Eight years of misery. Eight years of hunger, cold, and fear.
But for Dathanham, those eight years had been… enough.
While he carried the firewood he would trade for half a loaf of bread in the village, his red eyes — an anomaly that made people whisper "cursed" — glowed with anticipation. Nika, his older sister, had promised to make soup today. With real potatoes.
"Big sis will be happy with all this wood," he thought, adjusting the bundle on his thin shoulders. "And maybe Leo can rest his leg today."
His middle brother, Leo, had hurt his leg a week ago. Another "accident" in a world where the life of commoners was worth less than that of a noble hunting dog.
The smell reached him before the sight.
A metallic, sweet, heavy odor that Dathanham knew well — the smell of pig's blood in the winter market, when the animals were slaughtered.
But it wasn't winter.
And they didn't have pigs.
Their hut appeared between the trees. The door — which always creaked with a specific sound that Nika imitated to make him laugh — was open. Silent.
The firewood fell to the ground.
Dathanham didn't run. His feet moved as if the ground were quicksand, each step heavier than the last.
The first sign was Nika's blue dress — the only good dress she had, inherited from a dead woman in the village. It was spread on the floor by the entrance, stained with…
Crimson.
The same color as his eyes.
The world blurred. Sounds disappeared. All that existed was that blue stained red, and beyond it…
"Nika?"
His voice came out as a hoarse whisper.
She was lying on her side, as if she had fallen while trying to flee. Her silver hair — as unusual as his own red eyes — was spread like a dirty halo. Part of it stuck to the packed-earth floor by a dark, thick substance.
Her blue eyes, which had always looked at him with endless patience when he asked questions about the world, were open. Empty. Glassy.
Staring at nothing.
Staring at her.
On her skull, right above the right temple, there was a… depression. Not a clean blade cut, but something crushed. As if someone had struck her with…
"An armor piece," whispered a distant part of Dathanham's mind. "The elbow plate. Or maybe the gauntlet."
He fell to his knees. The stones on the ground cut his skin, but he didn't feel it.
"Big sis?"
He touched her face. Cold. Colder than winter nights without fire.
"Big sis, get up. The wood… I brought wood. We're going to make… the soup…"
His fingers trembled. A stain of blood — her blood — clung to his hand. Still warm. She hadn't been gone long.
Something inside him broke.
"BIG SIIIIS!"
The scream tore through his throat, echoed in the empty forest, and came back to him like a mirror of his own agony. "NIKAAAAA!"
Hot tears rolled down his face, mixing with the blood on the floor, forming small pink rivers in the dirt.
He grabbed her dress, buried his face in the fabric that still smelled like her — wild lavender and hope — and shook. A trembling that came from the bones, that promised to shatter him.
Good things don't last forever.
Good things don't last forever.
Good things don't—
A creak.
Slow. Deliberate.
The cabin door, which was open, moved. Not by the wind. Someone was pushing it.
Dathanham raised his soaked face.
Two knights stood in the entrance.
The first looked like the angels from the stories Nika told to calm him during stormy nights. Porcelain skin, golden hair that glowed even in the dim hut, perfect features. His armor — light, adorned with silver runes — was the kind Dathanham had only seen from afar, worn by nobles passing the main road.
"High Rank," his mind whispered, registering details even in ruin. "Swordmaster apprentice, at least."
The second was a woman. Purple hair like twilight flowers, light-blue eyes like mountain ice. She wore no helmet, and her expression was… interested. Like a child watching ants before stepping on the anthill.
The blond knight smiled. A wide, genuine smile, as if he had just heard a funny joke.
"Oh, another little rat," he said, his voice melodious like a bell. "We thought the family was finished."
The purple-haired woman crossed her arms. "The youngest, it seems. The eyes… curious. Cursed, maybe?"
"Even better," the blond man laughed softly. "Killing cursed ones gives extra points for promotion, right, Lyra?"
Lyra — the woman — tilted her head. "Rule 47 of the Imperial Code: 'Unregistered magical anomalies may be eliminated by rank-A knights or higher without prior judgment.'" She recited it as if reading a menu. "But, Roran… he's just a child."
Roran, the blond man, stepped into the cabin. His steel boots stomped on Nika's dress without hesitation.
"Age isn't mentioned in the rule," he said, looking at Dathanham. "It only says 'anomalies.' And those eyes… are definitely anomalous."
Dathanham didn't move. Didn't breathe. Everything he had been — the youngest brother, the wood-gatherer, the boy who believed things would someday get better — evaporated.
In its place remained only two things:
His sister's cold body under his hands.
And the smiling eyes of the man who had killed her.
Something inside him… changed.
Not a physical change. Something deeper. As if a switch he had never known existed had been flipped.
Dathanham's red eyes, once just a strange color, began to… burn.
Not metaphorically.
A crimson glow rose within them, so intense it lit the pool of blood on the floor. The air around him distorted, like rising heat on a summer day.
Roran stopped, his smile freezing. "What…?"
Lyra straightened, showing— for the first time — something other than boredom. "Roran. That is not in the registry of common anomalies."
Dathanham didn't hear them.
All he heard was a whisper. Not coming from the knights, but from inside him. A voice ancient, cold, filled with centuries of dormant hatred.
"…they broke her smile…"
"…they stained the silver of her hair…"
"…they think they're heroes…"
"…show them…"
"…show them the price…"
"…of crimson blood…"
He opened his mouth. His voice came out different. Double. As if two people — an eight-year-old boy and something very, very ancient — spoke at the same time.
"You…"
Dathanham raised his hand, still stained with his sister's blood.
"…will regret…"
His crimson eyes shone like fallen stars.
"…ever being born."
[END OF CHAPTER]