Dusk hung low, and the last ray of sunset slipped down beyond the distant mountains.
Young Johnny Blaze glared sideways at the devil Mephisto. He watched the "old man" occasionally hunch his back in a timid stoop, whistling while tapping his cane against the asphalt to keep time, then suddenly strut back and forth with his head held high like a gentleman.
"How can I trust you?"
Johnny's fair, handsome face was full of distrust. He glared viciously at Mephisto, yet he truly had been tempted by the terms of the exchange offered once again.
The devil's temptations always struck most precisely at the itch in the human heart.
"Hehehe, Johnny, Johnny. I've always thought humans were the greediest creatures. Think about it, child. Your father would have died of cancer—it was I who gave him health! Yet you blamed his accident on me, and even asked me to grant him life again. Greedy. Truly greedy!"
Johnny vaguely felt that there was something wrong with Mephisto's words, but for some reason, the devil also seemed to have a point. As the rash young man tried to sort out the logic, he heard him continue:
"You merely signed a contract with generous Mephisto. Look at yourself now! You're alive and kicking, still able to curse me. Don't you think you've lost nothing at all? All you need to do is retrieve a little trinket, and you may get your father's soul back. Such a good deal—what are you still hesitating for?"
Mephisto paced forward. A spark deep within his pupils burned ever brighter, gradually filling his entire eye sockets, as though a blazing fire had ignited inside his skull. Thin wisps of black smoke curled from his ears and nostrils.
Johnny Blaze watched Mephisto's bearing abruptly change, revealing a measure of