A younger Brent was running through the cold stone halls of the Terran estate. The sun had long set but he couldn't sleep without his twin and something was wrong with Adam. He hadn't eaten dinner. He hadn't spoken. He'd just… stared. The door to Adam's room stood slightly ajar, a low rasping sound slipping through the gap like the breath of a dying beast.
"Adam?" Brent pushed the door open gently. What he saw froze him in place. His brother was crouched in the corner, nails digging into his cheeks—no, clawing—as if trying to tear his own face off. But it wasn't just his fingers. His skin was shifting, muscles twitching violently under the surface.
His face… it changed, moment to moment, warping into the likenesses of people they'd known: their mother, a neighbor, even Brent himself—morphing without warning, jerking like something was wrong with the blueprint of his soul.
His arms bulged, stretched, then thinned again. His ribs contorted unnaturally beneath his shirt, the fabric distending as if something beneath it tried to burst free. Veins pulsed with wrong colors. His body was not a body anymore—it was clay reshaping itself beyond reason. And he was screaming through it all.
Not the scream of fear, or pain, or even madness. It was all of them at once. Brent stumbled back, hand slamming the door shut as he collapsed against it. His ears rang, but the sound of his brother's anguish pressed through the wood like it wanted to crawl inside his head.
He remembered the last time Adam had screamed like that. It was when Father had taken him. That day, Balthazar Terran had summoned Adam to the sanctum. Brent hadn't been allowed in, but he remembered the look on their father's face—cold, determined, like this was just business. Then the door had closed, and hours passed.
The screaming had started. And when Adam returned, he was… different. He was no longer the controlless twin but had the greatest control Brent had ever seen. A miracle, they called it, a breakthrough but it was a curse, He cursed my brother.
Heavy footsteps began to echo down the hall. A slow, deliberate rhythm like stones rolling into place. And then he arrived, Balthazar Terran.
The man was a walking monument, carved from stone and shadow, his body thick with muscle but sculpted with impossible precision. His presence crushed the air around him, every step a quiet quake. A sleeveless black coat trailed behind him, stitched from something that looked like scorched leather, its edges frayed and claw-marked.
And in his right hand, resting with unnatural ease, was the black crucifix of the Terran Guild, six feet of merciless legacy. Its edges bore the faint glimmer of old blood. The moment Brent's eyes landed on it, his breath hitched.
Balthazar paused before the door and looked down at Brent with eyes like buried coals, faintly glowing, utterly indifferent. He said nothing. He opened the door and stepped inside. The screaming stopped. Brent sat frozen in the hallway. The silence stretched. And then the door opened again.
But it wasn't Balthazar who stepped out. It was Adam with Balthazar standing right behind him. Only, Brent wasn't sure anymore because of his smile. Adam was smiling but it was too empty. Too easy. The kind of smile someone wore when they didn't understand what pain was anymore. When they didn't feel fear, or empathy, or anything at all.
Brent stared at his brother's face and didn't see his brother at all. He saw the shell of Adam. He saw a mask. He saw a corpse still walking. His stomach twisted as the truth hit him like a landslide. He's gone. His brother was dead. Father did this to him.
And in that moment, through the blur of tears and the crushing weight of silence, Brent made a vow that would carve itself into the stone of his soul: Balthazar Terran must die.
***
I don't want to do this, Omari stepped forward, heart pounding, his eyes locked onto Brent. His face was already hardened with resolve, like this was war—not a test. I'd rather die than lose. Those words echoed. Heavy. Sharp. Brent meant it. That made Omari's stomach twist. How am I supposed to fight someone like that?
He wasn't a killer. But if I didn't win, I wouldn't even qualify for the exams. That meant no graduation, no becoming a Slayer, no protecting anyone. My dreams would end here. He closed his eyes, took a breath, and let his father's voice cut through the chaos.
"When you finally have something you can dream of doing, don't give up your morals. Don't put aside your feelings. Don't forget to find joy in the small things. And don't fail to cherish every small success—even in the face of failure."
