I Possess the SSS Skill: Future Sight-Chapter 68: The Mask Falls

— Kyle Valtier’s POV —

4:13 a.m.

The city was sunk in a deep slumber, and the dense winter fog crept over the asphalt streets like wandering spirits searching for their graves.

We stood in the dark alley opposite the main entrance of Saint Hilarius Hospital.

From a distance, the building looked like an architectural miracle descended from the heavens to cleanse the defiled land of Elysium.

A massive façade of pristine white marble, gleaming under warm, soothing floodlights. Enormous Roman columns held up the entrance canopy, and a fountain of pure water stood at the center of the front courtyard, crowned by a towering marble statue of Saint Hilarius, his arms outstretched to embrace the sick, traced with lines of pure gold.

Luxury ambulances rested quietly in their spots, and security guards in elegant white suits stood by the automatic glass gates, exchanging friendly smiles with a few nurses.

An angelic scene. Peaceful. Pure.

But it was the purity that comes before decay.

All of us—myself and the squad behind me—knew that this white marble was nothing more than makeup applied to the face of a rotting corpse.

Beneath the feet of those smiling guards, thousands of souls were being flayed, harvested, and fused within a cosmic slaughterhouse no human mind could comprehend in its horror.

"Twenty-four hours..." I muttered to myself, the words of the dead Lieutenant Gray still echoing in my skull like the tolling of a cursed church bell.

I looked at my hand.

The hand that had been trembling for weeks—feigning fear.

The hand I had always hidden in my pockets, pretending weakness, cowardice, and fragility before this squad to stay off their radar.

I took a deep breath.

The cold winter air filled my lungs, extinguishing the fire of hesitation and igniting in its place a black, lethal, absolute frost.

The time for games was over.

The play of the pitiful recruit had ended.

We were going to hell. And in hell... sheep are slaughtered first.

I pulled my hand from my pocket. The trembling stopped completely.

I straightened the back I had deliberately hunched to appear smaller. I raised my head and relaxed my tense shoulders.

My neck cracked sharply as I tilted it side to side.

I drew my twin black "Etralium Magnums" from beneath my coat, loading them with a smooth, swift, professional motion—so precise that the sound of sliding metal rang like a deadly symphony.

Eva Blackwood turned toward me. Her black eyes widened in genuine shock.

I was no longer that scrawny boy who shrank into himself.

The aura now emanating from me wasn’t a dense Etra aura like Valicera’s—it was pure killing intent. Thick. Sticky. Dark.

My crimson eyes, which once avoided their gazes, were now steady—cold—piercing the darkness like those of an alpha predator that had just caught the scent of blood.

"K... Kyle?" Eva whispered, her sniper rifle trembling slightly in her hands as she stared at the terrifying shift in my body language.

"What... what is this look?"

Damian turned as well, blinking several times, unable to comprehend that the recruit who used to hide behind him and cry now stood like a professional killer, his presence surpassing even elite intelligence agents.

Sia narrowed her blue eyes, her grip tightening on her daggers.

Even Valicera... the silver demon glanced at me over her shoulder.

She wasn’t surprised. Instead, a faint, sideways smile curved her bloodstained lips—as if to say: Finally... the mask has fallen.

I didn’t answer Eva.

I gave her a cold smile, devoid of any human warmth, and stepped past her to stand in line with Valicera and Damian.

"If you’re expecting me to hide behind you like a rat tonight, you’re delusional," I said in a rough, deep, eerily calm voice—nothing like the trembling "Kyle" they knew.

"We’re going to flay the angels of Saint Hilarius. And angels... are only killed by demons. Your backs are covered from now on. Focus on what’s in front of you."

Eva swallowed hard, realizing in that stark moment—without the slightest doubt—that her suspicions in the sewers had not been paranoia.

This boy had never been a recruit.

This boy was the nightmare that once tore through her insides—and now he stood beside them, weapon raised.

"Save your questions for hell, Eva," Valicera said coldly, her voice bone-chilling, cutting off any attempt at discussion.

"We don’t have time for dramatic shock. Alexander Vance and the Voliders are waiting for us below. Time to knock."

Valicera walked forward, stepping out of the dark alley and onto the open asphalt street separating us from the hospital’s glass gates.

We followed her.

A hexagonal execution formation.

Damian on the right with his armor and dual machine guns.

Eva on the left, sniper rifle raised.

Aiden at the rear, his holographic gloves flickering.

Sia beside me, her daggers dripping acid.

And me... in the center, moving in wide strides, magnums pointed toward the ground, my mind operating like a quantum processor scanning every angle, every camera, every guard.

The moment we stepped under the hospital courtyard’s floodlights, the cameras picked us up.

The white-suited guards at the glass gate noticed our approach.

Six figures covered in blood, mud, and gore, armed with heavy weapons only sold in the deepest layers of the black market—advancing like an army of the walking dead.

"Stop right there!" one guard shouted, drawing his Etralium pistol, while his partner stepped back to hit the alarm.

"This is a sovereign medical facility! Drop your—"

He stopped mid-sentence, his eyes widening as he recognized the blood-stained faces.

"Alpha... Alpha Squad terrorists! They’re here!" the second guard screamed into the radio on his shoulder.

Valicera didn’t stop.

She didn’t slow down. She didn’t say a word.

She slowly raised her right hand as she walked, pointing her index finger at the two trembling guards.

Sssshhhhhhhk!

Gravity didn’t double—it collapsed at the very point where they stood.

Kraaaaaaaaaack!

Splooooort!

The sound of bones shattering and flesh tearing exploded through the quiet courtyard like a devastating cannon blast.

The guards didn’t fall to the ground—they were crushed inward. Their skulls caved into their ribcages, their internal organs bursting beneath their pristine white suits under pressure exceeding fifty tons.

In a single second, they became two balls of mangled flesh and shattered bone the size of watermelons, dropping onto the white marble before bursting like blood-filled balloons, spraying a crimson fountain that painted the glass gates with death.

The alarm blared across the hospital. Flashing red lights replaced the warm illumination.

Valicera stepped forward, and without touching the blood-smeared glass doors, she released a light gravity wave that shattered the bulletproof glass into millions of crystal shards that scattered inward.

We entered the "Facade of Angels."

The hospital’s main lobby.