Chapter 49

Moyako...

She had been walking through the center town plaza on her way to the brotherhood hall so that she could finally meet Marcus Wright when she heard the crackle of thunder and saw a bright flash only a few feet away from her. It was there that he stepped out of the flash of light and stood with a sword of black stone in his hand. He was covered from head to toe in dirt, blood, and bruises showing that he had just finished a lengthy and exhausting fight. At his feet lay Ruvick's decapitated body and all she could do was stare at him in shock and horror.

​To think, this man who she had been searching the good part of the last two centuries for, was capable of killing the most powerful person in the world who even she had no chance against..., it scared her.

​Noticing that she was the only one among the crowd who hadn't run away from him, he turned to face her.

​After all this time searching for him, she finally managed to get a good look at him with her own eyes and for the first time in a long time, she felt intimidated by him. It was very unusual to her since she regularly fought and killed monsters and people alike that looked far more terrifying than him and yet, his very presence felt threatening and cold and intense. When she locked eyes with him, his murderous stare made him unlike the pictures that depicted him with a warm and kindly expression.​

This man was a cold hearted killer. That fact was more than apparent to her than ever.

​"M-Marcus...?" she said to confirm that he really was the person she believed him to be.

​His expression calmed down slightly as he tilted his head in confusion and asked, "Who the hell are you?"

​Not a moment after, his eyes rolled into the back of his head and he fell to his knees before collapsing onto the ground and losing consciousness. 

​She went completely silent as she didn't know how to react to seeing him fall right in front of him but before she had the chance to think of what to do, Ruvick's body twitched and he slowly pushed himself off of the ground before getting back to his feet.

​"Good grief...I can't believe I let him surprise me like that," he said as his head slowly regenerated from the jaw up as if it were decomposing in reverse.

​"Ruvick...what happened?" she asked.

​"Well, I was training Marcus to try and see if he could figure out manifestation magic and he shut off his pain receptors during the fight. I forced him to experience all that pain towards the end of the fight and all it did was just make him angry so he...actually did something rather clever to beat me," Ruvick chuckled as his eyes reformed.

​"How did he beat you?"

​"Throughout our fight he manipulated time around his body to move faster even if it wasn't making his attacks stronger and towards the end of it he concentrated that power so much that he stopped time completely and forced me out of the shadow realm," he said as the rest of his head regenerated.

​He then muttered to himself as he said, "I wonder what that red glow in his eyes was..."

​"What are you going to do with him now?" she asked. 

​Underneath her feelings of panic, she wanted to spend a little more time with Marcus to get to know him a little better.

​"For the moment, I'm going to take him with me, get him cleaned and healed up, and see if I can't figure out anything else that can draw out more of his power," he said as he picked Marcus's limp body off the ground and carried him over his shoulder.

​Ruvick then met her eyes and a look of understanding was shown on his face.

​"I assure you, you'll have more than enough time to meet and talk with him after we're finished. Just wait a little bit longer, will you?" he said as they disappeared into the shadows and she was left wondering what she was left to do.

​After so many years looking for him, for Marcus, now that she had him within her grasp, she had no idea what action she needed to take.

Ruvick...

​He appeared in his home in the southeastern kingdom of Forrosa with Marcus dangling off of his back. He brought him here because he figured that because Kayron did not know of this place and that inviting Marcus directly into his home would be a show of trust and hopefully make him open up more to the idea of trusting him as a person.

​He called for one of the caretakers of his home to help wash and heal Marcus's body while he took the time to rest.

​Not that Ruvick really needed to rest at all, his body didn't require it. Sometimes though, it is just nice to sit and relax one's mind.

​In fact, it has been quite a long time since he had slept and he's been wanting to do that for a while.

​Again, his body didn't require sleep to function but the idea of not dreaming at all is almost painful to think about which is why he manifested the ability to allow his body to sleep and dream if he wanted to much like how he made it so he could enjoy food and drink.

​He made his way into his room and laid in his bed and commanded his body to fall into a deep sleep.

The Bronx, New York, two and a half years ago...


​The dream that surfaced in Ruvick's mind was unlike anything he had ever seen before as he was shown Terra in the modern age with its mechanical vehicles and electronics and towering skyscrapers.

However, that was not the focus of this dream. 

Ruvick witnessed this through the eyes of a short Hispanic man named Pablo as he drove through the city with four others riding with him. All of them had a look of panic and fear in their eyes, as if they were being hunted down by some kind of monster.

