Location: City Of Leria, Plague Sector
The world wants me dead, or at least, that's the simplest way I can put it, the closest truth to what my life has become. My wanted poster is plastered everywhere, constantly flowing through the city of Leria in the heart of the Solis Kingdom. Whether it's broadcast on the massive jumbotrons, pinned to the sides of walls, or scattered across paper bulletins, my face, if you could even call it that, is never far from sight.
Usually, those same jumbotrons are reserved for cheerful distractions: children playing in the streets, advertisements for new forges or spirit-threaded armor, updates on the latest news, or the Queen herself addressing the world with carefully measured words. Sometimes they display nothing more than serene skies above the royal capital, painted in gold and silver hues, or the constant barrage of propaganda about the kingdom's rivalry with the Gerie.
"Become a hunter. Join the military so we can push back the Gerie Kingdom." "They want what isn't theirs."
The declarations ring out every day, echoing over the rooftops. But then, without warning, the screen flashes red, and the familiar message returns.
Wanted by the Kingdom.
File: 9098643-1211
Codename: "Sin"
Crimes listed in bold white letters: slaughter, manslaughter, murder in the first and second degree, theft, arson, evasion of arrest, hindering the war effort, destruction of military and royal property.
Bounty: 1,200,000 Deries.
For more information leading to this arrest, contact the military or the Royal Guard of this sector.
It wouldn't be so bad if mine was the only name displayed, but unfortunately, it never is.
Wanted by the Kingdom.
File: 9198784-2489
Codename: "Taichi"
Crimes: manslaughter, aggravated assault, assault with a deadly weapon, murder, theft, aiding a criminal, hindering the war, arson.
Bounty: 1,150,000 Deries.
The images they show are never accurate. Sometimes Taichi is portrayed as a pale boy with curly black hair and unnaturally blue eyes, other times a demi-human lion with streaked gray mane.
They can't seem to settle on anything definitive. As for me, I am never afforded even that level of humanity. My likeness is drawn only in demonic features: a demon with black horns curling from his skull, skin darker than shadow, red pupils glowing like blood, white hair dripping like snow. Sometimes I am nothing but a twisted abomination, or a faceless silhouette shrouded in black flame.
It says enough that, even in their fantasies, they still see Taichi as a man, but me as something else.
They hate us both for two reasons: first, because our data does not match anything they have on file. Our blood, our genetics, even the imprints of our fingers yield no record, no registration within their archives. Second, because we move like those too young to be caught, too fast, too precise, too dangerous. Beyond that, the kingdom knows nothing about me nor Taichi. That ignorance terrifies them. That is why we are wanted.
It's not that we are inherently dangerous. No, what they fear is that I cannot be caught. That I am an embodiment of what they all carry inside themselves but dare not face. I am what they name me: a Sin.
Night has long since fallen. The city lies bathed in the silvery light of two moons, one vast and pale, the other smaller, tinted in deep crimson. Stars scatter faintly in the heavens while the glow of jumbotrons and hex-lanterns casts fractured patterns on the cracked streets.
Huh.. a rare red mooned night..
I sit on the rooftop of a ten-story building, leaning against a rusted railing so brittle that a single prayer seems to be the only thing keeping it from crumbling beneath my weight. This building once belonged to the military, a forgehouse for arc-forgers who lacked the space or essentials to work from home. Now, abandoned, it stands in ruin: lanterns shattered, glass strewn across the floor, and concrete slabs cracked as though the entire structure teeters on the edge of collapse.
My eyes drift downward to the ground below where a broken knife lies half-buried in dust. The blade is chipped and rusted, but faint runes still shimmer along its edge, surprisingly intact. I don't touch it, picking up a stray enchanted weapon is suicide, especially one discarded in a place like this.
The night air catches on my hair, thick dreads pulled back into a smooth ponytail, two strands left to hang forward where the golden tips flicker in my sight, severing the endless darkness of my black locks with flashes of brilliance. A single golden amulet dangles at the end of my right dread, swaying gently with the wind. But my attention tonight is not on myself. I watch the streets below where demi-humans and humans alike wander, the poor and broken, scraping their way through another day. Some bear marks tattooed across their foreheads, others walk bare skinned, their eyes hollow with hunger.
