Fury

The endless night gained a hazy quality, punctuated by rain that fell vertically, shattering into pieces against the grim architecture of Nostramo.

The rain would not stop.

Kael crouched in silence atop a gargantuan gargoyle, gazing down at the Church of Rest. The Wraith stood behind him; his mere presence sent a frigid chill crawling up Kael's spine.

The Wraith held no hostility toward him; this innate sense of threat stemmed from the fundamental differences between them.

Kael was well aware of this—he had known it from the moment he first encountered the Wraith six months ago.

"How is it?"

A hissing voice sounded behind him. When speaking the Nostramo tongue, the Wraith's voice was softer than most.

Kael did not answer.

"What is the situation, Kael? Are we moving?"

The Wraith asked again, his voice tinged with impatience. "He is right there in the church, along with his men. It is an unprecedented opportunity."

"He was never the target." Kael finally spoke, his tone cold. "At best, he is merely a dog."

Beyond that, he did not say another word. The Wraith fell silent, letting his thoughts drift. With this unsettling silence, the Wraith closed his eyes.

The next moment, countless visions swept over him. Ominous, dark, violent. Terrifying. They were refractions of a future, a shattered mirror.

Yet, the Wraith remained unmoved.

He knew that among all these visions, only one could come to pass; the others were nothing but interference. However, he rarely managed to see the future clearly without such distractions.

This was one of his gifts.

He had never mentioned this to Kael, nor, of course, another fact—the Wraith had never glimpsed Kael's shadow in any of the visions he witnessed.

Not even once.

In all the visions he could see, the person known as Kael Lohars seemed not to exist.

Kael did not care about the Wraith's silence; he was accustomed to this companion who was more of a monster than he was. Most of the time, the Midnight Haunt resembled a beast in human shape more than a man, and Kael had fully grasped the habits of this beast.

Kael knew that the Wraith preferred silence in his daily life.

As it happened, he preferred it too when he was thinking.

Kael stared at the woman in the white robe; his eyesight was excellent. This allowed him to see the woman's attire clearly.

The white robe the woman wore was outlined with gold thread at the edges, a stark contrast to the dress of most people in the lower hive. Even some nobles likely lacked the status to wear such garments.

And that metallic prosthetic limb.

It was clear she was someone from the upper levels, yet Razor did not appear servile while speaking with her.

To this, Kael merely smiled calmly. What else could he say? He was not surprised.

The woman left the church entrance, boarded a vehicle, and departed. The roaring machine started up, its momentum terrifying, its size even more so. The vehicle occupied more than half the street, and as it pulled away, it even crushed two children crossing the road.

Yet, no one cared; only a few hands reached out from the darkness, impatiently dragging the mangled corpses inside.

The vagrants, thrown out of the factories because they were too ill to continue working, needed those two children.

People are always hungry.

A sharp sound came from behind him, like two pieces of razor-sharp metal grinding against each other.

Kael knew that a monster was gnashing its teeth.

"No need," Kael said. "Your anger is useless for now, Wraith. She cannot die yet. Did you see the clothes she was wearing?"

"Noble," the Wraith exhaled a cold mist.

"Yes, noble."

Kael bared his teeth, laughing silently as he nodded.

He should have been handsome, with melancholic eyes and a high-bridged nose. Yet, the way he laughed openly could completely ruin that handsomeness.

At this moment, crouching on the gargoyle, he looked exactly like a monster in the dark, waiting to devour its prey.

"I am going into the church to pray."

Kael stood up, and the gargoyle beneath his feet bared its teeth toward the sky in silence. "You can go and track that woman first. But do not kill her."

He turned his head, looked up at the tall, silent Wraith, and asked patiently, "Can you do that?"

"I make no guarantees," the Wraith whispered. "I cannot guarantee..."

Faced with his ambiguous reply, Kael merely smiled.

"Just don't kill her," he said softly. "You understand what I mean."

--

"Fuck!"

Razor kicked the priest's head away in a fit of rage. It flew through the air, slammed into a nearby pew, and rolled far away.

At this moment, the interior of the church looked like a slaughterhouse, and the thick scent of fresh blood made some of the eleven people present tremble uncontrollably.

Don't misunderstand; they weren't afraid. How could they be? They had committed acts far more horrific with their own hands.

As for the reason:

A hallucinogen derived from human blood was quite popular in Nostramo. Most gang members had injected it and were deeply obsessed with it.

As this addiction deepened, even ordinary blood began to have an effect on the user similar to a stimulant.

If you find this absurd, then you don't yet understand Nostramo. There is no such thing as morality here; as long as there is profit to be made, anything can happen.

Razor stood beneath the blood-stained idol, fury churning endlessly in his heart—most of the time, he had to struggle immensely to suppress his emotions.

However, the moment his gaze drifted upward and he saw the words inscribed on the idol, his rage finally erupted.

"Who does he think he is?!"

Razor roared, drew the pistol at his waist, and fired repeatedly at the idol, shattering the head of the faceless deity. He had no respect for this god; after all, Razor knew that gods simply did not exist.

"Coming for my sins? Fuck that! Does some lunatic killing people all over the city think he's so noble?"

"I'm going to kill him, I'm going to skin him alive, and I'll pull out every one of his ribs to use as carvings!"

Razor bellowed in a frenzy, his temples throbbing and the veins on his forehead bulging—his anger didn't stem solely from his uncontrollable emotions; it was also linked to a chemical agent he had been using. The substance had a long history, serving as a special indulgence for the upper nobility.

