-John Newman

John's shout tore through the Albidian halls, reverberating off the school's barely altered tiles. His cry of pain and rage was so loud that had he been in any reasonable state of mind he would surely have heard the echoes himself. But John was too far gone for that, too lost in the rising inferno to care about anything except the feeling of his blade's grip in his hand, and the feeling of his mana surging as he called out to his own world.

"John, be quiet!" Moira called out, sympathy now blunted by instinct and frustration as she reached out to grab John. The Gamer moved away from her grasp before she touched him, avoiding her clenching hands as the light shimmered around him. Sophia appeared beside him, drawn by Summoner's Warp.

"Father, is it time? Are we entering battle? …Father, what is that I see in your eyes? Has something-"

Sophia's voice fell silent, and her own eyes began to mirror John's in a small way, as her gaze flickered from John to the body laid across his lap. The body of her own family, her own so-called Mother, and no matter how peaceful she looked… Sophia's eyes met John's, and in an instant - with instincts so attuned to a brutal lifestyle - the harpy clearly understood what had happened.

"…Father…"

Sophia didn't apologize. She did not grieve, nor did she seem remorseful. Little empathy showed on her face in that moment, though there was some buried beneath a stone wall of intense furor. Were it not for the tears that began to well and streak down her face, John might have thought that Sophia was untouched by sadness at all in that moment. Instead of crying out or grieving as he had, she strode even closer to John and knelt beside him. One of her powerful hands wrapped around John's shoulder, and as she leaned in, she whispered venomously into his ear.

"Tell me what we do now, Father. My life is yours."

"We kill them," John whispered back, not turning his head. He snarled as he finally willed Seras' body away, whisking it into his inventory where it would remain safe, until he was victorious… or dead. "We kill them all, and make it as slow as we can."

"John, how did you bring someone to join us? Your abilities…" Layla paused for a moment, looking like she was debating something with herself. "You should have warned me. Your shout was dangerous enough; I wasn't concealing her aura when she appeared. We need to leave now, or else-"

"I'm not leaving," John growled, standing up and facing the doorway. He put one hand on Sophia's shoulder in a return of her dedication, and willed all of his Creation Experience into her. Every last point - all that he'd been saving for an emergency. He wished he hadn’t saved it, thinking perhaps it could have made some difference in this atrocity - but if it couldn’t save Seras…

Perhaps it could be enough to make sure that everyone involved in this regretted their actions for the rest of their short, miserable lives.”

The effect was instant and very noticeable. Sophia's level went from 21 to 30 as John poured every ounce of his stored power into her, all those days upon days of dungeon grinding bringing her to bear as a weapon as formidable as he could make her. Sophia actually gasped at the change, the most experience John had ever given one of his creations by a full magnitude and more, her body visibly showing the changes. Her health and mana more than doubled, her muscles grew noticeably larger, and the tone of her body even seemed to shift. The wings upon her back half-appeared, only a foot or so wider than Sophia herself and half-translucent. Layla gasped, Moira growled, and John…

John only stared, lifelessly, as the sound of footsteps in the hall grew louder.

"Such a surge of mana… I…" Layla's words were shocked, though her voice was anything but angry. Her eyes glanced between John and Sophia, obviously beyond surprised by these actions, but seeming somewhat… overcome by something else, besides shock. Her hands twitched by her waist, and she seemed to suddenly have a difficult time standing still, grinding her legs together.

"John Newman, you fool!"

Moira did not suffer from the same distraction. She strode forward and grabbed John by both of his shoulders, looking as if she were ready to strike him.

"You promised me that we would retreat; I call upon you to honor that promise, John! You have released so much mana that even I could feel it, and they will surely be bearing down upon us as we speak."

“I never promised that…”

The words came so easily, even though John only barely remembered the promise now. Had he made it intentionally? Had he known what would happen? Or had he just preferred to think that it didn't matter what he promised, refused to believe they could fail…

"You promised me that you would come with us," Moira said, shaking him not-too-gently.