Behind me, Taichi shifts where he has been leaning against the wall, gaze fixed upon the moons above. He steps forward and kneels, picking up the knife I had deliberately ignored. For a moment, every nerve in my body wanted me to leap off the building, certain that the blade carries a hidden failsafe ready to unleash the forger's curse. But nothing happens. Calmly, Taichi twirls the weapon between his fingers, testing its balance, then extends it toward me, the point reversed.
"Small things like this are worth a pretty penny, you know," he says. "Can't just leave it on the ground. Or… you could always use it."
I was uneasy, Taichi could sense it, of course. Not merely because the blade he picked up was enchanted, but for another reason entirely. A sickness was spreading through the city, especially in the Cessianic sector where we lingered. The Royal Guards had been conducting inspections, dragging people from their homes to confirm who carried it. They called it Spirit Rot.
Those who bore the crimson marks on their foreheads were the afflicted. The markings were carved in vertical lines, each stroke representing the severity of the disease. One line meant the infection was manageable, something the body's natural defenses might overcome with time, rest, and a little help. Two lines meant that treatment would be necessary, but recovery within a few months was possible. Three lines, however, marked the direst stage, the body would rot away until death was certain. With treatment, it was reversible, but only if caught before the rot consumed too much.
The tragic truth was that most could not afford the treatment, not even us. The poor were often dragged from their homes and fed to demon beasts under the guise of preventing further spread. Those who had a home were confined within its walls, but those without, those with no place to quarantine, simply drifted into this part of the city. It had been given a name, whispered with contempt and pity both: the Plague Sector. Not everyone here carried Spirit Rot. Some chose to live among the silence, while others had no choice but to stay, too impoverished to survive in the brighter, cleaner parts of the city.
Taichi, realizing I hadn't taken the knife, tucked the weapon into his waistband and exhaled, leaning casually against the railing. His shadow stretched across the rooftop, his silver eyes catching the faint light, the darkness veiling everything else.
"Why stay here?" he asked, his voice steady but carrying the weariness of someone tired of the pain and hatred surrounding us. "We can leave this city for a few months. This place is gloomy as hell."
His gaze shifted toward me, the faintest glint of amusement breaking his otherwise guarded demeanor. "We have plenty of Deries. We could wait for the sickness to die down, come back later. Hell, maybe even try for the military." A low chuckle followed, though even he knew the suggestion was half a joke.
"Military? Yeah, right." I scoffed, unable to suppress a bitter laugh. My eyes lingered on the streets below before narrowing on the jumbotron as it shifted to a serene projection of a blue sky. "No. I'm not leaving until I know our sister is okay. I haven't heard from Sonya in a while."
Taichi tilted his chin toward the other side of the city, the sector bathed in cleaner light. "They're fine. Mom is a headmaster, remember? Unlike us, they live over there. They won't get sick. That side rarely deals with this disease."
"Doesn't mean they can't," I muttered. "I just need to make sure they're good. After that, we'll head back, cross the ocean, and return to the Beast Glades."
For a long moment, Taichi studied me. The silence stretched before he finally sighed, his shoulders easing as he nodded reluctantly. "I gotcha. I doubt they'd get sick, but fine."
"And if they do?" I asked, my voice low.
"Then we enact the plan as soon as possible," he replied without hesitation.
I nodded, silently agreeing with Taichi, when a piercing screech tore through the night. The sound echoed across the Cessianic sector, sharp enough to draw both of our gazes downward. On the street below, a girl lay writhing, her voice raw as she screamed at the top of her lungs. Her forehead bore three vertical crimson lines, the unmistakable mark of terminal Spirit Rot. She couldn't have been older than fifteen. Her skin was riddled with swollen, blistering welts, deep cracks splitting across her flesh as black ooze seeped from her wounds and every orifice.
The sight was grotesque, enough to make the average man collapse to his knees in revulsion. But for me and Taichi, it was nothing new. We had seen worse, endured worse.
Poor girl. She had probably failed the HASVAA (Hunters Association Service Vocational Aptitude Assessment) test. The ones who failed were always cast into the slums like refuse. If she had scored even a little higher, perhaps she would have been spared, perhaps they would have treated her, allowed her to attend school in the bright city, maybe even given her a chance at a better life. But fate hadn't been that kind. She fell to the ground, coughing and retching, the black sludge splattering against the cracked stones beneath her. Normally, soldiers would already be here, sweeping through the plague sector, testing households, eradicating any infected who dared wander outside. But tonight wasn't one of their rounds. And so, her suffering dragged on.
