High above Staten Island,
Count Kolsais held Lynn aloft in the night sky, a cruel smile on his lips. "Right now, your life is in my hands."
"Urg..."
"Necromancer, you have two choices—cooperate with me, or I let go, and you fall to your death, nothing but a smear on the pavement below."
Lynn glanced down.
Thousands of meters high, the world beneath them was a blur of clouds and faint lights. The skyscrapers that once towered above everything now looked like tiny specks of starlight.
He clicked his tongue and said, "Urg.. You know, this would be terrifying for someone afraid of heights. Luckily, I'm not."
"Oh—and by the way, I let you catch me on purpose."
"What do you mean?"
Before Kolsais could react, Lynn pressed the button Natasha had given him.
In an instant, a cable shot out and wound tightly around both of them, binding their bodies together.
"What are you doing?"
Kolsais struggled violently, but to his shock, the seemingly ordinary rope was incredibly strong—strong enough that even he couldn't break free easily.
"No choice. The core issue is that all the undead's obsession is linked to you. If Natasha, Steve, and I teamed up to kill you, the Power of Death I absorb would drop by two-thirds."
"Urg.. cough.. This is the first time I've encountered so many undead with purple obsessions. If I lose two-thirds, my heart will ache horribly. Heeh~"
"What do you mean?"
A flicker of unease passed through Count Kolsais. Especially since the necromancer before him was still smiling.
"I don't know whether your trick of stopping bullets midair is some vampire technique or a kind of telekinesis," Lynn said. "But it doesn't matter now. Oh—by the way, I was spouting nonsense to distract you."
A faint ticking began to come from under Count Kolsais's black card.
A cold premonition crawled up Kolsais's spine and he struggled wildly. He reached to remove the mithril bomb Lynn had somehow attached to him, but Lynn's grip held him fast—his hands wouldn't move.
"Damn you, you madman—if that mithril bomb goes off at this range, you'll die too. Do you want us to die together?"
He watched the fear and panic flash in Count Kolsais's eyes.
Lynn, however, spoke calmly, his expression almost relaxed. "I've always wondered what dying feels like. As a Harbinger of Death who hasn't fully awakened, I've never actually experienced it myself."
"If the Goddess of Death knew that, she'd probably laugh at me."
Truthfully, in that moment, Lynn's heart was filled with genuine curiosity about his own nature.
He had never died and revived before.
He truly wanted to know what that experience was like—whether, during the process, he could absorb the Power of Death within the realm of death itself, pushing forward the progress of his awakening as the Harbinger of Death.
He needed to find out. And with an opportunity like this, there was no way he'd let it slip by.
As more than thirty undead girls with violet obsessions gathered around, each glaring at Count Kolsais with deep resentment, Lynn's lips curved into a faint smile.
He felt a strange anticipation for the journey that awaited him—his first true death.
"You're insane! You'll die too, you lunatic!"
With his hands still locked by Lynn's grip, Count Kolsais could only listen as the beeping grew faster and faster. Despair and terror flooded his heart.
Damn it! If he'd known, he would've killed this man the moment they met.
Why hadn't the Black Magic Book ever warned him that necromancers were this insane?
"Haha, don't bother struggling—here comes the little flying stick!"
As Lynn spoke, the mithril bomb reached its critical point.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
Beep! BeepBeepBeepBeepBeep—
"No!!!"
Sensing the approach of death, Kolsais let out a desperate roar.
BeepBeepBeepBeepBeep—BoOOOOOOomm!!!
In the next instant, a violent explosion erupted. The impact and flames burst into the sky, forming a dazzling bloom of light against the night.
Moments later, a "meteor" streaked toward the scene.
High above, Tony Stark hovered in his armor, staring in disbelief at the explosion. Sparks rained down from the sky, yet there wasn't a trace of debris or remains.
"How much explosive did they use to get a result like that?" Tony muttered.
Descending through the falling embers, he ordered, "Jarvis, analyze the area—scan for tissue composition."
"Scanning, sir," Jarvis replied. "No biological tissue detected."
"The explosion burned everything that clean? Not even a trace of human tissue left?"
Landing on the ground, Tony stood in silence for a long moment.
Then Natasha's voice came through his earpiece. "Tony, have you found Lynn—or that damned vampire?"
At Natasha's anxious question, Tony Stark stayed silent for a few seconds before replying, "I'm sorry, Natasha. I got here too late. By the time I arrived, the explosion had already gone off."
"What?"
Hearing his words, Natasha froze where she stood on the manor grounds.
"I understand," she said quietly after a deep breath, then ended the call. Her face had gone pale, her expression grim.
"Natasha."
Seeing her look, Steve Rogers already knew what it meant.
He sighed softly, stepped forward, and placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "Lynn was a hero. Even if he always claimed he just wanted to enjoy life, he still had the courage to sacrifice himself."
"We should be proud of him."
Turning toward the manor, Steve's expression hardened. "But the mission isn't over. We still need to rescue those innocent girls."
"At the very least, we can't let Lynn's sacrifice be for nothing."
Natasha took a steadying breath, rubbing her face with both hands. "You're right. Let's move."
Just as Natasha started toward the manor, she suddenly stopped. "Wait a second—why does that eulogy of yours sound so familiar? Oh right, you said the exact same thing after that abandoned villa in the New York suburbs exploded!"
As she spoke, Natasha instinctively glanced around.
But the faint hope in her heart was quickly crushed—Lynn didn't appear beside them this time like he had before.
"Let's go. We still have a mission to finish," Steve said, patting her shoulder before heading toward the manor.
...
Meanwhile, inside Lynn's apartment—
"Awesome!"
Lynn shot upright in bed, feeling his body brimming with energy. Every part of him buzzed with vitality, as if his entire being had been recharged.
It felt like taking a huge gulp of ice-cold cola on a blistering summer day.
As the Harbinger of Death, Lynn realized that dying actually felt… amazing. Every pore in his body seemed to hum with satisfaction.
If he'd known that dying and reviving felt this good, he would've done it a long time ago!
_______
(づ￣ 3￣)づ
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