The man looked fat, sure—but it was the kind of fat that padded a hollow shell.
Dead weight, really. No resistance when I grabbed him by the collar and slung him over my back like a sack of spoiled meat.
Then—boom—we were gone.
The town was small enough for this kind of thing.
Built inside a valley with a central market strip and scattered housing, it took no time at all to cross from civilization into the jagged wilds surrounding it.
Trees lined the outer border like silent sentinels, watching and judging in their stillness.
These weren’t soft trees either.
They were tall and spindly like pine cones, their branches jutting out like knives.
The ground beneath them was littered with broken needles and ancient bark, sharp enough to sting.
I dropped him without ceremony.
He hit the ground with a thud, a satisfying one, the kind that echoed between the roots and leaves.
His groan followed quickly after, a wet, pitiful sound as he struggled to sit up.
"Y-You bastard!" he spat, blinking through the dust. "Is that any way to treat your elders!? You—!"
His voice died midway.
Not because of pain, but something else. His gaze had landed on my uniform.
More specifically, the emblem sewn just above my heart—the Golden Rose.
Recognition flickered in his beady eyes.
He straightened, wiping sweat from his brow, forcing a calmness he didn’t feel. "Ah, I see... you’re one of them. From the Academy. Rose student, huh?"
He smiled, fake as hell. "But still, even students have rules. Misconduct in public—especially violence—has consequences. Your marks could be deducted. Your future could be ruined. Maybe your teachers haven’t taught you that."
I stared at him for a beat, then slowly crouched down, settling into the dirt as if I had all the time in the world.
Our eyes met—mine calm, unreadable. His? Getting shakier by the second.
"Yes," I said quietly, voice smooth, "I’m a student."
I let the words hang, then leaned in a little, just enough to whisper the next part with deliberate calmness.
"But I’m not the type to care about marks."
He scoffed. "Hah! Young blood, I see. Arrogant and reckless. It’s your future, not mine."
His tone shifted, from fake cordiality to that familiar smugness. "So you’re pissed about the brat, huh? Is that what this is about?"
I tilted my head slightly. "And if it was?"
He chuckled again, that disgusting gurgle that tried to pass for laughter. "Then you’re a fool. A soft-hearted idiot. You’re probably some noble’s son, one of the higher bloods. Why waste your time caring about street rats? Let them rot. You? You were born to enjoy life. Like me."
He stood up, brushing dirt off his clothes like he was the one doing me a favor.
"Let me enjoy mine, too."
He reached over and tapped my shoulder—lightly, condescendingly. Then he turned his back to me, as if that was that.
"Now," he muttered while scanning the woods, "how do I get back, huh? Not asking for an escort, but at least point me in the right direction."
Not because he deserved it.
But because I was done pretending.
He stopped walking, his shoulders tensing. "What do you mean?"
Instead, I reached over and grabbed a low-hanging branch beside me.
It was short—no thicker than my wrist—but jagged and pointed at the end. Bark peeled in rough strips like claws. Sharp enough for what I had in mind.
He turned back toward me, brows furrowed. "Are you going to tell me or not—"
The branch sliced through the air and rammed straight into his palm. The wood punctured clean through, the end bursting out the other side like a grotesque bloom.
The forest erupted with his scream.
Raw. Guttural. Like something had crawled up from his throat and tried to claw its way out.
He dropped to his knees, clutching his impaled hand, blood spilling in hot rivulets across the grass. His face twisted—red, wet, miserable.
I clicked my tongue and stood up, twirling the broken branch in my hand.
"I forget my strength sometimes," I said, approaching slowly, step by deliberate step. "Let’s try again. This time I’ll make sure to pin you to the tree."
His eyes bulged, terror overriding every ounce of arrogance he had left. He tried to scurry back, but his foot caught on a root and he toppled over like a wounded pig.
I crouched again, but this time it wasn’t to talk. This time it was to savor the silence between us—the moment when a predator stops bluffing and bares its teeth.
"You thought the world owed you something," I murmured. "That being older, richer, filthier gave you power."
I tapped the branch against my shoulder, watching him sweat.
"But out here, no one gives a damn. Not the trees. Not the gods. And especially not me."
He whimpered something. A plea? An apology?
I grabbed him by the shoulders, his sweat-slick flesh squishing beneath my fingers like rotted fruit.
He squirmed, a useless motion, as I hoisted him up with one hand—his body as light as his convictions.
He made a strangled noise in his throat, but I ignored it.
