Luke lay perfectly flat on his back. He didn't move. He didn't even breathe for the first thirty seconds. He was staring at the ceiling of the Yviel Estate, where the morning light caught the dust motes dancing in the air. His body felt like a coiled spring made of cold steel, ready to leap into a battle that wasn't coming. The Sovereign Heart within him beat with a slow, heavy rhythm, a drumbeat for a king with no kingdom.
Goal for the day: Economic Self-Sufficiency, he reminded himself.
He had spent the last hour of his sleep-state simulating social interactions. He had watched human teenagers in the archive films Uncle Pontus provided—their slouching gait, their messy hair, their complains about "the grind." Luke sat up, deliberately mussing his hair. He stood and forced a yawn, a physical lie that felt itchy against his skin.
After a breakfast consisting of three pounds of ribeye—seared just enough to lock in the juices but raw enough to satisfy the primal hunger of his bloodline—Luke began his transformation. He pulled on a plain, oversized grey hoodie, the fabric heavy and thick to hide the unnatural density of his musculature. He opted for faded denim jeans and generic white sneakers. He looked in the mirror and pulled the hood low. The red eyes remained his greatest obstacle; they were deep, wine-dark pits that seemed to absorb the light.
"Sickly student," he whispered to his reflection. "You are just a sickly, overworked Finance student."
He stepped out of the estate, the humidity of Sabu hitting him like a wet towel. Niko Dana was already there, his shears clicking rhythmically against the hedges.
"Off to find work, Luke?" Niko called out, squinting against the morning glare.
"Yes," Luke replied. He focused on his facial muscles, forcing a tight, awkward smile. He had practiced this in the mirror: the 'approachable' smile. "I want to experience the value of a hard-earned peso, Niko. It is a foundational human experience."
Niko laughed, a boisterous sound that made Luke flinch internally. "Foundational, eh? You talk like a textbook, kid! Try the shops near the University. They’re always looking for warm bodies."
Luke nodded, his walk a bit too stiff, a bit too purposeful, as he headed toward the city.
Sabu City was a sensory assault. For someone raised in the sterile, quiet isolation of a high-security compound, the chaos of the urban sprawl was overwhelming. The air tasted of diesel exhaust, charcoal-grilled pork, and the salt of the nearby sea.
He spent the first four hours of his day in a grueling marathon of rejection.
His first stop was a 24/5 convenience store—a cramped, neon-lit box filled with the scent of stale coffee and industrial floor cleaner. The manager, a man with deep bags under his eyes and a permanent scowl, didn't even look at Luke’s neatly printed resume.
"We need someone who can work the night shift without looking like they’re already a corpse," the manager said, gesturing to Luke’s pale skin and the dark shadows cast by his hood. "You look like you're about to faint, kid. Are you on something?"
"I am perfectly healthy, sir," Luke replied, his voice a low, steady monotone. "It is merely a lack of Vitamin D due to excessive study."
"Yeah, well, customers get jumpy around people who look like they’ve seen a ghost. Try the library."
The library was no better. The head librarian took one look at his crimson eyes and asked if he had a contagious pink-eye infection. The laundromat owner told him he looked "too fragile" to haul bags of wet linen. By mid-afternoon, Luke found himself at a fast-food franchise, standing in a line of noisy, energetic teenagers. He felt like an apex predator hiding in a flock of pigeons. When his turn came, the hiring manager simply laughed.
"You want to flip burgers? Kid, you look like you’d rather eat the customers. Pass."
By 3:30 PM, Luke retreated to a public park near the University’s southern edge. He sat on a splintering wooden bench, the heat of the sun finally starting to wane. He pulled a strip of beef jerky from his pocket, chewing it slowly as he watched a group of students play basketball. They moved with such effortless, unthinking grace—tripping, laughing, shouting. They were so loudly alive.
Why is it so difficult to be normal? he wondered. I have the strength to crush the hoop they are playing with. I have the intellect to master their entire curriculum in a month. But I cannot convince a man to let me sell instant noodles for four hours a day. Is the 'Normal Life' truly the hardest quest I have ever faced?
He pulled out his notebook, his "Normal Life Checklist" staring back at him in neat, cramped handwriting.
