A burning sting spread across the rough-looking man's cheeks as consciousness slowly crept back to him. Every muscle in his body screamed in protest, and a dull ache pulsed through his ribs whenever he drew a breath.
That knight girl was far stronger than she looked. A single kick from her had nearly knocked the soul right out of him.
"Just wake up already!"
Another sharp slap snapped him fully awake. His eyes flew open, though immediate regret followed as the world spun violently around him.
The first thing he saw was the young woman crouching directly in front of him. Sharp green eyes stared down without the slightest hint of sympathy the kind of eyes that seemed capable of looking straight through a person to drag every hidden secret into the light.
"What do you want?" he groaned. Even speaking torured his jaw. He barely had enough strength left to lift his head, let alone fight back.
"Who do you work for?" Alina asked instantly, her tone cold, direct, and completely without hesitation.
The man let out a tired, wheezing laugh. "None of your business, young lady." He winced as pain shot through his chest. "If you and this kid get involved in this mess, neither of you will be escaping."
"That's for us to decide." Alina crossed her arms, her uniform taut against her shoulders. "As members of the Knight Order, we're not going to pretend we didn't see what happened tonight."
Silence followed. The mercenary studied her for several seconds. The sheer determination in her gaze told him everything he needed to know; there was no fear, no uncertainty, and absolutely no room for negotiation. No matter what he said, this girl wasn't backing down.
"...If I tell you something useful," he muttered at last, his head slumping forward, "will you try to reduce my sentence?"
Alina hesitated, knowing she couldn't make official promises she wasn't authorized to keep. "You'll certainly be rewarded by the Magistrate for cooperating."
A long sigh escaped the man's lips, his shoulders sagging in genuine defeat. "The hooded man you saw..." His expression darkened, the mere memory of the figure seeming to unnerve him. "He's the leader. He paid us a fortune to gather nonbelievers from the outer districts."
The atmosphere in the alleyway immediately shifted, both siblings locking their focus entirely onto him. For a moment, a flicker of shame crossed the criminal's face, before he shook his head. "I don't know what he plans to do with them. The admission came quietly, almost reluctantly, as though he wished he knew less than he did."
"Do you know where he took them?"
This time, the question came from Nuri. Alina blinked in surprise, glancing toward her brother. Nuri rarely inserted himself into interrogations; more often than not, he preferred to stay quiet and let others take the lead. Yet now, there was an edge of real urgency in his voice. A small, proud smile briefly tugged at the corner of Alina's lips. At least he was finally finding his spine.
The mercenary, however, was too distracted to notice. "He might be at the abandoned cathedral," he whispered, his voice dropping lower, as if merely naming the place made him uncomfortable. "That's where I first met him to negotiate the coin."
The siblings exchanged a sharp glance. Neither needed to say a word; the same conclusion had already formed in both their minds. They had to investigate immediately.
As they turned to leave the alley, the man suddenly called out after them. "Wait."
Both paused, looking back. The arrogance that had colored the smuggler's voice earlier was entirely gone, replaced by something far more unsettling: genuine sincerity.
"That guy isn't something kids like you can handle," his tone was quieter now, stripped of bravado. "Bring someone stronger. Your captain. Yeah... someone like him."
Alina's expression hardened instantly. "We know that." She glanced back over her shoulder, her green eyes piercing. "If things get out of hand, we'll do what's necessary. But don't start acting concerned for us now. You tried kidnapping innocent people. A child. A mother." Her fists clenched tightly at her sides. "Who knows how many others you've already ruined."
The man didn't argue, offer a defense, or attempt an excuse. He couldn't. Everything she said was true. Money had blinded him, convincing him it was just another job that paid well enough to ignore the questions he didn't want to ask. Now, all that remained were the consequences. By the time he finally raised his head again, the siblings were already gone.
The night air rushed past them as they sprinted through the capital's secondary streets. Moonlight spilled across the sloped rooftops and cobblestones, while the distant, fading glow of the festival lanterns painted the sleeping city in shades of gold.
For several blocks, neither of them spoke. Then
"Alina..." Nuri's voice trembled slightly, his breathing ragged from the pace. "Are we really making the right decision?"
The image of the hooded man immediately surfaced in his mind, that overwhelming, suffocating presence that made the air feel like lead. It was the terrifying sensation of standing before an entity far beyond his ability to comprehend.
"The mercenary was right," Nuri swallowed nervously, his face growing pale beneath the moon. "That person is far stronger than both of us combined. What if we walk right into an execution?"
Alina noticed the tremor in his voice. She slowed her pace slightly, staying right beside him as they navigated the quieter corridors of the district. "Nuri," she said, her voice softening as she looked at him. "This is dangerous. And yes, we could get hurt."
For a brief moment, the only sound was the rhythmic slap of their boots against the stone. Then, Alina looked ahead. "But what if we wait for a full squad and we're too late? What if all those innocent people disappear before anyone can help them?"
