Jamie opened his mouth, momentarily confused by Roy's words. It wasn't until Roy found a seat and plopped down that it clicked for him.
Still, since the big shot said he wanted to watch the show—and looked so damn calm about it—Jamie had no choice but to swallow his fear and sit next to Roy.
As Roy and Jamie settled in, the puppets in the theater all sat down in perfect unison.
Mary Shaw's voice echoed from the stage again.
"Today, to welcome our distinguished guests, the Puppet Theater has prepared a special puppet show."
A puppet show, huh? Roy was curious to see what kind of tricks Mary Shaw was pulling.
By now, Roy had activated his True Sight, his golden pupils scanning the theater, searching for Mary Shaw's figure.
But whether it was on stage or in the audience, there was no sign of Mary Shaw's soul. The puppets' bodies were filled with other people's souls, and Mary Shaw herself was hiding somewhere.
Suddenly, Roy noticed one of the female puppets had Jennifer's soul trapped inside, completely under Mary Shaw's control.
Roy's brow furrowed deeply, but he held back the urge to act immediately.
"Today's performance is a puppet play called Pinocchio! A long, long time ago, there was an old man named Geppetto who had no wife or children. One day, he found a magical piece of wood in the wild that could cry and laugh. So, he carved it into the shape of a child. Geppetto treated the puppet as his own son and named him Pinocchio."
As Mary Shaw narrated, various puppets appeared on stage, moving in sync with the story, their mouths even producing voices that matched their roles.
Roy started to feel something was off. The theater's lights were gradually dimming. At first, he thought it was his imagination, but when he looked up and saw the overhead lights turn an eerie blue, he knew something was wrong.
Was this theater under some kind of spell?
Roy subtly nudged Jamie, who had been terrified at first but was now engrossed in the puppet show.
The performance seemed to have a hypnotic quality, drawing people in. Jamie, being an ordinary guy, was likely affected by it.
Roy's willpower was strong enough to resist, and frankly, Mary Shaw's show was pretty lackluster, so he wasn't fazed.
If Mary Shaw had Ella come out and do a pole dance, maybe Roy would've felt something.
The show went on, and Pinocchio's story was one everyone knew. Mary Shaw was now at the part where Pinocchio, being a naughty kid, ran away from home, fell in with bad company, and suffered for it.
"A blue-haired fairy saved Pinocchio. She was kind-hearted and wanted to guide him to be a good boy. But Pinocchio was too rebellious and lied constantly. So, the fairy cast a spell on him: every time he lied, his tongue would grow longer."
Roy: ???
Wait, that's not right! In the original story, it was his nose!
Hold on… a longer tongue might actually be more useful than a longer nose. Maybe a princess would be into that, ahem!
As Roy's mind wandered, the Pinocchio puppet on stage told its first lie.
"The fairy asked Pinocchio, 'Where's your family?' But Pinocchio said he had no family. The next second, his tongue shot out of his mouth…"
With the narrator's description, the Pinocchio puppet's tongue extended, stretching dozens of feet, heading straight for Jamie, who was engrossed in the show.
Jamie jumped, nearly screaming, but Roy swiftly punched him in the neck, knocking him out cold into a baby-like sleep.
If he's asleep, he can't scream.
Roy grabbed the extended tongue, only to realize it wasn't a prop—it was made of real flesh and blood.
Puppets shouldn't have tongues like that. Then Roy noticed the Pinocchio puppet was different, with patches of rotting flesh on its face.
Wait a sec… was this Jamie's brother-in-law?
Mary Shaw was playing dirty, making Jamie's brother-in-law try to kill him!
With the Pinocchio puppet's tongue caught, the show couldn't go on, and every puppet in the theater stood up.
Henry had said Mary Shaw had a hundred "children," but Roy did a quick count and saw way more than that.
Maybe after becoming an evil spirit, Mary Shaw had made even more puppets.
"Why the hell are you interrupting my show?!" Mary Shaw's voice boomed through the theater, dripping with rage.
She clearly didn't like her performance being disrupted.
Perfect. Roy decided to play the brat and rile her up to force her to show herself.
"Your show sucks! The story's cliché, your voice has no emotion, and the stage and costumes look cheap as hell…"
Roy kept listing off the flaws in Mary Shaw's puppet show, and with every critique, the theater shook.
"Shut up! You don't understand my art!"
Finally, unable to take Roy's roasting, Mary Shaw appeared on stage.
She wasn't just a soul—she had a physical puppet body, which protected her from soul-targeting attacks and let her linger in the human world longer.
"My children, kill this troublemaker!"
At Mary Shaw's command, all the puppets floated into the air, including Jamie's brother-in-law, whose tongue Roy was still holding.
Hundreds of puppets dove toward Roy, their bodies sprouting sharp claws—the same kind that had scratched Jennifer before.
"Bring it on!"
A massive blade appeared in Roy's hand, and he sliced through the charging puppets, cutting them in half.
With Roy's strength and agility, the puppets didn't stand a chance—they were shredded before they could get close.
The only exception was the puppet with Jennifer's soul. To avoid any accidents, Roy grabbed it and stashed it in his inventory.
"No—!"
Seeing her "children" chopped to bits, Mary Shaw was furious.
