Flames clawed through the shattered warehouse, devouring everything—oak table, bloodstained chairs, the heap of bodies—all turning to crackling memory behind Seraph as he strode through the smoke-choked ruin. Bright tongues lit the night sky, painting jagged shadows across the fractured bones of Hell's Kitchen.
At his heel, trailing through soot and embers, was Arclight—her combat leathers torn, mouth stained with blood, body battered and half-conscious. Seraph dragged her by the leg without ceremony, her boots scraping furrows in the broken concrete. The only evidence not claimed by fire.
He knew torching the place would draw eyes—police, vultures, rivals. Not the quiet exit he preferred. But the knot of corpses, the signature violence, the shattered underworld power… all had to vanish. Only Arclight remained, groaning as she clawed weakly at the ground.
They reached the curb, heat pressing hard at their backs, glass popping in the inferno behind.
Arclight tried to sit up, blood bubbling in her chest. "You know… you just made yourself a target," she rasped, glaring through pain. "All that… noise. The whole city's going to want a piece of you now."
Seraph's helm turned, unreadable. His reply was cold, dry, edged with irony. "Was starting to think New York forgot how to throw a proper welcome party. Nice to know the city's still got manners."
Arclight barked out a laugh, then doubled over coughing, flecked blood spattering the curb. For a moment, amusement glimmered beneath the bruises.
"Crazy bastard," she wheezed, voice twisted between respect and exhaustion. "Almost makes me hope you last long enough to see who comes for you."
Seraph only shrugged, his silhouette white and bronze in the flicker of firelight. "Stick around, you might get front-row seats."
He let go of her boot. She slumped, breathing ragged, glaring up at him with a mixture of hate and grudging admiration.
Without another word, Seraph turned and began to walk away, fading into the steam rising from gutters—leaving her bleeding but alive on the concrete, and Hell's Kitchen smoldering in his wake.
***
Arclight's vision blurred as darkness crept at the edges. The acrid scent of smoke stung her nostrils, mingling with the metallic taste of blood flooding her mouth. The heat from the burning warehouse cast a hellish glow, illuminating the ruins behind her like the final act of a nightmare.
The sounds of the city—sirens, distant shouts, the crackle of fire—were muffled, distorted, as if the world itself was slipping away. She could see the inferno behind her, walls collapsing, flames licking the night sky, consuming everything that bore witness to her life in Hell's Kitchen.
Her body trembled and weakened, sinking lower into the unforgiving concrete. She knew if someone found her now, alive or barely so, it would mean one of two fates.
At best, imprisonment—a cold cell for all the crimes she'd carved into the city's bones. But that was the kinder possibility.
She was no ordinary criminal.
She was a mutant.
The thought was a jagged blade in her mind. Worse than a broken cell was the research facility waiting for her—a place swarming with cold-eyed scientists who saw her as nothing but test subject, experiment, property. The horrors she had escaped once, clawed free from at great cost. If caught again… she would disappear into their darkest machines, never to return.
Pain sharpened her senses, fear sharpened her mind, and instinct drove her last, desperate act.
"Arbor!"
The word tore out of her throat like a bullet, ragged and raw.
The sound cut through the roar of fire and the sirens, slicing through the night air. Seraph froze mid-step. His helm tilted, bronze spider emblem catching the firelight as if the night itself had paused.
"I'm listening."
Arclight's chest heaved. Sweat, soot, and blood slicked her skin. She pushed herself slightly, forcing her gaze onto him, defiance and desperation mixed into a final plea. "Don't… don't let me die like this… please."
Seraph's helm tilted, bronze plating glinting in the firelight. His voice was low, deliberate, each word heavy with irony.
"Why should I? I'm no hero. You hold no value to me. Nothing in your blood, your fight, or your screams… compels me to help."
Arclight gritted her teeth, coughing blood, but met his gaze. "Because… because no one else would. And if you leave me here, the city—or worse—they'll take me. You know what they do to people like me."
A pause. Seraph's armor shifted as he studied her, silent and calculating.
"And what if," he finally asked, voice cold as the steel in his veins, "you betray me after I save you?"
Her jaw clenched tighter, but fear made her fingers twitch. "Then… then I die. But anywhere is better than what they would do to me. I… I don't care who you are. I just…" Her voice cracked. "…I just don't want to die like that."
Seraph extended a gauntleted hand, bronze roots curling slightly around his fingers like waiting fangs.
"Take it," he said, voice dark, measured, a whisper that could split bone. "If you take it, you serve me. You obey my command, no matter the cost. If you do not… I leave you here. And if you betray me in the future… death will be mercy. Nothing else."
Arclight looked at the hand, at the fire behind him, at the open night around them. Every instinct screamed caution, every memory of pain and pursuit urged distrust. But the thought of the research labs, of experiments worse than death, twisted her gut. She swallowed hard.
Her fingers closed around his.
Seraph's helm tilted, and a faint, almost imperceptible smile curved beneath it. Without a word, he swept her up, bridal style, her weight heavy but hers to bear only for now.
