"You sure you won't need my help?" I asked calmly.
"We're damn sure," they replied in unison.
"Take cover," Yeshe added, flashing a
grin. "And be impressed by your seniors."
Not sure I'll be, I thought. But if you crawl out alive, maybe I'll might be.
I said nothing. I stepped back letting them take charge.
The imitation didn't rush them.
It tilted its head, studying them the way a bored predator studies prey it already owns. Its smile widened before it moved.
Not fast.
Casual.
It appeared in front of Renoir without sound, as if distance had simply stopped applying to it.
Renoir cast up a barrier on instinct.
The imitation tapped it once his barrier shattered with a sound like glass.
The barrier collapsed inward, folding like wet paper. The impact hurled him backwards like a broken doll; He skidded across the floor, blood spraying from his mouth as he rolled.
Cerise roared and charged.
Her blade sank into the imitation's side, biting deep, but the creature didn't even flinch. It turned its head slowly toward her, smiling wider as blood poured down its ribs and steamed against the frost.
The imitation looked down at the wound with mild curiosity, then back at Cerise, unimpressed.
"Oh," its voice rasped, amused. "That tickled."
Its hand closed around her wrist.
Crack.
She screamed as a bone shifted wrong under her gauntlet.
The pressure was wrong, dangerous and she knew that if she didn't free herself, her arm would be ruined. She twisted sharply, with all her might but the grip didn't loosen.
So she kicked.
Her boot slammed into the imitation's chest with everything she had. The impact drove it back just enough for her to rip her arm free.
She staggered away, clutching her arm to her chest, as the gauntlet split and slick with red, only because she'd torn herself free before the grip could finish the job.
Yeshe didn't hesitate.
He went in low violent aura flaring around his blades as he crashed into the imitation's knees with bone-jarring force.
The impact buckled it just enough.
His blades flashed.
One swept upward, ripping through muscle in a spray of dark blood. The second followed a beat later, precise and merciless, severing fingers cleanly at the joint.
They struck the floor with dull, wet sounds.
The imitation laughed.
The sound was wrong, wet, bubbling, torn straight from a ruined throat. It scraped through the air as the imitation backhanded Yeshe in the middle of his swing.
The impact was catastrophic.
Ribs collapsed with a brutal crunch, he was ripped off his feet and hurled through the air launched before slamming into a pillar with enough force to shatter stone. The column caved inward, cracks spiderwebbing out as his body hit.
He slid down slowly.
Blood smeared the stone in a long, dark streak before he collapsed at its base, motionless.
Renoir dragged himself upright, lungs burning as blood spilt from his mouth, but his eyes stayed locked on the thing in front of them.
Fury burned hotter than pain.
"Vinxir," he snarled, voice raw and shaking with strain, as he slammed his staff into the ground.
Mana detonated outward, the command ringing like a sentence being passed.
Chains of light erupted from the floor.
They didn't just bind, it was as if the ground itself had reached up to claim the imitation. Luminous coils wrapped around its limbs and torso, biting deep, burning as they constricted. Flesh split under the pressure, strips of skin tearing away as mana ground bone against bone.
The imitation snarled, then laughed.
For one fractured heartbeat, its body stilled.
Cerise didn't hesitate.
She surged forward and drove her blade straight through its chest. Steel punched through flesh and shattered the bones, the impact jolting up her arm as she twisted the weapon brutally.
Blood exploded outward, hot, black, drenching her armour, spattering her face.
"Stay. Down," she hissed through clenched teeth.
The imitation lowered its head.
Slowly.
It looked at the sword buried in its chest as if noticing a curiosity. Then its grin widened, lips tearing at the corners as both hands closed around the blade.
It pulled the sword closer.
In delight.
Its forehead smashed into Cerise's face with a wet crack. Blood sprayed from her mouth as she reeled backwards, vision blurring, teeth rattling.
The creature cackled.
The chains screamed.
Mana backlash detonated outward in a violent shockwave, flinging all three of them across the floor.
The imitation rose again.
Skin hung in shredded ribbons. Limbs were twisted, fingers missing, its chest split wide open yet it straightened with a lazy, obscene grace. Flesh crawled back into place, bones knitting with audible pops.
It smiled.
Wide. Unhinged.
Eyes locked onto them with slow, hungry amusement as if the fight was finally becoming fun.
In a blink, it was whole again.
As if the damage had never mattered at all. And the fight was only beginning.