-
~~Enroll in Finance.~~ (Done)
-
Obtain Part-Time Job. (FAIL)
-
Make 2.5 Friends. (Pending)
He felt a twinge of shame. He would have to rely on the allowance his father and Uncle Pontus had set up. To be normal, one had to struggle for their bread. To live off a secret, ancient inheritance was to be a "clique" character—a trope he was desperate to avoid.
As the sun dipped below the horizon, painting the Sabu sky in bruised purples and oranges, the park grew quiet. The students headed home to their dorms and families. Luke was preparing to leave when his chest gave a sudden, violent twitch.
THUMP.
It wasn't a heartbeat. It was a resonance. A heavy, suffocating pressure settled over the grove of acacia trees to his left. It tasted like bitter iron and old rot.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
This feeling... Luke’s hand went to his hoodie, clutching the fabric over the Sovereign Heart. It is not the girl from the hallway. This is different. This is a grudge. It is the sound of a soul snapping.
In the secret world Luke had come from, this was common. But here, in the "Normal" world, such things were hidden. People didn't believe in the paranormal; they believed in stress, in mental illness, in bad luck. But Luke knew the truth.
He turned his head, his crimson eyes scanning the deepening shadows. There, stumbling through the grass, was a man in his early twenties. He was wearing a rumpled office uniform, his white shirt stained with sweat and dirt. His movements were jerky, as if his limbs were being pulled by invisible, rusted wires.
"Hey, mister?" Luke called out, his voice cautious. "Are you alright?"
The man didn't respond. He let out a low, wet growl. As he stepped into the pale light of a streetlamp, Luke saw the transformation. The man’s skin was turning an oily, bruised grey. The veins in his neck were pulsing with a black, viscous fluid that seemed to glow with a sickly light.
Possession. Luke felt a surge of annoyance. I move to a city of millions to be normal, and I stumble upon a Stage 1 transformation in a public park? My luck is truly abysmal.
He looked around. The park was empty. If he did nothing, this man would become a Malus. He would kill someone, and then the secret "Hunters"—the executioners of the world—would arrive to put him down like a rabid dog. In the history of the clans, there was no cure. Once the black veins reached the heart, the human was dead.
"Forgive me, mister," Luke said, his voice dropping into a cold, professional tone. "I do not wish to do this. I really just wanted to go home and finish my reading on Macroeconomics."
He reached for the necklace around his throat. It was a cross-shaped pendant, once silver, now stained a permanent, visceral red.
"Bleed for me."
The cross glowed with a dark, heavy light. From the air itself, a spray of crimson mist solidified into a sleek, obsidian-red spear. The weight of it felt right in his hand—familiar and dangerous.
He approached the man, intending to end it quickly. But as he drew closer, the Sovereign Heart didn't pulse with the urge to kill. It pulsed with a strange, predatory curiosity. It felt the man’s heart. It didn't feel like a monster; it felt like a man who had been pushed too far.
If my heart consumed the Golden Vein... can my blood consume this rot?
"Blood Test 1.0," Luke muttered.
He pricked his thumb on the tip of the spear, drawing a thick, luminescent drop of blood. He flicked it onto the man's grey, mutated shoulder. He expected the man to explode or the blood to act like acid. Instead, he watched in silent shock as the leathery skin recoiled. The black veins fled from the touch of Luke’s blood as if it were holy fire.
"It works," Luke whispered. A spark of something—curiosity, and perhaps a bit of his father’s pride—ignited in his eyes. "But I need to hold him still."
He didn't have the golden energy of the Condre Clan. He couldn't summon the holy light to bind a demon.
I have to improvise, he thought. If my blood is the energy, it can be the ink.
He knelt, slitting his finger with a sharp silver amulet from his pocket. He didn't have paper or a brush, so he used the earth itself. His fingers moved in a blur, drawing a complex, geometric pattern on the dirt beneath the man's feet. He wasn't following a textbook; he was translating the memory of a Golden Seal into the language of his own blood.
"Experimental Blood Sealing..." he whispered, pouring his will into the wet, red lines. "ACTIVATE!"
