"A lot of our ghouls have been killed, Master Tenebrosity," said a man in a cloak that covered his entire face.

The man was standing on top of a nine-story building watching the street that had gone quiet below him. There had been a fight there several hours ago and now everything in that part of the street had settled down. The bodies of the victims had been transported away by the hospital carriages including those who were in need of immediate medical attention.

"It is no problem, Dread. As long as they managed to kill, the descent of the Pale Lord will be brought slightly closer," replied Tenebrosity. He was standing next to the shorter and younger dread with a cloak covering his whole face. Neither his identity nor his expression could be seen.

"Should we send some of our members to defend the remaining ghouls and also the Dullahan? The Police should be reaching their place soon," suggested Dread. He put both of his hands inside the pocket of his cloak.

Tenebrosity didn't reply right away and just kept observing the night street. The night breeze carried a faint smell of iron from a distance and there were still the sounds of gunshots breaking the night's silence somewhere far away. The Police were still busy fighting with the supernatural creatures that they had summoned there.

"It's not a wise decision. We can always summon more supernatural creatures, but we cannot replace our dead members. We shouldn't be in a frontal confrontation with the Police yet for now," he replied calmly.

Dread nodded.

"You are right, Master," replied Dread in agreement.

Tenebrosity then looked at the direction where the fight was still going and then turned to Dread.

"Let's watch the fight from up close, shall we?"

After that, two holes were drilled out of the building's rooftop and two giant worms came out of them. The worms' round mounts that were full of teeth were open wide as if waiting to be fed. Tenebrosity and Dread came closer and the worms lunged at them, swallowing the two cloaked men whole. Once they were inside the worms, the segmented creatures burrowed back into the holes, which then closed on their own, leaving nothing behind.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

In another part of the wide street near Raadhuislaan, there were loud sounds of gunshots and the smell of both blood and gunpowder filling the air. The fight was still going on in this part of the street, and the Police had been advancing slowly, circling around the summoned creatures.

On top of a six-story hotel, two holes appeared and the same worms came out of them. The worms spat out two cloaked figures, Dread and Tenebrosity, and then returned to their holes before disappearing.

"It seems that the creatures we summoned have done a number on the people. The souls should be enough to bring us closer to our goal, Master," said Dread as he was observing the situation.

The moon was shining bright in the sky, making their cloaked figures rather visible on top of the building. However, the Police were busy fighting down there, so they hadn't noticed the two masterminds of the incident.

On the street below, there were mangled bodies of innocent people that had been killed by the creatures. There were clear claw and teeth marks on their wounds, and some of them had been cut into pieces cleanly by the Dullahan's giant ax.

Swoosh!

Three ghouls were struck by blood arrows simultaneously. There was a female Police member carrying a short bow who always accurately shot blood arrows at her enemies. She looked to be the leader of the subjugation force tonight seeing how she gave commands to everyone else.

"That one is Roze, a Police Lieutenant. We must be careful with that one," said Tenebrosity.

"Should we do something, Master? It should be safe from here as long as they don't notice," replied Dread.

"It can be done," replied Tenebrosity meaningfully and then gestured at Dread.

The two cloaked figures took a step back from the edge of the building and then Tenebrosity started concentrating. In the street below, behind the enemy lines, four holes appeared on the ground like something had been digging from underground and had just reached the surface. There was an insidious purple miasma emitted by the holes that disappeared right away the moment it came in contact with the air.

"Huh?"

A member of the Police force whose task was to save the injured noticed the sudden appearance of the holes on the ground and nudged his partner on the arm. The other person turned around to see what his partner was pointing at.

"What are those holes?" he asked curiously.

"I don't know, but they look dangerous. We need to report it to Sergeant Groen!" replied his partner and then quickly got away from the area.

The other officer was watching the holes closely in case any changes happened to them. Suddenly, from the four holes, four giant worms with sharp teeth around their round mouths appeared. The worms' segmented bodies were mostly burrowed, but they emitted a disgusting smell like that of a rotting corpse.

"Bleeerghh!!"

The officer vomited because of the putrid smell. The worms then opened their mouths even wider and swallowed one corpse each. Once their bellies were full, they quickly burrowed back to the holes and disappeared, leaving the officer baffled.

"What happened to you?" asked his partner who had just come back with someone else. It was Sergeant Groen who had quickly come because of the report.

"Don't you smell it?" he said.

His partner and Groen then focused on their noses to try to smell what the officer was talking about. There were still traces of the rotting smell that the worms left.

"What is this?" asked Groen, "Tell me what happened,"

The officer who had just vomited stood up straight because his superior had just asked him a question.

"Sergeant Groen, four holes just appeared on the ground earlier. From the holes, four giant worms came out and ate a dead body before disappearing. The rotting smell came from those worms," he explained.

Groen listened intently to the explanation and got a bad feeling in his heart.

"You two stay watch here. I need to report it to Roze and Rood," he commanded.

