[Author's Note:]
Hey everyone,
I just want to ask you something from the heart. Writing this story takes a lot of effort, and sometimes it feels like I'm just throwing words into the dark. What keeps me going are your comments and reviews—they let me know you're actually out there, enjoying the journey with me. Even a few words mean so much.
And if you really like the novel, please consider dropping some Powerstones. It's the best way to show support and helps the story reach more readers. Honestly, your support is what keeps me motivated to keep writing every day. So please… don't be silent, let me hear your voice.
---
Auren leaned back against the couch, breath steady, then wear his clothes, his cruel satisfaction filling the silence of the hall. The naked woman—Caius' other wife, the so-called treasure he had betrayed Auren's mother for—lay collapsed on the floor, her body trembling, her eyes vacant, and her mind broken under his control.
She was no longer a wife, no longer a mother—just a hollow doll bent to Auren's will.
Caius' bloodshot eyes locked on her, veins bulging as he thrashed against invisible restraints, but he couldn't even raise a finger. Every gasp that left her throat cut him deeper than any blade could. Auren tilted his head, watching Caius, lips curling into a smile.
"So this was it, wasn't it, Father?" Auren whispered, his voice like venom dripping into an open wound.
"You killed my mother… abandoned Selene… for her. She was worth everything to you. And now look at her—your precious jewel reduced to a plaything. My toy."
Caius growled, a broken, animal sound that barely resembled speech. Auren stood, walking closer, his boots leaving faint red smears on the floor where blood had already dripped.
"Don't look away," Auren hissed, grabbing Caius by the hair and forcing his head up. "You will watch. Every second. Every breath she takes under me is a reminder of how powerless you are.
You called yourself my father, but today, I own everything you ever loved."
Then, without warning, Auren's hand ignited with shimmering blades of psychic energy. He drove them through Caius' fingers, one by one. Slice. The first finger dropped to the ground, blood spilling across the floorboards.
Caius screamed, but Auren didn't pause. Slice. Slice. The cuts were surgical, deliberate. Each finger was severed slowly, tossed aside like scraps of meat.
"You don't deserve hands," Auren said calmly. "You don't deserve to touch, to hold, to build. You only deserve to feel what it's like to lose everything you ever thought belonged to you."
Caius' body writhed, but Auren didn't stop. He carved thin lines into his chest, his arms, his legs—long, shallow cuts, letting the blood run but never deep enough to kill. It was agony stretched into eternity, pain laced with humiliation.
The naked woman whimpered faintly on the bed, her body shaking, and Auren turned his gaze back to Caius. His eyes gleamed with madness, his smile wide, predatory.
"You see, Father," Auren whispered, crouching close enough that Caius could feel his breath on his ear, "death would be a mercy. And mercy is something I no longer have."
Auren drove the blade across Caius' cheek, slow and deliberate, leaving a crimson smile carved into his skin. Caius' head slumped, his voice reduced to broken sobs, his will shattering like glass under the relentless torment.
For the first time, Caius—once proud, once feared—looked small. Defenseless. Already dead in spirit.
Auren rose, towering over him, satisfied at the hollow ruin he had created.
"Now," Auren said coldly, "you are ready to be judged."
Caius was no longer a man. He was a heap of shredded flesh and bone tied together by the fragile thread of Auren's will—every breath was stolen, not his own, every scream choked before it could leave his lips.
His eyes rolled back and forward again, bulging with raw terror, because he knew what was coming.
Auren crouched before him, blood dripping off his fingertips like crimson paint.
"Do you still believe death is your escape?" he whispered, voice low, venom sweet and deliberate. "No, Father. Death is mercy. And mercy is the one thing I'll never give you."
With a snap of his fingers, Caius's body convulsed. His nerves ignited like burning wires. He writhed, not from cuts or broken bones—those were nothing compared to the storm Auren unleashed inside his mind.
Every memory Caius clung to was ripped open, replayed, and twisted until they became weapons. He saw his victories as failures, his pleasures as curses, his pride turned into the very chain strangling him.
"Look at her…" Auren forced Caius's eyes toward the woman, her body still shivering under his control, her face blank, stolen of will. "The one you threw everything away for. The one you betrayed my mother for.
The one you thought was worth every sin. Now she belongs to me. She doesn't even remember your name anymore."
Caius tried to cry, but Auren silenced even that. He wanted him mute, gagged by his own helplessness.
Then Auren's hand slid across his chest, and with a slow grin he whispered, "Your punishment will not end with your body."
One by one, he peeled Caius apart. Fingers severed clean, tossed to the floor like discarded scraps. Deep cuts carved into every stretch of skin until blood soaked the wooden boards beneath. But the true horror came when Auren dug his will deeper—not into Caius's flesh, but his soul.
Auren opened a rift of shadow, black tendrils slithering out like serpents. They pierced into Caius's chest, threading into his spirit.
Caius's eyes widened further, the whites reddening as the tendrils dragged pieces of his essence out of him like glass shards pulled through skin. His scream this time wasn't sound—it was felt in the marrow of the room.
"You will not die," Auren declared, standing over him like a god sentencing judgment. "You will rot. Every second will stretch into eternity. Your body will wither, but your soul will stay trapped, gnawed at by shadows until nothing remains.
I will carve your existence into a prison where even death will not want you."
The black void pulsed, swallowing Caius's spirit inch by inch. His face collapsed into sheer horror, as though he finally understood—this wasn't torture of flesh. This was obliteration. No afterlife. No rebirth. No end.
Only Auren's laughter echoing in the abyss.