The man standing at the center of the dormitory shattered the filthy monotony of our daily existence with brutal force.
He was tall, with impeccable posture, tailored into an oxblood three-piece suit that clashed violently with the dripping gray stone of the cell.
A perfectly slicked streak of purple hair swept across his forehead without obscuring the silver monocle fitted to his right eye.
This apparent refinement radiated an almost aristocratic aura.
But my experience with Déva Callis had taught me a fundamental lesson: in the underbelly of Malbour, the more polite, polished, and civilized a man appears, the darker the psychopathic monstrosity he conceals.
The stranger let his gaze, serene with an Olympian calm, sweep over the crowd of three hundred recruits.
A thin, ferocious smile stretched his lips before he spoke in a drawling, theatrical voice:
“Oh…
Well, well, well…
There are still quite a few of you left here…
It’s almost a touching sight.
However, my dear recruits, the time for hasty introductions is over.
It’s time to clean house.”
At those words, an icy shiver ran down my spine.
Clean house.
The phrasing was tragically clear.
Eresboros wasn’t going to burden itself with useless mouths.
This man had come to purge the vermin, to eliminate everyone he deemed too weak or unfit to serve the league.
As a deathly silence settled over the room, a voice rose from the back.
It was young Neïd, who had already made a name for herself in previous days.
Her blue-scaled skin looked dull, dried out by the dorm’s suffocating atmosphere, and her eyes betrayed immense fatigue.
“What do you mean by ‘clean house’?” she called out, her voice trembling but defiant.
“And who are you to be giving us orders anyway?”
The dandy in the red suit slowly turned his head toward her.
His smile widened, revealing dazzlingly white teeth.
“Oh, my deepest apologies…
Where are my manners?” He paused, dusting off an invisible speck from his sleeve.
“Allow me to introduce myself: Valentin Ash Crawford…
Personal secretary to Lord Favell.”
A collective shudder ran through the ranks.
A Lord’s secretary.
Aside from Mélo, Callis’s subordinate, this was the first time I was standing face-to-face with an officer of such high standing—a direct operative for one of Eresboros’s supreme leaders.
Deep inside, my survival instincts screamed.
I knew I had to tense my muscles and mentally prepare myself: whatever this Crawford was about to announce, it boded nothing humane.
After an ironical bow, Crawford resumed his speech, pacing the room like a headmaster addressing his students:
“What do we mean by ‘cleaning house,’ you ask?
Well, as you know, my dear children, you have had the privilege of joining one of the three greatest criminal organizations in the underworld.
That means we are the elite.
“Absolute excellence.
But to remain the best, we must harbor the best…
and dispose of the trash cluttering our gears.
“You have all executed your first official mission for our organization, each in the sectors assigned to you.
I congratulate every one of you for the effort made, but…
“…unfortunately, some here have failed miserably.”
Crawford wore an openly amused expression.
A ball of cold rage formed in my stomach.
I knew what failure meant for an organization like Eresboros.
Failing a mission wasn’t just a bad grade; it was a net loss of capital, goods, or reputation.
If Lucas and I hadn’t brought back little Marie, if we had let the armed parents destroy the cargo, the league would have lost business.
And for monsters like these, that was simply unacceptable.
The crowd remained petrified, breathing shallowly.
Neïd, refusing to yield to terror, pressed on:
“So…
you came to execute those who failed?”
Crawford let out a stifled laugh, a chuckle that echoed cruelly against the stone vaults.
“Our goal is to train members who will be of use to us, my dear.
That is why…”
He made a gesture with his hand.
Behind him, heavy iron gates opened to let a dozen men in dark hoods pass through.
They deployed silently alongside Crawford.
One of them stepped forward and handed him a thick parchment.
The secretary cast a casual glance over it, adjusting his monocle.
“Right…
I see…
Exactly one hundred and twenty-four of you failed your mission criteria.
To begin, we will split the room into two distinct groups.
To my right, those who succeeded.
To my left, the rejects.”
The sorting began.
The hooded men pointed out recruits based on Mélo’s reports.
Among the first sent to the left side, I immediately recognized the lamb-faced young man who had approached Lucas on the first day.
With his naive demeanor and apparent weakness, I was not in the least surprised to learn he had cracked on his very first outing.
Once the physical separation was complete, Crawford gestured to our group—the victors.
The hooded figures stepped toward us, carrying large wicker baskets.
Inside were hundreds of trench knives—basic, but razor-sharp.
