Deep in the moon's guts, where the coliseum's dungeons lay, the four of them—moving in a rush—kept running into subjugators scrambling not to die, even as the whole place stayed trapped in relentless tremors. The guards they encountered didn't try to fight; they tried to flee. That didn't stop the vampire or the lycanthrope from using their weapons to deal with them anyway.
Dante and Jhades were badly hurt and used their victims as food. Human blood and flesh had an exquisite taste, though not enough energy to fully recover. The floor, walls, and ceiling quivered like a rubber house; if gold and silver weren't as malleable as they were, pushing deeper into a facility about to be wiped off the map would've been more than madness. Even so, cameras and every kind of ventilation mechanism crashed down from above, and doors blew off their hinges and shot away. After dodging the dangers snapping at them, they pressed farther into the cellblocks—until they stopped seeing subjugators and began to notice imprisoned slaves instead.
On the way down, it felt almost refreshing for the two brothers to fight and kill more than a dozen uniformed men. On one hand, it fed their egos—their confidence—proof they hadn't lost the edge their masters' training had given them in a not-so-distant past. On the other, it washed away the bitter aftertaste the fight with Gilgamesh had left in their mouths. With every corpse, they regained more than half their strength and kept moving, like unstoppable machines of destruction fueled by renewable energy.
Daniela and Marín kept behind them, at a cautious distance from the two feral beasts—beasts who warped the right parts of their bodies into what they truly were: predators of humans. One was as black as night; the other as violent as a tornado. Through shredded limbs, scattered organs, torn meat, and splintered bones, the women walked—grateful the two young men were helping them push through a place they would never have set foot in otherwise. Still, their stomachs threatened to revolt at every step. They weren't used to the sickening stench of blood, and the situation promised only to get "better."
The cherubim's descendant couldn't stop herself from clapping her hands over her ears whenever she heard those who had once been slaves like her—crying, begging for help, their bodies wrapped in a burning pain. Marín, for her part, made a point of looking away from the slaughter. After all, to her, the slaves who had chosen a different path—who had decided to submit and enforce the laws of the humans' sovereign—were no different from the subjugators.
When they turned the next corridor, they found a basement three stories deep with countless doors made of iron bars. Every cell held starving, sick, decaying people who only moaned with pain every time they exhaled; they didn't have the strength left to complain. More than a prison, the place could be described as an old attic where useless junk was thrown—things left there to wait patiently to be discarded. Because the people in that place were considered property. Objects. Flesh materials. Even livestock.
"There are far more than I expected. I don't think we can look after all of them," Daniela said, voice firm as she braced herself and forced a barred door open with the strength of her renewed body, metal groaning under her grip. Dust and rust rained down over her hands. "You'd better go back, in case Rey needs help. Once I'm done opening the bars, I'll meet you halfway—if it's still safe…" She turned her head slightly, eyes hard despite the tremors shivering through the corridor. "Marín, go with them in case you have to make it back on your own."
With the cherubim's descendant's decisive words hanging in the air, the three of them retraced their steps.
Up on the surface, among a world of lava and scorching stone, the screams of dying people came more and more often. Then—suddenly—a deafening sound made Heliúk look up and see the flare of a massive bolt that turned everything black to white and everything white to black. With its mere presence it could disintegrate, ignite, and freeze whatever it touched directly with its light.
The sound of an event like that was unmistakable; it had been heard not long before the immolation of humanity's three heroes, after the thunder of one of the apocalypse's trumpets.
"The apocalyptic one!" Heliúk gasped, legs trembling as he finally understood why humans had given those titles to the hybrid son of a vampire and a lycanthrope.
Gilgamesh, who still held on to Enlil's endurance, didn't disintegrate. Instead he felt his bones ignite and his skin freeze the instant the powerful bolt wrapped around him—forming innumerable cubes of ice around his body while it set the distant buildings of gold, silver, copper, and diamonds burning even brighter.
Agonizing, the humans' sovereign fell from the sky back into the coliseum, landing at the very center of a fire tornado—right before the eyes of the son he had rejected and condemned to fight until the day he died.
"My great friend… forgive me, I beg you," Gilgamesh pleaded, barely able to speak. The air still left in his lungs had turned to ice, and the skin of his body burned like a torch.
