The thunder of twenty barrels in such a confined space turned the throne hall into a torture chamber. The pressure wave slammed into Eli's chest, stealing his breath, while the muzzle flashes seared his retinas. He couldn't see where the lead was flying; he could only feel the floor shuddering beneath his feet from the sheer violence of the volley.
The hall vanished behind a wall of gray smoke. A sharp, nauseating stench of burnt gunpowder hit his nostrils, swirling with centuries of disturbed dust. The soldiers, blinded and deafened, frantically worked their bolts; the thin clatter of spent casings against the marble sounded mockingly fragile against the ringing in his ears.
As the smoke began to curl lazily toward the floor, Eli saw the Guard.
He stood exactly where he had been. His halberd hadn't even flinched. His armor was peppered with fresh pockmarks, and at his feet lay flattened gray slugs—bullets capable of piercing a ship's hull had simply shattered against his chest. The Guard remained as indifferent as death itself.
But behind his shoulder, where the Faceless youth had stood, everything was different.
The lead—heavy, blind, and filthy—had not chosen its mark. The volley had simply shredded the space. The boy in the canvas shirt didn't get to finish his sentence; he didn't disappear in a flash of light or wave a hand in defiance. He was simply swept away.
The impact of several bullets hitting at once hurled him backward toward the base of the throne. He didn't fall gracefully. His body jerked like a downed bird, collapsing sideways with a leg twisted unnaturally beneath him. His clean white shirt turned into sticky, black-red rags in a heartbeat.
A silence fell over the hall, so thick it felt like something he could touch.
Eli took a step forward. His boot landed heavily in a pool of blood that was spreading rapidly across the ancient tiles. He looked down at the Faceless one. He was still alive, but this was not the life of a "god" or a "master of the castle." This was the agony of an ordinary man.
The youth tried to speak, but only a thick, dark froth bubbled from his lips. His eyes, which once held a look of ancient boredom, were now wide with primitive, animalistic terror. He stared at his mangled fingers, at the mess of bone and fabric, and his expression held only one thing: a childlike shock at how much—and how quickly—the flesh could hurt.
"Filthy..." he croaked, choking. "How... simple... it is."
His head lurched and fell limply onto the steps. No grand speeches. No curses. Just a heap of meat in a ruined shirt that had stopped breathing.
Eli froze. He had waited for triumph. He had expected that this creature's death would return meaning to the world and peace to his soul. But inside, there was nothing but a viscous, sickening void. He looked at his soldiers: black silhouettes coated in gunpowder soot, looking like demons who didn't even understand why they were there.
Eli tore off his helmet. The air tasted bitter. He wanted to scream, but only a dry, strangled rasp left his throat. He realized then that he would have to live with this emptiness forever.