Ability Wielders

That was until a few minutes ago when he received news from Anthony through the wrist.w.a.tch he was sporting.

"I also don"t know." Alex shook his head, shrugging. "All I know is that one of our best talents in years is missing, encountering a Level 3 wielder, with Zeke returning to make a report of a mole inside Puting Araw. It may be a mistake, but our field Blue Agents are all meticulous, lowering the chances of that. This suspicions are solely because of a singular ent.i.ty, Butcher."

Alex fiddled with his computer for a bit and rotated the screen, showing the fake Butcher"s face on the screen.

"To make it all worse, Daniel was the leader of this mission, and Daniel opted to not use a Sensory Link. Not like he was at fault as physical a.s.sistance do typically doesn"t use Sensory Links, especially in crowded places such as Paraiso, a club." Alex explained the feasible dilemma they were in. "It"s probably safer to have a meeting with Anthony first."

"Agreed." Gerald"s ferocious eyes and enraged expression persisted, infuriated. "Let"s go."

With that, the two went to Anthony"s office. Hayden, who was in front of the Missions Board of the inner area for Third Rank Special Agents noticed the two exiting the office with hurried steps. Regardless of Gerald wearing a mask, the atmosphere surrounding him was incredibly fierce, as if a pack of wolves is glaring back at you if you even took a glimpse at Gerald.

Hayden, as someone who disliked sticking his nose in other people"s business, wondered for a wee bit of time prior to throwing this to the back of his mind. "Ahh, yes, this will be a pretty good mission for me."

In the corner of his eyes, Hayden noticed a mission on the screen of the Missions Board that suited him perfectly. According to it, the bounty was for a person who wandered around Pateros committing terrifying murders.

Apparently, this person wasn"t as simple because all her murders are considered serial killings. What"s horrifying with that? It was that she committed all this using different guises, hence, to the public, her killings were all distinct!

To sum it all up, she was a shapeshifter that stole the faces of people, complete with DNA replication through an unknown method, allowing her to access their Ident.i.ty Numbers. What"s common with all her ident.i.ties was that she has killed them all, which were enough for Blue Agents from Puting Araw to investigate, ultimately discovering that she was indeed a wielder.

She wasn"t that powerful, nevertheless, her ident.i.ty keeps changing, thus, she couldn"t be tracked down the second time, probably learning from being caught. Since then, her kills were indistinguishable from regular grisly murders. To the ma.s.s populace, she was termed as a demon and a nighttime terror, while in Puting Araw, she is known as the Evershifter, or the Face Stealer.

Anybody who has accepted this mission in the past has failed on tracking her down as she was not just too evasive, she was also good at covering her tracks! It was fundamentally a nigh-impossible task.

It was a task that merely Third Rank Special Agents and above can accept, though no Level 2 wielders desired to waste time on this deemed-to-be-impossible mission, what more, Level 3 wielders and above.

"I"d take up a challenge." Hayden shrugged. He wanted something to do for the remainder of his Christmas vacation, it was much better to do so with a challenge versus without. "It"s getting late…"

Approaching a terminal, the one mentioned by Gerald. The terminal scanned his handprint and retinas before he got to access his account.

The user interface was intuitive, allowing Hayden to go to the missions file and accepted the mission for hunting down Evershifter. Done with that, Hayden exited the Ghost Unit division. There was no hurry executing this mission as there weren"t much leads except that Evershifter"s area of operation is in Pateros, and one exclusively probable lead that could even possibly be unrelated: rumors of a white lady in Pateros.

On his way to the bas.e.m.e.nt of the apartment complex, a young man with rushed footsteps were running to his direction, probably to the Ghost Unit. Hayden sidestepped to give way as the word "urgent" was written on the man"s face.

Watching the man"s departing back, Hayden shook his head and directly went straight to his motorcycle. That was when his phone rang.

It was a call from Eun-ha. Taking out an earpiece, Hayden sat on his motorcycle whilst connecting the earpiece and answered the call.

"Hey, noona." Hayden enthusiastically answered. Mischievously, Hayden asked, "Missing me?"

"Of course." Eun-ha"s sweet voice rang in Hayden"s ears. With a jokingly angry tone, Eun-ha asked, "Why? Do you not miss me? How dare you not miss me!"

"Of course I do!" Hayden exclaimed as if he was a victim. Subsequently, the two laughed. "So, really, what"s up?"

