Enid sat sniffling in a dusty corner of the brightly lit settlement office, her knees drawn tightly to her chest. Her eyes were red and swollen from crying, a constant, silent stream of misery that had left clean tracks through the grime on her cheeks. Everyone else had come and gone to collect their monstrous purchases; only her mysterious, crazy buyer remained absent. The auctioneer tapped his fingers impatiently on his ledger, already wondering if the unusual bid had been some cruel joke. "If he really forgot you," the auctioneer mused, his voice a dry rasp, "I can't help but say you might have a stroke of good luck. Who knows? Perhaps that person had a family in Gultra and actually bought you just to kill you himself." At his words, Enid's tears flowed anew, a fresh wave of despair washing over her. They kept mentioning Gultra. It was always Gultra. How could she have done anything to her own hometown? Even if she had been resented and bullied there, she had still loved everyone. "Did... did anyone survive... in Gultra?" she asked, her voice a hoarse whisper filled with a fragile, desperate hope. Probably... probably her ailing mother and little brother had survived. They had to have.
The auctioneer raised a brow in cold amusement. "How would I know? Shouldn't you know better? I really hate witches who put on innocent faces like the one you're doing." He scoffed and turned away, picking up an evolved rodent with malevolent red eyes and heavy chains coiled over its body from the floor and placing it on his desk.
Such things were common in the cities surrounding the steep, animals that had evolved to become more powerful with four distinct grades. Those with red eyes, like the rabbit, were actually the weakest, followed by those with yellow eyes, then those with purple eyes, and finally, the most dangerous no matter their size, those with green eyes. They had appeared a hundred years ago, and since then, humans had learned to tame them into the most loyal and dangerous pets.
Just then, a knock echoed through the room, a single, firm, and unnervingly precise sound that seemed to suck the air from the space.
The auctioneer paused. "That must be your buyer," he said, his lips curling into a sneer. He walked to the door and pulled it open. Immediately, his face turned a sickly pale, and he fell to his knees with a heavy thud, his head bowing so low his forehead nearly touched the floor. "F..forgive me for delaying, Shadow Servant," he stammered, his voice trembling with profound fear. If he could have disappeared at that moment, he would not have hesitated.
In the doorway stood a deathly pale, masked figure dressed in a tattered brown cloak. Streaks of an eerie blue vein pulsed faintly across its visible skin. Its presence was a void, cold and absolute. "The Lord asked me to bring his purchase," the figure intoned, its voice devoid of any emotion, like the dry rustle of leaves over stone.
Realization dawned on the auctioneer's face, his eyes widening with terror and understanding. The Lord of the Eastern Castle bought the witch. In that case, they really were worth each other. Without another word or any ceremony, he scrambled to his feet, rushed to finalize the paperwork with shaking hands, and roughly handed the chain connected to a confused and terrified Enid over to the servant. The moment Enid met the figure's hollow eyes through its mask, a profound darkness surged up to swallow her consciousness whole. Her body went utterly limp. Without a hint of effort, the shadow servant caught her and slung her over its shoulder like a sack of grain, turning to walk silently away. Behind them, even the vicious evolved rodent on the table had curled itself into a shivering ball in the farthest corner, utterly cowed by the shadow servant's oppressive, dark aura.
---
The journey was a blank space in her memory, a void of unconsciousness punctuated only by the sensation of cold, inhumanly movement. When her consciousness finally returned it came with a throbbing ache that permeated her entire being. It felt as if her body were falling apart, as though she had been trampled by a herd of stampeding cows. She groaned, consciousness seeping back into her limbs, and her first coherent thought was about the floor beneath her. It felt profoundly different. Not the gritty, unforgiving dust she had been sleeping on for the past two weeks or the stinging bed she had slept all her life. This was cool, smooth, and unyielding. It felt like... marble. Marble! Had she been killed? Was this the afterlife?
