Mary froze.
Though she had trained as a knight and faced more than her share of danger, the weight pressing down on her now was unnatural—like a mountain had settled atop her bones. Even lifting a finger felt like an impossible task.
It wasn’t just fear.
No, this was something more… arcane. Something vast.
A force domain.
Only the most elite warriors could manifest such control over Force—those on the cusp of becoming Awoken. And though this man before her had not reached that mythic state, he had done the next best thing.
He had twisted the very rules of the world around him.
It wasn’t like the vivid, reality-warping worlds Awoken Ones created. His domain was subtler, crueler. A place where force itself didn’t flow freely—no, it all flowed toward him. Like a black hole at the center of the room, draining every ounce of power from its surroundings. Any attempt to draw upon one’s strength here would lead to swift and brutal exhaustion.
And then, with a thunderous crash, the great oak doors burst inward—flattened beneath a boot.
Axeman stepped onto the broken wood, the bone-forged edges of his twin axes brushing the splinters, leaving shallow cuts as he walked forward. His head tilted slightly, his scarred lips curling into an eerie, jagged smile.
“I heard Black Rose slaughtered every soul in your brother’s castle,” he said, voice like gravel sliding through blood. “Even his beloved beast was torn apart. Yet… your brother lived.”
His smile grew wider—almost hungry.
“What about you, golden eyes? Does the same spirit to survive kick inside that chest?”
Mary’s hand twitched toward the dagger at her belt, but before she could grasp it, fingers coiled gently but firmly around her wrist.
A breath warmed her ear.
“Do not fear, My Lady. For we are with you.”
Then came a second voice—sharp, clear, and louder. A challenge hurled across the room.
“Is it in you, assassin?”
Two figures emerged from her shadow, as if reality had simply allowed them to peel free. Both were clad in close-fitting black leathers, their faces veiled beneath hoods. Each wore a pair of blades—one longer dagger strapped at the thigh, a shorter one at the back.
Axeman’s eyes widened. His instincts screamed danger. But more alarming than that—he couldn’t sense their force at all. They stood before him, yet gave off nothing.
Not a trace.
Ghosts. No… worse.
‘I wasn’t told about them,’ Axeman cursed internally, his face darkening.
“If you are mercenaries,” he growled, raising his axes, “I’d suggest you walk away now. I am Axeman. Ranked 21st in the world.”
The figures didn’t flinch.
“We are His Lordship’s angels. His shadows. Executors of his will—his judgment, made flesh. Do not confuse us with your kind. We are no mercenaries.”
Without another word, one angel dissolved back into shadow while the other leapt.
In a blink, he closed the distance, slashing with gleaming steel. Axeman parried, the clash of axe and dagger sending shockwaves through the hall. Both figures slid back—but only for a heartbeat.
From the shadow cast by the first, the second emerged again.
Too late.
Axeman reacted, swinging wildly. The blade cut through only embers—the angel had already vanished.
And then—steel kissed flesh.
A dagger pierced through Axeman’s throat from behind, bursting out cleanly in front.
His expression froze in utter disbelief. His axes slipped from his bone arms and crashed to the floor with a heavy thud. He stumbled forward, clutching the blade lodged in his neck as blood gurgled from his mouth.
Mary and the others stared in stunned silence.
In seconds, the man who had made the air feel like death itself—was dying.
Axeman dropped to his knees, his body trembling with defiance even as the life drained from his eyes. How…? He couldn’t understand it.
Who were these phantoms?
How had they slipped through his domain?
Were they even human?
Angels? No. These were not heavenly beings.
These were death incarnate—evil angels made for slaughter.
A voice cut through his haze like hot iron through frozen flesh.
“Who sent you?”
One of the angels stood over him now, his voice deep and merciless.
Axeman grinned weakly, blood bubbling at his lips. “C… Countess… N—Nephis Ny…x.”
He spoke her name not in loyalty, but in vengeance. She had led him to this. She had known. And now, he would return the favor—by sending these monsters to her.
Mary’s heart dropped.
The name struck her like thunder.
Nephis Nyx—she had come to Duke Mormont’s ball dressed in midnight and silk, her smile all honey and daggers. Fiancée to King Reuel.
A woman of dark elegance.
A woman with bloody ambition.
Mary’s expression hardened.
So… this was how deep the rot went.
Her loathing for nobles hadn’t always been this deep, but it began the day the vultures came circling. The day her brother went missing and rumors of his death echoed through the halls like funeral bells. That was when they came—lords draped in silks, barons oozing false charm, viscounts with wine-stained smiles—all proposing marriage like she was nothing more than a title to inherit, a prize to possess.
They feigned sympathy, masking greed behind velvet words. Each one smelled of perfume and desperation.
Now, one of them—one of them—had sent an assassin to end her life.
The angel moved with quiet reverence, his gloves bloodstained from the fray. He knelt beside Axeman’s corpse, still sprawled where he’d fallen, axe frozen mid-swing. Carefully, he slipped a folded letter from the dead man’s inner pocket. His mantle rustled faintly as he rose and crossed the hall, placing the blood-specked parchment into Mary’s hand.
She stared at it for a heartbeat, then tore it open.
The scent of iron and ash hung thick in the air as her eyes moved over the script. Line by line, her grip tightened, knuckles bleaching white, the parchment crumpling in her trembling hands.
It read:
“Axeman, journey to the Dukedom of Ashbourne and send a message to the name that my people within their walls shall give you. This message must be written with the target’s name, and you shall write this—
‘This is my promise.’
Signed… Countess Nephis Nyx.”
The name struck her like a slap—cold and stinging. Nephis Nyx. A woman she had never met. A woman she had never wronged. And yet, the Countess had named her for death with a flourish and a signature.
Mary’s throat burned with unshed screams. Her breath hitched, her pulse a war drum. As she turned, the parchment fell from her hands, forgotten.
She walked out of the hall, boots echoing against the stone floor, each step heavy with fury. Her cloak billowed behind her like storm clouds, her fists clenched so tight her nails bit into her palms. The bodies she passed were not just casualties. They were her men.
Men with families waiting in distant homes.
Men who had taken oaths to protect.
Men who had stood between her and death—and paid the price.
The scent of blood lingered. The silence of the dead pressed in on her like a suffocating blanket, broken only by the slow drip of blood and her own footsteps.
And still she walked.
Until at last, she spoke—quiet, but with steel in her voice.
“Send word to my brother.”
She didn’t look back.
“I want him to see this with his own eyes.”