"We"re flying there tomorrow." Eun-ha informed of Hayden. "Got any plans?"

"Yo," Hayden was surprised. "This early? Isn"t the first concert 19th of January? And the fansign at 12th?"

Nicole has already sent him the fansign ticket right at December 30, hence, he already knew of the dates of the fansign in Maharlika Hall and first concert at the Philippine Arena.

"Yeah, early preparations. Rehearsals at the arenas, practice for the schedule of the fansign, all those stuff." Eun-ha talked of her career. "Anyhow, are you free tomorrow?"

"About that…" Hayden couldn"t think of a plan to get out of this one. On one hand, Evershifter, a serial killer, was on the loose, on the other, his girlfriend was coming. What the h.e.l.l should he prioritize!? "I just accepted a mission earlier for hunting a serial killer… I didn"t know that your flight was this early…"

"You mean to say that you"re hunting a serial killer?" On the other line, Eun-ha was at her room in their dorm, her eyes blinking with surprise. "Is it a wielder?"

Hayden agreed with an "mhm." He was in a serious dilemma as both were… Well, needless to say, time with his girlfriend was important, but… It"s a serial killer! Was he supposed to just let this Evershifter make a move?

"Wait, no, I can do that…" Hayden thought. "I mean, there"s no leads on her, right? If there"s no leads, I cannot possibly start hunting… No, wait, am I sincerely thinking of sacrificing a human being solely to spend time with my girlfriend… What the f.u.c.k is wrong-"

"That"s fine with me." Eun-ha interrupted Hayden"s thoughts. The first half of her sentence nearly killed him with anxiety, yet, the second half turned his mouth agape. "Sounds fun! There"s not much action going around here, and considering that it"s a rest day tomorrow, I guess I"ll help you! Sounds fun!"

"What?" Hayden was repeating Eun-ha"s words in his head. It"s not that he didn"t process it, it"s just that he genuinely didn"t predict this. "are you okay with that? I mean, there"s not much leads on her… Plus, wouldn"t it be overkill if I bring you?"

"Nah, don"t worry about me." Eun-ha laughed. "I"m simply going to watch you working, maybe give the perspective of a bystander, you know?"

"Okay." Hayden agreed. He couldn"t see anything going wrong with her suggestion. "Want to come to my house before?"

In that instance, Hayden heard a door creaking and a familiar cutesy voice disrupting Hayden and Eun-ha"s conversation. "Eun-hyaaaa~ Who are you talking to?"

"Oh G.o.d…" Eun-ha"s face darkened. She attempted to cut the call, yet was stopped by Sayuri. "Noooo!"

The phone lit up as it left Eun-ha"s ears, the name "Hayden-ah~" showing up on the screen. "Ohooo, it"s Hayden-ah! Guys, our little Eun-ha is flirting with her boyfriend!"

"No!" Eun-ha panicked, wanting to get the phone out of Sayuri"s hands. Agitatedly, she activated her powers and swiped the phone out of Sayuri"s hands prior to her exiting.

Chaos descended on Eun-ha"s room as Sayuri wrestled with Eun-ha. With the loud commotion, the other girls doing their own things around the dorm sensed something was up and rushed to Eun-ha"s room.

By the time they got there, Eun-ha has already thrown Sayuri out of her room and got her phone back from her hands, leaving a giggly Sayuri on the floor.

"What is it? Is there something wrong?" Jin-ae"s eyes were alert as she eyed the room. She saw Sayuri standing up, all smiles, while Eun-ha was walking back to her bed with a grim countenance. "What happened?"

"Eun-ha"s flirting!" Sayuri laughed, pointing at Eun-ha on the bed agreeing to Hayden"s proposal discreetly.

On that note, the other members joined in on the conversation, smiling at Eun-ha knowingly with Sayuri leading the "tease party" targeting Eun-ha.

"Get out!" Fl.u.s.tered, Eun-ha"s eyes flared up with blue fire, her voice booming all throughout the house. She was still one of the more powerful members of Lunar a.s.sembly, hence, with this, the ten members stopped their teasing as they jokingly shrieked, screaming things such as "The fox is angry!" and "Oh no, she might seduce us!"

