After finishing the cleaning, Lucian headed home, but the owner stopped him. His expression had turned solemn.
"Are you turning sixteen tomorrow?"
"Ah… yes," Lucian said with hesitation.
"Which means you might Awaken."
"…" Lucian remained silent.
"Hmm… let me tell you a story, then."
"Ah… a story. But stories are banned. Telling one is punishable by law."
"Only if there's a witness." He smiled softly.
"It's been so long since I heard a story, much less told one. But as far as I remember, it goes like this. Long ago, a boy wanted to touch the sun. That desire led him to make a deal with a black magician, who gave him a seed. The boy planted it and cared for it every day. One day the seed grew, taller and taller, lifting the boy with it toward the sun. But the tree burned, and so did the boy."
Lucian listened, confused by the poor display of storytelling. As a teenager of the modern era who had never heard a real story, he had always imagined stories to be magical experiences. But this…
The owner coughed. "It's been so long. My abilities as a storyteller have declined. But what I want to say is, don't chase the impossible. Understand?"
Lucian nodded and thanked him before leaving. He wanted to ask about the conversation with Lily's brother, but the topic felt too sensitive.
'I might become jobless soon.'
*****
Lucian walked beneath the crimson moonlight. He passed the park that had never once seen children play. He passed the hospital whose lights had been shut off for years.
Then he stopped and looked up. He sighed and whispered,
"I wish this world would end today."
As he made his way home, a distant glow flickered. Soon, gliding along the clean cobblestone road, a metallic engineering marvel rolled into view on four elegant wheels.
It was a car.
In the last decade, a new form of transport had taken root, machines that ran on four wheels. They had ushered in a new era, one where the wealthy flaunted their status with gleaming, extravagant automobiles.
Lucian didn't remember much about his life, but one thing he knew for certain, he loved cars.
"It's the latest model…"
It was a sleek hybrid of polished metal and brass, its rounded fenders and long hood gleaming under the blood-red moon. Thick, heavy wheels pressed firmly against the cobblestones, while two headlamps shimmered like a pair of watchful eyes. Even the hum of its Nether engine felt alive, a low, eager growl that tightened his chest with excitement.
The car came to a stop in front of him. Through the open roof, he saw two men in their twenties and a boy around his own age wearing expressions of bold confidence.
"Hey, what're you doing in this ghost town, kid?" one of the men in the front seat called out.
"Ghost town?" Lucian felt a prick of offense.
There might not be many people… but it was not a ghost town.
"Ah… I was just…"
"Anyway, you should get out of here," the man interrupted. "We saw some shady people up ahead. Don't go near them."
With that, the car sped off in a hurry. Lucian watched the mechanical beauty disappear around the bend before turning toward the direction they had warned him about with a smile.
"One after another. It must be my lucky day."
*****
Between the narrow alley of two red-brick buildings, a long shadow stretched under the crimson moon.
Inside that shadow, four men with knives were beating a man in his late thirties. His once elegant coat and polished trousers had been shredded into filthy scraps, no different from a beggar's rags.
After taking more punches than he could count, the man broke down in desperation.
"Pl-Please… spare me!!" he begged.
"Oh, come now. What's the point?" the thug in the back smirked. "We keep asking, and you keep refusing."
"But two-thirds of my shop's income is outrageous," the man cried.
"What? You saying the Blood Fang don't deserve that much?"
"No… I… I—"
"What are you doing here?" A sudden voice echoed from the end of the alley.
"Huh?" The four thugs turned around.
For a moment they stiffened in fear, but the tension disappeared when they saw a boy, sixteen or seventeen, standing alone.
"Hahaha… you scared me for a second," the closest thug said, stepping forward with a wide grin. The smile curled even more as he looked at the boy's harmless appearance, messy black hair, tired hollow eyes, a strange maturity that still wasn't enough to intimidate a gutter thug.
"Are you lost, kid?"
As the man approached, the innocence drained from the boy's tired eyes.
"Are you new here?" Lucian asked quietly.
"Wha—"
A sharp pain exploded in the thug's stomach. He looked down and saw the boy's fist twisted deep into his gut. He dropped to his knees, only to receive a second blow to the nose that smashed him flat onto the ground.
The other three froze, staring at the impossible scene.
Lucian glanced at the crying shopkeeper and sighed. "Go."
The man didn't hesitate. He scrambled up and ran into the darkness.
The first thug tried to regain his bearings, but by then two of his companions were already on the ground, clutching their ribs in agony.
The boy's movements were too fast, too precise. He was too skillful for them to use their size.
'Damn it… who is he?'
In his panic, the thug remembered a rumor, of a lone resistance in this ghost town.
Someone who hunted people at night.
Before he could think further, Lucian slammed the last standing thug onto the ground. Then he climbed over him and began punching relentlessly, like something inside him had just snapped.
Blood splattered, painful growls echoed through the darkness until the man no longer had the strength to cry.
The other two thugs, terrified, ran for their lives. The wounded one scrambled up and fled in the opposite direction.
But as he turned, a hand touched his shoulder.
A faint burning smell reached him, just before his body collapsed into ash.
The man's scream jolted Lucian out of his rage.
He spun around.
A creature stood before him, a shape vaguely human but made entirely of living fire. At its feet lay a half-burned corpse. The creature's molten eyes fixed on Lucian.