"Kayden," Henry said as he placed the papers on the table, lowering his voice. "These are about the corpse. Here's everything I've discovered… but there are still missing details. I'm thinking of consulting someone else. Look at what's written about the heart—it seems rotten, as if the very power itself corrupted the body."
Colton raised an eyebrow and asked calmly, "Why are you talking about this in front of me?"
Henry laughed, gesturing toward Kayden, who was busy reading. "Because he trusts you. Kayden doesn't even trust his own shadow, so that's proof enough."
Then, suddenly, as if the question slipped out of nowhere, he asked, "They say people with completely black eyes are blind. Is that true?"
Colton placed a hand over his face and sighed. "It's just the lighting… the place is a bit dark, that's why they look so black. Or are you planning to dissect my eyes?"
He smiled, then added, "My eyes lean toward black, that's true—but not completely. Luckily for you, I can see you!"
Kayden felt a headache coming on and muttered irritably, "Colton, shut up."
Henry grinned and teased, "Kayden, don't talk to my friend like that… So, will you let me dissect your eye?"
Colton thought for a moment, then replied, "I know where you can find a pair of truly black eyes. I can bring you one as a gift."
Henry fell silent for a moment, realizing Colton wasn't joking.
Kayden finished reading and spoke slowly, "So it's true—this power destroys the body from the inside first… and then the outside."
"That makes sense," Henry agreed, while Colton kept staring intently at the papers.
Then Colton leaned closer to Kayden and whispered, "You two really are smart… your father wasn't exaggerating when he said he'd raised intelligent sons."
He lightly poked Kayden's hand, tracing invisible words onto his skin: "Can I join the research?"
Kayden responded quickly, scrawling a hasty message across Colton's palm: "Don't get too involved."
He wondered silently if Colton understood what he truly meant.
"Did you say he was attacked by something unnatural?" Colton asked, feigning ignorance.
"Yes," Henry replied curtly.
Colton wasn't trying to scare Kayden—he was trying to draw him in, little by little, down a path with no return.
"An unnatural attack… that alone suggests he wasn't an ordinary man. During the investigation, it turned out he wasn't anyone of importance, and his record wasn't clean. Someone very reliable told me that… so, in a way, he was different," Henry explained what he had discovered.
Kayden spoke hesitantly. "He possessed the power our father told us about."
A theory began to take shape between him and Henry—something that felt disturbingly logical.
"It's not just power… it's a spiritual essence," Colton said casually, as if commenting on the weather.
Kayden wanted to ask, 'Why do you keep saying that word?' but chose silence instead.
Colton continued in a quiet tone, his words slithering through the mind like a whisper.
"That man… he was broken. He died twice. The first time, inside—just as you wrote, his heart was destroyed. His spiritual essence shattered… and then his body followed."
He looked at Kayden briefly, but deeply—so deeply that Kayden felt as though Colton was warning him of something yet to come.
"How do you know all this?" Henry asked, curiosity getting the better of him.
Colton smiled faintly. "Knowing too much leads straight to the abyss and a miserable death… but fortunately, I only know a little."
"So… the destruction of the spiritual essence caused the heart to fail. And as Henry mentioned, the body seemed to have burned from within… Where's the corpse now?" Kayden asked, lifting his gaze from the papers, his eyes heavy as they shifted between Henry and Colton.
Henry shrugged uncertainly. "Buried."
"Where?" His voice sharpened, as though the question itself was helping him resist a creeping dread.
"In the cemetery of the lost…" Henry's eyes suddenly widened as he realized something. "Kayden—don't do what you're thinking!"
Kayden stood up, gathering his things with firm steps. "I'm not an idiot or insane… I won't do anything reckless. I just want to know who's responsible for that cemetery—and where the corpse came from."
Henry rose beside him, quietly collecting his own belongings. The three of them left the library together as the sun dipped behind the tall windows, painting the air with a dim, burnt-orange glow.
