**Chapter One: Escape to Hell**
In this city built in darkness, far from the sunlight, surrounded by nuclear radiation everywhere.
In an upscale residential neighborhood, in the middle-class district.
A pale young man with gray hair moved quietly, slipping into one of the houses. It was routine for him. He easily bypassed the outer and inner security of the house and entered through the front door, a key appearing out of nowhere in his hand.
Once inside, he headed to the second floor, where he heard the sound of running water in the bathroom. Knowing his target was bathing, he sat down to wait. As he waited, he heard a noise coming from one of the rooms and went to investigate.
The room was locked with an advanced device rigged with a bomb, requiring a passcode. It was strange—such high-tech security for a room in an otherwise ordinary house. He searched the area for the electronic keycard.
He looked everywhere: the bookshelf, inside books, on tables, behind paintings and posters, under rugs...
Silently, he searched until he found a hidden safe. He opened it slowly and discovered a keycard for the lock, along with a blank map covered in scribbles. The map was hand-drawn, with a yellow zigzagging line forming a right angle—though it looked like it had been drawn by a blind man or an infant.
The young man recognized the line as representing the Black River. Inside the right-angled space on the northeast side—which took up two-thirds of the paper—was a crude drawing of a black pipe, next to a card and a machine. Below them was a large drawing of an animal's head, labeled **"Dragon."**
*Click.* The sound of a door closing.
The young man stopped his search, slipping the card and map into his coat pocket. He exited the room like a seasoned soldier, a dagger now in his hand—one that hadn't been there before. When he reached the source of the sound, he found himself back at the same locked door. He frowned. *"Did someone leave... or enter?"*
**"Who are you?"** A voice came from behind him. The room suddenly lit up as a man pressed a button on a remote in his hand.
**"You shouldn't have crossed someone from the Fringe, Mr. Paul,"** the young man replied, turning to face a balding, lightly bearded man in his forties, wearing pajamas and still damp from his shower.
**"Leave,"** Paul ordered, irritated.
**"The passcode for the room. I need to confirm something before you die,"** the young man demanded, ignoring him.
Paul didn't answer. The two stared at each other.
The young man realized Paul was waiting for someone. In a flash, he lunged forward, dagger raised—and severed Paul's head in one clean motion. The head flew through the air before hitting the ground.
The young man looked at the decapitated head and sighed. *"Is this really Paul?"* He pushed the thought aside. He couldn't believe the infamous gang leader had been so weak. Something strange was happening.
He touched the locked door. It began to decompose slowly but steadily, creating a hole that expanded like a cascading, dirt-like waterfall. Once the hole was large enough, he stepped through.
Inside, he found a five-year-old girl slumped against the wall near the door. She was sweating, barely breathing, exhaustion written all over her.
He administered precise first aid, but her condition only worsened. It made no sense—she wasn't sick or injured, yet she was deteriorating by the second.
He picked up a dirty, tattered doll beside her and placed it in her hands. Leaning close, he whispered in her ear:
**"The one you love is coming. You shouldn't make him worry about you."**
Just as he expected, her breathing slowly steadied. He left her on the floor and headed to Paul's office.
After rifling through documents, he found what he was looking for—a file attached to the girl's picture. She was an orphan, her mother currently a hired assassin for Paul. Her targets were Paul's rivals, and in exchange, her daughter's safety was guaranteed.
The young man searched for information on the mother but only found her targets and their locations. He took the latest target's address and left.
---
When he arrived at the target's house, he found a policeman surveilling it. The young man realized the officer was verifying whether the woman inside was indeed the assassin.
He disposed of him. Then, with his dagger, he began peeling the skin from the policeman's face.
Inside the dimly lit house, a man in his sixties lay on a couch, blood seeping from his mouth despite his feeble attempts to stop it.
Sitting atop him was a beautiful young woman in her late teens, pressing a short combat knife slowly into his heart.
She watched calmly as his desperate expression faded into indifference toward death. Her gaze sharpened, making her look like a poisonous rose.
She had fed him a paralyzing toxin, leaving him unable to move or resist.
When the last breath left his body, his eyes dulling, she pulled the knife out. With a barely noticeable flick of her wrist, she severed his head, letting it roll to the floor with a sickening *thud*, fresh blood spreading across the floorboards. Unfazed, she left the room, cleaning the knife one-handed in the bathroom sink before stepping outside.