The flames of the warehouse roared behind them, painting the night in crimson and orange, but Seraph stepped into the shadows, carrying her effortlessly. The world around them was chaos—but in that moment, the deal was sealed.
He walked away, silent as the night, leaving Hell's Kitchen smoldering behind him and Arclight's fate firmly in his grasp.
***
Seraph strode forward through the smoke-choked street, Arclight cradled bridal-style in his arms. Her weight was light compared to the burning city around them, but every groan and cough reminded him that she was fragile—at least in appearance.
Even as he moved, his spider-sense flared, warning him of danger. Projectiles—knives, shards, debris—sliced through the air, intended to pierce, slow, or kill. Seraph didn't break stride. His limbs moved with preternatural calm, rooted reflexes guiding him. The first knives arced around him, harmless, missing by mere inches—deadly for anyone else who dared follow, but harmless to him.
Arclight's eyes widened as the deadly dance unfolded around them. "What—what the hell—" she rasped, half-coughing blood, half-shouting in disbelief.
Seraph's voice cut through the chaos, cold and measured. "Don't look. Stay alive."
Every strike, every missile, passed harmlessly around him. To onlookers, it seemed impossible luck. To Seraph, it was awareness—a mesh of spider-sense and reflexes honed like Hashirama's own.
Then, his senses sharpened further. Another presence—lighter, precise, familiar—tracked him from behind. A voice rang out, clear and urgent.
"Stop!"
Seraph turned his head just enough to catch the figure stepping from the shadows. The familiar silhouette emerged: Daredevil, red costume stark against the smoke, staff poised, senses mapping the street like a pulse of sound and motion. He had come straight for him.
Arclight stirred slightly in his arms, groaning, but Seraph tightened his hold. "Eyes on me," he muttered, voice calm and lethal.
Daredevil didn't respond with words. His stance was a warning, a promise: stop or risk a fight he couldn't ignore.
Seraph's helm shifted to face him fully, the bronze spider emblem glinting. A faint hum of amusement rippled through him, ironic and cold.
"You're far from home, blind man," Seraph said, voice smooth and chilling. "And this is far from a friendly welcome."
Daredevil's head tilted slightly, senses mapping the air like a web of sound. He could "see" the whorls of danger surrounding Seraph—but even he felt the pressure of something inhuman waiting to strike. "You're not walking away with her," Daredevil called, staff coiled for motion. "Let her go. Now."
Seraph flexed his gauntlet slightly, bronze roots twitching, brushing faintly through the air as though tasting the space itself. "I suggest you reconsider your next move," he murmured, almost conversational, though the weight behind it promised consequences far beyond pain.
Daredevil lunged, staff whistling through the smoke-choked air. "I won't let you take her!" he shouted, rushing straight at Seraph.
Seraph didn't move—not a step, not a twitch. Only a faint hum of amusement escaped him. "Fool," he muttered, voice low, cold.
Then the street erupted. Massive wood veins tore through the asphalt, splitting concrete with terrifying force. Matt's senses screamed danger—he halted mid-stride, staff poised defensively, but the veins were already moving, alive and hungry.
He tried to dodge as the roots lunged, twisting like bronze serpents in the night. But even his honed reflexes couldn't match their speed. The roots struck him with bone-shattering force, flinging him across the street like a ragdoll.
Seraph didn't pause. He extended his control, weaving the roots into binding chains that coiled around Matt. The blind vigilante struggled, muscles straining, but the bindings tightened, unyielding. His every movement was anticipated, countered.
For a moment, even the city seemed to still in awe. Seraph's wood-style control rivaled Yamato's own mastery—Yamato could halt a rampaging jinchūriki like Naruto in his prime. Matt? He was still a newborn by comparison.
"Impossible…" Matt rasped through clenched teeth, trying to twist free.
Seraph said nothing. The veins began to sprout delicate flowers, blossoms opening in rapid, unnatural cycles. A pale, sweet-smelling gas seeped from them, curling through the air around Matt. His struggles slowed, breath coming shorter, limbs heavy.
"Can't… hold… on…" Matt muttered, his voice fading, consciousness slipping. His last thought was a silent curse as the gas claimed him.
He crumpled, unconscious, restrained by the wooden chains. Seraph walked over, each step deliberate. He picked up Matt's billy club, swinging it with a single, precise motion to snap one leg—"just in case," he muttered coldly.
Without another glance at the fallen Daredevil, Seraph adjusted his hold on Arclight, her head lolling weakly against his chest. He whispered something to the air, a promise and a warning, before vanishing into the smoke. The billy club came with him—a trophy from the encounter.
Arclight, barely conscious, blinked through the haze of blood and smoke, her vision catching only the glint of Seraph's mask as he faded into the darkness. Her body trembled, battered and broken, and a cold realization seeped into her bones: she had fallen into the hands of a devil. The fire behind them, the chaos around her, and the man carrying her—all of it spelled the same truth. Her fate was no longer her own.
End of chapter.
Author's note: Don't forget to add this story to your library and drop a Power Stone to show your support!