Shadows of the Infernal

Previously

…But the victory felt hollow. The artifact remained, a ticking time bomb. The entity was weakened, but not destroyed. And Ethan knew, with a certainty that chilled him to the bone, that this was far from over. He had used the loophole, he had forced the demon to obey, but the pact itself, and the artifact that anchored it, still existed. The shadows had receded, but they had not vanished. They were merely waiting for another opportunity, another crack in their fragile reality, to creep back in. The power of the loophole had bought them time, but time was a currency they might not be able to afford to spend for much longer. The true battle, he suspected, had only just begun.