Lashes and muffled grunts echoed throughout the underground dungeon, ensued in complete darkness, populated by disease carried by rats and cockroaches. The distortional grunts came from a single person; the only captive in this dungeon, Gryph Note. Currently under suspicion by the headmaster and detained and interrogated here on the behalf of his request as well.
I had now been continuously and regularly beaten and tortured, every day that I had spent here since my original admission. I don't know exactly how many days had gone by, by now, due to there being no light in this dungeon allowing me to grasp the flow of time. It could have been a day, 2 days, or even the final day of the week, yet I wouldn't know. Or would I? Since I came to this dungeon, I had been counting the time and carving it into the wall as an instigation of the time. I doubt I got the time spot on, but from the time that I had counted, I assumed I had been held here for now the 4th day. And the 4th day being consecutively beaten.
Mud and grime had now mixed with my blood in a distasteful russet pallet scattered across my pale white skin, which had now been dawned with a sickly and unhealthy complexion.
The guard who beat me today again, paused as he usually would, and asked. "Got anything to say?"
I reply with no delay or hesitation, my voice remaining strong and firm in my conviction. "Why would I? I've told you everything I know. You should have understood this by now. Anyway, my week is almost up, meaning that its best to see out my resolve till I receive my verdict from esteemed headmaster Kaiser."
"Suit yourself, Phoenix." The guars voice ringing through my ear as it cut off to a mocking tone, while his eyes directed and composed themselves on my tattoo engrained below my abs, but still above my pelvis. There I had the tattoo that I acquired at a young age, the tattoo of a phoenix spreading its wings, engulfed in glorious flames, it's ankles though, chained.
Kala Fang POV:
Half of the week had gone by and Gryph's sentence would soon be announced. As for mine and Ray's situation, we finally received them, just as I expected. The letter from our house, more precisely, my father, the head of the Fang house and uncle to Radence Fang. The letters instructions were plain and simple. Return and Report.
I headed over to Ray who was being discharged today, from the medical department building. I entered the building through the entrance as I had before when visiting Ray, and there in the reception on one of the seats sat Ray, dressed in his school uniform and with his bag in hand waiting, for what I assume my arrival, in silence. And as soon as he noticed me walk through the main entrance doors and step into the reception, he walked up to me immediately and asks me, "You also got yours, right?"
I didn't make him wait in anticipation and quickly replied with a nod. He then proceeds to calmly say, "Alright, I guess we have to go back for now. Hopefully we'll make it back in time for the announcement."
He goes to walk off ahead of and marches to the entrance, but before he can open the door, I ask, "Ray, why do you care so much about Gryph? Of course, apart from the fact that he saved you."
He stops at the entrance his hand already slightly pushing the door, letting a cool breeze in. His brazen eyes, hidden from my vision. "I don't know. I guess it's just that kind of connection. You know, when you meet a person, and you feel connected to them on a deeper level. As if you found yourself in another person, a distorted mirror that reflects a shard of a once possible present you. I feel like, where closer that we were to our late mentor, who gave everything up for us."
My eyes looked on in melancholy as I heard the mention of our late mentor and an image of him holding my hand as a little girl, walking with me in the garden swam up from the depths of my consciousness. "Ray-"
Before I can say anything, Ray cuts me off. "Well, this isn't important right now. Currently we need to get going to the Fang estate held in this capital. Fang's eastern territory."
My eyes reclaim their previous fierceness and I speak up, Right, Let's get going."
Headmaster Kaiser POV:
Knock, Knock, Knock!
"Excuse me sir." A man said as he entered my office. It was the guard that I had assigned to watch over student Gryph. He wore the uniform of the cell guards, that being the black leather pants, the black gloves that were tinged with gold on the fingertips, a black vest and a similarly black robe with a hood on top of that.
"What is it?" I asked in response to his sudden arrival.
"Sir, he still refuses to talk, claiming he knows nothing more than he had already said. And it's almost been a week."
I smile at the guard, not pleased but more amazed at Gryph's limitations. He really is something special. I go to scratch my scruffy beard and ponder. "Hmmm. Well, well, well. What should we do? We can only hold him there for a maximum of a week due to our limited evidence and lack of definitive proof or testimony. We need to find at least a small bit more evidence to extend his sentence whilst we search for definitive proof that will allow us to take this to the Five Grand Pillars and request his execution."
"If I may be so rude sir, why are we trying to execute student Gryph?"
I pause to think for a second and allow the silence to fill the room. I turn to look at the window unable to face the guard for whatever reason. "I'm trying to do this for his sake. I don't know how he's still alive, but because I think he is who I think he is, I need to kill him. For his own sake and for that man's sake. For Note's sake."
"Sir, who is this man named Note?" The guard asked.
"He... He was my best friend."
"Then why do you want to eliminate Gryph if he has connection to your dead best friend."
Images of Note's head flying off his body, the blood splattering around the wooden house, the firecracker on the ground and the small child who lay there in shock watching this happen, all floated through my head.
"That's enough of the questions."
"But sir-"
"I said that's enough of the questions! Sorry about that outburst." I rested my hand in my palm and continued to speak. "Please, return to your post, I have already told you more than enough, more than I had to."
The guard looks towards me and replies solemnly. "Understood, headmaster Kaiser."
"Oh, and one more thing. To try and get the information out of him, tell him about his duration in the dungeon being extended by two whole months."
The guard who had almost turned around ready to head out, jumped up and faced back looking directly at me. "But you know we can't do that-"
I interrupt him, "But he doesn't", as that leaves my mouth, my mind floats back to that scene and me now walking to that crying child. Blonde hair, azure blue eyes, sharp features even at a young age. His head, just like Note's, I severe off his head, disconnecting it from his nape down. I'm sure of it.
So how?
Radence Fang POV:
"Welcome back home, young master." I'm met by multiple servants as soon as I reached the outer gate of the Fang residence, alongside me of course my cousin Kala, the daughter of the head of the house and the next in line to the title of head.
The entrance to the residence were as grand and as uselessly expensive as I remembered it. The residence itself was rather modern and incredibly large, spanning for hundreds of meter in each and every direction. And that was just what was visible to the eye.
"Yes, I've returned per as the request of the letter. Now, where is my uncle?"
Another servant responds to my question, whilst the other servants tended to Kala, taking her bags and weight of her. "Master is currently awaiting your arrival on the grand balcony that overlooks his illustrious snow garden."