Behind them, the library remained still—filled with the scent of old paper. Towering shelves hid silent readers and abandoned books within their shadows, as if guarding forgotten secrets. The faint light filtering through the dust-coated windows created an air of mystery, making it feel as though the place itself was watching their last steps.
"Don't exhaust yourself. Whoever sold that corpse won't be in the cemetery now—he must be working with higher authorities," Colton said in a low, sharp voice that seemed to crawl straight into Kayden's bones.
Kayden wanted to keep asking questions, but a strange feeling washed over him—as though unseen eyes were following him. The whispers, the glances, even the silence itself… it all felt directed at him.
He listened to those whispers quietly, as did Colton. Henry, however, seemed used to them—the murmurs and gossip that trailed his brother's name wherever they went.
Then Colton's voice cut through the air. "You really do have quite the golden reputation."
At that moment, Kayden was certain—the whispers were real, not imagined.
He chuckled softly, trying to ease the tension. "I've always enjoyed chasing after girls…"
But the sharp looks from both Henry and Colton—half astonishment, half disapproval—stopped him mid-sentence.
"You… be quiet for a while," Henry ordered sternly.
Kayden didn't care. He let the unfinished words linger in the air—heavy, like the walls of the library behind them.
Before they reached home, Kayden suddenly stopped, staring at the road ahead.
"Henry… my mother told me earlier that I should buy a few things. I'll go get them now so she doesn't get upset."
Colton bid him farewell with a half-hidden, half-regal smile.
"I should leave as well. Stop digging for a while—and if you want to ask something, ask me directly."
Kayden began walking alongside him, but Colton turned down a different path.
"Where are you going?" Kayden called out.
"I need to confirm a few things. Go where you need to, and don't bother me, human," Colton replied clearly, leaving without looking back even once.
He vanished into the crowd, leaving Kayden standing still, staring into the space where he had disappeared.
Kayden muttered to himself as he looked around, "I can't stop thinking…"
He noticed how dark the sky had become, as if time itself had sped up without warning.
"How does time even work here?" he wondered, feeling a sharp, unexplainable unease.
He forced the strange thoughts aside, reminding himself that he still needed to buy the bread his mother had asked for.
When he reached the bakery, the place was warm, filled with the scent of freshly baked bread. Workers moved gracefully between the ovens and the wooden tables, their motions almost rhythmic.
The old lady behind the counter handed him the prepared loaves.
"Mr. Kayden, look at you… you seem brighter these days. That's good. Don't make your mother worry again."
Kayden smiled politely. "I won't do anything that would make her worry."
He thanked her and said goodbye before stepping outside.
Yet the strange feeling never left him. The whispers hadn't stopped. The stares followed him everywhere.
It was obvious now—he had become the talk of the town. And this time, he could feel it more clearly than ever.
Kayden quickened his pace until he finally reached home.
His mother greeted him at the door, with the maid Mary standing beside her. Mary glanced at the basket and whispered to Isabelle,
"He forgot the stuffed bread…"
Isabelle raised an eyebrow in surprise.
"Really?"
Mary whispered again, trying to soften the mistake.
"My lady, he's doing well. Don't worry… he'll start reintegrating with people gradually. Mafilda might hit him if he doesn't blend properly back into society."
Isabelle trusted Mary's words—she had been her personal maid for many years.
"Should we tell him to go back and get it?" Mary asked hesitantly, then added with a sigh,
"He might lose his temper… it saddens me, my lady. I helped raise the family's children, and Kayden is still young. He doesn't deserve what he's been through."
Isabelle looked down for a moment before speaking in a firm tone.
"He'll go and bring it. He's not a fool. He has to start accepting responsibility. And we'll give him more tasks… it'll give Eduardo a chance to rest."
Eduardo said gratefully, "Thank you, my lady."
She smiled kindly.
"You're newly married—spend time with your wife and don't overwork yourself. Your mother and I will make use of Kayden for a while."
