"Who are we killing?"

"Anyone. Spill blood like rain, and Head will jump out to make trouble, no matter who dies."

I closed the notebook, then opened it again, and a scarf bloomed from nothing upon the page, like mist congealing. It was the advance payment of a devil’s bargain.

A devil’s make, Delusion’s Obsession.

Its only trick was to hood a portion of the senses. The bearer wouldn’t just fail to see; even the pulse of mana would fade like a drowned ember.

I folded the scarf into a neat little shape and slipped it into my pocket, like a moon tucked into cloud.

"All right, Dulan, pick any small village nearby. Then start the slaughter."

"Uh…" Dulan looked troubled, her eyelids heavy as wet leaves.

"What now? Don’t tell me you think indiscriminate slaughter is wrong. Villains trying to wash clean are due for the grave."

"Not that. I mean, I’ll probably fall asleep before I find a village… mmh."

"You already dozed off! And if you know you’ve got a problem, grit your teeth and stay awake!"

You can’t rewrite inclination, but you can push yourself when it’s work, like rowing against a black tide.

"Anyway, move. We’ve got a long night’s worth of sins."

I flicked Dulan’s forehead, a crack of knuckle like a pebble on ice, to wake her up. I caught her hand and sank into the Shadow.

In the realm that is purely Shadow, time thins like watered ink; body-sense time fails, drifting like a leaf on still water.

Walking inside Shadow, you can peer through windows of outer shadow, like lantern panes set in a dark wall.

The pretty arc beneath a girl’s skirt fluttered like a crescent; the restless feet under a heated table twitched like mice; a man stretched his arm under a vending machine for a lost coin, fingers groping like blind fish; Stini used magelight under blankets to read smutty comics, glow like a secret moon; in a fireplace’s reflection, a family’s story played like silhouettes on a red curtain.

None of that was my target. I wanted somewhere farther, a small village Stini wouldn’t pop out to ruin halfway through, like a cat swatting a thread.

"Mm. That one."

I picked a small village a bit away from the town where the Hero Squad camped, distance like a pale ring around a flame.

Just an ordinary, featureless, everywhere village, a pebble among pebbles. Three hundred years from now a Hero might be born here, or twenty years from now Wilderness Kingdom Veneli might mark it a free trade city and it’d flourish like wheat.

The future is fog. Who can swear to it?

I only knew it would be ash by tonight.

"Aileen, where did Dad go?"

"I don’t know either. Sally, you’re the clingiest to Dad; you don’t know?"

Two little girls, eyes fogged with sleep, crawled into bed like kittens. Lisa—no, the smaller one—yawned a soft flower. She kneaded her pillow into a comfy cloud, and both lay down happy.

"Auntie said Dad went hunting monsters again. I’m uneasy, like leaves in wind. I’m scared Dad will run into danger."

"He won’t. Dad’s fine. Dad’s the strongest in the village, a boulder in the stream."

"Is he a Hero?"

"I asked. Dad smiled bitterly and shook his head. That’s what grown-ups call ‘humble,’ right? Dad’s so strong—how could he not be a Hero?"

"Heroes… sound wonderful."

Aileen pouted, rolled and rolled on the bed like a wave, sleep fleeing her like a deer.

"I want to be a Hero too, dashing like Dad."

"Don’t. They say becoming a Hero means eating lots of hardship, like gnawing cold bark."

"But I want to be someone who saves others, like a lantern against rain."

"Mm…" Sally puffed her cheeks, then brightened, knocking her plump little fist into her palm like striking a drum. "Then tomorrow we beg Dad to train us to be Heroes!"

"Okay, okay!" Sally flailed on the bed, joy tossing like sparrows.

"Ah, that’s not enough. We must pray to a Divine Being too. They say all Heroes do."

Sally flung off the quilt, sat up on the bed, and knelt, praying to the moon outside like a seed speaking to dew:

"I swear to treat everyone with honesty, clear water for all. I swear to fight for those who cannot fight, a shield for the unarmed… Aileen, what else… huh? Why did the moon vanish?"

Shadow draped the sky, a world-ender’s wings smothering starlight like soot.

"Why—"

Her question found no answer. It died with her, like a candle pinched in two fingers.

One slanting cut.

The house split on the bias, a loaf sliced wrong, collapsing to ruin. Half of Sally’s head came off, slid diagonally onto the bed, blood soaking the sheets like a spilled pomegranate.

Aileen stared, terror freezing her like a hare in hawk-shadow, and shrieked.

Perhaps the noise offended the blade. The second stroke fell vertical.

The scream snapped. The cut ran from Aileen’s crown to her lower belly, a seam of red. Her body held a twisted balance, a scarecrow of flesh, and did not fall apart until the blood clotted like dark lacquer.

Children’s dreams and bright hopes—what Heroes and Divine Beings should guard—ended here, like paper lanterns dunked in rain.

A maid-clad fiend kicked through the wall, boards flying like sparrows, shouldered her great blade, and stepped into the room to gaze at the little corpses she had made.