I turned and threw him.
His back slammed against the trunk of a pine-like tree, bark tearing through fabric and flesh.
The tree didn’t even flinch. Silent and still, towering above us like a judge.
Without pause, I broke off another branch. This one was even sharper than the last—splintered at the tip, dry as bone.
Before he could make a sound of protest, I impaled it through his forearm.
The wood crunched through skin and muscle, piercing straight through and sinking into the bark behind him.
He screamed, of course.
A full-throated, agonized shriek that rang through the forest like a dinner bell for the damned.
Blood sprayed out in a fine mist before oozing in thick rivers down his arm, dripping onto the roots below.
All that smugness—all that leering cockiness—vanished in a puff of breath.
What replaced it wasn’t even a man.
It was something primal.
Cornered. Helpless. Terrified.
His lips trembled, eyes wild and wet, chest heaving as he tried to form words—pleas, no doubt. Begging for mercy. Maybe even for forgiveness.
But I wasn’t going to let him speak.
I crouched down, scooped a handful of moist dirt from the forest floor, grabbed a few jagged leaves from a nearby branch, and mashed them together.
A sloppy, coarse mixture—wet, pungent.
Then I shoved the concoction into his mouth, forcing it between his lips as he tried to turn his head away.
"No flailing," I whispered, voice cold and dry. "No screaming."
Just to make sure, I broke off more branches—shorter, thicker this time. I drove one through his left thigh, pinning it to the tree.
Another went into his other forearm. Then the last one, through his remaining leg.
Each impalement brought another muffled scream, another fresh river of blood. His body twitched with every stab, but I kept him steady.
He was nailed to the tree like some grotesque scarecrow, twitching in silence, mouth full of earth and leaves, blood soaking into bark that had never asked for this.
Even the tree, I imagined, was disgusted. Forced to bear the weight of a wretched man’s filth.
But it had to endure.
I stared into his eyes.
They were pleading now. Wide, glistening, full of broken humanity. He would’ve offered anything—money, secrets, his soul—just to be spared.
But that wasn’t what I wanted.
This wasn’t about punishment anymore.
It was about refinement.
An idea struck me then—a delicious, terrible idea. Wasn’t this the perfect opportunity to push my elemental mastery?
My control over Amethyst Lightning—its volatility, its violent, surging power.
But with him... I had a live specimen.
A breathing, twitching, screaming test subject.
I extended my fingers, summoning a thin thread of violet lightning to dance along my fingertips.
It crackled faintly—unstable, hungry. A predator barely leashed.
And then I brought it down.
The lightning sliced into his right leg, acting as a precision knife—stripping flesh from muscle, searing nerves as it traced up and down his skin. The smell of burnt meat rose, acrid and thick, coating the air.
He screamed behind the dirt, body convulsing.
Too much force, I realized. The lightning always burned through too fast. I needed control. Precision. To treat it like a scalpel, not a hammer.
Three long, focused, methodical hours.
I had only worked on his right leg.
The limb was nearly charred black now—veins exposed, skin peeled, flesh cooked—but he was still alive. Still breathing. Still conscious.
My fingers trembled slightly as I stopped to wipe the sweat from my brow.
The mental strain was significant, but the improvement was there.
My mastery had increased. Not by leaps and bounds—but enough.
Enough to know I was getting closer.
I crouched down again, brushing aside the blood-crusted leaves and soil from his mouth.
He choked, gasping for air, eyes twitching wildly as he blinked up at me.
Tears mixed with snot and blood stained his cheeks. His chest heaved like he was drowning, lungs struggling to hold on.
But there was something else now in his gaze—recognition.
He blinked a few times. Then the words came out, broken and gasping.
"I-I know... I know who you are now..." he stammered. "You’re... Cassius. Cassius Lancaster..."
He continued, desperate to connect dots that might save him. "You’re... doing this for your fiancée, aren’t you? Amelia... Everhart. You... you found out, didn’t you... about our plan."
"Our plan to destroy the Everharts from the inside... yeah... that’s why... that’s why..."
My expression didn’t change. But something shifted inside.
"Oh?" I said quietly, calmly.
That was interesting.
He wasn’t just some lecherous merchant who got off on hurting children.
He was connected—part of something bigger. This wasn’t random cruelty. It was deliberate. Targeted.
Just how long had this been orchestrated?
His eyes were pleading again, but this time with hope—twisted, ironic hope that his confession would save him.
Was make me want to keep him alive longer.