The humans' sovereign had been wrong about his vision of the future—had misread the dream he'd had. All because of a mistake. Because he'd held on to the hope of finding the one he had always sought so desperately. His world teetered on the edge of destruction, and the immortal life he possessed was about to end, because everything he had imagined had been the opposite.
Rey, meanwhile, spread his powerful black wings into the air of a moon that screamed in suffering and trembled as if it were about to split in two. Eyes bloodshot, wearing the form of an unstoppable beast, he drew in a breath with the intent to invoke the next spell—after letting his intimidating energy slip its leash, after revealing in full the fighting spirit that surrounded him, after no longer restraining his murderous intent.
Rey's energy, his spiritual force, his intent poured outward in an abyssal quantity, distorting the space around him until anyone who looked at him would shake with fear.
Before Gilgamesh's blazing eyes, the moon shifted around his opponent, trying to restore the balance it had lost. The air that had been shoved and compressed outward snapped back just as violently to fill the vacuum that had been created. The atmospheric upheaval ended in a grand collision with the fire tornado wrapping Gilgamesh, driving the winds to chase one another in tightening circles—forming a storm that, in seconds, stitched the sky to the earth.
The storm brought a torrential downpour that fused with the rising fire. It was as if the sky, the wind, the moon, the few stars still visible, and the flame itself wanted to mirror the sheer, immense fury they carried.
Something inside Gilgamesh screamed that the immortality he had longed for—earned through so much work and so many trials—would end the moment his treasured friend opened his mouth to invoke. After all, how powerful could a sorcerer be—one with the knowledge and skill to rival gods—if he were human? His friend was far from human and, at the same time, so close to being a god that the answer was obvious.
With his lips ready, Rey couldn't invoke—couldn't use his sorcery at all. He had said that in front of an opponent he had to look strong, when in truth he wasn't. Invoking the first touch in my condition made me lose all my senses as the price for misusing the spell. I can't see, hear, feel, or smell… at least I didn't lose consciousness too, like the last time I used this invocation, Rey thought, drawing another deep breath as if he were doing it for the first time.
As he drifted down through the air, slow and heavy, no matter how hard he tried he couldn't make sense of any of the images his eyes received—nor could he register anything his senses should have been distinguishing.
In the middle of a battle, Rey was trapped inside a body with no contact with the outside world.
I feel an immense emptiness devouring me, claiming this body piece by piece. Feel something? Even "wanting" can create power in a situation like this. To desire something with no logical foundation can become reality if I want it with enough force. Sorcery is the art of ignoring and changing the laws of creation. Vampires, lycanthropes, and other superhuman beings are exceptions to the rule. I've fought for so long just to survive, to keep going—what's wrong with fighting to win, to destroy, to demand respect, and for revenge over what I've lost?
Wrapped in feelings of dissatisfaction and desire, the boy's thoughts became reality in the face of adversity. That opened the way to a sixth sense capable of giving him a faint—but peculiar—glimpse of the outside world.
Rey couldn't even savor it or be properly amazed by the world of burning shadows he managed to perceive. It still wasn't clear enough, and by desperately forcing his awareness, he lost the link to that sixth sense the moment he felt the presence of the person he wanted to kill with all his strength, his being, his soul. That presence was still there beneath him—weak but real—moving, and it had to be eliminated before it recovered. Even after losing the perception he'd reached, he didn't forget how his body was positioned, nor his enemies'.
With the fleeting awareness of his own body etched into his mind, unable to speak, Rey chose to use his hands to form the symbols of a conditioned spell, aiming to manipulate space-time so his body would return—partly—to what it had been before the fight.
With trembling arms and legs that could barely move, Rey struck his chest with fierce force, his fists clenched, torn, and wounded. Then he extended his hands into a T-shape and began a circular motion: one hand rising as the other fell. A golden flash appeared, and the sensationless body returned to what it had been before the fight began. Only his right eye could see, only his left ear could hear, and the soles of his feet could feel just enough for the worn and tortured body of a sorcerer to keep invoking—and he did the moment he had the chance.
"Second touch," Rey announced, his demeanor haughty and arrogant. Then he looked down toward the ground where his enemy was, inside the abyss that had begun to form in response to the frequency triggered by the first touch.
