On the Path of Eternal Strength.

Morning came without asking for permission.

There was no bright sun, no cheerful birdsong. Only a dense mist and a heavy silence, as if the world itself avoided making noise before those who slept there: three motionless bodies by the lake, surrounded by stone, vapor, and scars.

Virka woke first.

She was lying against Sebastián's chest, her tangled hair pressed against the rough fabric of his black trench coat. Her nose moved slightly, recognizing the scents that still slept with him: old blood, metal, ash, restrained fire.

—You smell like death —she murmured softly, as if it were a compliment.

Sebastián opened his eyes.

Calm. Not like those of a man who has rested… but like those of a creature that never truly closes its eyelids —It's because I never took it off.

Virka raised an eyebrow.

—The skin or the clothes?

He didn't answer. He only let out a slow, warm exhalation, as if the body still debated whether to move… or remain there, eternal.

Narka emerged from the lake, his reduced form glimmering for an instant beneath the faint veil of mist. He slid through the water and climbed onto a nearby rock, sitting without a word. From there, he watched them with that wise stillness that only ancient guardians —those who have seen too many centuries pass— can possess.

Sebastián rose.

The trench coat creaked with the movement, revealing beneath it his combat clothes, still stained. The face mask rested at his neck. The goggles still on his forehead. It was an attire of war, not of truce. One that no longer belonged in that morning of vapor and stone.

—We can't go like this —he said suddenly, as if replying to a thought only he had heard.

Virka looked at him with disdain.

—I like it.

—The city doesn't —he clarified, sliding his hand toward his storage ring. A faint glimmer shone from the black stone encircling his finger, and as if responding to a silent will, a small bundle appeared: folded with military precision, wrapped in gray silk. It was the clothing Drailä had given him. His only garment before becoming a tool of cleansing.

Without another word, Sebastián stood.

He walked a few meters away, into the trees, and began to undress. Not with shame, but with the natural ease of one born among mountains, mud, and blood. Each garment he removed fell like an old skin. The trench coat was left hanging on a branch. The pants, folded upon a rock. The boots, still damp, were set aside.

Virka did not look away.

She watched him with the calm of one who has already licked her wounds. Yet there was something in her gaze… a shadow, a mixture of pride, desire, and unease. As if by watching him shed his skin, she feared he might also shed his instinct.

When Sebastián finished dressing, his figure had shifted from hunter to urban shadow. The black clothing was tight, comfortable, light. His silhouette remained inhuman, yet it no longer screamed of death. It only whispered it.

—Ready? —he asked.

Narka settled on Sebastián's shoulder with a barely visible motion.

—I will go. This world is still foreign to me. And I must learn either to hate it… or to protect it.

Virka said nothing. She simply walked up to him, slid her hand into his, and squeezed tightly. Her fingers, though delicate in human form, carried the same lethal pressure they bore when they were claws.

And so, the three departed.

Without ritual words. Without farewells.

Only the murmur of the water, a breeze smelling of dampness and ash, and the city waiting for them below: bright, filthy, full of ruin and promises.

They were three monsters disguised in passing.

They walked among the trees as if the earth owed them something.

And though no one knew it, the day had just changed.

Because Sebastián had chosen to walk with them.

Not as a hunter.

Not as a beast. But as the one who wants to see… if there is still something worth it.

The world opened before them like a sleeping animal.

The city, still distant, pulsed with the electric noise of its entrails: engines, lights, voices, floating signs that flickered in the sky like artificial fireflies. Sebastián walked without haste. At his side, Virka moved with her pitch-black, stylized shoes without heels, sniffing the air as if the asphalt hid secrets no one else could smell. Narka, in his reduced form, rested on his shoulder, motionless… yet awake.

None of them spoke.

They simply walked.

And that was enough.

The road descended between hills that still held on to old trees, gray roots, and branches twisted by the wind. Civilization had not yet torn them away. In the distance, the first buildings rose like broken teeth: towers without symmetry, reflecting the sky in their dirty glass.

But Sebastián did not look at that.

He looked at something else.

His shadow.

Stretched beneath his feet, cast by a sun that had not yet decided to be kind.

And he thought…

"What am I when I do not destroy?"

The question was not new. But this time, it did not hurt. This time, it simply drifted.

He remembered the way the Qi had stirred within him when he devoured the meta-human's core. It was not power in itself. It was hunger, yes. But it was also an answer. A reaction to what the world demanded of him: strength to exist, brutality to avoid being devoured, constancy to keep from falling apart.

The Eternal Strength, that invisible line separating the living from the survivors, was not only muscle and blood.

It was accepting that the world does not bend, but that one can walk crooked without breaking.

Sebastián understood it without words. He felt it in the weight of his body, in the silence of his steps, in the way Virka sometimes looked at him… as if she expected him to collapse one day.

He would not.

Because although his path was made of ruin, there was also room for something else.

Not hope.

Not redemption.

But perhaps…

Commitment.

A choice repeated each morning.

To keep moving forward.

To keep being.

—Look at that —Virka murmured suddenly.

He lifted his gaze.

A human girl, just a few meters away, was selling synthetic flowers on the sidewalk. No one stopped. No one looked at her. Yet she remained there, holding a perfect plastic bouquet, smiling as if she believed in something no one else could see.

Virka watched her with her head tilted.

—Why does she smile… if she is alone?

Sebastián did not answer. He only kept walking.

But within him, the devouring core —that white vortex that fed him— did not roar.

It was… still.

As if, for once, it was not hungry.

Narka, from his shoulder, opened his eyes.

And though he said nothing, his Qi slid toward Sebastián like a river beneath the earth.

"You are beginning to understand."

"The Eternal Strength is not a weapon."

"It is a decision."

The city drew closer.

Taller. Louder.

And the three of them, monsters disguised as silence, kept walking.

Without an immediate destination.

Only with the certainty that the world would go on hurting.

And that, even so, they had chosen to walk within the pain.

The city, at last, devoured them.

Not with violence… but with indifference.

The streets opened like veins of concrete. Automated vehicles floated along soulless lanes, humans disguised as people walked to the rhythm of invisible clocks, and the ads shone like broken promises: beauty, success, obedience. Everything was for sale. Everything was desirable. Nothing had a soul.

Sebastián entered that chaos like a silence given form.

Virka, at his side, looked more beast than woman: her eyes glowed beneath the artificial light, and her upright posture did not imitate humans… it defied them. Every step she took was an unspoken declaration: "I am here. I am not like you. I will not hide."

Narka, in his small form, coiled in a spiral around Sebastián's arm, his dark, scaled skin camouflaging itself like an ancient jewel. From there, he watched. He listened. He pondered.

When they reached an intersection, the city offered them its most made-up face.

A five-story shopping mall rose like a cathedral of consumption: glass ceilings, black columns of polished metal, false fountains and stairways tangled like serpents. At the center of the building, a floating sphere projected ambient music and patterns of light that danced through the air.

—I want to go in —Virka said suddenly.

It was not a command. It was… curiosity.

Sebastián said nothing. He only turned and walked with her toward the entrance. No one stopped them.

The automatic door opened with an electric whisper. The air conditioning greeted them like an invisible tongue. And then…

The stares.

All of them. Absolutely all of them.

Fixed upon them. Sebastián felt it first: a faint pressure in the eyes of the others. They were not blades. They were not threats. They were only… judgments. Humanly harmless. Socially poisonous.

A man in a black suit stopped his call.

A couple fell silent.

A mother discreetly pulled her child closer, as if her ancestral instinct knew that something wild had just entered.

Virka froze in place.

Her fangs did not show, but her pupils dilated ever so slightly. The urge to tear was an inheritance difficult to suppress. But this time, she breathed. Deeply.

—They have no idea —she murmured, more to herself than to the others— how close they are to the end.

—Leave them —Sebastián said, without turning—. This world consumes itself. We only walk among the ashes.

The ambient music once again wrapped around them. It smelled of synthetic perfumes, of machine-brewed coffee, of sweat trapped beneath expensive suits. As they walked, the corridors seemed to narrow. Not because they were small… but because no one dared to come close.

In a leather clothing store, a saleswoman swallowed hard upon seeing them.

In a technology shop, the welcoming hologram shut down by mistake.

But Virka moved in fascination. She ran her fingers across display cases, sniffed packaged products, stopped in front of screens where models imitated human movements she did not understand.

Sebastián only watched.

He did not want to buy.

He did not want to belong.

He only… was there.

Watching his female test a world that did not deserve her.

Narka, from his shoulder, whispered into his mind:

"This is how it begins, Sebastián."

"Not with blood. Not with power. But with a choice."

"Let her explore… without unleashing the beast."

He nodded without speaking.

Not because he understood.

