The North Wing of the Hotel, once a banquet hall destined for opulence, had been transformed into a zero-visibility slaughterhouse. The gypsum dust suspended in the air, a result of Max's explosive entry, created a ghostly filter under the flashing emergency lights. At the center of this chaos, Dan's body was still twitching on the floor, his throat opened by a cut so clean that the blood took a full second to begin gushing.
Alex did not look at the corpse. He remained standing, the darkened steel combat knives lowered along his thighs. His breathing was inaudible.
Foxy, leaping over an overturned table to avoid shrapnel, felt a chill that didn't come from the broken air conditioning. He knew John's style; he'd seen the soldier fight with technical efficiency, blocking and counter-attacking with the force of a tank. But what Alex was doing was different. The stance was the same—the low center of gravity, the angled feet—but the energy was that of an absolute vacuum. John fought to win; Alex fought to erase the other's existence.
"This guy... he's still hiding something," Foxy murmured, before his attention was snatched by a guttural roar.
The Clash of Brutes: Foxy vs. Max
Max charged through the dust cloud like an enraged rhino. The heavy sledgehammer in his hands swung in a horizontal arc that would have turned any man's ribs to powder. But Foxy was not "any man."
With a shrill laugh that echoed through the ceiling beams, Foxy bent his body backward in an impossible bridge, feeling the displacement of air from the hammer pass millimeters from his nose. In the same movement, he used his hands on the floor to propel a double kick that caught Max's chin, snapping the brute's head back.
"You're slow, big guy!" Foxy hissed, regaining his upright position with an acrobatic spin. "Didn't Smith warn you that hitting a shadow only tires out your arms?"
Max wiped blood from his mouth, his eyes bloodshot. "I'm going to crush you like the bug you are!"
Foxy didn't respond with words, but with pure brutality. He lunged, not with military technique, but with the savagery of an urban animal. He drew his long machete and began circling Max at a speed the big man couldn't process. Every time Max attempted a blow, Foxy left a new gash: on the arms, the thighs, the sides of the abdomen. He wasn't seeking the fatal blow immediately; he was carving Max up, dehydrating him in fury and blood.
The Broken Mirror: Alex vs. Sora
While Foxy toyed with his prey, Alex was confronted by Sora, Vane's right hand. Sora was known for his speed, a fighter who boasted of being the "lethal reflection" of his opponents. He lunged at Alex with a tactical knife, executing the exact sequence John would use: a high feint followed by a dive into the low zone.
What followed was a terrifying display of superiority.
Alex didn't just dodge; he moved through the attack. He utilized John's style—the flow of redirected energy—but elevated it to a level of lethality the soldier seemed to avoid out of ethics. Where John would use a palm to deflect Sora's wrist, Alex used the hilt of his knife to crush his opponent's metacarpal bones.
"Your flow is interrupted by your hesitation," Alex said, his voice sounding like wind in a tomb.
Sora screamed, attempting a desperate kick. Alex spun on his axis, a "shadow pivot" maneuver that Foxy instantly recognized as an evolution of his own tips, but executed with the rigidity of an executioner. Alex appeared behind Sora's back. Before the intruder could turn, Alex drove the combat knife into Sora's trapezius, hitting the nerve plexus.
Sora fell to his knees, paralyzed. He looked up, seeing Alex observing him with eyes that held neither mercy nor hate. Only the realization of a technical error.
"John fights to protect the system," Alex murmured, leaning over Sora. "I fight so the system has nothing left to process."
With a mechanical, rapid movement, Alex finalized the encounter. There was no prolonged struggle. It was a silent execution.
The Dance of the Fox: Dante vs. Vane
Vane watched the obliteration of her group with frigid disbelief. Dan was dead, Sora had been neutralized like an amateur, and Max was being shredded alive by Foxy. She realized that Alex's group wasn't just a bunch of "lucky kids." They were monsters contained by a thin layer of civility that the Scarecrow game had just dissolved.
"You are the weak link, Dante," Vane said, her voice maintaining a forced calm as she circled the boy. "The little bunny who learned to bite. But I'm the one who teaches the wolves."
Dante didn't answer. He felt the weight of the knives in his hands, felt the superhuman agility pulsing in his legs. He was no longer trembling. For the first time, fear was background noise, like rain on a roof.
Vane attacked with deadly elegance, using a metal-tipped chain. She tried to wrap it around Dante's neck, but he moved with a fluidity that defied gravity. He slid beneath the chain, closing into Vane's guard zone.
"Agility isn't about running," Dante whispered, repeating Foxy's words as he delivered a quick slash that opened a furrow in Vane's cheek. "It's about being where you aren't expected."