The garden was so dark that the only light came from the faint streetlamps. The air reeked of dampness and mold—odd, considering it was midday, when the sun should have been at its peak.
After five minutes of silence, she decided to leave.
As she exited through the front gate, she found a young man about her age, his expression sorrowful, staring intently at the knife in her left hand.
**"So it was you,"** he sighed, running a hand through his black hair in despair. **"Do I have the right to know something... or do I deserve nothing?"**
**"No. And... aren't you a cop?!"** The young woman smiled faintly under the yellow streetlamp, her dark skin, blue-black hair, and striking blue-green eyes making her look almost angelic. Her thick dark eyebrows, unnaturally black eyelashes, small nose, and short, perfect smile completed the image. **"Aren't you going to arrest me?"**
**"A cop... arrest..."** The young man muttered, his gray eyes hollow, lost in thought. **"Well, it doesn't matter anymore... It's already too late."** He stood still for a moment. **"Actually, your daughter isn't doing well..."**
**"Strange. You're not the cop who was tailing me! But why do you look like him?"** She tilted her head. **"Whatever. I don't care, boy. But what do you mean, 'your daughter isn't doing well'? Are you playing with me?"**
**"Paul is dead. That explains everything,"** the young man said as he walked away. **"We'll meet again."**
---
### **In the Middle-Class District**
Between the luxury of the upper-class neighborhoods and the simplicity of the slums, there was a middle-class district—a place caught between two worlds.
As the young man wandered its alleys, heading somewhere, his mind fixated on the door sound he'd heard earlier. He never got the chance to open it and confirm his suspicions.
Paul had seemed different—emerging from the bathroom without a sound, not even the door creaking. Yet he'd been weak. His presence in the Fringe wasn't random; there was a reason behind it.
And then there was the map. He'd heard of the Dragon but had never seen it—or even a picture of it. Yet the map reminded him of it. *Was there really a Dragon in this city? Impossible.*
Finally, he stopped in front of an old garage with a wide, rusted gate attached to a plain-looking house. He pushed the door open with ease and stepped inside.
Inside, a young woman was tattooing roses over a teenage girl's scarred and burned arm. The teenager had long black hair, light green eyes, and wore old black clothes.
The woman's fingers moved with precision and expertise, covering the scars to make them invisible. The only sound was the needle burning into skin.
Ignoring them—and them ignoring him—the young man walked to a marble slab on the floor, lifting it to reveal a dusty black bag. He opened it, peeling the policeman's face from his own, revealing his pale, sickly features. The exhaustion in his eyes was gone, replaced by a deep, sorrowful wisdom. He returned the bag to its place.
Next, he headed to the corner of the garage, where an old toilet and a rusted sink stood. He stripped, turned on the shower (held together by a thread), and began washing.
The water carried away black dye from his hair, but it couldn't wash off the thick, milky fluid clinging to him. As it dripped off his well-built frame, it revealed countless scars—each larger and deeper than the last. One particularly gruesome mark ran from below his left eye down to his neck, with three deep gashes beside it. Both liquids slid down the drain like a soul leaving a body.
The young man's hair was gray—not a sign of handsomeness, but proof of the suffering he'd endured in the Fringe. It had once been black. His gray eyes, now free of exhaustion, were filled with grief and the hard-earned wisdom of a hellish life.
He raised his left hand, staring at a milky-white crystal. Slowly, it secreted a liquid of the same color, covering the scars and deformities on his palm as if they'd never existed. But in the end, he rejected it, leaving the scars untouched.
Once finished, he dressed in black underwear, pants, and a hoodie, then dried his hair with a tattered towel. He looked like a new man—pale skin, short gray hair—but the scars and sorrow remained, making him seem like a high-ranking gang member.
The young woman, now done with the tattoo, cleaned her tools alone.
**"I told you not to waste water,"** she said coldly, glancing at him with her violet eyes. **"Especially in this place."**
**"I found Paul,"** he replied, changing the subject as he dried his hair with a faint smile. **"He no longer exists."**
She nodded without reaction, saying nothing.
**"I found a little girl in a room. Barely breathing..."** He paused, then continued, **"I looked into her background. Found her mother... and recognized her."**
She looked at him now, slowly, strands of her black hair falling over her eyes.
