San Venganza - Texas
Ernst watched with a heavy heart as Mephisto inhaled the last of the town's spirits.
The potential of a thousand corrupted souls, capable of spawning elite super-spectral soldiers for Ghost's army, was gone in an instant.
The entire venture felt like a wasted opportunity.
But there was no time to mourn lost resources.
Mephisto, brimming with the freshly devoured souls, exuded absolute, terrifying confidence.
The hellfire on his massive frame surged outward with unmatched momentum, crashing toward Ernst like a localized meteor strike.
Ernst stood his ground. He raised his hands, focusing his kinetic barriers to their absolute limit. To an observer, he looked like a mere ant trying to hold back a falling mountain.
Mephisto's full-strength blow struck.
But it failed to crush him.
Reacting with enhanced reflexes, Ernst absorbed the kinetic payload of the downward strike.
As Mephisto instantly followed up with a lethal, sweeping tail strike, Ernst leveraged the absorbed energy. He violently pushed back the devil's claws and launched himself high into the air, narrowly dodging the tail whip that shattered the street below.
Mephisto stabilized instantly. Seeing Ernst airborne and without leverage, the Devil seized the opportunity, lunging upward for the kill.
Facing the crisis, Ernst remained completely composed.
He aimed his right hand at his own chest. He didn't need a wand.
"Depulso!"
He chanted the Banishing Charm, propelling his own body backward with a sudden, violent burst of concussive magic, narrowly escaping Mephisto's snapping jaws.
Mephisto landed heavily, his red eyes narrowing.
"A wizard!" he cursed, recognizing the specific flavor of the magic.
He immediately resumed the chase.
Ernst hit the ground rolling. He fired a rapid succession of spells.
"Expelliarmus! Protego!"
Flung debris and kinetic shields sparked through the air. Unfortunately, the standard spells had limited effect. Mephisto exhaled a thick, suffocating black fog from his scales.
The demonic miasma acted like a magical sponge; the moment Ernst's spells entered the fog, they dissipated into harmless sparks.
Undeterred, Ernst shifted tactics. He needed something with absolute lethality.
He leveled his hand at the approaching darkness.
"Avada Kedavra!"
A blinding flash of sickly green light erupted from Ernst's palm.
The Unforgivable Curse tore through the air and violently shattered the black fog enveloping the demon.
Mephisto abruptly halted his pursuit, staring at the dissipating green light with genuine, instinctual fear.
A smirk played on Ernst's lips. So, the ancient lore was true.
Human wizards had developed a comprehensive magical system that rivaled the demons.
The fact that the Killing Curse made a Monarch of Hell flinch proved that wizards had historically won their fair share of wars against the underworld.
"It seems we're evenly matched now," Ernst called out, brushing dust from his coat.
"If we continue, it will just be a war of attrition. You already absorbed the town's souls. My primary objective here has failed. There's no point in further fighting. Shall we call it a draw?"
"Humph!" Mephisto growled, black smoke pouring from his nostrils.
"If you had begged for a draw earlier, I might have agreed. But it is too late. Thanks to your interference, I've had to burn precious energy. I will not let you leave this town unless you leave your soul behind!"
Ernst sighed helplessly. He had no interest in a drawn-out, profitless battle. However, he wasn't about to retreat with his tail between his legs.
Since Mephisto refused to yield, Ernst decided he needed to leave a lasting impression.
"Well, negotiations have officially failed. Let's settle this with one decisive strike."
Ernst retracted his physical weapons. He closed his hands together, focusing entirely on his magical core. He slowly pulled his palms apart.
A gloomy, intensely bright red light gathered between them, condensing until it took the physical shape of a long, jagged crimson dagger.
As an ancient entity, Mephisto had survived since the dawn of humanity. His instincts screamed at him.
The aura emitting from that red blade felt similar to the Killing Curse, but infinitely more primordial and potent.
Mephisto grew deeply cautious. He began a guttural chant.
The black mist around him condensed rapidly, forming a massive, physical demonic claw several meters wide, hovering in the air.
