Continuing from the last episode.

Bard tried to reach for his skullcap, but it was now covered in cockroaches. He turned his lute to his front, to play a song, only to notice cockroaches busting out of the soundhole cover. Bard threw it away, desperate to get rid of the cockroaches. He looked for the door, but couldn’t find the one he used to get there. He could feel it, he wasn’t afraid of them but the way they were surrounding him was starting to suffocating him.

Bard tried to feel the water around him and noticed the air dry. He moved his hands over the cockroaches and felt no water inside them. His water powers were useless over the cockroaches, he concluded. He felt a nice damp breeze coming from the bathroom, only place still connected to the kitchen, so he tried to get closer to it, only to discover the walls of the corridor filled with cockroaches running up and down, falling from the ceiling and pilling up over each other.

Bard felt uneasy, and the sound of the bugs was getting louder and louder like the whole place was made of cockroaches. He felt some walking over his black shoes and he stepped back, just to step over some cockroaches, making them explode their juicy guts out.

— Eew — Bard made, seeing how sticky the mess he made was.

A cockroach fell over his hand, and he quickly shook it off, slapping his hand with the other. He tried to think about something, but nothing was coming to his mind. He tried to sing a single note, and another cockroach fell over his head, making him slap his head repeatedly.

— Dawn you! You little pests!

Bard them decided to kill as much as he could and stepped on some of them that dared to get close to him. The space free of cockroaches was getting scarce, as more and more of them appeared. Bard got over the table and tried to think about a way to get out of that nightmare and felt another cockroach fall over him, but this time, it got inside his shirt. He tried to reach it, but it was tickling him all around and, without thinking twice, he took his shirt off and threw it away. But they didn’t finish there. Now they were getting inside the leg of his black and white checkered pants, making Bard slap his legs violently, only to finally take them off and lose them in the middle of the vicious intrusion.

— What the fuck! Help! Somebody, help me! — He finally gave in. He tried his wave navigator and some interference was blocking its connection with the electromagnetic wave signal. — No! Nonononono! Not even you! Why nothing is working today?! —Bard screamed shaking his wave navigator in his pulse.

The pierrot, now only in his underwear, felt the cockroach tickles going up his thigh. He slapped it as much as he could, trying to get it off his backside.

— No! Not there! Not fucking there!

Afraid of feeling the cockroach getting into his dark cavity, he took off his underwear. Noticing his state, in a room filled with supernatural cockroaches, he could only think about concentrating on water. He could feel there was water around, but couldn’t have the patience to get it all so quickly. He had no option, he tried to calm himself down and gather as much water he could. The cockroaches didn’t stop passing over his feet, but he didn’t let it break his concentration. He focused his power in his middle and index finger of his right hand and used it to force the water outside the room to cut its wall like a blade. It worked, and the circular hole opened to outside. Bard quickly jumped out of the hole, falling into the dirty water reservoir of a deactivated water fountain, and tried to reach for help, running away.

Caleb got upstairs and passed through a long corridor. He noticed Guy and Emmeth were nowhere to be found. He was feeling Bard and Arian mind getting away until he couldn’t feel them anymore. He looked back and the corridor ended in a wall.

— When the cat is away, the rat comes to play. Are you trying to play mind tricks on an Alharir? I’m sure I can play that too!

Caleb concentrated on the same wall, ignoring how solid it was, and created a door. He turned the doorknob and was surprised to find out it led to a green garden, filled with plants in vases and glass panels for walls. Outside it was dark as if the time had passed and the stars above were already shining.

— Bismillah! In the name of God! — Caleb was surprised. — This can’t be!

Caleb couldn’t believe he was seeing an illusion that could counter his own illusion.

— You are playing with fire, shaqiun! — Caleb threatened against Emmeth thinking it was he who was doing that.

The sand sailor brought out his mind powers and made them take his left arm. He pointed to the garden ceiling and forced the starry sky to move by his will. He saw the stars moving for a moment and then felt the floor swallowing him. Caleb stopped pointing to the sky and now he closed his hand as if he could hold into the air and the quicksand floor stopped pushing him down.

— It’s impressive, for sure! — Caleb said, taking his foot from the floor. — But you should take care of me soon, boy, ‘cause I will take you down no matter what. No one tries to fool an Alharir in mind games and leaves unscathed!

Caleb then felt the floor disappear into a void below him, pulling him down.

