After Jack's wife passed away, things started evolving much faster than I liked. That very evening, a man broke into Jack's apartment. He kept on repeating how he was doing it for "Edward Wright, the true God." I didn't know what has gotten into him, but I had a feeling that Ifrit had his hands in that as well. It got even more obvious when the man tried to kill Jack, but was suddenly stopped by a flaming arrow shot by none other than the wannabe God himself. Ifrit was trying to make it seem like he saved Jack's life but was too late to save his wife.

"Who are these people?! Why won't they leave me alone?!" Seeing the same person I met in Sunwalley broken and crying felt strange. On one hand, I wanted to help him. On the other, I still couldn't help but hate him for what he did to the Deaths and people in Sunwalley.

"Worshippers of the fallen God. They want you because you can carry God's power. Part of Edward's creativity," Ifrit answered him.

"Is that why you came too? To use me?"

"No. I came because I needed your help. But I never intended to hurt you or force you to work with me. An ally like you would come in handy though, I do admit that."

Jack wiped the tears off of his face.

"This God... Will he come here?"

"Edward Wright? He will come into this world. But probably not into this city specifically."

"Then where will he be?"

"As far as I know, he will make it to the town of Sunwalley at some point." My heart skipped a beat. This was because I told him about it. If it wasn't for me and the talks I had with Ifrit, nothing would've happened and the people in that saloon would still be alive and well. I clenched my fist. If my nails were any longer or sharper, I would've drawn blood.

"Can you get me there?" Jack asked and his voice got suddenly much deeper.

"I can. But you will not defeat him on your own. He is stronger than you might think."

"Then can you teach me to use this... power I supposedly have within me?"

"Yes. And I can give you even more strength. If it is revenge you wish to get, then I will gladly help you. After all, we have a common enemy."

"Then I agree. I'll come with you. He took everything from me. Staying here and waiting to die is the last I wanna do right now."

From that point on, there wasn't much else to discuss. Ifrit seemed happy to be able to achieve what he wanted. After they sealed their deal with a proper handshake, Ifrit told Jack to follow him and walked out into the streets. Of course, I wasn't far behind.

He then led Jack into an old warehouse at the edge of the city. At first, it seemed empty and abandoned, but as soon as they got deeper into the complex, more people started to show up. One of them I knew too well. It was the Gunslinger. This giant man with more muscles than brains had to be one of Ifrit's oldest companions.

On top of one of the boxes, I saw Marley. He was whistling and sharpening his sword. Knowing that this man was already dead made me feel a bit relieved. There was no way I'd be able to defeat him on my own.

However, there was one more person I didn't recognize. In fact, I had my doubts if it even was a person. The hood they were wearing was by far the longest, so the only parts of him I could see were two white eyes glowing in the darkness. He was hunched down and he kept his arms crossed all the time.

"Welcome to the team, Jack. Let me introduce you to our team. That giant over there is Alphonse Lester. He's got the power of accuracy, making him incredibly good with guns or anything throwable."

"Make sure never to play darts with him," the cloaked person mumbled.

"And that swordsman over there is Marley. He's got some impressive powers of light and destruction magic."

Marley jumped down from the box and walked over to Ifrit.

"And who is this little guy?" he pointed at Jack.

"This here is Jack. Our new ally. He has the power of force and I will bestow time upon him later as well."

It was clear that those words caught him by surprise.

"Force and time? Magic? I can use that?"

"Not yet. But with some training, you will be able to. Now come. I will show you where you'll be staying."

After that, they walked out of the main room and into a nearby hallway. I wanted to follow them, but something felt wrong. When I looked at the cloaked person, I noticed that he was looking straight at me. The two shining white dots in the darkness of his hood were always glued onto me. I even tried moving around a little bit to escape his gaze, but no matter where I was, he still kept staring at me.

I didn't like that. What caught me off guard, even more, was that Ifrit introduced everyone with the exception of him. In fact, it seemed like that person wasn't even in the room. Was he perhaps like me? A ghost? Something inside me really wanted to test this out.

"You can see me?" I asked the person and pointed at them, just to make sure they wouldn't think I'm talking to someone else. The creature didn't reply. Instead, it just nodded slowly, without taking its eyes off me. "Are you also a ghost?" This time, it shook its head. That was a clear sign that we weren't quite the same. "Do you help Ifrit?" Another slow nodding followed. So they were indeed on his side. But my curiosity didn't stop there. "Who are you?" I asked, not knowing what kind of answer I'd expect.

The creature's eyes narrowed and it finally let its arms drop by the sides of their body. Then it lifted up the right arm in front of its face. After a moment, several long and sharp claws rose up from the incredibly long sleeve. I stood there, completely paralyzed. That was not a normal person. It was a monster. After a while, it retracted its nails again and returned the arms to the previous crossed position. Then, it seemed to lose all interest in me, and walked away. I just kept staring blankly at the strange being. What the hell was it? And where did Ifrit find it? I went through my mind, trying to remember if I ever made an animal with such long claws. Nothing came to my mind. There was something oddly alien about the creature.