​"Everything's fucked now man! The boss is dead and all the money is burnt to shit! What the hell are we supposed to do now?" the guy in the passenger seat next to him, his name was Juan, asked desperately.

​"I don't know! Fuck! Let's just get out of the city first before we come up with anything!" Pablo said as he pushed through traffic without stopping for a red light.

​"How the hell did this even happen?" the man in the seat behind him, a black guy named Demarius, asked as he tried to make sense of things, "We were all doing just fine working for Castellano but everything's gone to shit now since Enderman killed Romano."

​"I don't know either man. Everyone else thought it was just a work dispute between the two but then he came after the boss and killed him too," Juan said as he tried to explain it.​

"Hold on, didn't you guys hear about the attack on the FBI that happened shortly after Castellano's banks were robbed? Some guy in a homemade Iron Man suit robbed two banks at the same time and was shot in the head by a sniper. That guy survived and was taken to the FBI, probably to be questioned."

​"Everyone heard about that, its old news. What does it have to do with us?" Pablo asked.

​"Well, there's only one other person that we know with tech like that. It had to have been Enderman!"

​"That's nonsense! Even the Enderman wouldn't have been stupid enough to rob a bank in broad daylight and get captured by the FBI!"

​"Yeah but..., the news said that after the attack, there were no survivors."

​The car was silent for over a minute as they collectively processed that information.

​Obviously, the Enderman wasn't stupid enough to get captured, they were quite sure of that.

​Unless, of course, he wanted to get captured.​

"Let's...let's say he wanted to get captured though, right? What would he hope to gain by being brought directly into their facility?"

​"Well..., assuming he knows how to hack through their security, he might be able to download all the files and any information that the FBI had on the three families or any other connections that he could use against us. That man is definitely smart enough to pull off something that crazy."

​"How long before we make it to the safehouse?"

​"Not much longer now. Once we meet up with everyone else, we can figure out our next step," Pablo said as he turned a corner and they made their way onto the highway and on their way upstate.

​​After a little less than an hour on the road, their nerves were shot and so everyone except Pablo and the forth person in the car, a brown haired white guy named Lucas, fell asleep. Throughout the whole trip, everyone else but him had been talking erratically as they tried to make sense of things. He did share a similar nervous expression on his face but he wasn't sure if it was for the same reason as Juan and Demarius. 

​He had been almost completely silent the entire time.

​"Hey Lucas, anything on your mind man?" Pablo asked.

​"Uh...well, I've been trying to clear my head so that the stress of all that's been going on doesn't get to me," he said calmly.

​"Right. I guess the idea of Enderman hunting us down would be rather terrifying. I get it."

​Lucas then pulled out his phone as if to check the time and for some reason Pablo felt a sense of panic.

​"Hey, you don't think Enderman can track us through our phones do you?"

​Lucas gave him a look that seemed to say 'are you an idiot?'

​"Be serious. He's just a fucking gangster, not a warlock mastermind or some shit like that," he said as he looked back at his phone before shutting it off.

​As they were nearly there, he noticed the gas station on the side of the road and realized that this was the turn he needed to make to get to the safehouse. 

They were almost there, just a little more...

Once they made it, Pablo noticed that five other cars and vans were already there. and over a dozen other guys were waiting for them.

​"Yo, everyone wake up! We're here!" he said as he smacked their legs and they jostled awake.

​They stepped out of the car and made their way inside the safehouse.

​After everyone was mostly accounted for, discussions started for how things would move forward from that point on.

​"Enderman destroyed all our supply lines and froze all the bank accounts associated with Castellano. How the hell are we supposed to get paid now?"

​"Forget the money for a moment! If he's coming after us, how are we supposed to defend ourselves? Most of our weapons caches have been seized too!"

​"FUCK! Just how far is this guy willing to go to hunt us all down?!"

​They continued to mutter amongst themselves as they tried to figure out who brought them there when Pablo noticed Lucas messing with his phone again. After pressing a few buttons he started walking backwards.

What the hell...?

​"Hold on...who's even in charge of this whole thing? Who organized this?"

​"What the hell are you talking about?"

​"I mean, who organized this safehouse in case our boss died?"

​"I did," Lucas said as he stood with his back leaning up against the metal door.

​"Lucas...? What hell is going on?" Pablo asked.

