CHAPTER 345: CLOSE VICTORY

Rain slid down Michael’s face as he cut through the storm, wings tearing the night open like blades. His sword burned bright, arcs of lightning dancing across its edge. Below him, the city trembled. Sirens screamed. People scattered like ants in the wake of something too big to understand.

The entity moved.

Not like an animal. Not like a man. Its body folded and stretched, arms splitting into three, then fusing back into one. Its torso writhed like water trying to take shape. Every time it shifted, the air rippled, reality bending as if the world itself wanted to look away.

Michael dove first. He slashed across its chest, blade cutting clean through oily flesh. For a moment, the wound stayed open. Then it closed—stitched itself with threads of black light.

The thing roared, but it wasn’t a sound. It was absence. The rooftop circle beneath Michael cracked as silence pulsed outward like a bomb.

Azrael was the first to answer. The white shard floated in his grip, glowing faint, like bone dust catching moonlight. He hurled it into the thing’s shoulder. The shard pierced—not deep, but enough.

The creature’s body shivered. Images spilled out of the wound. A small boy alone in a dark room. A knife on a table. A door that never opened. The memory bled across the rain before vanishing into nothing.

Azrael’s jaw tightened. His wings snapped once, pushing him higher.

Raphael shot up from the ruins of the building he’d crashed through. His shard—red, jagged, pulsed with fury. He gripped it tight and lunged straight for the thing’s throat. It hit, buried itself to the hilt.

This time the scream came out. The city shook with it. Windows shattered for blocks. Cars flipped on the streets below. Cain and Mabel shielded their faces as glass rained down like knives.

But the creature didn’t fall.

Its chest-mouth split wider, teeth gnashing. A beam of raw absence fired out, cutting through the air like a blade.

Raphael barely dodged. The blast carved a tower in half behind him. The top section tilted, groaned, then collapsed, raining concrete and fire down on the streets.

Michael darted through falling debris, slicing chunks apart before they could crush the people below. His voice cut sharp through the storm.

"Focus core mass!"

Uriel answered with a silent nod. She raised her shard—the cold one, ice-blue and sharp as regret. She flew straight for the entity’s stomach and drove the shard in.

The effect was instant.

The thing buckled, its limbs folding in on themselves. For a moment, it froze. The city went quiet. Then—memories spilled again.

Not human this time. Older. A battlefield. Angels burning in gold fire. Chains wrapping a figure that wasn’t flesh. A voice whispering through stone.

Uriel faltered. She knew what she was seeing. The thing had history.

It had seen Heaven once.

The creature ripped her away before she could process it. Its hand twisted into a claw and slammed her down into the street below. The ground split, cars exploding under the impact.

"Uriel!" Raphael’s voice cracked. He shot toward her—but the entity swung, catching him with its arm. The blow hurled him across the skyline like a ragdoll.

Gabriel moved then. He hadn’t used his shard yet. It hovered near his hand, humming softly. He didn’t throw it. He didn’t stab. He touched it—pressed it against his chest.

Light bloomed.

The shard sank into him, dissolving like water. His wings flared, brighter than the storm. His eyes lit from within. He shot forward, faster than the rain could fall.

He crashed into the entity’s side, hand outstretched. The shard’s energy ripped through him, flooding into the monster.

The scream it made this time wasn’t empty. It was alive. Angry. Pained.

The city shook again. Streets cracked. Lamps burst.

For the first time—it stumbled.

Michael took the chance. His sword flashed, lightning trailing, and he carved into its chest. The wound tore wide, exposing something inside—something not flesh. A core of shifting black crystal, pulsing like a heart.

"There!" Michael shouted. "The shards—aim for that!"

Azrael dove, white shard glowing. Raphael steadied, clutching his bleeding arm, red shard humming hotter.

They all aimed for the core.

But the thing wasn’t stupid.

It snapped shut, limbs twisting, covering the wound with layers of shifting flesh. Its body ballooned, stretching taller, broader. Its mouth split again, wider, until its whole torso was nothing but teeth.

Then it screamed.

The shockwave wasn’t just sound. It wasn’t just silence. It was both. Every building within blocks bent inward, glass imploding, steel warping. The circle on the cathedral roof cracked again, runes breaking like shattered glass.

Michael staggered mid-air. Raphael coughed blood. Uriel tried to rise from the crater but collapsed again. Azrael hovered steady, but his eyes narrowed—calculating.

Gabriel pushed forward through the scream, his body lit with the shard’s power. He forced his way close, wings burning brighter, until he was nearly at the core. He thrust his hand forward—

The entity shifted.

Its chest split open again, but this time not with teeth. With hands. Dozens of them. Black, wet hands that shot out like spears, grabbing Gabriel mid-flight.

They dragged him in.

"Gabriel!" Michael roared, surging forward.

But the hands pulled faster. Gabriel was swallowed whole, vanishing inside the mass. The light around him blinked out.

The creature straightened. Its body pulsed. And then—its chest glowed. Not with its own light. With Gabriel’s.

It had absorbed him.

The sky went silent.

Michael froze. Raphael’s face went pale. Even Azrael, calm as ever, clenched his fists.

The entity’s eyes—thousands of them—blinked open across its body. For the first time, they looked focused. A direction. A purpose.

And then it spoke.

Not words. Not sound. Just Gabriel’s voice—bent, twisted, broken.

"You cannot kill what was here before you."

The rain stopped mid-fall. Drops hung in the air, suspended. The city froze. Even the fire from the collapsed buildings paused, unmoving.

Time itself trembled.

Michael’s grip tightened on his sword. His wings flared with lightning. "Then we end you anyway."

The storm roared back to life. The fight wasn’t over.

It had only just begun.