"Jeez, those people…" Eun-ha mumbled, sighing and smiling to herself. Putting back her phone to her ears, she apologized. "Ahh… So sorry about them…"

Meanwhile, on the other side, Hayden heard everything, snorting as he strained a laugh. "What happened?"

"Don"t worry about it." Eun-ha dejectedly spoke. "I"ll see you tomorrow. Pick me up, we"re staying at Rain Sanctuary Hotel in Manila."

"Sure, noona." With that, the two bade each other goodbye. Taking off the earphones, Hayden mounted the motorcycle and headed out to go back to his house.

…..

10:00 PM. Three drunken men sporting blue attires were walking groggily on the dimly lit streets of Pateros supporting each other.

"You know bros," the man on the middle spoke. "Why don"t we test that myth of a murderer showing up on the streets at night."

"Oh come on…" The man on the left cackled. "It"s 2058! You still really believe on rumors and hearsays? So old school! Old man!"

"Heh, old man." The man on the right chuckled.

"It"s going to be fun!" The man on the middle said. "I mean, it"s a mere rumor, right? Oh, am I sensing a scaredy cat?"

"Heh, scaredy cat." The man on the right chuckled again.

"Shut up Kyle!" The man on the left berated the man on the right, causing the lad to whimper. "Let"s f.u.c.king do it then! Let"s see who"s the scaredy cat!"

At that moment, a fuzzy figure of a long-haired person in a white dress can be seen in the distance. As the two people were arguing, Kyle was the only one who noticed it and immediately sobered up.

"Holy s.h.i.t!" Kyle was a true chicken and has always been someone easily swayed, believing baseless rumors naively. Without delaying, he ran to the opposite direction, leaving the two men confused.

"Coward." The man on the middle spat out, checking out the person in front. "A white lady? Tsk."

"Heh, white lady, huh?" The man on the left noticed and wasn"t scared at all. Such legends were of the past. Shouting, the man spoke to the "ghost." "You"d have to do better if you want to scare people away!"

The two noticed the woman seemed to be getting clearer, an indication that she was constantly inching towards them. The two stared at each other knowingly and loomed in on the white lady.

Suddenly, the white lady"s figure disappeared from the horizon. A woman with flowing black hair covering her face, adorning a tattered white dress materialized in front of them, horrifying the two of them, leading to them to fall on their b.u.t.tocks.

"H-how did you do that?" The man on the middle was wide-eyed, sobering up and asking with a shaky voice. "Y-you..."

"Hehe." The woman"s eerie chuckle rang out, scaring the minds out of the two men, their bodies freezing up. "I do not want to scare you, hehe… I just wwant your bodies…"

"Y-you what?" The man on the left was shocked. What did she say did she want? Their bodies? "What do you mean by that?"

"When I say I want your bodies…" The woman"s voice got increasingly louder and deeper. Her stature was similarly transforming, the two noticing that the woman"s feet was not that of a human"s, it was that of a gra.s.shopper"s.

Abruptly, their skin crawled, instinctively looking upwards. The black hair covering the woman"s face up was parted, the dim light from the street light revealing a… quite a beautiful face, in spite of having grayish skin.

However, that beautiful image was soon wiped off the two men"s minds as the woman opened her mouth and unveiled fangs, saliva drooling from it. Her eyes were akin to those of a cat���s, and only when she spread her arms apart did they notice that those arms were riddled with black hair, similar to those what you would see on gorillas.

However, she was not done, gigantic bird wings abruptly sprouting behind her back, and spiraling goat horns growing out of her forehead.

The two people were absolutely horrified on the scene playing in front of them. Realistic movies were not new to them, so is the futuristic VR-version of movies, but this was like true augmented reality, of which hasn"t been fully developed.

The man on the middle came back to his senses much faster than the man on the left as he attempted to stand. Unfortunately, the woman"s fingers turned into octopi tentacles and pulled the man back in beside the man on the left.

"You"re not going anywhere…" The woman"s eerie voice and vicious smile was imprinted on their minds. "I told you… I want your bodies! Nay, your screams and fear."

Subsequently, the woman smashed the skull of the man on the ground, killing him. Meanwhile, the remaining person alive froze up as he witnessed this gruesome scene, brain matter scattering over him.

"How shall I kill you? Hehehe." The woman returned her fingers to normal, grasping the man"s neck with her powerful arms and lifting him up. "Alcohol… Ahh, f.u.c.king people who enjoy the small pleasures in life endlessly. Go f.u.c.k yourself in h.e.l.l!"