But because he knew that, this time, he had to remain silent.

And let the world —that perfumed corpse— show Virka what neither he, nor chaos, nor war could ever give her.

Only the beautiful senselessness of existing.

The shopping mall was a box of artificial light trapped in glass.

It gleamed with soulless signs, mannequins frozen in false gestures, and hallways so pristine they no longer seemed human.

But there they went:

A man who had never been a child,

a woman who had never been human,

and an ancient one who no longer fit within any rational definition,

drifting like shadows dressed in flesh,

while the world watched them without understanding.

They walked unhurried.

The crowd parted without knowing why,

feeling in their bones that something ancient was moving forward with soft steps.

Virka walked to Sebastián's right, her gait freer than that of any woman.

She did not walk, she stalked.

Every step was a small dance of contained power.

Her wild eyes, despite the human disguise, devoured the colors, the sounds, the scents.

She did not need to understand: she only needed to feel.

And then she stopped.

A display at the back, bathed in warm light, showcased sets of lace, silk, impossible shapes.

Women's undergarments.

But not the simple kind.

The sensual kind.

The provocative kind.

The one designed not to cover, but to suggest.

Virka frowned, tilting her head like a beast finding an object foreign to its jungle.

—What is that? —she asked bluntly, pointing at the display with her chin.

Sebastián followed her gaze.

For a moment, he did not answer.

The image was so distant from any useful memory in his mind…

—Underwear —he finally said, his voice neutral.

But then, he lowered his eyes for a second, as if searching through a forgotten corner of his life.

—Although… it doesn't look like what I remember.

—The last time I saw something like this… —he paused briefly— I was a child.

—And it wasn't like this. Not so… exposed.

Virka did not blink.

She did not react with modesty.

She simply kept her gaze fixed on the black and red lace, as if trying to understand the logic behind so much useless thread.

—Is it worn underneath? —she asked, curious.

—Yes —Sebastián nodded.

—What for?

He had no logical answer.

He had never learned to think in those codes.

—I don't know —he admitted—. Maybe… to seduce.

—Or to cover just enough.

—Or maybe because that's what this world dictates.

Virka lowered her gaze for a moment to her own body, still clad in the clothes Draila had given her.

She had never worn anything beneath.

Nor had she needed to.

The idea of covering her body only partially made no sense to her.

It did not bother her either, but she could not understand it.

—I don't need it —she murmured at last, as if answering herself.

—No —Sebastián agreed—. You don't.

And without another word, they kept walking.

They left behind the glittering shop.

The lace.

The stares.

The questions.

The world went on turning.

And they…

remained foreign.

Though for an instant, they had tried to understand it.

The steps of the three carried on through the illuminated belly of the shopping mall,

where the walls were display windows,

and the windows, distorted mirrors of others' desires.

Sebastián looked at nothing with interest.

He observed, yes…

but without seeing.

Like one who walks through a world to which he does not belong,

only to accompany those he loves.

Virka, on the other hand, smelled more than she looked.

Her eyes wandered with the feline calm of one who could leap at any moment,

but her nose—

that was alive.

And so she stopped.

Not because of an ad.

Not because of a colorful screen or any human stimulus.

But because of a scent.

—It smells… different —she whispered.

Narka turned his small body, still perched on Sebastián's shoulder,

and slowly lifted his eyelids.

—What kind of smell? —he asked in his mind, extending the communication among the three.

Virka did not answer immediately.

Her chest rose slightly, as if she inhaled more deeply.

—Meat.

—Not raw. Not rotten.

—Cooked…

—over slow fire.

—With spices I don't understand.

—With fat.

—With soul.

Her eyes sharpened.

Her tongue barely traced the edge of her fangs, hidden beneath her human form.

—I want that —she said at last.

Sebastián tilted his head, curious.

Then he smelled it too.

Late, but he felt it.

It was an intense, smoky, heavy blend,

like a tide of grease and fire dancing over invisible embers.

A scent that called to the primitive,

to the savage,

to the real.

They followed the aroma.

They did not walk.

They were guided by the nose of a beast in the shape of a woman.

The crowd grew denser in that corridor.

Children running.

Couples laughing.

Adults typing on their phones without seeing anything.

But among them,

the trio moved like clothed shadows,

too present…

too alien.

The place appeared after a discreet curve of the main hall.

A steakhouse.

No flashy lights.

No blaring music.

Only a façade of black wood and polarized glass,

and a sober sign:

"Fire & Bark — Grill Kitchen"

At the entrance, a soft cloud of smoke escaped with each swing of the door.

And with it,

the scent that had captured Virka from afar.

She stepped closer until she was just inches from the door.

—This… this is different —she said.

Her eyes did not lie.

They did not shine like those of a curious child.

They shone like those of a huntress facing a new kind of prey.

Sebastián stopped at her side.

He looked inside through the glass.

Occupied tables.

Raw wooden surfaces.

Thick steel knives.

Glasses filled with golden liquid.

And cuts of red, juicy meat served on plates that still sizzled at the touch.

—Do you want to try it? —he asked.

Virka did not answer.

Her body was already turned toward the door.

Only the final step remained.

—Yes —she said at last.

—I want to eat that.

Sebastián did not smile.

But something in his eyes loosened.

—Then let's go in.

And they did.

Like three creatures disguised as humans,

about to taste a part of the world…

that, for a moment,

asked for neither blood,

nor death,

nor power.

Only fire.

And meat.

They entered.

The air changed as soon as they crossed the threshold.

From the artificial noise of the mall to the intimate crackle of contained fire.

The restaurant was deeper than it appeared.

Low light.

Walls blackened by smoke.

Tables carved with the scars of old knives.

And the aroma—

the very same that had guided them…

now embraced them from within.

A waiter approached them.

He was young.

His smile tried to stay firm upon seeing the three.

But eyes do not know how to lie.

—Welcome… a table for three?

Virka did not answer.

Neither did Sebastián.

It was Narka, with his soft voice from his companion's shoulder, who nodded politely.

—Yes. Somewhere secluded, if possible.

The voice made the young man tremble.

He did not know where it had come from.

He saw no mouths move.

But he obeyed.

He led them to a table in a stone corner,

near an open grill,

where the fire danced with brutal elegance.

They sat.

Sebastián first.

Then Virka, still standing for a moment longer, sniffing as if she were choosing not a seat… but territory.

And finally Narka, descending from the shoulder to sit at the edge,

close to the heat.

The menu arrived,

but only Sebastián touched it.

He read it out of habit.

His hunger was something else.

Virka, on the other hand, had her eyes fixed on the open kitchen.

There, cuts of meat sizzled over embers,

greased with salt,

paprika,

and something more…

something that spoke directly to instinct.

—I want that —she said, pointing with her chin, like a hunting she-wolf.

—Large.

—Bleeding.

—With bone.

The waiter swallowed hard.

—Would you like a specific cut?

Virka turned her face slowly.

Her bright red eyes carried a wet edge,

as if desire were eating her alive from within.

—I want several.

—All of them.

—Bring one. Then another. And another still.

—Don't stop until I say so.

The young man hesitated.

He looked at Sebastián.

Searched for a hint of a joke.

A smile.

But Sebastián's face was carved from stone.

Dark.

Silent.

Sincere.

—Do as she says —he murmured.

The boy nodded.

And left.

Narka chuckled faintly.

—You know how to intimidate better than a queen, Virka.

—I'm not trying to intimidate —she replied,

licking her lips.

—I'm hungry.

The dishes began to arrive.

And what followed…

was not a dinner.

It was an exhibition of savage appetite.

Of instinct without a mask.

The first cut was a bleeding tomahawk,

still steaming.

Virka grabbed it with her hands.

She didn't use a knife.

She didn't ask for utensils.

She bit straight into the bone,

and the meat tore apart like wet silk.

The second was an ox rib wrapped in spices.

The third, a thick steak with black butter.

Each time she finished one,

the waiter —pale— brought another.

And the table began to gather stares.

Couples stopped their conversations.

Children's eyes widened.

Waiters whispered.

Because the black-haired woman… ate as if the world were about to end.

But it wasn't grotesque.

It wasn't vulgar.

It was beautiful.

A brutal dance of jaw,

hidden claws,

and pure desire.

Sebastián, in silence, cut his own steak with delicacy.

Not out of manners.

But out of habit.

He didn't need meat.

But neither did he disdain it.

Narka sipped a dark broth,

something special brought after a soft request,

more fitting to his small, ancient body.

—Do you find it ironic? —Narka asked.

—That after so much blood… we celebrate life in flesh.

Sebastián did not answer immediately.

He looked at Virka.

He saw her devour with joy.

With honesty.

And then, he simply said:

—Flesh…

is not just nourishment.

It is history.

