Silence was absolute.
In the depths of the bunker, the only sound was Kael's breathing—ragged, forcibly controlled, like a beast on a leash.
The shadows trembled around him, but not out of fear. They trembled because they recognized him.
Kael stood in the center of the dark room, surrounded by charcoal circles, unknown symbols drawn with bloodied fingers across the floor.
He had left the soldier's shadow in one corner of the chamber—inert, uncontrolled, a remnant of a mutilated life, writhing in its own darkness.
He hadn't slept in three days.
He hadn't eaten in two.
And for one, he'd started hearing whispers that weren't Seraphine's.
And yet, he was calm.
He knelt, palms on the floor, and from him flowed tendrils of shadow—like black veins crawling toward the distorted body of the dead soldier.
The former soldier no longer resembled anything human.
He had no face, only a black mask fused to a shattered skull.
His body was fragmented, with spikes of bone and blades of shadow growing from it—executioner's limbs.
Kael called him Voiceless.
Because he didn't speak. Didn't beg. Didn't scream. He only listened.
But he was unstable. Like a fire that refused to burn anywhere but hell.
Kael drew in a breath, and as he exhaled, the darkness around him quivered.
— "You are mine… but you are not complete."
His own shadow pulsed beneath him like a chained beast. He could feel its hatred, its pain, its thirst. It wasn't just a projection—it was a piece of his soul.
And it wanted blood.
— "You want to feed? Fine. But you'll make him stronger."
And then, without hesitation, he opened his palm, and from it unraveled a strip of pure shadow—thick, pulsing black, like a living vein.
It writhed in the air, squirmed, and merged with Voiceless's chest.
The creature trembled.
The walls darkened.
The symbols faded.
Voiceless fell to his knees, back arched, mouth open in a silent scream.
Kael's shadow wove into his, and the body began reconstructing in real time. The blades extended. Ribs pushed outward to form an armored cage.
The eyes became two glowing red craters.
Then… silence.
The creature stood.
Slowly.
Controlled.
With its head bowed in submission.
Kael gave a faint smile, blood dripping from his left eye.
There had been a cost. A sacrifice. But he had succeeded.
— "Raise your weapon."
Voiceless extended an arm, and from it emerged a long sword—crafted from solidified shadow, trembling like wind in a dead forest.
Kael rose to his feet, limping, but with a new force in his eyes.
— "Now you are what you were meant to be. Not a soldier. Not a victim. But a curse."
That night, Kael slept for the first time without nightmares.
But somewhere above, the shadows stirred.
Someone—or something—had begun to feel the presence of the new curse born underground.
And not all gods were asleep.
Every step was calculated with clinical precision.
Kael crouched, pressed against the cold wall of the underground depot.
Here, behind rusted bars and flickering cables, interplanetary transport tech was stored. Not rare, but not common either. The kind of thing no one would notice missing... until it was far too late.
His breath was steady. Cold.
Around him, only the electric hum of control panels and the slow creak of an unoiled wheel.
No alarms. No guards. Yet.
From his shadow, a figure materialized—faceless, but alive.
The soldier's shadow. But it was no longer the soldier from his memories.
It was something else now.
Deformed, with elongated limbs, black edges pulsing like open wounds. Hollow, yet solid. Malicious.
When Kael had offered a part of his own shadow as an "offering," the creature transformed.
Now, it was a fragment of his will. An extension of his hatred. A silent instrument of vengeance.
Kael blinked slowly. He felt the pulse of the corridor in his chest, but he didn't hesitate.
Thoughts of his mother, of her face scorched by incomplete memories, of the laughter of those who destroyed him... these built his resolve.
He didn't want another massacre.
Not here. Not now.
Not yet.
The shadow slithered across the floor like dried blood.
It slipped under the metal door and, within seconds, the silence was broken only by a soft mechanical click.
A security lock disengaged.
Kael stepped in.
In the center of the room, on a glass pedestal, sat the device:
A metallic sphere split down the middle, like a broken heart.
Small, but capable of sending him anywhere in the universe—if he knew the coordinates.
And Kael knew them.
He had stolen them from a classified report long ago, back when he was silent. When he was still "the cleanup boy," the one who washed blood off the walls after interrogations.
Earth.
The only planet where no one would look for him.
Too far. Too chaotic. Too alive.
He reached out.
The shadow wrapped around him like a cloak of darkness.
He touched the sphere.
A violet light began to pulse at its core, like a heart awakening.
Then an artificial voice:
"Coordinates confirmed. Activation in 10... 9..."
Kael closed his eyes.
He said no goodbyes.
There was nothing left behind.
Only ruins and scars.
"3... 2... 1..."
Space tore apart.
Silence was replaced by an explosion of light, by distorted voices, by the sensation of being ripped from his own reality's flesh.
And then—nothing.
He awoke in a place where the air tasted of burnt smoke and ozone.
Skyscrapers sculpted from living glass and organic metal, carved with glowing runes. Floating fountains.
Drones with artificial angel wings.
A world where magic and technology were one and the same.
The streets swarmed with people. Each one had an active system, each wore an aura around their wrists—a mix between incantation and digital code.
Kael pulled up his hood.
He drew no attention.
Just another young man with a lost gaze, freshly teleported—like so many others.
But inside him… something simmered.
The shadow was there. Sleeping. Waiting.
Seraphine… was silent.
Still locked in the abyss of his mind.
For the first time in his life, Kael wasn't being hunted.
He wasn't a prisoner.
He wasn't known.
He was… no one.
And no one… could become anything.