— Nice try, but the same trick will not work twice on me! — Caleb tried to let go from his invisible pole and felt his hand stuck. — What?

Caleb opened his hand, but something was stuck. The Alharir looked well and it was his power ring, his magic family weapon, and their symbol of power. He tried to hide it away under an incantation of invisibility, but it wasn’t enough to protect it.

— You did locate my ring, shaqiun! — He then broke his power ring, turning it into an energy circle. Caleb turned it, so he could hold onto it. — You will not get away so easily!

Eventually, Caleb noticed how the attraction below him was getting intense. In that state, he wouldn’t be able to concentrate into create anything new and his arm wouldn’t keep him up for too long. Then he decided to let go of the energy circle and let the illusion swallow him. Caleb opened his hand getting down just one centimeter to the floor, though he felt how intense the gravity still was and he got on his knees.

— Gravity? You are really not kidding, shaqiun! Are you really treating me like a monster? That’s a little too much, don’t you think?

Caleb tried to stand up, but he couldn’t, the pressure over his body was too intense. The sand sailor's breathing was getting hard. He couldn’t let it get worse, so he tried to focus his mind power to get up, involving himself away from the gravity.

— One, two… three! — Caleb shouted, getting up with all his might, and ripping his clothes, which stayed on the floor, but his underwear. — What?! — The gravity weakened. — This can’t be! I’m sure I nullified your brat mind, shaqiun!

Caleb heard an explosion on one side of the house, and then the sound of a strong water jet on the other.

— What is happening?!

Suddenly, the room went pitch black, Caleb didn’t know what to do anymore. His sense of balance went off, the whole world was spinning aggressively, and two different forces were pulling on him on opposite sides. Caleb feared for his life and called for his power ring to hold him up, but he was forced against the other side of the room, then he could only close his eyes and finally concentrate to break the illusion around him. He kept forcing and forcing until he heard all the glass panels breaking apart, revealing the sunlight.

When Caleb opened his eyes, he was still on the green garden, but now all the plants and vases were torn apart and the metallic structure holding the glass panels together was twisted right above him.

— What? Was this… real? — Caleb got too weak to unmake what he had done and slowly got out of the mess he made going out of the house. — Everyone is a critic of the flaws of others, but blind to their own. You won, this time, shaqiun, but I will…

Caleb didn’t finish his sentence, as he felt something holding onto his legs. The sand sailor looked thinking it was another illusion, and could only see a shadowy humanoid figure with wide hunger eyes and human teeth look him in the eyes.

— AAAAA!!! — Caleb screamed. — Daeni ‘adhahb! Let me go!

The creature reached out his hand in Caleb’s back and scratched him. Caleb forced his way, feeling the burning feeling in his skin, and escaped, leaving his underwear in the creature’s claws.

— AAAAA!!! — He screamed again, running away without thinking twice.

— Hahahahah… — Emmeth, wearing a white shirt, got out of the house through a window laughing out loud. — What a bunch of cowards! — The shadow creature ran in an eerie crazy way to Emmeth. — Did you get it? — He asked and the creature handed Caleb’s white briefs to him and he put it together with Arian’s colorful briefs and Bard’s white boxer shorts in his pants. — Good boy!

Emmeth caressed the creature’s neck, and it dissolved into a cloud of ashes. It flew to form the blackness of Emmeth’s black shirt again, also forming the eye symbol on the shirt, which was the eye of his familiar, a boogeyman – a creature that can take any form and it feeds on fear.

— Now, where did that big one went? — Emmeth said, turning around the house from outside to reach for the main entrance.

He was happy. Without much effort, Emmeth humiliated his veterans like an experienced warrior. He grinned, recounting the scenes in his mind. For Arian, he distorted Arian attacks to make him think the little shadow things were eating his clothes, but it was his own knives making the work, while his boogeyman held him in place. For Bard, he didn’t do much thinking. Once nullifying Bard’s ability to play a song, Bard would be easy to take down. The boogeyman turned itself into a hundred or so of cockroaches, while Emmeth multiplied them into millions, making Bard too dizzy to fight the source of the illusion. For Caleb, it was harder, but he knew he could deal with him using his mind powers against him. Forcing Caleb to think it was just an illusion, while he used other magic powers, like gravity and wind, and even a glue trick, to mislead a mind master into believing it was all real for a moment. Sending his boogeyman to scare Caleb was the last piece of his plan, knowing the shapeless creature could naturally change into Caleb’s worst nightmare. All that the creature needed was to take hold onto the sand sailor’s underwear and he was lucky, Caleb’s worst nightmare is the evil jinns, the shayatins – an easy image to copy.

