27. Interlude: Standard Interrogation (5k)

Zabriel took off his robe, shook his hands, and slowly pushed the sleeves of his gray training shirt up to his elbows.

The air was cold, and a pale light descended from above, filling the interrogation room with a sense of foreboding—"there is no place to hide," the pale light whispered.

In another corner of the room, a woman who had been suspended was struggling, drenched in sweat.

The chains swayed, and the iron hooks that pierced through the gaps between her muscles and bones began to punish her silently. Blood gushed out, quickly pooling into a new mass at her feet.

Zabriel calmly turned his head, a combat dagger already in his hand.

He wasn't a professional interrogator, nor was he some kind of sadist who enjoyed torturing humans, so the only thing he had in this situation was this poorly sized combat dagger.

However, that probably doesn't matter. His interrogator was already on the verge of collapse after being put on the Edge of Reason, and Zabriel felt that he probably only needed to cut a little skin to get the truth.

But he didn't really want to use his own knife, especially after he learned what this woman had done.

Holding the knife, Zabriel approached her. "Leona de Laar?"

Please, please!

The witch, her real name called out again, spoke with fear, but then gave a rather strange response.

"I beg you, sir, please do not say that name again."

Zabriel frowned and turned to look at the wall on his right, but received no response, so he simply asked directly.

"What's the meaning?"

That name no longer belongs to me.

The witch answered hoarsely, shaking her head, blood and sweat dripping from her golden hair. Her blue eyes were wide open to their limit, bloodshot, as if she had fallen into madness.

Zabriel hesitated for a moment, then walked up to her, gently taking her left hand in his. He pinched the witch's thumb between his index and middle fingers, applied slight pressure, and bent it, then rotated it.

Until he reached a certain limit, a section of his thumb, still attached to the bone, was held between his fingers by Zabriel. He raised his hand, showing it to the hanging witch, and asked her question again amidst her screams.

"Why, Leona de Laar? Why do you say this name doesn't belong to you?"

"Stop reading!"

She roared in response, weeping bitterly, blood spurting from the hole in her left hand, where remnants of nerves and blood vessels were still faintly visible in the cruel, bloody cavity.

She looked pitiful, but Zabriel had no kindness in his heart—Leona de Laar was a genuine witch, already wanted by the Adeptus Arbites and the Inquisition.

Her crimes are numerous, one of which is "stealing someone else's identity." It seems unremarkable, but the way she did it was by skinning the victim and eating their flesh and soul together to gain their memories, and finally turning that skin into her own.

In other words, the real Catherine Fine and countless other victims suffered ten thousand times more before they died than she is experiencing now.

"Then tell me the truth," the old knight said coldly. "Or do you wish for further punishment, Leona de Laar?"

The witch's head, which had been drooping in pain, suddenly rose, followed by a cracking sound as her chin abruptly split open, tearing apart her fair, taut skin and muscles.

Her bones creaked, her jaw and tongue twisted and turned, and countless still-living insects burst from the depths of her throat with a supernatural shriek, instantly filling the room with a putrid stench.

Zabriel frowned, took a few steps back, and then heard another strange muffled sound.

Are there even more evil practices?

He instinctively raised his knife to kill the witch, but a voice in his ear dissuaded him. "No, there's no need to do that, Zabriel. She's just being punished."

Punish?

"Yes. It seems someone has taken her name and forbids her from using it anymore. She'll be punished if anyone calls her by that name. It's an interesting method, but I think it's probably beyond your area of expertise?"

The old knight nodded almost imperceptibly.

"So, do you need a helper?"

Who?

"A seasoned Inquisitor's attendant arrived shortly."

Attendant?

Zabriel, puzzled, sheathed his knife and took a few steps back to avoid his boots being touched by the insects still wriggling on the ground.

He wasn't opposed to help from the Inquisitor, even the annoying Shefa wouldn't bother him, after all, the person he had just spoken to was, strictly speaking, the founder of the Inquisition.

But a mere servant? Does he really have the ability to handle something like this?

Three muffled knocks sounded a moment later. Zabriel went to open the door and saw a strong mortal. The man was wearing a black uniform, his muscles bulging at the cuffs. The insignia of the Inquisition was pinned to his chest and was polished to a spotless shine.

He wasn't wearing a hat, revealing a head full of very short stubble, a high nose bridge, and lips that habitually turned down, giving him a troublesome and unapproachable look. Even when he opened the door and saw a giant like Zabriel with an expressionless face, he didn't change his expression.

"Excuse me, sir, I'm here to help." That's how he began.

Zabriel stepped aside to let him in, closing the door behind him. With a heavy, echoing sound, the man began to introduce himself.

"My name is Lental Black Sable, and I am the armed squire and personal bodyguard of Inquisitor Serano van Delleef. I have been assigned by Lord Karyl Lohars to provide you with some professional theoretical explanations. For the sake of the Emperor, may our cooperation be fruitful."

