Chapter 2

The rain pelted my face.

It was even bigger than before. The sky seemed to have a hole in it, and rainwater poured into my collar and streamed down my back. I knelt in the mud, digging at the first mound with my fingers.

Wild dogs howled and scattered. They dug over the graves. The soil was soft and reeked of decay. I picked up a handful of soil and brought it to my nose—the smell of blood. It had seeped into the earth and wasn't completely dry yet.

It wasn't her.

I peeled open the second one.

The shroud was torn to shreds, shattered into blackened fragments. The bones inside were blackened, and there were cracks in the sternum from the chains. The mark of heresy—a red-hot iron pressed into the ribs, scalding the flesh and deforming the bone. I touched the grooves; they were of varying depths. The person who did it used great force, as if venting their anger.

It wasn't her.

The third one.

The fourth one.

The fifth one.

My hands were blistered. My fingernails were peeling up, and blood seeped from beneath them, smearing into the mud. The flesh was torn open by bone fragments, and muddy water seeped into the wounds, stinging painfully. I didn't feel any pain. I only felt cold. Coldness seeping from the very bones.

The sixth one.

No.

The seventh.

I stopped.

This mound had no wooden sign, no shroud. It was just a pile of yellow earth, like trash carelessly tossed in. The mound was covered in footprints; someone had deliberately compacted the soil. Wild dogs hadn't touched it—it was too deep, buried too deep.

I knelt down and plunged my hands into the soil.

Peel it open.

Then peel it open again.

My fingernail fell off. I didn't look. My fingers were worn down to the bare flesh, and when they touched the pebbles in the dirt, blood gushed out. I kept digging.

bone.

It's very small.

I saw finger bones. Slender, three broken. There were grooves carved out by instruments of torture—wires, so thin they could wed between the fingers, wrapped tightly, round and round, until the bones shattered. I recognized those hands. When she was six, I used those hands to teach her to hold a sword. Her hands were too small to grip the hilt, and she cried in frustration.

I saw ribs.

Half of it was broken. There was a hole in his chest, as if something had forcibly hollowed him out. The edges of the bones were jagged, with burn marks. Those were the marks left by his talent being brutally extracted. The forbidden technique of the Holy See—stripping the source of the extraordinary from a living person, causing bones to shatter from the inside and the marrow to be drained.

I saw a skull.

A rusty steel needle was stuck in his eye socket. It pierced through the skull and exited from the back of his head. Dried black blood clung to the tip of the needle.

I picked up the skull.

Rain streamed down her face, as if she were crying.

I didn't cry.

I just knelt there, my fingers digging into the crack in my skull. The crack stretched from my forehead to the back of my head, as if it had been made by a blunt object. Once, twice, three times… at least five times.

Arya.

She's afraid of pain.

When she was little, she would fall and scrape her knee, and she would cry all day. I would blow on her wound, and she would stop crying. She said her brother would blow on it and it wouldn't hurt anymore. She said her brother could heal all wounds.

I looked down at her bones.

There were needle marks on her wrist from blood draws—not just one, but a dense, honeycomb-like mass. Her bone marrow had been drained; her bones felt as light as paper. I pinched her finger bones, and with the slightest pressure, they shattered.

It turned to ash.

It slipped through my fingers.

I could hear my own breathing.

It's very slow. It's very heavy.

It looks like it's about to stop.

"elder brother."

Her voice rang in my ears.

I looked up.

There was nothing there.

Only rain.

"Brother, when are you coming back?"

She asked me that question when she was seven. I was going to the Vatican for training, and she clung to my leg, refusing to let go. I patted her head and gave her a packet of lemon candies.

"I'll buy you a whole case when I get back."

I said it.

I fucking said it.

I'm back now.

She's here.

It's in my hands.

All that's left are bones.

I stood up.

He put his hands in his pockets .

They pulled out the dark red Holy Judgment bone seal. It was the size of a palm, engraved with three thousand names—each a killing machine that had crawled out of purgatory. The Pope had seen it once and vomited on the spot. Not out of fear, but out of disgust. Because every single mark on it was cast with the blood of abyssal demons.

