Only the slow settling of dust disturbed the ruined bedroom.
Broken concrete rained from the shattered walls.
Splintered wood creaked beneath the weight of collapsing debris.
Lucas lay half-buried beneath the wreckage, his body slumped against what remained of the opposite wall.
His ears rang violently.
His vision swam.
Every breath scraped through his chest like broken glass.
Warm blood trickled from the corner of his lips before dripping quietly onto the shattered floor.
“…”
He tried to move.
A sharp agony exploded through his abdomen.
Lucas looked down.
A jagged timber beam, broken from the wall during the impact, had pierced through the lower side of his body, pinning him against the cracked concrete.
For several seconds…
He simply stared.
His mind refused to accept what his eyes were seeing.
“…”
“…No…”
His fingers twitched.
Nothing more.
His strength was already fading.
The apartment had become eerily quiet.
Too quiet.
Even the distant sounds of Sacramento seemed swallowed by the suffocating silence.
Then…
Footsteps.
Tap.
A calm rhythm echoed through the settling dust.
Tap.
Another step.
Unhurried.
Without fear.
Without hesitation.
Lucas forced his blurred eyes upward.
A shadow slowly emerged from the cloud of drifting debris.
The stranger walked as though nothing around him had been destroyed.
Each step was measured.
Elegant.
Almost graceful.
The long black coat draped over his shoulders swayed gently with every movement.
Lucas couldn’t see his face.
Only polished black boots stopped a few feet before him.
Then…
A crimson aura slowly spread across the cracked floor.
It moved like liquid.
Like living blood.
The dust itself seemed afraid to touch it.
Lucas’s breathing grew uneven.
The figure finally stopped.
For a long moment…
Neither of them spoke.
The stranger looked down at Lucas.
Then…
A quiet sigh escaped him.
“…So.”
His voice was smooth.
Almost disappointed.
“This is what Lady Hana spent eighteen years protecting.”
Lucas’s pupils trembled.
“…Mum…”
The stranger’s expression remained unchanged.
“Eighteen years.”
“Different countries.”
“Different names.”
“A different life.”
“And yet…”
His crimson eyes slowly settled upon Lucas.
“…she couldn’t escape destiny.”
Lucas clenched his bloodstained fist.
“…Who…”
“…are you…?”
The stranger smiled faintly.
Not warmly.
Not mockingly.
Simply…
As though the question itself held no importance.
“Names.”
“They only matter to those who expect tomorrow.”
His smile faded.
“You…”
“…will not.”
Lucas gritted his teeth.
Despite the pain…
Despite the blood pouring from his wound…
He glared back.
“…What…”
“…did you do…”
“…to my mother…?”
Silence.
Beyond the shattered wall…
The evening wind drifted softly through the broken apartment.
His gaze lingered there for only a moment.
Then he spoke.
“…Lady Hana.”
His voice carried neither hatred…
Nor sympathy.
Only certainty.
“She chose her own ending.”
Lucas’s heartbeat stopped.
“No…”
The word escaped as little more than a whisper.
“No…”
His breathing became frantic.
“No…”
His trembling fingers dug into the broken floor.
“…You’re lying…”
The stranger looked back at him.
“If she had surrendered…”
“…she might have lived.”
Lucas’s eyes widened.
“But she refused.”
“Just as she did eighteen years ago.”
Another silence followed.
The stranger slowly removed one black glove.
Pale fingers.
Perfectly clean.
Not a single drop of blood stained them.
He flexed them once.
“…She was stronger than I expected.”
Lucas’s vision blurred.
“…Stop…”
“…stop talking…”
The stranger ignored him.
“Even after all these years…”
“…she still believed she could protect you.”
His crimson eyes narrowed ever so slightly.
“What an unfortunate woman.”
Lucas’s entire body trembled.
His nails dug into the floor until they split.
“…Shut…”
“…up…”
The stranger took one slow step forward.
The crimson aura thickened.
The air itself grew heavier.
Lucas struggled to breathe.
Then…
The hood slipped from the stranger’s head.
Golden hair fell over his shoulders like strands of molten sunlight.
His face was impossibly handsome.
Almost divine.
Yet there was no warmth within it.
Only an overwhelming coldness.
A faint scar crossed his left cheek.
His crimson eyes glowed with an ancient, terrifying authority.
Lucas stared.
Something about that face…
Felt…
Familiar.
“…”
“…Ren…?”
The name escaped before he could stop it.
For the first time…
The stranger’s expression changed.
One eyebrow rose slightly.
“So…”
“You remember me.”
Lucas’s mind spun.
Fragments of forgotten memories flashed through the darkness of his childhood.
A man.
Golden hair.
A cold smile.
Standing somewhere inside a vast mansion.
“…Impossible…”
“…You’re…”
Ren’s smile returned.
Small.
Cruel.
“Eighteen years…”
“…and you still recognize me.”
He crouched until they were eye level.
Lucas could smell smoke…
Ash…
And something ancient that no human should carry.
Ren studied him quietly.
Then shook his head.
“…Disappointing.”
Lucas coughed violently.
Blood spilled from his lips.
“…Why…?”
Ren tilted his head.
“Why?”
Lucas forced the words out.
“…Why…”
“…kill her…?”
For the first time…
Ren’s smile disappeared completely.
His voice became colder than winter itself.
“Because.”
“…orders were given.”
He stood once more.
Looking down upon Lucas as one might look at an insect trapped beneath a boot.
“And I have never failed an order.”
Then…
Lucas noticed it.
Ren’s right arm.
The skin…
Moved.
As though something alive writhed beneath it.
A sickening crack echoed through the ruined room.
CRACK.
Bones shifted.
CRUNCH.
Muscles twisted unnaturally.
Dark crimson scales erupted through the flesh.
His fingers lengthened.
Curving into monstrous black claws capable of tearing through steel.
The air itself screamed beneath the pressure.
Lucas’s breathing stopped.
“…Monster…”
Ren slowly flexed the transformed arm.
The claws gleamed beneath the moonlight.
His crimson eyes met Lucas’s one final time.
“There is one mercy…”
“…I can still offer you.”
He slowly raised the enormous claw above his head.
“You won’t suffer long.”
The monstrous claws descended—
And at that exact moment…
From somewhere below the apartment…
A voice suddenly thundered through the building.
“Saint Hunters!”
“Search every floor!”
“We’ve detected a strange demonic energy!”
Ren’s claw stopped only inches from Lucas’s throat.
His crimson eyes shifted toward the staircase.
A look of quiet annoyance crossed his face.
“…Persistent.”
He clicked his tongue.
“…Tch.”
The demonic arm slowly returned to normal.
The crimson scales dissolved into black mist.
He looked down at Lucas one last time.
The young man was pale.
Barely conscious.
Blood continued flowing from the timber lodged through his body.
His breathing had become shallow.
Ren quietly watched for several seconds.
Then…
He turned away.
“…Pathetic.”
“I overestimated you.”
To him…
The powerless boy lying in the rubble was already dead.
There was no reason to waste another second.
Black mist rose around his body.
Within moments…
He disappeared into the night.
Silence returned.
Lucas’s blurred vision slowly drifted toward the shattered bedroom.
“…Mum…”
His voice was barely audible.
He tried to crawl.
His arms trembled.
They gave out immediately.
Darkness slowly crept into the edges of his vision.
Heavy footsteps thundered up the staircase.
The Saint Hunters had finally arrived.
But to Lucas…
Their voices sounded impossibly far away.
His eyelids slowly closed.
Everything became dark.
And the ruined apartment fell silent once more.