After the family dinner, father and son descended into the subway facility. They carried torches whose beams of light cast dancing shadows on the stone walls, as if ancient specters were watching them from the crevices. Each step creaked beneath their feet, enveloping the descent in an almost ceremonial silence.
Seik, walking a few steps behind his father, broke the silence with a question he had been pondering for some time.
"Father... I've been thinking, who is Sebastian really? I know he's the butler, but beyond that, who is he?"
The question sounded casual, but it was an arrow shot in the dark. I hoped that, by touching some fiber, I could pull the thread until something was revealed. He suspected that Sebastian and Alisa were connected, and starting with the old man seemed like the safest move. Besides, it wouldn't hurt to know more about the enigmatic butler.
Erick gave him a sidelong glance without pausing. He knew his son too well: Seik wasn't asking out of mere curiosity. However, after a few seconds, he stopped halfway up the stairs and turned to face him.
"Why do you want to know about Sebastian?"
Seik held his gaze. Talking to his father was like walking on thin ice: every word counted, every gesture could be interpreted in a thousand ways.
"Simple curiosity," he replied in a firm tone.
"Curious of you," Erick replied with a barely perceptible smile. "You don't ask why. Get to the point: what do you really want to know?"
Seik did not look away. His jaw tightened.
"Sebastian is not what he seems," he said without hesitation. "And Alisa... it's strange to me. I was told to choose a maid, but he already had her in mind. He didn't say it, didn't suggest it. He just pointed her out, as if it had always been her. I wonder why. Why her?"
Another arrow shot into the void. But this time, the echo seemed deeper, as if it had touched something.
Erick turned away without answering and continued down. The crackling of torches filled the space, projecting ephemeral figures that twisted in their wake.
The silence dragged on... until, finally, Erick spoke.
"Sebastian is a slave I trained," said Erick in a neutral tone, without pausing. "Today, he's a high-level assassin. I bought him when I tamed Red. I needed someone to test the dragon on, so I trained him from scratch. I made him what he is: an assassin in the service of this house."
Seik didn't answer right away. He chewed the information silently, fitting the pieces together in his mind as he searched for some link to Alisa.
"So..." he muttered at last, more to himself than to his father. "He wasn't chosen for talent. You made him special."
"Exactly," Erick said without looking at him. "He's shown me loyalty and efficiency. He doesn't hesitate. He doesn't question. He does what he is told."
Reaching the top of the stairs, Erick stopped in front of a black steel door. Without turning around yet, he added:
"It was he who asked to choose Alisa in advance. I wanted to know why. He explained that she was also a slave, like him. So I agreed."
Then he turned to Seik, looking at him seriously.
"Sebastian didn't want Alisa to go through anything worse? Is that why he asked you?" Seik asked, keeping his gaze fixed.
"Exactly," Erick nodded. "Sebastian, even though he's a murderer, is still human. Just like us, The Fénix. Don't forget that, Seik."
"I understand, father."
Erick raised his hand toward the door. From his palm a red glow burst forth, like a veil of fire slowly unfurling, overlaying the trembling light of the torches.
"What is that?" Seik asked, intrigued. "It looks like a magic password."
The glow began to dissipate, fading like mist in the sun.
"Intermediate magic," explained Erick. "It's a spell to open multiple locks on a single door. Although it is classified as intermediate, it is forbidden in most realms. I'll teach you how to use it later."
Erick had always been a man covered in layers. Secrets, knowledge, skills... Everything about him seemed vaster than his figure. To Seik, that commanded respect. Or maybe he just desired his knowledge.
The door opened slowly, with a metallic groan that echoed like a low whisper in the depths.
Beyond, a dark corridor. The torches on either side were extinguished, save for a lone one at the end.
Erick entered first, raising his torch to the right. As if the darkness itself responded, the torches on the wall flared one by one, tracing a line of living fire. He repeated the gesture to the left, and the light invaded the corridor, pushing the shadows solemnly away.
Seik followed, step by step, until they were both completely inside.
Behind his back, the door slammed shut. A dry, definitive sound. As if an invisible thread had pulled it... and there was no turning back.
Seik began to take note of the place. He scanned the corridor with his eyes, absorbing every detail: the precise arrangement of the torches, the play of shadows twisting on the walls, the sound of his own footsteps, which were now becoming denser, heavier, as if something invisible was clinging to his ankles.
The air was icy, despite the fire that lit the path. A cold that came not from the surroundings, but from somewhere deeper.
The closer they got to the torch at the end, the more frigid the atmosphere became. Seik shoved his hands into his jacket pockets, uncomfortably. Erick, on the other hand, moved forward with the unflappable calm of someone who has walked that path more times than he could count.
As they reached the end of the hallway, the corridor opened into a dark, vast, almost cathedral-like room, barely illuminated by a single moonbeam that slipped through a crack in the ceiling. The silvery light fell like a forgotten blessing: too dim to warm, too beautiful not to unsettle.
Seik scanned the place cautiously, trying to understand its purpose. Erick stepped in without hesitation, stepping with the assurance of one who knows every stone on the ground. As he advanced, the lunar light revealed the shapes of the surroundings, like a curtain slowly unraveling.
Then, a sound broke the silence: drops of water falling, rhythmically, from two different directions.
Seik turned to the left. Out of the shadows emerged a statue of a phoenix. The stone bird held a blade in its beak, and drops fell on its open wings, clattering against the marble. Each drop marked time with a cruel cadence, like a torture clock.
"What is this?" she whispered, not waiting for an answer.
Another drop fell. This time, behind him.
Seik slowly turned around.
A woman was sitting in a wooden chair. Gray steel bracelets clamped around her wrists. On her head, a machine dropped drops, one by one, soaking her mustard-colored hair. His skin was pale, his eyes as black as obsidian. Terror had frozen his face in a grimace that seemed sculpted.
Seik knew what he was coming to.
He averted his gaze to his father.
Erick had stopped, shrouded in shadows. Only his crimson eyes glowed brightly, like glowing embers in the midst of darkness. He was watching him silently, with that expression impossible to decipher.
Then he raised his hand and gestured: come closer.