The sound-and-light frequencies of this touch, invoked by Rey, were capable of breaking the direction of things. Fire and everything that rose began to sink and plunge downward, while water and everything that fell changed course and surged upward, producing a vacuum effect in everything that was static. The coliseum, the mountains of rubble, and the fire ignited by the first touch pitched toward the edge of the earth. Meanwhile, the water—tainted with the blood of the dead—climbed until it reached the skies.
Gilgamesh's legs and limbs, less fortunate, snapped and twisted like dry branches. The fire still burning his skin changed course and flowed downward like a blowtorch. Blood rose toward him, while his body felt as if it would be split in two by the pressure created by the vacuum brought on by reversing matter's logical directions.
After having stopped his breathing as a consequence of the first "touch," which had deprived him of his senses, Rey couldn't understand why the second "touch" made him experience something different from what he'd imagined—or calculated would happen. Like a container with a massive hole, the energy he had accumulated in his core was leaking out of his body involuntarily. With his core gone, his life as a sorcerer was finished. Even so, he sharpened his gaze and let his killing instincts spill out unchecked, because he understood he still had the chance to keep invoking and finally destroy his opponent.
"I need one last sacrifice," he muttered through his teeth.
After drawing a deep breath, the one who had fallen from the sky opened his mouth—and as if it were divine punishment granted by the very moon that wept, dying, a powerful bolt struck him. A naturally produced electrical discharge slammed into Rey's body at the precise moment he was about to invoke.
Taking the full impact, Rey made emergency decisions. While the surge of energy pierced him, he canceled the three invocations he had performed in consecutive effect; he couldn't guarantee he would keep producing energy to meet the demands, and he refused to risk being left cursed over something that wasn't the anti-oblivion spell.
The instant the light vanished, the inside of the young man's sharp eyes went dark, like candles snuffed out. That wasn't easy to notice, because the energy distorting the environment kept emanating, along with Rey's murderous intent and his burning will to fight—though he had died, for the second time, on the battlefield against Gilgamesh.
When Gilgamesh realized the true strength and determination of his friend—who, despite being hit by a bolt of lightning, didn't even blink or feel pain—the moment he returned to the ground, he couldn't stop trembling. Even with the vile sensation of having all four limbs split and hanging uselessly, panic made him drag himself in a desperate attempt to escape. Rey, meanwhile, descended slowly onto the hellish ground.
Heliúk was still peering out, watching the situation with bulging eyes. Seeing the gigantic body of a beast with wings spread settle onto trembling ground as lightly as a feather—after taking an electrical explosion like that, one that had left a ringing in the ears—was breathtaking.
Román, on the other hand, set his hand on the human's right shoulder and walked out to meet Rey, ignoring the cries of a moon that wanted to split in two.
With nothing better to do, the former subjugator also walked out over crystals turning to dust—only to realize something he never would have imagined.
Rey—incarnation of the former judge of Hell, the HeroSlayer, the apocalyptic one, the hybrid between a vampire and a lycanthrope—stood there with his arms at his sides and his wings spread, and he wasn't breathing. Dead beyond remedy, he didn't move at all, despite the energy radiating from him that fanned the flames and stirred the ground's crystals.
Román quickly positioned himself in front of the creature that matched him in size, clenched his fist, and drove a hard blow straight over Rey's heart. The heavy impact could be heard, but it didn't move Rey's body—though it did pass through with kinetic force, and if he'd been a normal person it could have caused internal damage.
In the next instant, Rey coughed up a great jet of blood that Román had to dodge. Rey sucked in several frantic breaths, coughing again and again as he lost his beast form and size.
"Wait—wasn't he dead?" Heliúk said, stunned.
"Control and energy—combined, consciously or unconsciously—are what allow the higher species to push past the body's limits again and again," Román replied, proud that he'd observed the fight in his meditative state. "In other words, the blow I gave him made his heart keep beating. And by the way, Rey, I don't think you have many more deaths left that you can survive."
Rey understood that the old man, more than explaining the situation to Heliúk, was indirectly telling him he was the one responsible for saving his life again. Still, Rey chose to set Román's intention aside so he could fully process that he'd died a second time—the first being during the sacrifice of the vampire he loved.