"…I promised that I wouldn't let myself be captured," John said dismissively, forcing Moira's hands away from his chest. “I promise you, I am not going to be captured.”

"We do not have time to argue, John, we must-"

"My Father has already told you what we are doing. You may join us, or you may leave," Sophia warned, voice dark.

"John…" Vallya's words came slowly, hesitantly. She allowed herself to reappear, invisibility fading so that she could face John more directly. As much as any of them, Vallya seemed to have taken the loss to heart. Her cheeks were damp with the flow of tears, and she looked uncharacteristically lost. "…I know why you're doing this, but the Order will be here soon. We can just wait, the Albidians won't go anywhere we can't track them. It would be smarter to wait."

"Yes, it would," John admitted, glancing toward the door. The footsteps now were nearly upon them, echoing loudly in the halls outside. "But I don't want to kill them."

A man appeared in the doorway, breathing heavily and eyes half-wild. He glanced around the room for a brief moment, shock appearing on his face as he took in the four figures. Layla was the only one still invisible, and the man found himself confronted by a Warden, a Gamer, a harpy, and a Kitsune.

"N-no fucking way… it's you, John-"

The man never got to finish his sentence. John moved to the doorway in an instant, Siphoning off speed from Vallya to make sure that he crossed the distance before the man could escape or react. John gripped him by his shirt and threw him across the room and into the cinder block wall so hard that it sounded like an explosion. The man coughed violently as his body dealt with the impact, magically enhanced physique still not enough for the wrath of the Gamer. Before he could extract himself from the small crater he'd formed, John was upon him again, grabbing him by the collar and casting an Observe in the same instant.

"Piirin, I know that… I know that name…" John breathed, fists tightening as he recalled the last time he'd heard it. "You're the fucking Cabal's old leader! The one who started this, all of this!"

"How the fuck did you get in here?! Someone, hel-"

The man's words were cut off as John wrapped his left hand around the man's windpipe, clenching until nothing else escaped. John's right hand travelled up to latch onto the man's cheek, cupping his face in a way that was almost gentle, were his eyes not alight with murderous intent.

"Kill him and let's be off, John! This is madness, this is foolish! The Order will be here soon, we can destroy them then!"

"I fucking said," John emphasized, leaning in until he was so close to the man's face it was almost intimate, "I don't want to escape. I don't want to beat them. I don’t even really want to kill them! The Order can't give me what I want. You know why?"

John willed one of his newest skills into action, praying it had the effect that he wished for it. Hoping against hope it could somehow return the pain that had been inflicted on him tenfold. Lifetime of Penance did not drain his mana, and he felt nothing from the skill's activation. But he knew it had activated.

He knew it by the way that Piirin began to wail as his eyes rolled back into his head. John sneered as the man's cries began to grow louder.

"Because I don't want anything from them. I just want to hear them scream as their light dies."

---

A few moments earlier, in an Albidian Barracks…

Piirin was not a lot of things, whether according to his friends or his enemies. He was not a genius by any means - his gut instincts and street smarts often served him well, but he had no talents for the magical or intellectual arts. He was not an honest or moral man, either. In his lifetime he'd done things that were unthinkable by most civilized folk, but that he had come to know as a very necessary, and sometimes even enjoyable, part of life. Truthfully, Piirin wasn't even always a consistent man - his morals and beliefs changed by the weight of his wallet, the hunger of his belly, and the fear he felt for the world around him.

He was consistent in his inconsistency at least, to a degree anyway - he'd been that way since he was born, long before he could do much more than light a campfire with his magic. In his forty years since discovering his magical potential, he'd worked nearly every kind of job. He didn't mind working as a city guard, he didn't mind working as a bodyguard, and he didn't mind working as a hitman. He'd done all of them, it just always seemed he was the best at the most violent jobs, and they were what ended up making him famous.

