Along with memories, Lianna curled up in a corner of the cell, but thinking about her family at this moment wouldn't offer much help; it only made her fear grow wildly like weeds.
The cell was small, yet it seemed as if there were creatures moving in every corner, a heavy black mist shrouding everything, forcing her to rely solely on hearing to assess the surroundings.
"Hiss... Rustle..."
Minute sounds came from within the cell. Lianna didn't even dare to cry, her eyes wide open, watching every sound-emitting place in panic.
The cell seemed to be alive...
She didn't know how long she had been captured, nor the current time and location, and even less whether her brother or the Professor would come to rescue her.
Her heart was filled with despair.
However, just then, she seemed to see a red light spot approaching from afar, the first light she had seen in so long.
What was that? As if it came through the wall? Could it be the eyes of a beast?
She pressed herself against the wall, clutching her clothes tightly, her other hand covering her mouth to prevent herself from screaming.
The answer was... far more terrifying than a beast; it was the Devil who had captured her here.
He appeared with a human-like appearance, except his entire body was in bright red, with a ring of bone spikes protruding from his head, like a natural crown.
Bare-chested, he revealed powerful muscles, more robust than her brother Gang Lishi, carrying a giant black war axe on his back. The glowing point was a huge red gemstone pinched between the Devil's fingers.
It emitted a mesmerizing yet elusive glow, just glancing at it, there seemed to be voices whispering in her ear some incomprehensible words capable of driving anyone insane.
The Demon gave a smile, seemingly in a constant state of madness. He quickly approached Lianna in the corner, pressing the gemstone against her face.
"Is it beautiful?"
Lianna didn't know how to answer. She could feel a foreign consciousness frantically burrowing into her mind, some indescribable horrors revealing their tentacles in the Dark Universe.
Her thoughts couldn't even connect anymore; she was heading towards madness.
Yet the Demon withdrew the gemstone and pressed it against his own face, sniffing the girl's scent on the gemstone with his pointed nose, extending a forked tongue like a poisonous snake, to lick its smooth surface.
The gemstone appeared more brilliant and dazzling.
"I'm Belasco, your master, the Lord of Hell Border, I... What am I supposed to do?"
Halfway through, he seemed to forget his words, having to raise his head to gaze at the tentacles hanging from the ceiling, pondering silently. Something had been conversing with him in his mind, and he lost his train of thought with just a minor interruption.
As he pondered, a drool-covered Blood Stone was thrust into his mouth, and Lianna could see a lump pushing against his esophagus, the glowing stone illuminating even through his skin, a point of light slipping into his stomach.
She clutched her mouth tightly, not allowing herself to scream.
"Ah, yes, I need to transform you into a 'Banshee', my weapon, my mistress."
Belasco suddenly remembered, his mouth opening like a snake, accompanied by red light, as the Blood Stone was spat out again.
He already possessed one Blood Stone, and this one was meant for creating a Banshee.
For hundreds of years, he had been alone. Why did he suddenly think to create a second-in-command? The reason had long faded from his memory, but surely something had urged him to do so.
A powerful living weapon, indeed excellent, to evade the X-Men's pursuit, he had specially chosen the past, a historical node without X-Men, and performed a time jump.
He couldn't do the time jump himself; it was the ability of the first Blood Stone he crafted, which had been destroyed by Dante. Now, he was using the eighth or ninth stone?
Because praying to the Ancient Gods was a dangerous act, he frequently had to abandon his Blood Stones to shield himself from disasters.
But now the Ancient Gods could fulfill his wishes; after the ritual, time immediately reversed, taking him and Lianna back to Hell Border in 1945.
As the unique existence in the Cosmos, he directly overwrote this era's self, smoothly replacing his current existence, still the King of Hell.
Who knew why the Ancient Gods chose this time, but it didn't matter, as long as there were no X-Men now. He considered himself clever, certain that no mortals could track him after the time migration, right?
Now it was time for the second step of the ritual, implanting the Blood Stone into the girl, corrupting her soul, transforming her into a loyal warrior, and the most brazen whore.
He held the wet gemstone in his hand, clenched tight, crouched down, and stared straight into Lianna's eyes.
"Scared?"
"..."
Lianna pressed close to the wall; she didn't know if she could survive. Tears streamed from her eyes; she didn't want to become a Demon.
Her hands covered her mouth fiercely, not allowing the Demon to push the stone into her mouth.
Yet behind her, the wall morphed into a cluster of writhing tentacles, stretching down, entwining her limbs, pulling her limbs wide apart in a spread-eagle position, fixing her to the wall like a lamb.
"Hahaha, scared is not right, no, no, you should scream!"
Belasco's large hand lifted Lianna's clothing, scraped some blood marks on her pristine belly with his fingernails, tasting the flavor of the blood.
Indeed, the girl's physique could resist the side effects of the Blood Stone, not only maintaining human form but enhancing strength considerably.
He pinched her jaw again, examining her face closely, pleasant features, should turn out to be a pretty bitch in the future.
Then, with a punch, the Lord of Hell pierced through Lianna's belly, seemingly from her navel stuffed his entire arm into her abdominal cavity.
He released his grip, and the Blood Stone began to rampage within Lianna's stomach, then adhered to her heart and merged with her.
"Ah!!!!"
The little girl screamed miserably, her eyes rolling back as if she were about to faint, but the whispers of the Ancient God kept her trapped in reality.