The ground hummed. Crimson vines, thick and liquid yet strong as steel, shot up from the blood-drawn pattern. They coiled around the man, binding his limbs and pinning him to the spot. It wasn't the rigid light of the clans; it was something alive, pulsing with Luke’s own heartbeat.
Now for the purge. Luke stepped in, his mind flashing back to an old horror movie he had seen once back at the compound—The Exorcist. He remembered the priest's dramatic gestures, the chanting, the forceful authority.
It won't hurt if I try to act the part, he thought. Maybe the spirit responds to the theatricality.
He pressed his blood-stained thumb to the man's forehead.
"I cast you out!" he muttered, his eyes glowing a fierce, luminescent red. "The power of my blood compels you! Malice... BEGONE!"
He visualized his blood as a wave of pure authority, washing away the filth of the grudge. The effect was instantaneous. A plume of black smoke erupted from the man's mouth, dissolving into harmless dust. The man’s skin returned to its natural tone, and he collapsed into Luke’s arms.
Luke assisted the man to a nearby hospital, staying just long enough to ensure the "psychotic break" was over. When the man finally woke up in a quiet recovery ward, he was clutching his head, his eyes wide with a terrifying memory.
"The spear..." the man whispered. "The shadows... you were there."
"Quiet!" Luke hissed, dragging the man to a secluded stairwell after he was discharged. "Not here. Talk. What happened to you?"
The man leaned against the concrete wall, his hands shaking. "I... I'm an accountant. My name is Arthur. Or it was. My boss... he set me up. He stole pension funds and put my name on the transfers. He fired me, and when I threatened to go to the police, he... he drove his truck through the animal shelter I built. The cats, Luke... he killed them just to show me he could."
Arthur’s eyes filled with tears, but behind the tears was a cold, sharp anger. "I didn't want to kill him. I just wanted to destroy that truck. I wanted him to lose something he loved."
Luke looked at him. "Well, you're safe now. I've returned your wallet. I used some of your money for the taxi—it was an emergency, so consider that the fee. No need to pay me back, old man. Just go home and try to be... normal."
Luke turned to walk away, his hood pulled low. He had done a good deed. He had been a "Normal" citizen.
"Wait," Arthur said.
The tone of his voice had changed. The stutter was gone. The fear had been replaced by a sharp, calculating light—the look of a man who had spent his life looking at balance sheets and seeing opportunities where others saw chaos. Arthur looked at Luke’s red eyes, then at the hospital bill in his hand.
"You're a real exorcist, aren't you?" Arthur asked.
Luke froze. "What? No. I told you, I was just acting. I saw it in a movie. It was a fluke. Don't tell anyone about my 'abilities,' Arthur. I'm just a student."
Arthur looked at Luke. He didn't know about "Hunters." He didn't know about the "Malus." But he knew he had just seen a miracle performed by a teenager in a cheap hoodie. He also knew he was unemployed, blacklisted, and broke.
"No problem, kid," Arthur said, a hungry, greedy glint appearing in his eyes. "I won't tell a soul. I promise."
In his mind, Arthur was already running the numbers. He didn't care why Luke had red eyes. He only saw one thing: a unique, high-demand service in a city filled with people who were "snapping" under the pressure of corruption and debt.
I won't tell anyone, Arthur thought, a predatory grin touching his lips. Why would I let the world know I've found my own personal gold mine? If I'm his manager... we could own this city.
"I have a way to pay you back," Arthur called out as Luke reached the door. "I'll be in touch, Luke Yviel."
Luke didn't look back. He just wanted to go home. He didn't realize that by saving the accountant, he had just hired the most dangerous "Business Manager" in the world.
Outside the hospital, the night air was still. But high in the branches of a mahogany tree across the street, a shadow shifted.
The girl from the hallway stood perched on a branch, her movements as light as a bird's. She had followed him from the park. She had seen the spear—the red, obsidian weapon that shouldn't exist. She had seen the blood ritual. She had seen the man who should have been a monster walk out of the hospital as a human.
She didn't move. She didn't breathe. She simply watched Luke as he walked away into the city fog. Her dark eyes reflected the moonlight, filled with a mixture of confusion and a strange, budding fascination.