He'd run the so-called "Cabal", a failed attempt at stealing name recognition from the older, more powerful Cabal that had fallen so many years ago. Most of his members had started out as little better than glorified hired help, mercenaries of their own right helping Piirin out when he ran into job offers that were clearly out of his league. Some of his hires stuck around, eager for more work that paid a little higher than the scraps they were used to; he didn't exactly support them when the jobs dried up at first, but he certainly wasn't going to turn away eager and **** workers.

It took a few years before he'd started doing his first jobs, but by then he had a steady following of new and **** mages. Why **** away at a menial job for $20-30 an hour when someone would pay you a few thousand dollars for a month of guarding a shop that hadn't been robbed in thirty years, thanks to inflated Abyssal prices? Why worry about going to a university, working your ass off to get a job as an accountant, a doctor, or a lawyer for a couple hundred dollars an hour? Far easier to walk out, openly deal **** for a few hours, and know that any mundane officer who tried to arrest you was effectively signing their own **** warrant.

What value did a human life hold? Only as much - or as little - as it profited him.

But in spite of all that, Piirin did have one trait he considered important. He was loyal to those who didn't betray him… of course, if you asked his companions about that, they probably would've disagreed. But he would contest that; he hadn't abandoned his former subordinates for his own gain. He had abandoned them because he had no other choice.

Piirin had overplayed his hand when he first contacted the Albidians. He thought the knowledge of an Abyssal mage who could keep Barrier creatures alive outside their Barriers was enough to make his entire organization seem far more important and grandiose than they were. He'd thought the Albidians would agree instantly when he made it clear his intel was accurate and verified… instead, they only offered him a place in their organization. Just him, and no one else. He refused, spent days doing nothing but negotiating. The Albidians were hard enough to get a hold of, even harder to sway in negotiations… it was all he could do to make them swear to recruit all of his officers, as well as himself. His followers would have stood up for him, had they known how hard he had to fight to bring them with him when he eventually fled the Cabal's complex in secret.

Actually, no, they wouldn't. Not anymore. Now they'd just stare blankly at you. That was all any of them did any more… even Zayana. Especially Zayana. At the end of the day, Piirin's intel and magically sworn vows to serve only went so far with the Albidians, even with data on an unprecedented mage, even with his life on the line… he retained his freedom, but not much more. He was a cabin boy at best, a ****-janitor at worst. But his former enforcers, leaders, and even Zayana, his lover and second-in-command?

They were mindless automatons, minds suppressed and withheld by the collars worn around their necks. It had been weeks since they were fitted with those devices, but Piirin still hated that they had been necessary.

And, he assured himself again, they had been necessary.

"Done with the feedings, then?" Piirin asked as his lover strode in, eyes blank and face void of emotion. She strode over to the bed across from him, sitting on it passively, eyes faced in his direction but staring far past him.

She said nothing. She didn't even move, her blood-red hair unmoving as her body remained statuesque. The collar around her neck glistened perhaps a little more strongly, then faded just as quickly.

"When this is all over… after you've screamed at me, after you've tried to kill me a couple times, I know you're going to forgive me," Piirin said with self-assurance, an almost innate arrogance filling his voice. "This was the only way. If I hadn't taken us all here, we'd be rotting away in an Order cell right now. You've lost control for now, but I promise you're gonna have your freedom back soon. And when you're done being pissed? You're gonna thank me… one day."

Of course, Zayana never responded. Just like always. He wondered sometimes if the Albidians had bunked her with him out of some form of mercy, or if it was to remind him constantly how close he'd come to losing his own mind at their hands as well… but he already knew the answer. The Albidians had no mercy left.

So he turned over, as he did every night after pleading with his former lover. Piirin closed his eyes, and tried to drift off into the realm of slumber without thinking too deeply on his actions and how they reflected on him. It usually didn't take him long, now. Piirin was a survivor - guilt was a burden one couldn't afford in his line of work.

