Lord of Mysteries:The Good Witch

Angel felt a searing pain in her left shoulder as she helped Klein, who had crawled away from 2-049's area of effect. The adrenaline had delayed her pain receptors until now.

Ignoring her bleeding wound, she approached within five meters of 2-049 and the clown it controlled, gun at the ready.

The sealed artifact had just demonstrated its terrifying power of domination. After Klein crouched down, he used his hands to support a spinning kick that sent 2-049 flying towards the clown behind him. 2-049 didn't disappoint, instantly afflicting the clown with negative effects as he entered its range. Even with his numerous escape abilities, the clown couldn't even snap his fingers.

Angel had no desire to experience those effects herself. She took position outside the artifact's range, raised her gun, and aimed at the paralyzed clown. He maintained a comical pose with one hand on his shoulder and the other pinching his thumb and middle finger. His eyes tracked Angel's movements extremely slowly before the light faded from them, no longer responding to external stimuli.

Dunn and the others hadn't told her what would happen to someone fully controlled by 2-049. They might maintain the same pose until death or become "puppets" for Antigonus, fulfilling its wish to find family descendants.

But she couldn't take that chance.

The tailcoat-wearing clown's many bizarre and powerful abilities had allowed him to move freely even when surrounded by multiple Nighthawks. If not for 2-049's control, even several Angels and Kleins would likely be powerless against him. If he had some means of escape or began moving again under the artifact's control, the consequences would be unacceptable.

Realizing this, Angel unhesitatingly aimed for the clown's head rather than any non-lethal areas.

Before firing, she glanced at Klein beside her.

Seeing no objection from him, she decisively pulled the trigger.

For conventional attacks, Angel would first target the chest for highest accuracy, then follow up with headshots. But with the clown now an immobile target, she fired two consecutive shots directly at his skull.

Just as the clown had earlier threatened to "put a hole" in Klein's head.

The hunting bullets lived up to their price, and the .38 caliber provided ample power. The two rounds pierced the clown's forehead, leaving two finger-thick entry wounds. The exit wounds at the back of his skull were horrifyingly large—about two fists wide—blasting away most of his occipital bone along with a significant amount of brain matter.

Angel knew without checking that he was utterly dead.

2-049 seemed to have no interest in lifeless targets. The clown's body, now devoid of life, was freed from the artifact's negative effects. His knees buckled, and he slumped forward, collapsing limply to the ground. Dark red blood mixed with sand quickly stained the earth beneath him.

Simultaneously, a sense of relief washed over Angel.

From Cole Granger's memories, she knew this wasn't just the satisfaction of defeating an enemy, but the "digestion" of the "Assassin" potion.

She had experienced this feeling after killing Madam Sharon too, but the intensity of that battle had left her no time to dwell on it.

However, after killing two non-ordinary beings in quick succession today, her instincts told her that the potion inside her was perhaps just one small step away from complete "digestion."

But surely becoming an Assassin couldn't be this simple...

Temporarily setting aside her doubts, Angel turned to Klein beside her. He was staring blankly at the dead clown before averting his gaze with a furrowed brow, seeming somewhat uncomfortable.

"Are you hurt?" Angel asked curiously as she reloaded her gun.

Klein shook his head. "I'm just not used to seeing death up close like this. Earlier..."

He looked apprehensively at 2-049 near the clown's corpse.

"...when the artifact controlled me, I really thought I was going to die. Luckily, it seems that guy fired a shot at my feet, and some debris hit my leg. Maybe that's what snapped me out of the negative effects..."

Could he really have been awakened from 2-049's control without direct contact?

Angel looked at Klein skeptically until he nervously averted his gaze.

"Let's just say that's what happened. We should check on the captain and the others."

Angel ultimately decided not to pursue the matter, though she was indeed curious about how Klein had broken free from 2-049's control on his own. It certainly wasn't for the reason he claimed.

But now the other Nighthawks were lying incapacitated and in urgent need of help. She would have to follow up on this later.

As for the focus of both sides' struggle—the Antigonus family notebook—it still lay quietly within 2-049's area of effect. The two tacitly agreed not to risk entering the danger zone to retrieve it.

After all, once they rescued everyone, neither the notebook nor the sealed artifact would be going anywhere.

Skirting the epicenter of the explosion, they made their way to the other corner of the clearing. Angel approached Leonard, who was groaning and opening his eyes.

Seeing that Leonard was regaining consciousness despite his bloodied face, she breathed a sigh of relief.

During those few minutes of cat-and-mouse with the clown, she had been quite worried that her teammates might have suffered fatal injuries. But it seemed that potions of any sequence provided some degree of physical enhancement. Although the team members were scattered about—either unconscious or bleeding from their noses and mouths—they were all still alive.

Watching Klein help Dunn Smith to his feet and attempt to rouse the shaky-headed captain, while in another direction, Borgia struggled up and pulled a small bottle from his pocket to hand to the prone Lolotta, Angel extended her hand to Leonard.

"Need a hand?"

The green-eyed poet lay on his back, his gaze unfocused. Like someone just waking from sleep, his eyes darted around before finally settling on Angel's face.

"What happened... Did Ray Bieber explode earlier?" he asked slowly as he reached for Angel's hand.

"Yes, the blast knocked all of you out. But fortunately, no one seems to be in critical condition. Well, probably not."