It is what remains

after the fight.

Knives clashed.

The fire kept crackling.

And while the city spun on outside,

they ate.

Like monsters hungry for more than blood.

The last piece of meat disappeared between Virka's fangs with a wet snap.

No bone remained. No nerve.

The table before her was a post-battlefield: empty steel plates, dark sauces spilled like blood shed after combat, and a faint steam still rising from the veins of fat that barely clung to the blackened steel.

She licked her fingers one by one, like a sacred beast satisfied after its offering.

The other diners —families, office workers, youths with urban aesthetics— watched her with a mix of fascination and fear.

No one spoke. No one laughed.

She was not human. And she did not try to appear so.

Sebastián finished his simple plate —a seared cut of meat without spices, accompanied only by a dark unleavened bread— with the same coldness with which he had walked over corpses days earlier. Narka, perched on his shoulder, dozed with half-closed eyes, sunk in deep calm, as if devouring magic or witnessing massacres meant nothing when he could taste the air.

Sebastián rose first. His stride held no haste, yet everything in his figure made the hallways part.

He paid without a word.

The woman at the counter —a waitress with powdered face and false eyelashes— barely managed to glimpse the total on the screen before a dark card with a biometric chip slid in front of her.

—It's fifty thousand units —she stammered, not knowing if she spoke to a murderer, a noble, or a devourer of worlds.

He gave a slight nod, passing no judgment.

The transaction was instant. He still had funds. Many. That money did not come from recent blood. It came from the inheritance his mother had left him… and from the slaughter he had accepted as a pact.

Outside the restaurant, Virka walked with feline expression, shaking her hands, her stomach full, her fangs satisfied.

—I didn't know those creatures… without magic… could cook something so good —she murmured. Her voice was soft, yet it vibrated like controlled thunder.

—They don't cook it. They manipulate it. They soften it so fragile bodies won't collapse —Narka replied from Sebastián's shoulder, without opening his eyes.

Virka chuckled low.

—Then it's useless. But it tastes good. I suppose that's enough… this time.

The restaurant's door was left behind, and the mall swallowed them again.

White lights, luminous billboards, fashion holograms, and artificial voices repeating soulless offers. A civilization locked within itself, polishing its skin while rotting inside.

Sebastián walked forward without the need of a map.

He didn't know where to go… but his feet knew.

It was not merely exploration. It was adaptation. Curiosity cultivated in the shadow of instinct.

They were three monsters…

…walking among display windows, devouring the world in their own way.

The air conditioning kept hissing, artificial and persistent, while Sebastián's footsteps echoed like a muffled drum against the polished surface of the mall. At his side, Virka walked without hurry, but with that feline cadence that never betrayed her instinct. Every movement of hers was a dance. Every turn of her head, a sentence.

She was still savoring the meat. Not only on her tongue, but in the memory her body cultivated like an ancestral art.

And then…

The smell.

Not of blood. Nor of iron.

But a soft, earthy one, woven in artificial perfumes: lace, intimate fabrics, colors designed for seduction.

Another lingerie store.

Not the same one they had seen before, but identical in purpose.

In the window, a suspended figure displayed a sheer black set with crimson details. Small red bows decorated the base. The garment was not meant to conceal anything. Its purpose was different: to ignite without touch.

Virka stopped. Not like before, out of curiosity. This time, there was something else in her gaze.

A slanted smile spread across her face as she slowly turned toward Sebastián, who was walking a step ahead. She grabbed him by the wrist, without gentleness, and pulled him to face her.

—You already ate. —she said with that voice that didn't drag, but devoured the air between each word—. You gave me cooked flesh from this world. You let my tongue taste something new…

Her grip tightened with subtlety, not hurting, but making it clear that the game was beginning.

—Now I want to return the favor. To satisfy your hunger, Sebastián. But not the one in your stomach.

Her eyes gleamed like night embers.

—I want you to buy me something from here —she tilted her face toward the display, without breaking eye contact—. Not for me. For you. For us. So that we keep entertaining that child who does not yet exist… but already waits in our entrails like a promise. Like a future war.

Sebastián did not respond immediately.

The world around turned more gray. The ads, the people, the background noise… all faded, as if the moment could not coexist with anything but that confession, that command disguised as desire.

Narka, from his shoulder, spoke softly, projecting his voice through Qi, meant only for the two of them:

—The way she loves… is ancient. She does not seek to fit in. She does not seek logic. Only surrender and mutual dominion. Like beasts… like pacts that bleed before they are sealed.

Sebastián lowered his gaze toward Virka. There was no doubt. No shame. Only that constant fire burning between them since the flesh of one had brushed against the other for the first time.

He nodded, wordless.

—Then we will enter —he said, his voice like stone rolling downhill—. And you will choose what you want. Not for tonight. Not for this city. But so that when we are alone… it will be your claws that tear it apart, not mine.

Virka laughed. Low. Savage. With a cruel sweetness.

—As it should be.

The three turned at the same time.

And entered.

The store swallowed them like a shining cavern, a den of temptations wrapped in silk and lace, while in the back, the lights flickered, ignorant that they were illuminating monsters… playing at being a couple.

The store was nothing more than a space adorned with soft lights and black carpets, tempered glass displays and mannequins that tried to imitate bodies that did not know how to sweat, bleed, or roar.

But upon entering, Virka did not walk. She advanced like a dense shadow. As if she already knew what she sought.

Her red eyes, glowing like living coals, scanned the sets with a concentration that was not human. She was not looking at colors. Nor fabrics. Nor lace.

She looked at impact.

At sensation.

At dominion.

A young saleswoman —too fragile, too human— approached with a professional smile. But upon meeting Virka's gaze, her voice faltered. She did not know whether to greet, to kneel… or to run.

—I'm looking for something sensual —said the beast disguised as a woman—. Something that will shatter the sanity of the one who loves me, with just a glance.

—Size? —the woman whispered.

Virka tilted her head. Her jet-black hair fell over one shoulder like a curtain of night.

—I don't have one. I've never worn… this.

—Then —Sebastián intervened, his voice grave— they'll have to measure you.

The clerk hesitated, as if she feared to touch her. But Virka was already turning toward him, like a wild beast inviting the hunter.

—Do you know how to do it?

—Not with tapes. But with my eyes… I always have.

Virka's lips curved into a dangerous smile.

—Then look. And tell me what I am.

Without warning, she began to remove Draila's dress.

Right there. In front of the mirrors.

The saleswoman stepped back, horrified.

—Miss, you can't! There are fitting rooms!

But Sebastián was already moving forward.

He placed a hand on Virka's shoulder, not to stop her, but to tell her what no one else could:

—I don't care if you scorn their rules. But I don't want these eyes… to see what only I deserve.

The beast looked at him. And for a second, in that gaze, there was no rebellion.

Only acceptance.

Only pride.

Only restrained desire.

—Then come —she whispered—. And look at me where the world cannot steal me from you.

She vanished behind the black curtains of the fitting room.

Sebastián followed.

Inside, the air shifted. There was no music. Only breathing, heavy and real, like a distant drum.

Virka turned. She wore only the set she had chosen: deep black lace, lined with dark red details, like veins running across her body.

Her white skin, without marks or scars, seemed to glow under the pale lights.

Her eyes… were no longer red. They were hunger. They were claim.

—Do you desire me?

—Since before touching you —said Sebastián—. But now… it is torture.

Virka stepped closer. She placed a hand on his chest. Felt his heartbeat, like a thunder held back.

—My emperor… if you desire me, wait for me. Where the walls are ours. Where your hands do not have to hide. Where no one can stop what we are.

And she kissed him. Without sweetness. Without permission. As one kisses an equal.

When Sebastián left the fitting room, his face showed no emotion.

But his body did. In tension. In fire.

Narka, on his shoulder, did not laugh this time. He only murmured:

—They feed each other… like two halves that do not yet know if they are whole… or condemned.

They paid in silence.

And left the store with the bag in hand.

But everyone knew that what they carried… was not just clothing.

It was a new pact.

An unspoken promise.

A war that, when it broke out, would have no witnesses… only ruins.

The mall kept beating like a foreign heart, distant from them.

The ads shone, the screens whispered promises, and the spotless corridors hid the miseries of the modern world.

But Sebastián, Virka, and Narka did not belong to that symmetry.

They walked together, and the air seemed to grow heavier around them.

Virka carried the small black bag between her fingers as if it were a trophy. At her side, Sebastián held to the same silence that bound them. There was no need to speak. Not when their bodies knew more of each other than any word ever could.

—Is this also part of the eternal strength? —Virka asked, without turning her head—. Not the wars. Not the blood. This calm… this strange desire that doesn't ask me to kill, but to touch.