Guilt was weakness. Piirin had long ago learned to sleep well no matter the day's horrors.

But tonight, things were different. Tonight, Piirin was only beginning to taste the dream world when a pulse ran through his body, silent but unmistakable. A pulse that not only alerted him to something being very, very wrong, but also physically activated his body. Adrenaline surged through him, even though he didn't yet understand what he was being called for. That changed when the radio on his bedside table began to scream at him.

"Piirin, one of the aura sensors in cellblock 2-E has been alerted. We're sensing at least two presences. Go there, now! We'll dispatch a team once the Barrier is secured!"

Piirin wanted to tell them to fuck off, a feeling he had more and more these days, but he didn't give into it. Partially because to do so would be suicide, and partially because he could already hear Zayana standing from her bed. If there was something actually wrong, he wanted to be the first one there. Either to deal with it, were it a false alarm, or to take her and flee if there were a real threat. Her own body was out of her control, but his was not… he would have to take care of her, if there was a real threat.

So Piirin dashed through the halls, leaving Zayana behind. He wasn't sure what could have happened; it was only a few minutes before his attempts at sleep that he'd led his few remaining enslaved Cabal members in delivering the evening scraps to the prisoners. What could have happened in such a short time?

Piirin knew the answer the moment he looked into the cell. It wasn't hard to recognize the man he'd spent so long stalking, so much time analyzing, spent so many hours hiring technomancer after technomancer to decrypt the data on their stolen Gorbachev drone to identify. It was John Newman, standing in the middle of the cell, surrounded by what appeared to be two of his creations and- no, Moira Brighton herself?

Panic set in, and Piirin's mouth began to run uncontrollably.

"N-no fucking way… it's you, John-"

Piirin was by no means a powerful mage, but compared to the rest of Springfield, he was pretty formidable. He still didn't think fast enough to understand what was happening as his body was launched into the cell, across the room, and maintained enough momentum to embed himself comfortably within the cinder block wall, blood spewing from his mouth at the **** of the impact. It wasn't even the wall that stopped him; he could feel his back painfully flattening against the wall of the prison barrier, stopped only by the physical limitations of the world.

Piirin tried to cough and wheeze, but the hands on his collar shocked him into action. He looked up and saw John Newman, eyes glowing and with a gaze that frightened Piirin to his core. The man’s mouth was moving, but his ears were still ringing from the impact.

"How the fuck did you get in here?! Someone, hel-"

Piirin's plea was lost as a hand crushed his throat. Already slightly winded from his sprint here, and halfway through a cry for help, he started to struggle for air almost instantly. Those eyes… those eyes never let up. Piirin could scarcely spare the mental thought to process what was being said by John Newman and the others in the room, too busy struggling, trying to free himself from what he knew would be a fatal grip if he wasn't able to escape it.

Then something unusual happened - something that had never occurred in Piirin's life, through any of his near-**** experiences. John Newman placed a hand on his cheek in a way that could almost be described as warm, touch so gentle it seemed innocent. Then a white light struck through Piirin's mind…

And suddenly, Piirin was no longer a mage of the Cabal.

---

---

Piirin was a fifty-nine year old man, homeless and shivering, but forcing his numbed body on through the alleyways regardless of the pain. It was cold, bitterly so, but he could not afford to stop now. The cold was the reason he was out, it was the reason he had left the homeless shelter at all. He was hoping that he was the only one fool enough to be out in the worst blizzard in Springfield in the last twenty years.

The roads were closed across a good portion of the state, which was fine by him. He'd travelled by foot most of his life, ever since he'd run away from home at the age of fifteen, and in conditions nearly as bad as these. Nearly. That prepared him for this most important mission. A mission that could set him up for life.

