Along a dark corridor, deserted from the naive comfort of the mortal world, columns of weak limbs battered by miles of walking staggered across the floor of an enclosed chamber. Their cries, sharpened to the highest pitches, dug into the silence of the atmosphere like rabies-infected madness unleashed. Rusty chains hung from the ceiling swayed side to side, as if in response to the contraction of their strained muscles.

  “The clown is dead. He is DEAD.” Something not quite human exclaimed. Its shivering breath fluctuated, while a hint of excitement masked quietly beneath.

  “What happened?”

  “How?!!”

  “Tell me more!”

  The gossip instantly rose to a rippling note, charging the tension in waves of volumes that overlapped each other voice until all sounds merged and flattened into a shriek. Suddenly, a den of snakes slithered out from the shadow and attacked the source of the loudest voice, ripping the vocal cord and veins apart until the figure was eventually shredded into pieces. In that split second of obscene violence, the madness of this chamber was tamed like muting lab dogs.

  Silence followed quickly and locked all the breathing in the coldness of sweat.

  Feeling the chill anger, a pathetic voice tried to entertain the aggressor, “King, welcome back.”

  There was no reply.

  The voice pressed on, “Damned us for such rudeness! Damned us! Please punish us for our ignorance in not expecting your return and enlighten us with the reason why you come back early from the tower?” He slammed his head repetitively against the concrete floor.

  This action, however, was received as an annoying gesture. If his desperate plea was meant to hide their displeasure of seeing the King’s return, it certainly failed to deliver such an impression. A snake crawled on the floor and hissed in response. However, the off-tune repetitive cry defeated by fear crippled into the aggressor’s eardrum like a poor existence begging for sympathy. This succeeded in amusing their master; his lip stretched into a lop-sided smile as he finally decided to grace their poor curiosity.

  “I’m bored.”

  For a mouth that hid dirty cannibal teeth, the words came out almost with a haunting gentleness that claimed territorial dominance over every mind. Shiver came in pulses, stirring all the submissive sensations of ghosts and demons alike, who were enslaved in the depth of this chamber for hundreds of years.

  Beyond the piles of young corpses, both human and demons, rotting down to the blackest of bones, he stood firm against the pitch-black reckoning of Hell’s desire. A cobra slid over the corpses toward his arm and twirled around his neck.

  The slaves looked up in fearful awe. Their King was really back from the tower.

  Maintaining his smile, King Cobra resumed, “Listen, my dear slaves, the tower has now been transferred. In the Bay Bellamy town, it has gripped its roots and become taller. This is a sign that the auras of all the towns are darkening and the wheel of fortune is turning in our favour. More and more new souls will sign contracts with demons and the plain of darkness will expand.” He held up a wine glass half-filled with blood in a celebrative motion.

  The slaves listened attentively, afraid to miss a single breath of his words. One of them, wrapped in heavy bandages, walked forward and started gasping in breathless laughter as a gesture of applause. Her sharp bloody tongue stuck in and out between gaps of needle-thin teeth, twitching by default. Aroused, she murmured in repetitive excitement, “Ceremonial indeed, ceremonial indeed.”

  “But none of the souls we have collected so far have yielded any progress in our hunt for that one soul. It is an utter disappointment, yet again.”

  The slaves started to wail in shock, filling the chamber quickly with agonising heat.

  “For centuries I have gone back there just to trace and read his memory. Bit by bit they build up an incomplete story that confuses and torments me. Why is it incomplete? Why does it have to be his memory THAT IS INCOMPLETE?” Like a dopamine rush, King Cobra’s pitch built up dramatically with every question, prompted by inquisitive looks on the slaves’ faces.

  “What if the tower has never managed to record all of his memories from different reincarnations?” The mad slave shoved herself to the front, onto the floor, pushing away other clumsy slaves who were bending their knees behind.

  The elite demon laughed eerily at this assumption, without reserving any bits of temper. Some slaves began to cry while others started to bite their nails, losing their last strand of sanity over the echoes of his chuckle.

  “It’s impossible. The tower breathes. It breathes and responds to your desire. It reads your energy and leads you to the right demon and human with the same wavelength. At the same time, it also records the energy as a part of its memory. In all of that man’s reincarnations, he had gone to the tower and sealed his final fate there, ending everything connected to him in a deadly massacre.” The King dipped his finger into the blood in his glass and looked at it in daze, as his finger swirled the thickness of the liquid. “Our only choice is to bring different souls’ memories back to the tower and complete the missing puzzle.”

