The city was gone.
Michael stood tall, robes of stitched skin flaring in the windless room, as he stared out the wide, circular window. Below him, the world crumbled—a mosaic of fire, smoke, screams, and shadows. Buildings fell in slow motion. Asphalt cracked like dry skin. Humanity buckled under its weight.
And the shop—NEW LIFE: Restoration & Repair—stood stronger than ever. Its glass pulsed like a muscle. Its doors flexed. It breathed.
Michael laughed. Loud. Joyful. Godlike.
"They called me mad," he whispered to his son. "But look, Lukas. Look at our inheritance."
Lukas, now The Boy, sat on a twisted throne of chrome and bones, wires crawling along his legs. His eyes burned red. The children of Marque—fleshless, jittering humanoids stitched from black-and-white school photos—stood still beside him, eyes fixed, ready to kill.
Below, the city screamed.
Michael raised his hand.
"Shah," he said.
From the shadows, The Thriller emerged—its smile wide, its limbs jittery, moving like a stuttering film reel. Its fingers dragged along the floor, twitching.
"Clear the streets," Michael ordered. "Only we live now. This is our country."
Meanwhile, Sison gasped. He was on the roof, his head bleeding. How did he get here? His mind reeled. A thousand voices crawled through his ears—but he focused. Then he heard it: squelching.Skittering.
He leaned over the rusted rail. Below—dozens of entities marched through the old police station's hallways. Limbs bending the wrong way. Mouths chanting broken lullabies.
Sison remembered the gun in his jacket. Click. He didn't hesitate. He charged down the rooftop door, kicked it open, and unleashed hell.
BANG. BANG. BANG.
Headshots. Chests exploding. Skulls cracking open like eggs. He stormed through the hallway, relentless, ancient fury in his eyes. He saw the children of Marque—the ones who dragged him before.
BANG. BANG.
Gone. Holes in their foreheads. Paper-thin flesh melting. From the throne room, Michael turned. "Check that," he snarled.
But before Shah could move, the door was kicked open.
Sison. Bleeding. Breathing hard. Eyes wild. Michael smiled. Lukas turned his head with cold curiosity. "Welcome back, Sison," Michael said.
Sison held up a lighter. Flicked it. Threw it toward the throne. Nothing. A puff of smoke. Michael chuckled.
"I made it fireproof."
Then—Michael nodded.
The Boy raised his hand.
With a crack, Sison's body was lifted into the air. Arms spread. Legs stiff. He choked, floating like a dead marionette.
And then— CRACK. His jaw unhinged. His limbs bent backward like folded metal.
"Let me show you," Michael whispered, standing from his throne, "what repair means."
Lukas snapped his fingers. Dozens of tendril-wires shot out from the walls. They pierced Sison's arms, his legs, his spine.
He screamed as the wires spun—tearing skin from bone, unraveling muscle, ripping out veins like thread. One wire slithered into his mouth—and out of his eye. His body began to twitch violently, forcibly held up as pieces of him peeled off like an onion. Then his eyes popped. One. Then the other. A final breath— And he burst into a splatter of blood and bone shards, painting the floor like a red Rorschach.
Michael sat back down. "Another broken piece," he murmured. "Irreparable."
Outside, Sinner 1 chased them, crawling on walls, its arms long as lamp posts.
Migz panicked. "FUCK THIS!" he screamed and sprinted away, ditching the group.
"NO!" Nina yelled, but he was already gone.
He ran into the broken road, past flipped cars and the burning post office. He thought he could make it. He could survive. Then—VROOOOOOOM—From the side—a rusted truck, engine screaming, tore through the dust cloud. It moved like it had a soul. It wanted blood.
Migz turned just in time to see the headlights. BOOM. The impact crushed him sideways—his spine bent around the corner of the hood.
His body flipped, hit the streetlamp, and cracked in half mid-air. His insides spilled out like sloshing bags of soup. His bottom half skidded across the road. The truck didn't stop. It kept driving toward. As if answering a call.
Sasha, Sam, Nina, and Toff ducked behind a collapsed bus. Their faces pale. Breathing ragged.
Sam clutched a knife with shaking hands. "We can't outrun that thing," she hissed. "It's not even human anymore."
Toff looked around, trembling. "Where's Migz? Where—?"
"He's gone," Nina whispered. "He's fucking gone."
