BOOM!
Sadistic Flame was almost knocked off her feet by the ensuing explosion, quickly righting herself before looking left and right to make sure no one saw her gaffe. Satisfied that there were no onlookers, she majestically walked into the ruined hall, which was splattered with soot, burn marks, and pieces of flesh all over.
This was the central chamber, where Darren the Puppeteer was holed up. Sadistic Flame could have entered normally and battled the fellow head-on by destroying his flesh puppets one by one, but she decided to be resourceful this time.
By using her old rival as a living bomb, she got the drop on this B-rank esper and turned him into mush.
Or so she thought, until the slabs in the middle of the chamber that had been knocked off from other parts of the walls were forcefully pushed to the side, revealing a young man with pale skin and sunken eyes being carried out by around ten humanoid creatures.
