Chapter 14: Chapter 14: The Devil’s Prey
The door was unlocked.
Lucian pushed it open and stepped inside like he owned the place. Sunglasses caught the dim light filtering through boarded windows. Silver hair fell past his shoulders. The Sword of Aikis hung at his hip, starsteel blade gleaming faintly.
Nine people occupied the room — a makeshift camp of mattresses, canned goods, and scavenged supplies spread across the floor of what had once been an office space. Five men, four women, all between twenty and forty by the look of them.
Eyes of the Eternals activated.
╔══════════════════════╗
║ TARGETS SCANNED: 9 ║
║ [1] Male, 34 — Normal Human ║
║ [2] Male, 28 — Normal Human ║
║ [3] Male, 41 — Normal Human ║
║ [4] Male, 25 — Early Neophyte ║
║ [5] Male, 38 — Mid Neophyte ║
║ [6] Female, 23 — Normal Human ║
║ [7] Female, 31 — Normal Human ║
║ [8] Female, 27 — Normal Human ║
║ [9] Female, 22 — Early Neophyte ║
╚═══════════════════════╝
Three cultivators. Mid Neophyte is the strongest.
The room had gone silent. Nine pairs of eyes fixed on Lucian.
"Zombie!" the young man shouted, mana flaring around his fists. "He’s—"
Lucian moved as his hand closed around the young man’s chest, piercing it and squeezed.
CRUNCH.
Ribs cracked like dry twigs. Lucian’s fingers found the heart, closed around it, and pulled.
The young man’s mouth opened. No sound came out.
Lucian tossed the heart over his shoulder. It landed on the floor with a wet splat near the door. The body followed a second later, crumpling like a puppet with cut strings.
Blood dripped from Lucian’s fingers.
He looked at the remaining eight people, picked up a nearby chair, set it down in the center of the room, and sat down with his legs crossed and hands resting on his knees along with a devilish smile plastered across his face.
"Hello, gentlemen."
He paused, gaze sweeping over the women.
"And of course the ladies too."
Silence. Absolute, suffocating silence. Nobody breathed. Nobody moved. The only sound was the wet drip-drip-drip of blood from Lucian’s fingers onto the floor.
Then one of the normal humans — a man in his thirties with a scar across his jaw — squinted.
"Wait. I know you. You’re— you’re one of the people we used as bait. The van. The silver-haired kid."
One of the women — female number seven made her decision and ran.
She bolted for the back exit.
Lucian raised his right hand.
Pop.
Her head simply... popped. Like a balloon. A shower of blood, bone fragments, and grey matter sprayed across the wall behind her, and her body crumpled to the floor, neck stump fountaining crimson.
The remaining seven people stared.
Lucian lowered his hand and flexed his fingers, examining them with mild interest.
"That really does the trick," he said conversationally. "Even though this is the first time I’m trying it."
Nobody moved.
Nobody could move. The fear in the room was palpable — a thick, suffocating weight that pressed down on all of them. The Mid Neophyte man, the strongest among them, stood frozen with his hands at his sides, his mana circulation completely disrupted by terror.
"Sit down," Lucian said.
All seven sat. Not because they wanted to. Because their legs had simply stopped working.
Lucian leaned back in his chair, the smile never leaving his face.
"Who brought out the idea of using us as bait?"
Silence.
"And don’t lie to me." His crimson eyes — visible now as he’d removed the sunglasses — swept across the group. "I will be able to tell using your heartbeat."
The normal human female — twenty-three, dark hair, number six — pointed a trembling finger.
"H-her." Her voice was barely a whisper. "It was her idea. Elise. She said we needed a distraction to get past the horde. She said the blood bags would—"
"Good." Lucian’s smile widened. "I must say, it was a smart idea. The execution was flawless. I’m genuinely impressed."
He pointed to the chair beside him.
"Come sit here."
The Early Neophyte woman — Elise, twenty-two, pale blonde hair, wide blue eyes — stood on shaking legs and walked toward him. Each step looked like it cost her a year of her life.
She sat.
Lucian pointed to the woman who had spoken — number six.
"You come here."
The woman’s face went white. "P-please— I didn’t— she made me—"
"You come here."
She walked. Tears streamed down her face. Her legs buckled twice, and she nearly fell, but some primal instinct kept her moving.
She stopped in front of Lucian.
He looked up at her. His smile was gentle. Almost seemed kind.
"Thank you for being honest."
Then his fangs extended, and he bit down on her neck.
"Nngh—!"
The sound she made wasn’t a scream. It was a gasp — sharp, shocked, cut short as Lucian’s venom hit her bloodstream. Her body went rigid, then slack, and a small, involuntary moan escaped her lips as the pleasure overrode the pain.
Lucian drank.
The blood was rich — not as rich as the hunter’s blood from the restaurant, but satisfying after the drain of the spike trap. He could feel his BE climbing with each swallow: 27... 32... 38...
The others watched in frozen horror.
A human was drinking blood.
Gulp. Gulp. Gulp.
Number six’s body went limp. Lucian kept drinking until the heart stuttered and stopped, then let the empty husk slide to the floor.
Worthless.
The Mid Neophyte man made his move.
He bolted — mana surging, legs pumping, sprinting for the door with everything he had. He was fast. For a Mid Neophyte, he was very fast.
He made it four and a half meters.
A blood needle — thin as a hairpin, hard as diamond — pierced his skull from behind, entering through the occipital bone and exiting through his right eye socket. He dropped face-first, dead before he hit the ground.
Lucian hadn’t moved from his chair.
The remaining five — three normal men, two normal women — started begging.
"Please—"
"I have a family—"
"We didn’t want to do it—"
"Money! I have money! I can—"
Lucian stood up.
One by one.
The first man lasted the longest — he tried to fight, swinging a metal pipe he’d grabbed from somewhere. Lucian caught it, bent it into a U-shape with one hand, and drained him in four seconds.
The second man tried to run. A blood wall blocked the exit.
The third man simply sobbed, arms wrapped around himself, as Lucian’s fangs found his throat.
The first woman fainted before he reached her. He drank anyway.
The second woman begged so creatively that Lucian almost laughed. Almost.
When it was done, seven bodies lay on the floor of the office. Seven empty husks, pale and still, their blood now circulating through Lucian’s veins.
He sat back down in his chair, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
Only Elise remained.
She’d just sat there, watching, as Lucian butchered every person in the room.
Now she was trembling so violently that the chair beneath her rattled against the floor. Her face was the color of paper. Her eyes were glassy, unfocused, seeing something that wasn’t there.
A dark stain spread across her jeans.
She’d pissed herself.
Then she fainted — slumping sideways in the chair, head lolling, unconscious.
Lucian watched her for a moment.
Then he waited.
Five minutes passed.
Elise’s eyes fluttered open. She blinked and her gaze focused on the devil sitting across from her.
Lucian smiled, holding his nose with his fingers.
"Go wash up. You stink."
