Father did follow through with his promise; he started his vacation early to spend time with me and recover. We bonded more over the last few days. Sadly, I am anxious about Markus's next attack. There is this dark feeling forming in the basement of the apartment. It is growing stronger and stronger every day. I checked multiple times and saw nothing. The other residents never went down there either.

I wake up from a night terror, involving the basement. I gasp heavily in a cold sweat. The ominous and fearful energy can now be felt upstairs. At this point, I can't take it anymore. I get up to check it again. This is my first time checking it in the middle of the night. It's not a wise and safe idea to check if the basement is haunted at night. I know how the movies go.

"Hello, anyone down here?" I call out while slowly going down the basement stairs.

Nothing.

Typical unfinished basement with concrete everywhere, dusty family storage, and the smell of gravel. This is not helping me at all.

"Markus, are you down here?" I dare call out its dreadful name.

The atmospheric pressure is rising as I get closer to the bottom. My head hurts and it feels like a heavy weight is trying to push me down. This pressure is different from the invisible forces that Markus throws. One, the forces are much stronger and last to Markus's liking. Two, the pressure is more spread out.

I look around, only to find no one. I heavily sigh and fold my arms out of disappointment.

"I know you're down here," I say to the darkness, "Come out. I am sick of you."

Nothing happens. Silence laughs at me. I groan loudly.

"Seriously, you aren't gonna do anything?"

God, the silence is irritating me, along with my ringing ears.

"You melt," I insult before making my leave. I flip the bird to whoever is invisible in the basement before scurrying out of here.

In the morning, I finally complained to my dad. He told me he has been feeling it too, but is trying to brush it off as a typical basement feeling. He tried to ease himself that there are people too in the apartments. We both decided to go down together. The basement's entrance is connected to the stairwell at the back of the apartment's entrance. The residents give us friendly glances before moving on.

The last friendly glances we will ever get in this apartment.

"It feels more pressurising when we get close," he notes.

"I know," I said, opening the basement door, "Stay behind me. You may be my father and all, but you're fragile."

"I am not that old," he comments, pretending to be annoyed.

"I know," I repeat, "But the power can't be compelled by Christ of what lies down here."

We steadily went downstairs. The dark feeling gets angrier, heavy, and hot. It's much worse than last night. Markus is now taking our fights very personally and cliche-like... All we need is boss music and we are good.

"Markus, I know you are down here," I call out to him without any fear, "You can't hide from us."

"What in the n-name is this?" Father blurts out of nowhere.

I wince at him and see his feet turning into obsidian stone, gradually moving upwards.

"Naomi, help me!"

I blast light towards it, but nothing happens. A force slams me against the other side of the basement wall, knocking the breath out of me and pulling me away from my father. The calcifying process speeds up. All I can do is watch helplessly to see my father turn to stone and hear him scream my name for help.

Markus materialises. I see his obsidian skin has holes and cracks, revealing a lava glow beneath. His body madly twitches and hisses. A volcano that is brought back to life. He looks more menacing and angry than last time we fought. Still, I stare at him without fear.

I don't bother letting out a war cry. Our battle initiates! Punch after punch, slice and dice, and powers unfold. The basement is a warzone for only two people. Once cleaned to apartment standards, now messy and hard to recognise. It looks like it's part of a secret doom temple room that's collapsing. Markus and I are evenly matched, but he is getting more pissed off that I am not giving up as easily as his victims. Nope, not today.

It doesn't necessarily mean I won't die though.

"Have you ever thought what your life would be if you just called for help, instead of turning yourself into a piece of revenge?" I ask, "You let your anger, your pain, and your misery control you. You were never fully alone back then. Now it's too late to turn back."

The ground rumbles and cracks open up in the basement. A vision hits me with my mom's and Markus's past. I saw her injuries, her scars, and her turmoil as she fought against Markus. Her spirit is also down here as a tearful spectator.

My wings appear. I raise my arms, casting a glacial spell. I am not holding back this time; the basement plunges into an ice age. To be harsh, I let it rain ice, cold water, hail, and snow. I make large ice spikes rise, trying to impale Markus. That git keeps trying to dodge all of them.

He explodes. A mighty soundwave shrieks into my eardrums. The room flashes into steam, ash, smoke, and lava. I push back the heat. He charges at me and shoves his whole fist straight through my abdomen. I hunch over and he uses his other first to slam into my face. I plummet to the ground, not feeling anything, but the increasing tiredness. Is this replacing the pain?