The benefit to being homeless was that nobody really noticed you, unless you made yourself a spectacle. Even in Springfield, if you went to the right neighborhood, people would glance over you without a second thought, never remembering your face, never even acknowledging you. That was bad for panhandlers…

But great for thieves.

About three weeks ago he'd seen them. Men leaving what was supposed to be an abandoned house. He'd seen a lot of squatters before, but these men looked nothing like that. Their clothes were clean, freshly pressed, and relatively expensive, even for homeowners. They left the place locked, secured, and even eyed the area around them before going. He started to hang around the area, and found they frequented the place, entering and leaving way more than any squatters would dare for fear of discovery.

He knew their type, the only type who could afford nice clothes and lifestyles in Springfield while squatting - **** dealers, the kind that really didn't want to be found.

So he waited. No more than the three he'd seen ever entered or exited, sometimes together, sometimes apart. The blizzard was his first real chance - all three of those men he'd noticed were gone together, and with the blizzard ongoing, no one would notice his entry.

So he stormed the building and found everything he was looking for - and more. He'd hoped to find enough cash to finally put a deposit down, rent someplace nice, and have something to build a life on. Part time and seasonal jobs barely kept him fed these days, and he'd never had a place to call his own that could last as much as a year. Instead, he found gemstones, strange and unrecognizable… **** too, he was sure, though he couldn't identify them even after so many years amongst the forgotten refuse of Springfield. There was cash kept in a cupboard near the back of the house, but beside it were blue sapphires as large as his fist. All of these things triggered so many warning signs in the young man's head that he thought about running out of that building then… but he was so **** for a new chance at life he did nothing of the sort. He grabbed everything he could carry in the thick pockets of his threadbare sweatshirt, then sprinted away, taking to the back alleys of Springfield and praying he could make it back to the shelter before anyone noticed his late-night absence.

He made it three blocks before he was eventually stopped. His lungs were freezing, and his mind so focused on the path back to the shelter he didn't notice the man stepping out from behind the dumpster until he'd already been clotheslined, body toppling backwards into the snow, hardly a cushion when his chest was burning and his mind reeling from the **** of the strike.

"Told you we should have fucking left someone to keep a Barrier up," a deep voice growled, from somewhere behind him. The man who had struck him just chuckled, grabbing him by the sweatshirt and pulling him up until they were face to face.

"And I told you," his assailant growled, "nobody is dumb enough to fuck with the Cabal. See this? Just some mundane shitter from the streets. He never had a chance of getting away with this shit. Probably doesn't even know what he stole."

Mundane? What did that word even mean? He didn't care.

"L-look, I'm sorry, I'm just really hungry and ****, I ain't got a good memory for faces," he pleaded, shaking with fear as he rapidly emptied his pockets. "Please, just lemme go. I won't tell anyone - I can't!"

"No memory for faces? What a shame! I thought I was so memorable," the man laughed, a loud and unsettling laugh as he threw his head back. "The name's Piirin, by the way."

"Y-yeah," he breathed, "I'm Hugo, I'm-"

"Shut the fuck up, you disgusting piece of street trash," the man said, slapping him across the face. "You stole from us… and now you know our name. So I've definitely gotta kill you now."

"Y-you’re the one who told me your name, please, just-"

They never answered his pleas. They didn't answer his screams, either… except with more laughter.

---

---

Piirin was a twenty-three year old ravenette hanging out the sunroof of a limo at midnight, black hair coursing in the breeze like the **** coursed through her veins. She giggled madly, trying to enjoy the last moments before that final round of shots for the night kicked in, the ones she’d surely regret when the sun rose up tomorrow.

"Oh my god, get down here!"

The laughs of her girlfriends told her that they weren't being that serious, but she giggled her way back into the limo anyway. They were leaving Springfield now and there wasn't that much to see anymore besides the highway and a few last-minute city-limit stops.

"This was sooooooooooooo much fun," she wheezed, her intoxicated lungs struggling to keep up with her cheer. "Seriously, best bachelorette party ever. Fuck mundane parties foreeeverr, magic makes the best ****!"