Amid the chaos of their struggle, I watched coldly. It was painfully clear from the way the imitation fought that the three of them were nothing more than toys to it. It was enjoying their resistance, as it broke them down piece by piece.
I knew how this would end. The moment it grew bored with them, it would come for the remaining two of us. And before that happened, I had to find out what had become of the real pervert.
I couldn't abandon him. Not entirely. No matter how infuriating or depraved he was, he had saved me when I was dying. He had hidden me when no one else would. That debt wasn't something I could ignore.
Vivian, meanwhile, hadn't looked away. Her eyes tracked every movement of the imitation, sharp and focused, as if she were dissecting the fight memorizing its patterns, searching for weaknesses.
"Should I get going as well?" I muttered, already turning to leave.
Then a single thought stopped me. A single face surfaced from the corner of my mind.
"…Seriously," I sighed.
Even though I was the one who had cut all ties, I still couldn't leave her behind with something so far beyond her.
"Lux," I said quietly, "stay with her. If anything happens, tell me immediately or protect her until I come back."
"Understood, Master," he replied without hesitation. He leapt from my arms and landed lightly on Vivian's shoulder, tail flicking as he settled in.
Only then did I turn away, my decision made, the cold in my chest sharpening as I prepared to move.
I knew exactly where to look.
If the entire castle was empty, then there was only one explanation someone had claimed it as their base. And the underground prison, hidden beneath layers of ice and mana distortion, was impossible to detect from the surface. It was the perfect place to carry out inhumane experiments and forbidden rituals without fear of discovery.
The least I could hope for was that the pervert hadn't been dragged down there.
But hope has never been kind to me.
As I descended, step by step, the air grew heavier, saturated with dense, warped mana that pressed against my lungs. It wasn't just powerful, it was wrong, contaminated, twisted into something that scraped against my senses. Beneath it all lingered a faint but unmistakable stench of blood.
Old blood.
The final step creaked beneath my boot.
And my heart dropped.
The basement, once a pristine underground prison where hoards of treasure had gleamed behind reinforced wards, was gone. In its place was a slaughterhouse.
The walls were smeared with dried blood, layered so thick it had turned almost black, streaked and splattered as if the stone itself had been flayed. The iron bars of the prison cells were bent and warped, some torn open, others sealed tight.
Every cell was filled.
Children.
Small, fragile bodies slumped against frozen stone floors and bars, limbs twisted at unnatural angles. They didn't move. They didn't breathe. Whatever had happened here had stripped the room of sound itself.
I already knew.
None of them were alive.
I walked slowly past each cell, my steps echoing too loudly in the oppressive silence. I looked at every single one of them.
There was a pattern.
Every child's chest had been carved open with surgical precision. Their hearts were gone, removed, not torn out. And what remained inside them was frozen solid, flesh crystallized by unnatural cold. No wounds. No signs of struggle. Nothing.
Just lifeless bodies laying on the frozen ground.
My fingers curled slowly at my side.
"What…" I whispered, my voice swallowed by the dead air, "…happened here?"
—
Above, the battle raged.
Mana slammed into mana with brutal force, each collision tearing through the air. The hall pulsed with violence, every impact echoing like a heartbeat on the verge of rupture.
The imitation was still smiling.
Still amused.
Still treating them like entertainment.
But the rhythm of the fight began to shift.
Renoir dragged himself upright, blood streaming down his chin, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and began to chant.
Each word vibrated with intent, threading mana through the air like invisible wire.
The imitation tilted its ruined head, a flicker of curiosity dancing across its face.
Cerise didn't hesitate.
She lunged. Armour screamed under the strain of her battered frame, joints protesting with every furious step, but she didn't slow. Her blade ignited with compressed mana, a violet flare that pulsed with lethal intent. She aimed low, straight for its leg, ignoring its torso, ignoring its head.
Steel ripped through flesh. Bone snapped with a sickening crunch.
For the first time, its stance wavered.
Yeshe didn't hesitate.
He vaulted high, twisting midair with lethal precision. Both blades drove down into the back of the creature's neck, steel sinking deep. Black blood geysered outward, hissing and steaming as it hit the ice. He twisted, tearing sideways, shredding muscle in a spray of dark heat.
The imitation howled almost inhumanly.
It spun with terrifying speed, catching Yeshe mid-motion, slamming him into the frozen floor. The impact shattered the ice beneath them, echoing like a war drum through the cavern.
