The tea tasted faintly of almonds and rot.
Rian, the fifteen-year-old son of a maid, knew what it was the moment the liquid hit the back of his throat. The Heart-Stopping Orchid. Expensive, colorless, and mercifully quiet.
He didn't scream. Screaming would only bring the guards, and the guards worked for the Matriarch. If he survived the poison, they would simply finish the job with a pillow.
He lay back on the thin straw mattress of the servants' quarters. The cold stone of the wall seeped into his shoulder. His heart stuttered—once, twice—like a bird hitting a windowpane.
So this is it, Rian thought, his vision blurring. I die so she doesn't have to explain me.
Resentment flared in his chest, hot and bright, but his body was too weak to hold it. The heat faded. The darkness rushed in.
Rian closed his eyes.
The room was silent.
The world was silent.
And then, the ceiling tore open.
It was not a physical tear. The stone did not crack. But the fabric of reality, the invisible veil that separates the living from the stream of the dead, was ripped apart by a hand wreathed in smoke and old blood.
The God of Revenge looked down into the small, pathetic room.
He had been watching. He was always watching when a child was removed from the board to save a powerful face. The imbalance of it offended him. The Karmic scales were tipped so heavily toward the Matriarch that they threatened to break the table.
"Unacceptable," the God rumbled. His voice was the sound of a blade being sharpened on a whetstone. "The debt is unpaid. The ledger is not balanced."
The boy's soul was already drifting away, fading into the ether. It was too weak to return. It had no will to fight.
"Fine," the God hissed. "If the vessel is empty, I will fill it with something that burns."
The God reached into the Great River of Souls—the chaotic, screaming torrent of spirits from a billion different worlds waiting for reincarnation. He searched for a specific frequency. He wanted a General betrayed by his king. He wanted a Berserker who died screaming. He wanted a soul that knew only fire and blood.
His hand closed around a drifting spirit. It felt cold. Hard. jagged.
"Perfect," the God muttered. "A weapon."
He didn't waste time checking the details. The boy's heart had stopped ten seconds ago. Brain death was imminent. The God shoved the foreign soul into Rian's cooling body, fused the spiritual pathways with a surge of divine power, and restarted the heart with a snap of his fingers.
"Wake, avenger," the God whispered, fading back into the void. "Wake and burn them all."
The body gasped.
It wasn't a frantic intake of air. It was a sharp, controlled inhalation, maximizing oxygen intake.
The boy sat up.
He didn't look around in confusion. He didn't check his hands or scream about being alive.
He brought two fingers to his carotid artery. He counted.
...Thump. ...Thump. ...Thump.
"Bradycardia," the boy whispered. His voice was raspy, but the tone was terrifyingly flat. "Heart rate forty-two. Pupillary response sluggish. trace neurotoxins in the bloodstream."
He looked at the empty cup on the floor. He looked at the straw mattress. He looked at the cold stone walls.
The God of Revenge, lingering invisibly in the corner to watch his creation rise, frowned. This wasn't the reaction of a Berserker. A Berserker would be smashing the furniture.
The boy closed his eyes, accessing memories that weren't his. He processed fifteen years of Rian's life in five seconds. The abuse. The neglect. The Matriarch. The imminent 'Age of Coming' ceremony.
The boy opened his eyes. They were not filled with the fire of vengeance. They were filled with the lifeless chill of a predatory reptile.
"Hostile environment," the boy murmured. "Liquidity: Zero. Assets: None. Liabilities: The entire board of directors."
He stood up, testing his balance. He walked to the cracked mirror on the wall and adjusted his collar, smoothing out the rags as if they were a three-piece suit.
"Strategy," he said to the empty room. "Avoid immediate liquidation. Secure capital. Hostile takeover."
In the corner of the room, the God of Revenge brought a hand to his face. He quickly pulled up the file of the soul he had grabbed.
Name: [Redacted] Occupation: Senior Risk Analyst / Corporate Restructuring Specialist. Cause of Death: Stress-induced stroke while closing a billion-dollar merger. Core Traits: Ruthlessness. Zero Empathy. Obsession with Leverage.
The God stared at the boy, who was now calmly pouring the rest of the poisoned tea into a crack in the floor to hide the evidence.
"Oh no," the God whispered. "I didn't send a warrior. I sent an auditor."