What made her even angrier was when Roy pulled out Billy, her favorite puppet, from his inventory and executed it with his executioner's blade right in front of her.
"So, you happy now, huh?"
Roy had genuinely wanted to work with Mary Shaw, but the old hag hadn't given him any respect.
Now that they were at odds, Roy would just have to force her to work for him. King Solomon's knowledge had plenty of ways to control evil spirits, after all.
Mary Shaw was beyond livid. She started chanting a spell Roy didn't recognize, and the scattered puppet pieces on the ground floated up again.
Under her magic, the fragments fused into a massive puppet that touched the theater's ceiling.
"Roy Black, I'll kill you!"
The giant puppet looked intimidating and was seriously sanity-draining.
Imagine hundreds of puppet heads on one body, some crudely stitched together after Roy's slashes. Most people would have nightmares for weeks.
But for Roy? Child's play. He'd faced a hundred-meter-long sea monster like Kraken. This puny, few-meter-tall puppet was nothing.
No matter how you patched them together, puppets were still made of wood. What, were they gonna turn into steel?
As the giant puppet attacked, Roy didn't dodge. He caught its fist with one hand.
The impact created a shockwave, kicking up dust, but Roy didn't budge an inch.
Mary Shaw, watching from the stage, looked horrified. She knew Roy was strong, but not this strong.
This giant puppet, fused by her magic, had the strength of a greater demon—around 60 in physical stats. On Earth, that should've been unstoppable.
Roy smirked.
"That's it?"
In Mary Shaw's stunned gaze, Roy grabbed the giant puppet's arm with one hand and tossed it onto the stage like it was trash.
Boom!
With a deafening crash, Mary Shaw, too slow to dodge, was crushed under her own beloved creation.
"Ha! I tried to play nice, but you just had to learn the hard way, didn't you?"
Roy dragged his executioner's blade toward the stage. Mary Shaw, pinned under the giant puppet, struggled desperately but couldn't move.
Just then, an iron hook shot out from a corner, aimed at Roy's head.
Roy had been on guard for Hookman's sneak attack, so he tilted his head slightly, dodging the hook, though it shaved off a few strands of hair.
From Francesca and Lilith's descriptions, Hookman was a sneaky bastard, skilled in stealth, disguise, and ventriloquism.
As long as he wasn't in Roy's line of sight, Roy had to watch out for his ambushes.
Sure enough, just as Roy was about to grab Mary Shaw, Hookman couldn't resist and attacked.
"Been waiting for you!"
Everyone hates a sneaky jerk, so Roy let go of Mary Shaw to deal with Hookman first.
He quickly locked onto Hookman's position and charged with Ghost Wolf's explosive speed.
But in the blink of an eye, Hookman vanished, and Roy's swing hit nothing.
This guy either had some kind of spatial ability, or Roy's True Sight couldn't pierce his invisibility.
The former seemed more likely. At Roy's level, only demon-king-tier illusions or invisibility could fool him.
But if it was a spatial ability, that'd be a pain.
Roy gripped his executioner's blade, scanning the surroundings for any sign of Hookman.
After searching and finding nothing, Roy resorted to taunting him.
"Hookman, I know it's you! Come out, or I'll execute Mary Shaw!"
"You won't do that, Roy Black. You still need her to work for you, don't you?"
Hookman's low voice echoed from all directions in the theater. Being a ventriloquist, he made it impossible for Roy to pinpoint him by sound.
"You seem to know my plans?"
Roy dragged his blade, walking toward Mary Shaw, acting unfazed by Hookman.
"I know more than your name and plans. I know where you're from—Cascade Town, right?"
Roy paused, his face expressionless, but his mind was reeling.
Hookman knowing Roy's name and plans was reasonable. He'd heard Roy's name while posing as Jack Snyder, and Roy had mentioned his intent to cooperate when he first caught Mary Shaw. That was all out in the open.
But knowing Roy's hometown? That was weird. Roy had never mentioned it.
His FEA file was top-secret, accessible only to branch heads, seconds-in-command, and headquarters' top brass.
Gerald had told Roy that himself.
So, despite Roy's FEA badge listing him as a regular agent, his actual status was high—most agents just didn't know it.
"How'd you know that?"
Roy kept walking toward Mary Shaw, still looking relaxed.
"I know plenty of your secrets. Like the things you've done."
Hookman was being vague now, and Roy didn't buy that he knew anything specific.
"Oh yeah? Guess what I did this summer. Get it right, and I'll let you go."
Roy's challenge silenced Hookman. He obviously couldn't answer, so he changed the subject.
"How about you guess what I did to those women of yours in the hospital? Guess right, and I'll let you go."
That was a blatant taunt.
Even knowing Lilith was there to protect the four Apocalypse girls, Roy was pissed.
"Watch your mouth, or you're gonna regret it later."
By now, Roy was standing over Mary Shaw, who'd stopped struggling and lay motionless, silent.
Roy yanked her out from under the giant puppet with one hand, only to realize her body was soulless—Mary Shaw's spirit had slipped away.
No wonder the giant puppet had gone still after being thrown. She'd bailed!
"Damn it! She got away fast!"
Roy muttered a curse, about to toss her empty body aside, when he noticed something odd moving inside it.
Insert deleted alternate ending from the DVD version of Dead Silence