Kane stalked through the subterranean maze with the chilling confidence of a man whose equipment wouldn't lie. The deeper tunnels were a suffocating nightmare of echoing water and decay, but his forearm-strapped spiritual radiation sensor, a sleek piece of tech, cut through the spiritual static.
Ambient Sin was a blinding white noise—the city's chaotic output of Lust and Greed. But beneath that noise lay a distinct signal: the cold, organised trace of Wrath energy. It wasn't the sloppy discharge of a frantic fiend; it was the calculated residue of a tactical retreat.
"You're too disciplined for the Pit, Emissary," Kane muttered, his breath misting in the cold air. "That makes you predictable." He noted the Emissary's path avoided major celestial ley lines, tracking only near deep flows of unprocessed Sin—a clear pattern of seeking camouflage over escape.
He rounded a bend and saw the target's sign: a set of faint, inhumanly precise prints in the wet silt. He raised his shotgun, his eyes narrowed.
Ethan waited in a narrow maintenance shaft, Kane's deliberate footsteps booming through the ancient pipes. He could feel the hunter's cold, intense focus. Kane wasn't a spiritual threat; he was a physical, methodical one.
Ethan used the twenty-four hours of downtime to study his environment. The tunnel he was in was bisected by a decommissioned hydraulic pipe, pressurised and unstable.
He channelled a focused pulse of Wrath—not enough to be visible, but just enough to create a vibrational frequency—into the pipe's weakest coupling. He wanted a localised, dramatic effect, not carnage.
The coupling burst with a sound like a small cannon. A massive wave of pressurised, sludge-filled water immediately slammed into the chamber. It wasn't intended to kill Kane, but to create absolute physical chaos, scattering dust, disrupting sound, and forcing the human hunter onto the defensive.
Kane rounded the corner and was instantly met by a churning wall of cold, noxious water. He didn't hesitate; he activated a magnetic grip on his boots and braced, but the sudden, violent surge threw him hard against the tunnel wall. His sensors went momentarily dark, drowned by the physical interference.
He emerged sputtering, his customised gear caked in filth, his anger a cold flame. "A physical threat. Good. You're still half-mortal, Emissary."
He was delayed, but the encounter only deepened his respect for the target's cunning.
Ethan was already moving, pleased with the result but knowing it was only a temporary measure.
Then, a flicker of red light danced on the wall beside him—a projected warning from a tiny, self-destructing relay left by the Pale Choir.
The message, delivered in hastily written, frantic code, was simple: SCANNER RANGE TOO WIDE. MUST BLIND THE EYE.
Ethan realised his mistake. He had been focusing on the spiritual static, but Kane's machine was sophisticated enough to filter the noise and track the infinitesimal changes in the Infernal Resonance. He couldn't outrun the signal; he had to destroy the tool.
He found a junction—a dry, electrically noisy area near a sputtering ventilation fan. He could hear Kane's approaching footsteps and the high-pitched whine of the sensor recovering from the water.
He waited, letting the Wrath pulse at the ready. He needed Kane to close the distance, to bring the sensor into point-blank range.
Kane appeared, his eyes scanning the walls, his weapon ready. The moment the hunter's arm—where the scanner was mounted—crossed the threshold of the ventilation fan's electromagnetic field, Ethan acted.
He unleashed the Gluttony.
It wasn't aimed at Kane's soul, but at his technology. Ethan channelled the Gluttony not to consume spiritual energy, but ambient electromagnetic energy in a localised, violent surge.
The sigil flared a deep purple. The sputtering fan instantly died. Every piece of battery-powered tech on Kane's person—his flashlight, his communications earpiece, and most critically, his spiritual sensor—went instantly, violently dark, their circuits fried by the sudden, total absorption of power.
The hunter froze, plunged into absolute darkness and silence. His external world vanished.
"What..?" Kane's voice, momentarily stunned, echoed in the black.
Ethan didn't wait. The burst of Gluttony was a massive drain, but the resulting Infernal Resonance was an overwhelming, delicious rush of technical competence and power. He was an emotional glutton, a sensory glutton, and now, a technical glutton.
He slipped past the now-blinded hunter, his silent passage a ghost in the engineered darkness. He was gone before Kane's eyes could adjust.
Kane stood alone in the absolute blackness, his weapon uselessly pointed into the void. He ran his thumb over the dead scanner on his wrist, the cold fury of realisation setting in.
"You took my sight," he snarled, recognising the sophisticated attack. "You are more than a demon, Emissary. You are a tactician. And that means I'm going to enjoy carving the mark off your chest."
Miles away, Ethan felt the spike of Kane's frustration, and the intoxicating thrill of victory made him laugh—a low, satisfied sound that echoed in the silent, dry passage. He had bested the hunter, used his power for precision, and established dominance. He had bought time to prepare for the inevitable return of the Angel.