After this scary encounter, my mind had trouble concentrating again. I felt lost and not sure what I should do now. Fortunately, Ifrit's talking quickly snapped me out of it.

"Alright. For now, I need you to do two things. Take all the money you have and exchange it for gold. Any kind will do. Then, ask someone to make you some coins like these." The man threw a single piece of Sunwalley's currency over to Jack. This explained almost everything. The money he had didn't come from legal means. He simply made some copies on his own while still in Everstar.

The next few days flew by much faster than I thought they would. Watching Jack run around the town, selling all his possessions and exchanging them for gold was dull and boring, but at least I didn't have to see death wherever I looked. In the evenings I was a witness to his training with Ifrit and the others. It was impressive seeing how quickly he managed to improve. His own magic, the magic of force, was the first thing he mastered. After only three days, it started listening to him. That made me feel bad, considering that I was still unable to draw out my own power unless it was commanded by powerful emotions. As for his control over time, that needed some more training. However, he managed to conquer even that within the first seven days. There indeed was something special about him.

"Alright, you can now finally go into Sunwalley," Ifrit told him on the last day after their training session had come to an end.

"Really? Does that mean..."

"Yes, it means that I want you to confront Edward Wright. However, do not underestimate him. Alphonse will come with you. His abilities as a gunslinger will come in handy." Jack didn't seem to be as happy as before after he heard that he will not be working alone, but he agreed anyway. At that time, revenge was the only thing that mattered to him, so he wouldn't throw the chance away, even if it wasn't ideal.

Even after they left the city, I followed Jack everywhere he went. During his first few days in Sunwalley, he realized that the people there have a huge problem with water. It was such a rare commodity, that buying a bottle of whiskey was less expensive than a glass of clean water. True, there were some cheaper options, but those were filthy and unfiltered. Drinking them would keep you alive, but the sickness afterward wasn't anything pretty. Jack bought out all the water he could with a large portion of his wealth and started giving it out to people, distributing it equally among everyone. When the locals noticed how rich he was, they started asking for loans. Seeing them as suffering people in a small town, Jack agreed and lent a few coins to whoever asked. However, they rarely paid back. And when he confronted them about it, they denied ever dealing with the man. That drove him further and further away from kindness. He saw that these people need to be ruled by fear. And so he started using his powers to publically punish people who owed him money. On the outside, he seemed vicious, smiling as the Gunslinger beat them up until they lost consciousness, and then tossing them aside to bake in the sun. Fear settled down in every part of the town. Very few people dared not pay back after many of their friends ended up injured and beaten up like that.

But Jack didn't take it well either. I followed him into his room at a hotel the first night he decided to fight back in such a way. He fell onto his bed and started crying into a pillow, mumbling some incomprehensible gibberish to himself. That night, I saw his true colors. He never wanted to be evil or hurt anyone. It was the circumstances that made him that way. That man lost everything and saw me as the reason for it. He has been thrown into the rough side of the world and told to swim. And all that hatred he felt was justified. If it wasn't for me, he would still have a happy life. Each day, I saw him return back to Ifrit to report what he's been doing. A few weeks later, he told him about a project he started. A factory that could filter the water and distribute it to citizens. Ifrit seemed to like the idea, as long as it wouldn't distract Jack from his main goal of killing me.

During the last meeting of theirs that I've seen, however, something seemed off. It was as if the room they always met in was suddenly darker, despite the lights being on just as always. And something changed about the way Ifrit acted. He used to listen to Jack's every word, but now, he seemed distracted. As if something was on his mind. For that reason, I decided to abandon my plan of following my old enemy back to Sunwalley's hotel, and instead, I stuck around with the wannabe God. Very quietly, I followed him after their meeting, hiding in the shadows so that he wouldn't see me. He walked far into the southern part of Everstar. His powers apparently even allowed him to cross the flaming wall. Then, he went into one of the skyscrapers and walked down many stairs into the deepest layer of the basement. This was all very surprising. Why would he come there? What was so special about that place? When he finally reached his final destination, he lit up the room with tiny floating flames. There were doors standing right there, in the middle of that old office, leading seemingly nowhere. But something was strange about them. They were made out of black metal and had unknown symbols painted all over them. From the little gap in the bottom, a dark mist was flooding the room.

"What do you bring me?" a deep voice came through the doors.

"Another fragment, just as I promised." He pulled a small glowing object out of the pocket of his cloak and held it high in the air.

"Take it. And as we agreed, I want..."

"STOP!" the voice suddenly shouted.

"Why? What is wrong?"

"First, let me get rid of the intruder." My body suddenly moved on its own. An unknown force picked me up from the ground. I started floating deeper into the room and closer to the door. Ifrit stood there, watching me with curious eyes.

"Get lost." As soon as the mysterious voice said it, the world around me sunk into darkness and disappeared. This nightmare of mine had finally ended.