Morning comes with the scent of ash on the wind.
I wake before dawn, my body already anticipating the day's work. Beside me, Ghatak stirs, his dark eyes opening to meet mine with perfect understanding.
We don't need words anymore.
Melinda is already awake, standing at the window of our commandeered residence—the former mayor's home in what used to be Thornhaven. She's checking her weapons with the methodical precision of a professional.
"The next settlement is eight kilometers west," she says without turning. "Mixed population. Vampires and shifters living together."
"How many?" Ghatak asks, rising from the bed.
"Approximately six hundred and twenty-five." Melinda finally turns, her violet eyes sharp. "More organized than the previous villages. They have patrols. Defensive wards. A council structure."
"Good," I say, stretching. "I was getting bored with easy targets."
Ghatak's lips curve into a dark smile. "How long do you think they'll last?"
"Two hours," Melinda says. "Maybe three if they're particularly stubborn."
"I'll take that bet." I move to the window, looking west toward our target. "Two hours. No more."
We prepare with the efficiency of soldiers before battle—except we're not soldiers. We're predators. And this isn't a battle.
It's a harvest.
---
The village appears just after midday.
It's larger than the previous settlements—more substantial buildings, organized streets, defensive walls that actually look maintained. I can see guards patrolling the perimeter, and the shimmer of protective wards glowing faintly in the sunlight.
"Vampires on the walls," Ghatak observes. "Shifters in the streets. Interesting division of labor."
"The vampires handle magic and defense," Melinda says. "The shifters handle physical labor and close combat. It's a common arrangement in mixed settlements."
"Was," I correct. "It *was* a common arrangement."
We approach from three directions—Ghatak from the north, Melinda from the south, me from above. The strategy is simple, elegant, and absolutely devastating.
I rise into the air on wings of chaos magic, my dragon form shimmering just beneath my humanoid appearance. Below, I see the guards notice me, see them raise the alarm.
Too late.
I raise both hands, and void magic erupts from my palms.
The defensive wards shatter like glass.
---
The massacre begins.
Ghatak hits the northern gate with the force of a meteor. The stone walls explode inward, and vampire warriors rush to meet him. They're fast, coordinated, clearly trained.
It doesn't matter.
He moves through them like death itself—void magic tearing through their defenses, his physical strength overwhelming their attempts at resistance. I watch a vampire warrior try to use blood magic against him, watch Ghatak simply *erase* the spell from existence before it can form.
Then he erases the vampire.
Not kills. *Erases.*
The warrior simply stops existing—no body, no blood, no evidence he was ever there. The other vampires falter, their confidence cracking.
Ghatak smiles.
From the south, I hear the howls of shifting wolves, the roars of bears, the screams of people realizing they're being hunted. Melinda is in her element—an assassin who understands predator instincts because she shares them.
She doesn't fight the shifters head-on. She *hunts* them.
I watch her move through the streets like a ghost, appearing behind a wolf mid-shift and driving her blade through its spine before it can complete the transformation. She anticipates their movements, understands their patterns, knows exactly where they'll run.
And she's always there first.
A massive bear charges her from an alley, and she doesn't even flinch. She sidesteps at the last possible moment, her blade opening the bear's throat as it passes. It crashes into a building and doesn't rise.
*Perfect.*
From above, I orchestrate.
Void magic lances down like black lightning, striking defensive positions, shattering organized resistance, creating chaos. I don't kill everyone—that would be wasteful. Instead, I target leaders, coordinators, anyone trying to organize a defense.
A vampire woman stands on a rooftop, clearly a mage of some skill, weaving protective barriers around fleeing civilians. I admire her dedication for exactly three seconds.
Then I erase the rooftop beneath her feet.
She falls, and the barriers collapse. The civilians scatter in panic.
*Good.*
Panic makes them easier to harvest.
The organized resistance lasts forty-seven minutes.
After that, it's just cleanup.
Shifters try to flee in animal form—wolves racing for the forest, birds taking to the sky, smaller creatures burrowing underground. Melinda hunts them systematically, her centuries of assassination experience making her the perfect predator.
Vampires attempt to use their speed and magic to escape or hide. Ghatak finds them all. His void magic can sense life force, can track the signature of vampire blood. There's nowhere to hide from him.
And I? I simply wait.
When the survivors realize there's no escape, when they huddle together in the village square with their children and elderly, when they finally understand what's happening—that's when I descend.
I land in the center of the square, my boots touching blood-soaked stone.
Six hundred and twenty-five residents. Approximately four hundred and twelve still alive. The rest are scattered across the village in various states of death or erasure.
"Please," a vampire man says, stepping forward. He's older, clearly a community leader. "Please, we'll give you anything. Money, resources, information—"
"I don't want your resources," I say calmly.
"Then what do you want?"
I smile. "You."
Before he can respond, I raise both hands and unleash the void.
It's not the destructive chaos I used on the walls. This is surgical, precise, *intimate*. Tendrils of absolute nothingness spread through the crowd like invisible fog, touching every person, every mind, every memory.
They freeze.
One by one, four hundred and twelve people stop being who they are.
I don't kill their bodies. I kill their *selves*.
Every memory stripped away. Every personality erased. Every identity unmade. When I'm done, four hundred and twelve blank slates stand motionless in the square, their eyes empty, their minds virgin territory waiting to be filled.
Ghatak and Melinda join me, surveying the results.
"One hour, fifty-three minutes," Melinda says. "You win the bet."
"I usually do." I gesture, and a portal tears open behind the blank-slate survivors. "Sirius needs administrators. Workers. Citizens. They'll serve well."
We herd them through the portal like cattle. They move when directed, follow simple commands, show no resistance or confusion. Perfect obedience born of complete emptiness.
When the last one disappears through the portal, I seal it and turn to survey the village.
Empty streets. Abandoned buildings. Blood staining the stones.
"Search for valuables," I say. "Anything useful. Then we move on."