Nice way to start, isn’t it? Me and my damn ambitions…

  I run for my life while thinking about every decision that brought me here: the projects, the betrayals, the conversations I should never have had. I slip through the city alleys like a rat, breathing smoke and raw fear, fleeing from the same people who swore they wanted a better world. My legs burn, my lungs are about to burst. Each breath is a gunshot of fire inside my chest.

  I should’ve done more cardio. I should’ve stayed teaching, pretending none of this was real!

  The world isn’t fair. It never was.

  Politics, economy, society… no matter where you look. Everything boils down to inequality. To that absurd lottery of birth that decides who gets luck, talent, power, or body, and who has to crawl to reach a shadow of what they dream of.

  Some are born with gifts. Others, with chains.

  “OH, SEBASTIAN~!”

  The voice pierces me like a dart. That damn woman. That beast. I fought her, I tried. But her strength, her speed… they’re not human. Not mortal.

  I saw my acid blast melt her face completely, and still, she kept moving forward. I saw every cell, every damn muscle rebuild itself as if the flesh itself refused to die. She smiled at me with those long fangs, sharp as scalpels. Now she’s laughing as she hunts me, leaping between the buildings. I see her from the corner of my eye: a black shadow with invisible wings.

  Hominus Nocturna.

  I thought they had gone extinct centuries ago, in the era of the Hollow King. Chronicles said he enjoyed fighting vampires because they were the only ones capable of resisting his infernal flames for longer. He enslaved them, locked them in coliseums all across Isdran, massacred them until the continent was cleansed of their kind.

  And yet, here I am, running from one.

  Carmilla. Of course. I’m not surprised in the slightest.

  She must’ve subjugated it with a forbidden blood spell. Only a mad witch like her would be capable of keeping alive something that shouldn’t exist anymore. Damn it—

  “Ngh–!”

  Speaking of blood… Her scythe grazed my abdomen. One slower movement and I’d be split in two. The blade leaves a wound that burns with dark poison. My healing miracle barely works. That edge must be coated with pure negative energy. I don’t have time to stop the bleeding. I have to keep going. I have to keep running!

  “Give up!” she yells at me, with a laughter that bites. “If you do, I promise I won’t kill you that slowly~!”

  Every word of hers sounds like mockery, like a lullaby for the dying. And still, I keep running. If I can’t reach the castle, at least I would distract her enough.

  I imagined a better world. One without inequality, without discrimination between groups. Where magic and science worked together completely, aside from just weapons. Where everyone had access to the power others monopolize.

  Just think about it: a world where anyone could be a mage. No overcrowded hospitals, no helpless ones. People could heal, protect, defend themselves. Knowledge would flow more freely. Mana would stop being a privilege dictated by chance and become hope.

  Since I was a child, I wanted to help others with my inventions.

  I failed each and each damn time. In the university of sciences they expelled me for being “discriminatory,” without even hearing my arguments. They said it went against the rules of nature. Bullshit! Smiley was the only one who supported me, the only one who offered me a classroom and a new purpose to teach the new generations of mages. And for a while… it was enough.

  But I didn’t just want to teach. I wanted to change everything. I wanted to democratize magic, make it accessible, break the corrupt balance that held the world.

  And now, as the echo of my steps mixes with the roar of that creature behind me, I think that maybe the mistake wasn’t dreaming. The mistake was believing the world wanted to be saved.

  Here she comes, I hear her—Now, attack!

  I stop dead as if the world had thrown a wall in front of me. I twist my torso, plant my feet on the wet cobblestone, push my pulse until my catalyst gloves vibrate and burn through the fabric soaked with blood. Despite the wound, despite the pain folding my side, I gather all the mana in my palms and release the boiling jet.

  “HEX STYLE: ACID BLAST!”

  The projectile shoots out like a liquid tongue of green fire, hissing, leaving vapor in its wake; the smell of burnt metal and hydrochloric acid gets into my throat. The acid isn’t just corrosion: it’s heat and noise, a moving bonfire that devours whatever it touches. I launch it straight toward the black figure rushing at me at full speed.

  CLANG-SSSSHHHH!

  “Oh come on! You’re so boring~!”

  Her scythe falls in a cold arc and splits half the jet in two, sending corrosive drops raining over the tiles. The remaining stream hits an old wall, where the stone wasn’t prepared for my venom.

