"You’re weak as hell.” The eyepatch demon spat on the canvas beside the redhead, casting him a disdainful look. “Stay down and let me break you already.”

  “Oh yeah?” Azrael rose shakily to his feet. Through a black eye, he saw three sets of champions circling about. Shaking his head, he focused on the eyepatch demon in the middle, who he knew was the real one.

  He stepped in, throwing a fist. He could feel the air rush past, as he twisted his hips, going for the champion’s face. His knuckles sailed past the eyepatch, through the demon’s head, and the redhead lurched forward, fumbling for his balance.

  “Oi, focus on me. Not whatever you’re seeing with your addled vision!” The eyepatch demon cussed, watching the redhead regain his position.

  Despite the bruises and body blows he had taken, Azrael stood his ground. He threw another punch, one he knew would reach his opponent. This time.

  Before his knuckles could touch flesh, he earned a sharp pain that shot up his flank and a second surge of agony raking his abdomen.

  “You just won’t fall even after all those blows? Your body’s definitely not built like ‘em regular mortals, I’ll give ya that.”

  “My body was taken apart and reassembled not too long ago. Pain’s the one thing I’d take head-on, any day.” It felt strange to know his resilience was earned through his tribulations in prison. But his know-how in a fist fight, came from just his beatdown at the orphanage. To think I’d thank prison life. He scoffed at the irony. Then again, it’d have helped if I’d trained my fists too, while imprisoned.

  “What a pain,” grunted the champion. “You’re tenacious as hell, I’ll give you that. Let’s speed this up.” Ripping the patch off his face, he exposed a glided orb with a blank pupil. “Enjoy my parting gift to you, mortal.”

  Azrael’s one good eye widened, seized by a force stopping him dead in his tracks, overwhelmed by an indescribable immensity.

  A headless corpse and a pair of heads were laid out on a platter atop an oaken table. It was a scene he was all too familiar with. One he’d grown accustomed to and come to hate. An inevitable plague, he couldn’t part with, despite the festering limbs he’d severed.

  In the murkiness, a gentle mist enveloped the backdrop, coiling about his shaken frame, hissing spittle over tender skin. Beckoning him with a seductive touch, the vapours drew him in, luring him towards the centre. Like a snake’s fangs, the icy smoke broke past flesh, sinking into bone.

  His heart throbbed with the venom, tearing through his blood, gripped by the toxin eating away at him, cell by cell. He had no choice but to watch, frozen in place, as the grotesque display brought his worst nightmare to vivid cognizance. Standing in front of the platter, a strange thought surfaced in his mind.

  It’s all the same huh? And yet… A strange notion began moulding in his mind, one that should have been obvious in light of his latest endeavour. Where’s Mol’okh?

  Amongst the desecrated dead, the one person he had managed to kill wasn’t present. He could feel the venom dissipate, invigorating his limbs with unquenchable inquisitiveness, combing through the chilly murkiness. He thrashed his hands about, in search of his tormentor.

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  He’s not here.

  Running back to the oaken table, his attention was drawn to the platter. The once clear remains of the three dead figures were now smudged and reduced to a grey, smouldering stain. Straining to recall their features, he could only grasp at vague outlines that rapidly began slipping through the sieves of his mind.

  “If I can take pleasure in the atrocity you wallowed in, perhaps the two of us aren’t so different.”

  The haunting voice resounded, echoing in the distance.

  “Is that what I had said back when I’d killed Mol’okh?” Azrael grappled with a great weight shearing away at the fraying strands of his threadbare existence. His hands clenched as he watched three mushroom shaped billows curling off the oak and dispersing into the air.

  As the table distanced itself, a spotlight suddenly illuminated a chunk of the sky, cutting through the murkiness.

  All of a sudden, gravity’s pull was inversed.

  He was pried off solid ground, reeling him skywards till he was sucked into the eye of the illumination.

  Iridescent scales emerged from the heavens, mirroring a spiral of cherry blossoms raining over the world, sheathing him in the scales of an immense beast. A snout parted smoke off scaled lips, focusing moonlit orbs on the redhead.

  You and I are one. Till death, do us part.

  Dazed and disoriented, Azrael felt a sharp pressure digging into his throat, nearly whisking his consciousness away.

  “Hey, what’re you doing?” asked the redhead, past a choking heave.

  “How!?” said the champion, taken aback. He loosened his fingers around Azrael’s throat. “How’d you break free?”

  Seizing his opening, the redhead lunged at his opponent, clawing at his face with all his might. His fingers found their target. A sickening squish was followed by a viscous ooze down his fingertips, trickling over his knuckles. Retracting his hand, the fleshy shackles around his neck vanished, followed by a furious howl gushing out his adversary’s lips.

  “My eye, my beautiful eye,” cried the champion. He turned his back to Azrael as he knelt over, gripping the marred socket he was left with.

  Panting, the redhead exhaled a breath, steadying his nerves. For the moment, he decided to gloss over the soreness around his throat, making his way towards the eyepatch demon. He took a bit longer to observe his opponent wallow in agony, defenceless in his moment of fragility.

  Dropping his weight, he rested his arms around the champion’s shoulders, holding him close. Brushing his lips past his opponent’s ear, he whispered, “Shhhh-shh-shh. Screw you!”

  His arms tightened around the champion’s throat as he pushed his feet off the canvas. His airborne legs shifted course, wrapping around his opponent’s waist, coiling about his prey, embodying a serpent’s fury. With a powerful twist of his body, the redhead toppled him over, forcing him to land face first, on the canvas.

  The duo rolled about, the champion squirmed violently, struggling to break free while Azrael relentlessly held on. A set of shaky elbows nudged the redhead’s flank every second breath, each blow weaker than the last.

  But it didn’t matter.

  He felt the champion’s body grow limp, sensing his opponent’s desperate attempts to tap out. The nudges around his flanks waned, replaced by an eerie, icy sensation crawling up beside him.

  Despite the chilling touch, Azrael held on firmly, refusing to let go. Weak winces wheezed past his lips despite the aching bruises. His body was running on fumes.

  But it didn’t matter.

  His grip slackened, giving in to the exhaustion gnawing at his bones. His fingers were peeled free from the limp throat, as he fell onto the canvas in a spent mound, gasping for breath.

  He rested beside the chilly champion’s body.

  Each breath came in ragged gasps as he swallowed sparse mouthfuls, desperate to steady his racing heart.

  The shaky light filtered through the ceiling, casting a glimmering glow against a cacophony of metal, falling from the sky, assembling a row of perfectly lined up steel bars around him.

  Azrael tried wrapping his head around his current predicament. He eyed the metallic framework, cordoning off his escape. Not like I can move an inch.

  He could hear distant voices and the sound of footsteps echoing, but his body couldn’t care less for the world around. He wondered if victory had traded him one set of shackles for another.

  Anything but prison. Again.