Zane forced his skill on the guards.
Three of them collapsed instantly, slumping against the brick wall in a heap of snoring, miserable exhaustion.
The fourth one, the squad leader, shook his head, trying to fight it.
He was stronger.
"No..." he grunted, raising his mace. "Intruder..."
Zane stepped in, grabbed the man's wrist, and drove a knee into his gut. The guard doubled over, gasping.
"I said sleep," Zane whispered, pouring a concentrated dose of lethargy into the man's mind.
His power was so versatile and dangerous, he figures he could overturn a King's decision.
Thoughts like these are probably why people like him are being persecuted.
The guard's eyes rolled back, and he fell face-first into the mud.
Zane looked up at the roof. A moment later, two bodies tumbled quietly over the edge, landing in the canal with a soft splash.
Wren waved from the parapet.
The way was clear.
Zane pushed open the heavy iron doors and stepped into the Processing Plant.
The noise inside was deafening. Massive furnaces roared, conveyor belts clanked, and hammers rang against metal.
The air heated up.
Dozens of workers, emaciated and chained to their stations, were stripping piles of clothes, melting down jewellery, and sorting scrap.
Overseeing them were the Nails. Brutal men with whips and clubs, patrolling the catwalks.
'At least there are no kids like back on Earth,' he joked to himself.
In the centre of the room, on a raised platform, sat a young man in a pristine white suit that looked shockingly out of place in the grime.
He was lounging on a velvet chair, eating a bright red apple while watching a worker get beaten.
Kael. Rivet's nephew.
Zane felt a spike of disgust so strong it almost broke his focus.
He activated Grief Sight.
The factory lit up. It wasn't just heat he saw. It was the history of the objects in the room.
The pile of clothes in the corner radiated a soft, mournful blue light—the sorrow of the dead. The wedding rings in the melting pot glowed with a sharp, red ache of lost love.
And Kael...
Kael glowed with a sickly, pulsating yellow light.
It wasn't despair. It was sadism.
He was feeding on the pain around him, enjoying it.
'What is this world?'
Zane stepped onto the main floor. He let the shadows from the high rafters drop down and coil around him, making him look eight feet tall and made of smoke.
He amplified his voice with a touch of Essence.
"SHIFT'S OVER."
The sound cut through the industrial roar. Every head turned.
The workers stopped. The guards froze.
Kael stood up, tossing his apple aside. He peered down from his platform, looking more annoyed than scared.
"Who let a beggar in here?" Kael shouted. "Kill him! And make it slow. I'm bored."
The guards on the floor, about eight of them, drew their weapons and charged.
Zane didn't move. He let them come.
He waited until they were in a tight circle around him.
Then, he opened the battery.
He didn't use Whispers. He didn't use Shroud.
He used the raw, unfiltered presence of the Grave-Warren monster he had consumed.
He released a pulse of pure, ancient, crushing uselessness with ultimate focus.
The air in the factory turned instantly cold. The roar of the furnaces seemed to mute.
The charging guards didn't stop because they wanted to. They stopped because their legs gave out.
They fell to their knees, weapons clattering to the concrete, weeping uncontrollably.
The sudden, crushing weight of their own wasted lives slammed into them.
[...why bother?... it's all ash... just ash...]
The workers, strangely, didn't fall.
They looked at Zane with wide, fearful eyes, but the despair wave washed over them without crushing them.
Even with his focus, they were already at rock bottom, they had nothing left to lose.
Kael, on his platform, gripped the railing.
His face went pale.
"What... what are you?" he shrieked.
Zane looked up at him. The shadows coiled tighter.
"I'm the Union Rep," Zane said.
He walked toward the stairs to the platform. The weeping guards didn't even try to stop him.
Kael fumbled for a pistol at his belt. He aimed and fired.
Bang!
The bullet hit Zane's shoulder. It hurt—a sharp, stinging bite—but it didn't slow him down. His dense, Essence-infused flesh absorbed the impact like wood absorbing a nail.
Zane reached the top of the stairs. Kael backed away, tripping over his velvet chair.
"Don't! Do you know who I am?" Kael stammered. "My uncle is Rivet! He'll skin you alive!"
Zane grabbed Kael by the lapels of his pristine white suit and lifted him off the ground. The boy was light, hollowed out by his own cruelty.
"I'm counting on it," Zane said.
"Drop him, Stain!"
Wren's voice came from the rafters. She dropped down, landing on the platform with a heavy thud, her spear levelled at Kael's throat.
"We need him alive," she reminded him.
Zane wanted to slap the dumb girl for giving leverage.
But he still went ahead and held Kael dangling over the edge of the platform. "Where is the Iron-Heart? How do we get in?"
"I... I won't tell you!" Kael spat, trying to look brave.
Zane looked at Wren. "Can I eat him?"
"Just a little bit," Wren shrugged.
Zane looked back at Kael.
His eyes flashed with that cold, blue light. He opened the connection to the void in his gut, just a crack. He let Kael feel the hunger.
[...emptiness... cold... forever...]
Kael screamed. It was a high, thin sound.
"THE SEWERS!" Kael shrieked. "There's a drainage pipe! Under the canal! It leads to the basement! Please! Don't eat me!"
Zane closed the connection. Kael went limp, sobbing.
"See?" Zane said to Wren. "Diplomacy."
Wren grinned. "Grab him. We're leaving. But first..."
She walked over to the main control panel for the factory floor—a mess of levers and dials that controlled the furnaces and the pressure valves.
She pulled a pin on a grenade she'd lifted from the Exterminator corpse and jammed it into the gears.
"Everyone out!" she yelled to the workers below. "Run! Now!"
The workers didn't need to be told twice. They dropped their tools and bolted for the doors, stepping over the weeping guards.
Zane threw Kael over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
They ran for the exit.
Behind them, the grenade blew.
The control panel sparked and exploded. The pressure valves blew, sending jets of superheated steam into the room.
The furnaces began to overheat.
They hit the cool night air of the alley just as the first explosion rocked the building. Windows shattered, raining glass onto the street.
Zane and Wren sprinted into the darkness, the flames of the burning factory lighting up the smog behind them.
They had their intel. They had their hostage. And they had just declared war.
But as they ran, Zane felt a new sensation.
A pang.
Not from the hunger.
From his Grief Sight.
It was coming from Kael.
The boy wasn't just terrified. Beneath the fear, there was something else.
A deep, twisted, familiar signature.
[...finally... someone strong enough... maybe he can kill Her...]
Zane frowned as he ran.
Her?
Who the hell was Kael afraid of? It wasn't Rivet.
It was someone worse.