Angel grasped Leonard's hand and pulled him to his feet in one motion. He swayed a few times before steadying himself against a nearby crate.

Removing his tattered gloves, Leonard pulled a small sky-blue metal bottle from an inner pocket of his coat. He shook it, unscrewed the cap, and was about to down its contents when he noticed Angel's curious gaze on the bottle. He lowered his hand.

"Are you injured? If it's serious, I can share half with you. But if you can still function, better not to drink it—the side effects are quite severe."

"What kind of medicine is it?" Angel was indeed curious. She had noticed that Borgia had given Lolotta a similar bottle. It seemed to be a standard medication used by Nighthawks, but perhaps due to her short time with the team, neither Dunn nor Old Neil had informed her about it.

"'Goddess's Gaze,' a standard Church concoction. It has some healing properties, but mainly it taps into the body's potential, maintaining peak combat readiness. However, once the effects wear off, you'll be even weaker, so prompt medical attention is necessary afterward."

Leonard patiently explained, carefully holding the blue vial as if protecting a precious treasure.

Indeed, for injured Nighthawks, "Goddess's Gaze" could certainly be considered a treasure.

"In that case, I don't need it for now. I only have, um, a gunshot wound to my left shoulder. My spirituality is somewhat depleted, but my physical condition is still okay." Upon hearing about the side effects, Angel decided against taking the "Goddess's Gaze." Her shoulder injury wasn't severe; it could wait to be treated properly later.

Moreover, she hadn't expended much spirituality during the entire battle. This was partly due to the "Assassin" lacking the high-consumption, high-yield abilities of other Sequence 9 pathways. Additionally, she had noticed that this body's strength, speed, and spirituality "reserves" all exceeded what she remembered from when Cole Granger was still a Sequence 9 "Assassin."

This aligned with her earlier speculation—this body still retained a considerable portion of the Sequence 7 "Witch" powers.

Leonard downed the entire bottle of "Goddess's Gaze" in one gulp. His vitality visibly restored, and his face, pale from blood loss, became flushed—perhaps a bit too flushed, like someone who had just finished intense exercise.

He smacked his lips, screwed the cap back on the empty bottle, and returned it to his pocket.

"Let's go check on the captain and the others. It looks like Ray Bieber won't be piecing himself back together, but that 'Twilight Hermit Order' member could return at any moment. We'd better leave quickly with the sealed artifact and the Antigonus family notebook."

Hearing a somewhat familiar term, Angel curiously asked, "Twilight Hermit Order?"

"An ancient organization established in the Fourth Epoch, connected to the corrupt nobles of the Solomon Empire. The notebook we came to find was one they had carelessly lost." Leonard's expression grew serious. "They hide in the shadows, rarely leaving traces, but when they do act, they're often extremely troublesome. The tailcoat-wearing fellow who ambushed us earlier and then harassed us during the fight with Ray Bieber—the one with his face painted—was a member of the 'Twilight Hermit Order.'"

"He's likely mid-sequence, with bizarre abilities. In our current state, we'd probably be at a disadvantage against him. If he manages to snatch the notebook, today's mission will have been in vain."

Mid-sequence, so at least Sequence 7...

Angel silently recalled her knowledge about sequence classifications. Sequence 9 and Sequence 8, like herself and Leonard, were considered low-sequence; above that were mid-sequences, including Sequences 7, 6, and 5; from Sequence 4 upward were the high-sequence powerhouses.

The few mid-sequence non-ordinary beings Angel had encountered—Dunn Smith, Daly Simone, and the now-deceased Sharon Hoey—all possessed various powerful and bizarre abilities.

From this perspective, the tailcoat-wearing clown, as another mid-sequence being, indeed demonstrated several peculiar non-ordinary abilities. From what she had seen, he could fire invisible bullets with a snap of his fingers, disappear and reappear from flames, move stealthily while concealing his presence, and even turn into a paper figure to avoid damage when blasted away.

Most impressively, with a swipe of his palm, he had transferred a fatal wound from his chest to his shoulder, a non-lethal location.

If he hadn't lingered at the edge of 2-049's range, struggling with Angel and Klein to seize the Antigonus family notebook, and ultimately fallen victim to the artifact's negative effects, he absolutely wouldn't have died so easily here.

"Oh, speaking of the notebook, did you find where it fell?" Leonard took a few steps forward before suddenly remembering their mission objective and turning back to ask Angel.

"Miss Lolotta already retrieved it from inside Ray Bieber earlier, but now it's fallen within the sealed artifact's control range. We'll need to call someone else to help us get it out."

Following Angel's gaze, Leonard looked toward the cracked iron box in the center of the clearing. Sure enough, he spotted the old, cover-bound notebook smeared with Ray Bieber's bodily fluids not far from it.

As well as the tailcoat-wearing clown, knees bent, buttocks raised, upper body sprawled on the ground in an undignified pose.

"Hmm... Who's that person lying there? Was he affected by 2-049... No, he's already..."

Leonard quickly scanned the surroundings, confirming that all his companions were accounted for, before squinting to examine the corpse near the sealed artifact.

"If the 'Twilight Hermit Order member' you mentioned is the tailcoat-wearing clown, then we probably don't need to worry about him coming back."

Angel pointed at the clown's corpse.

"He's dead."