Raphael slumped to the floor, coughing. Each breath tasted like copper and bile. Through a red haze, he saw Darion. His brother looked like a broken marionette—face pulped, limbs bent at angles that made Raphael want to vomit.
"Get up," Raphael hissed internally. His vision was a blurred smear of greys and reds. He pushed his palms into the dirt, feeling the grit grind into his raw skin. He spat a thick glob of blood and forced his shaking knees to lock.
He didn't look at the exit. He looked at Levi.
One step. His hip screamed.
Two steps. The world tilted.
Three steps.
The Blood Weave hummed under his skin—a faint, desperate warmth. It started to stitch the frayed edges of his sight back together. Just enough, he thought. Just enough to see the man I'm going to kill.
In the corner, Gordon felt the world shrinking. The roar of the massacre had faded into a high-pitched ring that drowned out everything else. He wasn't in his home anymore; he was in a cold, silent void.
"I hate you."
The words were tiny, distant needles. Gordon's eyes flickered. The void cracked.
The smell hit him first—the heavy, sweet stench of an open vein. He saw his wife, motionless, a pale ghost on the floor. He saw the titan standing over his children. And then, he saw Raphael.
"Raph...ael..." Gordon's voice was a dry rattle. "Your... your mother..."
Raphael's head snapped toward him. The boy's face was a mask of gore, but his eyes were burning with a terrifying, lucid clarity.
"I hate you!" Raphael shrieked. The tears carving tracks through the blood on his cheeks weren't from pain—they were pure venom. "You just stood there! He touched her, he broke her, and you just watched! You're a coward! Look at her! Look at what you let him do!"
The words hit Gordon harder than Levi's fists ever could. He didn't defend himself. He couldn't. On trembling hands and knees, Gordon began to crawl. He ignored the insults, dragging his broken body toward his wife's hand. He just wanted to touch her skin one last time.
"Don't touch her!" Raphael lunged, but a heavy boot intercepted his path.
Levi grabbed the boy by the throat, hoisting him up. The giant looked at the child with a disturbing, fatherly pride. "Strong. Mean. Uselessly brave. Leo is going to love you."
Levi turned his gaze to the shadows where the other two children huddled. "The Dark Kings have a use for stray dogs with bite. You're coming with me."
"I'll... kill you..." Raphael clawed at the iron-hard wrist. He gathered every scrap of Blood Weave left in his marrow, channeling it into a single, desperate fist.
The punch landed with a dull thud against Levi's chest.
There was a sickening crack—not of Levi's ribs, but of Raphael's own hand. The boy's fingers shattered against the titan's muscle. Raphael screamed, a raw, primal sound, and immediately drew back his other hand to do it again.
"Stop," Levi sighed, catching the second fist effortlessly. "Or I kill the father and the little ones right now. Your choice, brat."
Raphael froze. His chest heaved, his mangled hand dripping blood onto Levi's boots.
"I'll kill you," Raphael whispered, his voice cracking. "I swear it. I'll slaughter every one of you."
Levi just laughed, scooped up the other two children like sacks of grain, and walked out into the night.
Present Day
"And we did," Raphael said.
The memory flickered out like a dying candle. He was standing in his father's bedroom now, his boots clicking softly on the polished wood.
Gordon sat in his chair, a shell of a man. His skin was the color of parchment, his eyes fixed on a spot on the wall that didn't exist. He didn't blink. He didn't even seem to breathe.
Raphael watched him for a long moment, the old hatred bubbling up, but finding nowhere to land. "That silence," Raphael sneered, reaching for the door handle. "It's why I can't stand to look at you. You're still just watching, aren't you?"
He slammed the door, leaving the old man in the dark.
The Crimson Tide
The empire didn't care about the scars of three brothers. The Night of Crimson was coming.
In Dragon City, the spires were being draped in scarlet banners to honor Kaiser Darkhaven—the man who had turned a butcher's trade into a throne. To the royals, he was a god. To the lower class, his legacy was a tax.
In the slums of the outskirts, reverence looked a lot like starvation. Ezekiel and Kennedy worked until their hands bled, skipping meals to scrape together the "tribute" demanded by the Emperor.
In Nefaria, you either paid in gold, or you paid in blood.
The streets sang with the howls of beasts, and more lives were lost under the veil of darkness.
The Night of Crimson had begun.
The Night of Crimson didn't begin with a roar, but with the frantic, rhythmic scuttle of servants. In the bowels of the royal castle, silver was polished until it screamed, and silk tablecloths were smoothed over mahogany with trembling hands. This wasn't just a party; it was a religious observance of power.
The ballroom was a cavern of opulence. Tables groaned under the weight of roasted meats, but the real centerpiece sat in the crystal glassware. Bioluminescent blood—thick, swirling, and pulsing with a soft, eerie neon glow—clung to the sides of the cups. The Darkhaven royals sipped the vintage ichor like fine wine, their hushed conversations weaving a tapestry of courtly gossip and ancient pride.
They were waiting.
The heavy doors didn't just open; they yielded.
