A fist was driven against a solar plexus, knocking the wind out of a man.
His breath forcibly escaped his lungs, as he covered up his stomach, leaning forward with his mouth agape. To which, the Failed Star clobbered him with a sharp punch that rang true—planting his feet firmly into the ground and using his legs, hips, and back for his power, Riley sent teeth flying.
"AGH! KUH, HK, PFFT!"
Spitting out teeth as blood spilled, the servant's fearful expression was illuminated by the moonlight as Riley lumbered over. With a shove, Riley sent him back against a desk, scattering papers onto the floor.
"W-wait! Wait, ghk, hk, wai—p-please, please—"
Raising his shoe, Riley stomped on the man's nose, his arm outstretched in an attempt for protection. His nose was bashed inwards, forcibly spilling blood.
…This sucks.
A disgruntled expression on his face, Riley grit his teeth and clenched his fists.
"How many people did you kill? Answer me, right now. Or I'll break every bone in your body next."
"A-agh, uh, I don't know! I swear, I really don't know!!"
"You ever killed a child?"
Breathing frantically, the man was silent upon Riley's question. Taking that as an answer, Riley grabbed him by the collar and punched his broken nose, inducing further pain. Riley threw him to the floor, to which the man tried to crawl away.
"Not yet. Still, not yet."
Riley grabbed them by their ankle and violently heaved them over to him, as he sat on their back and pinned them to the ground. Placing his knee on the back of their elbow, he pulled their wrist upwards, snapping the arm in the wrong direction.
"AHHH!"
Continuing to sob, the servant had the process repeated to his other arm.
"Get up."
Removing himself from the man's back, Riley kicked him in the side. Struggling to stand with both arms broken, the servant's mind went blank with fear, unable to consider the possibility of regeneration.
"You've killed children before. You've killed women before. You've probably wiped out an entire family to prepare for this. You've ended bloodlines. You've laughed and mocked and screamed at those who couldn't fight back."
Grabbing them by the back of the head and pulling them in, delivering a knee-strike to the already broken nose, busting their lips and further targeting a weak point, the youth let out his frustration.
"Aa-aghh, hhh, w-wh, m… m… ma, mmuh, muh…"
"Alright then."
Riley grabbed a lamp with a metal pole. Ripping it in three, Riley turned the middle metal center into a small blunt weapon. Riley grabbed the servant by the hair and jammed it through their eye, only about an inch or two deep downwards into their skull.
They let out a violent cry, as they collapsed to their knees, to which he continued. Mercilessly overpowering them with his physical force, dominating them with raw violence, Riley fractured their skull and left his face into a heap of bruises, cuts and blood. Finally, he violently threw them against the wall, further instilling their own powerlessness into them.
"Go on. Tell everyone about what I've done to you. If you don't, I'll impale you just like I did to your friend. Leave."
The servant, a metal pole sticking from their left eye, fled upstairs, screaming and crying all the way. With that, the living were leveraged against the servants, making death into something preferable.
…
Upstairs, a group of three was harassed by [Hanging]. It was not actively damaging them, it was not actively causing pain or hurting them or weakening them.
Rather, it would not let them rest.
Even when Riley was not physically present, his ability was sent to harass the enemies, never once letting them settle or grow fully comfortable, not allowing for any kind of breaks.
Glass would shatter, their legs would be pulled, the rope would try to wrap around their neck and drag them out—futile, but ultimately troublesome harassment.
…
Below, a group of four, Scott's group, heard the door slam open, as a fellow servant rushed in. His face beaten to a bloody pulp, his arms snapped and broken, a metal pole plunged into his skull—just looking at him caused the fearful servants to shiver with fear.
"Muhh, ughhuhk, ehh… my, a-agh, hk, hhh… h-help, help…"
As the servant walked forward, the group unanimously stepped back, shouting for him to stay back and away from them. Fearful of the bombs, they truly believed Riley was using this man as a weapon against them—a suicide bomber.
"GET THE FUCK BACK! DON'T MOVE! I SAID DON'T FUCKING MOVE!!!" Scott roared, declaring his authority as his teammates hid behind him. The bloodied man sniffled and sobbed, hardly able to breathe proper as his shaking knees gave out, sending him to the floor.
"I-it, it, it hurts, it, aghh… h-help, help, help me—"
"I said… Get. The fuck. BACK!"
Even Scott, whose ability was based on his overwhelmingly absurd regenerative capability, was left terrified of Riley's mind. Truly, he couldn't consider Riley a hero in the slightest.
Utilizing a screaming ally to draw them in, only to bomb them as a result—that was the same kind of twisted strategy the most vile humans used.
Wary of experiencing sensory overload, the vampire stared with perfectly clear vision towards the wounded "soldier."
Indeed, that was part of his ability. To see perfectly in the darkness, and to enhance his hearing to pick up even the subtlest of sounds, befitting the sensory advantages of a vampire. However, he had not used his hearing to his advantage, in truth due to Morgan's own ability and the fear of bombing.
Should he activate his extraordinary hearing, which can turn a gunshot into an ear-splitting assault on the mind, how much worse would a full-scale bomb? There was nothing to fear of being blown-apart—his regeneration was instant due to his killings. But the sensory assault was the most troublesome attack Riley could possibly deliver.