"Girl, you gotta slow your roll," one of her friends said from across the car, rolling her eyes. "You keep goin' like that, you ain't gonna remember much after your wedding."

"God, I- I mean, Gaia, I hope not, can’t forget that" she giggled. "Have you seen Fireze? Betcha he's got a huuuuge-"

Her words were punctuated by a loud popping noise, followed by the squealing of tires and the screech of metal hitting pavement. She screamed loudly as their vehicle nearly went into a spin, strafing back and forth across the late-night empty road, until their driver somehow managed to control the car and put them into a slight incline beside the road. Her drink was spilled and some of her friends were on the floor of the limo, but for the most part they were all okay, so far as she could tell.

"Holy fuck… what was that?"

"Flat tire… four of them, actually," her driver called out. "Something's wrong. I don't know what-"

Her driver never finished that sentence. She watched with dizzied eyes as his door was yanked open and he was pulled out into the night. She would have been horrified, maybe even screamed, if the limo wall beside her wasn't ruptured in the next moment. Steel and reinforcement was torn apart like nothing, purple shimmers in the night the only sign of something beyond the mundane as the entire limo's lining was ripped away. A moment later multiple sets of hands wrapped around her body, pulling her from the vehicle as her friends cried out behind her.

"Evening, Miss Varettia," a husky male voice said from beside her. The voice came from a man not holding her, but instead striding alongside as multiple others manhandled her. They had lifted her entirely off the ground and were currently carrying her. When she twisted her neck, she saw a black SUV a few dozen yards away from the scene of the crash, and her heart began to race.

"Who the fuck ar- mphawef!" she cried out, her voice muffled suddenly as one of the men carrying her clamped his hand over her mouth.

"Your father has made a grave mistake, Miss Varettia. He owes us a great debt, and he seems to think that he can escape this debt by marrying into money. Normally, of course, we'd have no problem with this, cash is cash you see, but your father… he made a very grave mistake by hiding his debt. You see, Miss Varettia…"

They reached the SUV and the door was pulled open, only for her to gasp at what she saw inside. Her fiancée, Fireze Chaffington, tied and bound within the vehicle. Their eyes met for a moment, and both seemed to realize in that instant what had happened. Despair overcame them both at the same instant.

"…both of your families owe the Cabal a great debt. Perhaps if you were more honest in your relationships, this could have been avoided. Now it’s too late, time is up on the loan, and we’ll have to find some other way for your young love to pay off your debts."

A magical binding of velvet and mana wrapped around her lips, but she screamed so loudly as the door was shut and the vehicle's engine started that it did little to muffle her **** cries.

---

---

Piirin was a vampiress with nearly twenty years of memories, though she reluctantly admitted she could only believe about two months of them were real. She had lived a life of relative happiness in those two months, though - almost worth imagining the rest was all faked. She'd met the love of her life, found a new family that supported her, and begun to discover her purpose… which she had now determined was to protect all of it.

After all, when she saw how John looked at her - looked at all of his lovers - how could she want anything else?

So it wasn't with fear that she made her decision. It wasn't with hesitation or a resigned sort of acceptance. It was with honor, with courage, and with a passion that these monsters would never understand.

She pulled the ring from her finger, bracing herself to deliver her final message to her lover, sure they would be coming any moment. It had been almost an hour since Mithra returned to the cell, her mind battered and weary. And she knew it would not be much longer before they returned to continue experimenting on her… she had to act now. She'd made up her mind, and she had to do it while she had enough time to leave a full message.

She glanced at the ring, its unnatural diamond gem fading into its diamond band. She took a deep, shuddering breath as she considered all the ring represented, all that she would now be losing…

Then she poured mana into it, casting the spell that Etriyya had begun teaching her, recording her voice so that her lover could know how much he meant to her, even now. Even after everything that had happened these last few hours.

