At noon, in a quiet office room of Los Angeles, Detective Eason leaned back on his chair with a peaceful smile. His moment of calm was disturbed by a knock on the door.
"Come in,"
He said, leaning forward with a sigh.
Christine, his secretary, stepped in holding a stack of files.
"What's new today?"
Eason asked lazily.
Christine placed the files on his desk.
"Have you seen the news, sir?"
"Yes, I have. That murder." Eason's tone turned dry.
"Though the reports say it was done by a group of people, and the photos have been tampered with. But this is the raw photo I took just this morning."
Detective Eason pulled the photo closer. His eyes narrowed as he studied the body of a man lying in an alley—half his head gone, ankle destroyed.
The wound on the ankle looked as if it had been crushed by a steel rod with such force that the ground beneath had cracked. The head had exploded like a watermelon struck by a hammer. A punch. The mark was clear behind the wound.
Cases like this had been documented across the world, but governments had tampered with the news, keeping the truth from the public to maintain calm.
Yet the evidence in front of him made it obvious—these deaths were unnatural. Christine flipped through the file, revealing more photos and strange marks that defied explanation.
Eason exhaled heavily.
"They're getting more rampant, aren't they?"
Christine frowned but said nothing.
"Well,"
Eason muttered, leaning back again,
"we can do nothing about it. Let the government handle this… exorcist business."
"Why do you think these exorcists are coming out in broad daylight, sir?"
Christine asked quietly.
"I have no idea. And it's better if you don't."
His tone sharpened.
"We don't want our lives swept away by those superhumans, do we?"
Christine hesitated but nodded.
"Good,"
Eason said, locking eyes with her.
"Ignore these things like any normal citizen would. Our job is to deal with the crimes of ordinary people, not superhumans. All right?"
Christine lowered her gaze and gave a reluctant nod.
=====
Morvathos was now sitting inside a plane. The air hostesses moved around, tending to passengers, all of them ignoring him.
He was heading to Japan. He boarded the plane scheduled to land there—but even if it didn't, the flight would surely pass over Japan, and he could simply jump and make his way to his destination.
Before boarding, Morvathos had hunted five more couples, harvesting thirteen souls in total. By his calculation, that would yield around three thousand karmic coins.
Not nearly enough to repair the spring of reincarnation, but at least one-third of what he needed to reach the underworld.
Hope flickered in him as he settled into his seat. Harvesting souls without divine energy was no easy task.
It demanded immense mental strength—using his mind to slice through the spiritual node, wielding the scythe in a way that severed soul instead of flesh, channeling death energy to erode the soul's bond to its body.
On top of that, flying across the city to stalk his prey drained him further.
Though his body was fine, his mind was exhausted. Still, he couldn't deny that his race—aligned with death, soul, and reincarnation—had given him an edge.
Without it, he probably wouldn't have been able to reap thirteen souls at his current stage at all.
He sat quietly in the front of the business-class suite.
The passengers around him couldn't see him. This was his natural state, the way of all underworld beings—hidden from mortal eyes.
Normally, at least. But right now, Morvathos found himself locked in a silent staring contest with a woman across the cabin. She had white hair and piercing blue eyes.
A mask covered half her face, but her eyes alone betrayed her beauty. She gazed at him with a frown, unflinching.
Intrigued, Morvathos activated the Eyes of Death. What he saw made his eyes slightly widened.
'Fate's Chosen!'
The woman's aura glowed golden, signifying a destiny far beyond ordinary mortals. Normal people bore transparent auras, colored only by the karmic energy layered upon them.
But she radiated gold from the very core—her karma just as extraordinary.
She was practically a saint.
Good karma was far harder to accumulate than sin.
Even the smallest evil act could ripple out and harm many, while small acts of kindness usually touched only one person, perhaps a family at best.
Unless someone served the masses, true karmic virtue was nearly impossible to gain.
Yet this woman radiated a tier-2 karmic virtue. Morvathos almost felt the urge to rip her soul and force a reincarnation—an act that could yield nearly five thousand karmic coins.
Her soul essence alone, if refined through soul water, would add another five hundred.
She was a walking goldmine.
But Morvathos quickly crushed the thought. To harm a Fate's Chosen was to invite disaster. Interfering too much with mortal destiny already disturbed the balance of fate.
If he dared to sever the soul of one marked by fate, divine law itself would punish him—perhaps chaining him in Hell, forcing him to wither away slowly.
So he stayed still. The two of them stared silently at one another until Morvathos, exhausted, closed his eyes.
In that moment of rest, his mind replayed the karmic threads he had seen. Her virtue came from hunting so-called "demonic beasts." But Morvathos knew better. They weren't demons—they were Netherbeasts.
He had sensed faint traces of Nether energy back in Los Angeles, but it was so weak that he dismissed it.
Now, seeing her, he knew there was more to it. Nether energy should not exist in the mortal world. Something was terribly wrong.
'I wonder if fates at play here...'
Morvathos wondered. Although it sounded ridiculous but giving the fact that she was a Chosen one, he couldn't completely rule out the possibility.
'There must have been a reason behind this... does fate want to introduce her to the greater cosmos through me? But whatever the reason maybe, I must admit, fates Chosen one's are something else. Casually encountering a God while going somewhere.'
He chuckled internally at the thought. But the more he thought about it, the more he thought about it, the more likely it felt. And his instincts told similar things as well.
His race was mainly a race of Death, Soul and Reincarnation but they have high affinity for fate and karma as well. The Eyes of Death was Prof of that. And if his instincts told him his guess about this being fate was correct then it must be because of Thanaris high fate affinity.
He still can't understand what need is there for a mortal to be introduced to the Greater Cosmos this early on.
'But even if this is jot fate, I want to ask her few things. So guess I will talk to her when we land.'
When he awoke, he decided, he would question her directly. Karma only showed what she had done, not why. Her actions had been enough to unintentionally benefit countless lives, and with her fate-bound aura, even small deeds were magnified tenfold.
He was curious about the superhumans that shouldn't exist in this world.
For now, though, he allowed his body to relax. Drowsiness pulled him under.
Hours later, the plane touched down.