—Yes —Sebastián replied—. Eternal strength… is also that. To recognize that destruction is part of the cycle. But not all of it. To learn to hold without breaking. To endure without devouring.

Virka did not answer.

But her hand brushed against his.

And though she did not take it, the touch was more intimate than a caress.

Narka, from his shoulder, opened one liquid eye and spoke, barely more than a restrained murmur:

—Eternal Strength is not only power. It is understanding. It is absorbing the world without ceasing to be oneself… even if the world hates you for it.

The mall carried on with its course.

But it was no longer just a place.

It was a trial.

A glass cage.

An absurd representation of a civilization pretending to be alive… but only imitating movement.

And then they noticed it.

It was not a sound.

It was not a gesture.

It was something deeper: a pressure at the nape, a subtle disruption in the rhythm of the shadows.

—We're being followed —said Narka, with no emotion in his voice.

—Since we left the store —Sebastián added.

Virka was already looking back, not directly, but through the reflection on a metal panel.

—It's not human —she murmured—. It smells… wrong.

—Wrong? —Sebastián asked.

—Like something trying to pretend it's flesh… but not knowing how to hide what it carries inside.

They took a detour.

A side corridor, empty. Low ceilings. No music. No displays. Only a dead coffee machine and a locked emergency door.

There, they stopped.

Sebastián said nothing.

He leaned against the wall with arms crossed.

Virka stood tall, like an animal that knows the terrain.

And Narka slid down from his shoulder, settling at ground level, taking on a liquid form without losing his core.

—Do you think it's one of those… experiments? —Virka asked—. Like the one you killed underground.

—Could be. Or something worse —Sebastián said—. Sometimes the ones who imitate monsters are more dangerous than the real ones.

—And if it doesn't want to fight? —Narka asked.

—Then we let it go. But if it comes closer… if it breathes like an enemy…

He didn't finish the sentence.

He didn't need to.

Virka smiled.

Not like a woman.

Like the female of a lost species.

And she looked at him with fire.

—See? This too is desire. Waiting for the hunt… at your side.

Sebastián did not smile.

But something in his eyes burned. Not with violence. Not with blood.

But with recognition.

Because love, for them… was also that:

Knowing when to wait.

And when to devour.

The corridor where they waited was a false refuge.

The walls, painted with the industrial white of the forgotten, could not hide the tension sliding between the shadows.

Then, Sebastián tilted his head. A minimal gesture. But his voice was clear. Grave. Sharpened like memory.

—I recognize it.

Virka frowned, never taking her eyes off the reflection.

—Whom?

—Not him. What he carries inside. That energy… I felt it before. The same distortion that hovered in those who hunted the pregnant woman, back at the overlook. Not the same, but it vibrates alike. Something rotten that is not born… only manufactured.

Narka, from the floor, allowed the liquid that wrapped him to tremble faintly. A minuscule oscillation. Like an ancient drum answering to a distant memory.

—Then they are part of the same nest —he whispered—. And if one is found… the others are not far.

Sebastián did not answer immediately.

He stared at the end of the corridor.

A man stood there now.

He was not walking.

He was simply… there. As if the world had dropped him from the wrong plane.

He was dressed normally. Too normally.

And yet, everything about him was a mistake.

—We won't wait any longer —murmured Sebastián, his voice cut by an inner blade—. I don't want to kill on impulse… but there are enemies who deserve no other choice.

Virka stepped forward. Her body tense, harmonious, like a beast that had already understood its prey.

—Then let me handle it —she said. It wasn't a plea. It was a promise.

Sebastián shook his head.

—Not this time. I want him alive. If I can. We need answers. Even if I have to tear them out from inside.

He closed his eyes for an instant.

And the air trembled.

Qi gathered around him like a sphere of contained pressure.

And in a heartbeat…

he released it.

Not like a strike.

But like an invisible veil that covered the entire corridor, stripping away the surface of reality.

A rift opened. Silent. Deep. As if the world inhaled inward.

—I'll take him with me —Sebastián said—. If he lies, he'll bleed out. If he keeps silent, he'll burn. But if he speaks…

—…perhaps he'll tell us why this world is rotting from within —Narka concluded, his voice never rising.

Virka turned toward him, her eyes ablaze, her lips curved in that smile she only showed when she craved more than blood.

—Make him scream, my love —she whispered—. Make him sing truths even if his tongue shatters. But don't die in his lies.

—I won't die —Sebastián said.

And he took the first step into the abyss.

Into the place where secrets are torn like skin.

Where truth is not asked.

It is broken.

The rift closed.

The world, once more, was left on the other side.

The shopping mall became its dead reflection:

no lights,

no people,

no advertisements.

Only shadows pulsing in the display windows,

and the air held still as if time itself refused to move forward.

The man blinked.

Twice.

Then brought his hand to his chest, confused.

His body trembled.

Not from cold.

From something deeper.

Instinct.

—Where…?

The word died between his lips.

Sebastián stood before him.

His silhouette wrapped in a restrained darkness,

as if he carried the mourning of all the monsters yet unborn.

Without warning, he seized him by the neck.

His fingers closed with surgical precision.

He did not strangle.

He held.

As if his hand were an iron clamp

and the man's neck nothing but a hollow branch.

The Profaned's feet lifted from the floor.

He hung.

He howled.

And then… Sebastián spoke.

—What are you?

The voice was not human.

It was not brutal.

It was not furious.

It was worse.

Indifferent.

The man kicked. Tried to scream. A string of spit hung from his mouth.

—What. Are you?

The words were heavier than bones.

—I… I'm not…! I'm not like the others! Don't kill me!

—Tell me why you wanted to eat us. All three.

The man's eyes gleamed. A flash of fever. Of hunger.

—Because you… shine. Vitality… power… your soul! Your aura is juicy! It's like sweet fire!

Sebastián tightened his grip just a little more. A cartilage cracked.

—"You"? Who are "you"?

The man gasped. Spat blood.

And then, through broken teeth, he spoke.

—The… Profaned.

The name fell like an ancient seal,

like a memory no one wanted written.

—We are mixture… we were not born. We were… fused.

Sebastián did not let go.

But his gaze shifted. A nuance. A calculation.

—Fused?

The man trembled. His flesh seemed to want to flee from his bones.

—A fetus… human…

a dying magical beast,

a spirit rotted… by rage, by fear… by filthy desire.

The three… are bound.

The spirit enters the beast.

The beast devours the fetus.

And together… we are born.

We are the mistake of the three worlds.

A voice without origin.

A flesh without heaven.

A soul without root.

—Is that why you hunt? —Sebastián asked—. To feed yourselves?

—Yes… yes… because if not, the body eats itself! We need living flesh, hot soul… it doesn't matter if it's child, woman, man… if it lives, it can be chewed!

Narka, from Sebastián's shoulder, said nothing.

He only closed his eyes, as if he already knew the ending.

Sebastián lowered his voice.

—And this reality?

—Eh?

—Where are we? What do you call it?

The man laughed.

A broken sound, more spat than spoken.

—It's the Veil… that's what some call it. It isn't another world. It's the same one… without you.

—Without us?

—Without the living. Here, we shine. Here, our true forms can awaken…

Sebastián narrowed his eyes.

—True forms?

—Yes… the profane form. The mixture. The truth. Here… we can let it out without the world screaming.

—And how many more are there like you?

Silence.

The man looked at him, and for the first time, smiled.

A broken smile.

—That I will not say.

Sebastián sighed.

No fury. No mercy.

—I tried.

And with a sharp twist,

he drove his hand into the chest.

His fingers cut through bone, muscle, ribs.

A brutal pull.

And the heart came out, beating in his fist.

The body convulsed. Spasms.

Then…

nothing.

The heart burned. As if the soul itself refused to die without dragging something with it.

Sebastián looked at it for a second.

Then crushed it.

Blood splattered like cursed ink.

The profaned corpse lay twisted among the shadows of that city without people.

The blood—if such a name could be given to that thick, black substance—still bubbled beneath the broken body. It did not smell human. It did not smell beast. It was as if corruption itself had learned to beat.

Sebastián lingered a moment longer over the body. Not from doubt, nor from respect. But to acknowledge what he had heard.

The Profaned.

Virka, at his side, no longer showed even a trace of interest in the corpse. Her red eyes, pupil-less, were fixed on him. But not because of death. Because of what she had felt when her companion crushed the creature's heart: hunger, fury, strength that was not hers.

—They weren't just words —Virka said, crossing her arms, her feline silhouette tense as if awaiting another strike—. He wanted to eat us.

Narka floated a few meters away, perched upon a railing that did not exist in the real world. His reduced form shimmered with the stillness of a sleeping lake. His golden eyes, like suns contained, watched the trail of death with an ancient sadness.

