The Spectre slowly approached the hitman, who covered his mouth to prevent any sounds of breathing from being heard by the Spectre, hoping that it would miraculously not notice him in any way, shape, or form.

He was panting heavily, profusely sweating at the sight of the ghastly being that was checking for anyone deemed suspicious in the area, it phased through the walls, checking every space within it. 

But in an act of frustration, the Spectre seemed to be knocking out the store’s equipment, throwing the kitchen appliances into the floor, leaving the hitman baffled and confused.

“What the hell is that thing doing?” He wondered to himself, before slowly sneaking away from the Spectre.

With sweat dripping from his forehead, the hitman slowly took one step over another, ensuring that no sound could be made, and that if one sound were to be even made, it would mean certain death for him. The spectre sat down and wondered where the hitman was, until an idea came to him. This plan was quite dangerous, and it could cost the Spectre its life, but it ultimately needed to be done for his conjurer Renzo’s sake.

The Spectre starts unleashing its ghastly aura around the department store, causing the hitman to be frightened, and crawling much faster than before as an act of desperation. His heartbeat pounded faster than ever before, putting him into a state of shock, needing to escape from the mall and meet with his allied hitmen immediately.

While the hitman went farther and farther into the store, only a few inches away from fully escaping its grasp. The Spectre started to track not by detecting any sounds in the area, but for the trajectory of someone’s breath, and there it detected the hitman who crawled on the department store’s floor.

It approached the hitman, and he needed to react extremely fast in order to deflect its attack. The Spectre held its sword, and it seemed like it was planning to stab the helpless hitman with no way to go.

However, the hitman was wrong about his guess. Instead, the Spectre stabbed himself, creating an explosion across the mall and leaving the hitman imbued with a ghastly aura that he couldn’t remove from his body.

He tried imbuing his body with essence to get rid of it, but to no avail whatsoever. It was like being coated with a slimy substance that you can’t remove no matter what. He was desperate to escape, and he couldn’t notice any more Spectres in the way. Trusting in his instincts, he quickly ran to the exit that was around 50 meters away.

But Renzo wasn’t gonna let him escape that easily.

“Found ya!” Renzo widened his eyes, and quickly went into the general direction that the hitman was facing, where he was about to escape the store. He exerted a sinister aura throughout the store, notifying Dex and Tanya about his current state.

Dex was concerned for Renzo, knowing that he was fighting with a hitman alone, he couldn’t bear to see anything unfortunate happening to him, whilst Tanya simply couldn’t bother with what’s been happening to Renzo, she was at the aisle where the beauty products resided, taking some valuable products for herself when they eventually fled the mall.

“Hey, I don’t think he’s in a good condition right now.” Dex worried about it.

“Nah, he’s fine… I already told you to stop overthinking it!” Tanya replied as she kept putting all of the expensive products that cost hundreds of thousands of Myrid on her bag.

After fifteen tireless minutes of searching for the hitman, Renzo had finally closed the distance between him, unsheathing his katana and preparing himself for a final battle between him.

“This is the end for you… I highly suggest you give up now.” Renzo said to the hitman in a calm, collected tone.

“I won’t give up that easily!” said the hitman, who charged at him with his lightsaber enabled.

The two clashed their weapons at each other, both of their weapons were coated with their Essence, with Renzo’s katana imbued with a ghastly blue aura whilst the hitman’s lightsaber was imbued with a bloody red aura. The clash of Essence created shockwaves across the mall, knocking out everything in sight, including Dex and Tanya, who were knocked into a nearby aisle where cabinets fell onto them.

They kept pushing their essence to their absolute limits, their strength was at their all time high, and it all came down to who could efficiently outlast their opponent long enough to survive the violent clash.

However, their strength was starting to descend, Renzo and the hitman couldn’t unleash their Essence for much longer after fighting for minutes, and there seemed to be no clear winner in the fight.

Until, Renzo called forth for one of his Spectres, who rushed towards the area where he and the hitman were fighting. The hitman noticed that the Spectre appeared without a sword, which seemed unnatural, as he always noticed that his Spectres always had a sword in them.

“I’m guessing he’s gonna explode like that previous one did, right?” The hitman said to Renzo.

“That’s where you’re wrong.” Renzo replied with a noticeable smirk on his face, something that the hitman realized way too late.

The Spectre approached the two who were relentlessly clashing, with its body on the verge of breaking, it decided to finally end things once and for all, and turned off the lightsaber that the hitman was holding.

“W-What the hell was that?!” The hitman was deliberately stunned, out of all the things that he expected to happen, like the Spectre suddenly exploding, this was the last thing that he could have ever expected.

Renzo’s katana struck the hitman, cutting his torso in half while leaving his lower half standing, like it didn’t even realize that it was already dead.

He smiled, knowing that the fight was finally over. “I guess that’s what being strategic does.” He said to himself before he went back to the first floor to finally meet up with Dex and Tanya who were eagerly waiting for him.