Solitude in the Dark

Episode 5: Boundaries Part 2

In his bright purple eyes, he declares with absolute solemn, "I will kill all the Seven Deadly Sins and burn them to the ground..."

His words didn't surprise Hayan, his anger and desire are justifiable. "No, it's not your responsibility," Hayan said.

"Then I'll join the Radiants. Together, we'll kill them all, for our family!"

All the talks aside, Hayan felt some exhaustion too and he brushes off the heavy talk "I'm going inside now, I need some sleep, and you should too. Again, there's no place for worrying." He picks up Cloud's cup "And I'm taking this. Goodnight, Cloud."

Now that he is alone on the balcony, quiet in the middle of the night. Wondering if he could do such magic, recalling the events from Busan. How the hell did I do any of those?

He looks at his hand, and moves his fingers, waiting for something to happen as he waves like an idiot. Surprisingly, purple energy flows through the tip of his fingers "Woah... Heol!" He fiddles with it and the energy slithers to his hand at his will. He faintly chuckles as he plays with it. An idea sparks, he manipulates the energy to his palm and presses it with both of his hands, and the energy compresses forming a sphere of unstable energy. Cloud was so mesmerized that he could do magic. He tries to do something again, he spreads his fingers, then the orb of energy unravels back to flowing energy, as he plays with it, it transforms into a black mist swirling in both hands uncontrollably. Out of nowhere, the golden bracelet on his wrist glows and shakes vigorously, and the black mist slithers around his hands, he flinches and shakes the black mist out. The bracelet absorbs every drop of the uncontrollable dark energy. "Shibal!... Wh—what was t-that," He checks himself if something is lost on his body and what else the bracelet took. As he went inside, a voice echoed, the same voice earlier. This bind will not hold you back!! He flinches again and rushes inside, miraculously not disturbing the two from their sleep.

...

Deep in the dark on the mystical mountains of the Sierra Madre, Archangel Raphael brushes through outstretched vines, tall grasses and towering trees in the middle of nowhere accompanied by ten Radiants.

Hours after meeting the Seraph in the central city of Eden, he was straight away sent on a mission to track down and neutralize a horde of Aswangs in the mountains.

He draws both of his pistols and merges them together, forming a sniper. Pitch black and only the bright full moon from the night sky is the source of light, he climbs an enormous tree and scopes a broad area hoping to spot their target. In a dark place with no human in sight, away from civilization, a perfect place for a Schatten to roam around. Raphael commands his team on the ground through his comms "Stay alert, we don't know what's out there, it's too dark we can't see properly." Then he drops down from a 65-foot tree without creating any sound, quietly landing on the ground like a soft feather, he disassembles the sniper reverting to black and gold pistols and holsters it. Why the sudden emergence, especially the Aswangs, are they back or is it just because of Envy's orders? Or because of—

As Raphael silently ponders, one of the Radiants carelessly casts a bright orb to light up their surroundings "The hell... it's so dark in here. How can we conduct the operation if we can't see properly in the first place?"

With that careless action, they are risking their stealth and chances of the element of surprise if an opponent is sighted, as well as gambling their lives in the mountains with no backup. Raphael snatches the source of light and immediately crushes into bits, angered by his careless actions, he grabs the ensign's hand, "Have you lost your mind?! We don't know if this place is crawling full of Aswangs..."

All the remaining Radiants behave themselves, his eyes alone petrified them.

"Use your mind, guns and swords will not be sufficient in a battle," Raphael says. He lets go of the hand of the novice and looks around their surroundings, assuring if they are compromised or not. He climbs once again and attempts for another recon through the dark mountains "When are you parasites going to show up? Now that you've seen a beacon..." he mutters.