Sasha peeked around the bus. The street twisted, buildings hunched and snarling like beasts. Far down the block, Sinner 1 clicked toward them, head twitching, limbs scraping sparks off the walls.
"Run," Sasha said. "Now."
They bolted through the alley.
And behind them, Lukas—The Boy—was coming.
Glass curled like petals. Asphalt wept steam. The buildings leaned inward, hungry. And down at the shattered crossroads, the last survivors stood frozen—cornered.
A four-way death trap.
From each street, they came. Michael. Lukas. Shah. Towering. Smiling. Not men. Not monsters. Something worse. Inhuman inevitability.
Then the ground trembled. A sound like bones grinding in a blender echoed as Shah's body unraveled—her torso stretching into a snake, long and black, her face splitting open like wet paper. She slithered into the sky, her hiss warping the air. She dove.
Before anyone could scream, her coils wrapped around Nina. Dragged her up, high, until her feet kicked helplessly in the air.
"Your grandfather is dead," Shah whispered with a grin that reached too wide, too far. "And you're next."
Nina wailed. Fought. Kicked. Then—a snap. Her head twisted. Her spine folded inward. And Shah let her go. She fell like a broken doll, her body hitting the pavement with a wet thud. Lifeless. Silent.
Sasha screamed. Lila pulled her away. Toff and Sam bolted to the next building over. Two groups. Two doors. No time.
They climbed fast. The rooftops were old, wooden, cracked by time and flame. But it was height. And they needed height.
But the entities followed. Shadow-thin. Spindly. Laughing.
Then—on the rooftop—Michael arrived. Sam turned, knife in hand, breath wild, hair whipping in the wind.
He didn't speak. He raised his hand, and she flew backward, smashing into the water tank.
Sam coughed blood. Got up. Face bruised.
"I'm not afraid of you."
Michael tilted his head. "Then die brave." With a blur, he crossed the roof, grabbed her by the throat, and lifted her. She fought. Scratched. Kicked.
But his fingers sank in—his other hand dug into her chest—ripping past bone. She screamed. Spat blood in his face. Then, he pulled. Ripped her heart out like a seed from a fruit.
Sam collapsed in a spray of red. Her body twitched. Her mouth opened, silent. And then stillness.
Michael dropped the heart. "Irreparable."
Across on the other rooftop, Missy and Lila cried out. But they couldn't reach her. Couldn't help.
Behind them, the Boy stepped from the stairwell, flanked by Sinner 1.
Missy grabbed a plank of wood and swung. It cracked on Sinner 1's skull—did nothing.
"Lila, we have to go!"
They looked down—a tarp from the store fluttered far below. A gamble. They jumped. The fall was long, terrifying. But the tarp caught them. Bent. Drooped. Saved them. Barely.
Inside the other building, Toff ran. Michael and Shah crashed through the floors behind him.
He dove down a stairwell, then another—until he found a fire exit. Outside, Sasha and Lila rejoined him, bloody and exhausted.
And they ran. Toward the shop.
The ground behind them shattered. Shah, enraged, hurled cars like toys—they smashed into buildings, barely missing. One. After another. Boom. Boom.
But then, the doors of Dead Shop opened. They ran inside. Toff found the shotgun in the storage crate.
Michael followed. No more words. BOOM. The shot hit his chest. Michael stumbled.
BOOM. Another. He dropped to his knees. Then—to his back.
The god of the city lay still. But the Boy stepped forward. Face blank. Eyes burning red.
Lila raised the gun. She fired. But the bullet froze mid-air. Lukas grinned.
Then—the bullet reversed. It twisted, spun, and slammed into Lila's chest, just to the side of her heart. She gasped. Blood gushed from her mouth.
"No!" Sasha screamed.
Toff shot again.
BOOM.
The Boy staggered.
Again. BOOM.
This time, the body crumbled—flesh turning to ash, hair burning away, until Lukas was gone. Then, all around them, the world cracked.
The entities shrieked, falling into dust. One by one, they disintegrated, sucked into the floor, like shadows dragged into hell. The ground heaved. The walls shook. And the shop—Dead Shop—collapsed in on itself.
Sasha and Toff dragged Lila out just before the final collapse. She gasped, eyes fluttering. Still alive. Barely. They stood in the rubble. Smoke in the sky. Ash in the air. And all was silent.
The inheritance was gone. The price was paid.
The city had fallen.
The end of Volume 8: The Return of the Cursed Shop