Chapter 144
- Micah -
The walls closed in, trapping us. The chamber felt like it would swallow us whole.
The air was so thick you could chew on it. Rot clung to every breath. Strange sigils pulsed on the stone like the heartbeat of something huge buried beneath us. And above, that thing on the ceiling stared back with hunger.
James lifted one hand, stopping us inches before we crossed its threshold.
"Don't move; it's tracking us—looking for a window to pounce."
—Too late.
Josh whispered, "By the reaction to the ruins and the closing of the walls, they activated something when we stepped inside."
Evan clicked his tongue. "Great. Motion-sensor nightmares. My favorite."
Uncle's fingers tightened around the Heart of Iron. His tired eye sharpened into something fierce. Old man or not, he looked ready to take a train head-on.
Then the shifting behind the wall stopped.
And then the wall split open.
It did not open like a door; instead, it resembled something tearing through flesh—a large abyssal tear.
A massive curled antler—mangled, bone instead of keratin—punched through the crack. Then another. Then a warped skull dragged itself forward, deer-like—the blasphemy of flesh. The jaw split into two, empty sockets with glowing embers for eyes, ribs protruding like armored plates, and hind legs twisted and overgrown with muscle and black scales.
Tomo whispered, "It's like a...black-rot elk demon."
James corrected quietly. "Abyss—taken. Completely reconstituted—some of them were once human even."
Evan elbowed him. "Dude. Less lore. More shooting."
The elk demon bellowed—a ragged, rattling scream that shook dust from the ceiling.
I could feel the sound rattle into my bones.
The runes flared again.
And the governor stepped out from behind the beast.
His eyes were pitch black. Veins spidered from the corners. Two councilmen stood behind him—bodies shaking, shadows flickering like they hadn't decided what shape to be.
He smiled with teeth that shouldn't have looked that human anymore. Which told us he still had some time left.
"Waymakers," he crooned, "we've been waiting."
Josh snarled. "Drop the act."
The governor tilted his head. "Why? This is the most actual form power has ever given me."
Uncle stepped forward—slow, measured, with command in every line of his posture.
"You let greed speak through you," he said. "But you can still fight it."
The governor's smile vanished—replaced by a feral, inhuman snarl.
He hissed. "No, I joined it."
The elf-demon charged, beyond him, as all hell broke loose.
James fired first—a holy, golden light from his bolt burst into the demon's flank. It staggered but plowed through, antlers lowering.
"MOVE!" I yelled out.
We scattered. The demon slammed into the floor where I'd been standing, stone splintering like wood.
Tomo dashed in—a flying side kick that snapped the creature's jaw sideways. He pivoted, spun, and slammed an elbow into its throat with perfect martial precision.
"Nice!" Evan shouted.
The demon barely flinched.
"TOMO—INCOMING!" I screamed.
He ducked as the antler swung overhead, shattering the support beam.
Josh covered him with a burst of cyan fire. The flames curled around the creature, hissing, burning black patches across its ribs.
The demon roared, dropping to one knee.
But then—
A hand wrapped around my neck.
It wasn't the elk-demon's.
A second demon—thin and skeletal, with limbs too long and a human-like corpse stretched on a rack—has crawled from the ceiling vent above us and dropped silently behind me. It looked like one of the council members had turned.
It lifted me off the ground with one hand, claws digging into my throat.
I couldn't breathe.
The world pulsed behind my eyes.
The sigils flickered around the edges of my vision.
I kicked wildly, but its grip tightened, cracking the air out of my lungs.
Evan shouted my name—too far to reach me—
BANG!
James bolted through a green light, straight through the demon's wrist.
Black blood sprayed. The clawed hand snapped off entirely. I fell—and Josh caught me before I hit the floor.
James smirked. "Don't touch my team, or monster!"
I gasped for air, rubbing my neck. "I'll be okay—keep going."
I told them that because now the chamber trembled. The elk demon was rising again.
And the wall behind it was tearing wider—like something was trying to claw through reality itself.
This was not a hell gate.
Just like Uncle's vision.
A dark vein pushing through the world, bleeding its energy into our world.
"James!" I cried. "That's not a portal—it's a root! They chanted a ritual to it, trying to call forth a hell gate!"
The governor laughed, the sound splitting into two voices.
"Yes! Through Greed's wound in the city, we were promised a power beyond angels!
Uncle stepped in front of us. "You were promised destruction to yourself and everyone else around you. That's the only thing demons offer!"