Vane recoiled, hand to her face, blood staining her fingers. She realized Dante wasn't just fighting; he was applying Foxy's theory with Alex's precision. He was the perfect fusion: the erratic speed of the fox with the mathematical lethality of the shadow.
Foxy's Brutality
Meanwhile, the combat between Foxy and Max reached its bloody climax. Max, exhausted and losing blood from dozens of cuts, tried one last bear hug. Foxy, instead of retreating, lunged toward the giant's chest.
He drove his machete into Max's shoulder to hold on and, with his free hands, began striking Max's eyes and temples with a brutality that made even Harry, watching from above, look away. Foxy didn't stop until Max fell onto his back. On the ground, Foxy mounted the man's chest and continued the punishment.
"You... broke... the... wall..." Foxy said between each blow, his face splattered with enemy blood. "Harry... had... a... hard... time... cleaning... this... up!"
Max moved no more. Foxy stood up, breathing heavily, wiping blood from his face with the back of his hand. He looked at Alex and then at Dante. A manic smile crept onto his lips. "Three down. Only the queen left."
The End of Vane
Vane realized there was no way out. Her men were dead or dying. The North Wing was a perfect trap. Despair—Smith's great equalizer—finally hit her. She looked toward the back of the room, where the Scarecrow hung.
If I touch it... she thought, her mind clouded by panic. If I touch it, the game changes.
She ignored Dante and ran. Her feet pounded the moldy carpet, her hand outstretched for the dry straw of the doll. She was inches away. Her fingertip brushed the rough fabric.
"I won..." she began to say.
But the world stopped. Vane felt a sharp, cold pressure pierce through her back and out her chest, exactly where her heart beat its last frantic rhythm.
Dante stood behind her. He hadn't used his agility to flee, but to execute the final strike. His knife was buried to the hilt in Vane's back.
Vane looked down, seeing the steel tip covered in her own blood. She tried to speak, but only a scarlet bubbling came from her lips. She fell forward, her fingers sliding uselessly down the Scarecrow as her body collapsed on the floor.
Dante withdrew the knife with a sharp pull. He was panting, his eyes fixed on the body of the woman who, seconds ago, was an unbeatable threat.
Alex, the Silence After the Storm
Silence returned to the North Wing, but it was a different silence. It was the silence of conquered territory.
Alex walked among the bodies, checking pulses with an indifference that chilled the blood of Harry and Elisa, who were now descending from the mezzanine. He stopped beside Dante and placed a hand on the boy's shoulder. Dante expected praise, or perhaps a critique, but Alex simply squeezed his shoulder.
"You did what was necessary," Alex said. "The scarecrow is still ours."
Foxy approached, still covered in Max's blood, sheathing his machete. He looked at Alex with a serious expression, his usual playfulness gone for a moment.
"Alex... that style. You said it was different from John's. But you used his fundamentals. Just... in a way that would give the soldier nightmares."
Alex sheathed his knives. He looked toward the entrance door, as if he could see through the walls to where John was fighting in the South Wing.
"John uses the style to maintain order amidst chaos," Alex replied calmly. "I use the style to ensure the chaos has no witnesses. The soldier's style is focused on defense and neutralization. Mine... is focused on closure."
Harry approached, trembling, looking at the wreckage. "Vane's group... they were obliterated. In less than fifteen minutes."
"They underestimated what fear does to talented people," Elisa said, wiping a small speck of dust from her uniform. She looked at Dante with a glint of admiration, but also concern. "Are you guys okay?"
Dante nodded, though his hands began to shake now that the adrenaline was fading. He looked at the Scarecrow, the straw doll that still wore its stitched-on smile.
"Did we win?" Dante asked.
"For this round, yes," Alex replied, turning his attention to the monitors Harry had installed. "But Marcos's group is still in the South Wing. And Smith still has the microphone."
Smith's voice echoed again, interrupting the moment.
"Oh, what marvelous carnage in the North Wing! Vane, my dear, you were such a... disappointment. And Alex! What a performance! That 'Closure' was simply poetic. But don't get comfortable! In the South Wing, Marcos's fire is starting to roast our dear soldier. Thirty minutes remain!"
Alex looked at his group. The calm was gone. The "Perfect Shadow" was ready for the next move.
"Harry, Elisa, check what's left of the traps," Alex ordered. "Foxy, clean yourself up. Dante... keep your knives clean. The penultimate game isn't over yet."
Alex's group, now a combat unit tempered in blood and efficiency, prepared for the final phase. They were no longer just survivors; they were the most lethal force inside Smith's Hotel. And under the leadership of Alex—the shadow that even the darkness feared—they were ready to exact the price of their freedom.