I sighed and looked away, unable to stomach watching any longer. Not because I was disgusted, it was the monotony of it. Spirit Rot had become so common here, its cruelty so systemic, that watching another victim writhe in the street was no different than watching rainwater trickle down a gutter. It was exhausting.
Over the years, Taichi and I had taught ourselves to save whatever money we managed to earn, never spending more than what was necessary. It wasn't out of poverty; truthfully, since we began living in the Beast Glades, our coffers had never run dry. Instead, it was discipline, a refusal to waste when every coin had to be calculated for the long game. Our goal had always been the same: to earn enough that our mother and younger sister would never again need to work, never again suffer under the weight of survival. We had made progress, yes, but true security would take another decade at least. Until then, we endured, waiting for the day they could finally rest.
Only Sonya knew the truth, that Taichi and I were still alive. Senyora, our younger sister, believed we had perished years ago after taking the HASVAA test. She was just shy of thirteen now, five months from her own trial. Soon she would face the same judgment that had once damned us. I didn't think she would fail, her determination was unmatched, but the thought gnawed at me. She wanted so desperately to be like me, to walk the same reckless path, that I feared she might mimic my defiance and seal her own fate.
I remembered my own test as vividly as if it had been yesterday. Taichi and I had both collapsed from exhaustion, falling asleep in class after the grueling ordeal. They had stamped something across our papers, muttered words we couldn't hear, and the next thing we knew we were unconscious. When we awoke, we were in the Beast Glades, left as fodder for demon beasts. That was their mercy: discarding failures where monsters would finish what bureaucracy could not.
From what we gathered, the HASVAA was more than a test; it was a sorting mechanism, one that defined your place in the kingdom.
A score of 2000, the legendary number only five had ever achieved. World-class hunters. Four of those five were the ones to score that number, and the fifth was a recent, someone young, a name on every tongue for weeks, celebrated as if they were a demigod. No one truly knew what such a score guaranteed, but most believed it meant limitless power, instant wealth, and eternal recognition.
Scores between 1900 and 1700 earned immediate access to middle and high school, all expenses covered by the kingdom. At fifteen, when high school began, such prodigies might even be courted by one of the Great Academies. The Congress, the Queen, the military, they would all vie for such talent, promising gold and status. Many became knights of the Round Table, royal guards, or soldiers whose names echoed in the halls of power.
Scores between 1600 and 1200 granted continued education as well, though less extravagant. You could still enter high school and college, but the state provided fewer luxuries. Still, it was enough to leave the slums behind, to live in the cleaner, brighter sectors.
Anything below that, however, was a failure. The Congress would erase your name from the city's ledgers, stripping you from your family. If you were poor, you stayed in the plague sectors, branded as worthless. If you were unlucky, you were drafted into death runs, resource expeditions with no pay and no return. If you fainted from exhaustion, hunger, or dehydration, they left you to die. And the families? They were tossed a handful of coins, a few thousand Deries—just enough to make them smile, enough to keep the cycle alive. That was the truth.
Taichi and I had been among the failures, discarded into the Glades. But fate twisted its hand. Left for dead, we survived, clawed our way through the kingdom's most dangerous forest, and returned. We carried those scars to this day.
My thoughts were broken by the sudden vibration in my pocket. I pulled out the communication amulet, a small black disk etched with a golden hex. It pulsed with blue light, glowing as I pressed it. A faint hum, then a flicker of projection: a blue screen with a single wavering line that moved with sound. No face, just a voice.
Taichi leaned closer, his eyes narrowing at the glow. "Good thing we bought one of these off the black market," he muttered. "Handy little thing."
"I know," I said quietly. "Saves us the trouble of traveling between cities every time." Lifting the amulet, I spoke into the light. "Hey, Mom. Is everything alright? How's Sissy?"
The line on the screen pulsed faintly, and then a voice emerged. It was Sonya's, strained and broken, heavy with grief.
"I'm… sorry, Sin…"
Taichi and I both stiffened instantly, eyes snapping toward the device. My chest tightened. Her voice cracked as though she had been crying for hours.
"What is it?" I demanded, my words coming too fast. "Did they give her three lines? Was it two? Is she sick? Tell me!"
There was silence, just her trembling breath. And then the words came, each one like a knife plunging deeper.
"They… they ran the test on her after drawing her blood… and they put—" her voice broke into a sob, "they put four lines."