For families like the girl’s, survival was a knife’s edge.
If either parent beca sick and couldn’t work, rent went unpaid. Food ran short.
No savings.
No safety net.
In the poorer districts, many of the holess who froze to death each winter hadn’t started as vagrants. They were workers who fell ill, lost their inco, and slid downward one missed paycheck at a ti. Relief rations kept them barely alive, but left them too weak to climb back out.
A slow, quiet death.
So when the girl realized she was safe...
She collapsed to her knees.
"Thank you... thank you for saving ... thank you for your kindness..."
In her mind, the strange infant who had appeared in fla could only be a divine ssenger.
She tucked the money tightly into her clothes and ran.
With that money, her family could leave the slums.
Her father could rest and find steady factory work.
Her mother could buy a sewing machine and take tailoring jobs.
And she could attend school full-ti.
It wasn’t wealth.
But it was a future.
Near the border of the West District, on Iris Street, stood a vast estate surrounded by manicured lawns, gardens, fountains, and marble statues.
Rowan hovered above it.
His perception pierced every wall.
Inside the lavish main hall, young girls were being abused.
Not by faceless monsters.
But by n whose portraits appeared in newspapers.
Lawmakers.
Senior police officials.
Municipal administrators.
Servants stood guard with whips in hand.
Any girl who resisted or failed to please was beaten.
Any girl who displeased a guest was dragged away.
No summoning circles.
No dark altars.
Yet the scene was indistinguishable from a demonic ritual.
At the center sat several awakened individuals, led by Heras.
Across from them sat powerful officials.
Kapin, red-faced and sweating, hovered nearby, barking orders and bowing endlessly.
Beneath the estate lay an underground prison larger than the mansion itself.
Rows of cells.
Rows of girls.
So being trained.
So being punished.
So simply waiting.
Rowan exhaled slowly.
"Hell is empty," he said. "The devils are right here."
His finger lifted.
A compressed burst of air slipped from his fingertip, threaded with spatial distortion.
It passed through roof, ceiling, and skull in a straight line.
The lawmaker’s head exploded.
Another shot.
Another.
Another.
Rowan’s finger moved like a trono.
Each strike found a forehead.
Each strike ended a life.
He had no interest in sparing them.
Handing these n to the authorities ant trials.
Appeals.
Connections.
Reduced sentences.
So would walk free.
Rowan preferred certainty.
Within seconds, every abuser in the hall lay dead.
Kapin collapsed beside them, eyes wide in disbelief.
Only Heras, Parker, and Katie remained alive.
"Run!" Heras roared.
The three turned toward the exit.
A child stood in their way.
Flas licked around Rowan’s tiny form.
Heras’s face went pale.
"It’s you."
Rowan tilted his head.
"So you rember ."
They attacked without hesitation.
Chains of force.
Psychic spikes.
Crushing pressure.
Rowan didn’t bother dodging.
He pointed.
Three invisible blades flashed.
Arms and legs separated from bodies.
The three collapsed, screaming, reduced to bleeding torsos.
"Please—don’t kill us!" Heras cried. "We’re military operatives! We were following classified orders! This is a misunderstanding!"
Rowan knelt in front of him.
"We’ll see."
He extracted their supernatural essence first.
Then searched their mories.
Silence followed.
After a mont, Rowan frowned.
"The military is buying slaves?"
The three truly were soldiers.
Their direct superior was a demigod.
Three years earlier, they had been ordered to help Kapin establish a trafficking network.
Officially, it was to generate funds.
Unofficially, vast numbers of people were being shipped overseas.
Where they went afterward...
Even the operatives didn’t know.
Rowan straightened.
"Let the churches deal with this ss."
He sealed their wounds to keep them alive.
Then he raised a blazing fireball over the estate.
It flared like a beacon.
Minutes later, two familiar presences descended.
Kristel of the Night Church.
Radar of the Storm Church.
Rowan stepped back into the shadows.
The devils had been exposed.
What happened next would shake the city.
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