I emerge back into the Scalebound palace, and I’m soon followed by my two Werewolf companions.

“Well, at least your method of teleportation is easy to follow…” Riley mutters before scanning the area.

“I think there are a couple of enemies hiding in the next room," Steve whispers. The part of my armor that provides the lifeforce scanner still isn’t repaired, so I’ll have to trust his judgment.

Steve and Riley slowly walk next to the wall and a few magical circles appear over their clenched fist just before they hit the wall. It explodes into tiny pieces and panicked yelps come from the dusty room. However, we don't pay any attention and we slaughter them without remorse.

Bullets fly around the room while faces are ground to a fine paste by the fearsome punches of the Werewolves, and we somehow clear the room just as the dust settles. I get a good look at our victims: A bunch of bird-like people, not unlike the ones who mugged me back in the Underworld, are lying in pools of their own blood.

“Not so thought now that you cannot fly…” Steve mutters before spitting on the mangled corpses.

“Come on, we don’t want your mom to clear out everyone before we can get our proper revenge!” I say with a grin when I hear muffled cries coming from the other side of the mansion.

Now the Scalebound remnants know we are here, so it’s only a question of time before that bastard comes out…

AnD We will tAke CaRe oF hiM!

It’s a bit frightening how right my newly acquired murderous voice is.

We bust into the next room, this time we encounter a group of Dragonewt that have already prepared makeshift barricades made with the furniture lying around. But their barriers don’t last a second against our combined assault.

The Werewolves are barging into the fray while I stay in the back and shoot the panicked lizards as fast as I can. This makes quick works of the creatures, and Riley’s ears perk up as soon as he crushes the skull of the last Scalebound soldier.

“I suddenly felt a few tremors in the ambient mana, and strands of lifeforce are coming from the corridor," he says while cracking his knuckles.

“Would you say they are about here?” I point towards a section of the wall and Riley nods. Then I fiddle a bit with my Portal Gun before a blue rip in reality appears in front of me. I aim my gun towards the portal and empty the magazine, causing surprised yelps to echo into the corridors, but they are soon followed by squelching noises.

We open the door to the corridor and the scene that greets us looks like it was ripped from a horror movie. Pieces of meat coated in metal spikes are stuck on the walls, and the expensive-looking carpets are soaked with fresh blood.

“I’ll remember to not piss you off in the future…” Steve says with a chuckle.

Looks who’s talking, I’m not the one who’s a giant creature covered in blood and guts.

“So where’s our next destination?” I ask after reloading my pistol.

An explosion answers me, and Riley immediately puts a hand on his left ear.

“That was our mother; apparently they just exploded and torched the entirety of the west wing.” He says before grinning. "Now, we need to hurry or we'll never have a higher kill count than them!"

We chuckle and rush through the corridor, only to bump into a group of Dragonewts wearing bloodied lab coats.

The Dragonewt in front raises his hands, “We surrender, we’re just part of the medical staff and-”

Sadly, a bullet silences him, and his comrades look at me in horror.

“Dude, isn’t this a bit too extreme? Aren’t we supposed to follow the rules of-” an uneasy Steve asks.

"I don't know about you, but I never signed any treaty so everyone in this mansion is fair game to me," I say as I mow down the group of lizards before they can plead for their lives.

Anyone who helped the Scalebound is my enemy, and I won’t hesitate to pull the trigger if I see them.

The Werewolves exchange a glance before shrugging; they probably arrived at the same conclusion as me.

We continue to clear the mansion; the pockets of disorganized resistance we encounter don’t last long against our onslaught and we soon arrive at a large and lavish staircase.

“So, do we go up or down?” I ask. Most of my helmet regenerated, so I regained my lifeforce scanner and it didn’t show any signs of life in either direction.

“Most of the upper floors have either been collapsed or severely damaged by Beelzebub, so I think we should go down. Plus, other groups are already cleaning out the upper floors at a pace we can't hope to match. But nobody went into the basement yet.” Steve answers.

We nod and go down the stairs, only to reveal a large open door to what could be best described as a massive underground complex. Dozens upon dozens of rooms are lined up in a neat concrete corridor that seems to go on forever.

And from the looks of things, this place also has multiple levels…

The sheer size of the Scalebound palace is a humbling experience. I thought my own mansion was big, but it’s a garden shed in comparison.

“So let’s go with this room first-” I try to push the door open but it doesn’t budge. I try to make a portal appear into the room but I can't make the connection.

“Hey Riley, could you open this door for me?” I turn towards the Werewolf who nods and creates spells after spells on his hands before ripping the metal door off its hinges. It reveals a dark room with just a bed, a sink and a toilet in one corner.

