Years had passed.

  Grion had long stopped feeling pain.

  The experiments, the torture—none of it mattered anymore.

  He no longer flinched when they cut him open, no longer screamed when they seared his flesh just to measure how fast he would regenerate.

  He had become something else.

  A hollow shell of hatred, waiting for the right moment.

  And then, one day, it came.

  Most of the knights and mages had left the laboratory.

  Grion listened carefully as the remaining ones chatted, their voices laced with boredom, oblivious to the monster they had created.

  "The king has declared war on the eastern kingdoms. Almost all the royal knights have been deployed."

  "The Grand Mages too. They’re out leading enchantments on the battlefield."

  War.

  Their insatiable greed had finally led them into conflict with their own kind.

  Perfect.

  Grion curled his fingers, his hands shifting, stretching into massive, brutish fists, thick with the sinew of an ogre.

  He took a slow, deep breath—

  And swung.

  The chamber trembled.

  The enchanted glass of his prison quivered under the force of his blow.

  The thick containment fluid rippled violently, sloshing against the walls of his cage.

  The mages nearby turned, their idle expressions twisting into horror.

  Grion swung again, his monstrous fist hammering against the glass.

  A web of fractures snaked across its surface, veins of death splintering outward.

  The magic struggled, crackling, failing to hold.

  One more.

  One final blow.

  The chamber exploded into chaos as the glass shattered into a thousand jagged shards, the containment liquid flooding across the cold stone floor.

  Grion collapsed forward, gasping for air, his body trembling as the thick, suffocating fluid drained away.

  His muscles, weak from years of confinement, spasmed as they awakened once more.

  For a moment, there was silence.

  Then—

  Panic.

  "H-He’s loose!" a mage shrieked, scrambling backward.

  "Sound the alarm! Get the—!"

  Too late.

  Grion’s legs twisted, his form shifting in an instant.

  Muscles thickened, bones stretched, and in the blink of an eye, he launched forward with the speed of a dire wolf.

  His claws found flesh.

  The mage barely had time to scream before Grion’s talons sliced through his face, carving deep trenches into his skull.

  Blood sprayed in wild arcs as Grion’s clawed foot slammed down, crushing the man’s head like a ripe fruit.

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  The wet crunch echoed through the room.

  The first kill.

  But not the last.

  Grion’s eyes turned to the rows of containment tubes lining the walls.

  Monsters—hundreds of them—trapped, suffering, waiting.

  Some had lost their sanity long ago, their eyes void of reason.

  Others still had flickers of rage, smoldering embers buried beneath years of torment.

  They were like him.

  Victims of human cruelty.

  Grion raised a fist and drove it into the release levers.

  Glass exploded.

  The liquid prison gushed forth, releasing its captives into the world once more.

  Goblins shrieked as they scrambled free, their thin, wiry limbs twitching with newfound energy.

  Gnolls bared their yellowed fangs, their snarls reverberating through the chamber.

  Ogres and trolls blinked as their massive forms dripped with containment fluid, their monstrous eyes adjusting to the sight of freedom.

  They stood there, stunned, hesitant—

  Until they realized.

  They were free.

  And they wanted blood.

  The remaining knights and mages burst into the chamber, weapons drawn.

  "Contain them! Do not let them escape!"

  Grion smirked.

  "You should be more worried about yourselves."

  A knight charged, his sword gleaming under the laboratory’s dim glow.

  Grion did not move.

  The blade struck his shoulder, cleaving through flesh and bone.

  The knight’s lips curled into a triumphant grin—

  Until Grion’s body stitched itself back together before his very eyes.

  The grin faltered.

  Fear took its place.

  Grion’s hand morphed, his fingers elongating into razor-sharp talons.

  With inhuman speed, he grasped the knight’s head, his claws sinking into the soft flesh of his cheeks.

  With one monstrous pull—

  The head tore free from the body, spine still dangling from the mangled flesh.

  The knight’s body convulsed, a wet gurgle escaping his throat before collapsing into the growing pool of blood.

  Grion inhaled deeply, the scent of death thick in the air.

  It smelled good.

  A mage stumbled backward, hands shaking as he whispered a spell.

  His lips barely formed the final syllable when a horde of goblins descended upon him, their jagged daggers and claws plunging into his stomach, his throat, his eyes.

  His scream turned to a wet, choking gurgle as they ripped him apart, tearing at his flesh like starved animals.

  A troll seized another knight in its massive, gnarled hands.

  The man struggled, kicking, screaming—

  Until the troll’s jaws snapped shut, his head vanishing between its yellowed teeth.

  Blood gushed down the troll’s chin as it chewed, savoring the taste.

  More knights fell. More mages perished.

  Limbs were torn from sockets.

  Throats were ripped open.

  Bodies were trampled under the weight of a stampede of monstrous fury.

