Chapter 150: Dead

The sound of the guard striking the mouth of the scabbard rang out like a signal that shattered the silence.

In that instant, the net of countless fine purple threads hanging in the air contracted violently around Pennywise's massive body.

Its head was severed the moment it touched the threads.

The falling pieces hit the crisscrossing lines below and were sliced apart again. The process repeated.

The clown that had seemed invincible just seconds earlier was reduced to chunks of shredded meat in barely a second. They hit the water with wet, heavy splashes.

Its physical form was completely destroyed. The three glowing Deadlights floated quietly in the air.

The threads, sharp enough to cut through steel, were instantly annihilated the moment they touched the Deadlights.

Sensing danger, the lights began spinning faster, trailing long streaks of light as they shot upward toward the ceiling.

"Trying to run?"

Soren blurred forward and snatched the spinning cluster of Deadlights out of the air.

Dark power erupted from his hand, trying to drag them into the Silent Hill domain.

"Buzz—!"

The captured Deadlights thrashed violently in his palm, spinning faster and faster, blasting out blinding light that shot between his fingers.

Even in his demonized state, with the armor protecting his hand, Soren still felt sharp stabs of pain in his palm.

Just as he felt the raging Deadlights starting to slip out of his control, Alessa suddenly appeared beside him.

She drifted over, placed her cold little hand gently on the back of his, and poured a far stronger wave of dark power into him.

The full force of that darkness erupted, scouring the light from the surface of the Deadlights until nothing remained.

The glow died. The Deadlights stopped struggling and were finally pulled into the Silent Hill domain.

A string of system notifications flashed across Soren's mind. He ignored them.

With the Deadlights sealed away, the crushing fear that had been pressing down on Bill and the others vanished.

"Hah—!"

Bill and the others, who had been hanging their heads and sagging in despair, suddenly threw their heads back like drowning people breaking the surface. They gasped for air in huge, desperate breaths.

"—No! Stay away from me!"

Beverly hadn't fully woken from the nightmare yet.

She thrashed in panic, swinging her arms wildly and shoving at empty air.

The others weren't much better.

Cold sweat covered their faces. Tears still streaked their cheeks. They collapsed onto the stone platform, curled up and shaking violently.

They thought they had been dragged into another round of terror.

But after a few seconds, the silence around them became deafening.

No mocking laughter from the clown. No jeering voices from classmates or teachers.

Bill sucked in ragged breaths and was the first to come back to himself.

He looked around in a daze. The water that had flooded the underground chamber was gone. His little brother, who had kept asking "Why didn't you save me?" in the nightmare, had also disappeared.

The environment had returned to the same stone platform they had first landed on after falling.

Bill's gaze swept across the area and suddenly stopped.

Not far away, on the surface of the water, a figure completely covered in black bio-armor stood perfectly still.

The monster had its back to them, long blade glowing faintly in its hand.

As if sensing his stare, the figure slowly turned its head.

Those cold purple eyes made Bill feel like he had been dropped into ice water.

He was still trapped in the nightmare. He had never woken up at all!

The monster turned fully and began walking toward him across the water as if it were solid ground.

"FUCK! Don't— don't come any closer!"

Bill scrambled backward in terror, looking around desperately for anything he could use as a weapon.

His helpless shout snapped the others out of their dazed states.

They opened their eyes, saw the armored monster walking across the water toward them, and immediately huddled together in despair.

Just as they squeezed their eyes shut and braced for death, the monster stopped.

Then the suffocating black armor covering its body dissolved into drifting purple particles and vanished.

The mask faded away, revealing a familiar face.

"S—Soren!?"

Bill dropped onto his ass, rubbing his eyes in disbelief and pointing at him. "That just now… was you?"

"A demon hunter needs a few special tricks when dealing with demons, doesn't he?"

Soren tossed the Shura Blade into the Silent Hill domain, his tone calm.

Beverly pushed herself up using a stone pillar, glancing nervously at the dark water all around them. "Where's the clown? Where did it go? Are we already dead?"

"It's dead."

Soren said it flatly.

For a moment the group just stared at him. Then a storm of complicated emotions crossed their faces.

"Oh God— my wife and kids are still waiting for me at home—"

One of the heavier men covered his face and started sobbing quietly.

Another slumped against the wall, muttering, "We never should've come back. Now we've got nothing left."

In the middle of that heavy atmosphere of grief and despair, one man suddenly scrambled to his feet with an excited look.

He rushed straight to Beverly, grabbed her without hesitation, and kissed her hard.

"Mmph—?!"

Beverly's eyes flew wide. Her hands came up instinctively against his chest.

Ben pulled back just enough to look at her stunned face and said with raw feeling, "I like you, Beverly. I've liked you since we were kids."

Beverly stared at him, mind flashing back to the poem she had received back in school: "Your red hair is winter fire—"

Ben's eyes lit up. He nodded and finished the line. "Embers in January. My heart burns there too."

He gripped her hands tightly, voice steady. "We're already dead anyway. If I don't say it now, I'll be taking it to the grave with me."

Soren watched the two of them with mild exasperation.

Back when they were kids, Ben had been too self-conscious about his weight to confess directly. He had written the poem and asked Bill to give it to Beverly.

Beverly had always thought Bill wrote it and that he was too shy to say anything—

Soren cleared his throat a couple of times, forced to interrupt the emotional scene.

"Just to clarify. When I said 'dead,' I meant the clown is dead."

The underground chamber went completely silent.

Ben and Beverly were still locked in their embrace. Their expressions froze, then both of their faces turned bright red at a visible speed.

Beverly punched Ben's chest, but in that moment their eyes met again.

They didn't need words. The clown was dead. What was left to hold back?

They leaned in and kissed again, lost to everything else.

Bill watched them with a bitter expression.

He had once had feelings for Beverly too, but he had known his good friend Ben liked her as well.

In the end he had buried those feelings deep.

Compared to the couple now lost in relief and happiness, the rest of the group looked like they had just survived an emotional roller coaster.

"What?!"

"That's impossible—"

"Soren, did you just say— the clown is dead?"

The others, still caught up in their own thoughts of lost lives, snapped their heads toward him with wide eyes full of shock and disbelief.

The monster that had haunted Derry for so many years? Just like that— dead?

"How is that even possible—"

Mike muttered, half to himself. He had spent most of his life studying the clown, and this man had ended it in a few days?

"The Chud Ritual failed. How did you—"

"I never had any faith in that ritual," Soren cut him off, already walking toward the far side of the platform. "I only told you to gather those items and perform it so you would open the path down here for me."

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