Zabriel watched him walk into the swarm of insects, and within half a second of introducing himself, he squatted down, grabbed a handful of insects still covered in slime and blood with his bare hands, and even brought them to his nose to sniff them carefully.

"Yes, just as I suspected, it's the Heart-Eater Worms."

"Heart-Eater Worms?"

"A Warp creature."

The Black Sable replied dismissively, tossed the insect to his feet, then lifted his coat and took a small metal bottle from his belt.

He turned his head and said to Zabriel, "My lord, please step back a little further."

What are you going to do?

The Black Sable gave a dry laugh, "The Heart-Eater Worms will rapidly drain the host's soul about a minute after leaving the host's body and then coalesce into the Heart-Eater Beast, a powerful Daemon about four meters tall. There's no way the two of us can defeat it."

"So, in other words, sir, I have to kill these little bastards before they use evil magic to devour the souls of our interrogation subjects and kill us—they're a bunch of Daemon scum."

Zabriel offered no comment on his words, but silently took a few steps back, watching as the Black Sable opened the metal bottle and threw it into the writhing swarm of insects.

A kind of pale, bone-white ash rapidly poured out of the bottle, as if being pulled along, quickly covering the entire swarm of insects, but they did not react at all, only suddenly stopping their wriggling.

Seconds later, without Zabriel blinking the entire time, the insects on the ground suddenly turned into wisps of smoke and silently floated towards the ceiling.

The Black Sable crouched down again, picked up his bottle and put it back on his belt, then walked over to Leona de Laar, who was hanging by chains, and casually asked a question while reaching out to straighten her head.

"Sir, how do you plan to interrogate her next?"

"What?" Zabriel asked instinctively—he hadn't yet recovered from the scene just now.

The Black Sable reached out, ripped off the witch's chin, and tossed it aside.

The sticky thud was fleeting, but he acted as if nothing had happened, reaching out to grab the witch's tongue. Then, his right hand shot out, and a golden light, like lightning, pierced through the bloody tongue, pinning it firmly to the witch's chest.

Zabriel looked closely and discovered that it was actually a sharp, gold-inlaid finger bone that had been polished.

Leona de Laer let out a muffled cry and slowly woke up.

I have three options to recommend.

The Black Sable spoke, hands behind its back, standing beside her and shrugging.

"The first step is to maintain the status quo and review each question one by one. It's not efficient, but she can't pull any tricks, and if the answers to some questions are cursed, she can bear the consequences for us."

"The second method is to directly extract her brain and place it in a humidification tank, then retrieve all her memories using data analysis. This is the fastest method, but it requires analysis and translation, as well as the accompaniment of a devout Tech-Priest."

The third is --

"--bass."

Zabriel, his face grim, drew his combat dagger; the sound of the blade scraping against the scabbard interrupted Black Sable's words.

He smiled knowingly, said nothing more, but bent down to pick up the witch's chin, then pulled out the finger bone and used it as a nail to connect the bloody chin to Leona de Laal's face.

She struggled in agony, her once vibrant blue eyes vanishing completely, leaving only a murky white.

"So, you choose the old method?"

"I'd rather use the old method," the old knight said expressionlessly, approaching the witch with his dagger, and then asked again.

"What is your relationship with the traitorous war gang, Thousand Eyes?"

The Black Sable raised its right hand at the opportune moment, turned the bone nail, and the golden light flashed again. Leona de la Régis cried out, her voice surprisingly clear.

"I'm their informant!"

"Explain in more detail."

Zabriel gave the order, glancing at the Black Sable. The sable understood and rotated the bone nail again.

The witch's screams grew increasingly shrill, excrement slid down her thighs, pooling in the blood. Dense, spiderweb-like veins silently bulged against her skin, their dark, alien substance containing some kind of twisted, living thing crawling rapidly within.

"I serve them."

Leona coughed as she answered, dust-like blood and fragments of rotting internal organs gushing from her throat.

"The Thousand Eyes gave me power, allowing me to transcend a mediocre fate. In return, I must serve them forever, passing on intelligence."

"Liar!" Zabriel roared. "You're clearly collaborating with Xenos scum!"

The Black Sable gently tapped the bone nail.

"That's because they've lost contact with me!" the witch screamed. "They haven't contacted me for almost a century!"

How did they contact you?

"Sacrifice. Use the essence of the living's blood and flesh to awaken the horn they gave me. As long as I blow it, they will find me, no matter where I am."

Zabriel took a deep breath, and a kind of indescribable hatred began to resurface in his heart.

Unlike hatred for Xenos, this was a hatred that had existed in his chest long before the Lion El'Jonson returned.

As a Terra veteran, Zabriel had witnessed most of the world's filth during his first twenty years of service. As Leona de Laar just mentioned, he had personally seen fellow Terra commit atrocities against their own people without any remorse.

This time, however, the sacrifice may actually be effective.

