I. The Girl in Two Pieces

  They screamed.

  All of them.

  The moment I stepped into the basement, their voices crashed against me like a tidal wave of suffering—raw, wet, unrelenting. Hundreds of them. Not metaphorically—hundreds.

  They were nailed to the walls. Bolted to slabs. Strapped to rusted chairs with coils feeding electricity into their skulls every ten seconds. I counted the intervals.

  A man in the far corner barked like a dog until his throat bled, foam bubbling from his lips. Another stared into a flickering fluorescent light, smiling through the exposed bone of his jaw, whispering the same word over and over again:

  "Forgive... Forgive... Forgive..."

  Some had no tongues. Others had no mouths to begin with—stitched shut like an afterthought. A woman crawled in a circle on her elbows, dragging her torso over broken glass, smiling with what was left of her lips.

  I couldn’t find the words.

  Not to describe what I saw.

  Not to explain what I felt.

  The Reflection— No, I —wanted to believe there was a mistake. That these people had been criminals. Monsters. That they had earned this.

  But this wasn’t justice.

  This was a graveyard still breathing.

  And then I saw her.

  At first, I felt relief. She looked… whole. Young. Maybe ten. Maybe younger. Pale skin. Black hair matted against her cheeks. She didn’t scream.

  She blinked.

  Alive.

  I stepped closer.

  And that’s when I saw it.

  Her body… wasn’t one.

  Her upper torso was seated against a metal frame, chin slumped to her chest, breathing shallow. But her lower half was on the opposite side of the room, displayed like a grotesque anatomy exhibit.

  Muscle. Bone. Intestines—still connected.

  Long, pulsing lines of nerve tissue stretched between her halves, suspended in glowing fluid tubes. Her arms were missing entirely, but the wiring kept her heart beating, her lungs moving, her brain active.

  A machine beeped softly beside her, administering doses of painkillers and adrenaline just enough to keep her conscious.

  She looked up at me.

  And smiled.

  “Are… you the new one?” she rasped, her voice like torn paper dragged across concrete. “They said they’d bring someone new today. I was getting lonely…”

  I froze.

  She wasn’t scared.

  She wasn’t crying.

  She was happy to see me.

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  “Why…” I started. My voice cracked. “Why are you still alive?”

  Her smile faltered.

  “They said I was special. That my nerves didn’t give out like the others. They wanted to see how long it would take before I broke.” Her eyes glistened. “It’s been seven months. I still haven’t.”

  My knees hit the floor.

  I couldn’t breathe.

  “You’re—” I couldn’t finish.

  She tilted her head. “Can you tell my mom I’m sorry? She told me to run, but I wanted to protect the others. I thought… maybe if I screamed loud enough, they’d stop hurting the babies.”

  A shudder rocked her body. Blood trickled from her nose. Her heart monitor blipped twice.

  “I think… I think I’m starting to forget what hugs feel like.”

  Something inside me broke.

  Not snapped. Shattered.

  II. The Knife That Broke

  The alley reeked of stale blood, rust, and adrenaline.

  The leader—Mako—stood a few feet away, his breath shallow and uneven, his body twitching with barely-contained energy. The veins on his arms bulged like cables, his pupils needle-thin.

  The others had started backing off, their courage drained the moment they saw Shinra stop responding. But Mako? He was too far gone. Sweat glazed his face, his lips dry and cracked, twitching with a kind of maddened thrill.

  The other two tried to hold him back. “Bro, he’s not even moving. He’s dead, man. Let’s just take his shit and go.”

  But Mako shoved them aside like leaves in a storm. “No. Shut the fuck up.”

  He wiped his nose, sniffed hard, and pulled something from his coat—a knife. Jet-black. Sleek. Unmarked. Its edge gleamed under the streetlight like a sliver of midnight.

  “This ain’t no toy,” he snarled. “You know where I got this? Black market. Titanium alloy. Military-grade. This thing can cut through bone like butter.”

  He stepped forward, sneering down at the body on the pavement—Shinra, unmoving, his blood pooling into the cracks in the concrete.

  “I’ll show you all. I’ll show you what strength is.”

  And then—he stabbed.

  Straight through the side. The blade sank in, buried itself deep—aimed directly at the liver.

  Shinra jolted.

  Like lightning crackled through his spine.

  CRUNCH.

  A sickening snap echoed through the alley.

  The sound was sharp, unnatural. Bone didn’t make that noise. Flesh didn’t make that noise.

  Steel did.

  Mako froze.

  He staggered back, lifting his hand in disbelief. Half of the blade was gone.

  His eyes widened, staring at the broken stub of metal in his fist.

  “No…” he muttered. “No. That’s not possible…”

  He dropped the hilt in shock and picked it back up again, fumbling, tracing the jagged edge. He remembered the dealer’s words—‘This thing won’t bend, won’t chip. You could run over it with a tank.’

  And now it was shattered.

  The impossible lays in his hands.

  Then he looked up.

  Shinra was standing.

  Not rising—standing. Upright. Tall. Motionless. His head was bowed, black hair hiding his face. Blood dripped steadily from his side, but it didn’t slow him.

  One of the other thugs—shaking—screamed and lunged at Shinra with another knife.

  Shinra moved.

  No footsteps. No warning. He just wasn't there anymore.

  Still looking down, he slid under the attack with perfect balance, his body flowing like water, untouched by the blade.

  The thug stumbled forward—only to be caught mid-stride.

  Shinra had his knife now.

  And with the same, quiet detachment as death itself, he buried it in the man’s chest.

  Not a quick jab. No—he drove it in, slow and sure, twisting until it found the heart. Shinra didn’t let go. He held it there. The thug choked, his body twitching—still standing—as Shinra gripped the handle, eyes still cast downward.

  Then—

  Shinra looked up.

  His face was calm. Too calm. But his eyes…

  They were bleeding.

  Blood welled from his tear ducts, thin streams trailing down his cheeks like crimson ink. But the whites of his eyes remained untouched—stark, ghostly white. It was his irises that had turned blood red.

  Not glowing. Not supernatural. Just dark, thick, red—as if blood had filled the space between pupil and sclera, seeping in and staining his gaze from the inside out.

  It wasn’t rage.

  It wasn’t madness.

  It was silence. The kind that came after the screams.

  Mako dropped his broken knife and took a step back.

  Shinra’s gaze locked onto him.

  He didn’t blink.

  Didn’t speak.

  He just pushed the knife deeper into the thug’s heart—until the man went limp, still skewered like an offering—and kept staring.

  Right at the man who had tried to kill him.

  There was no rage.

  No cruelty.

  Just a quiet inevitability.

  Like death itself had taken form… and chosen a face.

  End of chapter 12

  To be continued