I knew that boy wasn't normal… the air around him was different.
Obel's thoughts murmured within him, hopelessly.
But it didn't matter now.
He lifted his dark indigo eyes—and saw carnage.
A slave girl sprinted blindly through the chaos, tears carving lines down her dirt-stained cheeks. Her breath hitched, her voice cracked—
Then her body exploded into red mist.
Her head lagged behind for a heartbeat before tumbling after her lifeless corpse.
Another slave knelt before the platform, palms raised, choking on his own screams.
"Please—please I beg—"
His cries met only chilling silence.
Then an obsidian sword pierced through his rib cage, ripping his lungs open. Blood sprayed violently across the shimmering barrier that protected the platform. His mouth opened… no words came out. Only a wet gasp.
The blade twisted.
His torso split.
His body fell in two neat halves.
Screams rippled through the hall.
The air tasted of metal.
Blood, sweat, and despair clung to every breath.
So this is how I end…
Obel exhaled, a whisper swallowed by chaos.
This is my fate.
Skulls cracked beneath panicked feet.
Some slaves tore at each other like starving beasts.
Others died to blades they never even saw.
From a far corner, a maddened voice pierced through the terror:
"How can that worthless rat get in and not me?!
ME?! Useless?!
I won't allow it!"
The reddish dark-eyed young man—hazel hair filthy and wild—raised both hands and began chanting in a tongue that vibrated reality itself.
Red runes spiraled into existence, burning and twisting the air.
Heat warped the space around him.
The hall itself seemed to flinch.
"You will all die with me!" he roared, blood foaming between his teeth.
The runes connected, froze—
Silence.
Then—
ING—BOOM!
The world folded inward.
A violent implosion shredded everything within reach.
Slaves nearest to him were reduced to charred silhouettes, faint memories of flesh.
Their bodies disintegrated into ashes that drifted like dark snow.
As for the boy—
There was nothing left.
Not even bone.
A perfect, horrifying stroke on the canvas of blood.