Yeshe lay there, chest heaving, shards of frost and blood coating him.
And then he laughed.
Low. Dark. Savage. Because even pressed into the ice, even crushed, he was already planning the next move.
"Yeah," he wheezed, forcing himself upright. "You felt that."
Renoir's chant reached its apex.
The air around the imitation collapsed. Space itself seemed to compress, invisible pressure crushing inward like a vice tightening around bone and muscle. Its chest caved, ribs splintering, organs rupturing beneath the impossible force. Thick, black blood gushed from its mouth and nostrils, heavy, hot droplets splattering across the ice with a sickening hiss.
For the first time, its smile faltered. Just a twitch.
Cerise didn't hesitate.
She drove her blade straight through its shoulder, pinning it to the frozen ground. Frost hissed and boiled where steel met corrupted flesh, steam curling into the air. She pressed her weight into the hilt, teeth clenched, driving the weapon deeper, refusing to let it pull free.
"Yeshe!" she shouted.
He answered immediately.
He surged forward, blades flashing with ruthless precision. Each strike tore into the creature's abdomen again and again, steel ripping through frozen muscle and corrupted tissue. Its chest split open, viscera spilling onto the floor in dark, wet thuds, steaming and staining the ice.
The imitation screamed.
And this time, there was no amusement.
No curiosity. Only pain. Only rage. Even that was fleeting, replaced by the realization that it had underestimated them.
"Kraxor," he commanded.
Renoir's spell erupted. The air itself seemed to tear as light and force collided around the imitation. Mana coiled and struck like a vice, pressing against its shattered ribs, grinding bone and muscle together. The pressure warped its chest, sending splinters of blackened bone spinning outward.
An arm was wrenched from its shoulder, ripped away by the violent force, crashing to the floor with a wet, twitching thud.
Blood coated the hall thick, dark, relentless, slicking the ice and stone alike.
And yet—
Even as its limbs were torn apart…
Even as it was driven to its knees…
The imitation lifted its shattered head.
And smiled.
Wide. Crooked. Maliciously delighted.
"Oh," it gurgled blood dribbling down its chin. "You are worth killing."
Mana surged violently around it, crackling and writhing like living fire.
Despite shattered limbs, despite torn flesh, despite the gore—
It began to rise.
They had the upper hand.
And yet, the thing before them still refused to die.
The imitation rose to its full height.
Shredded muscle crawled back into place, bones knitting with wet, audible pops. Torn flesh sealed itself as if reality itself had decided the damage was inconvenient. Steam bled from its body as corrupted mana pulsed beneath the skin. Its cloudy eyes locked onto Renoir, Cerise, and Yeshe.
A knowing smile split its face.
"Playtime is over," it hissed.
The words were quiet. Controlled. Final.
The air recoiled from them.
Renoir braced, dragging mana into a dense, crushing wave but the imitation laughed. A hollow, marrow-deep sound that crawled through the hall and sank into bone.
Then it moved.
One instant it stood still.
The next—
It was on Renoir.
A hand slammed into his torso like a siege ram. Fingers closed. Squeezed. Ribs shattered inward with wet, snapping sounds, organs rupturing under the pressure. Black blood erupted from Renoir's mouth and chest, spraying the floor and flash-freezing as it hit the stone.
Renoir screamed once.
The imitation lifted him effortlessly and smashed him backwards into a broken pillar. Stone imploded. Ice burst outward. Renoir hit the ground in a heap, coughing blood, trying to rise
A blur.
Another strike.
His shoulder detonated, bone exploding under the impact. He collapsed with a choking gasp, mana flaring uselessly as pain swallowed him whole.
"Renoir!" Cerise screamed.
She charged.
Her blade carved a brutal arc toward its neck.
The imitation dipped its head lazily.
Cerise's swing passed through empty air.
A backhand followed clean, casual.
It struck the side of her skull with a crack like splitting stone. Cerise was flung across the hall, skidding over ice and blood until she slammed into the far wall. She collapsed, blood pouring from her temple, vision swimming.
Yeshe came from behind, burning with rage.
The imitation twisted.
Two fingers caught his blade.
It snapped in half with a dry crack.
Yeshe barely had time to register it before a kick drove into his ribs. The impact folded him to the floor, ice fracturing beneath his body as bone gave way with a sickening crunch.
He coughed up blood and didn't get back up.
Silence followed.
