Under the suffocating pressure of Blade Head and the Hell Wendigo, the air grew thick as congealed blood.
Pinhead, the hell lord once renowned for his elegant cruelty,
was now down on one knee on cracked, charred rock that vented sulfurous steam.
He was a wretched sight, nearly half his body destroyed.
His signature long black leather coat, along with the body beneath it, had, during that brief but utterly savage clash,
been torn apart by Blade Head's blades, which shared the same origin yet were far more brutal. The dark matter and essence of pain that formed his body were slowly dissipating, like a candle guttering in the wind.
His nail-studded face, devoid of human emotion, still seemed utterly expressionless.
But in his eyes, as deep as an abyss of pain, flickered disbelief, humiliation, and a barely perceptible trace of fear.
Li Dan gave him no chance to catch his breath or devise a countermeasure.
Delay invited trouble. In a place like hell, even a moment's hesitation could bring unforeseen consequences.
He stepped forward, a playing card having appeared in his hand at some point.
It was not a physical object, but a rectangular outline traced in flowing spectral light and tiny runes. Its edges blurred, as though connected to the void of another dimension.
The face of the card was blank, a chaotic gray-white, yet it radiated a pull more unsettling than the hellish scenery around them.
There was no incantation, no ritual, not even an unnecessary exchange of glances.
The Blank Ghost Card was aimed at Pinhead.
"No..." Pinhead forced a dry syllable from his throat, attempting to command his remaining chains or invoke his authority over the Pain Realm.
But Blade Head snorted coldly. The blades wrapped around Pinhead's ruined body abruptly tightened with a piercing