Eduardo glanced at his mother, who didn't object to the decision of "using the young master," as she had once called him.
Isabelle called out loudly, "Kayden!"
"Yes?" he answered, stepping into the kitchen.
She pointed at the basket. "You forgot the stuffed bread. Go back and bring it, please."
Kayden agreed without argument and went to get the stuffed bread.
He didn't take long. When he returned to the bakery, the old lady apologized,
"I forgot to put it in."
"It's alright," Kayden replied, taking the bread before leaving again.
On his way back, Kayden felt as though something was watching him.
He hoped it was just his imagination—that maybe Colton was playing one of his twisted jokes again. The man was disturbingly unpredictable.
He glanced around the pitch-black street, his heart pounding violently. Still, he forced himself to stay calm, walking with slow, steady steps to avoid drawing attention.
But the soft sound of footsteps behind him didn't stop.
They grew closer and closer, as if the shadows themselves were weaving around him.
He wanted to run—to dart into a dark alley—but any sudden move might give him away.
Then suddenly, he felt a cold hand touch his shoulder.
His entire body froze, as if a surge of electricity had shot through his spine.
His eyes widened in the dark, but he didn't dare turn around too quickly.
Kayden spoke in a tense voice without realizing it.
"Do you want something?"
Silence hung for a moment—then came a low, whisper-like voice carrying an unspoken threat.
"Turn around… slowly."
Kayden froze. His mind nearly stopped functioning. Then, obeying, he turned his head inch by inch, every movement tightening the veins in his neck, as if the darkness itself pressed against his chest.
Before him stood an old man.
His skin was pale—deathly pale—veins crawling across his face, wrinkles carved deep into his flesh. Yet the body that bore those marks of age was disturbingly firm, athletic even, as though weakness had never touched it.
Even Kayden couldn't ignore the contradiction—a man aged in face, but whose body defied the laws of nature.
The man was only half a head shorter than Kayden, but the sheer weight of his presence made him seem taller, larger—wrapped in a heavy, suffocating aura.
The old man spoke softly, yet his tone carried a clear threat.
"Kayden Price… do you think you're clever?"
The blood in Kayden's veins ran cold. Every muscle in his body tensed.
He stayed silent, staring at the man, trying to think—trying to find a way out—but every thought dissolved under the crushing pressure of that quiet menace.
The old man's lips curled into a cold, wicked smile—a smile devoid of any human warmth, sharp as shards of ice cutting through the soul before the flesh.
Then he continued, his voice calm but heavy enough to suffocate the air around them.
"We know about the weather you caused."
Kayden's breath froze in his chest. His heart began pounding violently, and the sudden rush of blood made his head spin.
Each word hit him like a heavy stone. 'The weather? How… and who are "we"?'
His pulse quickened, breaths coming short and uneven. It felt as though the entire night had grown heavier—like the darkness itself had mass—and this old man wasn't merely a man, but part of something far greater, more secretive… and perhaps sinister.
Kayden forced himself to stay composed and replied in a deliberately calm tone, trying to suppress the tremor in his voice.
"What weather are you talking about?"
The air between them thickened—dense, oppressive—as if the very atmosphere held secrets one could never escape. The shadows coiled around Kayden, tightening, suffocating him by degrees, making each passing second heavier than the last.
Then, from the darkness, another figure emerged.
The moment Kayden laid eyes on him, a sharp dread clenched his insides, stealing the air from his lungs.
'It's over!' he thought, panic stabbing through him as his body froze, pinned by invisible gravity.
"Walter, old man, stop scaring him!" a new voice called out—quiet, but cutting—approaching with steady, confident steps. "His mother sent a telegram today… we've stopped monitoring him."
A faint spark of hope flickered through Kayden's veins—only to be extinguished by the man's next words, spoken in a dry, mocking tone.
"But look at our little suicide case now… he's got a spiritual core!"
Kayden shuddered, caught between disbelief and dread, unable to utter a single word.