She was stuck at the midpoint between reality and nightmare. In such a situation, every second would be infinitely prolonged, and this torment would magnify the anger in anyone's heart indefinitely, gradually transforming them into a Demon.
"Come on, curse, speak out the most venomous blasphemies, say them, and you'll feel better."
Belasco squeezed Lianna's innards, using his fingers to pierce several holes in her liver.
"Ah!!!"
The Blood Stone would heal these injuries, but it wouldn't disguise the intense pain; meanwhile, as the Blood Stone Energy repaired her damaged organs, she would become increasingly susceptible to its influence.
Perhaps it wouldn't be long before a new Banshee would emerge.
But Belasco had forgotten one thing: when people scream, they often can't hear outside sounds.
Especially now, when Lianna's mind was full of the voices of the Ancient Gods, her consciousness was about to dissipate, and she only wanted to scream loudly. The whispers of the Ancient Gods completely drowned out Belasco's crazy howls.
"Why don't you curse? Why?"
He crushed Lianna's liver and then reached for her pancreas.
"Ah!!!"
Belasco didn't get the reaction he wanted. He immediately pulled a long face, then tore off some tentacles from the ceiling, using them as whips to lash Lianna's small body.
Even though her body twisted in pain due to an unconscious reaction, she said nothing except scream.
During the transformation into a Demon, the Caster's heart must be filled with Darkness and hatred for Destiny. Blaspheming one's own Soul is also indispensable.
And Lianna, as she was now, couldn't meet these requirements.
After whipping for a while, Belasco began to grow impatient.
He reached out, ready to pull off Lianna's pants, intending to use his favorite method.
However, before he could touch her again, he suddenly found himself falling into emptiness, and then the surrounding was rapidly swallowed by Darkness, endlessly falling downwards with no idea of the destination.
He looked up, only to see a golden spark-emitting ring, gradually shrinking into a small dot, then disappearing.
"Ah!!! Kama Taiji! Damn The Ancient One!!!"
Hamill withdrew his hand into his sleeve, signaling Deathstroke to settle it.
Substituting Monac for Hamill was to deal with Belasco, a Lord of Hell who couldn't fly and forgot how to cast magic? Su Ming had a very simple way to handle him.
That was to give him the same treatment Loki once enjoyed in a certain world: a Suspended Ring opening and then free fall.
Monac's Dark Magic had stronger attack power, but his use of Teleportation Gate wasn't as fast as Kama Taiji's Suspended Ring; wanting to trap someone with a Teleportation Gate would inevitably rely on White Magic.
As for why Su Ming was there, it was just reverse reasoning from the storybook. Previously, he excluded a bunch of names using elimination, but he didn't see Secret Guest in the storybook.
In London and Germany, future Secret Guest had always been acting with the X-Men, and her behavior clearly showed she knew Su Ming, unlike others. Her understanding seemed more personal.
Other individuals with active Time Ability, Cable and Deadpool, even Phantom Cat and Bishop, were recorded in the storybook.
But Secret Guest wasn't mentioned.
Given that Kama Taiji hadn't been recorded throughout the book, Su Ming speculated that Secret Guest wasn't unrecorded because of her Time Traveler identity, but because, as a Kama Taiji Mage, she avoided being recorded.
She lacked the ability, but someone else could do it for her, and that was The Ancient One.
The Ancient One not only avoided being recorded herself, but she also ensured that Kama Taiji and even the enemies in the Alternate Dimension weren't recorded in the story.
Hence, there were generally three points of intelligence.
First, Su Ming knew that future Secret Guest possessed Dimension and Time travel abilities, allowing her to use the Hell Border as a transfer station, traveling to any time and place. The X-Men and others could return from World War II using her ability.
Second, he also knew that after Belasco kidnapped Secret Guest, he planned to corrupt her Soul and transform her into a Demoness at the Hell Border through time traversing, though the specific time wasn't certain.
The final point: Loki concocted a story, and that story didn't include Secret Guest.
Then the expression Secret Guest showed Su Ming when they last met made no sense. This was enough to prove something happened between them, and this event made her a special connection between the New X-Men and Deathstroke.
She was kidnapped at seven—Su Ming certainly didn't know her beforehand, otherwise, he wouldn't have let her go to Xavier Academy; wasn't Zhongsi Academy better? There were ways to handle her genetic disease.
And after her rescue, she grew up at the X Academy, acting with the New X-Men, never having the opportunity to contact Deathstroke independently.
So the acquaintance with Deathstroke must have happened during the kidnapping.
Su Ming could assert that he didn't want anything to do with existences like the Ancient Gods; if not for Balder, he wouldn't have come to the Hell Border this time.
After giving up on finding Balder, he wouldn't return in the future.
To put it romantically, this was a once-in-a-lifetime encounter with hell; to put it harshly, who the hell would come again to this tentacle-filled wretched place?
The comprehensive reasoning of all information led to the conclusion that his current presence at the Hell Border was exactly the time of Deathstroke and Secret Guest's 'first' meeting.
It was also the only possible time.
Thus, he immediately portrayed Belasco's appearance for Ciri, who leaped through space, confirming the direction before returning, and the three then used a Teleportation Gate directly behind Belasco.
Even because little Secret Guest screamed so miserably, Su Ming arranged tactics for Hamill behind Belasco, and the Lord of Hell didn't hear a thing...