Starting out as a Dragon Slave

The tears those traitors tried to return, but he forced them back with almost physical violence. Not anymore. Never again. His face shut like a slammed door, his features hardened under the influence of an icy rage that seeped into his veins, gradually replacing his blood with something denser, darker. With each step, that sensation grew, carving a dizzying abyss deep within his soul.

Time an illusion now lost all meaning. Hours passed, fluid and elusive. The streetlights drifted by like slumbering sentinels, the neighborhoods changed their appearance under his indifferent steps, and the few night wanderers instinctively moved out of his way, as if even in their drunkenness, they perceived the aura of danger emanating from him. The sky, once a deep blue, darkened into an ocean of ink where pale stars swam, indifferent to the suffering of men.

Finally, like an apparition emerging from the void, the building where he lived materialized before him. An ordinary structure in a world that had become alien, its illuminated windows seemed like curious eyes peering into the cold night. frёeweɓηovel.coɱ

Isaac halted at the base of the stairs, his heavy gaze lifting toward the upper floors. His breath that stubborn reminder that he was still alive formed an ephemeral cloud in the freezing air, a translucent specter that vanished as quickly as it appeared. His legs, suddenly heavy as if the weight of his conscience had settled there, carried him up to the entrance. His hand, trembling uncontrollably, grasped the handle. The familiar smell of the hallway polished wood, dust, and faint traces of kitchen scents assaulted him, but that familiarity was now as foreign as everything else. He climbed the stairs with macabre haste, each creaking of the wood echoing like the mute accusation of an invisible judge.

The apartment door yielded under his push, emitting its usual complaint that creak he had never bothered to fix. His sister, a motionless figure in the golden glow of the living room, immediately looked up. Her delicate features flickered with a complex dance of emotions—surprise, relief, then growing worry as she read what was written on his face.

- "Isaac!" she exclaimed, springing up from the couch with a liveliness that cruelly contrasted with the lethargy that inhabited him. "Where were you? I’ve been waiting for hours, I tried calling you dozens of times!"

Silence was his only response. His gaze, now an abyss without end, passed through his sister as if she were only a hologram, a projection without substance. His steps—heavy, inexorable guided him directly to the sanctuary of his room, each stride echoing like a death knell in the suddenly oppressive atmosphere of the apartment. His sister remained frozen in his wake, a statue of flesh seized by anxiety, her instincts whispering that something irrevocable had happened.

- "Isaac?!"

Her call vibrating with worry that bordered on panic rebounded off the hallway walls but did not reach him.

The door to his room closed behind him with a definitive click, the lock engaging with a sharp sound a pitiful barrier between him and the world. The darkness welcomed him like an old friend, wrapping his silhouette in a cloak of shadow. The drawn curtains barely filtered the city lights, casting dancing shadows over an unmade bed and scattered clothes the remnants of a life that now seemed to belong to someone else. He moved like a sleepwalker, his knee striking the edge of the mattress before he collapsed entirely onto it, his face buried in his hands as if to hide from the world or perhaps to hide from the world what he had become.

An oppressive silence settled in the kind of silence that possesses its own weight, its own texture, that suffocates thoughts before they can even form. His hands trembled uncontrollably, his fingers gripping his hair with a violence bordering on self-harm. His breathing had turned into a series of irregular gasps, but his eyes remained dry burning with a rage so pure that it consumed even the tears before they could be born.

The pain was there, omnipresent, unavoidable. No longer just an emotion, but a living entity that inhabited every cell of his body, every corner of his mind. He could feel it pulsing like a second bloodstream, acidic and corrosive. Akane had vanished, consumed by her own sacrifice. And he he who had sworn to protect, he who had thought himself strong enough could do nothing but watch, a powerless spectator to his own defeat.

His fists clenched so tightly that his nails pierced the flesh of his palms. A few drops of blood—his blood, still flowing while hers would flow no more splattered onto the wooden floor, which groaned under the pressure. He closed his eyes, his jaw clenched so tightly his teeth ground together, every muscle in his body tensed to the breaking point in the superhuman effort to contain the cataclysm roaring inside him.

That’s when reality imposed itself again brutally. A faint buzzing, first distant, then quickly amplifying, tore through the cocoon of silence. The sound became clearer, multiplied the rhythmic beating of blades slicing through the night air. A helicopter. Then two. Then more. The walls of the apartment began to vibrate under the sonic assault, objects quivering on the shelves as if animated by their own will. Isaac slowly raised his head, his eyebrows knitting into a dark line of confusion.

The crackle of a megaphone suddenly split the night, followed by an amplified, metallic voice, devoid of any human emotion, resonating from the street below.

— Isaac Mordred! This is the Hunter’s Bureau! You are surrounded! Come out with your hands up and surrender immediately! Any attempt at resistance will be considered an act of hostility!

The roar of helicopter blades intensified, a mechanical symphony barely drowning out the wail of sirens and the rhythmic stomping of boots on asphalt the grim echo of an army locking into position.

Isaac stood up with deliberate slowness, his gaze fixed on an invisible point on the floor, his fist clenching with such force that his knuckles cracked audibly.

The door to his room burst open with a violence that made the adjacent wall tremble. His sister appeared in the doorway, her face twisted with a terror that even the darkness couldn’t hide.

- "Isaac!" she cried, her voice shattered by incomprehension and fear. "What did you do?! They... they’re here for you! But why?!"

Isaac did not respond immediately. His gaze drifted to the window where the beams of searchlights painted a chaotic choreography across the walls of his room. In his eyes, the spark of rage that had simmered since his return suddenly ignited not just a flame, but a blaze that consumed the last remnants of the man he had once been.

The strobing lights of the intervention vehicles now swept through the room intermittently, carving his face into a mask of shadow and light. Outside, the night had filled with voices, barked orders, and the sound of weapons being armed. The world was coming for him, but it was no longer his world. Not anymore.

Slowly, with glacial determination, he turned towards his sister. When he finally spoke, his voice was unrecognizable—a rough whisper, laced with a promise that made even the air around him shiver:

- "They’re too late to stop me. And too early to save me."