—Because you… —he said, his voice like wind upon wet stone— you smell of origin. Of living energy. The Profaned devour anything that emits force. Especially what they cannot reach with their own deformities.

Sebastián did not respond at once. The word that creature had spoken still hammered in his skull.

He looked around.

The world was the same… and yet not.

Same floor.

Same ceiling.

Same empty buildings.

But no people.

No warmth.

No sound.

A replica… stripped of humanity.

—He said this… —he began, his voice low and heavy— is called the Veil.

Virka repeated it in a whisper, as one spits something bitter.

—Veil?

—That's what he named it —Sebastián said—. And it makes sense. It is a veil between what is real and what lives beneath. Between the world we see… and the one that sees us.

For the first time in years, Narka lowered his gaze and seemed small.

—That name… existed before human words —he said—. And yet, I had never heard it spoken with certainty until now.

—Then —Sebastián added— if this place is real, but parallel… it will be useful.

Virka turned her face toward him. Hard, but expectant.

—Do you want to stay here?

—No —he denied sharply—. Only use it. Like everything else.

Narka descended, until he was level with the ground.

—The Profaned are the first echo of what is coming. A species that belongs neither to flesh, nor to soul, nor to mana. They have no cycle. No return. Only desire. Only hunger.

—And that makes them weak —Sebastián declared—. If they desire, they can be manipulated. If they feel, they can be destroyed.

—Are we going to hunt them? —Virka asked.

He lifted his gaze. Looked at the dead sky of the Veil. A vault without stars. A ceiling of ash.

—I don't care about them. Not as long as they don't cross my path.

—But they will cross it —Narka interjected.

—Then I'll tear them apart.

He did not say it with rage.

He said it with certainty.

Like someone who already knows his place in this world… and is unwilling to yield it.

The Profaned's body burned slowly behind them.

And as they walked, unhurried, toward the rift that would take them back to the normal world, the Veil seemed to keep silent…

…as if it too recognized that it had awakened something that could never be put back to sleep.

Sebastián remained still, still among the smoldering remains of the corpse.

The silence of the Veil was dense as old smoke, like the eternal pause of a city without heartbeats. Nothing moved. Nothing breathed. Only the memory of the muffled scream, the heart torn out, the name revealed.

Profaned.

The Veil.

Echoes that no longer weighed on his mind.

—This is not my war —he said at last, as Qi slowly gathered in his abdomen—. Not unless they decide to make it mine.

Virka watched him from the side. The ashen lights of the alternate plane played against her silhouette. Her jet-black hair shifted with a breeze that did not exist. There was blood on her claws, though she had not fought. There was desire to continue… but her desire was not for the hunt. It was for closeness.

—You're right —she murmured, her eyes glowing like embers burning in cold water—. This place is hungry. But not for us. Not yet.

Narka, in his reduced form, perched on Sebastián's left shoulder, as if the journey had been nothing more than an uncomfortable breeze.

—What was essential was heard. The useless… can rot —he said.

Sebastián closed his eyes.

Slowly, he began to release the Qi that kept him anchored to the alternate plane. He did not expel it. He did not cut it. He simply let it unravel, like someone releasing a prolonged exhalation.

Reality trembled around him.

The colors of the Veil faded first at the edges: the empty walls, the soulless corridors, the sky of ash. Then, the floor vibrated like a damp membrane, and everything began to fold back, as if the world were being returned to its shell.

The real city came back.

People.

Noise.

Lights.

Artificial voices repeating advertisements.

The mall bustled around them as if nothing had happened, as if they had not just tortured and killed a monster in twin corridors of another world.

Virka returned to his side without asking for words.

She settled close, her arm brushing against his, her wild, constant warmth breathing with him.

Narka remained firm on his shoulder, as if he had never moved.

Sebastián looked around. The people were only scenery. The noise, a shadow. For him, only two things existed:

The present.

And them.

—Let's go —he said.

And they began to walk.

As if they were not three creatures who had crossed a cursed threshold.

As if they were only a man, a woman, and a formless being.

Back to the world.

Playing at belonging.

The air inside the mall was heavier now.

As if the blood of things vibrated differently.

Sebastián's, Virka's, and Narka's steps were slow, but certain. They did not walk, they hunted. They did not search… they inhabited.

The crowd no longer stared at them insistently.

Eyes learned to turn away when intuition burned at the nape.

But the world… still spoke to them.

A song floated through the corridors.

A strange melody. Melancholic.

As if someone had trapped a sigh in a glass box and strung it with silver strings to weep.

Virka stopped first.

Her face turned, feline.

Her dark hair brushed her back while her reddish eyes fixed on a wide shop, without flashy signs.

Black screens glowed with symbols drifting like echoes of a forgotten tongue.

—What is that…? —she murmured, her deep voice not asking for an answer, but affirming her awe.

—Technology —Sebastián replied—. In service of sound.

She moved forward, without hesitation.

Entered like a wolf discovering a new forest.

The music lingered: sad, beautiful, human.

Sebastián followed. Narka, perched on his shoulder, opened his golden eyes.

Inside, the world was colder.

Screens floated like mute spirits.

Wireless headphones, mirrors that spoke, devices offering control without touch.

Virka brushed one of the panels, and the song shifted to something slower, more hollow.

It sounded like the voice of a child who had fallen asleep under the rain.

—I don't understand how this is born from humans… —she said—. It's… too… true.

—Because sometimes —Narka intervened— humans don't create with intention, but with wounds. And those… never lie.

In that moment, someone coughed.

A presence revealed itself from the side aisles of the store.

A thin man, dressed in a sober suit. Young. With a long face, a tense neck, and hands that did not know where to rest.

His shoes were expensive. But his soul had no price. Only fear.

—Excuse me… —he began, with a voice that tried to sound firm, but died on the second attempt—. I work for Lady Helena Caelis. I was sent to find you… we couldn't locate you at the construction site… and…

Virka looked at him.

Silence fell like a blade.

Her body did not move, but her essence projected like knives.

The edges of her figure seemed to vibrate, as if her skin hesitated between staying human or unfurling into claws.

The man swallowed hard.

—W-What… do you want? —she asked. Each word like an invisible claw.

—J-Just to deliver a message… —he gasped—. Miss Selena wishes to speak with Mister Sebastián… urgently.

The word Selena crawled to Virka like a provocation.

She stepped forward.

The floor creaked.

—She wants…? —she said, with a smile without teeth, but with invisible fangs.

The young man took another step back. His legs trembled.

Sebastián raised a hand. Only one.

And it was enough.

Virka stopped.

Not out of submission.

But because he asked it of her.

And in her world, that was enough.

—Don't kill him yet —Sebastián said, his voice never rising.

The man nearly collapsed.

—I-I'm just following orders… I didn't mean to offend…

—Speak —Sebastián ordered, his eyes deeper than the night.

—Only… that Selena wishes to meet with you… something about the second phase of cleansing… details… and perhaps about the… clothing. That's all I was given.

Virka snorted.

—Then let her speak to you whenever she wishes. —She turned to Sebastián—. But don't let her test you.

—I belong to no one, Virka.

—I know.

—Neither do you.

—I know.

Narka sighed.

—The chains of love… are older than those of fear.

Sebastián looked at the young man.

—Tell them we will go. When we decide. Not before.

—Y-Yes, of course… forgive the interruption…

And the man fled.

He did not walk.

He fled.

Silence returned to the store.

The song had shifted again.

Now it was only a piano, dripping notes like tears.

Virka listened for a few seconds.

—I don't like that she seeks you —she said—. Nor that she thinks she can speak to you that way. Though I know you will decide everything.

Sebastián did not answer.

But his hand brushed hers, just slightly.

And in that touch, the promise that no Selena, nor Helena, nor world… could break what they already were.

The young messenger had run like a broken animal.

And with his escape, the mall recovered its forced normality.

But normality was only for the others.

Sebastián turned slowly, unhurried.

His gaze swept across the corridor.

The technology store was left behind, an echo that no longer mattered.

The music, as always, continued without asking permission.

—Do we return? —Narka asked, his liquid voice from Sebastián's shoulder—. Will we answer the call?

—No —Sebastián replied.

Only that word.

But it carried the full weight of one who has not forgotten how to choose.

The world demanded urgency, obedience, answers.

He chose something else.

—There are still paths we have not walked —he added—. And no law holds more worth than our will.

Virka smiled, barely moving her lips.

—Good. I didn't want it to end so soon —she whispered—. Everything here is strange… but also beautiful, in its own way.

They walked.

Their steps were not those of tourists nor of customers.

They were the steps of masters of the moment.

Of those who neither ask permission, nor give explanations.

The mall opened like a golden labyrinth.

Warm lights, displays showing borrowed lives, scents shifting at every corner.