  “Seriously, again? Didn’t you realize you can’t kill me with just that? You’re such a weakling, yuck! I won’t even bother eating you completely.”

  The masonry creaks as if someone had set its skeleton on fire. The surface softens: the stone warps, the mosaics bubble and begin to drip like black wax.

  “Behind you, fangs!”

  Metal from gutters and fittings crackles. She turns, not understanding where the deep sound comes from—the steel bars melting into ropes of liquid metal that drip and smoke.

  “Huh–?”

  THWOOM!!!

  A nearby post, made of dark iron, bends and falls with a crash, creating a large curtain of debris and smoke between us.

  It’s my chance!

  For a few seconds worth hours I can feel the distance grow: my legs respond, I sprint at full speed, and the city swallows my figure between alleys, while behind me the hissing continues and her fury remains trapped in a half-melted mouth of stone.

  I must reach the castle. I must tell Smiley everything.

  I don’t care about the oath Carmilla forced me to seal into my skin. I don’t care if breaking it kills me.

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  I’d rather die speaking than keep breathing with this inside for one second longer!

  I have to tell them… Gods, I have to tell them what they’re planning!

  The children. The deformed bodies.

  All this time, those bastards from the organization lied to me. They said they were looking for volunteers, “blank civilians interested in the experiment.” Clean words, full of bureaucracy. But the truth… the truth is they were kidnapping children without magic.

  And it wasn’t to give them power. It was to disarm their souls.

  The Arcane Cell Transmutation Catalys…the damn machine I helped to build…

  Those bastards discovered that it could be corrupted with enough NEG energy. What was meant to turn a healthy body into a pure mana channel could instead mutate it. Turn it into something even the gods wouldn’t want to look at.

  Abominations.

  Demons made of pain, agony.

  When I saw the bodies convulsing, the muscles dissolving into those masses, the veins pulsing outside the skin… I vomited. I vomited until I bled. The air smelled of copper and sin. The screams were from children, from creatures that once had names and families. They were shaved, naked, marked with numbers like cattle.

  They weren’t test subjects. They were offerings.

  I played dumb. Pretended not to see anything. Kept my calm while taking samples, while hiding recordings in my pockets. I thought I could escape, that I’d have enough time to report, to deliver the evidence.

  But they found me out.

  They burned my house. Destroyed my files, my plans, everything. Now they hunt me. They don’t want to silence me: they want to erase my existence.

  I should’ve known from the start.

  From the moment they offered me unlimited funds, from the moment they stopped asking moral questions, from the moment Carmilla smiled.

  The Design.

  It was always them in secret. Anti-blank terrorists with a god complex, lovers of power and extermination. Damn fanatics. Damn every single one of them—

  FWOOOM–CRASHHH!!!

  “WHAT THE—?!”

  A crash shakes the street. A car falls in front of me, exploding like a metallic meteorite, bursting the asphalt, lifting a wave of smoke and scrap. I formed a barrier to absorb the blast, but it hit me hard, I fell, my ears rang like bells. The lights flicker. The air becomes a hot roar. If I’d taken one more step, I’d be under those burning wheels, crushed like a damn bug.

  “End of the game, Sebi…”

  I hear her. That voice. Soft, evil. I can barely stand up…

  Panting, I turn. And there she is: the woman. Walking towards me with a calm more terrifying than any laughter. No smirk this time, no sharp smile. Only that fixed, predatory gaze of someone who savors every second of the end of the hunt.

  I stumble backward, feeling my heart pounding in my throat. Each step is a tremor.

  Focus. This body’s unstable. I spent more energy than I should’ve to replicate myself completely.

  I have to focus. If I lose my calm, if I make a single mistake right here and right now… it’s the end.

  I take a deep breath. I search for every drop of mana, claw at the reserves in my veins, try to gather enough energy for one last illusion, one last distraction.

  “ILLUSION STY—”

  SHNK!

  A hum, and then… silence.

  I look down. I don’t understand. My arms… my arms are… gone? Blood gushes out in spasmodic pulses, hot, alive. My forearms fall to the ground like rag dolls, the hands still clenched in a futile attempt to conjure.

