Philip slipped away from the hallway with flawless stealth and rejoined Alphard, who waited impatiently a couple of floors below.
Tucked in a corner out of the guests' sight, Philip shed the servant's uniform and changed back into his usual clothes. Once ready, they left the Grand Hotel without drawing any attention, briefcase in hand, and posted themselves at the corner of a nearby street, hidden within the shadows of the night.
From their position, they kept close watch on the main entrance, waiting to see whether Valentin would take the bait, or ignore the letter entirely and stay holed up in his room. If the latter happened, they'd have no choice but to launch a direct assault inside the building — an extremely dangerous option, both for themselves and for the civilians inside.
Beyond that, their goal wasn't simply to take Valentin's life, but to locate his base of operations and wipe out every ally hiding there as well.
"I can hear his heartbeat from here. He's getting closer," Philip said, eyes fixed on the hotel doors.
At that, a hired carriage pulled up in front of the building's entrance. Almost in perfect sync, the hotel doors swung wide open, and Valentin stepped out with a firm stride to board the vehicle.
Without wasting a second, Alphard and Philip climbed into another carriage waiting near their hiding spot and gave the driver an immediate order to begin the pursuit.
And so began a long journey beneath the night sky. Above them, the moon glowed a deep, brilliant crimson, rising like a bloody omen of the massacre yet to come.
As they pressed on, Philip's right leg began jittering with an uncontrollable restlessness, thin beads of cold sweat trailing down his temples.
"Something wrong?" Alphard asked, noting his obvious agitation.
"Don't worry about it... it's just an effect of my Door," Philip answered through gritted teeth. "The full moon's to blame, but it'll still come in handy when it's time to finish this."
Alphard fell silent, faintly unsettled. Despite the carriage rattling along at speed, he glanced up at the red moon and pieced together what was happening: the crimson moon was destabilizing his mentor's control, but Philip was forcibly holding that chaotic energy in check, saving it to unleash in the coming fight.
"His heartbeat's fading out... he's getting too far ahead," Philip murmured, uneasy.
"I've got this," Alphard said, cold and certain.
At that, Alphard activated his spiritual sight. The physical world shifted into ethereal tones, and instantly, he caught Valentin's spiritual signature, dense and overwhelming even at a distance.
Without hesitation, he began calling out the exact turns to the driver at every crossing, refusing to lose the trail.
Just as the chase seemed like it might drag on forever, the carriage ahead of them finally rolled to a stop. Alphard and Philip tensed immediately. They tossed the driver a few coins, stepped down without a sound, and moved along the walls to close in on their target.
"Can you sense spiritual essence through solid structures?" Philip asked.
"No, matter blocks my sight," Alphard clarified.
"Then stay behind me."
The two of them melted into the shadow of the buildings. Alphard gripped his weapon firmly, alert to any hostile movement along the rooftops or nearby corners.
They emerged into a dark, dismal alley, lit only by the red glow of the night's moon. The place seemed deserted, but embedded in the cobblestone was a small grate, perfectly camouflaged. It had been designed to go unnoticed, but Philip's nature let him spot it instantly.
"They're underground," Philip announced under his breath. "This is our way in."
Resting a hand on Alphard's shoulder, Philip pried the metal cover free and helped him slip through the narrow passage. He followed right behind, sliding into the dark himself.
The darkness inside was absolute.
Far from smelling of waste or resembling an ordinary sewer, the passage was built from old brick walls and hand-carved stone blocks, reinforced with iron beams to bear the weight of the city above.
Everything about the design made it clear this place had been built for one purpose alone: hiding secrets from the world outside.
Philip guided Alphard through the dark using his night vision. But as they pushed deeper into the belly of the place, Philip's senses began overloading: the air throbbed with the sound of blood pumping violently through countless veins.
This wasn't just one person — it was dozens of hearts, beating in a low, coordinated frenzy behind the walls.
"I'll give the word when it's time to use the cane," Philip murmured, barely a whisper. "Keep the briefcase secure with one hand, and hold your weapon firm with the other."