"John? John, I don't have much time."

---

John released his grip and let the limp body of the former Cabal leader fall away. His eyes were unfocused, his body twitching uncontrollably. His heart still beat, and his eyes still spasmed between moving figures around him… but his mind was gone, lost in a twirling mass of pain. He would not die yet, not fully.

John wouldn't allow that. He had to feel the suffering of every life he’d touched. And just looking at his pathetic, writhing form, John knew his mind would not be strong enough to survive an entire lifetime’s worth of horrors.

The room around him was silent, but John did not bother himself with the awed stares of those around him. His focus was on the building, the sound of still approaching footsteps, and the presence of Sophia just behind him, as they strode toward the doorway together.

"They know we're here. If they didn't before, they will now. This is your only warning. If you try to stop me, I’ll fight you too. I know the Order is coming, but I… I can't. These people are an abomination. A monstrosity, a fucking stain on not just the Abyss, but humanity itself. If we leave, and even a single one of these shitstains escapes while we’re waiting… I'd rather take my own life than live in a world I know one of them has fled into while I could have stopped it. But that being said… Moira, Layla..."

The angry, vengeful tones gave way for a moment. As John strode to the cell door, he turned around and glanced back ruefully toward his allies. Locking gazes with each of them in turn, John sighed deeply as he turned his eyes to the floor.

"I can never thank you enough. Moira, you helped me become who I am. You taught me about the Abyss and kept me from becoming an unknown late-bloomer who died in his first week, or worse, a **** to someone like these unforgivable monstrosities. Layla, you hardly even know me, and I've kept so much from you… but you've still continued to do anything I ask of you, and shown me nothing but loyalty."

John turned his eyes to Vallya, and held out his hand.

"Vallya, you've only just recently joined our family… but you have shown us nothing but dedication, love, and loyalty. If you want to return to our realm, I will send you back there. If something happens to me…"

"It won't," Vallya swore, stepping forward and locking hands with John. Her eyes were intense, more so than John had seen since her creation. She grasped John's palm with a certainty that betrayed the slight nervousness in her eyes. "Because I'm coming with you!"

"So am I," Moira said stepping forward and slamming one gauntleted hand down on John's shoulder. "I told you before… your ability might be more valuable than the Rose, in the long term."

"Moira, Vallya, you don't have to- you don't need to risk your freedoms. This is my choice, my decision. And it's foolish, I know that, but-"

"By Gaia's tits, you're right it's foolish," Moira said, voice venomous with one of her rare curses. "But I won't let you do this alone!"

"…Nor will I."

Layla stepped forward, though in the narrow space before the doorway she did not come close enough to touch John. Her eyes were all that John needed to see - a determination he had not expected from a woman he'd thought he barely knew. Yet somehow… she seemed even more devoted than Moira as she slowly nodded her head.

"…Flee at any point you want," John said, trying to steel his resolve, burying himself within the hatred still surging through his core. "I won't be offended. I forgive you already should you decide at any point to leave. But… I have to do this. To walk away now would be to give up who I am. To allow them even one more minute of peace would be more than they deserve, more than I can stand. The very thought of leaving this place while they breathe fills me with an existential terror I can’t describe. They will pay for what they have done. And they will do it now."

A woman stepped in front of the cell door, eyes dull and mostly unseeing. Even as she noticed John and his friends, their attempts at stealth fully faded, something hung over her. A veil of disinterest, a certain detachment from the world. A removal from her own actions that turned John's stomach as he noticed the collar on her neck.

John launched himself forward, flying free of the cell at full speed… already plotting how to break through that disinterested mind. Already charging up mana to judge them all. Every Albidian and ex-Cabal in this facility had already surrendered themselves unto him. Their lives were forfeit, their horrors finally about to end.

The only thing they had left to look forward to was ****, and for a lucky few, a Lifetime of Penance.