A screech comes from the occupant that jumps towards me before I can even react.

“You! You’re the destroyer, the one who destroyed everything!” the emaciated Dragonewt starts to claws at me with her one intact arm but she’s sent crashing into a wall by a swift kick coming from Steve before she can do any real damage.

She spits a glob of blue blood and chuckles before walking towards me like a mangled puppet, so I fire a bullet into her skull and she explodes on the spot.

“Dude, you might want to take a look at this…” Riley says while pointing towards the cell.

I do as he says and I freeze. My name is engraved in the concrete walls, it's written hundreds, if not thousands of times.

Great, so now we might have to deal with insane magic wielding lizards.

“I’m almost afraid to ask…But did you do anything to her?” Steve asks.

I shake my head, “I have no idea who she even is, I think it’s the first time I ever saw this woman.”

"Are you sure? The nameplate says she was named Usgia, does that rings any bell?" the Werewolf continues.

“Still nothing. She said I was the great destroyer, whatever that means.” I shrug.

“Her name reminds me of something…” Riley cups his chin. “I’m not sure, but I think I saw her name somewhere.. But I can’t remember where.”

“It doesn’t matter; we still have rooms to clear!” I beckon them towards me and we continue past the empty holding cells before we arrive in front of a small locked metal door. Riley rips it off the wall and we enter the room, rows upon rows of beds occupied by unconscious Dragonewts appear in our vision.

"It looks like we reached the sickbay…"I check the ammo on my gun before heading in front of the first bed, then I-

“Dude, no. That’s going too far.” Riley grabs my wrist.

ShoW hiM Who’s in cHaRge…

My murderous voice and I need to sit down and have a serious discussion at some point. It’s obvious it has anger issues; it wants to murder everyone constantly.

Of course, the one who has a voice in his head that tells him to murder everyone might not be the best placed to offer mental health advice.

“And sending assassins after me isn’t going too far?! Killing me over and over again just isn’t going too far?!”

Oh shit.

Riley doesn’t have time to react to what I accidentally blurted out and I Rewind to when we enter the room.

That was fucking close! I never slipped up before, so it’s not a good sign…

I shoot the first patient as soon as we step into the room and Riley growls, “What was that for?! They are wounded and unconscious, so what-”

“You seem to have a misconception on our mission. We’re here to exterminate the Scalebound, not nurse them back to health.” I click my tongue in annoyance. Leaving loose ends like letting the wounded soldiers live is almost guaranteed to bite us in the ass later.

“Come on, they are wounded and unable to defend themselves, so-”

“He’s right.” Steve interrupts his brother. “You weren’t there on the second front… It’s not right to let these bastards live when so much of our own were killed.” the Werewolf continues with a growl.

“It doesn’t feel right to me, to slaughter them like that…” Riley says with a heavy sigh.

"Well, go wait outside then," Steve says and Riley nods before leaving the room. “Now we need to clean up this mess.”

We don’t exchange a word as we slaughter the remaining unconscious patients, and the murderous voice was quite happy with the whole ordeal.

“Hey, do you know what’s behind that door?” Steve asks just as I load another magazine into my Field Pistol.

I hope we'll finish soon or I might run out of ammo…

My scanner shows no signs of life, so I shake my head, “No idea, maybe we should check it out?”

The Werewolf nods and pummels the door until it breaks. We arrive in a large clinical room covered in white tiles; a single bed surrounded by dozens of weirdly shaped machines is resting in the middle of the area.

We cautiously approach the bed, the person resting here must be important since the room was shielded against my Portal Gun and my lifeforce scanner.

The person lying in the bed is hooked to an impressive number of plastic tubes and an even larger amount of multi-colored perfusions.

I frown when my eyes rest on the patient's face, and it takes me some time to recognize her because more than half of her face is covered by an oxygen mask.

“Hey, isn’t it-”

"Yes, it is." I interrupt Steve and take a good look at her… at Alza.

What’s the Scalebound heiress doing here? Maybe she got wounded in the battle?

“W-Who’s there?” she asks with a weak and croaky voice.

Her eyes rest on my face, and she sighs when I retract my helmet.

“So it was you… I’m not even surprised. Then I guess all the commotion outside was your doing?” she says after a coughing fit.

“In a way it was…” is all I manage to say since a violent urge to execute her almost takes over my entire body.

ShE’s oNe of tHose wHo Made uS suffer… MaKe hEr PaY!