  “G…gah—”

  I mumble, incredulous, staring at my own limbs on the sidewalk, soaking the ground in bright red. I don’t feel pain yet. Only emptiness. The body still hasn’t realized what it’s lost.

  The woman takes another step. Her silhouette is framed against the shattered lights of the burning car. The edge of her scythe gleams with a sickly reflection.

  SHNK!

  A diagonal slash cuts across my chest. The air leaves my lungs. I feel the pressure, not the blade—the sensation that something is separating me from myself. Rough, wet, a red gush bursts from my mouth.

  Romina… Bernt… Astera…

  I’m sorry. I’m so sorry…

  SHNK! SHNK! SHNK!

  Each strike is an echo. The world slows down, a parade of flashes and shadows I can no longer distinguish, as my vision goes completely dark.

  Inspector Vans… Please, protect them…Protect Feralynn. Protect Miria.

  I… I told Carmilla about them… that night, in her car. I thought I could distract her, buy some time while copying the files. I thought I understood her… that I could mislead her long enough to bring everything to light.

  But I failed. Yet again…

  I gave her their names. I gave her their faces. And now she’ll go after them, as she came for me.

  Her shadow… must already be over them. Protect them, Vans. Do it for all those I couldn’t save. For the children. For the bodies I let rot in the name of progress.

  …I just wanted to help the world.

  SSSHHLACK!!!

  But the world doesn’t want to be saved.

  …

  …

  …

  Sebastian’s lay bleeding out on the street, lit by the orange fire of the burning car.

  Fwip!

  With an agile turn, Elfrana wiped the blood from her scythe. She smiled faintly, that satisfied grin of someone who enjoys their work far too much. Another hunt. Another life extinguished in this new era—where castles were rectangular and had electric lights, where carriages no longer needed horses.

  She stretched, her muscles tense and her jaw relaxing in a sigh of pleasure.

  “Haaah~ What a great way to start the night!”

  She sheathed her weapon across her back and walked among the remains of the smoking vehicle. The fire painted her face with crimson glints, as if the city itself were applauding her work.

  “Little snack to regain some energy,” she murmured, grabbing the head by the hair like someone choosing a ripe apple.

  She opened her mouth, her tentacular tongue licking the drops of blood.

  “Aaah~”

  MUNCH!

  “Mmph…?”

  The look of pleasure twisted into a grimace of disgust.

  The flesh was… strange. Too soft, without texture, without a real soul. It didn’t taste of fear or life at all. Centuries spent devouring villagers across the towns of Isdran and the neighboring kingdoms had sharpened her palate when it came to mortal flesh. She could distinguish age, race, and even gender with a single bite. Elfrana frowned and looked at the severed head.

  Sebastian’s face began to melt like wax under heat. The features dissolved, dripping through her pale fingers until they formed a viscous puddle.

  “Uh… oh…”

  She backed away, horrified. Not because of the spell, but because of what it meant.

  “WHAT?! A FUCKING CLONE?!”

  Her scream bounced between the buildings. Some windows lit up; the sirens were already roaring in the distance.

  Her earpiece vibrated. The cold voice of her mistress pierced her like a spear of glass:

  “I told you not to make too much noise. Take the body and get out of there before you’re seen.”

  Carmilla hung up before allowing any reply.

  “Y-Yes, ma’am!”

  Elfrana saluted the empty air like a soldier, stiff, feeling a chill crawl down her spine at the mere thought of her discovering the mission’s failure.

  But there was nothing left of the body—it evaporated between the smoke and the fire, vanishing as if it had never existed.

  “Shit, shit, shit! Just what the hell do I tell her now?!”

  She spun around on herself like a lost child afraid of her mommy’s imminent punishment.

  “It’s fine… it’s all fine! Just… just tell her you ate it because you were hungry. Yeah. Yeah! That’s it! You ate it!”

  She took a deep breath, trying to recover composure, while the sirens drew closer. With a single leap, she launched herself to the rooftops, vanishing into the shadows.

  “Ughhh… I don’t want Carmilla to twist my limbs with her bare hands, again…” she muttered, leaping between buildings.

  The moon followed her with every movement, every dash through the darkness.

  “If that was a clone…” she whispered, with a shiver that froze even her immortal blood. “Where the hell is the real one?”

  …

  …

  …

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