The blood threads take the whole room in cover while getting tight around the neck of the member of the order. Then, after breaking 3 of the members of the order, he freed himself from those ropes he was bound with and stood on the ground ready to fight.
He ran his hands on his clothes, which were dyed with his own blood. And as he ran, his hands, the blood on his clothes, and the dagger in his hand became one. The dagger was completely made of blood.
He grabs it and licks its blade, which was made of blood, with his tongue, and starts moving toward Henry and the others. He then holds his blood-forged dagger in his right hand while turning his eyes toward those dead members of the order.
He raised his left hand toward those dead bodies and moved his fingers; as his fingers moved, the skin of those dead bodies got ripped, and blood came out of their bodies. The dead bodies' blood starts floating in the air and is ready to be in command of James.
He again started walking toward Henry and others, while the blood that was flowing in the air started following him. He then closed his eyes and opened them again, and with a smirk, "Hmph, planning to outgun… But why is it taking forever, Madame Éloïse?"
He then pushed his hand forward toward her in the air, and the blood, which was flowing behind him, acted hurriedly and bound the right hand of Éloïse, which was in her pouch.
Éloïse seems panicked as she tries to remove those blood threads from her hand, but all is in vain. She started sweating because of panic and tried her best to get free. Those threads feel like they are burning her skin and soaking up all her body's blood.
James takes out his tongue and keeps licking his blood-forged dagger's blade until he speaks up, "I only take some of these dead bodies' blood. Imagine if I take all of the remaining blood from their body."
All 2 remain members of the order, and Henry seems shocked while Éloïse is still busy freeing her hand from those blood threads. Henry moves on at the speed of sound to stop James. He faded into the air in a blur and ended up in the blink of an eye behind James and held his hand.
James didn't react, nor did he move his body at all. He just keeps standing there while laughing, "Hahaha, you think you can defeat me now? Forget it. I'm a dead man who has a soul but does not have a core script anymore."
His hand, which was held by Henry, started melting in blood and flowing down Henry's hand. It feels like his hand is made of ice, and it is put on fire and starts melting. But then Henry, in shock, let go of James' hand, and in the blink of an eye, James vanished from in front of his eyes.
And in another moment, he was standing near those dead bodies and smiling, "Now let's see what happens to a body that has lost its blood." He turned his left hand toward those dead bodies and moved his fingers in the air.
As his fingers move, blood in those dead bodies rots in skin and veins. And burst out of the body in a hurry, leaving the dead bodies scratched from part to part and turning the skin color pale greenish. The eyes of those dead bodies were pale white, with not a single red vessel in the eyes anymore.
The blood was in a massive amount, like around 3 to 4 liters, floating in the air beside James while he turned toward Henry. He holds his dagger a little high up, and then, for a small amount of time, he stares at Henry. "Shocked? How did I move that fast?"
He moved his eyes in awkwardness, "Ohh boy, I hate it… I hate explaining. But still, before you die, I'll tell you the method of how I did it. Let's see how much your brain works in the power system of this world."
"I move in the blink of an eye because of the help of these dead bodies' blood. You can see these blood drops on the ground. I just teleported myself here in the first place; it seems impossible, but for me, nothing is impossible because I don't have my core script anymore."
Éloïse shook her left hand and stared at Henry. "Oy, give me that bottle of perfume that I gave you back in the—" she sighed, "I forgot where I gave it to you, but give it to me right now."
Henry, without a moment's waste, moves in the blink of an eye and stands right beside; he opens his palm, and a bottle of perfume appears in his hand. He handed it over to Éloïse, while she seemed a little bit.
Éloïse, before opening the bottle of perfume, turned her head toward the remaining member of the order. "Hey, move your asses and take those dead bodies when you get the time."
They both nodded without speaking. They both seemed to have shock and a little fear in their eyes.
Éloïse put perfume on her right hand on the threads of blood. And then whispered, "Turn to ashes." And she spoke, and the threads of blood started forming in ashes. The ashes were red and fell on the ground, leaving all of them who appeared to be in the room in shock.
She frees her hand, and, without wasting a moment, she takes out her gun from her pouch and points it at James, who is standing right on her left. The gun was golden in color and seemed to be different from normal guns; it had a mechanical size of 1 inch near the breech.
She moved to her left and whispered, "Playtime's over. It's time to end this, blood guy." She, without a second thought, shot the gun, and before James could see it, it appeared to be in his chest, on his heart; as he put his hand on his chest with a shocked face, the bullet in his chest moved.
He felt intense pain in his chest; it was not like a normal pain from a shot. He doesn't feel like he is going to die with this pain, but it feels like that bullet hitting his heart, and right before the heart stops beating, it heals him and hits him again, and it keeps repeating.
He let out his voice in rage and pain, "AHHHHH, it hurts, but… why does it heal me and hurt me again?" He fell on his knees, pressing both his hands on his chest after throwing his blood-forged dagger away on the ground.
