The Alley – Night
Dot slumped against the grimy alley wall like a marionette whose strings had been viciously severed. Two heavy harpoons jutted from his shoulders, their iron shafts slick and gleaming with fresh blood. A third had only grazed his temple, yet the wound smoldered—blackened flesh raw and weeping, a thin ribbon of smoke curling lazily into the cold air. Beneath him, a dark lake of blood spread slowly across the cobblestones, seeping into every crack like spilled ink.
His head lolled forward. Eyes half-lidded. Chest utterly still.
Then, impossibly, the wound at his temple began to knit itself shut.
Flesh crawled and twisted, threading together in unnatural, glistening strands. The embedded harpoons trembled as muscle and bone shifted beneath them, reforming with wet, obscene sounds. A low, heavy thump echoed from inside his ruined chest.
His heart beat once.
Then again.
Faster.
Behind his closed eyelids, crimson light flickered like embers stirring to life in a dying fire.
A Hidden Room, Somewhere North
A single lantern cast long, wavering shadows across the cramped stone chamber. Prince Garon lay on a narrow cot, his face pale and glistening with fever-sweat, breathing shallow and ragged. An old man—gray-haired, but with hands still steady from decades of practice—pressed two fingers to the prince's burning forehead.
"The fever's climbing," the old man murmured. "Must be poison from the blade."
He dipped a cloth into a bowl of water, wrung it out with care, and laid it gently across Garon's brow. The prince stirred, murmuring something incoherent. For the briefest moment, the old man's eyes softened.
"Rest, lad."
He rose, fetched fresh water from a cracked earthen jug, and returned to clean the ugly knife wound in Garon's side. Against the far wall leaned Skógrimr, its massive blade catching the lantern's light, gleaming as though it stood silent vigil over them both.
---
**Yutor – Rooftop**
Dren and Sylric carved through the pirates in perfect, deadly synchrony.
One pirate lunged at Dren with twin swords flashing. Dren parried once, twice—then ducked beneath a wild, overcommitted swing. At the exact same instant, Sylric sprinted toward another foe. He leaped, planted one boot on the man's shoulder, and used the pirate's own body as a springboard. Mid-air, his chain whipped out like a living serpent, looping around the pirate's neck.
**CRACK.**
The man's head snapped back with brutal finality.
In that same heartbeat, Dren spun and slashed upward. His blade opened the twin-sword pirate's throat in a clean, crimson arc.
Sylric landed lightly on the tiles and kept moving toward the alley without breaking stride.
Dren turned to face two more pirates rushing him. His sword flashed again—blood sprayed in a hot fan across the rooftop.
The Alley, Moments Later
Sylric burst into the narrow street like a shadow given murderous speed.
A massive figure stepped out of the darkness to meet him—an ogre-blooded pirate, easily twice Sylric's size, muscles bulging beneath a lattice of old scars.
The ogre grinned, yellow teeth gleaming. "Surrender, little man."
Sylric tilted his head, almost amused. "You've grown."
The ogre laughed—a deep, guttural sound—and slammed both fists together. A brutal shockwave erupted outward. Pure force blasted through the air; the entire building beside them exploded backward in a roar of stone and splintered timber. Shrapnel filled the street.
Dust and debris billowed thick.
The ogre lowered his fists, chuckling. "Dead."
A soft click sounded behind him.
Sylric stood at his back—already inside his guard.
"You've grown up," Sylric said quietly.
One precise chain strike to the base of the skull. The ogre's massive body convulsed, then shrank violently—muscles collapsing, bones compressing—until a terrified boy no older than twelve stood trembling in his place.
Sylric did not strike again.
He simply walked away.
The alley was empty now, save for three discarded harpoons and a wide, glistening smear of blood trailing toward the far end. No body. No Dot.
Dren knelt, fingers brushing the still-warm blood. "He's gone. We have to find him before he loses it completely."
Sylric's eyes narrowed. "If he's already lost it—"
"Then we find him before you decide to end him," Dren said sharply.
Sylric said nothing. His chains snapped once, and he vanished forward in a blur of motion too fast for the eye to follow.
Dren followed at a dead run.
The Town Square – Night
Lanterns swayed in the chill wind, casting restless pools of light across the square. A small crowd huddled together, voices low and trembling with shock.