Tink! His claws extend and he pierces through the back of my neck. I try to holler, only to choke on my blood. He rips the neck off its foundation. My sight rolls away while I witness my body collapse lifelessly to the ground.

How can I still see? I thought. I blink, thinking of permanent darkness. I reopen them and become completely baffled. My head is completely attached to my body and is in working order. Markus screams in frustration, ripping my damn head off multiple times. Still, I keep finding myself getting up and getting beheaded again. He even stomps on my body to try to add milk into the wound. The result is the same thing; I see myself on a fully-healed body. Regeneration is in full-swing. It irked him so much that he even cut my limbs off before ripping my head off.

A heavy fog appears- Cold, dense, and poisonous to its enemies. I smirk to see that G.G Terri is here. Markus is only inches in front of me, but I can't see anything. He can't see anything. I quickly move. I hear Markus scream. My sight returns, immune to the fog. I see boils bursting all over his body. At this point, I can hear people screaming above me.

That'll do. Just weaken him, I say in my head, urging myself to keep at it.

A chaotic aura appears around me. I can feel it in my skull, my soul, and inside me. I feel like I can take on thousands of warriors in enemy territory. My body twitches as I let the full chaos take control. I see and feel myself part of all dimensions. Out of rage, Markus disperses a lava wave. Like a mirror, I deflect it, sending it back towards him, but it transmutes into a wave of chaotic energy. If chaos was a stream, it would be like a molten glass of red, orange, and purple. It would be fast enough to leave you off guard. He flies into the wall, creating a dent. After the wave goes away, I see his skin is completely gone, revealing a lava glow.

It's my turn now, but he will feel it. Thousands of swords appear at will and drive them straight through him repeatedly before I make them combust inside of him. Trust me, exploding metal inside of you is not a good way to go. If you are not human, you will definitely be in excruciating agony. For humans, you're lucky, you won't feel a thing when dying. He shrieks in a high-pitched tone before collapsing to his knees for a moment. He gets back up again and starts to throw meteors at me. He doesn't need the sky to rain them down from. He only needs a bit of room and space to knock you completely. I dodge all of them, only feeling their little shockwave.

Small red energy bursts from my eyes as I remove the joints inside of Markus's monstrous body, turning him into a lava puddle of mush. He's not giving up yet; he sinks into the cracks that were formed in the preceding earthquake. The feeling of madness seeps back into my spirit. It waits for another time to rise again. It can be seconds, minutes, hours, days, months, years, or centuries if I can live that long.

Another earthquake hits, getting stronger and stronger. The cracks have a massive emission of sulphur and heat. Looking at my father, who is still in obsidian stone. My wings stretch out and I dash towards him. I grab him and try to get him out of here. I am not risking breaking the stone by flying upwards. I would blast into many ceilings because of it. I fly out of the basement and run out of the lobby. I look around and see smoking cracks all around the property. People are scattering. I feel no hope for those stuck in the apartment. The Richter scale will be going off the charts with this measurement. The eerie bug crawls up back to me. He is going to be much worse than what he has done inside the basement.

"I am sorry, father," I whisper to my calcified father. I freeze time. I go quickly into the Omniscal to find that it leads to a peaceful cave in the middle of nowhere on Earth. There's no Markus, no one that will disturb him. I gently place dad there. "It's too dangerous to be called home." I return to London. Then, time resumes.

Not long after, the ground erupts. It blasts me into a brick building. My back stiffens up for a brief moment. The apartment exploded with a loud boom all at once. The shrieks inside the apartment go away. Glass, concrete, wood, stone, and many apartment materials rain down on me.

"Christ," I shout while breaking the debris falling towards me with a powering punch. I rise into the air as I hear a deep unnerving voice from where the apartment once stood. Lava blasting around in hard and heavy fragments.

Markus is in a much larger form. His skin is a stony grey with a pink-reddish tint. He has multiple spiky horns and wings. The wings expose its bony structure like a bat and dragon combined. His body emits hot red flames with volcanic ash. A plume rises from the basement with lightning and ash.

The explosion from Markus's reemergence has caused pyroclastic flows that spread miles in London. The lava remains close to the volcano. It's mostly stationary with gas having trouble breaking out.

"Oh my... God." Panic and distress hit me. The pyroclastic flows alone are going to kill countless people. There's no way in hell that I can revive all of them.