  The laboratory was drowning in death.

  And at the center of it all, Grion stood, watching.

  For years, the humans had experimented on them, tortured them, reduced them to nothing more than flesh to be studied, to be used, to be discarded.

  Now, the tables had turned.

  Now, the monsters were in control.

  And there would be no mercy.

  Not until every single human in this cursed place was dead.

  Grion did not stop.

  The humans had stolen everything from him—his family, his people, his very life.

  So he would take everything from them.

  He walked among them, hidden in plain sight, his body shifting with ease.

  A noble draped in silk and gold, sipping wine with the elites.

  A merchant with a warm smile, peddling his wares in the bustling markets.

  A wandering priest, whispering false prayers to the faithful.

  A kind old man, offering sweets to unsuspecting children.

  He wore their faces, spoke in their voices, walked in their streets.

  And when the sun dipped below the horizon—

  He became their nightmare.

  It began like a whisper.

  A single house reduced to cinders, flames licking the night sky.

  A merchant found sprawled across his counter, his body twisted and mangled beyond recognition.

  Then, an entire noble household, slaughtered in their sleep—blood pooling beneath silken sheets, their once-opulent chamber now a silent grave.

  Fear took root.

  The people spoke in hushed voices, their eyes darting at every shadow.

  A demon walked among them, they whispered.

  A creature of death, unseen, unstoppable.

  Yet none of them knew.

  Because he was one of them.

  And then the whispers became screams.

  Towns fell, one after another, reduced to nothing but smoldering ruins.

  Villages were erased from existence, their streets littered with lifeless bodies.

  Cities drowned in rivers of blood.

  No one was spared.

  Men clutched their swords with trembling hands, only to fall before they could swing.

  Women ran, pleading for mercy, only to collapse with crimson staining their dresses.

  Children hid beneath beds, in closets, in dark corners—whimpering, praying.

  But prayers could not save them.

  Their screams echoed through the night, but they were nothing compared to the agony that had once shattered his world.

  The pain they felt now was a mere whisper of what he had endured.

  Because when his family cried for help—no one came.

  He remembered his wife's gentle smile, the way her voice was soft as morning dew.

  He remembered his daughter’s laughter, bright and pure as sunlight.

  Gone.

  Gone like the wind that carried the scent of burning flesh.

  Gone like the lives he now took without hesitation.

  So he burned their homes.

  Tore their families apart.

  Made them feel everything he had felt.

  For months, his rage swept across the land, a storm of endless destruction.

  And yet, deep inside—

  It was not enough.

  No matter how many lives he stole, how much blood he spilled—

  The emptiness remained.

  The grief still clung to him like a curse, refusing to fade.

  No amount of suffering could ever bring them back.

  One night, beneath the glow of the pale moon, Grion stood alone in a city that no longer breathed.

  The streets were littered with bodies, their vacant eyes staring into nothingness.

  The scent of fire and death thickened the air, suffocating, overwhelming.

  And yet—he felt nothing.

  He had waited for satisfaction, for the rage to finally settle.

  But all that remained was a hollow silence.

  He missed them.

  More than anything.

  His knees buckled, and he collapsed onto the bloodstained ground.

  The grief twisted inside him, raw, endless, suffocating.

  He had killed hundreds, thousands.

  And still, they were not here.

  Still, he was alone.

  He clutched his head, his breath ragged, uneven.

  It was unbearable.

  So he did the only thing left to do.

  He tried to end it.

  A dagger through the heart.

  A blade to the throat.

  A crushing grip against his own skull, trying to shatter it into pieces.

  But his immortality mocked him.

  Every wound closed.

  Every attempt failed.

  His body refused to break.

  His life refused to end.

  And so he remained, trapped in a nightmare of his own making.

  He could not see them again.

  Could not hold them, speak to them, be with them.

  The gods had cursed him with eternity, forcing him to exist in a world where they no longer did.

  The thought clawed at his sanity.

  Until there was only one path left.

  If he could not die—

  Then he would ensure that none of them lived.

  He would erase them all.

  Every last human, until nothing remained of their wretched kind.

  But he needed more.

  A greater force.

  Something that could match the gods themselves.

  And so he wandered, listening for whispers in the dark corners of the world.

  Voodooists.

  Mages who dealt in forbidden arts.

  Casters of death magic, manipulators of souls, masters of rituals best left forgotten.

  Perhaps they could end him.

  Perhaps they could finally break the curse.

  He hunted them, tracked them through the shadows.

  And when he found them, he spoke a single command.

  "Kill me."

  They tried.

  Spells wove through the air, curses wrapped around him like venomous tendrils.

  Dark magic tore at his soul, seeking to unravel his existence.

  And yet, nothing worked.

  Not even the strongest death magic could undo him.

  So he gave up on the idea of dying.