Every time I die, someone has to sacrifice themselves and suffer, the white-eyed young man thought. In a fight against someone who isn't even a third of half as strong as Father, I was forced to use every secret technique and spell I'd learned and prepared. Even then I ran out of options, and I had to rely on an external factor to make my heart work again. I'm still a long way from making a difference.
"You don't have to worry so much," Román added, joking as if to brush the whole matter off.
"I still have plenty of reasons not to trust you," Rey warned, his words bitter enough that Heliúk edged back as a precaution. "You've guided the decisions I've made up to now. The fact that you're wiser than you look—and even stronger than Gilgamesh—makes me feel like you could be mocking me, like I'm your entertainment."
Román understood he needed to soften the suspicions the white-eyed boy carried inside. That made him speak plainly, dropping the joking tone and changing the way he said things.
"Rey: I always hid my true power because my intention was never to fight. It was to find someone qualified to do it for me when this moon's time reached its end. Call it a conspiracy—you have every right not to trust me, because even if I haven't stabbed you in the back yet, you'll never know when I will, like I did to Gilgamesh." He held Rey's gaze without blinking. "When the moment comes, I'm asking you to be the one to judge and decide whether I'm qualified enough to earn your trust. Don't take it the wrong way, but since it's come up—and knowing the consequences—are you really going to leave alive the one who insists so much on calling you his friend? Maybe it's sensible to reconsider his position, to fight what's waiting for us… if you haven't realized it yet."
Rey paused at the guided question. The tremors rising from the ground didn't lie, and the weather kept worsening.
"The end of this moon isn't far from reaching its conclusion. I admit I should've been more cautious and not leaned on luck, but I managed to decode the blessings that keep the humans' sovereign alive. The thing is… that blessing also keeps this moon—what they call a sun—alive, and everyone on it, including me."
"How is that possible?" Heliúk asked, confused.
"Did you notice?" Román asked Rey, lifting his eyes to the sky stained red—the same firmament whose white points grew larger and larger, because it wasn't a sky full of stars; it was one packed with human vessels. "Gilgamesh's luck was—and still is—the thin thread keeping this moon many call a sun in existence. After so much destruction, I don't think anything can be saved. It's incredible that one individual's luck is enough to hold up an entire civilization, and the happiness of millions of human lives, for so long."
"Leaving aside that he's my father," Heliúk added, "killing him won't solve anything if it leads to our destruction. From the beginning he wanted you at his side to build great things. Do you remember, Rey?"
Rey breathed in, determination hardening in his eyes as he touched the new scar on his body—the one along his abdomen that reminded him of a loved one's sacrifice, a sacrifice that had cursed Gilgamesh, the moon they called a sun, and everyone who lived on it, even if it wasn't right. On top of that, from that moment forward, that place no longer had any chance of returning to peace. Conquering without destroying wasn't an easy task—at least not now, not when every human scattered across the neighboring galaxies was invading, and if a god could kill a thousand humans, the effort of a thousand humans could kill a god.
"Joining Gilgamesh means letting everyone weak die," Rey replied. "That includes you—and everyone I know." And there was also the brilliant idea Gilgamesh had had: broadcasting live, for all to see, the location of the most hated individual among humans—the one responsible for everything that was happening.
"But people can change, and my father doesn't have friends—not yet—because there's never been anyone who could tell him he was wrong," Heliúk insisted. He tried to keep going, but someone shouted from far off, cutting him short.
"Rey!" Jhades called out loudly, trying to get his brother's attention. "Where's Gilgamesh? We're recovered and we came to help you in case you die again—you know… the usual."
You're late, Rey wanted to say, but it didn't feel right. His brothers had fought well in the last battle.
"Gilgamesh isn't a concern anymore," he answered, thrown by his vampire brother's words—because by nature, Jhades didn't ask for anything unless he stood to gain something in return.
"We've got a situation," Jhades said as soon as he came close and lowered his guard.
Heliúk stopped where he was, closed his eyes, and felt the weight of what was coming settle on his shoulders. When a vampire talked like that—we've got—it meant he had something in mind.
Román, on the other hand, smiled as if he'd been waiting to hear it.