The question struck Nuri harder than he expected. He didn't have an answer.
"I already sent a magical dispatch to the captain," Alina said, quickening her pace once more as the buildings began to thin out. "He should be on his way. But until he intercepts us, we have a duty. We have to protect them."
Resolve burned brightly in her eyes. Nuri stared at his sister, struck by how radiant she seemed beneath the moonlight. It wasn't due to any divine blessing or supernatural power, but simply because her core conviction was that unbreakable. She understood the mortal danger, yet she pressed forward anyway.
Confidence, conviction, and courage, everything Nuri felt he lacked seemed to flow completely naturally to her.
As they ran, Nuri's clenched fists tightened. He knew she wasn't entirely fearless; he had seen her anxious before. Yet somehow, even when she was afraid, she kept her feet moving forward. And maybe that was what real courage was. Running away wouldn't solve anything, and worrying wouldn't save a single soul. No matter how much fear churned inside his stomach, it wouldn't change what was happening to the people who had been taken. If he wanted to become someone who could actually stand beside Alina instead of hiding behind her coat-tails, he had to keep moving.
Nuri took a deep breath, forcing the panic down as a genuine expression of focus took over his face. "Let's do this."
Before long, the abandoned cathedral came into view, and both siblings naturally slowed their pace to a cautious crawl.
Something about the architecture felt entirely wrong. The massive structure loomed over the surrounding dilapidated district like a corpse that refused to stay buried. Cracked stone walls stretched toward the night sky, illuminated by a pale moonlight that seemed strangely dim whenever it touched the cathedral's surface, as if the building itself were actively swallowing the light. Dark, stained-glass windows stared down at them like empty sockets. The air felt heavier here, thick enough to make breathing uncomfortable, and the usual sounds of the night, the insects, the distant stray animals, were entirely absent. There was only a dead silence.
Nuri felt a cold shiver crawl down his spine. "This style..." His eyes tracked across the weathered stonework and the jagged spires. "Is this a sanctuary dedicated to the God of Sacrifice?"
Alina glanced toward him, her hand resting instinctively on her hilt. "Is it?"
"I'm almost certain," Nuri nodded slowly. Religious history had always fascinated him; while other children spent their time playing war games or training with wooden swords, he had spent hours pouring over old texts and studying the lineages of the various pantheons. Which was exactly why this specific site bothered him so intensely. His frown deepened. "It doesn't make sense."
"What doesn't?"
"Why would someone use a sacred site like this as a criminal hideout?" Nuri asked, his voice a low whisper. "Even if it's old, cathedrals under the God of Sacrifice should still receive regular purifications. Priests, pilgrims, ascetic worshippers..."
"Exactly," Alina agreed, her brow furrowing. "This place shouldn't be completely abandoned."
The siblings exchanged an uneasy look. Unlike Alina, however, Nuri had a terrible, lingering suspicion forming based on what he had witnessed in the void with Lucien. The more he thought about the absent gods, the less he liked where his logic was leading him.
"Why won't this stupid door open?!" Alina growled a moment later, planting both hands against the massive wooden entrance. The ancient iron hinges groaned, but the doors remained stubbornly jammed. Her eye twitched in irritation.
BOOM!
The cathedral doors exploded inward beneath the sheer, reinforced force of her punch. Fragments of rotten oak scattered across the foyer while the heavy remnants of the frame slammed against the stone floor with a deafening crash that echoed through the nave.
Nuri immediately looked away, pretending he had seen absolutely nothing at all. Sometimes, his sister was far more frightening than any heretic they actually fought.
"Let's go inside." Alina brushed her hands together as though she hadn't just brutally assaulted a historical structure, stepping confidently through the shattered entrance. With a quiet, long-suffering sigh, Nuri followed her.
The moment they crossed the threshold, the air changed. The cathedral should have felt peaceful and sacred, a place where people came to offer devotion and seek sanctuary. Instead, the atmosphere felt entirely hollow, like a body with its soul torn out.
Dust coated every single surface. Rows of wooden pews sat crooked and uneven, many of them overturned or splintered into kindling. Cracks crawled across the high stone walls like dark, creeping veins, while damaged statues of saints watched silently from the shadows with missing heads and shattered limbs.
The entire building felt dead. Yet, at the same time, it wasn't dead enough. There were unmistakable signs of recent movement: disturbed dust tracks, fresh boot prints, and ritual markings that shouldn't have been there. Someone had been operating here within the hour.
"I don't remember it being this desolate..." Alina's voice came out as a fragile whisper. For the first time since they had arrived, genuine worry crept back into her expression. "What happened to the clergy here?"
Neither of them had an answer.
Then—
THUMP.