"How many times have you done this? How many people did you kill each time?" the Black Sable suddenly asked.

Meeting Zabriel's questioning gaze, he gave a cold smile and explained, "Our Inquisition requires written reports, sir, including for everything, big or small."

"Twenty-eight times. One hundred people each time!"

The witch roared, interrupting them. Her cloudy eyes began to change again, the outer membrane of the eyeball melting first, followed by the vascular membrane and retina, then the lens and vitreous humor.

They melted into a pool of boiling, viscous liquid in the witch's eye sockets in an indescribable way, scalding her face, melting away skin, flesh, and bone, and creating two irregular, linear holes in her face.

The Black Sable sighed, shaking its head with disgust. "I'm so annoyed by you Daemon summoners. You have no skill whatsoever, all you know is contracts and sacrifices. How's the pain from the contract backlash? Do you like it?"

He sneered and took a step back, handing the initiative back to Zabriel.

Nevertheless, the old knight no longer wanted to continue; he felt an urge to vomit.

He wasn't unfamiliar with dealing with matters involving supernatural forces, but throughout his entire military career and the more than three hundred years he spent in exile, he had never seen anything like what he was witnessing.

His understanding was refreshed, in a way that he neither wanted to admit nor accept.

"Grown ups?"

"It's nothing," Zabriel said, turning his attention back to the witch. "Where is that so-called horn?"

"Inside my body."

Zabriel frowned, raised his right hand, pressed the dagger against her neck, and then snapped again, "Explain yourself! Where are you?!"

He received an answer he wasn't really interested in.

"My spine," Leona de Laer said, her face ashen.

The Black Sable whistled and, with a hint of delight, pulled out the gold-inlaid finger bone, which remained spotless, without a single drop of blood on it.

The witch's jaw slid down again, and she immediately uttered a string of incoherent curses. The captive, who had been so obedient just moments before, was now so insane that he dared to insult Zabriel to his face, his battered face filled with resentment and madness.

But this seemed to be the last thing she could do. Before Zabriel could even sever her head, the traitor trembled and melted into a pool of indescribable flesh and blood.

The old knight took a step back in disgust, not wanting to have anything to do with the carriage. But the Black Sable, contrary to his usual behavior, pursed his lips, reached inside with both hands, and pulled out a tattered, blood-stained human skin.

Zabriel saw a hint of sadness on his face.

What are you trying to do?

"That lord named Farn," the Black Sable paused, "He and his wife have a three-year-old daughter who misses her mother very much."

Zabriel stared at him in disbelief, his brows furrowing sharply. "Don't even mention you're going to give this to a child!"

"No, of course I wouldn't do that. I work for the Inquisition, sir." Black Sable shrugged self-deprecatingly. "It's just that I don't think the victim should be burned along with the perpetrator."

He withdrew his left hand and took another metal bottle from his waist. Half a minute later, two flames quietly bloomed in the interrogation room.

The flames reflected in Gabriel's eyes, casting a chilling hatred upon them.

--

Karyl stood with his arms crossed, watching Shefa walk out of another interrogation room. He was expressionless, still wearing his uniform, unstained by blood, but wiping his hands with a blood-stained handkerchief.

He walked up to Karyl, bowed, and said, "The situation is clear, sir. This Xenos scum has no connection whatsoever with the Thousand Eyes Warband we are currently investigating."

"So, he was just unlucky?" Karyl asked with a hint of humor.

"I wouldn't say that. All Xenos deserve to die, especially Eldar like them," Shefa replied. "But is this Judgment really necessary?"

Why would you say that?

"I believe you already knew all the information we needed the moment you saw him, didn't you? The current course of the Edge of Reason is the best evidence of that—"

Shefa pointed to the porthole; the stars twinkled, and a puddle of pebbles silently passed by the thick window.

Karyl chuckled, then nodded readily, acknowledging Shefa's speculation. "Yes, I ripped his brains out the moment I saw him."

"Then?" Shefa asked doubtfully, pointing to himself.

Karyl began gently, "The investigation into the Thousand Eyes Warband is a major undertaking involving three Inquisitor. According to the Inquisition's internal regulations, each Inquisitor involved must provide a detailed report."

"Whether you like it or not, Shefa, you've already been involved in this matter, so—if you're not allowed to interrogate him, how are you going to write a report? Are you going to write a four or five hundred thousand word report based on your imagination and submit it to the Sigillites for review?"

Shefa remained silent for a full minute before finally uttering a sound.

". I see."

He said this, then bowed and turned to leave, but paused just before taking a step, and whispered another sentence.

"My lord, you are truly completely different from the person described in the records."

Karyl watched him leave, but his smile didn't fade.

From his Shadow, a voice echoed softly, "I'm even more convinced now that you're actually a terrible person, Karyl."

"Save those words for the other brothers you'll be playing tricks on in the future," Karyl said. "Especially Corax."

A cold snort came from the Shadow.