  Somehow there was a hint of passion in his voice, one of romanticisation that seemed to caress this thrill of chase.

  Feeding the rush of anxiety, the mad demon whispered eagerly, “But you don’t look too disappointed.” Those words came out boldly from her mouth as her bloody tongue dripped saliva carelessly on the floor. It was a sight akin to an unhygienic eating manner unconfined by her constant thirst for flesh. “Is the meal I offered you to your liking?”

  “You mean the one you offered me at the entrance just now?” The King smiled back at her as he twirled the blood-filed glass lightly with his hand gripping on the stem. “Well, her soul is too immature to remember anything useful.”

  “Oh my… I am utterly sorry. Please punish me all you want!!”

  “Not that fast, my dear subject, or must I say, my perfect prototype. Our intuition is perfectly aligned. Your victims coincide beautifully with my encounter in the tower."

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  “Oh, no you flatter me!!! Pray tell, how did it coincide with your encounter? Who is that person? Who did you meet?”

  “An unfortunate man, whose soul trauma called him back to the tower, which he saw as a calling to save his own children. During our encounter, a record of his memory seeded back from hundreds of years ago was shed. In that memory, I glimpsed into the eyes of his little son.”

  There was a moment of silent before he finally gave an order. “Get that boy. That boy knows him, that little boy knows that man.”

  “The little boy, Tin?”

  Outskirt of the Bay Bellamy town

  (A few hours ago)

  Somewhere four hours by train from the Lotus town, on the far outskirts of the Bay Bellamy town, a large crowd of people could be seen swarming around a towering, majestic building, anchoring into the depth of the earth like a cancer sprouting from a rotten seed. The tranquility of a mundane life was long forgotten here, yet the presence of the building stood divine against the backdrop of a starry night, much to the satisfaction of their blinded eyes. Its shadow casted a hunting emptiness over the abandoned landscape, leaving a shallow heart with an enriched feeling of a glorified loneliness.

  Inside the tower, many malicious mages were hanging around at random points. Some were sleeping, while others were playing cards, smoking and drinking alcohol. Most of them bore a look stranded from reality, almost as if they were living in a different world.

  Amidst this wasted setting, a panting sound was heard hurrying down a narrow spiral staircase, accompanied by a series of trembling steps that ended in a careless stumble, which cost the escapee a twisted ankle. Bruises slowly appeared all over his body and tainted his lungs.

  “Stop it, please—stop it, I reject your contract! I reject it!” Coughing out volume of blood, his eyeballs swelled and rolled to the back of his head. “You are…not what I ask for.”

  The bruised skin busted open, making ways for snakes made of blood to crawl out in dancing motions, staining the floor as they slowly sank into the shadow stuck between every visible corner.

  The malicious mages nesting by the staircase looked at the battered man and immediately fled the scene without a second glance. Like a chain reaction, other mages followed out, until only a couple of curious drunkard eyes were left to witness the unfolding tragedy.

  “I’m sorry, father is terribly sorry.” These few words parted from his lips settled on a declining note, as senses started to retreat from his consciousness. Left with a blurry vision, he clung onto the image of his wife and two children, repetitively calling out to them.

  A cobra sign appeared on his neck and engraved into his flesh with a sharp burning intensity. The dying man raised his arm midair in an attempt to reach the image in his mind.

  “Father promises to protect you from this darkness. Father promises to prevent our tragedy and make our family whole forever. Please, run…run....” His last word stretched until it fell to a flatline.

  “This…is…” The drunkards’ faces lit up in childish excitement. Feasting their eyes, they watched with curiosity as the blood thinned across the cold ground and threaded into a pattern that formed a large cobra symbol under the fresh corpse, much like the one on his neck.

  It was a sign that his body and soul was claimed by an elite demon.

  In Tin’s home

  Mrs. Sunny Yang jolted awake from a nightmare. She recalled her husband’s voice ringing in her dreamy head like a broken radio that kept on repeating “Run, run ,run”, until it felt too physical to ignore.