The murderous voice in my head doesn’t stop repeating the same words again and again, and I finally stop it after a few minutes of struggle.

“John, are you all right?” Steve asks without even sparing a glance towards the dying Dragonewt.

I nod, “Yeah, I’m fine. It’s just, you know… memories resurfacing.”

"Of course, this was bound to happen," Steve mutters. "I'll leave you to it then," he says before leaving the room.

“Don’t worry; I’m paralyzed from the neck down. So, you’ve finally come to finish the job?” she asks. A mix of despair and hatred swirls in her eyes for the briefest of moments, but it’s soon replaced by profound weariness.

“What do you-“My jaw drops when I realize what she meant, “Don’t tell me you’ve been here since-”

“I did. Whatever you did to me… It stayed there. Do you have any idea-" she coughs a few droplets of blue blood. “D-Do you have any idea how it feels to be torn apart from the inside, feeling your organs constantly breaking apart before being forcefully regenerated to continue the infernal cycle?”

This hits a bit too close to home, in more ways than one.

Alza takes a deep breath, “I have a feeling that you know what I’m talking about… How could I ever forget that scream when you endured my Red Inferno. You can tell me now, I only have minutes to live before you finally free me from the prison my body has become. Your shield didn't protect you back then, did it?”

By Red Inferno, I think she means that horrifying column of fire.

Just remembering this particular episode of my life is enough to make my limbs tremble.

She smirks, “Your reaction tells me everything I need to know. I don't know how you did it, and if you're even human in the first place."

I close my eyes and take a deep breath to chase the thoughts and phantom pain away.

"In a way, I am a bit happy that you got to feel what I had to endure since our battle. But I made my peace with what has happened, and what will happen." She sighs. “I was almost certain that you would be coming here at some point. I'm sure that my father didn’t let you off the hook that easily.”

You have no fucking idea.

“On paper, you had no ways of surviving whatever my Family threw at you. In fact, you shouldn't have survived our battle in the first place." she continues.

“But I’m here, aren’t I?” I say as I put the muzzle of my gun on her scaly forehead.

YeS! Yes! EnD hEr!

She chuckles, “Yes, yes you are… There was no way we could’ve won, was there? After all, we angered someone capable of predicting the future.”

Well, it’s not really like that, but she doesn’t need to know.

I raise an eyebrow, and she grins, “It was obvious from the way you fought me, the way you avoided everything I threw at you no matter how fast I was…”

“When did you realize?” I ask.

“At first, I didn’t want to believe it. But I’ve been stuck in this bed for a while now, and I kept replaying the battle in my head over and over again. I eliminated all the possibilities until it was the last one remaining.” Alza answers.

“Well, you got me… Do you have any last words?” I say as I readjust my gun.

“How kind of you, I wouldn’t expect it from someone with a mind twisted enough to make those vile weapons. Then listen carefully…” Alza closes her eyes and takes on last breath, "I hope you die in the most gruesome way possible, and if there’s an afterlife then I swear that I’ll be waiting there to torment you until the end of times.”

"Well, that sounds like a normal Tuesday for me." I declare before pulling the trigger, causing chunks of flesh to coat the white tiles covering the walls.

I take a deep breath and look at my blood covered hands.

Just how many people did I kill since this all started? Could I have done things differently?

We diD nothing wRoNg, tHey wanted uS DeAd aNd wE foUghT BaCk…

And this voice in my head is a problem I should address soon, but for some reason, I'm not too worried about it.

I guess I’m just too far gone, aren’t I?

Who would have thought? At this point, I Rewound so much that I should be at least a few centuries old, if not more.

And most of that time was spent dying.

I laugh dryly as flashes of previously sealed memories appear in front of my eyes. The tremor coursing through my hands stops at this moment. I head out of the room while sparing one last look at Alza’s final resting place. Steve glances at me but doesn’t say a word, and we leave the med bay without exchanging a word.

Riley, who was waiting for us in front of the room, also stay silent and we continue to follow the empty corridor.

This is all going to be over soon.

But I don’t have it in me to rejoice. The Scalebound incident is just the tip of the iceberg, and my newly declared independence will certainly put me in the sights of multiple Families.

And it’s not like it could get any worse since the battle against Beelzebub has been broadcasted on the HiddenNet…

But I had to do it. Creating an independent zone free of Enforcer interference is only the first step towards my goal.

Of course, I don’t want anything too complicated. I just want to completely destroy the Enforcer system.

The Enforcers have stunted Humanity's development for too long. And from what I saw in the last battle, they only care about their own profits and have no regards for the consequences of their actions.