Right now, it felt wrong to hurt another person, to fight someone who was ready to die just to win. But if I gave up—if I threw this fight—I wouldn't just be walking away from a school. I'd be walking away from saving people. Not fighting doesn't make me a better person—it just makes me a Slayer who never became one.
He wasn't putting aside his feelings in the moment but he knew if he give up now, he'd feel worse later now so he was not going to give up. He looked up. The arena was silent, the teachers watching, waiting. And the boy in front of him? Unflinching. He could kill Omari without hesitation. That meant Omari couldn't hold back.
But that didn't mean he had to throw away what made him who he was. I won't kill him. Even if it's harder. I'll win without stepping over that line. No decapitations. No deathblows. Just knees, wrists, tendons. I'll disable him. I'll Disarm him. I'll Dismantle him. Omari bolted for Brent. Earth spikes rose from the ground to impale Omari, but he leaped above them, having thought he would do that.
He then ran towards Brent and Brent rose a wall between him and Omari. More spikes shot from the ground, but Omari sidestepped them. Spears formed from the wall and shot at Omari. Omari, with a vertical cut, sent a slash flying that parted a way for him between the spears.
Brent, with his control, lifted the wall and threw it at Omari. With two powerful horizontal slashes split the wall, dived through the slip, rolled and wacked the sword out Brent's hand so hard it and his whole body crumbled. A stone double.
As Omari turned around, Brent leaped from the sliced wall, slashed into his chest, spun and kicked him back. When Omari stumbled back onto his knees, an earth spike shot up, aimed for his heart. With his sword, he blocked it and was pushed back and up on his feet. Brent, knowing Omari could break through his defence, dashed at him with a slash.
Omari parried the attack, spun behind Brent and slashed Brent's ankle. Brent's feet gave up under him but he would not give up on his vengeance so the ground wrapped around his legs to keep him standing. He spun and stabbed his sword through Omari's ribs and out the back.
Omari grabbed the sword, but Brent let go of the sword, slipped out of Omari's grip and shot an earth spike at him. Omari blocked it with his sword, but it sent him flying back. He fell on his back, pushing the sword out of him. For a moment, he felt something sharp pointing his back and with a quick roll back onto his feet; he dodged an earth spike.
He rose a wall and from it spears but before they could shoot, with a series of powerful slashes, Omari cut down the wall. Two walls rose on either side of Omari. He narrowly dived out from between them as they crashed together. The joined wall became a spinning circular saw going after Omari.
Omari got up and sent a horizontal slash that cut the saw in half. The top half became a spear shot at Omari's head. He weaved it but once it was behind him, it exploded, sending stone shards into Omari's back and pushing towards the bottom half of the saw, which was transforming into an earth spike.
An earth spike was actually what Omari needed. His back towards Brent, he blocked it with his sword, sending him up into the air but straight towards Brent. Brent made a sword from the earth and, pointing it at Omari, shot earth spears from the ground at him. He blocked most of the earth spikes and when he was approaching the ground, Brent raised his sword guard, but Omari crash landed, slashing straight through it.
Omari then dropped his sword and hit Brent with a right uppercut to the face, followed by a left hook to the face again, a 6,3. What is he doing? Brent thought. He then rounded, kicked him in the face, grabbed him by the hair and kneed him in the face. Is he trying to incapacitate me?
Omari pulled his fist back when he heard Brent through his busted teeth whisper, "I give up." Omari let go of his hair and he fell to his knees before an earth spike behind Omari impaled him in his torso. Brent got up and watched Omari pass out. "I'm sorry." Brent said, "I did what I had to."
He was about to walk away when he noticed Omari's hair becoming white. Omari reached out one of his hands to Brent, his open hand pointed at Brent and he flicked his wrist before becoming unconscious again. But with that flick of his wrist, he slashed with his hand and sent that slash through the top of Brent's head, instantly killing him.