The silence after the purification was almost deafening. Every breath seemed to echo in the destroyed nave of the church, and the golden embers that still floated in the air resembled an otherworldly battlefield.

Kael took a step forward, sword still in hand, his gaze sweeping the darkened corners. Something in him told him this wasn't over.

Then… the air changed.

A dry chill, not coming from the wind, spread through the nave. The golden sparks began to fade faster, as if sucked in by something invisible. The ground shook, but not as before. It was a sound… rhythmic. Footsteps.

From the darkness of the destroyed door, a figure entered.

He was tall, thin, his skin tinged with bright red tribal symbols that seemed to bleed of its own accord. His eyes—two yellow, pupil-less dots—burned with pure fury.

He wielded a staff made of bones woven with plant fibers, and on top was the skull of some animal Kael didn't recognize… but which seemed to still be murmuring.

"Who…" His voice sounded like stone scraping against iron. "Who dares… destroy my work?"

His tone wasn't that of someone asking an ordinary question. It was that of a judge, ready to execute sentence.

Klee backed away, clutching her backpack like a shield. Asuka stepped forward, still panting, but with her katana raised.

Kael merely narrowed his eyes. "You were behind this."

The strange shaman tilted his head slowly, as if watching insects trying to speak.

"You… have no idea… what you touched. That being… was the seed. Now… you've burned my garden."

He slammed his staff into the ground, and the impact sounded like muffled thunder. Small cracks spread across the stone floor, from which shadows began to crawl like living serpents.

Asuka whispered to Kael, never taking her eyes off him: "He's not an orc… and he's not human."

Kael felt it too. The scent in the air was a mix of ancient blood and wet earth… but there was something else. Something reminiscent of the void that existed before the light.

"You want explanations," Kael said firmly. "But first, state your name."

The shaman smiled. It was a dry, joyless smile. "You will hear my name in the last beats of your hearts… but if you must know…"

He raised his staff, and the flames of the fallen candles reignited on their own, all an icy blue.

"I am Var'khan, son of the Void, shepherd of souls who have found no home."

Klee shivered. "Shepherd… of souls?"

"Yes," he said, pointing the staff toward her. "And you… have just freed many who belonged to me. Now, you will pay your tithes."

Kael didn't wait for Var'khan to finish another word.

The air was already saturated with putrid energy, and those serpentine shadows were taking shape faster than anyone could react. The time for dialogue was over.

He advanced.

It was a sharp, direct movement—a step, a cut. The sound that followed wasn't like steel slicing through ordinary flesh; it was a dense rip, as if the blade had pierced both muscle and something more… arcane.

Var'khan's scream echoed, sharp and guttural, a mixture of pain and rage. The staff fell with a dull thud as a jet of black blood, thick as tar, exploded from the shaman's shoulder. His arm—still marked with pulsing tribal symbols—fell to the ground and began to writhe on its own, as if trying to crawl back to its body.

Kael gave him no space.

He grabbed Var'khan by the neck, with the strength of someone carrying years of war in his hands. The touch wasn't just physical—the impact made the air around him shudder, and the shaman let out a muffled sound, gasping for breath that wouldn't come.

"An imbecile is only strong with creations," Kael growled, bringing his face close to his, so he could feel his hot breath and pent-up fury. "You are nothing."

And then, with a brutal movement, Kael lifted him as if he were weightless... and slammed him into the ground.

The impact cracked the ancient stone, scattering splinters through the air. Var'khan's body arched with the impact, a dull thud coming from his back—probably a vertebra giving way. Black blood pooled quickly around him, and the shadows that had been rising stopped, trembling as if in fear.

Var'khan tried to react. With his remaining hand, he summoned a beam of murky energy and fired it at Kael. But the warrior merely turned, letting the attack hit the destroyed altar.

"You think… you can…" Var'khan tried to speak, but Kael wouldn't let him.

The second blow came faster. A punch straight to the face—hard enough to drive part of his skull into the floor. A tooth, sharp as a beast's, flew out and tumbled to Klee's feet.

"You won't talk," Kael said, his voice low and heavy, "you'll just learn."

He lifted him again by the neck, this time using his sword to drive the shaman's remaining hand into the ground, pinning him down. Var'khan let out a roar of pain, and the runes on his body began to glow brighter, as if trying to regenerate the lost flesh.

Kael wouldn't let him. With his foot, he crushed the trapped arm, feeling bones and tendons give way beneath his boot. The scream that came this time was different—not just physical, but as if something in Var'khan was being ripped away beyond his body.

"You live by parasitizing lives," Kael continued, "but you never learned to fight for yours."

Var'khan spat blood and saliva, his right eye already swelling and becoming opaque. He tried to use his shadows again, but Kael dug his free hand into his throat and squeezed, until the sound became only a faint hiss.