Meanwhile, Ernst's red dagger was fully formed.
Under the cover of his raised hands, Ernst activated the hidden pendant around his neck.
A few drops of a shifting, liquid-like red fluid, the Aether, the Reality Stone, seeped out and silently infused itself into the core of the magical dagger.
He rarely used the Infinity Stone's power, but today, he was going to steal something priceless from the Devil.
"Hell's Claws, Kill!" Mephisto roared.
"Reality Rupture," Ernst commanded.
The two titanic forces collided in the center of the ruined street.
BOOOOM!
A shockwave of violent, hurricane-force energy erupted outward, leveling the remaining saloons.
The crimson dagger and the demonic claw slammed into each other, grinding and sparking in a deadlocked struggle. Neither gave an inch.
Ernst and Mephisto stared each other down through the blinding light, teeth gritted, both pushing their power to the absolute breaking point.
"Explode," Ernst whispered.
Unable to overpower the demon directly, Ernst voluntarily detonated his own construct.
The dagger went critical. The resulting blast entirely neutralized the demon's claw and violently threw Mephisto backward.
Ernst, prepared for the backlash, used his kinetic absorption to anchor his feet, sliding safely back without taking damage.
Mephisto crashed into the dirt. He wasn't overly concerned; the explosion had neutralized the threat, and he assumed Ernst was drained.
His guard momentarily dropped as he pushed himself up.
He was wrong.
From the swirling dust of the explosion, a single droplet of crimson fluid surged forward.
Driven by the power of the Reality Stone, it transformed into a needle-thin, blood-colored arrow, aiming directly for Mephisto's eye.
Stunned, Mephisto instinctively summoned a shield of dense black mist.
It didn't matter. The Aether rewrote the physical laws of the shield.
The crimson arrow passed through the dark magic as if it weren't there and struck the Devil's left eye.
"GAAAH!"
Mephisto unleashed an agonizing, ear-splitting scream.
As a Monarch of Hell, physical damage was trivial. But this was different.
The crimson arrow carried a conceptual weight that ripped directly into his spiritual core. The sheer agony of having his soul torn surpassed physical pain thousands of times over.
The arrow erupted from the back of Mephisto's skull. It reverted into a floating, red fluid and zipped back into Ernst's waiting hand.
Ernst looked down. Trapped within the swirling Aether was a dark, pulsing fragment of Mephisto's actual soul.
A cold smile lit up Ernst's face. The trip wasn't a waste after all.
He had secured a prize far more valuable than a town full of ghosts.
Across the street, Mephisto fell to his knees, clutching his face. Once the Aether exited his body, the pain subsided to a dull roar.
The gaping hole in the back of his head rapidly knit closed, but his left eye was a ruined, smoking husk that refused to heal.
Mephisto glared at Ernst with his remaining eye, a burning, apocalyptic hatred radiating from his form.
Logically, the Devil should have retreated. He was severely injured and structurally compromised. But the stolen fragment of his soul was too vital.
A damaged soul meant a massive drop in his power in Hell, inviting endless betrayals from his demonic subordinates.
He couldn't afford to leave it behind.
"Give back that fragment of my soul," Mephisto demanded, his voice shaking the earth.
"Or I will kill you, no matter the cost!"
With a sickening crunch, two massive bone spurs erupted from the demon's back, tearing through his flesh to form colossal, leathery bat wings.
His one good eye burned with absolute, suicidal resolve. He looked ready to burn his own existence to a cinder just to destroy Ernst.
Ernst, however, didn't flinch. He saw right through the theatrics.
The Devil was bluffing, trying to look intimidating to gain leverage for a negotiation.
Ernst didn't say a word. He casually pocketed the stolen soul fragment.
Then, he tapped his pendant. A significantly larger pool of the terrifying, crimson Reality fluid floated out, hovering ominously over Ernst's palm.
He tossed it lightly in the air, catching it like a baseball, and stared back at the demon.
Mephisto's imposing, resolute expression instantly crumbled.
He looked at the mass of Aether, swallowed the threat he was about to make, and choked on his own words and vanished.
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