Both siblings nearly jumped out of their boots. The sound echoed heavily through the cathedral's vast, hollow interior, like something massive shifting somewhere deep in the darkness beyond the altar. The noise faded, returning the space to a crushing silence, but somehow the quiet felt infinitely worse. At the end of the day, they were still young knights, and the dark was very good at feeding a imagination.
Alina slowly raised a slightly shaking finger, pointing toward the oppressive dark of the lower catacombs. "Shouldn't we check that out?"
Nuri stared at her as though she had completely lost her mind. "Are you insane?!" his voice cracked, his eyes widening. "We are absolutely going in the exact opposite direction!"
Alina opened her mouth to argue, but then another distant, scraping creak echoed from the depths of the sanctuary. She immediately changed her mind. "Opposite direction sounds perfect."
A few moments later, the two siblings were cautiously making their way down a lateral corridor, holding hands tightly, far tighter than either of them would ever openly admit to the rest of the squad. The cathedral seemed determined to make every shadow look alive. Every dark corner felt as though it held a pair of eyes, and every distant pop of settling stone made their hearts skip a beat. Neither wanted to be the first to let go of the other's grip.
"Maybe we shouldn't have come here without the captain," Alina swallowed, her usual bravado completely spent.
"No regrets now," Nuri said, tightening his grip on her fingers. Though if he was being completely honest with himself, he regretted absolutely everything, the investigation, the cathedral, and his life choices up to this exact second.
They continued forward until a plain, reinforced wooden door appeared at the end of the hall. Both of them immediately relaxed slightly. A room. An ordinary, enclosed room. Finally, something normal and free from mysterious noises.
Alina stepped forward and pushed the door open. The moment they looked inside, their brief relief vanished into absolute horror.
This wasn't an ordinary room. It was a holding pen.
Rows upon rows of heavy iron cages filled the chamber, stretching deeper into the subterranean darkness than either of them could have anticipated. Cold metal bars, heavy padlocks, and thick chains bolted directly into the solid stone walls met their eyes. Even though every single cage stood empty now, there was no mistaking their purpose. People had been kept here like livestock. Not for a few hours, but for days, perhaps weeks.
Dirty blankets lay abandoned across the damp floorboards alongside rotten scraps of food sitting inside rusted bowls. Several chains still held torn pieces of fabric caught between their links, silent, tragic remnants of prisoners who had once struggled desperately against their binds. The air smelled stale, hopeless, and deeply copper-heavy.
Nuri felt his stomach violently twist. As his eyes traced the walls, he saw scratch marks, hundreds of them, deeply grooved into the solid stone by frantic fingernails. Some were clustered around the hinges of the cell doors, others tightly around the base of the floor chains, telling the story of countless prisoners who had spent their final days clawing at the stone, desperately searching for a way out.
The realization made his blood run completely cold. Then, his gaze landed on something else on the far wall, and his legs froze entirely.
Hidden among the frantic scratches was a drawing. It was a small, crude sketch made entirely with a piece of salvaged charcoal. Someone had drawn a simple little house with a chimney. Beside it stood a stick-figure family holding hands, and above them all, drawn with clumsy strokes, was a smiling sun.
For a long, agonizing moment, neither sibling spoke. The cathedral seemed to fall completely dead around them. No footsteps, no settling stone, nothing. Because suddenly, the people who had been imprisoned here were no longer just a nameless, faceless group of nonbelievers. They were real. The scratches on the walls were real. The blankets were real. And so was the child who had drawn that picture.
Nuri stared at the crude lines, clearly made by small, trembling hands. A child had stood right here inside a iron cage. A child had looked at this bleak stone wall and drawn their home, maybe because they missed it, maybe because they were terrified they would never see it again, or maybe because it was the only beautiful thing they had left in their mind to cling to.
A painful knot formed tightly in Nuri's throat. Without meaning to, his mind forced him to imagine the exact scene: a frightened child sitting entirely alone in the dark, shivering, hungry, and waiting. Wondering if their family was searching for them. Wondering if anyone was coming to save them. Wondering if they would ever get to go home. The thought made him feel physically sick.
Beside him, Alina covered her mouth with both hands, her face completely drained of color. For once, there was no confidence left in her eyes, no determination, only pure, unadulterated horror. How could someone do this? How could anyone look at a child and decide they deserved to be caged like an animal in the dark?
The room suddenly felt entirely unbearable, the cages, the chains, the drawing, all of it suffocating them. Without exchanging a single word, the siblings turned and fled.
Not walking, but running. Their footsteps pounded violently against the stone floor as they raced back down the corridor, desperate to put as much distance as possible between themselves and that horrific chamber. Yet, no matter how fast they ran, they couldn't escape the image burned forever into their minds. A little house. A stick-figure family. A smiling sun. The simple charcoal drawing followed them through the oppressive darkness like a ghost, and neither of them would ever forget it.