Alphard nodded in the dark and kept following him. As they closed the distance, the absolute darkness began thinning, giving way to a distant glow lighting the depths of the complex.
Reaching the edge of the path, the darkness opened onto an imposing network of stone stairways sinking into an abyss the light couldn't reach.
"How is something like this even possible...?" Alphard murmured, unable to process the sheer scale of the underground structure.
"This is worse than I feared," Philip admitted, low.
Refusing to turn back, they began the dangerous descent down the steps. As they went, the darkness swallowed them once more, sharpening the paranoia of an ambush waiting at any moment.
The faint creak of the stairs put them on edge, forcing every step to become even more careful, more precise. Beyond that, the smell of rusted metal and a hint of blood in the air kept them from losing focus for even a second.
"We're close now," Philip warned.
They reached a new passage and advanced with silent steps. Through the gloom, they spotted six men gathered around a table, chatting in a relaxed, unhurried manner.
Still, Philip's attention snagged on a side tunnel just a few meters away. He crossed over to check the angle, and the moment he glanced inside, he froze in place.
At the center of a vast underground chamber stood an enormous, grotesque sunflower. Its yellow petals stood out horrifically against a pyre of pale corpses, drained entirely of blood.
Alphard stepped up behind him to see what had stopped him cold. The instant he caught sight of the grim scene, his stomach lurched violently; he turned his head toward the shadows of the corridor and clamped both hands over his mouth to choke back the retching.
"Why did your heart just spike like that?" Philip asked, catching the sudden hammering in the boy's chest.
"It's nothing... forget it," Alphard said, drawing a breath and forcing himself back under control.
Alphard tightened his grip on the briefcase, raised his pistol with his free hand, and aimed straight for the center of the table. But just as his finger brushed the trigger, a sinister voice rang out, its echo rolling violently through the tunnel.
BOOM!
An invisible blast erupted from the front, hurling them both violently backward. Reacting in a fraction of a second, Alphard reshaped his free hand, molding skin and bone into a dense shield that absorbed most of the shrapnel and the shockwave.
Beside him, Philip rolled across the ground from the impact; but true to his nature, he didn't so much as flinch in pain. Alphard never let go of the briefcase's handle, pulling himself up immediately, gritting his teeth against the dull throb in his bruised arm.
Philip took the initiative at once. He wove with feline agility around a hail of gunfire one of the men unloaded at him. Using the momentum, he slid across the floor, seized the attacker's arm, and snapped it before finishing him off with a brutal kick to the face.
Alphard, for his part, kept his cool. Briefcase clamped under one arm, he raised his pistol and emptied two rounds straight into the head and sternum of the nearest attackers.
To his horror, the impacted flesh didn't so much as flinch; the men kept advancing without breaking stride, as though the bullets had been nothing more than fly bites.
Alphard moved to reshape his hand to defend himself, but a dull, stabbing pain stopped him cold.
A violent spasm tore through his circulatory system. He could feel his blood boiling inside him, surging in a sudden hemorrhage through every internal cavity.
His pulse roared in his ears like thunder, and the air froze solid in his lungs, trapping him inside his own body without the ability to take a single step.
Ah, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts! My body's on fire!
Philip caught Alphard's suffering instantly and closed the distance to step between him and the threat. The moment he cut the gap short, two of the men tried to seize his own blood from within to tear him apart.
The technique proved useless against Philip's own nature, but the pressure it exerted still shoved him back, denying him the stillness he needed. He silently began invoking the poem in his mind, though he knew that without a couple of seconds of absolute stillness, the roots would never manage to take hold.
Beside him, Alphard fought to hold onto his sanity through the searing burn, drawing on every last drop of willpower he had left.
Wrestling the pain into submission through sheer mental focus, he forced his blood vessels to purge the infected fluid scorching him from within.
A thick, blackish surge spilled from his mouth, dense enough to look like raw crude oil. Enduring an indescribable agony, he used his shaping ability to realign, with surgical precision, every torn muscle and internal tissue, letting him move again without tearing his own organs apart in the process.