Ethan materialized in a freezing rain beneath a crumbling overpass, the force of the chaotic Gatewalk throwing him against the concrete. The pain was secondary; the betrayal was absolute.
He scrambled back to his feet, the infernal sigil burning with a shame colder than the Wrath. Four down. Nine more to go. Nine more souls that, if secured, would become the final key—the Tenebris Rift Engine fuel—to drag Hell's armies onto the Earth.
His debt, his escape, his promised salvation—it was all a lie, a masterfully constructed lure to turn him into the architect of the apocalypse.
The single, agonizing reality pierced the noise of the four warring sins in his core. He would not continue the hunt for Lucien.
His freedom was worthless. His survival was irrelevant. The only objective remaining was to destroy the Ledger. He had to secure the remaining nine high value souls and ensure they were annihilated, not merely bound, so they could never fuel the Rift Engine.
He forced his mind to focus. He was now on borrowed time, operating under a false flag, hunted by every major power in the conflict.
Seraphina? Her orders were to contain, to question, to secure him as an asset. She would not believe him, and even if she did, her celestial hierarchy would prioritize cosmic law over any single human life or truth. He could not rely on her.
Kane? He would simply follow Seraphina's orders, or try to kill Ethan if the orders were confusing. Impossible.
He was a weapon without a master, and weapons need logistics. There was only one resource that possessed the requisite paranoia, the necessary subtlety, and the absolute need for secrecy: The Pale Choir.
He needed Elias.
First, he had to neutralize the immediate threat of the Greed soul. He couldn't carry it; it was a tracking device and too volatile for his current state.
He found a derelict, sealed cistern—a place utterly silent, spiritually dead, and easily wardable. He used a massive, disciplined surge of the contained Wrath to carve a containment ward into the concrete floor, ignoring the flare of the Reality Warping that twisted the nearby pipes into knots.
He forced the Greed soul from his core and violently slammed it into the new containment ward, sealing it not with infernal law, but with a temporary layer of pure, focused Wrath. The soul would be secure, hidden, and impossible for Lucien to remotely reclaim without a massive, obvious effort.
He was free of the immediate spiritual burden, but now utterly exhausted.
He contacted Elias using the disposable data terminal she had left him—a simple, chilling message: Rift Engine. Need meeting. Now.
Elias materialized twenty minutes later, not with fear, but with a cold, desperate urgency. She had seen the data packet. She knew the truth.
"The Rift Engine," Elias whispered, her pale eyes wide with horror as she looked at the signs of his volatile escape. "It is real. My sources confirm the transfer protocols match the Seventh Seal configurations—a device for bridging dimensional space."
Ethan didn't waste time. "I am done collecting. I am now destroying the remaining nine souls. Each soul must be annihilated—reduced to nothing, not contained. You will provide the logistics and the sanctuary. I will provide the force."
Elias trembled, not from fear of him, but from the magnitude of the task. Destroying a high value soul required power far beyond simple Penance Chains; it required a directed, specialized application of immense power, something he had not yet attempted.
"The Choir is loyal to the safety of this plane, Emissary, not to your salvation," Elias stated, her voice regaining its professional steel. "We will provide sanctuary, intel, and resources. But if you fall, we will use every resource we have to stop the Engine, including betraying you to the Angel."
"Fair," Ethan agreed, the cold resolve in his core overriding the lingering Pride. "But you must accept the terms of the hunt. I must use Wrath. My humanity is irrelevant. Only the mission matters."
Elias gave a sharp, single nod, accepting the horrifying necessity. "We are now your quartermasters of the apocalypse. Your objective is not just to destroy the souls, Emissary. It is to find the Rift Engine's location and destroy the device itself. That is the only way to stop the invasion permanently."
Ethan, the weapon of Hell, was now an unwilling, desperate warrior for Earth. He was a fugitive from every power, but he had a new mission: find the Engine, and destroy the remaining souls with pure, overwhelming, annihilating force. The hunt for salvation was over; the fight for redemption had begun.