They passed a store of family holograms.

False parents embraced digital children with preprogrammed laughter.

Virka glanced at it from the corner of her eye. She said nothing.

They continued.

An indoor fountain sang with dancing lights.

Sebastián paused a moment and watched his reflection, distorted by the water.

—Sometimes I wonder if any of this… matters —he murmured.

—It matters because you live it —Narka said—. Weight does not always come from meaning. Sometimes it comes from the act.

The next store sold books.

Real ones. With pages. With dust. With soul.

Virka entered.

Her fingers traced the spines as if caressing the skin of a sleeping serpent.

She took one.

Flipped through it.

She did not know how to read all the symbols. But the scent was enough. The weight. The sound of the turning pages.

—I like this one.

Sebastián did not ask why. He simply took it and paid for it. With that, it went with them.

They left. No one dared to stop them.

And they continued.

A pastry shop.

A weapons store disguised as tools.

A corner where memories were tattooed.

Another where programmed gazes were sold: new eyes, with built-in filters.

The world was a beautiful aberration.

And they… walked through it like ghosts with flesh.

—What will you do when all this becomes common to you? —Narka asked—. When the wonder fades.

—I don't know —Sebastián replied.

—I do —Virka intervened—. We'll burn it all. And we'll start again. As it must be.

The promise did not sound violent.

It sounded inevitable.

They went on.

The bodies that crossed paths with them learned not to look.

Children fell silent.

Advertisements lowered their volume.

Everything adapted.

Everything obeyed.

And they answered to nothing.

Because their only law was their desire.

Because their only path was the one they walked now, together.

And the mall, without knowing it, had been witness to something it could not understand:

The brutal freedom of three beings who needed no permission to exist.

The mall had nothing more to offer them.

What was new became repetition.

What was bright, noise.

What was human, a worn-out disguise.

Sebastián stopped in the middle of the widest corridor.

Virka, at his side, looked at him without the need for words.

He turned his face.

His eyes were bottomless cracks.

And she, without hesitation, raised her arms toward him.

—So quickly you tire of the game? —she whispered, mocking.

—I don't tire —he answered—. I just no longer find reason.

And without another word, he lifted her into his arms.

Not as one carries a flower.

But as one carries a crown.

As one raises a wild queen.

Her legs hung, one on each side of his body.

Her torso rested against his chest.

Her jet-black hair danced in the artificial air, and the small black bag hung between her fingers.

—Again like this? —Narka asked from his shoulder.

—The most efficient way to travel… —Sebastián replied—. And the only way I accept to carry what is mine.

Virka laughed, low.

And her laughter was like the echo of an ancient jungle.

A heartbeat of a satisfied beast.

Then, without warning, Sebastián bent his legs.

And the ground thundered as he left it behind.

The city became a dissolving line.

His body moved with brutal precision.

It was not a sprint, it was a controlled stampede.

A roar of muscles, of nerves, of purpose.

Buildings passed like formless shadows.

Lights warped in the wake of his figure.

With each impulse, the air cut like glass.

With each stride, the world fell behind.

His speed was sustained, relentless, lethal.

400, 420, 445 km/h…

And he never faltered.

Virka did not complain.

She needed no words to cling tightly, nor to smile with her fangs barely showing.

Narka, steady on his shoulder, simply watched.

They crossed bridges.

They leapt across avenues.

They vaulted walls in a single breath.

From above, the city looked like a cemetery of lights.

And they, a fugitive star.

The entrance to the construction site appeared like an open wound in the asphalt.

Sebastián did not brake abruptly.

He merely twisted his body, skidding over the dirt, slicing the air like a merciless blade.

When he stopped, not a drop of sweat marked his brow.

Only the echo of his low breathing.

Only the creak of his body settling back into rest.

—We've returned —he said.

And he set Virka down with a gentleness he had no right to possess.

He placed her on the earth with the same reverence one gives when laying a sword upon an altar.

She looked at him, intense, desiring more… but respecting the moment.

Narka descended in silence, floating, and slipped into the lake that already seemed to await him.

And the world, once more, adjusted to them.

As if the entire universe already knew…

that the monsters had arrived.

Sebastián did not brake abruptly.

He only twisted his body, skidding across the dirt.

The air split at his passing.

And when he stopped, there was no strain, no display.

Only his low breathing.

Only the creak of his body returning to repose.

—We've returned —he said.

He lowered Virka with a gentleness that defied reason.

He placed her on the ground as if danger still lingered on his back.

She descended without speaking, without breaking her attention from him.

Narka touched the water without raising a sound.

The night had already adapted to them. As if it had been waiting for their return.

They walked toward the interior of the construction site.

Raw concrete, exposed beams, and hanging portable lights cast thin shadows.

The place was not yet a home, but it already felt like part of their routine.

Selena stood beside an unfinished column.

She held a tablet in her hand. She did not greet. She did not wait for anything.

Sebastián approached.

Virka followed half a step behind, her eyes not on the surroundings, but fixed only on her.

—The next zone is active —Selena said—. It didn't wait as long as we thought.

She projected a map into the air.

It showed a rusted factory, large, fenced by dead rails.

—They call it The Cradle.

An underground arena. Slave trafficking, doping, forced training.

Some with cores. Others just bodies to be broken.

Sebastián did not ask. He only listened.

—Until three weeks ago, we had records.

After that, everything went dark.

Those who tried to enter never came back. Not trackers, not drones.

What's inside has changed. It no longer responds to our systems.

—Access points? —Sebastián asked.

—Eastern underground.

Two side entrances under guard. But they no longer seem human.

We don't know if they're alive. Only that they remain there, unmoving.

Virka did not look at the map. Only at Selena.

—Since when did you have this prepared?

—Since before I met you.

—And you bring it now because you want him to enter.

Selena held her gaze, her tone unchanged.

—He already accepted to cleanse this city. I only mark the next point.

Virka did not reply.

But the tension in her back became solid.

Sebastián spoke without changing his pace.

—Pass me the full information.

Selena nodded. She transferred the packet without another word.

—Inform me when you move —she added.

—I will —said Sebastián.

She turned and left without a farewell.

It was unnecessary.

Virka watched her until she vanished behind a pillar.

She did not speak.

She only confirmed she was no longer near.

Sebastián looked at the map once more.

No time was marked.

But the decision was already made.

The map still glowed on the screen.

The Cradle was large, rusted, with side entrances and an active underground.

The data was incomplete. The last transmissions arrived distorted, as if something had warped the signal from within.

Sebastián asked no questions. He only studied.

The eastern entry had the lowest heat signature.

The two side accesses showed presences, but with no clear pattern. They did not patrol. They did not move. They simply were.

He shut off the tablet's light.

The data was already integrated into his core.

He stood. Checked his gear.

No adornments. Nothing extra. Only what was needed.

The air inside the construction site was dense, smelling of iron and dust.

The lights hung low, flickering.

Virka sat nearby, silent. She asked nothing.

Narka, submerged up to his neck, watched from the water without a word.

No one offered to accompany him.

No one stopped him.

Sebastián walked toward the northern edge of the site.

Each step measured. Precise.

Not from caution.

From nature.

At the exit, he adjusted his gloves.

The night outside was still. Windless.

He had not yet reached The Cradle, but his shadow already stretched in its direction.

He did not announce his departure.

There was no need.

And without looking back, he left.

The night did not receive him.

It recognized him.

Sebastián moved among deserted structures, hood low, back straight.

He did not run. He did not conceal his step.

He advanced like one who does not need the world's permission to enter its marrow.

The journey to The Cradle took a little over an hour.

There were no interruptions.

Only the dry crack of branches yielding beneath his weight,

and the echo of the world breathing in tension.

In the distance, the structure rose like a dead organ, still pumping out errors.

Abandoned factory, they had called it.

But what stood before him had not been abandoned.

It had been deformed.

Rusty rails surrounded it, like the ribs of a sleeping beast.

The walls were covered in a mix of rust and what seemed to be dried blood,

but it carried no smell.

As if it had been cleaned… but not by humans.

The main gate was sealed with plates welded from the inside.

The sides, sealed with a mixture of metal and hardened flesh.

There were no lights.

But the darkness was not natural.

It was not absence of electricity.

It was a dense, directed darkness, one that seemed to watch from every formless corner.

Sebastián did not stop.

He circled the perimeter in silence.

Every step marked an internal record: distance, entry points, temperature, air pressure.

Nothing alive.

Nothing dead.

He reached the eastern point.

The underground.

A mound of earth partially covered the entrance, as if the building itself were trying to bury itself.

There were traces of metal forced aside.

The mark of an attempt.

Not of escape.

Of entry.

Sebastián descended the slope with his body relaxed, yet his muscles alert.

