Azriel sat in silence for a few minutes before grabbing his coat and retrieving a small dagger hidden in his boot. Without wasting another second, he rushed out—headed straight for the Quiet Helm, desperate to make sure Gio was safe.
The smell of gunpowder thickened the air. Blood pooled beneath the body of a fallen enforcer. Inside, Gio was holding his ground, fighting off the remaining attackers with nothing but a kitchen knife, darts, and a handful of nuts hurled like bullets—each strike backed by brutal strength and deadly precision.
There were five enforcers left.
Azriel quickly snatched the pistol from the dead enforcer and fired. One bullet struck an enemy in the back of the head. The second hit another in the shoulder—enough of an opening for Gio to hurl a dart directly into his forehead.
Azriel dove to the side, flipping over a table for cover. The remaining three enforcers split up—two turned to Gio, one charged at Azriel. As the man lunged, Azriel kicked the table forward, throwing him off-balance. He darted to the side, slammed a foot into the enforcer's thigh, and cracked him in the jaw with the butt of his gun.
Meanwhile, the two others pursued Gio into the kitchen.
One burst in recklessly—
BOOM!!!
Gio struck him square in the face with a frying pan, sending him tumbling into the second enforcer. Off balance, the second man staggered—just in time for Azriel to drive a blade into his back.
Breathing hard, the two retreated into the kitchen and slammed the door shut behind them. Azriel grabbed Gio and hugged him tight.
"I never doubted your abilities," Azriel said, breathless, "but I was still worried."
Gio patted him on the back, chuckling hoarsely.
"I'm too old now, kid. Can't use my golden eyes like I used to. My strength's closer to a normal man's these days. But... thank you. I should scold you—but you saved me,"
Azriel slumped to the floor in relief, catching his breath. Gio, wiping blood from his hands, glanced over and asked,
"How'd you learn to fight like that? I didn't even know you could shoot—let alone that well."
Azriel blinked.
When did I learn to fight like that?
"I… don't know," he muttered.
Gio looked surprised, but Azriel's mind was already racing. The movements—the reflexes—they hadn't felt like his own. Then the thought hit him like a hammer.
"A warrior killed me that night," he said slowly. "One with a gun. A marksman type. Maybe… I absorbed a bit of him?"
Gio rubbed his jaw, thinking it over.
"It's possible. But if you only took his muscle memory, then you wouldn't know the techniques, right? Or any special abilities or memories he had. So… maybe you only take fragments from those who kill you."
Azriel nodded, replaying it all in his mind.
When I fell off that building, my senses sharpened too.
Could it be? Since he had killed himself in that moment—could he have absorbed his own senses? And enhanced them by doing it twice?
The two sat in silence, trying to piece it all together. But the idea would have to wait.
They needed to escape Reigo.
That wouldn't be easy—not with enforcers crawling through the streets, and the Quiet Helm drenched in blood. They had no idea how long this purge would last… or if the Graces planned to wipe out the entire city just to find Azriel.
They picked up the guns from the fallen enforcers, wiping the blood off the barrels with shaking hands. Then, one by one, they stripped the uniforms from the corpses, dressing quickly. The fabric was damp—some of it still warm.
Disguised in bloodstained armor, Azriel and Gio stepped outside.
And stopped.
The sight before them was hell.
Bodies littered the cobblestone streets—men, women, even children. Stray animals lay in broken heaps beside them. The enforcers hadn't discriminated. The purge had swallowed the city whole. Screams echoed faintly from blocks away, cut off as fast as they rose. Fire licked the edges of buildings.
Smoke choked the air.
And above it all—she stood.
The Grace of Life. Voralis.
Floating effortlessly above the carnage, her feet rested atop two subdued mages like a living throne. She watched her enforcers carry out the slaughter below with detached calm, her white robes unstained. Her expression held no joy, no malice—just the cold, clinical satisfaction of a gardener pruning weeds.
Azriel's stomach turned as he watched one enforcer break down mid-slaughter—dropping his weapon, sobbing over a child's corpse. Another enforcer, face stricken with guilt, lifted his gun and shot his own partner before turning it on himself.
They're killing their own…
Their own families.
Voralis tilted her head, seemingly unmoved. But her eyes scanned the skyline, searching—waiting.
Gio leaned in. "She's lookingforyou."
Azriel's jaw clenched.
"She didn't feel the power again. That surge when I came back… she wants to find its source."
They ducked behind a scorched wall as a patrol marched past—ten enforcers, three hounds, and a Clockroach Drone clicking and skittering across the cobblestones. Its brass shell gleamed under the firelight, legs twitching like a metallic insect, gears grinding within its body. Its singular red eye scanned left to right in an eerie rhythm, pulsing with arcane energy.
Gio whispered, "We can't go through the streets. Even in uniform, that thing will smell the blood or read your pulse."
Azriel thought quickly, then looked at a nearby alley where storm drains ran deep below Reigo.
"The sewers. If we cut through them, we can reach the train yard."
Gio raised a brow.
"And after that?"
Azriel stared into the smoke-darkened sky where Voralis loomed.
"East. As far from the Graces as we can go."
They moved quickly, darting between rubble and wreckage, hiding behind collapsed walls and burnt-out trams. The air was thick with death, and every step felt like a betrayal—leaving behind a city Gio had once called home.
Just before reaching the alley, a sound stopped them.
A high-pitched whir-clack—followed by skittering metal legs.
Gio shoved Azriel down. "Clockroach!"
The drone burst from a charred storefront, legs whirring and claws snapping. It emitted a low-pulse sonar screech, gears inside spinning fast as its red eye locked on movement.
Azriel rolled behind cover and raised his stolen gun, but Gio held him back.
"Don't shoot! If she hears gunfire, she'll know you're here. We need to take it quietly."
Azriel took a breath.
"Then we disable it. Fast."
Then suddenly, a blinding green light spilled from the sky—consuming the Clockroach and every corpse in sight. The source was unmistakable: Voralis. With a wave of her hand, she revived them all, puppeteering the dead to return to their routines as if nothing had happened. But the illusion fooled no one. Reigo—no, all of Evascera—was no longer safe. And so, Azriel and Gio slipped into the underground systems and made their escape, heading east toward the distant region of Neuraleth, where the Graces' reach had yet to fully take hold.