One for me, and one for Lucas.
Lucas was lying at my feet, unable to sit up.
His burn was appalling.
The skin of his back was blistered and charred, giving off a stench of scorched flesh that I tried to mask by standing in front of him.
Raw magic inflicted damage far deeper than ordinary fire; every breath tore a muffled groan from his throat.
Crawford stepped back into the center, clapping his hands to demand attention.
“Right.
As you can see, the capable elements now possess a weapon.
Your objective for the remainder of the night is child’s play: eliminate all the rejects.
Without exception.”
Panic erupted instantly on the left side.
Pleas, screams of terror, and heartbreaking sobs tore through the air.
On our side, the unease was just as palpable.
Killing a man in cold blood in an alley was one thing; butchering bunkmates with shivs was another entirely.
Sensing the hesitation paralyzing his troops, Crawford dropped his dandy mask.
His eyes turned pitch-black with rage, and his voice thundered, vibrating through the walls:
“SILENCE!
Listen to me carefully, you mangy dogs!
Any among the victors who refuses to carry out their task need only take one step forward.
I will execute them with my own hands—and exceptionally slowly.
“As for you rejects, shut your mouths!
You should have been better!
The world doesn’t belong to the mediocre!”
Silence returned—heavy, oppressive, broken only by the hitching breaths of the condemned.
Crawford instantly recovered his honeyed tone:
“Well, I say that, but I’m no tyrant.
The rejects aren’t obligated to just sit there and let their throats be cut nicely.
Everyone wants to stay alive, don’t they?
It’s only human.
That is why, if one of the rejects manages to tear a knife from their attacker and kill them, they will take their place and be reinstated.
But one thing is certain: at least one hundred and twenty-four people must stop breathing before dawn.
“On that note, I’ll leave you to it.
Remember, Eresboros is one big family…
but to be a true part of it, one must know how to make sacrifices.
Have fun.”
With a demonic laugh that chilled my blood, Crawford turned on his heel.
The heavy iron doors slammed shut behind him and his men, sealing us inside our stone tomb.
For several long minutes, no one moved.
The air had grown so thick you could cut it with a knife.
Lucas, sensing the imminent danger, tried to crawl, but a wince of agony twisted his face and he collapsed again.
Without a word, I grabbed him by the armpits, gritting my teeth under the exertion, and dragged him by main force to the darkest, most secluded corner of the room, sheltered behind the support pillars.
I slipped his knife into his good hand, then drew myself up, a dagger in each fist, ready to face the tide.
On the rejects’ side, a burly man tried to play the diplomacy card.
He stepped forward with open hands, eyes wide with anguish:
“Hey, guys…
We’re not really gonna kill each other for the entertainment of that freak…
right?
Listen, what if we all wise up?
If we stick together, we could force the gates and escape this damned castle!
Honestly, I only joined this league to make a quick buck, not to—”
He didn’t get to finish his sentence.
A blinding shadow dropped onto him.
With a dull sound of tearing flesh, a blade drove deep into his throat.
Blood erupted in a scarlet jet, splashing across the floor.
The man collapsed with a gurgling gasp.
Behind him stood Neïd, her eyes bloodshot, her expression transfigured by the raw rage to survive.
“You want us to run while your incompetence is what got us into this mess?!” she screamed, ripping the knife from the corpse.
“You’re dead weight!
You’re all gonna die right here!”
That first blood poured gasoline onto the fire.
All at once, the arena erupted.
Several cornered rejects charged Neïd, screaming.
But the sea-runt was surprisingly agile; she dodged their wild attacks with fluid footwork, slashing faces and severing tendons with surgical precision.
In an instant, the dormitory transformed into an open-air slaughterhouse.
War cries mingled with death rattles.
I held my ground in front of Lucas, parrying and dodging as best I could against the desperate assaults of rejects trying to reach our corner.
Whenever some lunatic got too close, my “Black Fire” instinct took over.
I felt no hatred, only cold logic: if you step close, you die.
I used my left knife to parry and my right to strike, letting a pile of limp bodies build up at my feet.
Further away, the savagery reached new heights.
A gigantic Grod from the rejects’ side was wreaking absolute havoc with his bare hands.
His red skin was smeared with blood.
Facing him, an armed recruit attempted a wide, predictable strike.
The sound of snapping bone was sharp and clear.
As the attacker collapsed, choking, the red colossus ripped the knife from his hands and, without a shred of hesitation, slammed it with all his strength into the man’s eye socket, putting an end to his life.