  When she looked up, everything inside the room seemed to condense toward her in shapes of panic. Panting heavily, she closed her mouth and cried in silence. Tin was sleeping beside her with his arms wrapped around her waist. The moonlight pierced through the pale-coloured curtain and softly lit the little boy’s face with a glittering touch. Like a gentle embrace, it soothed her sadness.

  “Darling, you shouldn’t have left to find the tower. Then maybe, Su wouldn’t have disappeared, Tin wouldn’t get hurt, and you would still be by our side, making this family complete. That tragedy you speak of, that foolish prophecy, is all but a demonic deceit to take you away from us! We are fucking cursed!! To hell, we are fucking cursed!!!” She swallowed her cry with a mouthful of nasty words.

  Her husband’s warning still throbbed heavily in her ears, but she was too overwhelmed to give it much thought. Sitting in total defeat, the stillness was the only thing that kept her composure intact, but it was momentary.

  Dark clouds quickly swallowed the moonlight and spread evenly across the horizon until every bit of the sky was obscured. Without a warning, heavy rain poured down, followed by an aggressive thunder clap, lighting the room in flash for a split second.

  Tin woke up in fear and hugged his mom tightly.

  “Don’t worry Tin, it’s just rain. Mom is right here. You are alright. Mom will protect you from anything! From any terrible things!” She raised her voice as if to warn of anything that might be approaching them.

  Every drop of rain seemed to stiffen upon impact against the roof, sending a deafening rhythm like a rapid firing of bullets.

  His mother reassurance failed to ease his fear. It engulfed his heart and hardened his muscle to the point the pain ached right into the bone. Tin hugged her stronger and stomped his legs in an irresistible outburst of agitation.

  The mother pulled him into a tighter embrace, “Don’t be scared! Be a strong boy! Your mother is here!”

  Tin couldn’t stop his tears, but seeing how hard his mom maintained her posture, he attempted to put up a strong face and nodded his head to all her words like a good boy.

  A loud crashing sound followed by a blackout across the street outside alarmed both of them. It sounded like something had broken the window and allowed all the rain in.

  “What is that?” Sunny quickly grabbed a jade charm under her pillow and pointed the Lord symbol engraved on the plate in all directions.

  Tin held on to her and cried, “Mom, they are here, they are here to take us!”

  “Hush now! What nonsense is that!” Sunny pulled Tin closer toward her with her free arm and barked at all the dark corners as she flashed her charm at them, “Get away! You lowly creature! I warn you or I will kill you! All of you! Kill you and burn you in hell!”

  Tin looked at his mother and mimicked her bark, “Give Su back and get out! Get out, you monster!”

  But nature left them even more defenceless as the rain matured into a storm, bringing with it an unceasing clapping of thunder, which enhanced the paranoia in the room. A darkening energy engulfed the atmosphere.

  As if his vision got blurred, Tin pulled back and rubbed his eyes and looked at his mother again. Her head moved from one direction to another but right behind her neck he suddenly spotted an eye staring straight into his.

  Tin was petrified, “Mom, something’s on your neck!”

  To his surprise, his mother turned around and glared at Tin with bloodshot eyes.

  “It’s you! You are the devil! You are the DEVIL!”

  She grabbed Tin and shoved him violently from one side to another, repeating her accusation like a madwoman. Tin screamed at the top of his lungs and pleaded his innocence, but it all fell on deaf ears.

  She stood up and pulled his legs down the bed, and dragged him across the floor toward the blank wall as he tried to grab on to anything he could to stop the motion.

  “It’s written over your head! You evil boy, remove that damned thing! Remove it!”

  She threw him against the wall with an abnormal superhuman strength. The force almost shocked his lungs, but before he had time to comprehend his situation, he fell face down to the floor.

  Without any second to waste, his mom advanced again, “Remove that damned thing on your head!”

  Tin quickly built up the strength to face her and resisted her touch. Locked eye to eye, he uttered, “You are not my mom!”

  Tears welled down his eyes as he braced himself, “Give her back! Give my mom back!”

  He threw his fists randomly at her face to wake up her senses. The women stood still for a second, her lip slowly stretched into a wide grin, but those angry eyes seemed even more pissed.

  “How amusing?”

  Just when she was about to manhandle him, a group of Angels broke the windows with chains and bound her hands and torso.

  Chan stood in the middle of the group and swung his hand midair as he commanded, “Take Tin away now!”.