Wind blew through the tunnel and out to the surface, hitting her nose, carrying the stench of rotting flesh and blood. She shuddered at the thought what could cause such foul smell.

"This must be the place. Not only the trace of magic, even the smell are similar." The smell and the trace of magic were familiar to her, after all, she had gone to the previous crime scene to collect some information about the serial killer.

"You sure about this Rose? You can just send me there alone." Aldwin asked. He pulled the chain in front of him that kept the gate closed.

She took a deep breath. "I have to. This is my duty as the head of Acturus family, and as the member of heroic faction to solve this problem."

"If you say so." Black smoke swirled in his hand and formed a sword in his right hand. He slashed the chain, creating a small spark. "But stay behind me."

Rose looked at the sign above the entrance for the final time before she entered. The sign was covered with dust and rust, making it impossible to read.

She looked back to the entrance. Aldwin had opened the gate and waiting for her inside.A ball of light was hovering above his opened palm.

She walked past the gate with a slow and steady pace, but just as she passed the gate, the air changed. The calm and cold winter night air were gone, replaced by a humid, thick and ominous air.

She grimaced for a second before resuming her composed and cold mask. She snapped her finger, creating a ball of light that hovered above her head.

Aldwin descended the stair first. The sound of his foot stomping the wet stair and the sound of water dripping from broken pipe echoed on the small stairway. The stairways were dark, there were lamp placed around every 3 meter on the wall, but they were all broken after years of abandonment.

The lower she went, the thicker the air and the worse the smell became. When she arrived at the subway station the smell was so bad that she almost vomited, but the sound of something moving in the dark brought her back.

Her eyes darted from one end of the room to the other, stopping every now and then to confirm what she saw before resuming. Rat, bug, and other filthy creature filled the place, but that wasn't what she was looking for.

The sound of many small footstep was coming from around her, slowly moving closer and closer, surrounding her.

They lunged at her. Dogs, five in number, all came from different direction.

“Baze!” She waved her hand around. Creating a ball of fire for each dog.

When they touched the ball, it burned their body to crisp, leaving nothing but charred corpse.

"Mutilating human, Stitched their bodies to a dog, and resurrecting them. Our enemy is a mage classed spirit, a necromancer." Aldwin said.

Rose looked at his direction. Aldwin was holding a dog by the neck in his left hand, inspecting it. The dog was still moving and struggling to get out from his hand.

He sliced the dog throat open with his sword and tossed it.  Around him, there were many more dogs without a head. "What do you mean?" She asked.

"Look at them closely! they look like a dog, but actually it's a human body part that was stitched together to look like a dog." He answered. Rose walked to one of the dog body near Aldwin.

Her eyes widen. She covered her mouth and held the vomit in her throat. Tears flowed down her cheek, unable to accept what she just saw. What Aldwin said was true. The dog was an abomination made of human flesh. Their eye, their teeth, their skin, everything was made of human body part stitched together to form a dog.

"W-Who could have done such a thing?" Her voice trembled.

"Someone, obsessed with dogs, and have no heed to ethic and moral code, and is not afraid of the supervisor." He answered. His voice showed that he doesn't care about what they have done. "They must have a lot of time and spare mana in their hand. Creating something like this is very ineffective, and inefficient, not to mention that the result isn’t that great."

Aldwin turned his head to Rose, he felt something strange. All of his five senses doesn’t pick up anything, but his instinct told him that something was coming, heading toward Rose.

He Ran to Rose side ,created a spear out of thin air, and spun it around. The sound of multiple metal clashing echoed the underground station. Aldwin deflected multiple dagger, stopping them using his spear.

She pointed her finger at the direction of the dagger. "Aldwin! Eliminate them!" Aldwin nodded and charged at their enemy in the darkness with a spear in his hand. Not long after, she already couldn't see him because of the dark.

Growl and footsteps was heard from around her. The sound of dogs running from the tunnel, of them moving through the ventilation. She looked around. Dogs started popping out again the moment Aldwin left.

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“Why doesn’t he tell me about this?” She complained.

'10? 20? 30?' The number of dog was too many for her to count, and they surrounded her from all direction, making her unable to flee. They suddenly stopped moving.

A maniac laughter of a woman was heard through the station. Because of the way it echoed, the sound appeared to came from every direction, making Rose unable to track its original location even with magic.

"Stupid girl, you shouldn't have send you spirit away. Now he's going to walk into a trap and die, but before that, i'm going to show him your cold body, ripped to shred by my precious children, and i'm going to see the despair in his eyes before killing him." She said.

Rose smiled. "Don't underestimate him, he's strong."

"Bluff all you want girl. A heroic spirit like him won't last a minute inside here, much less a girl like you. My children, shred her to pieces!"

