The air in this city, Aethelburg, is thick. Not with pollution, but with something heavier. The cloying stench of fear. It's a flavor I've come to recognize, a subtle seasoning on the tongue of a predator. I ignored it. My focus was on a far more pressing matter: locating a restaurant called "The Gilded Fork." My source claimed their steak was a transcendent experience. Trivial, yes, but one must have standards.
As I checked the address on my phone, a blur of motion slammed into me. A girl, maybe nineteen or twenty, stumbled back, landing hard on the pavement. Her clothes were torn, her face streaked with dirt and tears, and a raw, desperate terror burned in her eyes. Behind her, three men swaggered out of the alley she'd fled. They were dressed in cheap, flashy clothes, but a stylized chimera tattoo on their necks marked them as vermin. The Chimera Syndicate's "Claws."
The crowd on the sidewalk, once a bustling river of people, parted and froze. Eyes darted away. Mothers pulled their children close. No one made a move. No one made a sound. That cloying taste of fear intensified, becoming a nauseating miasma. It was pathetic.
The leader of the thugs, a brute with a jagged scar across his lip, sneered, his gaze flicking from the girl to me. "Hey, pretty boy. Out of the way. Syndicate business."
I didn't move. My eyes remained on the girl, who was now trembling uncontrollably on the ground. I lowered myself to one knee, my movements calm and deliberate. The motion was so unexpected it startled them into a brief silence.
"What did they do to you?" I asked, my voice even.
Her breath hitched. Fresh tears spilled down her cheeks. "My... my brother," she sobbed, her voice cracking. "He was a reporter. He got evidence... videos of them... their experiments. They found out. They... they made me watch as they..." She couldn't finish, her words dissolving into a gut-wrenching wail of pure grief and horror. She cried with the desperation of someone who had lost everything.
Something inside me, a cold, dormant star of contempt, began to glow. This city wasn't just afraid. It was diseased. And these things... they were the plague.
The scarred thug laughed. A greasy, ugly sound. "She's a little emotional. Now hand her over before you get hurt. We're just gonna have a little chat with her. Teach her some manners." His friends chuckled along, their eyes filled with vile intent.
I rose to my full height, turning to face them for the first time. The shift was subtle. The air didn't just feel heavy anymore; it felt solid. The ambient city noise seemed to die, replaced by a humming silence.
I let a sliver of my true nature bleed into my gaze.
Just a sliver.
It was enough. The leader's sneer froze on his face. The color drained from his cheeks. His two cronies stopped laughing, their eyes widening in sudden, instinctual terror. It was the look of a rat that has just realized the shadow looming over it belongs to a hawk. They felt it in their marrow, the primal command that screamed prey.
"You... what the hell was that?" the scarred one stammered, taking an involuntary step back. He was trying to sound tough, but his voice trembled. "You think some spooky look is gonna scare us? We're the Chimera Syndicate!"
He lifted his hand, a fist clenched, to try and reassert his dominance. A foolish, final act of defiance.
In the space between one heartbeat and the next, I was in front of him. My hand shot out, not in a punch, but with my fingers open. I clamped my hand over his face.
The reactions from the crowd were a symphony of gasps. The man under my hand tried to scream, but the sound was muffled against my palm.
"You speak of 'manners'," I said, my voice a low, chilling whisper that seemed to cut through the air. "Allow me to demonstrate."
I squeezed.
There was a wet, sickening crunch of bone and cartilage. His nose, jaw, and cheekbones collapsed inward under the pressure. Blood erupted from between my fingers, spattering my dark coat. I didn't let go. I lifted him off his feet by his ruined face, his body twitching in a grotesque dance of agony.
His two friends were paralyzed, their faces masks of pure, unadulterated horror. They had never seen anything like this. Their power was built on the fear of others. They had no reference for what to do when they were the ones who were truly, hopelessly afraid.
With a flick of my wrist, I threw the gurgling, broken leader into his companions. They tumbled to the ground in a heap of tangled limbs and terror. One of them, scrambling in panic, tried to pull a knife.
I didn't even grant him the dignity of a direct attack. I stomped on his wrist as he lay on the ground. The sound was like a bundle of dry sticks snapping, sharp and final. He shrieked, a high-pitched sound of animal pain.
The third one had wet himself, the dark stain spreading rapidly on his trousers. He was crawling backward, babbling incoherently. "Monster... demon... please..."
I walked toward him slowly, each step a hammer blow against his sanity. I crouched down, bringing my face close to his. My eyes, I knew, were no longer just black. They were voids, promising an eternity of pain.
"Go back to your masters," I commanded, my voice devoid of all emotion. "Tell them what you saw. Tell them Kael is here. And tell them their reign of fear is over. I am coming to tear their little empire down, piece by bloody piece."
I then drove my fist into the pavement an inch from his face. The concrete spiderwebbed, a small crater forming from the impact. The shockwave threw him back several feet.
I stood, turning my back on the wreckage of their arrogance. The street was dead silent. Every single person was staring, their faces a mixture of stark terror and, for the first time in what was likely a very long time, a dawning, incredulous flicker of hope.
I walked back to the crying girl, who was now looking at me with wide, tear-filled, and utterly awestruck eyes. I extended a hand to her.
"It's over," I said, my voice returning to its normal, calm tone. "They can't hurt you anymore."
This is how my journey in Aethelburg began. Not with a quest for justice, but with an act of pest control. And I was just getting started.