The vampire stepped closer than the other two. He held his breath, puffed his chest, and took the lead before Dante or Marín could.
"Down in the depths of the dungeons, we found more than a dozen prisoners willing to follow us and fight—along with the ones who were rescued from the decontamination area inside the temple. They're there too. They're the fire of the rebellion Akai left behind."
Rey opened his eyes to look at the vampire, who most of the time wore truth like a disguise out of habit. Given the situation, his behavior, the circumstances, there was no need for him to lie—yet he wanted to believe, and make others believe, something that might not be true. When Rey shifted his gaze toward Dante, he understood Dante didn't want to intervene for fear of putting his foot in it. In a way, it made it obvious: they were being influenced by the girls with them, trying to stop being what they were—trying to look like the kind of people who took responsibility for other lives.
How long are they going to keep that attitude? At least this time they don't seem to be doing it out of competitiveness, like before, Rey thought. And at the same time he knew that if he made a decision that didn't satisfy his brothers' wishes, it meant taking a different path from theirs—and leaving them behind on a moon about to be destroyed, which meant their imminent deaths and the breaking of the promise he'd made to his mother long ago.
The moon's tremors doubled with every second. Under Román's watchful gaze, taking responsibility for who knew how many sick, decaying people was something that had to be weighed in peace. After all, if Rey made a mistake and lost his own life by taking responsibility for people he didn't even know, he would be failing Lía's promise. But if he found a prosperous place for life at the price of being alone… would Lía and his brothers endure something like that?
After thinking it through—remembering Akai's words, the name Jhades had slipped so casually into his manipulative conversation, and seeing himself reflected in his own father—Rey decided to accept his brother's suggestion. Relief and joy lit the faces around him, especially Román's.
"Bring whoever wants to keep living to this place," Rey said, voice steady, "but keep in mind that from this moment on, the lives of those who follow me will carry the same weight as yours. No more. No less."
With an energized attitude, Jhades got exactly what he'd planned to get and felt proud for following the path his beloved had suggested he take. Dante and his companion understood the purpose, so they moved at once, falling into step behind Jhades.
After giving Heliúk one last look, Rey set off in the direction Gilgamesh had fled, as if he were someone with unfinished business that needed to be settled.
You can't leave an enemy alive—unless he ends up becoming your friend, Rey thought, walking calmly.
One of the arena's walls had been knocked down, revealing the entrance to what looked like a secret passage—one Gilgamesh had chosen to slip into. Too luxurious to be used by slaves, too small to be used under normal circumstances. Without a doubt, it was one of the many escape routes meant to guarantee the safety of important spectators.
Rey no longer had bloodshot eyes, but he felt exhausted. The fissure in his core still allowed the energy inside him to leak out.
When he raised his hands, Rey could see black stains on his skin—signs of the illness advancing. Step by step, he stared down the corridor toward its end. After all, he couldn't kill Gilgamesh without first giving his brothers enough time.
Letting someone live who could be a threat in the future isn't a good option… Román isn't the exception, but there are always special circumstances, the white-eyed young man reflected. On the other hand, for someone like him to run, it's because he knows he'll die without question if he doesn't. Otherwise, why would he? Preserving life is a natural instinct we all have.
"Last round—and you'd better run, because for every moment you stop moving, I'll be that much closer to catching you," Rey said out loud. His voice was low and terrifying, reverberating off every wall.
Meanwhile, Jhades, Dante, and Marín sprinted back toward the cells where Daniela was. On their second trip, with hardly any delays, the young ones noticed the worry on their own faces. For them, not finding anyone waiting at the halfway point felt wrong.
Maybe I shouldn't have left Daniela alone. If a subjugator survived and found her… Jhades thought, quickening his pace, irritated at himself for worrying so much over a food wrapper. Still, she's given me so much trouble to keep alive that letting her die over something insignificant makes no sense.
The vampire barely recognized himself, nearly to the point of panting for breath. After a while, the three of them reached the cells—and ran headfirst into a cruel reality that hadn't even crossed their minds earlier.
Daniela and a handful of people whose bodies were in poor shape had just finished opening the bars of the last cell. Daniela's steady voice carried through the space, giving them courage, urging each and every one of those forced into becoming warriors, slaves, and damares to keep going.