"Yes, Sir!" the two officers said at the same time.

Meanwhile, on top of the hotel, the giant worms had reappeared and spat out the mangled dead bodies and disappeared right away.

"This many should be enough, Master?" asked Dread.

Tenebrosity nodded solemnly.

"You do the ritual," he said shortly.

Dread started walking around the four dead bodies and then took out a thin dagger from under his cloak and pressed the blade against his wrist. The dagger with the skull engraving easily cut open his flesh and blood vessels, causing blood to flow out. Dread used his blood to draw a sigil that resembled a candle holder with three crosses on top.

Once the sigil was finished, he carried the dead bodies one by one and placed them in the center of the blood sigil. After that, he stood outside the sigil with his hands stretched in front of him and his palms facing down. The wound that he made earlier had completely healed, leaving no scar whatsoever.

Dread began muttering something inaudible under his breath. Slowly, the blood sigil began glowing red, and the dead bodies on top of it began twitching violently like something was trying to dig out of their skins. The dead bodies continued shaking and squirming for several minutes before finally, they melted into a pool of blood and flesh. The bodily remains then slowly slithered to the center and solidified into four tiny horse-like creatures.

The tiny creatures were only half the size of an adult's palm. They each had four legs made out of human fingers complete with the nails. Their heads looked like thumbs that had grown a tumor cell in the form of eyes and body hair made out their manes.

Dread looked at his creation and then took a deep breath. He then issued a command to the tiny horses.

"Get down there and help your brethren!" he said with a ceremonious tone. His voice echoed in the cold night.

The tiny 'horses' then quickly galloped and jumped off the six-story hotel, landing perfectly safely on the paved ground below. They moved quietly towards the dead victims of the ghouls and Dullahan and stood next to them. Their 'head' then grew sharp nails that they used to dig a hole inside each of the dead bodies. The horse-like creatures entered the holes and once inside, they merged with them creepily. After the 'horses' were inside the dead bodies, the wounds that they had mysteriously began healing and the dead bodies came back to life, ready to serve their new masters.

"They are ready, Master," said Dread proudly. His breathing was heavy because the ritual had taken a lot of his stamina.

"Good. Let them aid our children," replied Tenebrosity solemnly.

...

Inside a quiet hotel room, Valentine Hymes was sitting in the dark with his hands pressed in front of his face. He had just finished his contract ritual and was now analyzing the new abilities that he had received. The color of his face had returned as he had recovered completely from the painful ritual. He also felt that his body had gotten stronger and lighter, and his stamina had been boosted greatly.

"G, let's see. The abilities are the same as what the man showed us during our fight. I can use illusion substitute to redirect an attack to my illusion instead. This ability must be activated beforehand but once it was active, it would passively trigger without me doing anything, although the limit is only ten times per day for now," he said analytically.

"However, the downside of this ability is that it doesn't distinguish fatal attacks from scratch wounds, so even if it was just a mosquito biting me, it would still activate. And I cannot reappear far from my original position, making it easy for the enemy to predict and redirect their attack, just like what we did to that man," he added.

Valentine leaned back against his chair. The veil of the dark soothed his mind and made it easier to concentrate.

"The next ability is also the one displayed by the enemy. It's a mass illusion ability that requires constant blood supply for activation. That means I can maintain the illusion for as long as I want, provided I have enough blood for that. This ability works on everyone around us, which means our allies might attack our weakened self if we were to use it recklessly."

"The type of illusion created depends on what I want them to see, so at least we can control it to some extent, G. It can be very useful for deceiving the enemies or for information gathering. It can even be used for assassination if used correctly," he said coldly, and then added, "The limit of this ability is ten times per day, as usual."

"There is another ability that the enemy couldn't show us. Is Memory Erasion. This one is not like your Memory Reading, G. This ability enables us to select a memory of us inside someone's mind and we can erase it. We cannot tamper with the memory in any other way for now, but maybe when we get stronger, we would be able to. This ability only works if the enemy is unconscious, however. But I can use Interrogation for that, or borrow your Order that has been copied by Purloin,"

"It sounds similar to Luuk's professor who just erased his existence from everyone's memory. But that man's ability sounds more potent than this because, with this one, we would have to do it one by one with every person that knows us. The limit to this ability is ten times a day as well, G."

"The greatest improvement perhaps is the fact that I don't have to chant the previous Deities' names anymore to activate the abilities. It makes it easier to use them; not to mention the fact that they can be used up to twenty-five times per day now. On top of that, I can now use Restriction and Concealment on multiple objects at once. I think the limit is six for now. That means I don't have to constantly activate and deactivate it like before. Reveal has also gotten stronger and it will tell us more information than before. We need to try it out after this,"

"Now, do you notice that most of our Contractbound abilities only work on sentient beings, G? It almost seems like the Deities purposefully want us to fight and kill each other. Remember what the book said? We are but just fuel for those Deities," he said heavily.

"But it doesn't matter, does it? We just have to do what we have to do,"