The night after the initiation, Elian couldn't sleep.
The scent of gunpowder clung to his skin. The memory of Travis's terrified eyes burned behind his closed lids.
Even though the gun hadn't been loaded, something inside him had snapped.
He had crossed a line — not in reality, but in his soul.
And the worst part?
No one had forced him.
He had chosen.
---
At dawn, a black car waited outside his crumbling apartment building.
The driver said nothing, simply opened the door.
Inside, Lucian lounged like a lazy king, tapping idly at his phone.
"Get in, Elian," he said without looking up. "You belong to me now."
The ride was silent except for the hum of the tires and Elian's ragged breathing.
Finally, the car stopped in front of a gleaming skyscraper — black glass, no sign, its surface reflecting the sickly gray sky.
They entered through a private entrance. Past security checkpoints. Past retinal scanners. Past halls lined with steel doors and the whispers of things Elian didn't want to understand.
At the heart of the building was a single, massive office.
Floor-to-ceiling windows. A desk carved from black oak.
And standing behind it — her.
She was tall, elegant, dressed in a blood-red suit.
Her hair was a waterfall of obsidian, her lips painted the color of dried roses.
Her eyes were the worst.
They were dead.
Not cold.
Dead.
"Elian Ward," she said, her voice sharp enough to draw blood. "You are hereby contracted to The Order. Refusal is no longer an option."
A folder was placed in front of him.
Inside: a contract.
Twenty pages of impossible legalese.
At the bottom, a blank line for his signature.
"Sign," Lucian said lightly, twirling a dagger between his fingers. "Or we'll rip the pieces of you we want and discard the rest."
Elian's hands shook.
Somewhere deep inside, a small voice screamed Run.
But there was no way out. Not anymore.
He picked up the pen.
And signed.
---
The moment the pen lifted from the paper, everything changed.
The woman in red smiled.
Lucian laughed.
And Elian felt something... tear inside him.
They led him to a different room — one tiled entirely in black marble, with a silver basin at the center.
"Your baptism," Lucian said.
In the basin, dark liquid shimmered — not water. Something thicker. Heavier.
Without warning, they forced his head down into it.
Elian gasped as the liquid filled his mouth, his nose, his ears.
It wasn't just liquid. It was memories. Suffering. Screams. Death.
He saw flashes of horrors he could never unsee: wars started with a whisper, empires built on children's graves, fortunes made from blood.
When they pulled him up, he choked and staggered back.
But something had changed.
The world looked different.
Sharper.
Darker.
Colder.
The voice inside him — the one that had begged him to run — was silent now.
---
Lucian handed him a black envelope.
Inside: a single name.
> Professor Mallory Finch.
And beneath it, three words written in red ink:
> MAKE HIM DISAPPEAR.
Elian's heart thundered.
Professor Finch was one of the few teachers who had ever been kind to him — one of the only people who had seen him, not mocked him.
He looked up at Lucian, pleading.
Lucian smiled — slow and cruel.
"No one said the slaughterhouse was fair, little lamb."
Elian stood there, the envelope burning in his hand, the black contract still fresh with his signature.
The rain outside blurred the city into a smear of gray and silver.
He had wanted power.
He had wanted revenge.
He had wanted to stop being the one who suffered.
But at what cost?
The devil's game had begun.
And Elian was no longer a pawn.
He was a weapon.