CORE

The London Sky was as dark as ever and as beautiful as the night was, all could agree that the day was what they missed the most.

It happened abruptly, without reason.

All they could hope was that it would soon turn day.

However, amidst the business...

"Well then, I expect we'll see each other later at the-" Justice said, who was about to send a small salute to Sherlock before he and Hero left, but suddenly, the three heard a scream from afar.

"That is no good, come on," Hero said, immediately running toward the source of the scream, to which Justice quickly followed after him.

"Ah, damn it, caught another one have you, Mad Scientist?" Sherlock said, gritting his teeth as he too started to rush over to where Hero and Justice were heading.

The three arrived at the scene, and they were shocked to see the body of a man, lying right on the ground, bloody and beaten, with teeth mangled, and eyes halfway to blindness, his Core was floating atop his body as all the civilians watched in horror, unable to move.

"What..?" Hero said, his eyes toughening up as he rushed over to the man, however, as he did so, Sherlock noticed something, the Core looked... Awfully bright, too bright in fact.

"Wait... A minute," Sherlock thought, his eyes straining as Justice noticed this, before turning back to Hero as the two of them realized the situation.

"HERO, DON'T TOUCH HIM, THE CORE IS OVERCHARGED, IT WILL EXPLODE!" The two of them yelled, almost simultaneously as Hero's eyes widened in puzzlement and surprise, along with the crowd who gasped in shock, but despite the bad situation, at that moment he was able to react just in time to form a dome-like magic barrier around the Core, if it could not stop the explosion, it could at least weaken it.

"EVERYONE GET BACK!" Sherlock shouted at the bystanders, who responded, panicking as they ran over to whatever could protect them.

So with that finished, Hero braced for impact as the Core soon exploded, with such a powerful explosion to the point the barrier almost cracked, as it slightly shook the street it was on, creating a large dust cloud.

A few seconds later...

"Hero?" Justice called out, to which the dust clouds slowly disappeared, and there stood Hero, scratched and dusted, standing upon the man's body, or at least where the man's body was before it was completely engulfed by his own Core Explosion.

"We were too late," Sherlock said, slightly pouting as he put his hands in his pocket.

"This is his doing, right?" Hero said in a voice that echoed, taking Justice and Sherlock by surprise for a moment before they quickly composed themselves.

"We will be going to the castle now,"

"This can not happen again,"

The three of them soon traveled up to The Castle, Hero was clearly angered by what happened, and supposedly, doing it now was not necessarily a bad idea, but they still had doubts...

"Is this really a good idea? Doing this so soon?" Justice questioned, his arms crossed as he, Sherlock, and Hero stood in front of its entrance.

"Well, we can all protect and help each other, so why not use this opportunity to finally expose this fraud? Especially after what he just did, and how Hero reacted..." Sherlock said, hands in his pocket as he grinned upon looking at the castle once more.

"That is fair," Justice spoke out as he stretched his hands.

"So, do you want things to be stealthy... Or shall we cause some chaos?"

"...I just want to clarify, one more time, is there any reasonable, or sympathetic quality this person may have? As persistent as I am with my goal... I do not wish to actually kill anyone unless I am forced to," Hero asked, taking a deep breath as he turned to Sherlock.

"He is completely insane, not a hint of doubt in that," Sherlock replied as he gave off a smug smirk.

"Any reason he uses just to stay alive is utterly false,"

"Then it's settled..." Hero said as he, Justice, and Sherlock marched over to the large entrance their magical auras slowly started to leak.

"We will send him to the depths of nothingness,"

Meanwhile, within The Castle's Main Laboratory...

The Scientist sat down on a wooden chair, right in front of the test tube that held the skeleton with the live Core, he seemed to brainstorming about something.

The Laboratory seemed more lit up than usual, with multiple empty and drained test tubes containing human remains, skeletons, and molded hearts, filling the room with an awful stench to which The Scientist had grown accustomed.

"It seems overcharging that man's Core turned out to be beneficial," The Scientist said as he snickered.

"With that, I was able to deduce who is and is not capable of wielding another Core, just from the aura the explosion produced..."

"The explosion was practically an X-ray... And the magic users were the bones that I found precious,"

"And how lucky I am..."

"To have found three all at the same time,"

Back outside The Castle entrance...

As Hero pulled back his fist, which was imbued with magical energy, he suddenly burst through the Castle's door, with such ferociousness in power the large doors towering over him were reduced to nothing but dust as what remained collided with a wall, causing a dent on the concrete.

"Impressive," Justice said, grinning as he crossed his arms, while Sherlock looked on in genuine surprise.

"I have to admit, it looks a lot more quiescent here than I remember," Sherlock said as he took the first step into The Castle.

"You secretly investigated this place time-to-time right? How have you not gotten caught?" Justice questioned as he stepped into the castle shortly after.

"I have my ways," Sherlock responded as he smirked.

As the three walked along the hallways of the castle, they felt a strange, dreadful presence of something or someone watching them, an uneasy feeling that misfortunate is to come at any time as they looked around their surroundings, just to be sure.