The imitation straightened and began to walk slowly now. Deliberate. Each step crushed ice and bone alike as it circled the broken bodies, savouring the sight of them trying to breathe, trying to move, trying to live.
Then it stopped and turned his head. Eyes sharp focused on Vivian.
A slow smile crept across its face.
Recognition.
"You," it whispered, killing intent dripping from every syllable.
Vivian didn't retreat.
She smiled back.
Small. Measured.
Their gazes locked and something twisted in the air between them, dark and electric, like two predators acknowledging the same hunger.
The imitation advanced, each step heavy with promise. Every inch of its body radiated lethal certainty. It was no longer playing.
Behind it, Renoir dragged himself upright, blood spilling freely as he tried to form another spell. Cerise forced herself to her feet, sword trembling in her grip. Yeshe groaned, clawing at the ice, teeth clenched against agony.
Too slow.
The imitation raised one hand and pointed at Vivian.
Its smile widened.
Vivian's widened hers, perfectly mirroring it, fearless, unhinged.
"Shall we begin?" it hissed.
The hall closed in.
Ice, blood, shattered stone, and roiling mana all bent toward that single moment. This was no longer a battle for survival.
It was a performance.
And Vivian was the stage.
—
I searched the entire underground prison.
Nothing.
There was no trace of that pervert. No lingering mana. It was as if someone had reached into the world itself and deliberately erased his existence.
That alone was unsettling.
He wasn't weak enough to disappear so cleanly, not unless his mana had been sealed first. And even then… it shouldn't be possible. Whoever took him out knew exactly what they were doing.
"Come forth, Zisel," I said.
A ripple of mana answered. Zisel emerged and dropped to one knee before me, posture immaculate, like a knight kneeling before his lord.
"You called for me, my lord."
"Read the memories of this place," I ordered.
"At once, my lord."
Zisel was second in command of my army the one who kept everything running when I couldn't be bothered. He oversaw the guild, handled logistics, and specialized in magic most people pretended didn't exist. Mind control. Memory excavation. The kind of spells the Mage Tower banned loudly, only because a rat was found in their tower.
But their stupid rules does not apply to Zisel.
As he began unravelling the lingering memories etched into the stone, Lux's voice cut through my mind.
Master. The situation above isn't looking good.
I sighed. "What's not looking good.'"
Vivian is about to fight the monster.
"What the hell happened to Renoir?"
His answer came short, "They're barely clinging to life, Master."
I pinched the bridge of my nose, exhaling slowly. "For fuck's sake. It's only been ten minutes."
"And her?" I asked.
Silence.
"Well?" I snapped.
"She's… elated," Lux said, "Her mana is surging thick with murderous intent. She's not retreating. If anything, she's leaning into it."
I swore quietly, rubbing at my temples. "Damn it. I can't afford to abandon what I'm doing right now."
My tone hardened. "Lux, listen carefully. Whatever happens, you make sure she stays alive. I don't care how far things spiral do not let her die."
"Yes, Master," he answered without hesitation. "I'll step in the moment it becomes necessary."
"I'll come the instant I'm done here," I said.
"I understand," Lux replied.
I exhaled slowly.
I knew they wouldn't last. I'd known it the moment they decided to play heroes. The thing facing them was a catastrophe. Yet still, they insisted so I let them.
Their mistake.
Trying to impress me of all people.
How pathetic.
As if I'd ever be impressed by someone else's recklessness.
Don't make me laugh.
"What happened to not caring and being cold-hearted?" Nox said, dramatically air-quoting my words.
Damn him.
"I only said that because if everyone died," I replied flatly, "wouldn't it look suspicious that they were the only ones who didn't make it—despite me being with them?"
"Whatever you say," he said, clearly unconvinced.
"My lord, I'm finished," Zisel announced.
I turned to him. "So? What did you find?"
"The ones behind this are affiliated with the Temple," he said calmly. "They've been harvesting hearts to awaken an ancient deity." He paused, then added, "There's also a hidden door in the cell at the far end on your left."
No surprise.
I'd suspected those wretched bastards from the start. Preaching peace to the masses while committing atrocities behind sealed doors, it was almost impressive how consistent their hypocrisy was.
"That will be all," I said. "Zisel, tell Zion to make sure he takes care of that place."
"As you will, my lord."
He vanished into the shadows without another word.
I exhaled slowly and glanced toward the indicated cell.
"Well then," I murmured, "shall we see what they've been hiding?"
To be continued....