And, once his vision ensured that the fellow servant didn't have a vest of any kind, Scott made his decision. Rushing forward, his nails sharp as knives, the Vampire decapitated the wounded ally, killing him instantly.
It was necessary.
As the blood spilled, not in gargantuan hordes like Riley could, and the visage of a head falling into someone's very own lap, accompanied by the gruesome insides of an open neck, Scott's group stared in horror at the sight.
Now, a servant had been taken out by their very leader, deemed a necessity to prevent further damage.
Scott's group was that of four members. The most cowardly of the bunch, Wade, was left speechless and frightened. The other two, however, sided with Scott, even if the sight of their commander killing their own subconsciously instilled a resentment against him.
To the leader in whom they had already begun to distrust as a competent protector, the act of taking an ally's life broke that trust down even further.
Even still—,
"We have to, we have to surrender!"
Shouting that message, a servant proclaimed it to the masses. As he ran up the stairwell, going floor to floor and pleading with all to hear, it spread the idea into everyone's mind. In such a horrifying circumstance, and without any trust or genuine loyalty to Ghira, the idea of simply surrendering was not one which was impossible.
Regardless, as that message was spread, a group of four on the sixth floor simply could not bear it any longer.
Being a victim to such traumatizing warfare, having lost all hope in Ghira as a good master they faithfully obeyed, and being screamed at to surrender, caused a group to simply give up.
Ghira's calling, the rewards he promised in this life, leading them to face such a monstrous opponent—worthless, it was simply not worth fighting for.
It was a group of four. And, in a group that small, much less than the already-dwindling numbers, they earnestly could not tell how many servants as a whole were left. It was entirely possible that they were the sole survivors, and that everyone else had perished.
The fear in such a private, intimate group spread like wildfire. No, much greater than wildfire, it instead acted as a tsunami which washed over them. One of the servants had already broken, had already surrendered.
"...I-isn't it fine if we just give up? I-I mean, I mean… Ghira would understand, right?" One servant weakly proposed, to which the others overwhelmingly agreed.
"That's right! B-but, I can't trust that… we can't surrender. We just… we need to run away. We need to run, we need to escape—we can't stick around here. If we do… we'll die next. That's why… we have to run away, as far away, as far as possible, as we can. We—we just, we just…"
Holding his hand over his chest, the servant looked out to the window. His fear was felt and reciprocated with all the rest, amplifying its power.
"Right," the third and final person who needed to utterly solidify their plan spoke. "We… we need to get out of here. Away from Riley… no. We need to escape this monster."
The embodiment of terror.
More akin to a calamity, a natural disaster given flesh, Riley Woods had utterly solidified himself as a person befitting the title of "The Enemy of the World."
To be outmatched and outnumbered, yet leveraging terror in such a cruel manner—plain and simply, a monster.
In order to escape such a horrible existence, a force so primally suffocating, they abandoned their mission. Unanimously, they deserted their post in the office building, leaping out from the window.
With that, Riley had taken out another four members of the Forgotten King's army, having acted as nothing more than a human being.
…
Using his sixth sense, Riley felt four servants leave the building.
This was a good thing, as it further divided the enemy forces, completely isolating those four people. If necessary, he could simply deal with them later.
But for now, I'll wait. Let my messenger proclaim surrender as an option—never back your enemy into a corner, after all. Desperate foes lash out in blind anger against you.
This, then, is different from anger in strategy. In warfare, anger leads to strategic blunders. But in battle, anger can be used to lash out, giving rise to a beast that fights with full intensity and resolve—less than ideal, to say the least.
"Thus," he began, speaking aloud to himself, as he sat on a desk in a meeting room, playing with a sharpie, "the key is to leave an opening. An exit. Desperate enemies grasp at your neck instead of straws. Weaken their will with choice… Tee-hee, I bet I sound reeaally philosophical, huh? Nina…"
Oh, Nina, if you were here, you'd probably laugh. But alas, I'm alone right now, so I'm the only one laughing…
——Regardless. I took down sixteen of them, and with those four deserting, I've managed to whittle it to twelve. But then, Scott took that final kill, reducing it to eleven total.
Much better odds than previous, eh? Who knows, I might have it in me to kill them all at once, like this.
No. Even if I'm technically facing ten due to one of them being unable to regenerate and having already surrendered, the last thing I need is to engage in genuine battle. "Victorious warriors seek victory first and then battle," right?
Got it, me. Then, I just need to continue to whittle them down using the tactics of humanity. Indeed, I really am a human being.
These guys have killed a lot of innocent people to prepare for this. Though, I guess it's also very human to try and justify committing actions you really hate, isn't it?
—So then, the way is this. This is the only option I have to survive. I can't lose heart.
Rolling down his sleeve, Riley looked at the tattoo he'd made. A noose, wrapped around his arm—representing the despair of the world, he did not forget it.
Right. These guys brought a lot of suffering and pain into the lives of many. Doesn't mean I'm justified in doing this, it just means I can look Nina in the eye and smile with what I've done, once this is all over.