It was also the payment Razor received for working for one of them.

You see, in Nostramo, anyone can find a way to pass the time.

But at what cost?

"I am not noble, Razor, but I have indeed come for your sins."

A voice spoke these words, and the lights inside the church were extinguished in the next second—once, the lighting in the church had been controlled by the priest; if he didn't nod, no one could turn the lights on or off.

As for now, he was dead.

In the darkness, a soft voice sounded, filled with rapid, hissing rasps. The phrasing was melodic, as romantic as poetry, yet it made those who heard it feel a creeping dread.

"Murder is the most common crime in Nostramo, my dear Mr. Razor. When the fire of rage rises in the heart, anyone might commit such a wicked act. However, I personally do not care for that method."

"Killing driven by anger is inefficient. I hate inefficiency."

Razor did not answer the voice in the darkness. He stared, gun gripped tight, his rage vanished without a trace.

The gang leader who had been roaring about torturing someone two minutes ago was now eerily calm, as were the ten men he had brought with him. Without even needing an order, they spontaneously formed a back-to-back formation.

"Well-trained, Mr. Razor."

The voice sounded again, amusement evident.

"So, which noble's private soldiers are you? Is someone planning to purge the lower-level factions again? Ah, it happens every twenty years, like a natural law—a natural law that brings immense profit."

"Show yourself!"

Razor shouted into the darkness. "Since you've already guessed it, there's no need to make an enemy of us! You cannot afford the price!"

"The price."

The voice in the darkness laughed lowly, the sound echoing between the stone walls of the Church of Rest, eventually becoming distorted, sounding like the low growl of a monster. The temperature began to drop.

Cold sweat trickled down Razor's forehead; he didn't understand why he was so nervous. Could it be the surrounding darkness? Yet, darkness was the thing every Nostramo native was most accustomed to.

He was used to walking in the dark.

But he couldn't stop his gun hand from trembling. And in the next second, a slight sound from behind him triggered his taut nerves.

Razor spun around violently, and he and his companions fired wildly in that direction.

Gunfire erupted.

"Wrong direction, Mr. Razor."

A voice sounded from above Razor's head, followed by warm breath. He widened his eyes and raised his hand, about to pull the trigger, but a piercing pain in his wrist stopped his movement.

The sharp sound of some blade cutting through the air rang out again, followed by the dull thud of a blade entering flesh.

The gang members were all too familiar with that sound.

Finally, there was Razor's scream. He opened the prelude to this slaughter with the most terrifying wail of his life.

Gunfire erupted once more.

The gang members, having realized what was happening, began to fire frantically at the ceiling, but to no avail.

They had been trained within the noble estates and knew that in such situations, they had to keep some men on guard rather than dumping all their ammunition at once, as that would give the enemy an opening.

But they could no longer remember that.

They only wanted to keep pulling the triggers.

The fear that spread from the darkness, devoid of reason or logic, completely shattered their training. Fear destroyed the details held in their memory and the willpower they thought was firm.

Fear crushed everything.

And so, death descended once more.

Karyl lunged out from behind them, the speed of the blade in his hand neither hurried nor slow, every strike perfectly precise.

The first blade pierced through someone's cheek from behind; the victim screamed in pain, trying to break free, but it was useless. As the blade pierced his flesh, it also served to control him.

Immediately after, Karyl rotated his right wrist. A tremendous force drove the second blade in through the jaw and out through the top of the skull.

Blood sprayed out, and he narrowed his eyes, licking his lips in satisfaction.

"Behind you!"

Someone shouted in the darkness, but Karyl was no longer interested in giving them any chances.

He never felt pity, nor would he ever miss an opportunity.

He nimbly withdrew the blade from the flesh and stepped back, his right leg lashing out with sudden force to kick the lifeless corpse into the air, sending it crashing into the chaotic crowd and knocking a row of them over instantly.

A few lucky ones had already reloaded their weapons; they pulled the triggers with trembling fingers, and the muzzle flashes erupted, illuminating the darkness and revealing a grinning monster within their field of vision.

Karyl began to glide—his footwork allowed him to move lightly through the shadows, and he didn't even need to divide his attention to easily dodge the bullets wrapped in fear.

Too simple, too easy.

Slaughter. To him, it was as natural as breathing.

He lunged forward, right hand extending, the blade carving an arc that drew blood. Then he lunged again, using a kick to force a man's head to snap at an angle. A crisp crack rang out, and Karyl let out a loud laugh.

He stopped, rotated his wrist, pierced an eyeball and the brainstem behind it, then twisted. He withdrew the blade and thrust it into another man's throat. He ducked to avoid a grapple, backhanding his blade to slice open the attacker's soft throat.

He threw his weapon with his left hand, driving it into a man's chest, then immediately turned back, using his now-empty left hand to rip cartilage and trachea from the throat he had just sliced open.

"Ah."

The monster stopped in place, smiling, shaking the sticky flesh in his grip before shaking his head as if feeling quite comfortable, taking a deep breath.

"Three left."

He whispered, counting the number of enemies without even glancing at the trembling gang members. He could already smell the stench of urine, clearly mixed in with the scent of blood.

A moment later, a series of screams rang out once more in the church, with low, wall-thumping laughter serving as the accompaniment to their deaths.

Amidst the disarray of the pews, the priest's head stared silently in the darkness, gazing indifferently at it all.

The dead have no comment on this.