Emmeth was so proud of himself. Three out of four! Nothing would stop him from finding Guy and do the same. That is, if he could find him. While Emmeth hid in the hall under an illusion, Guy passed right in front of him and went upstairs. As he was waiting for everyone to enter into the house, he heard Guy’s scream but didn’t care to check it. He was patient to get his prey and forgot about the last one. He simply entered the hall and stared at the stairs.

“BOOM”, made something right behind him. Because of the metallic sound, Emmeth knew it was Guy’s armor and turned back in a good mood, with his hands up.

— Okay, you got me! I was the monster all along! — But Guy was still down and didn’t move a millimeter. — You don’t need to scare me, old man! No one has ever scared me!

Emmeth smile disappeared from his face. He poked Guy’s helmet with his feet and it fell away from its armor. There was nothing inside.

— Haha! — Emmeth made. — Good one! You almost scared me…

Suddenly, Emmeth felt a tug at the top back of his pants.

— Why did you let me die? — Said a bodiless voice in a ghostly tone. — Why did you let me die?!

— C’mon! I’m not falling for it! — Emmeth insisted.

Another sound was heard, this one was way to sinister for Emmeth, who felt goosebumps from it. It was a disturbing whistling that was getting closer and closer, turning into screams and pledges of thousands of people in pain. The walls started to bleed and the corridor ahead leading to the basement was getting twisted, looking like a throat now. The putrid smell that emerged almost made Emmeth vomit.

— What the fuck… You are not supposed to have this kind of power! — Emmeth said, not understanding it. He tried to use field control to localize the source of the power, but the only thing he noticed was how big the creature in front of him was. — Woah! What the fuck?! Is this house… alive?

That didn’t make any sense to him, he knew the house had a distorted field, making it bigger inside, but that was becoming too much for him. He tried to take a step, but his pants were still stuck in midair. Emmeth then sent his boogeyman to fight the creature, or, at least, to create a distraction.

— Go, Edgar!

The cloud of ashes float to the throat-like corridor and disappeared inside it.

— Edgar? — Emmeth was almost speechless. — Edgar! Come back!

Emmeth’s familiar had never left him, and it would never leave him. They were together since Emmeth’s birth and they would never be apart. Emmeth felt a loneliness he never witnessed before. It then turned into despair, and from despair, it turned into agony.

— AAAAAH! — Emmeth made.

The house started to crumb down, the whole ground was shaking. Everything was coming apart and Emmeth didn’t think straight at first, however, the presence of a horrifying monstrosity was emerging from the depths of the twisted house. Emmeth tried to look at it once more, before hearing his terrifying howling. Emmeth saw something so horrible he could only think about getting out of the house, leaving his pants and underwear behind.

Out of the house, Emmeth was crying out loud but stopped to take some air. He looked back at the house and saw something enormous destroying the whole house.

— Mommy! — He screamed, regretting trying to pose like a professional when he wasn’t.

— Huhu… Huhuhu… Hahaha… — Guy laughed out loud.

He was back inside his black armor, now holding Arian, Bard, and Caleb’s underwear in his left hand and took Emmeth’s orange loose boxers out of their pants.

— Did I get too spooky, little one? — Said an eerie voice. — I made him cry.

— No, big Joe! You made your job perfectly! — Guy smiled, talking to the corridor. — I’m still amazed I have found you again! If I weren’t from the Slayer family, I would have loved to have you as my familiar!

— You grow up so much, little one… — said the boogeyman, with a sad tone, still holding Emmeth’s small boogeyman down.

— Me? I was just six years old back then! Look at you! You grow up so much you can look like a house now! — Guy laughed kindheartedly.

— I was trying to hide from people… Didn’t want to scare them again…

— I know… It looks I’m still the only one who likes you. I even screamed when I saw you again! I will help you find a new home soon, big Joe. But, now… — Guy took Emmeth’s underwear out and started his camera, posing for a selfie. — Say cheese!

In his Heatwave profile, he titled the photo as “Got this from a scared little girl”, and the frightening boogeyman behind him was smiling too.