In southern Poland, at Auschwitz.
A cloud of black smoke flickered into existence at the foot of a hill beside the concentration camp. James looked around, disgust written across his face.
With the faintest thought, he rose smoothly into the air, barely leaking any excess energy. His control over his own power had grown ever more precise.
James floated higher and looked down over the immense concentration camp, which covered roughly forty square kilometers. A grief he had never felt before surged deep within him.
After several boosts to his body and mutant abilities, and with his Beast Perception continually honed by a martial arts realm nearing its peak, he had developed a level of awareness akin to psychic power. His ability to sense danger, emotions, killing intent, and the like had almost reached the realm of a Mind-based mutant ability.
Now, an endless stillness enveloped him, like the deathly silence of gazing into infinite darkness while training in the depths of the sea. It was a thick abyss woven from too much death, despair, and grief.
Beside the rows of concentration camp barracks, lined up like gravestones in a cemetery, lay heaps of clothes and shoes that had not yet been burned. There was a shooting range where Nazi soldiers practiced, replacing one row of targets with living prisoners after each round.
Azazel appeared on the roof of a barracks. Slowly, he unwound the bandages around his face, one layer at a time, his expression blank and his lips sealed. His tail burst through his trousers and swayed freely as he deftly drew the two Adamantium Daggers from behind his waist.
He had become once more the terrifying, hideous Red Devil from hell.
No one had noticed the figure hovering in the air or the devil on the rooftop.