Yet despite her energetic tone, the eyes of those present didn't look like they wanted to keep living—especially not the ones already dying from wounds or disease. It wasn't as if the dead would rise and decide to live again.
Marín, insulted that even with every cell open no one alive wanted to come out or listen to Daniela, began to lose it and slammed her fist into the nearest wall.
"This is the fire of the rebellion Akai left behind? A miserable ember of coal wrapped in ashes. We got you a place with the 'fallen from the sky'—the powerful being said whoever followed him would be treated like brothers and sisters. After Gilgamesh's defeat, you don't want your freedom on this moon that won't stop shaking?"
Jhades wondered, troubled, if what he expected was his beloved's happiness—yet his face showed sadness. The blood bag's unhappiness was caused by those who wouldn't get up, and that meant another problem for him.
Of the few who lifted their eyes to look at the cause of the commotion, someone tossed a question into the air:
"What's the point of staying alive? Just to keep suffering?" Lamentations followed those words. "Dragging out our lives when there's nowhere to go is clinging to a pointless illusion. Ever since the fallen from the sky arrived, word is this moon is considered contaminated—because of the presence of a category-three being. If we leave, we'll be exterminated anyway by OEM forces when these collars blow."
The man's words, pessimistic as they were, were reality for many of those present—who didn't even have the strength to speak.
Marín had no choice but to lower her gaze.
"Who said that kind of stupidity?" Dante roared, feral with fury, as he forced someone to stand.
Seeing his girl suffer put such a crushing ache in his chest he couldn't bear it. The only thing that dulled it was being violent toward someone else.
Jhades reached out and tore the explosive collar off the person Dante had yanked upright. Everyone nearby flinched, thinking it would detonate, but it didn't.
"Even if you've surrendered and accepted your deaths, you're still afraid to die?" the vampire said, irony dripping from his words, contempt thick as if he were staring at something foul. "Anyone who changes their mind is still free to take the collars off and keep living."
Faced with that miraculous proof, the people felt a spark of motivation from the one with those intense blue eyes. Slowly, trembling, one by one they began removing their collars—biting down hard, squeezing their eyelids shut. When they saw the deadly devices didn't explode, joy and the will to live flooded the faces of that class that had been oppressed for so long.
As quickly as she could—and trying not to draw attention—Daniela ran to meet her beloved. Holding herself back and resisting the urge to hug him, she asked, "How did you do it?" She meant the collars.
The eyes of a happy girl looking at him, the way she moved closer—those were the things that could make any young man in love feel warm inside. The same things that made Jhades draw a proud breath and brace himself for praise.
"Blood wrapper—my intelligence is superior," the vampire replied, triumph flashing across his face, anything to avoid explaining the outcome of something that had been pure coincidence.
"Cherub…" a dying voice called. "Earlier you were asking about someone like you—pink eyes and pink hair, right?" said a man passing nearby, and Daniela froze mid-step, her whole body jolting. "I'm afraid to tell you that when he was informed of his parents' deaths, he raised his voice at an officer and was transferred to another location."
The man speaking had no idea the other cherub might be her brother, which made him mention the parents' deaths without any delicacy—those same parents who could be Daniela's, the beings she loved and adored most in the world. Knowing that, she swallowed hard and lowered her head. She felt selfish—so selfish that it wouldn't be enough for her to know her brother was alive to feel okay.
"Jhades…" Daniela said, eyes full of wanting—of asking without words.
Understanding that his happiness and his moment of greatness lasted so little, Jhades took the cherubim's descendant's hand for the first time and, with certainty in his gaze, agreed to the silent request she'd made. The vampire wasn't bothered that his praise session had been interrupted, because seeing the desperation and pain on the girl's face after receiving such a brutal piece of news gave him far more satisfaction—so much that it made him wonder, What if she manages to see her parents' dead bodies?
"Dante, Marín—can you handle the rest?" the vampire asked, already with something in mind.
His question earned a firm yes. Both Dante and Marín were determined to deal with whoever needed to leave the facility before it collapsed. With that, the vampire and the cherubim's descendant set off in the direction the man's hand had indicated.