​He pressed a button on his phone once more and the sound of automatic doors locking echoed off the metal walls.

​"So long," Lucas waved as he opened the door behind him and as he was closing it behind him, Demarius ran as fast as he could to try and stop it closing.

"Stop! Don't you dare-," he was only a hairsbreadth away from keeping the door open when it shut and locked itself. 

​"DAMN IT! Check every door! Knock em down if you have to!" 

​Everyone inside quickly rushed to every door in their small safehouse and tried opening them before slamming their bodies against them but none of them would so much as budge.

​Pablo then heard the sound of his car being started up. He checked his pocket and realized that Lucas must have swiped his keys.

​"Damn you, Lucas! You fucking coward!"

​Then, a loud and heavy thud echoed as if a large body had dropped from the ceiling. 

​Everyone turned around to look at the man who had appeared in the room.

​There, in the center of the room, stood the man who they all collectively feared, The Enderman. He wore metallic armor painted black and dark red and the low vibrating sound of machinery whirring seemed to come from his suit. This armor was completely different from what had been shown on the news when he had robbed two of Castellano's banks. That armor was huge and bulky and looked to be meant to cut down a fully armored militia. This armor he wore now was obviously designed for stealth as well as speed and flexibility as it looked much lighter.

​Everyone went silent as they were frozen in place, sweat dripping off their foreheads as if they were facing down a beast that would kill them at any sudden movement.

​Yet, he was the first to move as he reached over his shoulder with right hand and the whine of his sword being pulled from its sheathe cut through the silence. At the same time he reached with his left and brought out a custom built pistol.

​The first to snap out of his fear was Demarius as he shouted, "Fuck this!" and pulled out his own gun as he pointed it at The Enderman. A few others in the room who still had guns on them pulled theirs out and each of them started firing. 

​The bullets bounced off of his armor harmlessly and some of them were even deflected off of him and hit some of the other guys in the room. By the time all the bullets were spent, The Enderman stood there completely unharmed and they were out of ammo.

​"Oh shit...," Demarius said under his breath as Enderman faced him and moved faster than any normal human being should have, his exo-suit making him much faster. 

​In one swift movement, Enderman swung his sword and cleaved through his torso so cleanly that it slid off of his body and fell to the ground with a sickening wet thump.

​Everyone started looking around for anything they could use as a weapon and tried to rush him all at once while some of them tried looking for another exit.

​Even while surrounded by over a dozen guys at once, he continued to carve through all of them and gun them down without mercy.

​Pablo managed to find a window and a sturdy box that they could use to escape. He grabbed a tire iron and shattered the window. As he was knocking most of the remaining glass out, some of it was lodged his hands in the process.

​"Shit!" he winced as he put his jacket over the window and crawled through. Juan came after him and one other was able to make it out. A forth guy tried to escape but his head exploded into bloody mist as Enderman shot him down. His body was stuck half way through the window blocking everyone else's escape.​

"Come on! Forget about the others, they're dead! Let's just go!" Juan shouted as he ran towards one of the cars and started hotwiring it. Pablo got into the passenger seat while the third guy who made it out hopped into the backseat. 

​"Come on! Come on!" the third guy urged.

​"Shut the fuck up! I'm trying!" He yelled back just as he managed to get it working, "Yes! Lets get out of here!"

​As Juan closed the driver's side door, one of the doors to the safehouse opened and Enderman walked through covered in blood. 

​"GO GO GO!" Pablo shouted and Juan hit the gas as he tried to make it out of there as fast as possible.

​Gunshots rang through the air and the backseat window on the right side of the car shattered.

​The car drove off and left a dust cloud behind them.

​"YES! Vete a la mierda, coño! [Fuck you, pussy!]" Juan shouted in glee as they managed to get away.​

​As the car was speeding along the dirt road, Pablo looked in the passenger side mirror and spotted Enderman running after them and managing to catch up with them.

​"Go faster now! He's catching up with us!"

​"On foot?! What the hell?!" he said as he gunned it even faster.

​"Hey! New Guy! Is there anything back there we can use to slow him down?"

​New Guy looked behind his seat and asked, "Do you think this will work on that armor?"

​In his hands, he pulled out an LMG with a fully loaded drum mag.

​"Might as well fire everything you have at him and find out!" Juan shouted.

​New Guy skipped rolling down the window and just started firing at Enderman wildly just as they were about to turn the last corner.