He glares at me and a deeper guttural roar unleashes. Despite Markus being triple the size of a normal human being, he is still pretty fast as we battle each other again. It still feels even. Every step he takes or he falls, major pyroclastic flows spread in all directions.

If he falls, people will die. If I don't finish him, more people will die. If I fall, I will be a swatted fly. It's a deep-hole situation that I am stuck in. The screams and cries of the people around as they suffocate are disturbing me to the very core.

He is turning this place into a no man's land. England will never forget the day when ash and pyroclastic clouds bury their cities. There are raining fireballs like the end of the world itself. The sky turns dark; day feigns night. The lightning from the ash clouds is the only way to see. It's hot, sticky, and muggy. Markus blasts fire and ash out of his mouth like a hydra.

I can do that too. I let my frustrations with him and the inner madness surface again. A red pulse shoots from my mouth, cutting his arm off. His limb falls straight into the ground. Fissures open up and lava spews out like Mount Etna. The lava regenerates his arm. He extends his claws and attempts to swipe at me. A mighty force shoots me away from him.

He still has that power too.

He should've hit me towards the ground or squished me with a body slam. I will still revive either way.

White light surrounds my body as I blast a full ray at him, hitting him in the chest with such force. He collapses to the ground. The heated cloud collapses into another raging flow.

Get closer to him, my mind whispers. A command that's not my own.

I obey it and fly towards him. I roar and blast a red beam towards him. My aura turns into red and white flames. The power keeps growing within me. Giving him a taste of his own medicine, I create an energy shockwave in all directions, knocking and stunning him. I use this time to get closer to him.

I pierce against his hardened skin. He belches out a terrifying roar.

"Now!" I yell out urgently, directly towards the dark angel.

My body locks up as the corruptive, shrieking, and limitless energy from the dark angel swirls around me. It's both behind and inside me. Markus's roars of hell become screams of pain as the power gets taken away from him. The dark swirling cloud keeps sucking in more power. The dark angel's vast power is taking a toll on my body. My powers are weakening and my vision becomes blurry.

Hold on a little longer! My brain encourages me. I keep snapping my head awake, telling myself to hold on, fighting against the tiredness. The dark angel is using me as a vessel to take away Markus's powers once and for all.

I let out a battle cry against the creeping unconsciousness. I am not letting it take over my vision! No! Not this time!

Just when I thought I was going to faint, the dark swirling mass explodes and engulfs me, blinding me in a blank void.

Once the void has lifted, I am on the ground. I am grateful that I don't feel any pain this time. Everything around me is completely demolished and a barren wasteland. Hot ash is covering my face and everywhere. The erupting vents are shutting down. My body lies on the rubble from buildings. My body is on a slight tilt, but still stable.

I wonder what the King of England is going to say about this. Better yet, how will my father react?

I slowly get up, fatigued. I look ahead and see a guy lying on the ground. It's Markus. Obviously, back in his bad state before becoming a monster- A young adult. Our age range is quite close. He looks underweight like he hasn't been fed enough. He is also covered in bruises and gashes. Stab wounds were also visible, but closing up. He coughs. He slowly opens his eyes and stares at me. His eyes are still red.

He looks at me, fighting against the brutal injuries that normally end someone.

"You..." He pauses. His voice is very hoarse and fraught with despair. I can tell he is very weak because he is stumbling as he gets up. I fold my arms.

"Do you ever even care about how many lives you've ruined?" I snarl at him, scolding him like a mom.

"I don't feel anything at all," he tells me very weakly. He is heavily gasping for air, "And who the hell are you? Where am I?"

I roll my eyes. "Alicia's daughter. I am your niece," I explain again.

"What do you have to say for yourself?" I ask harshly.

He evilly chuckles, his voice returning into a maddening state.

His hand goes behind his back. I give him a serious look, notifying him that I am watching. With the fleeting power he has left, he draws an obsidian sword. The red glow in his eyes flickers on and off. He smirks. Then, he tiredly frowns. This happens over and over again.

This is going to be funny, I thought, already amused.

He runs towards me. Although boney, he can run fast. Thank goodness, it's an easy dodge. He glares at me. He runs towards me again, turning it into a knife. His eyes are glowing red. He dashes towards me and drives straight into my leg. Another dagger forms and he places it in my chest. I fall to the ground, yelling. Once numbed, now I can feel everything my body went through. I lie there, unable to move.

My body is exhausted too.