The tremors in the floor and walls worsened by the second, making it clear they didn't have much time. The two of them chose to push toward areas far deeper inside the installation.
With every step down past the three levels, the dungeons became sturdier in structure and smaller in space—so much so that the doors weren't barred gates anymore, but solid metal slabs studded with rivets and stainless bolts. Inside each one lived only a single person, someone who didn't seem to have lost the will to live. Among the survivors, a small green child stood out—one who looked familiar to Jhades, because he resembled someone he knew.
After raising his weapons and firing, Jhades blasted the locks apart as he hurried past with his beloved, who only had time to cry out a name—Max.
"Make your way to the arena!" Jhades called as the doors swung open and Daniela pointed the way, teetering on the edge of desperation and grief.
They searched the corners of the facility carefully until they reached what looked like the end. A gigantic gate blocked the exit, but since it had once been the entrance everyone had to pass through to reach the arena stands, the area was decorated to draw the eye and lined with countless empty vendor stalls. Chairs, fountains, food that was still fresh, the occasional dead body on the floor—someone trampled by a crazed crowd—luxurious walls, and signs everywhere telling people where to line up if they wanted to get something.
Daniela, familiar with the place, pushed through the different stalls, leaving the one who had come with her behind.
"What is this?" Jhades asked when he finally reached the spot his beloved had been trying to find.
"This is the entrance to the arena's mini temple of amatory arts," the girl replied, desolate at not having found her brother. "Just like with the men, women who aren't fit to fight can choose to serve the humans. Help me open this door—it's blocked."
As the tremors grew more violent, Jhades ordered Regres to hurry and open the door Daniela indicated. She stepped aside and covered her ears.
With the thunder of explosions caused by energy-pistol rounds, the lock and the hinges holding the metal door in place were hammered violently. The metal didn't allow the shots through, but it took brutal dents across its surface. From the other side—between detonations—murmurs and the shouts of dozens of anxious voices could be heard.
"Get back, it's dangerous!"
After a burst of ten shots, the heavy door of pink-toned metal crashed down, and female bodies—covered by very little—were suddenly exposed.
The panic of the many women trying to protect themselves from the tremors was obvious to Daniela. She understood their eyes were wide at the idea of being crushed by a door like that. But she had no time to understand or explain. She scanned faces, said her brother's name, and kept moving.
At the unexpected sight of a vampire and a cherubim's descendant entering through a door that had just been forced down, the priestesses—confused—stood waiting for an order they could follow. They didn't know whether to rejoice or be afraid. They were only used to receiving commands and offering their bodies; it was how they'd stayed alive for so long.
Daniela swept the room with her gaze and hurried on.
"Head to the arena with the others if you want to keep living," the blue-eyed young man clarified, forced to speak at last. He couldn't deny the women here were closer to his tastes in physical appearance—but not in suffering.
Wanting to live, the women began filing out through the main entrance without asking a single question. Meanwhile, flipping through the papers that held the records for the place, Daniela couldn't find the name she was looking for. That meant her brother wasn't there.
"We've gone through the whole arena—where else could he be?" Daniela murmured, stepping closer to the enormous hollow that came with losing hope.
The tremors were already warping the ceiling and walls. Even so, Jhades lifted his beloved's bowed head with his hand, giving her encouragement—because for him, the best part still hadn't arrived.
"Daniela. Let's keep looking…"
After wiping her tears with her wrists, she forced her best face onto the situation before moving forward. Maybe she hadn't come in time to save her brother or her parents, but she was doing something to save the ones still trapped in the coliseum.
"Before the festivities began, a cherub was brought in by force," said one of the last girls to leave.
"Where did they take him?" Daniela asked, desperate.
"To the BDSM room—it's at the end, down the stairs. Maybe that's why he wasn't registered."
As fast as she could, the pink-haired girl thanked her and hurried in the direction she'd been told. Jhades, driven to see it through to the end, followed close behind.
The moment they reached the bottom of the stairs, they found grim gates soaked in the unmistakable stench of blood. From inside came screams—pain, suffering. Daniela, terrified, clapped her hands over her ears, hard, so she wouldn't hear. It tore at her soul that sounds like that could come from a person.
