I watched Ilya reduce her size. Standing next to the trees, her head almost touched the top branches of the nearest ones. Now at a more manageable size, she didn’t have to duck the thin, pointy branches. She walked to the chests the soldiers had brought and started looking for something.

  I turned my attention from my sister to the warrior priests. The inquisitorial squad had gathered together in a circle, preparing for some kind of ritual. They took off their cloaks and placed them on the ground. The patterns inside the cloaks made a circular, geometrical shape. They began reaching into their pockets and took out what looked like handfuls of dried grass and wooden pieces. One by one, they walked to a large thurible Inquisitor Asaki had placed in the center and dropped them in.

  With a loud exhale and a thud, Ilya sat down next to me on the pile of logs I had turned into a seat. I looked at her and the two naked swords she was holding in her hands.

  “I need to speak to you, Voss,” Ilya stated.

  “Yes?”

  “You are a death caster,” Ilya stated.

  I took in a breath and nodded.

  Ilya looked past me to Grek. “Punisher Grisslow, make sure what we discuss here remains a secret.”

  Grek gave Ilya a curt nod. “Your Grace, all information about Truechilds is classified.”

  “Good.”

  Ilya turned her attention back to me and continued, “I saw you using death in the fight with that damned.”

  I frowned. “Why does it bother you so much?”

  Ilya raised her eyebrows. “Why does death magic bother me? A better question is, why doesn’t it bother you, brother?”

  I shrugged. “Death is normal. We all die.”

  Ilya gave me a look. “That is a very grim outlook on life, Voss.” Her expression changed to one that I didn’t understand. “But, let’s not speak about that right now. What I want to discuss is your magic. And the fact that it is dangerous.”

  I turned fully to look at Ilya. “Dangerous? How? I couldn’t do anything with it.”

  Ilya gave me a long, searching look. “What do you mean you couldn’t do anything with it? A death caster is one of the most dangerous mages in the world. You could raise the dead. Create hordes of undead and take on armies.”

  I grimaced. “That sounds…”

  “Unnerving? Distressing? Perturbing?” Ilya asked when I stopped mid-sentence.

  “Pathetic,” I finished.

  Ilya blinked and asked in disbelief, “Pathetic?”

  “Yes. An army like that cannot think. Cannot react. I am not used to having a body, but even I can see that a body without a soul is pathetic.”

  Ilya opened her mouth and closed it. She started again, this time with an inquisitive look. “What do you mean that you are not used to having a body?”

  “I am a reaper,” I answered.

  “And?”

  I looked from Ilya to Grek and the others quietly listening to me. Which meant I was speaking to all the inquisitors, the punishers, and the soldiers near the cave.

  “Do none of you understand what that means?” I asked everyone.

  “No, your highness, we don’t,” Inquisitor Asaki answered for everyone.

  “I see.” I nodded and tapped my knee with a finger.

  After thinking about my answer, I began my explanation. “Father called me a reaper. I don’t know what that means for you all, but I can tell you what it means to me. I was known as the Silent One, the Hunter, and then the Silent Hunter. I was not a being separate from the dark waters of death. I was them. I could meld with them. They were a part of me, and I was a part of them. I don’t know how father pulled me out of the waters, but I can’t meld with the waters anymore.”

  Ilya frowned. “You were death?”

  I gave Ilya a chiding look. “No. There is no such thing. You need to understand what a soul is and what it means to be dead to understand me. Souls travel in the dark waters. Even yours right now is slowly traveling to the other side, swimming from one shore to the other. I kept order in my domain. I hunted the predators and fought the doom bringers—the ones you call the damned and demons, eldritch horrors that want to end the light of souls. At the apex of my power, I could travel to them in a blink of an eye and strike them down in an instant.”

  “Who gave you so much power, your highness?” Asaki walked to me and asked.

  “Gave?” I gave the old inquisitor a pained smile. “You don’t get power. You create it. I created mine by giving away my memories, my emotions, and my sense of self. Until I was as dark as the waters.”

