The winter sky was a barren land filled with nothing but clouds. Only the howling wind and heavy downspout of snowflakes were the true companions of the night. Ironically the city of Flamefair lacked flames during this winter.
One could not even see the guards patrolling around the Duke's manor. The soldiers were long gone into the barracks after leaving defense arrays activated around the manor. Not only the Duke's manor but every single important place was now protected by the arrays, not the guards unless they were willing to use Arch energy to keep their bodies warm.
The heavy downpour of snow soon became a merciless blizzard. The blizzard wind seemed like it was trying to replicate the sound of wolves howling at the moon.
Those who were living outside the city suffered most of the winter. Most of them lacked the necessary winter clothes and cozy home. For the nobles, winter was a perfect time to increase their family size. The majority of the nobles treated the winter as their sweet little escape from reality. However, their perfect reality was messed up by a single person, Nightcrawler.
Now the nobles had to spend their nights in fear as the cold was not the only reason for their shivering.
"You messed up human, I see no shit except blue," said Gaya staring at the monitors back in Abyssal.
"It's called thermal vision. To put it simply, my drone will pick up the heat signatures emitted by someone or something. Since Nesta withdrew the troops, leaving the Flamefair vulnerable, there's a possibility that Nightcrawler would emerge from his hole"
"Ghosty but look at the blizzard there. We can't bet this Nightcrawler would pick this night to hunt"
Nightmare was right, the blizzard might throw a wrench on Nightcrawler's plans but Michael strongly believed that he would choose this night to hunt.
"You heard Nesta before. He's a serial killer, if I'm right, he's still learning the craft. Unless he learned to control his urge to kill, he will emerge from the dark"
If Michael had either personally seen the crime scenes or read the file Nesta's team put together, he would have completely learned that Nightcrawler is still an amateur serial killer. Michael wondered how Nightcrawler managed to get in and out of the nobles' house without triggering any defense mechanisms. If this Nightcrawler too had an ability to hide his arch energy radiation like Aria, he would prove to be a worthy cadaver for Michael to experiment on in the future. Recruiting a serial killer had too many risks as most of the serial killers tend to work alone.
"What are those thingies you made me put in all around Bredia and Kethen?"
"It's easier and fun to demonstrate rather than me explaining"
The three of them stared at the monitors in silence before Gaya cleared her throat attempting to get Michael's attention.
"Hrrggmm" she cleared her throat again but seeing no response from him, she grabbed Michael's chair, turning him around to look at her.
He saw her staring at him with her hands folded against her gorgeous chest. No matter how many times he has seen her, she still mesmerized him. If she showed her original face, he knew he has to fight noble brats from morning to night as she was an angelic beauty who would turn a straight woman into a gay and gay man to straight in a few seconds.
Even when she was mad or annoyed, it only boosted her beauty.
"What?" Michael shrugged. The little dragon was slowly walking backward from Michael.
"So that bitch tried to kiss you huh?" it was not a question but rather sounded like a threat.
"I thought I made myself clear. How about the next time I see her, I'd go for the kiss?" he joked, removing the black skull mask from his face.
"Like this'' he pulled her closer as she stumbled on him. Without letting Gaya speak, he closed her mouth with his. The longer he kissed her, the stronger he pressed her head against his. It was a deep kiss willed with flames of passion and love.
"Look!" Nightmare's shout broke their kiss. The little dragon raised his claws pointing at the mirrors. Gaya's meaningless anger completely vanished away after the kiss as she cuddled him tightly.
Cuddling on the chair, they both looked at the mirrors to see a red humanoid figure moving over the rooftops.
"Welcome to the party pal" he willed the drone that's catching the figure's feed to follow. By looking at the thermal image of the figure, Michael could see the figure has a medium height with skinny body type.
"What's that?" Because he was familiar with thermal images, he quickly saw the abnormal heat emission from the figure's body. All of the figure's body was golden yellow but his chest area was bright red. The red around his chest area was also pulsating.
"Nightmare, come here buddy" The little dragon hopped over to him as Michael put a collar around his neck. A small glimmer of light shone on the middle of the collar, it was the camera he built.
"What is this?"
"It has a built-in camera. Look there, now I see what you see" he pointed at one of the mirrors as Nightmare saw Michael's and Gaya's faces in the mirror.
"Plus, there's a mic and speaker attached to the collar. These will let us communicate regardless of the distance" He didn't build these himself but bought from the system because it only cost him 100 badass points.
He was too busy building four drones and spiders as he decided to buy them from the system rather than building them himself to save time. Moreover, the collar had a tiny poison dart that could be fired by Michael through a telepathic connection.
"We'll teleport to Flamefair. Follow him, it's highly unlikely that someone would notice you through the blizzard. Remember, don't get closer. I'll talk you through this"
"Let me go with him" Gaya interrupted Michael before he could leave the chair. "If this Nightcrawler isn't stronger than me, I'll shoot him with one of the knockout arrows and bring him here"
He rubbed his stubble beard he had started to grow recently. Gaya was a far better shot than him, he was good but she was better. There was certainly a possibility that he could miss the shot at Nightcrawler thanks to the blizzard yet he was confident that she could make the shot using her Legolas bow.
Time was of the essence. Nightcrawler wasn't hunting as he was probably thinking, he was being hunted by the guardians. Nightcrawler had no idea that he was going to walk straight into a trap. If Michael wanted to catch him, he must act now before it's too late.
"Alright but if you feel something amiss, get the hell out there"
"I killed a group of grim reapers with a knife. How hard can this be?" she said, cracking her neck.
"And I killed a group of trained assassins with an ice pick but that doesn't me we should be careless"
He stood up from his chair before putting his black mask on. She too wore the mask that he gave her to change her face and then, she put on the black mask to finish her female Lucifer getup.
"Oh shit, here we go again" she couldn't help but curse, recalling how bad she felt after being teleported using his new method. She closed her eyes involuntarily.
The very next moment, she felt like she was being torn into countless pieces before a sudden chill hit her face. She opened her eyes to see she was standing in an alley knee-deep in snow.
"Go"
Gaya and Nightmare took off from the ground like a rocket leaving the ground. In their rush to find some action, they forgot to ask what Michael's going to do.
"System, hide my presence," he said as the energy being radiated from his body became less and less until it had almost gone. Taking out a mirror from his storage, he monitored Nightcrawler who was still moving on the rooftops. The blizzard was definitely making his advancement towards his target a pain thus saving him from the guardians.
However, the guardians weren't his only problem.
"Ghost, I can see him. He's...he's...just at the... Body Refining stage" Michael was thoroughly stunned to hear Nightmare's words. He could sense the doubt and uncertainty in Nightmare's voice.
"I see him too. What the actual fuck? How could a Body Refiner manage to kill those nobles? Does he have a special ability like Aria?"
"Take him down and we can find out his secret. Avoid hitting his chest though" he guessed that the thing pulsating could be Nightcrawler's secret. Therefore he didn't want it to get damaged by Gaya's arrow. Considering he himself brewed the knockout agent that was smothered on Gaya's arrows, he couldn't be more positive that it would knock him out the second the arrow hit Nightcrawler's body.
He could feel the tension building up inside him. He had a strong feeling that this is going to lead him to something big other than a shit load of badass points he would get when he livestream killing Nightcrawler to the entire Bredia and Flamefair.
"Target insight"
"Take the shot" Michael took off from the ground like superman. He soared through the air towards Gaya's location as fast as he could. He wanted to get Nightcrawler, subdue him with the help of the system before teleporting back to Abyssal.