"They killed the poor kid," one villager muttered. "He was just trying to help."
"He snapped that pirate's neck like it was nothing," another replied. "We had to do something."
A child pointed suddenly toward the shadows.
"Look…"
Heads turned.
Dot stepped into the square.
His shirt hung in blood-soaked shreds. Dark streaks of drying blood painted his arms and chest. His eyes burned solid crimson, and a flickering red aura clung to him like heat rising from a forge. Each step left a faint scorch mark on the ancient cobblestones.
The crowd recoiled as one.
"Demon!" a woman screamed. "It's a demon!"
Panic erupted. People scattered in every direction—doors slammed, children were dragged inside, shutters banged shut. A few brave (or foolish) souls raised whatever weapons they could find: pitchforks, broken chair legs, kitchen knives.
Dot did not speak. He did not even glance at them. He simply kept walking—straight through the heart of the square, the red light around him pulsing brighter with every heartbeat.
Sylric appeared in front of him in an instant, chains uncoiling like living serpents.
"You're gone, kid," he said coldly. "Time to end it."
The chains lashed forward, aimed for Dot's throat.
Dren slid between them, sword raised, intercepting the strike with a ringing clash of metal.
"Stand. Down." Dren's voice was low and dangerous. "He's still in there."
Sylric's eyes hardened. "You willing to bet your life on that?"
"I already have."
Dren turned slightly toward Sylric, his voice steady but urgent. "They say when a person dies, they pass through the gates of hell to be judged. What happens to someone who keeps coming back?"
A vision flashed behind Dot's eyes: falling through an endless void, thousands of skeletal hands clawing upward from the darkness, grasping, climbing over one another in their hunger to reach him.
"Possession?" Sylric asked.
"Some pass through and try to claim the body," Dren replied. "If the host isn't strong enough to resist… they take over completely."
Dot stopped walking. The red aura around him flickered uncertainly. His head tilted, as though listening to a distant voice. A hoarse whisper escaped his cracked lips.
"…Yiva…"
The crimson in his eyes dimmed—just a fraction.
Dren lowered his sword slowly. "Come back, boy. She's still out there. We're getting her back."
Dot's fists unclenched. The aura faded. He swayed on his feet, then dropped to one knee, breathing hard.
"I… failed again," he whispered.
Another vision assaulted him: the cowboy pirate dragging Yiva away, striking her head brutally until she finally went limp.
Dren knelt beside him. "Not yet. You didn't fail yet."
Sylric coiled his chains but did not retract them fully. He watched Dot with cold, unreadable eyes.
"Next time he slips," Sylric said quietly, "I won't ask."
Pirate Hideout – The Cove, Pre-Dawn
The camp buzzed with nervous tension. Pirates hurried to load the last crates onto the fastest sloop. Yiva and the little girl sat bound near the gangplank, heavily guarded. The captain paced, sweat beading on his brow.
"Move!" he snapped. "The rogue and his partner are coming—we sail before first light!"
The cowboy pirate leaned against a crate, watching him with cold contempt. "You're running? Really?"
"I'm off to take my prize. You do what you wish."
"Coward."
The other pirates—scarred faces tight—stepped aside, slowly circling their captain.
"What is this?" the captain demanded.
"The crew's made a decision," the cowboy said. "We can't have a fat-ass coward leading us anymore. You're no use to us."
"No—you're making a mistake! My father made you. He made all of you. Now you turn your backs on me? Bastards! You're nothing without me!"
The cowboy pulled the trigger. The captain's head shattered in a spray of blood and bone.
A brief flashback flickered: a much younger cowboy pirate, wide-eyed and grateful, being taken in by the captain years earlier.
"I'm the new captain now," the cowboy declared.
The pirates erupted in wild, bloodthirsty cheers.
He turned to Yiva and smiled—a slow, cruel curve of his lips.
A scream split the night—short and choked. One of the watchmen on the ridge tumbled forward, throat slit, body rolling down the slope.
Another pirate spun toward the trees—then vanished into the darkness with a wet yank, his scream cut off mid-breath.
"He's here!" a pirate shouted in panic.
The new captain grinned wider. "Let's show them what we've got."
To be continued…