"Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!"
Sharp sounds of cutting through air rang out from behind. Leonard didn't look back and immediately dodged to the side.
After landing, he quickly turned his body to face the direction the attack came from.
Where he had originally been standing, several tarot cards were now stuck in the ground.
They were ordinary tarot cards, some showing their backs, some showing their images.
"Who is it?"
Leonard looked in the direction from which the cards were thrown, his expression showing slight confusion.
In the darkness of the street stood a man with the exaggerated style of a magician.
His face was painted with white greasepaint, his eyes made up into exaggerated black stars, and tarot cards were held between his fingers.
This person was naturally Klein.
At that time, he and Silas had seen Lanevus escape together. The two of them had mobilized to deal with him, so naturally they wouldn't just let him run away.
However, Lanevus bore the pollution of a deity.
Silas could resist it, but Klein was uncertain, and given the large Sequence gap, Silas had arranged for him to observe the situation from afar while he went first.
He had waited on the surface until the sewer collapsed and the figures of both men were exposed under Backlund's sky.
When Silas was wrapped up by Lanevus's body, Klein had even planned to brave the mental pollution to rescue him.
But before he could rush over, Silas had easily dealt with Lanevus.
From Klein's perspective, Silas had muttered something at the time, and Lanevus suddenly became extremely panicked, threw him down while shouting, then had some invisible thing drawn out of him, leading to his physical collapse and death.
What did Silas do?
Klein was confused and uneasy in his heart, but saw that the other was plunged into pain and madness.
At the same time, a Red Glove came running... This Red Glove was none other than his former colleague, Leonard!
"Who are you?"
Although it was nice to see an old colleague, he had no way to reminisce now.
Hearing Leonard's question, he didn't answer but instead threw tarot cards again, forcing Leonard to pull back once more.
Several matches were mixed in with the tarot cards. Using the "Magician's" masterful technique, he threw them into the opening, landing beside Silas.
"Damn it, this guy keeps throwing cards, not letting me pull him into a dream.
He seems very familiar with 'Nightmare' abilities."
Leonard dodged the attacks and thought.
He had only recently advanced to Nightmare and hadn't yet mastered the ability to pull people into dreams well enough, finding it difficult to accomplish momentarily.
"Bang!"
Since he couldn't use dreams, he simply drew his gun and fired.
But after the revolver bullet hit the other person, their body suddenly transformed into a mass of flames and disappeared without a trace.
"Boom!"
By the side of the agonized Silas, the scattered matches on the ground suddenly self-ignited. From the suddenly expanding flames, Klein's figure jumped out.
"Control your spirituality!"
He was impacted by Silas's wildly overflowing spirituality and retreated several steps, shouting, "Otherwise I can't get close to you!"
Of course, because Leonard was above, he deliberately changed his voice.
Klein?
In the gaps of his madness, Silas heard the latter's voice, raised his head, and saw his magician-like attire.
So he struggled to restrain his spirituality, stopping the mental impact around him.
"There's my Beyonder item on Lanevus's body..."
He struggled to say to Klein.
"Got it!"
Klein sprinted to the corpse's side and saw a section of white bone lying in the flesh and blood, glowing with a gentle, lustrous sheen in the scattered firelight.
From its shape, it looked like a human rib.
This must be the thing, right? It looks a bit strange...
"Hm?"
He took a step toward Lanevus's corpse and suddenly felt something odd.
The sewer environment became somewhat pale, as if it had lost something, or as if it were composed of blurred illusions.
It's Leonard. He pulled us into a dream!
Klein thought.
If it were an ordinary Beyonder, they might not notice the dream, but he had peculiar qualities that allowed him to remain clear-headed in dreams.
Just as he was preparing to try breaking through the dream, he felt Silas's aura behind him suddenly surge.
Everything before his eyes transmitted an illusory shattering sound, as if invisible glass was being destroyed.
The dream was broken.
"Ugh!"
Above them, Leonard let out a muffled cry of pain, as if he had received a strong mental impact.
"Hurry!"
Silas shouted with difficulty.
Leonard, you're on your own...
Klein thought, rushing to Lanevus and first picking up that white rib. The item emanated an intense stimulating sensation.
Just touching that white rib brought knife-like pain from his entire body, making him feel very uncomfortable.
"What the hell is this thing?"
He first dropped it as if electrocuted, then took out a piece of white paper from his coat.
Using the paper as a barrier, he wrapped up that section of white rib, finally avoiding that intense pain.
After packing away the rib, Klein hurriedly ran back to Silas's side. Looking around, he found a large amount of blood scattered on the ground, including both Lanevus's and Silas's own.
I must clean up the scene. Otherwise they might track us down through these!
Klein thought for a moment. His gloves moved slightly, and the gaps between his fingers were immediately filled with over a dozen tarot cards.
This deck was made of ordinary cards, but could roughly serve as "Paper Figurine Substitutes" left at the scene to interfere with divination.
"Swish, swish, swish!"
Countless cards were thrown from his hands, falling on the sewer floor and on Lanevus's rotting, decomposing corpse.
Many tarot cards began burning after landing, scattering glowing sparks and disturbing the scene.
But some also fell on Lanevus's body, covering his face that refused to close in death.
On them were depicted images and numbers: a man hanging inverted from a tree, leisurely contemplating; a Fool full of hope, shouldering a pack and embarking on a journey; and a goddess raising the sword of judgment, punishing evil.
Klein hastily finished all this and grabbed Silas.
"Bang, bang, bang!"
Above the opening, Leonard's nose was bleeding as he used his handgun to obstruct them.
But he immediately saw the figures of the two men become tinged with crimson flames and disappear.
"Boom!"
The next moment they appeared on the road, and the moment after that, they appeared in an even more distant district.
Jumping continuously like this, before Leonard could react, they had left his line of sight.
"Damn it..."
Leonard lowered his arm holding the revolver and stared blankly into the sewer. He saw Lanevus's corpse buried among a large number of tarot cards.
Just then, he suddenly heard the sound of wings flapping from above.
Looking up, in the night sky, the demonified Mr. A came flying on bat wings.
His body bore wounds, and a large group of Nighthawks pursued behind him, but his gaze was fixed only on the sewer.
"Ahhhhh!"
When he saw clearly the state of Lanevus's death, he let out a despairing howl!
"Damn bastard!"
Mr. A roared heart-wrenchingly in the direction Silas had departed, his voice containing madness and fury.
"I'm going to kill you! I'm going to make you wish you were dead!"