He did not strike the ground with clumsy weight.

No step announced his presence.

Only a faint brush.

The trace of something trained not to be seen, even by what has no eyes.

He reached the entrance.

A half-closed hatch, warped at the center.

The metal looked as though it had melted… from within.

He touched it.

Cold.

But not dead.

The air there was dense.

Not with dust, not with confinement.

With presence.

Sebastián stood still.

He did not hear footsteps.

He did not sense bodies.

But something inside did not move because it had no need to.

It was like a cage where the jailer slept with eyes wide open.

He did not speak.

He did not light a lamp.

He did not force his way in.

He only waited.

Because places like The Cradle

do not open by force.

They open… when one deserves to enter.

And Sebastián,

for all that he was,

for all that he had broken,

already carried the key.

The hatch yielded with a wet sound, as if flesh itself were opening.

The metal did not groan.

It tore.

Sebastián crossed without a sound.

The air on the other side was thicker.

Not from confinement, but from the invisible weight pressed into every wall.

A weight that was not physical.

It was the residue of everything broken and sold there.

The corridor was coated in a mix of tar and blood.

Not fresh.

But not dry.

The floor was uneven.

Crusts of what once were bodies still marked the ground.

Black stains, fragments of nails embedded in cracks, strands of hair stuck to the concrete like crushed insects.

The walls were not smooth.

They were carved with markings.

A language of numbers and screams.

Inventory codes, tallies written in blood, symbols of some system that classified bodies as if they were spare parts.

An open cage on the left revealed the inside of a formless cell.

Damp mattresses, loose straps, a broken bottle inside a plastic bucket.

In the corner, a drawing made with dried blood.

It was a face.

Without eyes.

Without a mouth.

Farther ahead, the corridor opened into a main chamber.

Large. Circular.

Covered in flickering lights, many already burned out.

The ceiling was stained with something that did not drip down, as if it bled inward.

Bodies.

Four.

Five.

Naked.

Disfigured.

They did not fight.

They did not breathe.

But neither were they entirely dead.

One had its jaw torn off, its chest opened in a cross.

Inside its torso still flickered a half-melted core, as if it had been cooked in its own energy.

Another had its skull wrapped in plastic bandages that seemed to have been welded directly to the flesh.

Sebastián crouched.

Touched the floor.

Warm.

The blood had not fully coagulated.

He rose without a word.

The smell was hard to define.

It was not just putrefaction.

It was something else:

a mixture of chemicals, sweat, reproductive fluids, and something more…

something unnatural.

As if someone had tried to imitate the scent of humans without understanding them.

To his right, a storeroom without a door.

Open metal crates, tubes of injectable drugs lined up like weapons.

Some were labeled:

"Stimulant 7-A"

"Inhibitor M-11"

"Selective Disconnection"

There were lists.

Names.

Dates.

Notes handwritten:

"Highly reactive.

Break in the fourth round.

Use against defective meta-humans."

Sebastián did not react.

He simply walked on.

Each room was worse.

A narrow corridor with hooks still hanging.

A circular space with shattered cameras and a broken two-way mirror.

Chairs stained with urine.

Cables embedded in walls.

Human mannequins propped up by plastic spines.

None were whole.

All had been broken until they became part of the furniture.

Farther down, a zone without lights.

Only sensors.

The temperature dropped suddenly.

Here there was no training.

Here there was discarding.

Black sacks with metallic markings.

Some split open.

Inside, bodies without bones.

Only gelatinous flesh, compressed.

Cores cracked open, beaten apart.

And at the far end…

A mirror.

Large. Immobile.

It did not reflect.

It absorbed.

Its frame was covered in symbols Sebastián did not recognize.

They were not runes.

They were not aura codes.

But they hurt to look at.

He did not approach.

Not yet.

Until that moment, sound had been scarce.

But now, from some invisible corner, a voice began to seep through.

It did not articulate.

It was only… a lament.

Constant.

Repetitive.

Like a machine that once recorded someone screaming, and now replayed it without understanding what it meant.

Sebastián did not stop.

He breathed normally.

His senses open.

Every space analyzed.

Every door measured.

The Cradle had not received him.

It had swallowed him.

And still it had not shown its teeth.

The mirror offered no reflection.

It was like staring at a surface that had forgotten light.

Sebastián raised his arm.

He did not hesitate.

And with a single strike of his fist, he shattered it.

There was no explosion.

Only a dull crack, as though he had broken bone, not glass.

The surface fractured from the center, and behind it… something opened.

A narrow vertical gap, hidden behind the frame.

A staircase descended.

It was not a recent construction.

It was ancient.

Built with blackened stone blocks, as if the factory had been raised atop an older ruin.

Sebastián began to descend.

The air changed immediately.

It no longer smelled of chemicals.

It smelled of coagulated blood, of skin confined too long, of organs fermenting.

Each step grew denser.

The walls narrowed.

And soon, the ground was no longer clean.

He went down four flights.

The next was stained with blood.

The one after, with bones.

Small ones, like hands.

Farther down, he began to see burst drug wrappings.

Syringes.

Shattered vials.

A black substance clung to the ceiling, dripping at irregular intervals.

The atmosphere was not just putrid.

It was agonized.

As if the walls remembered what had happened there and repeated it endlessly in their essence.

Deeper still, crossing a low threshold, he heard a sound.

Rhythmic.

Wet.

Like flesh striking flesh.

At first it was faint.

But with every step, it grew louder.

And with it, the stench worsened.

An impossible mixture:

semen, blood, intestine, chemicals meant to preserve dead flesh.

The corridor trembled faintly, as if that repetition carried a pulse of its own.

The air was so heavy it seemed tangible.

At the end, a rusted metal door.

No lock.

No symbol.

Only a horizontal bar across it, wrapped in what looked like dried human skin.

Sebastián pushed it aside effortlessly.

The door opened with a slow, slopping sound.

The scene did not hide.

Inside, the chamber was wide, filthy, damp.

At its center, a man.

Naked.

Tall, more than two meters.

His body was that of a monster wrought from muscle: broad back, swollen veins, skin cracked by steroids—or something worse.

He bore no face.

Where his eyes should have been, there was only inflamed flesh.

His movements were constant.

He was on top of a headless female body.

Penetrating it without pause.

The dead flesh shuddered only from the impact.

The body did not respond.

But he continued.

He did not look.

He did not moan.

He did not speak.

He only moved.

As if his existence were reduced to that repeated act.

As if he did not know he was alive.

Around him… more bodies.

Female.

Mutilated.

Some with swollen, opened wombs.

Others with severed legs.

One hung from the ceiling by its arms, hollowed completely from within.

There was liquid on the floor.

Not water.

A mixture of semen and coagulated blood coated the tiles in a viscous layer.

The stench was unbearable.

Sebastián did not flinch.

He only let his gaze sweep across the scene.

The number of corpses could not be counted.

Some lay in advanced decay.

Others still fresh.

Some bore the marks of pregnancy entwined with mutilation.

At the far end, a pile of black bags, torn open.

He had seen them before.

The discards.

But these held nothing.

They were empty.

And yet, they still bled.

The man did not stop.

He was like a cog trapped in its single function.

An organic machine, broken since its birth.

Sebastián said nothing.

He did not raise his energy.

He did not move—yet.

But something in the atmosphere recognized his presence.

The rhythm of the sound began to falter.

The body ceased its exact repetitions.

The creature lifted its head.

It had no eyes.

But it saw him.

And for the first time, something without a soul…

seemed to scent one.

The movement stopped.

As if the world had exhaled for the first time in hours.

The being froze inside the headless corpse.

Not out of shame.

Not out of awareness.

Simply because something else had entered its space.

Something different.

Something that, for the first time… was not prey.

Sebastián did not move.

The air was charged with that silence before detonation.

Even the dripping dared not continue.

The atmosphere thickened, curving between them.

The creature raised its head.

Where its eyes should have been, there was cracked skin, inflamed flesh from within.

But its body recognized.

Not through sight.

Through something more primitive.

The vibration of the other being.

The density of his blood.

Sebastián held it in that stillness.

And spoke.

—Are you profaned?

His voice was low.

But it cut the distance like a weapon cast without tremor.

The being breathed.

Not like a human.

Not like an animal.

But like something that remembered what inhaling once was, without knowing why.

Its answer was immediate.

A rough whisper.

Deep.

Like the scrape of a rotted throat.

—Yes.

Silence.

Then, the question:

—How do you know of us?

A pause.

There was no aggression.

Only the certainty that what stood before it… should not know anything.

All who knew were dead.

Sebastián merely tilted his head.

There was no expression on his face.

No rage.

No hatred.

Only reply.

—One of you bled too much.

Today.

The creature did not react with surprise.