Kael Darkhaven stepped into the room, and the air seemed to thin. He didn't walk; he prowled. His attire was a sharp study in violence and elegance—a blood-red shirt silk-spun with snaking obsidian patterns, paired with charcoal trousers. An emerald hung at his throat, a drop of green envy against a sea of red.
His hair, once a modest length, now tumbled down his back in a raven-black mane that seemed to absorb the candlelight. He looked less like a king and more like a predator that had deigned to wear a crown.
He stepped onto the dais, his lips pulling back into a grin that was all teeth. He cleared his throat, a sound like grinding stones.
"Welcome to the Night of Crimson," Kael began, his raspy voice effortlessly filling the hall. "We drink tonight not just for ourselves, but for the ghost of Kaiser Darkhaven. He saw a world of warring rabble and forged it into an empire. He gave us the blood we drink and the floor we stand upon."
He lifted a chalice from the podium, the bioluminescent liquid casting a ghostly blue light across his sharp features.
"To the man who paved the road we walk. To the First Emperor!"
"To the First!" the room echoed, a hundred glasses rising in a synchronized wave of light.
Away from the spotlight, at a table draped in shadows, the royal brood watched their father with varying degrees of cynicism.
"There he goes again," Loki muttered, leaning back in his chair. He adjusted his embroidered sleeves, his pristine face tight with a mix of awe and annoyance. "Does he have to be that dramatic? It's a toast, not a theater production."
"Oh, shut up, Loki," his sister, Raven, retorted. She adjusted her dark hair, her eyes never leaving her father. "You're just moody because when you walk into a room, the only thing that happens is the servants wonder if you're going to complain about the drapes. Dad has presence."
"Presence? Is that what we're calling it?" Loki scoffed. "The girls at the Academy don't even know my name. They just call me 'Little Kael.' It's degrading. I'm my own person!"
"You're a child," a deep, rumbling voice cut in. Mars, the eldest, didn't look up from his plate. "Mind your tongue, Loki. You're at a state dinner, not a tavern."
"Mind your own business, Mars," Loki snapped, though he visibly stiffened.
Mars shifted his gaze, his eyes narrowing into slits. "Make me."
The tension was a physical weight until their mother leaned forward, gracefully swirling the glowing blood in her glass.
"Darlings, please," she mused, a dangerous sparkle in her eyes. "If you're going to kill each other, do it on the lawn. I'd hate to get brains on this silk. Though," she added with a sharp smile, "I would pay to see Mars put you in a headlock, Loki."
"Thanks, Mom," Loki grumbled, returning to his food.
Raven chuckled, leaning toward her mother. "It's okay, Mom. When these two finally take each other out, I'll be the one left to wear the crown. It'll look better on me anyway."
Mars and Loki both choked on their meat simultaneously.
"In your dreams," they wheezed in unison.
The laughter at the table was cut short not by a sound, but by a sudden, violent chill.
A swirl of violet mist snaked across the floor, extinguishing the candles as it passed. The bioluminescent blood in the cups flickered and died. The room plummeted into a bruised darkness, lit only by the frantic sparks of defensive magic.
"What is this?" Kael's voice boomed, no longer celebratory. "Who dares?"
The purple shadows didn't dissipate; they condensed. A localized gale shrieked through the hall, flipping heavy tables and sending fine china shattering against the stone walls like shrapnel. The Darkhavens reacted with instinct, summoning shimmering red barriers of blood magic to deflect the flying debris.
When the wind died down, a figure stood in the wreckage of the center aisle.
He was a contrast to the room's gothic red—dressed in heavy, layered travelling clothes and a sweeping cloak the color of a twilight sky. His hair was a wild, curly violet, and when he raised his head, his eyes were the most striking feature: amethyst irises with pupils the color of dried scabs.
Most unsettling of all? When he spoke, his teeth were flat. Human.
"My apologies for the mess," the stranger said. His voice was smooth—dangerously sweet, like honey laced with arsenic. "But some things cannot wait for the dessert course."
He raised a gloved hand, pointing a single finger at Kael.
"Kael Darkhaven. I am here to take you into custody for crimes against the balance. You can walk out of here in chains, or you can stay here in pieces. The choice is yours."
A low, guttural laugh vibrated in Kael's chest. He stepped down from the ruined stage, a blade of solidified, glowing blood forming in his palm with a hiss of steam.
"You trash my home, frighten my children, and demand my surrender?" Kael's aura exploded outward, a shockwave of crimson pressure that turned the floorboards to splinters. "You've got spirit, boy. I'll give you that."
The King leveled his sword at the intruder's throat. "Give me a name to carve on the headstone."
The man smiled, unfazed by the killing intent rolling off the Emperor.
"Slade. Of the Shadows."
Kael tilted his head, his mane of black hair shifting. "The Shadows? Never heard of you."
"You weren't supposed to," Slade replied, his violet eyes glowing. "Until today."
Kael gripped his hilt, his fangs fully descending. "Well, Slade... let's see if your blood is as purple as your hair."