The city bled under neon lights.
Ren moved through it like a shadow, unseen, unwelcome.
Every breath he took was thick with smoke, magic, and rot.
The Court.
That name echoed in his skull, a parasite gnawing at whatever pieces of humanity he had left.
He needed leads.
Blood would come later.
Ren slipped into the maze of alleys behind the collapsed metro station. His instincts, sharpened by years of survival in another world, screamed at him to stay hidden, but he didn't care.
Let them come.
He needed to be seen.
And it didn't take long.
Three figures broke from the shadows, dressed in tattered coats, moving with the clumsy arrogance of men who thought the night belonged to them.
The leader stepped forward, a jagged grin on his face.
"Lost, kid?"
His voice dripped venom.
Ren said nothing.
Just watched.
The leader sneered. "You're not from around here, are you? Don't worry—we'll show you how things work."
The two others spread out, boxing him in.
Ren loosened his fingers.
Let the magic in his veins stir, slow and lethal.
No flashy bullshit.
No chants.
Just pure will bent into force.
The air around him grew heavy. The leader hesitated, confusion flickering across his face.
That was all Ren needed.
He moved.
A brutal, efficient step forward — a fist slammed into the leader's gut, doubling him over, spitting bile and blood.
Before the others could react, Ren grabbed the nearest one by the jaw and drove his thumb into the soft tissue under the eye.
The man shrieked, stumbling back, clutching his ruined face.
The third pulled a knife.
Amateur.
Ren caught the first clumsy swipe, twisting the man's wrist until the bone snapped with a satisfying crack.
The knife clattered to the ground.
Ren didn't bother picking it up.
Instead, he planted his boot into the guy's knee, shattering it backward.
The scream that followed was pure music.
The leader gasped from the ground, struggling to rise.
Ren grabbed a fistful of his hair and yanked him up.
"The Court," Ren said, voice flat and cold. "Tell me where."
The man spat blood, laughing weakly. "You're dead, freak. You're already dead."
Wrong answer.
Ren slammed the man's head into the wall once.
Twice.
Three times.
Bone cracked. Blood sprayed.
The laughter stopped.
Ren leaned close, breathing in the stink of sweat and fear.
"One last chance. Or I start cutting."
The man whimpered, a broken thing now.
"Old town... warehouse... Dock 17..."
Ren dropped him like trash.
No hesitation.
No mercy.
He turned to the others—both crippled, moaning on the ground.
"Tell your masters," Ren said, voice low and lethal. "A monster is hunting them now."
And then he walked away, leaving them to drown in their own piss and blood.
---
The warehouse district reeked of salt and rust.
Ren stood in the shadow of Dock 17, watching.
No guards at the gate.
No obvious defenses.
It was a trap.
Of course it was.
Good.
Let them come.
He pushed open the rusted door and stepped inside.
Darkness swallowed him.
But Ren didn't need light.
He could feel them—
The magic.
The hatred.
The sick, twisted hunger of those who thought they were safe in their filth.
Figures shifted in the gloom.
Half a dozen, maybe more.
One stepped forward, face hidden by a porcelain mask, etched with crimson lines.
A voice like nails on glass rasped, "You shouldn't have come here."
Ren smiled.
A cold, dead thing.
"You took everything from me."
His magic surged, wrapping around his fists like molten steel.
"Now I'll take everything from you."
The masked figure raised a hand. A blast of warped magic shot toward Ren, shrieking through the air.
Ren didn't dodge.
He absorbed it, let it crash against the wards stitched into his soul by years of battles in another world.
The force staggered him, but he held firm.
"Is that all?" he whispered.
And then he attacked.
Faster than human eyes could follow, he closed the distance, driving his fist into the masked figure's sternum.
Bone shattered under the impact.
Another rushed him with a jagged blade glowing sickly green.
Ren side-stepped, grabbed the attacker's wrist, and twisted until flesh tore.
The blade clattered to the ground.
Ren kicked it into the darkness.
Three more charged, weaving spells into the air.
Chains of fire.
Spikes of ice.
Whispers of death.
Ren laughed—a harsh, broken sound—and unleashed the true weight of his magic.
A wave of crushing pressure slammed into them.
The chains shattered midair.
The spikes melted to water.
The whispers screamed and died.
The first fell to his knees, blood pouring from his ears.
The second vomited black bile, convulsing on the floor.
The third tried to run.
Ren let him.
Fear was a better messenger than words.
He turned back to the masked leader, who lay broken at his feet.
"Tell me," Ren said, voice like frost, "how deep does your Court rot into this world?"
The figure coughed, spitting blood onto the floor.
"We are the roots... the branches... the fruit..."
"Then I'll burn your fucking tree to the ground."
Ren crushed the masked figure's throat under his boot.
No hesitation.
No regret.
The warehouse was silent now, save for the distant echoes of the city that didn't know it had already started dying.
Ren stood among the bodies, breathing hard, heart pounding.
This was only the beginning.
He could feel it.
The Court wasn't just some cult.
They were bigger.
Older.
Deeper.
And now they knew someone was coming for them.
Good.
Let them prepare.
Let them build walls, summon demons, weave armies out of nightmares.
It wouldn't matter.
Because Ren had nothing left to lose.
And a monster with nothing left to lose was the most dangerous thing in the world.
---