Dulan yawned wide, shoulders slumped like a wilting lily, voice dull as overcast.

"Rest easy. I’m hunting from outer ring inward. Did you girls see your father?"

—End.

"No, no, not right. I just killed a boy, not a little girl."

"You can’t say it like that. Remember, the world has cross-dressed beauties; that’s a known charm."

"But I’m sure the one I killed had a little boy-bit. Not a slit."

"Fine. I’ll revise."

Dulan lifted Aileen’s skirt and found beneath a sky-piercing Tower of Babel, ridiculous as a flagpole in a nursery.

"What the—he’s a boy."

She spoke with a face wrinkled by disgust, like biting into bitter rind.

—End.

"Um… I can’t joke with you like Vega and play along happy. If my quips fall flat, Master, please don’t mind."

I couldn’t see Dulan’s face, but I knew the troubled look, a knot of cords in rain.

"Fine. I’m bored; talk."

I tied the devil’s ribbon over my eyes, knot at the nape like a blindfold for penance, sealing sight to black.

In my ears rose shouts to kill, cries to save, blades pushing into meat and bone like cold nails, houses falling like crates kicked loose, and Dulan’s lazy voice drifting like smoke.

"Please don’t compose a melodramatic novel on-site because you’re bored while someone’s working. What if I suddenly feel guilty about what I’m doing?"

Guilt?

I laughed, bright and brittle, like glass thrown onto stone. "Guilt—what a funny Demonfolk joke."

"And what if your story gets me entranced, and I let a few mortals go? That’d be bad, wouldn’t it?"

"Don’t worry."

I pointed with my beloved halberd Nandu toward the sky. I couldn’t see, but I knew Shadow spread there, hooding the stars like ink.

"This is an Authority Field application: ‘Tenfold Night Forbids Light.’ Inside this zone, everything is ‘irrelevant’ to the outside, like sound swallowed by snow."

"Irrelevant… wait, Master, this child has decent talent. Should I train and recruit?"

"What grade?"

I don’t recall any great Hero born nearby, but talent and destiny rarely marry. Maybe I’ve got protagonist luck and can dig up a gem from sand.

"Mid-grade retainer."

"Kill them. Too low."

Finding pearls in dung is like gambling without a pity system. Expectation is wasted breath.

"Understood. Did you say Divine Beings can’t see what happens here?"

"Authority alone isn’t enough. The blindfold is a ritual, a lock on the lantern, too."

Those who know too much can’t unwind the skein, no matter how hard they pull.

Prophesy the future, and the world curses back, like brambles lashing a hand.

Fools do many things, and in the end discover their choices were led like oxen by a rope.

Since the Golden Age they say the gods watch the human world, eyes on the mortals they think they guard, like hawks over fields.

So I won’t look. I won’t sense. I limit my power and my senses, and with the Authority Field in place, even Divine Beings can’t feel what I do.

"If Divine Beings cannot sense your acts, then what meaning does your slaughter hold?"

"Why must it hold meaning? Why has your mind thinned like mortal gruel? Must you have sure meaning before you can move?"

"There are more alive over there, Master. I’ll be right back. Please sit and wait."

"Hey, don’t go! I’ll say it straight. Sheesh. Can’t you keep the jokes? Fine, serious now. Even if no one knows, at least one will know the future, at least one will see my crimes, at least one will try to stop me."

I pointed in any direction, like throwing a knife at fog. I didn’t know from where Head would come. I only needed to declare faith, like driving a post into ground.

"Yes, that’s right—Head, the all-knowing, all-seeing Divine Being of wisdom. He will come. What we’re doing is a summoning rite, like beating drums at a midnight gate."

"Um… Dulan? Miss Dulan? My dear maid, are you still there?"

"Don’t you walk off. Don’t tell me you think ‘the boss is annoying, so I’ll avoid him under cover of work.’ Hey. Come back!"

"…Fine. The maid is working hard. Don’t interrupt her, right… but I can’t see anything. I can’t do anything. Care for me a little, maybe?"

"…The maid… still respects me, right? She should, right?"

"Anyone? Someone answer me. No living souls left… you killed them all."

Just as my mood sank like a stone, footsteps came from far off.

Not Dulan’s lazy, drowsy tread, but a heavy run that burned life like straw, thick and doomed.

…A living one Dulan missed?

I planted my halberd Nandu, a black spear sprouting from earth, and rose to harvest a soul.

Before I struck, the figure pitched forward and fell. The sound was bad, like green wood splitting; bones cracked low. A woman’s grunt bled out like a crushed reed.

Not a warrior, it seemed… Wait—the breathing was twofold, like two lanterns guttering.

"Please… please spare my child!"

Ah. So it is that.

I’ve grown used to voices ripped open by grief, but this cry shot straight at me like an arrow, and the emotion struck like a hot brand.

"Do whatever you want to me! Only, please spare my child! He’s only nine!"

The woman likely knelt, forehead knocking the stone street, blood stippling like berries.

So what should I do now? In what skin should I act? With what tone should I speak?

I held my beloved Nandu close, thinking a little, a hand over a cold flame.