"It's all yours," Marcus said after venting for a while, his expression somewhat complicated.
At that moment, his heart was in complete turmoil. The fact that Number Four was the murderer of Number Two had already been fully confirmed. Even if he wanted to protect Number Four, it was simply impossible.
The death of Number Four, although a deserved punishment, was also a blow to Marcus's authority and prestige as the leader and person in charge of the group.
Moreover, his subordinates and Tony's had already been looking at each other with a certain hostility, and now the conflict between the two sides seemed to have intensified even further.
But in this matter, they were clearly at fault, so they could do nothing but swallow the bitterness in silence.
Marcus, accompanied by his Houndoom and his Malamar, walked to the side, leaving Number Four's body—lying at the bottom of a deep crater—completely exposed to Tony and his Pokémon.
"Uuugh... uugh..." Although Number Four could no longer express himself with words, he could see everything clearly. After the most intense pain had passed, the constant suffering had sharpened his mind. He believed he had understood the whole situation, but his severe injuries prevented him from explaining himself.
He did not know why Cain had done everything possible to frame him, but he desperately wished he could say everything out loud.
It was true that Number Two had died by his hand, and he accepted dying for that. What he could not accept was that Cain had been able to watch everything as if it were a spectacle, and that, even worse, the true person responsible for everything, Cain, not only came out unscathed but also took all the benefits, while he became the scapegoat.
In his mind, the only reason Cain had acted this way was to keep all the advantages for himself.
Unfortunately, when he saw Tony approach and look down at him with absolute coldness, he understood that in his eyes there was not the slightest trace of compassion, only anger and madness.
Never try to reason with a madman, especially when he believes he holds the truth in his hands. No one stepped forward to explain anything on Number Four's behalf, and under Tony's unleashed fury, the place was completely wiped clean: not a single trace remained, not even of the crater Marcus had created with his psychic powers.
Number Four seemed to vanish into the air, leaving no trace of his existence.
It was as if none of it had ever happened.
However, Cain could clearly feel the emotions of those on both sides of him. Number One, Marcus's subordinate, radiated a bitter sadness, like "when the rabbit dies, the dog is boiled," while from Number Five's side there was an obvious sense of satisfaction and joy.
These emotions were not feigned; they arose instinctively upon witnessing Tony deal with Number Four.
Those who had seen that scene could not help but put themselves in his place, imagining that they might have been Number Four... or even Number Two, who had died at the beginning.
But those people did not know the truth, and their assumptions were necessarily partial.
Not only Cain noticed all this, but Marcus did as well, whose expression remained complicated.
Why had he tried to protect Number Four when Tony released his energy sphere? Precisely to prevent what had just happened.
It no longer mattered whether Number Four had committed the crime or not.
What mattered was that, as leader and person in charge, Marcus had failed to protect his subordinates. In front of his own group, in front of Tony's men, and even in front of the mere spectators, his prestige had plummeted.
In fact, if Marcus himself had executed Number Four, it might have been better. At least it would have been preferable to Tony doing it.
But Tony was a madman, a true lunatic. Marcus knew him well: when he entered that state, if he was not given an outlet, his madness would not stop. In that case, the next one to suffer might have been Marcus himself, so he chose to yield.
Seeing the low morale of the people now, Marcus regretted it a little, but there was no turning back.
When he saw that Tony was gradually regaining his calm, Marcus took a deep breath and forcibly suppressed his dissatisfaction.
Anyone who had been "forced" to go through something like this would feel uncomfortable, and even more so someone as powerful as Marcus.
But in front of a madman, even a rational person is forced to act with extreme caution, like a scholar facing a soldier.
"Tony, what about Number Six?" Marcus asked when he saw that Tony had completely calmed down.
The matter of Number Two had already been settled. Now both sides had lost one person, which could be considered a tie. Moreover, Number Four had received his deserved punishment.
Upon hearing the question, Tony froze for a moment, with a hesitant expression.
Noticing this, Marcus frowned and shouted in a deep voice, "Tony!"
Cain, who had been carefully observing the situation, could not help but form a faint smile. The death of Number Four had only been the fuse; this was the real bomb!
Tony still did not speak, and the longer he remained silent, the more uneasy Marcus became.
"Tony! Don't force me!" Marcus roared for the third time.
Tony knew he could not keep avoiding the topic. He had just released all his fury and had no intention of losing control again in the short term, and he was also aware that he had put Marcus in a very awkward position.
With a wave of his hand, he threw out two energy spheres: they were spheres of psychic energy. Of the two, only one matched the psychic power of someone present; the other did not correspond to anyone gathered there.
Even so, everyone knew perfectly well to whom they belonged.
One of them matched exactly the psychic power of Number Five, who was standing not far from Cain. The other belonged to Number Two, who had not appeared that day and had died at the hands of Number Four.
The appearance of those two spheres was like throwing a devastating bomb into the square, which until then had remained in deathly silence.
The message was clear: Number Six, like Number Two, had been eliminated. And all signs indicated that the ones who had taken care of him were the already deceased Number Two and the stunned Number Five.
Number Five, who until that moment had been watching the situation as a mere spectacle, took a few seconds to react. Although Number Six was Marcus's subordinate and did not have much to do with him, the fact that one of the spheres matched his own psychic power left him completely dumbfounded.
It was true that he got along fairly well with Number Two, but that "cordial" relationship was nothing more than a friendly rivalry to improve each other, just as had previously occurred between Bartram and Number Four.
The death of Number Two had surprised him, but that was all.
What he could not understand was when he had attacked Number Six.
At most, they had had a few minor frictions. In his view, Number Six's strength did not even reach a decent level, and after those small conflicts, Six himself had learned not to cross his line.
(End of chapter)