The man screamed loudly. The people who heard this were either too scared to check the man"s blood-curdling screams, were wearing headphones, or was taken over by their survival instincts and covered themselves up with a blanket.

After all, gossips of a white lady have been spreading around town, with people hearing some truly f.u.c.ked up outlandish screams during the past few years, with the authorities unable to locate it at all regardless of the cameras around.

In fact, the cameras made things stranger as it simply showed people being lifted up, or straight up killed by different means, never a sign of a person. This made the residents behave up during nighttime, children not overstaying in the streets anymore.

These rumors were indeed done by one ent.i.ty, and that was the Evershifter who was so skilled and pa.s.sionate of her hobby that she did it to the point of memorizing the blind spots of the street cameras and streets that were unmonitored.

"Guess I"ll choke you." Evershifter"s crazed impa.s.sive voice entered the man"s ears, driving him insane, his screams choked back as he was started being choked by Evershifter. "Yes, yes, suffer… I love suffering of you mortal maggots…"

Evershifter laughed ardently. She was clearly a s.a.d.i.s.tic psychopath. This laughter of hers sent everyone on the street that can hear it to oblivion, their hearts jumping, trying to convince themselves that this was a hallucination.

Thereon, Evershifter"s smile grew wider and wider, her chokehold on the man getting tighter and tighter. The man struggled, his survival instinct kicking in as he held the hand of Evershifter to make an effort of freeing himself. This was all for naught, it even made Evershifter ever more satisfied, her face br.i.m.m.i.n.g with elation.

The man"s face got progressively purple, struggling to break free and call for help. Soon, the man"s body went limp, lifeless.

"Aww, that"s all?" Evershifter"s face turned salty, filled with unsatisfied desire. "Tsk, weak puny humans… I should leave some trails behind so I can rejoice and feast on the screams of wielders again…."

Flinging the body to the ground, she departed, her body going back to normal.

…..

Arriving at his house, Hayden parked his motorcycle, took a shower, and checked on his Streamlink account.

The past few days, he remained trending, although it was slowly waning down and settling. Numerous people on Streamlink uploaded videos explaining his mechanical genius, basketball players imitating his moves, which weren"t really that impressive in Hayden"s eyes as those weren"t his actual best moves, and the highlight videos of War of Honor including his face now.

Most videos pertaining to him praised him for his stroke of mechanical genius whilst capable of maintaining his own studies, some went to the lengths of calling him a one in a century genius.

Nearly every video of his was breaking through tens of millions of views, 12% of which likes the videos. Hayden was termed as a hegemon of a rookie due to this as most internet celebrities that was at his level of follower count get likes of a measly 2 or 3% of their viewership.

He was planning the next step, despite it being a long time as there were quite a few things he could milk from War of Honor. He won"t be doing that though as, sooner or later, it would become repet.i.tive and boring. In truth, he was getting tired of War of Honor.

"Well, countless people do say that my content is quite… funny with the commentary…" Hayden was puzzled as to how people find his commentary humorous. He was just narrating stuff and naturally acting his own self. "I don"t flame people, I don"t make jokes per se, I speak my mind and that"s it… What a world we live in…"

He was clueless that most people find him funny because of the latent charisma penetrating the screen stemming from his considered perfect face.

This was the case ever since he began uploading on Streamlink, many haters but it"s as if haters can"t find anything to flame him with… Needless to say, there were haters, nonetheless, Hayden wasn"t that kind of person who gets sad from shallow haters saying "you"re a piece of garbage," and "you cheat," as he always has proof that he doesn"t cheat and he understood full well that his plays were all top notch.

I mean, who the h.e.l.l can even cheat the matchmaking system of a MOBA game? If anything, the system would be the one cheating the players, giving them sucky teammates.

"I wonder what will happen when I announce my retirement on War of Honor…" Hayden wondered to himself in bed, thinking of the various hate and the public outrage that he would suffer when he wins the Pro a.s.sembly by annihilating Ares completely. "Though I may find a good match with Ares… Eh, I have bigger ambitions…"

Hayden shook his head, closing his eyes to get some shut-eye. Talking to himself to not let this popularity get to his head and reminding himself of the abundant interviews he would have to face. He drifted to sleep.