“Heroic huh?”

The dogs started to move again. The one near her lunged at her, while the one that was still far from her ran to her.

Rose placed both of her hand in her chest and started an incantation. He body glowing red. She stretched her arm as far as she could.

Pillars of flame erupted from the ground. The flame slithered like a snake, incinerating any that touched it. Wall of flame covered her all around, burning any dog that came too close to her. She waved her hand liked before, and numerous ball of fire shot from her hand, blowing any dog that came to contact with it.

Before long, all that left was sea of ashes. Rose stood in the middle of all of that without even a single scratch, not even one dog could came close to her, much less touched her.

Rose was panting, her chest was moving up and down rapidly, but she tried her best to conceal it from her enemy. She just used multiple B ranked spell at once, it took a lot of her mana.

"HOW DARE YOU TURN MY CHILDREN TO ASHES" Her enemy scream.

"Your children are so weak, even a thousand of them won’t change the result." Rose answered.

"SHUT UP! You! You! You arrogant girl! Let's see then how you fare with something like this."

Fire appeared in front of her, hovering in the air. It started to move, making a pentagram and circle in the middle of the room.

"No!" Rose shouted. She casted a spell to stop it, but by the time she realize the spell, it was too late.

Bright light filled the room. She covered her eyes with one of her arm while the other prepared a spell for anything that came out from the pentagram.

As soon as the light dissipate, she threw a fireball from her arm at her enemy, without waiting to see what it was. Only after she lowered her arm she noticed her own error.

The fireball bounced of her enemy cracked pitch black skin without leaving a single trace.

Stood before her was a giant double headed dog as tall as Aldwin. Its skin was black like a charcoal with many cracks, revealing a red burning flesh underneath. The innerside of its mouth and its eyes was also red, covered with fire.

"He-Hellhound." She took a step back..

"MY CHILDREN! BURN HER WITH THE FIRE SHE SO PROUD OF". The hellhound roared at her command.

------

Aldwin was running along the dark corridor without his ball of light. A tunnel as dark as that was like a well lit room for him because of his skill, but his enemy was still too far away for him to see. He spun his spear around to deflect any incoming dagger that was thrown at him.

He was chasing his enemy at full speed, but it doesn't feel like he made the gap any closer. He stopped his feet to think.

A dagger was thrown from the front, he deflected it. A second one came from his right, then the third one from his right, and the fourth one from his back.

"Damn!" He noticed it too late.There was no enemy that could be chased to begin with. All the dagger that was thrown was created and thrown at him using magic. The caster was far away and nowhere to be seen.

He turned and started running back at his full speed, not even slowing down at corner and turns. He ran, he ran, and he ran for a full minute, but the scenery didn't change, it was the same dark corridor no matter how far he ran. He couldn't find his way back to Rose.

He stopped when he stepped on something, something that made a distinct metal sound. He crouched down to see what he stepped on, he stepped on the dagger that he deflected before, from the time that he realized all of this was just a trick.

'Did I run in circle? Impossible!' He thought. He looked at the wall, it felt like he had passed this wall a few time over when he ran before. He scratched the wall with his spear. He ran again, this time he ran straight. He didn't turn left or right, but after only a few second, he stepped on the same dagger and saw the same wall again with the exact same mark he made before.

He laughed as he realized. "How could i be tricked by such a simple illusion?" He gripped his spear with both hand. The spear transformed into a box, a small black box that he could grip with only one hand. He opened and raised it above his head.

His vision started to distort, the world turned upside down, and crack appeared in the air, until finally the whole illusion world shattered and crashed down on him.

A sabre was held at his throat. Holding it was a man not too different from him. The enemy in front of him was around as tall as him, with a white hair that was a contrast with the dark surrounding. His eyes were also the same as him, white pupil and black sclera.

"You? You're a demon too?" The man asked with his eyes wide open in disbelief, he gritted his teeth. Aldwin stayed calm unlike his enemy, he doesn't find his enemy appearance to be something surprising. "Traitor!"

Aldwin noticed an opening when his enemy was surprised. He parried the sabre in his neck with his spear, pushing it away from him. They both took a step back. His enemy raised his sabre and assumed a stance, he expected an attack from Aldwin. Instead, Aldwin ran away from there the instant he pushed his sabre back, not even bothering to look at what his enemy was doing.

Aldwin ran back, sensing that Rose was in danger and needed him, but his enemy won't just let him ran away without a fight.

Multiple dagger were thrown at him. Aldwin dodged, turned his body, transformed his spear into a bow, fired several arrow in retaliation, and continue running without slowing his pace.

He heard a beeping sound from a wall somewhere in front of him. His instinct told him to stop.

'STOP!' his instinct screamed at him.