Each time Kael slammed him into the ground, more symbols on the shaman's body faded. The tribal red became dull, gray, like old paint fading. The power that had once made the air tremble now dissipated like smoke.

Asuka watched silently, her katana still raised, but unintentional. She knew—this wasn't just combat, it was execution.

Klee, however, turned her face away. Kael's expression wasn't just one of victory, but something darker. It was as if he were taking out centuries of rage on a single enemy.

After the sixth blow against the stone, Var'khan could no longer support himself. His muscles trembled uncontrollably, and his head lolled to the side. Still, his yellowed eye sought Kael, not with defiance... but with pure fear.

Kael lifted him once more, bringing his face closer. "Remember this feeling. It's the weight of insignificance."

And, as a final gesture, he dragged his body down the nave, to the broken altar. There, he slammed him against the wall, sending more pieces of stone raining down on him. Var'khan tried to get up, but his leg gave way. He coughed, and a black clot ran down his chin.

"You... haven't... won yet..." he murmured, almost voiceless.

Kael walked toward him slowly, his footsteps firm, the sound echoing in the heavy silence. When he reached the shaman's face, he knelt down to face level.

"I've already won the moment I took your advantage," he said. And with a swift movement, he ripped off the skull attached to the fallen staff.

The scream that followed didn't come from Var'khan alone. It was as if all the voices trapped within that artifact were released at once—a wave of high-pitched, desperate sound that made the walls tremble. Var'khan writhed, as if he were being burned from the inside out.

When the sound died, he lay still. He was breathing, but faintly. The shadows had vanished completely, and the runes on his body were faded.

Kael stood, threw the skull to the ground, and crushed it with his boot, never taking his eyes off it. "Now… you're just a broken man."

Var'khan remained slumped, his chest rising and falling slowly, each breath a reminder that he would live… but he would carry the pain and humiliation for a long time.

Var'khan's body was already broken, but Kael wasn't satisfied.

The air was still heavy, and that dense, humid fog lingered, engulfing the corners of the ship like a suffocating blanket. It was the remnants of the ritual, still pulsing with the energy the shaman had summoned.

Kael knew that as long as it remained, nothing was finished.

He grabbed Var'khan by the hair, lifting his head so that his yellow eyes met his. "You will undo this now."

Var'khan tried to smile, but his face was too swollen and cut to form anything more than a pained grimace. "I… never…"

Kael didn't wait. With a yank, he dragged him to the center of the ship, where the cracks in the floor still exhaled a dark vapor. He drove the tip of his sword into his thigh, piercing flesh and stone, pinning him in place.

The scream echoed, filled with agony and hatred.

"You think pain makes me give in?" Var'khan gasped. "I've lived among screams—"

Kael interrupted with a kick to the jaw, the crack of bone breaking muffled by the fog. "It's not pain, worm. It's shame. I'll make you feel every second of your helplessness until this damned fog disappears."

He bent down, pressing his hand to the wound in his severed shoulder and twisting his fingers within the flesh, eliciting another roar. The surrounding skin began to sizzle, not from the touch, but because Kael was letting the energy of purification seep through his hand, burning away the corruption in his body.

Var'khan trembled like a cornered animal. Sweat dripped along with the black blood, dripping onto the stone. With each spasm, the mist seemed to tremble, as if connected directly to his nerves.

"Stop…" he gasped.

"No. You will speak the words, or I will tear them apart piece by piece and leave you alive to feel them."

Kael pulled his sword from his thigh and, without warning, plunged it into his other leg. The sound deepened, and the scream that followed seemed to vibrate the very ground. In response, the mist recoiled slightly, as if it had been struck by an invisible blow.

Klee, from afar, watched with wide eyes. Asuka remained still, but her hand on the hilt of her katana was steady—ready to intervene if Kael lost control.

"Do you feel it?" Kael pressed deeper. "Every time you bleed, your magic weakens. Every time I break you, this lie you call a ritual shatters."

Var'khan gasped, his body jerking in convulsions. The runes on his skin flickered, as if struggling to maintain their connection.

Kael changed his approach. With his free hand, he grabbed his face and jabbed his thumb into his right eye. The sound was wet and repulsive, and the shaman let out a scream that almost became an animal roar.

The mist churned violently, swirling around him.

"DO IT!" Kael roared.

Var'khan, trembling, let out a choking sound that turned into slurred words: "Na'ru… sheth… vek'tra…"

The cracks in the ground began to close, and the mist slowly receded into the crevices. The icy blue of the candles extinguished one by one, replaced by a dry silence.

Kael didn't let go of his face until the air was clear again. Then he dropped him to the ground like discarding an old rag.

Var'khan coughed, blood and saliva staining the stone.

Kael stood, wiped his sword on the shaman's torn cloak, and said, without looking back, "I told you I would win from the start."

The mist dissipated completely, and the ritual was dead.