Nor with fear.

It only set the headless body aside.

And rose to its full height.

It stood nearly two and a half meters tall.

Its muscles were not from training.

They were mutation.

Its skin tightened at inhuman points,

as if the body had not been designed for it, yet it had stolen it anyway.

It answered with a single word.

—Understand.

Both were already on their feet.

Unmoving.

Without raising energy.

Without warnings.

But the air began to tremble.

The remains on the floor cracked.

The walls contracted faintly.

The corpses did not stir,

but the liquid covering them began to vibrate.

As though the tension between these two presences altered even what was already dead.

And without another word,

without a scream,

without any signal…

Both struck their fists together.

The sound was dry.

Dull.

There was no flash.

No shockwave.

Only flesh against flesh.

Force against force.

Two equal weights colliding with the precision of a sentence.

The old blood on the floor rose.

The darkness trembled.

And for the first time, The Cradle understood…

that one of its spawn was not the only monster inside.

The impact of their fists still vibrated in the air.

But Sebastián did not wait.

From his initial stance, with his right arm still extended from the clash, he twisted his hips slightly to the left.

His shoulder drove forward half a span.

And without channeling external energy, he used the raw strength of his body to launch the next strike.

His left fist shot toward the Profaned's liver.

It was not a wide blow.

It was sharp, precise—like a lance of hardened flesh aimed to break from within.

The Profaned did not dodge.

Did not step back.

He simply twisted his torso just enough.

And with a short motion, placed his right forearm between his side and the strike.

The impact was brutal.

Sebastián's fist sank against the rival's bone.

A crack rang out.

Not of bone breaking—

but of muscle vibrating against muscle hardened to its extreme.

The Profaned's arm resisted the blow, but its flesh trembled.

The skin split under the strain.

A thin line of black blood slid down his elbow.

Without breaking posture, Sebastián withdrew his arm.

Already retreating half a step with his right foot, opening his line of attack.

The Profaned seized that instant.

He twisted his hip forward and launched a descending punch with his left.

It was no technique.

It was weight and raw fury packed into a single path.

Sebastián did not block.

He dropped low.

Bending both legs, he lowered himself until nearly brushing the ground.

The Profaned's fist cut through the space where his head had been a second earlier.

The wind it dragged scraped the concrete floor.

The hiss rang out.

But it did not cut.

From that low stance, Sebastián pivoted on his left foot and countered.

His right leg swung in a clean arc toward the back of the enemy's knee.

The strike connected.

The Profaned staggered.

He did not fall.

But the leg gave for an instant, as though the tendon had been forced to bend without permission.

The abomination's body shuddered.

A line of thick saliva slid from its mouth.

Then it responded.

It leapt back with both feet, gaining distance.

Not to flee.

To calculate.

Sebastián did not pursue.

He breathed calmly.

Hands open.

Torso barely stained by blood that was not his own.

The Profaned lowered its head.

The muscles of its back contracted.

A soft, wet sound followed.

And something… began to split open along its spine.

As if the fight had only just begun.

The silence did not last.

From the center of its back, the Profaned began to tear open.

Not by cracks.

Not by rupture.

It opened as if something beneath the skin were shredding its way out.

As if the borrowed body was not enough.

As if it needed to be born again… without limits.

The muscles tightened at impossible angles.

The flesh throbbed.

Its ribs cracked outward, separating one by one.

Each vertebra lengthened.

Proportions reshaped themselves.

Its arms stretched, claws sharpening not by growth, but by mutation of the structure itself.

Its face began to split—

from a snout that had never existed… until one appeared.

Where once had stood a deformed humanoid, now emerged a creature two and a half meters tall, perhaps more.

Its chest was that of a tiger: broad, ridged, striped with warped patterns that slithered across the skin as if alive.

The fangs did not jut outward from its mouth.

They were born deep within the jaw and tore their way through, dripping strands of black saliva that hissed and sparked when they struck the ground.

The legs were not feline.

They were thin, angular.

Deer legs, but reinforced with bony plates.

The hooves, cracked and sharpened, sank into the concrete like blades.

And from the feline skull…

two antlers rose upward and back.

Elk antlers, twisted, like dry branches sprayed with old blood.

At the base of the antlers, something moved.

Small, formless eyes, embedded like parasites, gleamed with a dim light.

The air in the chamber thickened.

Not from pressure.

From presence.

Sebastián did not step back.

But he knew.

What stood before him was no longer the body from before.

It was a complete entity.

A Profaned in its first true state.

And its level…

was clear.

Thirty seconds earlier, the weight of its power had been contained.

Now, he felt it against his skin.

The Profaned was level 13.

Sebastián, even with his body strung to its limit, barely grazed the sharpest edge of level 12.

The margin was small.

But it existed.

The Profaned dragged a step forward.

The old blood on the floor quivered.

The air splintered.

And then it happened.

The surroundings cracked.

A vertical line of distortion split open in the center of the chamber.

It did not shine.

It made no sound.

It simply split reality like fractured glass.

Through that fissure, the darkness of the Veil seeped in.

The walls were no longer walls.

They were membranes.

Gravity lost all direction.

Everything felt bent.

The body of the Profaned did not vanish.

It was absorbed by that membrane without disappearing.

But it no longer belonged to the physical space.

Sebastián felt the change.

Not with his eyes.

With his core.

Reality was different.

He had been dragged into the Veil.

Not by choice.

Not by magic.

But because that—that creature—could no longer exist in the human world without destroying it completely.

At the center of the Veil, that thing breathed.

Not with lungs.

With power.

Its body no longer dripped blood, but fragments of something else:

distorted memories, dead ideas, traces of rotted souls.

Sebastián said nothing.

He only adjusted his stance.

The true fight was about to begin.

And The Cradle was no longer in the world.

Reality bent.

And then it vanished.

There, where a cursed factory should have lain rotting among ruins, nothing remained but a trembling line on the horizon, barely perceptible to those who still dared to call what surrounded them "the world."

The Veil had been triggered.

And it was not gentle.

Nor silent.

Nearly five hundred kilometers away, on the rusted ledge of an ancient watchtower, two figures observed.

There was no sound.

No wind.

Only the subtle shiver of the fabric of their dark cloaks, stirred by something deeper than air.

The first figure was male.

Burly, but without excess.

Every muscle in his body existed from necessity, not vanity.

His torso was covered by a black cloth, reinforced, flexible, and muted, without insignia.

A deep hood hid his face, and beneath it, a featureless mask returned to the world a silence impossible to break.

At his hip, bound with precision, hung a retracted scythe.

It was not ornamental.

Each section was sealed by ancient markings, as if it should never unfold unless balance itself shattered.

Beside him, seated cross-legged on the rusted ledge, was a young woman wrapped in the same darkness.

Smaller.

Even quieter.

She too wore a mask, but hers bore thin lines engraved along its edges.

Marks without name, without cult, without identification.

Both stared westward.

Toward where The Cradle should be.

And though their eyes could not pierce what was happening inside the Veil… their souls could feel it.

A different vibration.

A pulse like a drum of flesh.

An echo that resonated not in the ear, but in the core.

The man spoke first.

His voice was low, rough, without emotion.

—He is no longer holding back.

The young woman did not answer at once.

Her hand rested on the rusted ground, feeling the rhythm.

As if she were reading the tremor of the world through the abandoned structure.

—It took longer than expected —she said at last, her voice soft, neutral.

Both knew what she meant.

The Profaned.

That being they had been tracking for weeks.

It had left marks on bodies, temples, mountains.

But it had not fully revealed itself.

Until now.

The activation of the Veil confirmed it.

The man rose.

His boots made no sound against the metal.

It was not stealth.

It was habit.

The young woman turned her face slightly toward him.

—Shall we go?

He did not answer immediately.

His gaze returned to the horizon.

The tremor of the Veil kept growing.

But there was something else.

A second vibration.

Lower.

More contained.

It was not raw power.

It was something else…

denser.

Older.

Unknown.

The man tensed his body for an instant.

Not from fear.

From caution.

—That is not our target.

The young woman tilted her head slightly.

—But is it one of them?

Silence.

The man lowered his gaze for a moment.

A black drop had seeped from his scythe.

It evaporated upon touching the air.

—I don't know.

Both fell quiet.

The Veil shook again.

And for an instant, like an inverted flash, the form of something colossal crossed the spiritual sky…

but they did not allow it to unsettle them.

The man walked toward the edge.

—We will watch.

—And if he survives? —she asked.

He did not turn.

—Then the board changes.

And he leapt.

The young woman followed a second later.

Not as a shadow.

Not as a servant.

As one who had already seen too much…

and understood that on that day, something else had awakened.

_____________________________________________________

END OF CHAPTER 23.