The chaos continued to roar all around me.
Suddenly, my attention was drawn to a figure slipping around my right flank, creeping toward Lucas.
It was the young man from the first day.
Panic had driven him mad.
Thinking Lucas was an easy target to steal a weapon from, he began stomping on him savagely, kicking his ribs and his charred back to break his grip.
Lucas let out a gut-wrenching cry of pain.
Fury rushed to my brain.
I lunged forward through the melee, thrusting my blade in a lethal strike toward the coward’s throat.
But the kid, driven by survival instinct, showed a surprising reflex and dodged my blade by a hair.
He backed away two steps, staring at me with wide eyes full of terror and greed.
Seeing that I had two knives, he tried to negotiate, his voice cracking:
“Ah…
It’s you!
How are you doing, huh?
Listen to me…
I just need a knife, you understand?!
I don’t want to die here!
I have a little sister back home, she’s really sick…
I was just planning to make enough money with the organization to pay for her care and get out.
Please, help me!
Your buddy is doomed anyway—look at him, he’s not even moving…
And even if he survived, you can see it on his face…
He’s weak.
“He’s not made for this cruel world.
But if you give me one of your knives, I could be the ideal partner for you—think about it!
Just give it to me…”
For an answer, I gathered the bloody spit in my mouth and spat violently into his face.
His expression twisted into pure hatred.
“You bastard!” he screamed, lunging at me with hands outstretched to strangle me.
But I was ready.
Relying on reflexes forged in alley fights, I pivoted on my heels, dodging his blind charge.
In an instant, I was behind him.
Without a shadow of hesitation, I drove my first knife deep into his shoulder to paralyze his arm, then sank the second straight into his stomach.
The kid gasped, the spark of madness draining instantly from his eyes.
I ripped my blades out with a sharp jerk, letting him collapse into his own blood.
I immediately returned to Lucas.
He was no longer moving, his eyes closed.
A dull panic surged through me, but placing a firm hand on his bloody chest, I felt the steady beat of his heart.
He had passed out, his body shutting down under the sheer shock of the pain.
I repositioned him as best I could in the shadow of the pillar, obscuring his body with the corpses of those I had just killed, then threw myself back into the fray.
Everywhere, the screams were dying down, replaced by death rattles.
It was a barbaric cockfight, an orchestrated butchery where everyone sold their skin dearly.
I felt no sadistic pleasure in eliminating these rejects, but if Eresboros demanded corpses to grant us the right to live, I would give them as many as it took.
While I struck and parried, my analytical mind kept working at full speed.
What was Eresboros’s true goal with this bloody ritual?
If they simply wanted to purge the weak elements, Crawford and his men could have lined them up against a wall and executed them in five minutes.
By forcing us to do it ourselves, the league was breaking our psychological barrier.
Killing a human being—a fellow creature capable of thought—causes trauma the first time.
By plunging us into this bloodbath, Eresboros was stripping away our innocence and the heavy weight of murder.
Later, when we were sent on assassination or escort missions, taking a life would mean nothing to us.
We would be perfect tools.
After long hours of nameless carnage, the uproar finally subsided.
Despite the murky darkness of the dormitory, thin clerestory windows near the ceiling let in the first pale light of dawn.
It was another sleepless night—one of many—spent carving out our survival with our teeth.
Morning broke fully, bathing the room in a harsh light that exposed the horror of the scene.
Dozens of bodies lay in grotesque postures, the floor turned into a lake of blackened blood.
The smell of iron and death was unbearable.
Suddenly, the heavy iron bars slid open with a grim screech.
Crawford walked down the steps, his red suit still pristine, a smile of total satisfaction illuminating his psychopathic face.
Behind him, the hooded men began gathering the corpses as if they were mere sacks of grain.
Crawford crossed his arms and called out in a clear voice:
“Congratulations to the survivors.
You are officially purged.
Follow me.”
Everyone began to drag themselves up painfully, limbs heavy, clothes shredded.
Beside me, Lucas opened his eyes.
Fueled by pure adrenaline and the desperate instinct screaming within him, he managed to sit up.
His secret Pentacle on his ribs glowed with an imperceptible shimmer beneath his tattered shirt, temporarily dulling his pain with a surge of mystical energy.
He bit his lip, leaned against my shoulder, and pulled himself to his feet.
Together, one step at a time, we walked out of that dome of blood, ready to face whatever next layer of hell awaited us at Eresboros.