He kicks me. He gets on top of me and begins to stab me repeatedly; the blood keeps draining. I look at him coldly. He turns the knife back into a sword. He begins to shake. I guess the disappearing power is weakening him too much for his fragile body.

"You had the option to ignore Terri's awful suggestion," I cough up blood, "He did realise his mistakes-"

"Shut up, you talk too much," he hisses.

He tries to force the sword into my chest, but something grabs him. Another person appears out of thin air. My eyes widen to see who it is that saved me: Mom. She is holding his sword. She uses her might to break the sword like it's nothing to her.

"Get your hands away from her," she tells him sternly, "You hurt me, you hurt my daughter, and you hurt my love." She pushes him away from me, tossing him into the ground in the process.

He tries to growl, but he coughs. His red eyes are now gone, just humanly brown. He tries to get up, but he clutches his head, starts groaning in pain. That reminds me of when he possessed Megan; he took over her body without caring at all. His hair turns grey and grows longer, falling off. His skin immediately begins decomposing. Markus's teeth rot away and fall out. As much as it's gross to look out, I can't help enjoying this scenery. Mom and I watch our poor relative rot away.

He screams and moans before his vocal cords go out. He starts vomiting profusely as his organs fail. His corpse-looking body levitates and contorts backward. I can hear his spinal cord snapping

"God is now punishing you for your sins," my mom whispers.

He doesn't rot away completely. He gets slammed into the ground by an unseen force. He lies on his sound as liquids come out of his mouth and it smells putrid. He is also making choking and gurgling sounds. Looks like he pissed off the higher beings too much.

As fast as a tiger runs, I go into the Omiscal to bring dad back where I left him. He is no longer an obsidian stone, wondering where he is. He stumbles around until he finds balance. He walks towards us as we look at Markus's paralysed and messed-up body. He is violently twitching and convulsing.

"It's over," I say to him weakly.

Dad picks me up and carries me. We wait until help arrives.

"Thank you, mom," I said to her kindly.

She turns to me and smiles. "You're welcome."

Luckily, dad was fine after turning to stone temporarily. Doctors are yet again surprised that I was not fazed and still alive after getting stabbed. They should see the number of times I was resurrected during the battle. I still healed faster than expected. Doctors were now calling me the "One that Cheats Death." As for Markus, he was paralysed, burnt, and his organs were failing. Surgeons gave him organ donations, but the organs were screwing up again. He was still conscious and doctors knew he wasn't going to live much longer. He also suffered multiple seizures, seventy-three in one day. I couldn't help. But felt sorry for him, along with the karma that he deserved.

Dad told the doctors that we would take care of Markus, make him at home, so he can be comfortable when he passes. They allowed us. We didn't torture him because he is already in his own hell. We followed the doctor's orders as caretakers. Months went by. We took care of him, fed him, bathed him, gave him his own room, and read bedtime stories. What? He didn't have a childhood and what is he going to do? Kill us? Doubt it. Well, he nearly killed us, so I guess this is our way of payback. Over time, the episodes of organ failure and seizures became infrequent. His decomposing body reverted to youthful smooth stages. He now looks the same age as I am. What is going on with this guy?

His attacks with volcanic eruptions and opening fissures were explained as weak spots in the crust or possible short magma plumes. Geologists would monitor the area more closely. Those who were never there at the Old Church didn't believe in a demon that attacked the church. They believed it was the first sign of a crustal weak spot. The thoughts of superstition and hallucinations were also happening due to the eruption coincidentally taking place at a church. It was Markus's abilities. He has the power to hurt people while people see it differently or do not believe them at all. It's like turning a blind eye. He killed thousands of people and tourists just by pyroclastic flows. I wouldn't even doubt that if one of them saw him, but they were unintentional victims. They might only see a volcanic eruption, instead of the true thing.

It's now Christmas time. Cold, but only forty-five degrees. We built a home in East London, which is away from the volcanic site. It took us a while and we had to live in another apartment until the house was completed. It feels great to be back at home without noisy residence and traffic.

"One day, we will fully recover from the witch's regime", Marigianna says," my mother says to Markus with her bedtime book open. I try not to laugh because she may be holding an open book, but the pages are blank. She is making stuff up as she goes. I finally discovered how my mother read me bedtime stories while I was younger. "But today, we are rebuilding what was lost and better it," she finishes before closing her book. She has gone slightly transparent. "Goodnight, Markus, see you tomorrow morning," she says before disappearing.

"Goodnight, Markus," I said to him before turning off his light and shutting his door.