As the last ray of sunlight vanished, the dilapidated walls of the house began to tremble, as if the place itself feared what was being born in its darkness. Leo, who moments ago was a mere shackled human, began to shake violently. It wasn't a shudder of fear, but the labor pains of a power buried long beneath mortal skin.
Leo inhaled, and suddenly, the rhythm of his breath shifted from a weary human wheeze to a terrifying exhale that echoed in the corners of the room. He whispered in a voice rising from a bottomless abyss:
— "I feel this human shackle cracking... it's as if I am breathing for the very first time."
The transformation ravaged his body; his frail muscles expanded with brutal strength, and his bones emitted sickening cracks as they reshaped themselves. But what struck terror into the hearts of those watching was his black hair—it began to grow at an insane speed, cascading over his shoulders like a waterfall of liquid shadows, shimmering with a mysterious glint as if woven from the threads of an eternal night.
Leo was no longer the young man who evoked pity; the era of helplessness was over. His body rose slightly off the ground while a deep crimson aura erupted from his chest, cloaking the room in a terrifying majesty. He inhaled the scent of the place deeply, and suddenly, his nose wrinkled in disgust. He didn't smell wood or food; he smelled Death. Beneath those floorboards that appeared clean lay human blood that had dried long ago—souls crushed here whose scent remained trapped in Leo's newly awakened senses.
Leo turned toward the Leader, who was stumbling back and rubbing his eyes in disbelief. Leo's eyes were now burning crimson behind the long strands of hair covering half his face. He spoke in a cold, provocative tone:
— "You aren't human either... so why the surprise?"
The Leader froze and let out a hysterical scream to his men: "What are you waiting for? Attack him! He's only one man!" He began to scramble for the exit. But with a single word that felt like an iron shackle, Leo commanded: "Stop."
Everyone was pinned in place; even the Leader found his feet rooted to the floor. Leo approached with heavy strides, stood before him, and said mockingly:
— "Going somewhere? Didn't you say you'd take my eyes as a souvenir? Here they are... the color of blood."
A terrifying silence fell, then Leo spoke with a haunting calmness: "Deny your own eye."
The Leader's eyes widened in horror. He stammered in a trembling voice, "What?.. What do you mean?"
Leo didn't answer; he only offered a dark smile. Suddenly, the Leader shrieked in terror as he saw his own hands moving against his will. They rose slowly toward his face as he screamed: "My hands! What are they doing?! Stop!" His hands did not stop. He plunged his fingers deep into the socket of his first eye amidst the shock and screams of his subordinates, while Leo watched the scene with absolute coldness.
Then, Leo threw an old, rusted sword at the man's feet and said: "I will forgive you... if you can kill all your followers with this sword."
The Leader grabbed the sword with a shaking hand and looked at his men, who began to scream in panic. He silenced them with a savage glare, then turned to Leo and asked in a voice filled with a desperate greed for life: "Will you really forgive me?"
Leo replied with a lethal chill: "Yes. I will not let your hand pluck out your other eye."
The massacre began. The Leader slaughtered his followers one by one with Leo's sword, while Leo watched in silence, sinking into his dark thoughts: (How can he sacrifice them so easily? And why are they so obedient to him even as he butchers them? Why did my own people not accept me in my old world despite my protection, while these fools follow this traitor to their deaths?)
After the Leader finished, he fell to his knees, gasping for air. The sweat of terror mingled with the blood of his followers. His body shook from the weight of the pain throbbing in his empty eye socket, and his tears—which fell as blood—covered his pale face. He looked up at Leo with his one remaining eye, filled with brokenness and pleading, and stammered, "I have done what you wanted... Have you forgiven me?"
Leo didn't let him finish. In a flash faster than lightning, Leo plunged his fingers into the Leader's second eye and ripped it out with chilling indifference. A shriek pierced the silence of the night—a sound that didn't seem human—as the man fell to the ground, thrashing in his own blood, clutching his face as agony tore through his soul.
Leo wiped the blood from his hand and said with a mocking sneer, "Well, now we have a deal."
Leo raised the sword to end his suffering, but suddenly, the place vibrated with a deep, non-human voice. It was the dragon Fru, his voice weaving through the air to stop Leo's final blow:
— "Stop, Leo! Ask him about the stones! How will we know their location if he dies now?"
The blade stopped inches from the Leader's throat. Leo's crimson eyes burned with rage as he turned slowly toward the source of the voice, speaking in a sharp tone full of pride:
— "Since when do you give me orders, Fru? No one dictates what I do."
Leo turned toward the Leader on the ground and hissed:
— "Where are the stones? Speak, before I make death a distant dream for you."
Despite his blindness and agony, the Leader clamped his lips shut, refusing to answer. Leo glanced back at Fru with a sarcastic smirk. "Well, it seems you have your answer... he doesn't want to talk."
At that moment, Fru intervened with his mental prowess, addressing the Leader directly:
— "Tell me where the stones are... and I promise you, we will not kill you."
The Leader let out a bitter, bloody laugh. "And why should I trust you?" he wheezed. "What guarantees you won't betray me just as this monster did?"
Fru replied coldly: "Because your life is literally in my hands right now, and I am the only one who can restrain Leo."
Leo's rage boiled over at the interference and the sense that the dragon was negotiating behind his back. In a violent surge of temper, Leo slammed his sword into the ground, shattering the stone right beneath the Leader's feet. The man recoiled from the sheer force of the blow, finally surrendering in a shattered voice:
— "All the secrets... the ancient books... they are in the Great Library. There is research there that dates back to before we even came to this world."