10. NEVERMORE (IV)

Under the glare of the searchlights, the corpses looked especially pale, like something out of a surrealist oil painting.

Their blood had long since drained away, and their once-soft bodies had been stiffened by death and cold. At a glance, they were nearly indistinguishable from mannequins made of synthetic materials, save for the vivid expressions on their faces.

Through those faces, fear descended gently from an abstract concept into reality, finding its perfect vessel.

The Grand Inquisitor stepped over the various tools scattered across the ground, his eyes fixed on them.

People often said that the eyes were the windows to the soul, and it was true. From that perspective, the eyes were the first gravestones of the dead, and the most unusual ones. They would not remain for long, yet they bore every emotion the dead had felt before their deaths.

The Grand Inquisitor crouched down, moving his gaze away from those terrified eyes and examining the wounds one by one.

He could be considered an expert in the ancient trade of killing. He valued efficiency immensely and detested mixing personal emotions into his work. That had given rise to his uniquely concise style, and robbed him of the right to poetic expression.

And the murderer that had killed one hundred and forty-six miners had no so-called "style" at all.

Its killing bore no emotion, but neither did it pursue efficiency. It had raced through the mine, smearing blood everywhere with its claws. It had even carefully strung the miners together so that they would die more slowly.

It was simply mad. Nothing more.

The Grand Inquisitor braced a hand against his knee and slowly rose.

Throughout the process, Kael Kade had not heard so much as a sound from bones, tendons, or flesh in motion. He had not