"Then I'm not going to take myself apart!"
Isaac did not answer. He jumped down from the watchtower and headed toward Hell Palace.
Ice Valley. Elena stood at the valley entrance.
Michelle walked over from the direction of the Holy Light Rift, her expression grim. "I can hear something crying on Heaven's side. Not people crying—the sound of souls being crushed."
Elena rose to her feet. "Where's Kyle?"
"At the Spatial Passage."
The Spatial Passage lay at the boundary between Hell and the human world.
Kyle's figure crouched in the void, his white eyes fixed on the widening rift ahead. It was not a crack in the Heavenly Barrier, but a different kind of rift.
Something was squeezing its way out from within the walls of the Spatial Passage.
He reached out and touched the rift. His fingertips felt a cold, viscous energy.
It was neither the holy light of angels nor the darkness of Hell, but something else. He withdrew his hand and looked at his fingertips, where black patterns pulsed beneath his skin.
He stood and headed toward Hell Palace.
Layla sat in the medical camp. An empty shell lay before her.
It had been sent over today—a young woman in her early twenties. Her body was intact, her breathing steady, and her eyes open, yet she looked at nothing.
Layla pressed her hand to the woman's forehead. Golden light poured from her palm and seeped into her skin. The empty shell did not react. The light circled through her body before returning the way it had come.
Layla withdrew her hand.
She had tried seven times, without succeeding once. Her healing energy was completely useless against the empty shells. She lowered her head and looked at the six eyes on the back of her hand. They were