​Juan turned the while and managed to drift on the dirt road while New Guy fired everything he had at him. One of the rounds slammed into his mask and sparks flew around it causing him to flinch as he rushed towards them. Turning the corner caused them to slow down just enough for Enderman to body slam the car and nearly make it lean on its side but Pablo and Juan quickly leaned to the opposite side to try and counter balance it and keep it flat on the ground. If New Guy hadn't landed a shot on his mask then the car might have been tipped over.

​Juan kept going as they took off while Enderman held onto the window and tried to pull himself up but the faster that car went, and the more Juan moved back and forth, the more Enderman bounced around on the side of the car. 

​"Get off you fucking psychopath!" New Guy shouted as he kicked at Enderman's fingers and a piece of the door bent and caused him to lose his grip as he fell off. 

​Enderman disappeared as the light shining from their taillights faded.

​"There it is! There's the gas station! We're almost there!"

​Pablo looked out the driver's side window and thought for a moment that he could seethe figure of Enderman running through the field to the left but the figure disappeared. They made the turn and were only about fifty feet away from from the gas station when Enderman fell out of the sky and landed on the hood of their car. He reached out his hand and gripped the hood tight to keep himself steady as he reached behind him to once again pull out his sword.

​However, Juan didn't stop as he drove towards the gas station and shouted, "Te voy a destrozar, maldito pedazo de meirda! [I'm gonna tear you apart, you fucking piece of shit!]"

​He drove straight towards one of the gas pumps but stopped just before hitting it and it was so sudden that Enderman lost his grip again and fell of the hood before crashing into one of them. As he slammed into it, the pump broke and gas started to pour out of it, dousing him and the area around him.

​Juan then pulled the car back and shouted, "New Guy! Fire everything at him now!"

​New Guy opened the car door on his right, aimed it at the gas pump, and fired. 

​It only took a few shots but soon sparks began to fly as the bullets bounced off of Enderman's armor. The sparks flew onto the gasoline and it quickly caught fire. 

​Just as he was getting back on his feet, the gas station exploded in a massive fireball that engulfed him completely.

​"There's...no way he could survive that...right?"

​The three of them watched as the flames and the smoke cleared to reveal Enderman's lying flat and unmoving on the ground as flames covered his body. 

​"Holy...SHIT! I think he's finally dead!" New Guy shouted in relief.

​Juan leaned back in his chair as the stress left his body and the three of them watched as Enderman corpse slowly burned...​

But then, just as they were enjoying their short victory, Enderman's arm twitched. 

​"You have got to be fucking kidding me...," Juan said under his breath before he shouted, "New Guy! Get in!"​

Once the backseat door was shut, Juan hit the gas and tried to slam into Enderman only for him to side step them completely and swung his sword through the driver's side window, through the car doors, and into the back seat. 

​In one swift movement, he had decapitated Juan and New Guy at the same time and sent their car crashing into the still burning gas pump.

​"Oh shit, oh shit!" Pablo said as he ran out of the passenger side door and made it ten feet before the gas tank exploded and the shockwave sent him crashing onto the ground. 

​A piece of shrapnel flew off of the car and lodged itself into Pablo's left leg and he screamed in pain.

​As he tried to crawl away and hide, Enderman walked around the car and Pablo watched as flames continued to burn at the man's body but he did not care. He then reached up to pull the mask off his head and dropped it on the ground, revealing a man with jet black hair and bright, icy blue eyes. The flames continued to burn and they licked at the exposed skin on his face and at his hair.

​However, instead of his skin melting and turning black from the heat it just lingered on his skin, harmlessly latching onto his body and continuing to burn. 

​"What the hell are you!?" Pablo demanded as he kept trying to crawl away to safety while Enderman pursued him. 

​"I thought you already knew what I am," he replied as he pulled his sword from its sheathe, "I'm the Enderman." 

​He raised the sword above his head and stabbed Pablo in the heart.

​"No-," Ruvick shouted in Pablo's place just as the sword pierced his chest in the dream.

Just what the hell kind of dream was that...? Ruvick thought to himself as he slid his legs off his bed and sat upright.

​For some reason, he felt an uncomfortable sense of uneasiness as he turned his head and found The Enderman, no, Marcus Wright sitting in one of the chairs in the room, staring at him as he had woken up.

​"Did you sleep well?"