The sun crept over the Dusk Slums, its light grazing Glass's face and stirring him from slumber. His crimson gaze met the new dawn.
He groaned, clutching his side—bitten and bloodied, the previous night's chaos now a fading blur.
"Mother," he thought, bitterness rising. "She came home angry. I don't even know what I did wrong. I apologized... I begged... but she didn't care."
He tried to sit up, wincing. His scarf—the same one he wore the night Belfrost discarded him—was shredded, a cold reminder of the beasts that nearly devoured him.
He was sure death had come. But they'd fled.
"I wonder what scared them off," he whispered aloud, a gust of frost biting through the alleyway.
His body shivered violently. He sneezed, exhausted. He knew the truth: if he closed his eyes now, he'd never wake again.
"Damn it," he muttered. "Dying like a dog on the side of the road... befitting, isn't it?"
With a final surge of desperation, Glass curled his fingers into a claw and jammed them into his own wound.
He screamed. An ear-piercing, primal cry as his body thrashed in agony. The pain was unholy—he shouldn't have survived it.
But he was awake now. Barely.
A growl echoed.
Glass froze. He looked around, senses blurry, panic mounting.
More growls. Closer now. He bit down on his lip until blood leaked, trying to silence himself.
The shadow loomed larger.
Thud.
The wind was knocked out of him. A hulking wolf-like demon—an Abyssal Fang—landed square on his chest, snarling, fangs bared.
Terror surged through Glass.
Then came the others—circling, ravenous.
The Fang atop him lunged, sinking its jaws into his neck. The others followed, tearing limb from limb until Glass's cries fell silent beneath a symphony of flesh and bone being devoured.
The alley fell deathly quiet.
Then the glow.
The beasts recoiled.
The puddle of entrails began to rise, pulled toward a crimson core. Bones formed. Skull. Spine. A body rebuilt—faster and faster. Flesh returning not as it once was—but reforged.
A silver-haired, crimson-eyed young man stood in the alley now.
Blank. Detached. Unmoving.
The Abyssal Fangs stared.
Then bolted.
But it was already too late.
As they neared the alley's edge, their bodies exploded into mist—red vapor dissolving mid-stride.
Of the twenty-seven Abyssal Fangs that hunted him, not a single one left alive.
The energy radiated outward—across streets, cities, and finally—
To Belfrost.
Amanda jolted upright in her office, papers scattering as cold sweat traced her spine.
She felt it.
Not a creature.
Not a rank.
An entity.
And she knew, instinctively...
She was at its mercy.