The guard shuffled into Xoza's cell, his boots echoing against the cold stone. He leaned down, squinting.
Guard (smirking): Still alive, huh? Persistent little rat.
Xoza's chest rose and fell in shallow, uneven gasps. His skin had gone pale, lips cracked, eyes bloodshot and empty from thirst. His ears itched and burned with that constant writhing — the sticky crawling that never stopped — but worse than the pain was the silence. A silence so deep it felt like the world had abandoned him.
His vision wavered, reality bending. He couldn't tell if he was awake or still trapped in some nightmare. His stomach groaned, hollow. His tongue was a stone in his mouth.
Two and a half days. No water. No food. No light. Just the dark, and the whispers of his mind turning against him.
The guard slipped brass knuckles onto his hand with a slow, deliberate click.
Guard (mocking): Let's finish this game.
He swung.
CRACK!
Xoza's head whipped sideways, his skull bouncing off the wall.
BAMM!
Blood sprayed, warm and wet down his cheek.
BOOM!
The third blow split his brow wide open.
The guard laughed, a hollow, cruel sound echoing through the cell. And then he didn't stop. He kept swinging, over and over, savoring every crack of bone, every drop of blood.
Guard: HAHAH—c'mon, break already!
Each strike pushed Xoza closer to the edge, his body twitching, trembling, breaking. Yet in that storm of pain, his mind clung desperately to fragments of memory.
He saw Vamos' smile when they first shook hands.
He remembered Loma's timid laugh.
He remembered the warmth of his mother's cooking, the smell of rice fresh off the pot.
Xoza (thinking): I'm sorry… I couldn't… protect anyone…
Tears mixed with the blood on his face. His vision blurred, but in those final seconds, he wasn't seeing the guard. He was seeing his friends. His brothers.
Xoza (whisper, fading): Vamos… Loma… I…
The guard raised his fist for the last time.
CRUNCH!
Silence.
Xoza's body slumped lifelessly to the floor. His chest no longer rose. His lips no longer moved.
The last thing he saw wasn't peace. It wasn't light.
It was the guard's smile — cruel, mocking, the face of hell itself.
Guard (panting, grinning): Finally… you persistent bastard.
Xoza's soul slipped away into the dark, and the cell swallowed him whole.
Narration:
And so, Xoza died.
No glory.
No peace.
Just the cold floor, the dark, and the echo of cruelty.
May his soul rest in peace.
When the news spread of Xoza's death, the halls of RDX fell into silence. The once-proud brothers clenched their fists, but none raised their heads.
One by one… they bent the knee to Kael.
Even Vamos, once the fearless leader, lowered his eyes. His silence was colder than words.
From that day forward, Vamos was no longer RDX's light. He became Fang's No. 2 — his eyes as cold as the steel of Kael's grip.
Sylven, stripped of his place, fell to No. 3.
But in the shadows, the ghost of Xoza lingered — his apology, his sorrow, his unfulfilled dream of protecting everyone.
A dream buried in darkness.
Chapter 61 end