"Spare me your moral sermons, old man; the world still goes on for now at least. I breathe to see it all burned and rewritten, untethered by boundaries!"
The root roared, and more elk demons stepped out, a whole herd. They charged us.
"WAYMAKERS!" I shouted. "FULL PUSH!"
Josh surged first—blue fire splitting the herd. Moses parting the sea. Evan dove in with twin blades flashing like silver arc of fury. Tomo attacked with pinpoint strikes—each punch breaking bone. James rained holy arrows in rapid succession.
But for every demon we cut, two more crawled out.
The governor laughed, his voice deepened by possession.
"You cannot stop what has been started!"
Uncle slammed the Heart of Iron into the ground.Light exploded outward.Demons vaporized instantly.
Something fast and serpentine shot out from behind a column—sharp claws raking my arm before I even finished turning.
Hot blood ran down my sleeve.
But I didn't fall.
"Micah!" James called out.
My heart thrummed. Wind curled around my hair. My fan's energy burned against my fingers.
I threw my hand outwards.
"RELEASE!"
A shimmering arc of light curved outward, unfolding my tessen war fan blades as they released a kunai storm across the battlefield.
Evan hollered, "Micah, that's a NEW MOVE! You had that in you this whole time?!"
"Apparently!"
I dove forward, slicing the first fan along the demon's foreleg. The wind blade carves clean through the corrupted bone.
The creature stumbled, roaring.
I spun—the second fan slashing upward, wind spiraling in a tight helix, cracking ribs open.
The demon elk kneeled backward.
Tomo finished the motion—dropping a heel in its exposed sternum. The thing crashed to the ground, shaking it.
"HA!" He kicked it, shouting. "Not so tough now!"
Another demon lunged for him—
I whirled the wind around my feet, sprinted, and leapt—slamming both fans outward, creating a gust that blasted it off course.
It attempted to hit Tomo and me when Josh erupted a protective fire around us. "Micah, Tomo, Heads up!"
"We're good—thanks!" I called back.
Uncle met one of the demons head-on, slamming the heart of iron into his skull as it glowed.
He moved like someone thirty years younger, instinct guiding him as if the blade were telling his muscles what to do. He ducked under the demon's swipe and drove the serrated edge up through its sternum.
The demon shrieked and imploded into dust.
Uncle breathed hard but steadily. "I… felt that before I even swung."
James grinned. "That's the point."
The governor lifted both hands.
The runes pulsed, trembling violently.
He screamed—voice monstrous—and cracked the wall behind him.
Dark roots protruded, writhing like veins searching for hosts.
Josh cursed. "He's losing his humanity and trying to finish the tear of the root."
"No, he's not," James said. "He's trying to become the new anchor."
"What good will that do for him in power? It will kill him!" I shouted, stepping forward. I turned and locked eyes with him. "Governor! Let it go, fight it, or it will kill you!"
For a second, I saw something flash through the corruption in his eyes.
He shook his head. "This is the power the city deserves."
The last remaining cultists—hiding in the shadows—smiling like spectators in the crowd.
"Cowards, using people for your own games is sick. Come out here and fight us instead of hiding behind your puppets."
The other city council member joined the fight, as the mayor was tied up, empty, and mindless-looking. He must have tried to fight them back.
"I know most of them. If we can save these people before they are too far gone, do so." Uncle begged.
Josh slammed the governor to the ground.
Tomo swept a few council members' legs.
James's shots pinned both the governor and council members to the ground.
Evan punched the masked cult leader in the face. The mask fell, and the others scattered like cockroaches.
"Running away—such a desperate move. There are no more strings to pull, villains. Your puppets lie broken on the floor."
The cult leader laughed, his voice echoing from across the room, speaking through the governor as though they were one body.
"YoU tHiNk ThIs Is OuR OnLy MoVe?" Two people spoke together, layered in a sick, monstrous voice. "This has been the plan to begin with the end of the Waymakers and this city."
Evan ripped off his hood and revealed the grotesque demon man, with darkened skin, glowing yellow eyes, and cracked red veins that no longer spoke of a human but of a shell of a man.
Recognition hit me.
"My God… he was one of the construction workers in Keetoowah…"
My stomach twisted as the demon-man looked at us laughing—suddenly, I understood everything.
It all clicked.
"They've been watching us..."I whispered."
Josh glanced at me. "Micah—what are you saying?"