**"She's Vordon's daughter. I took care of her for six years—I was eight, she was five."** He smiled bitterly, fragments of memory resurfacing. **"We were separated after that. Me... and her."**
**"But she didn't recognize you?"** the young woman asked softly.
He shook his head. **"I was wearing a cop's face... a cop who'd been tailing her as a 'suspect' in a murder. I killed him... and took his face."**
He sighed, staring at the floor. **"I watched her silently... then told her about her daughter... and left the rest to fate."**
She was silent for a while before asking, **"What's your connection to Vordon that he'd leave his daughter with you?"**
**"He was my mentor. I was the one who put the idea in his head—to escape this city, no, this entire world. But I never thought he'd take on such a mission himself."** His sigh was heavy.
**"So you were the reason Vordon united the Fringe's children. And you stayed silent all this time."** She understood now. **"Do you really think Vordon found a way out? And will you stay here with me today, or do you have other business?"**
**"I found a way out. If my treasure is real."**
After a heavy silence, the young man hung the tattered towel and smoothed his disheveled hair. **"I'll verify the treasure now... I can't stay anyway. Gangs are competing to hunt me down. At least three groups are after me."**
The young woman gave him a long, unreadable look, as if waiting for him to say more.
He hesitated before continuing, **"I want you to come with me... If you stay, they won't just come for me. They'll come for you in my name."**
**"What a romantic way to invite me,"** she said with a smile. After a moment, she nodded. She had nothing to lose by following her husband. She didn't even ask about this "escape treasure."
---
### **Preparations**
They gathered their supplies—not many, but carefully chosen:
- Two elegant energy pistols with blue engravings.
- Fully charged crystalline ammunition.
- Several boxes of colored crystal bullets.
- Two daggers—each double-edged, one sharp, the other serrated like a saw.
- Two black gas-purifying masks.
- Two pairs of transparent lenses that adhered directly to the eyes like a second layer.
Despite being weapons, everything was beautifully designed—shiny, clean, attractive, like deadly jewelry. The crystal bullets gleamed with faint light, each color different.
This wasn't just packing for an escape. It was arming for war.
Unlike the young man, who took only combat gear, the young woman didn't forget essentials: compressed food cans, copper water bottles, spare clothes, nine packs of "energy cigarettes," and three lighters. She divided them between them, afraid they might get damaged.
---
### **The Plan**
The plan was simple... and insane.
Escape the stratified city through **"Prison of the Covenant"** by freeing a dragon and clinging to its claws as it flew randomly beyond the barrier.
A plan half myth, half desperation.
The young woman didn't dwell on it. She knew her husband had a morbid sense of humor. The dragon was just a legend—like lions, wolves, dogs, ants, bees, and mosquitoes, creatures wiped out by radiation, existing only in stories passed down through generations.
But she didn't question it. His twisted humor was part of why she loved him.
The outcome was inevitable, the truth clear. Yet she chose to gamble. Staying meant certain death. An adventure—even if it was a death wish—was better.
But their decision to escape their miserable lives for the very thing that had ruined them—the hell outside—showed just how few choices they had.
**"Is the outside world better?"** the young woman asked, smiling as she studied the childish map on the floor.
The young man studied her face for a moment before sighing. **"I've heard radiation has a limited range."**
**"Hmm. Doesn't matter. But if we get out and find a place without radiation..."** She lifted her gaze from the map to meet his eyes. **"What will you do?"**
**"The sea... mountains... rivers... animals... the sky... stars..."** He quickly looked away, his eyes landing on the food cans filled with toxic mold and worms. **"Let's just get out first. Honestly, I hate hope. I prefer the truth, even if it's scalding—not just bitter."**
---
### **Meanwhile...**
Somewhere near the city's aerial barrier—the foundation of the city, blocking over 90% of outside radiation—a transparent, wave-like shield pulsed steadily every second.
The young mother, her eyes lifeless, dug into the dry, rotten earth with her bare hands near a withered black tree.
After fifteen minutes, she found a door handle. Lifting it, she triggered a burst of dust across a two-and-a-half-meter radius. Carrying her sleeping five-year-old daughter, she descended the stairs leading beneath the city, making sure to close the door behind her.
**"Another failure,"** a man muttered, appearing out of nowhere as he examined the black door, now being buried again by the living, rotting earth. Bald with a light beard, he looked eerily like Paul. **"As Vordon's daughter, I thought she'd found the Dragon's hideout. But she didn't. Damn that useless servant—not only did he get captured by Fringe rats, he didn't even notice this door was new, not old."**
Paul's double glanced behind him before leaving quietly. **"I sacrificed my brother for nothing. Well... it doesn't matter."**
---
### **End of Chapter One**