So I think it's time for them to have Newton's third law thrown into their faces.

But first, I need to take care of the Scalebound. My involvement in their extermination coupled with how I destroyed Beelzebub should make the Families wary enough to buy me the time I need to prepare for their inevitable retaliation.

We continue through the corridor, opening each and every door. So far, we haven’t found anyone or anything of interest.

“This room has a well-reinforced door compared to the rest, and the barrier surrounding it is very strong… I’ll need help on this one.” Riley says while pointing to a large circular door made of engraved polished stone.

The two Werewolves punch the door with all their might, but their fist bounces off the construct. They exchange a glance and point their index towards the door while muttering something I can’t comprehend.

Six magic circles from around their forearms and a beam of lightning emerges from the tip of their fingers! The beams intertwine and hit the door with tremendous force, causing cracks to appear on its surface.

“Well, this is going to take some time-” Riley then smacks his head. “How stupid can I be!” he chuckles before grabbing a big brown box cube hanging on his belt. “I still have a charge with me! This thing will surely blast the door open.”

"Or it'll collapse the basement on our head," Steve adds.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure it will hold…” he says before putting the charge in front of the door and tapping it in various places, causing cracks to appear on its trembling surface.

“If I were you, I would prepare to teleport out of here as soon as possible…” Steve whispers in my ear.

I gulp and grab my Portal Gun in my free hand.

"And it's armed; it should blow in fifteen seconds so we should find some cover," Riley says before dashing towards one of the empty room we forced open. We quickly follow and he slams the remains of the door on the opening before casting a barrier behind the large metal piece.

"This should protect us from the explosion…hopefully," Riley says with a nervous chuckle.

Great, I feel so reassured now.

A shockwave echoes into the basement and the metal door becomes red hot in an instant, but the barrier somehow holds it in place. Riley collapses on his knees once the explosion ends, and he wipes his sweaty forehead.

“Damn, this almost broke my barrier…” the Werewolf declares with a smirk.

I think these people are not aware of the concept of safety regulations.

“So, shall we check out this room?” Steve says after helping his brother up. We nod and exit our room, the explosion did a lot more damage than I expected. Cracks run along the walls while soot covers everything in sight. The stone door is almost completely destroyed ready so Steve punches it with a mana-infused attack, causing the door to turn into a pile of rubble.

My jaw drops when I see what’s on the other side: Piles of ingots, hundreds of boxes that look very expensive, not to mention the weapons, sets of armors and various crystals and other miscellaneous materials.

“Holy shit!” The brothers exclaim.

“I think we hit one of their treasuries…” Riley says, and a small marble wand hanging on the wall catches his attention. "This should give us some answers… It doesn't look like its trapped or anything, so here I go."

Riley places the wand over his forehead and frown, but his frown is quickly replaced with a big and bright smile.

“What they have here is insane… And apparently it’s just one of the auxiliary treasuries, so I’ll definitely have to warn Mom about that-”

Riley is interrupted since I just looped the timeline. All this wealth can’t possibly go to the Wolfheart, can it?

I memorize the coordinates of the pile of treasures before Rewinding to when we were waiting for the explosion to occur. I configure my Portal Gun with the coordinates I memorized and run the programs as soon as the charge explodes.

Now I just have to hope that the seal was broken by the explosion…

Steve punches the remains of the door away and what greets us is-

“Empty?! Come on, why have defenses that are so strong if it doesn’t protect anything!” Riley says with a dejected face.

I’m lucky that my helmet hides my face. Otherwise, the Werewolves would notice my huge grin.

What an unfortunate accident, it seems the explosion was so strong that it catapulted the treasury’s content into my basement.

“I thought this place was a treasury or something, but I guess we were too unlucky…” Riley turns towards me. "And we can't open more since I only had one charge. Sorry about that, I planned to give you some stuff off the records, but it looks like everything will go to our mother's coffers."

If only you knew.

I shake my head, “Don’t worry, it doesn’t really matter."

The Werewolf shrugs, “Oh well, then let’s keep exploring this basement, shall we?”

We nod and continue down the corridor until we arrive at a fork, the path on the left leads us to what I assume is a sub-level, while the other leads to a large and ornate, half-open stone door.

Steve tenses up, “Do you smell that?”

His brother nods, “Yes, it smells like blood…”

I tighten my grip on my gun and Steve opens the assault by punching the door off its hinges. We jump into the room and I have to pause for a second. Every single inch of the room is covered in small, barely visible runes.

The runes seem to converge to a luxurious wooden desk.

My blood freeze when I recognize the figure sprawled on it.