I swallowed hard
The cult didn't find us tonight or even recently. They've been tracking us since Keetoowah."
James's eyes widened. "Because the first gate we closed there."
"Exactly."
My throat was sore from where the demon had grabbed me before, but the truth burned hotter.
"When we closed the rift, it ruined their plans...They were trying to reactivate a chain of roots buried under the continent. Each is tied to a sin, a wound they can infect.
"Tomo froze. "And you children cut them off."
I nodded.
"Ever since that night, the Waymakers became a threat. We stopped the awakening of Envy's gate—the cult we had the power to sever the other. We weren't supposed to interfere; they didn't expect us at first."
Evan's jaw clenched, "So they put targets on our back."
"And started watching us," I said. "In the woods. At the school. During the protest. Everywhere. Every demon attack, every possession attempt—they weren't random. They were test runs. They were trying to map our strengths, exploit weaknesses, and figure out who would crack first, taking us out one by one. They lured us here. In this chamber. With this root. They wanted to break us… so no one could stop them in their next awakening. "
Josh flew in with a flaming kick before the demon-man could make another move, snapping the demon's neck clean.
He vaporized.
The end of his life shattered the governor's spell, sending an energized blast of words that slammed the root tear shut. The ground shook for a quick second like an earthquake, and the ruins died, fading into the wind.
Josh sighed. "One down. Once I saw he was no longer human, I didn't hold back." He looked at Uncle. "When humans get this far gone, they are dead, mind, body, and spirit. And this buys us more time."
"Then what about the demon you once became? How did you come back?" I was never really a demon; it was a veil that covered me and hid my true nature, tricking me into the belief I was no good. And the demon my father appointed me was to keep me under control, as possession does for some. Some demons don't need to be in you to affect you still."
"I am just glad this is over; I swallowed. "So, what do we do with the governor?"
Uncle knelt beside him. "You let greed take root and almost lost your humanity—you hurt many people. But you're breathing. That means you can fix what you've done."
The governor teared up—an old, broken man, yet human tears.
"No—I will resign," he whispered. "I have done enough damage. I destroyed everything I was meant to lead. I accept the punishment for my crimes. Even before losing myself to this evil, I did many wicked things, dishonoring my family."
"You can rebuild that relationship with them," Uncle said. "Start by telling the truth to everyone."
The mayor—who had been bound by a rope sitting in the corner—stumbled forward, shocked but alive.
He bowed deeply to his uncle and the rest of us. "I am truly sorry, Marcus, for whatever I may have done... If you will have me, I will take office and clean the council and the police. All of it. Before this, I followed this man; even though I felt something was wrong, I let my job override my morals. Although I can't remember anything that happened or how I got here, seeing the aftermath and the governor's story, I feel I have a role to play. In this as well."
"Yeah, the hell you do!" Evan growled.
"Evan!—" I scolded him.
"Regardless, if you want to make things right, you need to take responsibility for your actions, take some accountability," Evan added.
"Micah, he's right," the mayor said softly. "Marcus—be my lieutenant governor."
Uncle froze. "What?"
Even the governor—broken but lucid—nodded in agreement. "The people trust him. More than any of us. He sees this city for what it really needs."
Evan whispered to Tomo, "Micah's family is leveling up. That's what's up."
Tomo smiled weakly. "He deserves it."
"I heard that," I said, rolling my eyes with a smile.
We found another exit outside, through the rumble of the fallen city hall.
The dome that once surrounded the city groaned and flickered.
I gasped, "Could it be?
Baby and Duke found us with the others, including a few of the police that had been released from their demonic holds.
"You're all still in one piece," Duke said, ruffling Evan's hair with locked eyes with Josh and James. "You're safe. Good job, kids."
"Where were you?" I asked.
"There were some weird portals that opened up like roots tearing from a tree. I could feel a hell gate forming. We took care of some demons and protected the kids."
Our conversation was broken by the sweet sound of the dome's collapse, like glass shattering in reverse—falling upward into nothingness.
"Tomo," whispered as he fell to his knees. "Finally, it's over."
Josh tensed when he noticed the time on Duke's wristwatch. "We only have four hours left, and it will take two to get back to the shelter."
I nodded, throat tight.
"We need to get to Kaysi and Becky," I said. "Now that the dome is down, it's time to get them to a real hospital."
Evan swallowed, fear, hope, and determination all mixing in his expression.
"Let's go," he said. "This will not be their final season—we're not losing them!"