF-WATER.' WHO DOES THAT?!" Nox replied with a petty remark.
Meanwhile, in the halls of the backstage auditorium, Mina runs for her life. "GGGGGAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!" she squeals as a disturbing old lady crawls toward her at an incredible rate. "Mina, why are you running? Kill that putrid beast!" Sorrow ordered, seeing the granny seething at her teeth.
Mina's movements were swift. Her movements were precise. Her motions moved with grace that made the air shiver. In a single blow, she sliced the old lady with both Ruin and Sorrow. She emitted an aura that could only be comprehended as an angel.
Kicking the corpse in the aftermath, the old lady splattered on the wall before dissolving into the floor. She looked at her daggers, clasping them. "What did I just do...?" What she did was a mystery. Her body moved by itself as if her muscle memory directed it, like a melody in her heart. "Mina, behind you!" Jerking around, she caught a glimpse of impending doom. A creature made of flesh, with an expression of agony. She couldn't hesitate or take chances on this. Taking Ruin in her hand, she made a clean vertical cut whilst infusing it with hellflame. As the creature is split in half, the flesh began to burn. The hellfire was growing bigger and bigger eating away at the glob of flesh.
"Mina, don't resist." The creature spoke in a low tone, this time with an unfamiliar voice. In the globs of flesh that were set ablaze, what rose from the flames was a skinnier figure who limped out. What started as a fat pink blob of a man is now someone completely different.
Sorrow observed his change in appearance. "What's going on? This guy has been making things appear out of nowhere! And now he's a repulsive old man?!"
His appearance was now an old man in a tuxedo and monocle. He has a very swirly grey moustache on his face and a top hat to finish it off. He let a proper and classy bow in good mannerisms for a moment before rising to meet her gaze. "I am delighted to meet a beauty such as you, Mina Sylvet. My name is Hoddchin, and I apologize for my unsightly appearance moments prior."
"What do you want? Why are you trying to capture me?!"
"Of course, it's my due diligence to capture you." His eyes averted to pitch black, and his head began to spin around uncannily. "But before that. I must desecrate your body and record 15 tapes of your body with no limbs. All in 42 different angles. For that is my pleasure." The words he spoke sounded so absurd, but his face spoke no lies. It only spoke pure desires.
Sorrow rattled in Mina's grasp. "Mina, you must focus on escaping from this man! He is absolutely crazy!" Hoddchin lunged forward at an incredible rate, barely seen in Mina's vision. His motions were decipherable only as aggressive shockwaves that pierced the air. Ducking below the arm that tried to grab her, Mina heaved her upper body as she sliced Hoddchin's arm. Hellflames from Ruin burst out as it ate through his entire arm.
This did not shock Hoddchin; he merely just replied with a heavy knee to Mina's face. Stumbling behind her, she hit her back against the auditorium walls. Then, focusing in on the battle again, she came to see Hoddchin slashing a massive scythe in her direction. The design was black as midnight and had a grim appearance. Blocking it with both her daggers, she made eye contact with Hoddchin.
"Beautiful Artifacts and beautiful struggle." Hoddchin says, now staring at her two Artifacts, Sorrow and Ruin. "You are so greedy, holding a big struggle. But the harder you work, the more satisfying your fall will be." His scythe began to emit a darkened miasma, getting denser by the second.
"Mina, that scythe is an Artifact, and it's charging up something! You must flee now!" Trying to push away the scythe pinning her down, she let out a heavy grunt. The harder she tried, the more eager Hoddchin got. "Good, good! I love that noise!"
He activated his Artifact's ability, causing the miasma to reach her mind. Her body trembled, and her eyes rolled back. It was a weird, painful sensation she experienced. Like thousands of pins prickling her brain and twirling it around like mush. Then, as Hoddchin heaved back his scythe, the miasma yanked out a blue orb from her head. The orb, fully materialized, gave a deep shine. Dropping into his palms, Hoddchin grinned. "Thank you for the meal."
He ate the orb and swallowed it. Mina, on the other hand, collapsed to her knees, coughing as her head rattled. Before long, Hoddchin went to finish off Mina by taking up his scythe, but Mina reacted by splashing Sorrow's acid onto Hoddchin's eyes. Hoddchin laughed in agony, keeping the same deep grin. His hand covered his eyes as they dissolved, but he acted as if it never fazed him.
Mina took this opportunity to run down the auditorium halls as far as she could, never looking back. "Mina, what did he just do to you earlier?!" Sorrow asked in worry. The lights on the ceiling of the hall started to flicker, and the hall began to stretch. "I have no idea, but I need to run!" Even if running in the endless hallway seemed inevitable, deep in her heart she felt like something shifted and she needed to escape.
"Mina, where are ya' goin'?" The old, wrinkly voice asked.
The voice was familiar. Something that made her heart sink. Her feet stopped in place, causing her to turn around slowly. Sorrow rattled, trying to rush Mina forward. "Mina, why did you stop? You need to go!"
That's when she saw him. The scar on his right eye, the old mercenary clothes, the grey ruffled beard, and his shiny bald spot. The name slipped out of her mouth as a thing she couldn't control. "Mr. Gregory...?"
Mr. Gregory stood there with a small smile. His presence was familiarly warm to Mina, but the vision of him haunted her. Staring at his face, she could see a flicker of a bullet wound on his head, only for it to go back to normal. Already, she was getting nauseous at his appearance. "Mina, hold it together!" Sorrow pleaded, seeing her state deteriorating. Mina held in her vomit, but the visions of that haunting day still traumatized her.
"Mina, how have you been?" he asked, approaching Mina slowly. He inched closer, his footsteps feeling like the weight of the world. "I've been waiting to see you again." Mina hyperventilated as he went face-to-face with her. She trembled under his intense gaze and his overwhelming presence. "A-Ah, I—I..."
Behind Mina was Hoddchin's scythe, ready to behead her. Sorrow tried to call out to Mina, but her cries were muffled in her mind. "Mina, Mina! Snap out of it!" She was a victim of her own trauma, and the weight was too heavy to bear. The scythe came in a vicious motion from above. Ready to strike her neck, the force of Sorrow stopped it. "Hmm? What's going on?" Hoddchin questioned while under the guise of Mr. Gregory.
Mina's eyes flickered with a crimson glow, and she let out a face of disgust. "I'll give you one second to get your putrid face out of my presence." Hoddchin was stunned. She was just near her breaking point moments ago. Now, she's acting like a completely different person. He has never encountered someone like this in the years of torturing people.
"What-"
He was too late. Hoddchin's head was split in two. The embers of Ruin's hellflames made a crisp sizzle before engulfing the entire area. The fire extinguishers on the roof came on, and the fire alarm buzzed throughout the entire auditorium. Mina snapped her head back with a devious grin. "It's been one second."
Meanwhile, Harold, already dressed up as an elegant prince, tidied up his outfit in the changing room. "Damn it, did some moron set off the fire alarm?"