In Éloïse's right hand, her gun reloads on its own, without letting her touch it. She moved toward James while Henry and the others were all in shock. Before she reached James, she stopped and moved toward the 2 members of the order and whispered, "Hey, cut it out and escort those dead bodies… and sigh after that, bury them in the graveyard of plants."
They both nodded in a hurry and went toward those dead bodies behind James. But then the blood that was soaked from their bodies returns to their body and makes their skin reddish-pink again. And in their eyes, those red blood vessels return.
They both take one of the dead bodies on their shoulders and take it out of the room, then after some time, one of them returns to take the last dead body. After they took all 3 dead bodies outside of the room, Éloïse moved toward James, who was on his knees while pressing his chest with both hands to stop the pain, which was caused by the bullet.
She leans in close to him and sits on one knee while pointing her gun toward the ground. "Blood guy, you can manipulate blood… but did you even think of using your power to take out the bullet with blood…?" Without letting him speak, she continued.
"Nope, even if you try, you will not be able to, because this bullet is fired by my gun. So it means it can't be removed until I want to. Now it's time to show you real blood manipulation."
She stood up and put her hand on his shoulder while he was screaming out of pain, then stared at him with her golden eyes. She let out some words from her mouth: "Bend that much that only soul remains."
As she finished speaking, she removed her hand from his shoulder and then took a step or two back from him. James' heart started beating loudly and faster than normal. His eyes widen, and red vessels start getting more and more.
His breath starts catching in his throat; he feels uneasy even moving his finger. His body starts getting twisted again and again, not from outside but from inside. His blood rotated at such immense speed that his veins started getting clearer and clearer on his skin, and some even burst because of the fast flow of blood.
After a short time, his body skin and clothes were covered in blood, and he fell to the ground. Henry, without waiting for Éloïse to take another action, in a hurry and shock, goes near James' body and checks. He put his hand on his neck to check his breath flow.
His eyes shocked, and his jaw tightened as he stood up and turned toward Éloïse, "You killed him. I told you to keep him alive."
Éloïse put her gun back in her pouch and turned toward the ropes, which James was bound with. She sits on one leg while touching the ropes. "You didn't say to keep him alive; you just said you need to capture his soul… That's what I did."
She holds the ropes and puts on some drops of perfume, which she takes out from her pouch. After she dropped some drops of perfume, she closed her eyes and whispered, "Turned into a celestial cage."
Those ropes in her hand started forging into something; after some time, those ropes became a fine cube of glass with crystal clarity in it. It was the size of a bird, which fit in Éloïse's hand. She stands up from her place and turns toward Henry. The dim light fell on that glass cube in her hand.
Without Henry to speak a word or ask any question, she speaks up, "Stop asking how and start doing what I say, ok? Now this is the Celestial Cage, though it doesn't really catch Celestia; its name is just Celestial Cage. It'll help you to cage the soul, and afterward you will be able to become part of that soul, which is caged in this Celestial cage."
She handed it over to Henry; he started examining it from every corner until Éloïse spoke up again, "Stop it, you can examine it later; the soul will get faded and be taken by death. Now…" She pointed her hand toward the ground and forged a chair from the ground; she sat on it and continued.
"Use sound and air particles in air and forge this Celestial cage into sound and air particles. Then, spread them in the air so that if any force tries to fade into the conscious world, it gets stuck in this cage."
Henry, shocked and confused, scratches his head. "But, isn't going to the conscious world only possible in our own mind? And everyone has a different conscious world."
Éloïse narrowed her eyes in awkwardness and whispered, "Do as I said; you will understand after you do something. Just remember this: you aren't entering James' consciousness world but the realm of death and life, which is also known as the conscious world of death. There you will catch James's soul."
She stopped for a moment before speaking in a hurry, "One more thing: you'd better do everything in haste. Because if death, or should I say 'Maiden of Eternity,' comes, you have to defeat her first. And defeating a universal concept is beyond your league because you are still a mortal. You will not even be able to touch her. She is just beyond anyone's league."
Éloïse looked calm and serious; she didn't show a single emotion on her face while making Henry nervous and shocked. He raises his grey eyes and stares at her. "Are you serious? I have to do it on instinct before getting noticed by death? That means I have to outmaster death."
Éloïse nodded and whispered while folding her legs, "Yep, you got it…"
Henry was shocked while sweating. He looks at the cube, then looks at Éloïse. Until his breath stuck in his throat because of thoughts in his mind. Because, before this day, in his whole life until now, he had never been stuck in a situation like this.
For him, it's a challenge that he never even thought of. In his life, he has fooled many humans, but now it's not a human, not even a mortal; it's death itself, a universal concept that only comes to take your life. And meeting it before your time comes feels like a nightmare Henry would never even have thought of.