The vampire, unable to hide the delight on his face, raised his weapons and opened fire to bring the door down. He was ready to execute any subjugator with a single shot if he ran into one.
As soon as the door collapsed, he identified two presences: one person bound to a chair, while the other stood armed with a knife. Jhades prepared to vanish into black mist, intent on annihilating the threat—but Daniela stopped him. She was the first to enter the room. She stared the torturer straight in the eyes, not at the one being tortured and strapped to the chair, their head covered by a hood that left only eyes and nose visible.
The one holding the knife shared the cherubim's characteristic eye color, even if his eyes were bloodshot. It was the brother Daniela had been searching for.
The moment he recognized his sister, he dropped the knife in shock.
Lowering his weapons and grasping the situation from his beloved's reaction, Jhades had no doubt she was about to get angry and start a fight—something he would find delightful to watch.
"Who the hell is coming to interrupt us?" the tortured man demanded, but his voice didn't reach the girl.
"As always… the family's 'troublemaker.' You're a cherub—your purpose is to help humans, not… do these things to them," Daniela scolded the pink-haired torturer, who tried to use his right foot to nudge the knife he'd dropped behind the chair, out of sight.
"Says who?" the half-dressed young cherub snapped, indignant. "My purpose is to let myself get tortured without resisting, to 'help' this human? Daniela, this bastard killed our parents right in front of my eyes—and he plans to kill me if I leave him alive after this. How am I supposed to die in peace without delivering justice with my own hands? Without showing the world I can go against my nature?"
"Pathetic…" the insulted man sneered. "What don't you understand? If you must serve humans, it's because we are their gods."
Even angrier, Daniela stepped up to her brother, snatched a dagger from the nearby table, and in one thrust drove it into the human's chest. His eyes flew open, as if he'd just witnessed something impossible.
"For your information, justice isn't torture…" Daniela said, voice sharp with reprimand. "This whole world started shaking because Jhades's brother—he defeated Gilgamesh in battle."
The young man—slim, and a little taller than his sister—furrowed his brow the moment she stumbled over Jhades's name. He looked her over with suspicion, wiped at his jaw, then added warily, "You've never stuttered someone's name in your life. You never even dreamed of killing a human… Did you fall?"
In a flash of rage, she yanked the knife out of the dying man's chest and pointed it at the blue-eyed boy, who watched the scene tenderly as blood spattered like rain.
Splashed with red, Daniela's already-damp hair moved in slow waves as she said, "Yes. I fell for him—when he saved me from dying."
Max shook his head. He was disappointed; he didn't approve of what she was telling him.
Daniela shot back, "I told you this moment would come, sooner or later. How dare you break our deal and not approve my decision with happiness?"
"Our deal was for when we both had someone," the cherub snapped, beside himself, "not for you to show up out of nowhere and tell me 'Jh… Jhades' with no warning."
"Why do you think I came looking for you?" Daniela asked, insulted by his attitude. "I'm here because I want you with us. Because I don't want to abandon you, Max."
Another blood bag. Two for one… Jhades told himself.
Tears spilled from Daniela's eyes—drops that held a whole tangled mix of feelings she probably couldn't even explain.
Needy despite himself, amid tremors and blood, Max broke down and hugged his sister. Then he opened his eyes and looked at the vampire, who stood at the end of the hall with a smile, as if weighing a difficult decision.
Jhades met that stare. In his opinion, the sensation of corrupting another person's innocent nature wouldn't be so bad—dragging into the open the selfishness and discontent he carried inside, something intense and deeply pleasurable to feel.
Suddenly, before Max could say anything else to his sister, the ceiling seemed to shrink downward and the floor began to quake so violently it was hard to stay standing.
Jhades's voice cut through.
"Want to end up compressed? No one knows how much longer this place will last."
Heeding the vampire's words, Daniela and her brother burst out of the room just as it finished crushing the ceiling down into the floor—like a soda can flattened under a shoe.
As they hurried up the stairs, the cherub kept one of the knives he'd taken. The power radiating from the blue-eyed young man's presence unsettled him—and even more terrifying was watching his sister kill someone without remorse, leaving their father and mother's memory behind with such ease. After all, what had looked like torture had been his own repeated, failed attempts to kill the human with his bare hands.