Her eyes flew open, desperate for an answer. They were met not with celestial light, but with the dim, flickering glow of countless candles arranged on an ornate, silver candelabra. The dancing light illuminated velvet-draped curtains, a king-sized bed piled high with silken pillows, and a single, throne-like chair carved from obsidian that sat in the shadowy corner of the vast room. The air itself was thick, heavy with a terrifying, unseen pressure that weighed down on her chest, making each breath a strained effort. This was most certainly not heaven. She was alive, though. She pinched the tender skin of her arm, wincing at the sharp, confirming pain.
Then, another shocking realization struck her: she was free. The rune-carved chains that had leeched her strength and burned her skin were gone. Her wrists and ankles, though bruised and sore, were unshackled. A wild, desperate hope flared in her chest. With every ounce of strength she could muster, her muscles protesting violently, she pushed herself up from the cold, polished floor. Her bare feet whispered against the impossibly smooth surface as she stumbled toward the room's only exit, a massive, oak-carved door. Her only thought was to escape to anywhere away from everything and everyone. She did not notice the way the candle flames throughout the room dipped and flickered erratically as she passed, straining away from her as if repelled by an unseen force.
Just as her trembling fingers brushed the cold brass of the door handle, a voice, cold and flat, sounded from directly behind her, freezing her in place.
"And where might you be going?"
Her blood turned to ice. She turned slowly, her heart hammering a frantic rhythm against her ribs. There, standing in the shadowed corner of the room as if he had been a part of the darkness itself the entire time, was a man. He had long, shimmering silver hair that seemed to absorb the candlelight rather than reflect it, and piercing blue eyes that glowed with an unnatural, icy intensity. His face was so perfectly, coldly sculpted it could have been carved from marble by a dispassionate god. He was dressed in elegant attire, with a richly embroidered doublet, luxurious velvet cloak, and fine leather gloves that reflected the light. Yet Enid found no pleasure in his otherworldly beauty. He was looking at her with a detached coldness, as if she were a prey tied to a rod. His aura was immense, a crushing pressure that made her very soul want to kneel and submit in terror. If this was her buyer, the one who had paid five million gold coins, then she was not saved. She was as good as dead.
"I... I.. I.." she stuttered, her voice a trapped, breathy thing failing in her throat.
He interrupted her, his tone devoid of all emotion, a flat and absolute command. "Do it."
She turned utterly confused. Do what? "W-what?"
"What you did at Gultra. Do it again."
Her eyes instantly brimmed with fresh, terrified tears, the mention of her home reopening a wound that had never closed. "I did nothing at Gultra! I did nothing, I swear!" she cried, her voice breaking into a ragged sob.
In the next moment, he was simply there, in front of her, having crossed the room without taking a single visible step. His hand shot out, long, pale, cold fingers closing around her neck with terrifying speed. He didn't squeeze to crush, but the threat was absolute, his grip an iron promise. "Have I done anything to you?" he asked, his voice deceptively calm.
She managed a frantic, negative shake of her head, her eyes wide with pure animal fear, tears streaming down her cheeks.
"Then why are you crying?" he asked.
She shook her head again, a desperate, silent plea for mercy her mouth could not form. His hand began to close in earnest, the pressure building, cutting off her air. Black spots danced at the edges of her vision, her lungs burning for a breath they could not draw. If this continued, he would truly choke the life from her without a second thought, without a flicker of emotion. But just as her consciousness began to fray, he released her. She fell straight to the hard floor in a heap, gasping and coughing, her hands flying to her bruised throat as she dragged in ragged, painful gulps of air.
He looked down at her, his expression one of mild impatience, as if she were a stubborn tool refusing to function. "Do it," he said again, the same flat, impossible command.
"I really don't know how!" she wept, the words scraping out of her raw, abused throat.
He looked at her deeply, his piercing blue eyes seeming to strip away every layer of her being, searching for a truth, a power, a secret she did not possess and could not give him. The silence stretched, thick and heavy. "Then why did I buy you?" he asked, the question hanging in the air between them, devoid of anger or curiosity, merely a cold, logical inquiry. She wondered how on earth she was supposed to answer that. And suddenly, without another word or a shift in the air, he was simply gone. Vanished. She was left alone in the vast, silent, opulent room, with only the flickering candles and his terrifying, unanswered question for company.