  “Why?” Ilya asked in a horrified whisper.

  “To keep order,” I answered with an unsaid obviously.

  “What is your fixation with order, brother?” Ilya asked.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  “Order is everything. Without order, we all fall,” I replied as a matter of fact.

  Ilya looked at Inquisitor Asaki. The inquisitor nodded. “Your highness, how do you plan to use your death magic?”

  I shrugged. “To do what father has tasked me to do. I am the emperor’s executioner. I am to be the cold death he sends to a battlefield. That is who I am.”

  “Wait, are you telling me that father gave you this attunement?” Ilya asked.

  I gave Ilya and the others a searching look. “You didn’t know? Didn’t Sage tell you?”

  Ilya clenched her fist. “No. I am going to have a chat with that brat when we get back to the fortress.”

  “Well, yes. Father saw my predisposition toward death and gave me this attunement, along with ice.”

  Ilya frowned. “And this role you have been given—are you okay with that?”

  “Yes. Why shouldn’t I be? The emperor is order in this world. I keep order. I am the Silent Hunter, a hunter of the damned and doomed,” I responded easily.

  Ilya bit her thumb. “That is not right, Voss.”

  “Why?”

  Ilya frowned. “Because we are more than just the role father tasks us with.”

  Inquisitor Asaki shook his head and in his old, wheezing voice announced, “Your grace, we are satisfied by his highness’s answers. The rest is your familial matter. I would still like to accompany you in the task ahead, though.”

  I looked at the old inquisitor. “You doubted me?”

  The inquisitor bowed his head slightly. “Apologies, your highness. It is my duty to keep the Starbright Empire safe. I believe you should understand what compelled me?”

  I smiled. “I do.”

  The old inquisitor nodded and walked back to his warrior priests.

  “Well, I am not satisfied, and I am going to have a long chat with our father and mother after all of this,” Ilya glared into the distance and looked at me. “You barely know what living is, and he has turned you into a weapon.”

  I sighed. “You look displeased, Ilya. If I wouldn’t have used that death wave, I would have perished.”

  “I am not angry about that, Voss. And I am not angry with you.” Ilya took in a deep breath and calmed herself. She saw me looking at her and asked, “What?!”

  “You have asked some questions. May I ask some of mine?”

  Ilya took in a deep breath and nodded. “Go ahead.”

  “Why do you want essence?”

  One side of Ilya’s face twitched into a smile. “Isn’t it obvious, brother? I want to fight demons.”

  “Why?”

  Ilya let out a long breath. “Because they killed your previous generation of Truechilds. My brothers and sisters. The ones I was reborn with. They enthralled us and…”

  Ilya lapsed into silence with glistening eyes. She cleared her choking throat and continued, “They made us fight each other for amusement in a coliseum full of a crowd of cheering demon worshipers. I still remember the look on my brother’s face as I took off his head from his shoulders. The look of horror and pain… I will not let that happen again.”

  After a few minutes of silence, Ilya regained her composure and continued, “Anyway, then father arrived out of nowhere, freed me, and carried me back.”

  I frowned. “Is that how you got hurt? They told me that you were injured and father was taking care of you.”

  Ilya grimaced. “No.” She gave me a complicated smile. “I went looking for revenge. I found demon worshipers, and I got injured by a powerful one. That is why I am here. Father doesn’t want me in the Ilyan Isles. To be honest, neither do the Ilyan people. My actions caused a tsunami that father had to stop.”

  I closed my eyes and nodded. “Causing a tsunami to drown thousands—that sounds like doom bringers.”

  “I don’t understand why they did that. They could have just killed us all.”

  I sighed. “You don’t understand. They are demons, sister. They don’t want to kill you. That will just let your soul carry on. They want to destroy anything that represents hope. Every time they extinguish hope in souls, they come closer to bringing oblivion.”