I'm holding it.

Apply pressure with your fingertips.

The bone imprint shattered.

Blood gushed into the sky.

A rift opened in the sky. Dark red ripples spread like water, tearing through the clouds, the rain, and the damned night. The ripples spread rapidly—one circle, two circles, three circles—all the superhumans within a ten-mile radius would sense them. They would kneel, tremble, and wet their pants.

Space began to distort.

It was as if someone was wringing the void like a rag. The air emitted a piercing shriek, and shadows surged in from all directions, converging into a black tide.

The first person emerged from the shadows.

He wore a faceless mask, a pale white mask devoid of features, with only two blood-red tear streaks. He wore a blood-stained black robe, and a black iron executioner's knife was tucked at his waist. He knelt on one knee in the mud, his head bowed.

The second one.

The third one.

Ten.

One hundred.

Thousands.

Three thousand.

They descended from the void like ghosts, silent and still, kneeling in a line. Their masks reflected a bloody light, like the eyes of three thousand dead men. Rain pelted the masks, streaming down tear tracks, like three thousand faces weeping.

No one spoke.

No one looked up.

They are waiting for my orders.

I stood among them.

He held Arya's bones in his hands.

"stand up."

Three thousand people stood up at the same time.

Their movements were perfectly synchronized, like those of a single person. There was only one sound as their knees left the mud—a resounding boom.

“To the manor.” I looked up at the brightly lit Campbell Manor in the distance. “Seal off all exits. The walls, the gates, the cellars, the dog holes—not a single fly is allowed to escape. Anyone who dares to run away, chop them up and feed them to the dogs.”

They didn't speak.

He simply turned around.

They disappeared into the rain. Their black robes billowed like a flock of ravens.

I looked at the ghost face closest to me.

He stood there, waiting for me to speak.

"Make a coffin."

"..."

“It’s made of black iron.” I looked at him. “A thousand pounds. Engraved with runes of the Inquisition. A cross welded onto the coffin lid. Deliver it to the manor gate before dawn.”

He nodded.

He turned and walked into the shadows.

I looked down at the bone in my hand.

"wait for me."

I picked up her bones one by one and put them in my arms. Her skull pressed against her heart, her ribs against her collarbone, and her finger bones slipped into my pocket. The rain soaked my clothes, and the bones hurt my chest. Every single one of them ached.

I don't care.

I turned and walked down the mountain.

My hands were bleeding. My fingernails were gone, and the tender flesh of my fingertips left bloody footprints as I stepped on the gravel. I walked steadily, each step firm and deliberate.

The sky began to lighten.

The rain has stopped.

Outside the iron gates of Campbell Manor, the coffin was already laid out. Cast from black iron, its surface was engraved with the oldest incantation runes of the Holy See—runes that glowed, wailed, and devoured the warmth of the living. A huge inverted cross was welded to the coffin lid, as if mocking the gods.

The masked figure stood beside the coffin. He nodded at me, then retreated into the shadows.

I stood beside the coffin.

His clothes were covered in mud, and his face was covered in blood. He was carrying a pile of bones in his arms.

I looked at the tightly closed oak door.

Footsteps sounded behind the door. People were shouting, laughing. The party from last night was still going on. They'd been drinking all night, celebrating Selena's coronation. Champagne bottles were scattered everywhere, rose petals were trampled into the mud.

I lifted my foot.

He kicked the door.

boom--

The oak wood cracked open.

The door shattered like paper, sending splinters flying into the hall. The champagne tower collapsed, bottles rolling everywhere. The crystal chandelier wobbled three times, dropping a few shards of glass.

The laughter stopped.

Everyone turned their heads.

Look at me.

Looking at the heavy black iron coffin behind me.

Carl stood on the steps.

He was still holding a wine glass in his hand. The wine was spilled all over him. His face was as white as a corpse, and his lips were trembling.

"You...you fucking—"

I went inside.

Step by step.

Footprints on the marble, stained with mud and blood.

“Karl”.

I called his name.

"come over."