"How many stories does this place have?" Hero questioned in a curious, nevertheless, serious tone.

"There are 5, and it is massively large on each of these floors I wouldn't even be surprised if this place literally breaks the laws of physics from its size," Sherlock said, clearly exaggerating.

"Is that so?" Justice said as he crossed his arms while they continued to walk along the halls, however, he then stopped in his tracks as his eyes turned sharp and serious.

"Justice?" Hero questioned, turning around upon hearing his footsteps stop, as Sherlock did the same.

"Something isn't right, we've said that before but now I'm really serious," Justice said, grinning as he was intrigued, Hero now felt as if something was lurking, it was not a metaphorical lurking, but rather, it genuinely felt real, Hero had thought.

"Well, that's simply because..." Sherlock said, raising his hand as he smiled.

"There really is something wrong," Sherlock said in a cold tone, his smile quickly fading away as he suddenly dashed to the side, as a large crater appeared in the ground where he was initially standing as Justice and Hero dashed back to get in a defensive position.

The three were confused, except for Sherlock, who was able to deduce that something was indeed there, and so the monster revealed itself, its magical technique being able to turn invisible, and as it showed its true form it looked like a mythological beast made out of flesh and tentacles, catching the three by surprise as it loomed over them.

"Lets not waste time-" Hero said, his magical aura coming to life as he took a step forward, about to rush at the beast until suddenly, multiple shots of what seemed to be compressed magic bullets pierced through it, dealing a fatal blow to what was supposedly its head, as it screeched and crawled back.

Hero and Justice looked over to Sherlock, who had pulled out a gun, which seemed to be completely empty, however, regardless of this, he made it function and fire through the use of magic.

"Quite versatile isn't it?" Sherlock beamed as he looked over to the beast, before firing one last magic bullet to its head, killing it as it dropped to the ground, its body turning into ash as its Core was soon revealed as it then floated elsewhere in the Castle.

"Can you capture it?" Hero spoke, looking over to Justice, who without a second quickly flew by, catching up to the Core in milliseconds as he grabbed it before returning to his original position.

"So what do you plan on doing with this thing?" Justice said, holding the Monster's Core in his hand which had a completely black color, so black to the point the light that reflected off of Justice's body barely reflected on it.

"I just wanna test something," Hero said as he took the Core from Justice's hands, he and Sherlock looked on in confusion as to what Hero was trying to do.

Suddenly, Hero opened up his mouth widely, and he held the Core above it, as it dangled as slowly and slipped away from his grip, the Core dropped right into Hero's mouth and he swallowed it whole, which both Justice and Sherlock looked at Hero with rather apprehensive and confused faces as they froze for a few seconds.

"...An odd decision indeed," Justice said, whose expression was no longer shocked, but looked fascinated.

"Honestly, you both have me thinking I'm the only sane one here," Sherlock said as he sighed out.

"You would not be too far off I suppose," Hero responded, looking down at his hand as he felt a new surge of magic within his body, it seemed eating the Cores of those Monsters strengthened him significantly.

"It's not entirely normal to pull off something like that, y'know..." Justice spoke out.

Within The Main Laboratory, up on the 5th story...

"I sense it..."

"They've killed one of them, yes... That indeed confirms it," The Scientist said to themselves.

"They are strong enough to be a vessel for two Cores..."

"After all, The Core and The Body are the same... If it does not wield enough magic, thus leading to both of them dying... But so long as the strength and power is there, The Core will survive, while the body rots,"

"...Ah, I'm talking to myself again,"

"How rich,"

"Perhaps I miss talking with my experiments while they were strapped to a chair for days..."

"I miss it a bit too much actually,"

Back on the 1st floor...

"What do you mean?" Hero questioned as he looked over to Justice.

"I don't know much about magic, but I'll take a guess and say that, more often than not, it's not easy to absorb the magic from Cores let alone the Core itself, right?" Sherlock answered.

"Indeed, I've only known about twenty people that could pull that off, you've rounded the number to twenty-one," Justice said, responding to Sherlock before turning back over to Hero, who suddenly peered over from behind, Justice's face turning unamused as he quickly raised his hand, as did Sherlock, as they felt a monster tried to sneak up on Hero while invisible.

But before they could make a move, Hero quickly put his new burst of magic to the test, quickly turned around and swinging his right hand fully, which created a slash of magic that cut the monster in half in which its true form of a large flesh ball was revealed from the invisibility, falling down dead as its body dissipated, leaving only its Core in which Hero quickly grabbed before it escaped.

"Nice draw speed," Sherlock complimented as he turned around to the right hallway, instantaneously shooting precisely at another monster that tried to crawl by, it then fell limp on the ground, its form being revealed as its body faded away while The Core ran, as Sherlock sensed the presence of other magical beasts, Justice looked over to where he was facing, intending to help him out, while Hero watched and felt the left corridor.

Elsewhere in The Castle, The Scientist stepped out of his Laboratory, sensing the magical presence of the beasts he let roam free and filled the castle as he stood both at the top and center of it all, he raised his arms, like an eagle facing the morning sun.

"How long, and how far will you make it?" He muttered.