  “Oblivion.” Ilya looked at me and shook her head. “We will talk about demons when we have the time. For now…” Ilya handed me a mana crystal and a bag full of mana-toughened meat. “Start eating again.”

  I groaned.

  Ilya snorted. “If you don’t want to eat mana, then don’t get hurt.”

  I chewed on the jerky while giving the bag a disgusted look.

  “So, what are you going to use, ice or death?” Ilya asked while looking at the two swords in her hands.

  “Ice. Father wants me to keep death a secret.”

  Ilya nodded and sheathed the thicker of the two swords in her hand. She handed the blade to me and ordered, “Don’t lose this one.”

  “Ooo…” The deep baritone of the priests made me look toward the inquisitors.

  Ilya sighed. “Ah… They have begun.”

  “What?” I asked with a mouthful of dry jerky.

  “Praying to our father,” Ilya answered.

  “Praying? I thought father does not like being called a god.”

  “It’s really hard to stop them when the prayers are answered,” Ilya chuckled.

  “What do you mean?” I put the mana crystal I was going to eat down.

  “Don’t stop eating.” Ilya stuffed the mana crystal in my mouth and continued.

  I gave my sister an annoyed look and sucked on the bland, watery crystal.

  “I don’t like it either. Because being related to him makes people look at us as demigods. Or gods. It all depends on the priests, cults, or the church you speak to.” Ilya shook her head. “I have to be more than mortal. Nobody understands the fact that I am a woman. I make mistakes. I fail. I don’t want to be held up as a symbol of divinity.”

  I sucked on the crystal and watched the warrior priests plant their spears in the ground, base first.

  “What about you? Do you want to be prayed to? Do you want to be known as a god?” Ilya asked.

  “I am a reaper,” I responded.

  Ilya shook her head. “You were a reaper, brother. Now you are a Truechild.”

  “No one can stop being a reaper. It is what my soul is,” I answered.

  “Let’s agree to disagree.”

  I gave Ilya a baffled look. Agree to disagree? What did that mean? Words were really strange.

  “Look, Master Inquisitor Asaki is beginning.”

  The punishers, including Grek, lowered themselves to one knee and bowed their heads. The soldiers fell to their knees and clasped their hands with bowed heads. The inquisitors stood tall and erect and began humming that “O” sound until their voices combined into a single deep, echoing mass.

  “Ooo… Starbright.”

  The thurible in the middle flashed bright, burning an afterimage in my eyes. I blinked and saw sparks escaping it.

  “Let thy prayers gather.”

  The inquisitors said together, and rich, fragrant smoke spiraled out of the thurible and hung in the air without dispersing.

  “Let thy spears point to the lost.”

  The spears planted in the ground shook and rotated. They spun and stopped, with symbols coming alive on their wooden shafts.

  “Let thy words guide our hands.”

  The inquisitors’ arms began to light up with similar markings to the ones on the spear shafts. They reached out to the spears and turned to the right.

  “Let thy incense set our steps to free the enslaved.”

  The thurible flew up into the air. Inquisitor Asaki caught it by its chain, and the master inquisitor followed it to the spot it tugged.

  “We beseech thee. Oh great lord of the stars.”

  The large metallic thurible hummed and began moving back and forth like a pendulum.

  “We beseech thee. Oh great lord of the stars. We beseech thee. Oh great lord of the stars. We beseech thee. Oh great lord of the stars.”

  With every beseeching prayer, the thurible began to gain momentum until it started to spin by the chain.

  The smoke created a circle of thick smoke that hung in the air without dispersing. Sparks flew out of the thurible, bathing the inside in twinkling orange dots. The dots began to expand and multiply. And then with a whoosh, they revealed a dark corridor inside the circle.

  Ilya nodded. “That’s what I meant when I said that it is hard to stop when your prayers are answered.” Ilya turned back to me and held out her hand. “Come, brother. Let’s go. It’s time for you to battle that spirit.”

  I began to rise when we heard a loud, screeching howl from the other side.

  “WHAAA…”