Kestrel stood under the gallows, looking up at the alpha tied there. His head hung low, his face smeared with blood, his hands bound tightly above his head, his toes not reaching the ground. The hot sun beat down on the gallows, making him look even more pitiful, like a rag hanging on a rack to dry.
Now Kestrel remembered the alpha's name, Ren Sloan. Ren, yeah, that was it.
The Ren right now looked nothing like the man he used to be.
Kestrel still had a clear picture in her mind from years ago of this alpha in his special forces uniform from the alpha academy, his face spotless. His black bodysuit highlighted his fit frame, his waist agile, his legs long. His black boots stomping on the piled-up snow, throwing a spray of snowflakes into the air.
Back in the day, that young alpha was like a razor-sharp blade, all edges. Now, if it weren't for the distinct sound of the sea, Kestrel wouldn't have made the connection.
Something about the sound of the sea always felt familiar to Kestrel. Every time she heard it, her tendrils would get all excited, curling up and standing tall, their tiny suction cups rubbing together in anticipation, ready to explore.
When Kestrel showed up at the execution site, the alphas down below were stunned. They made room for her, watching curiously, whispering eagerly among themselves, calling friends and gathering more people.
No one had expected a beta to be the one doing the questioning. Sure, in a place like this, questioning was the norm, but having a beta show up was a rare sight.
Hearing the growing chatter, Ren on the gallows opened his eyes, only to see a young girl making her way through the crowd towards him. She was a beta, dressed in a white skirt, slender, with a gentle face. Even her walk was smooth and soft. She didn't seem threatening at all.
But the moment he saw her, Ren's heart dropped. He thought, "Why does it have to be her?"
Ren wasn't too worried about them sending in a beta. In his younger days, he lived in the Empire's capital, and he'd seen many betas from the Tower. Those betas were pampered in the Tower, wearing fancy clothes, living comfortable lives, surrounded by luxury and softness. Like flowers in a greenhouse.
Sure, betas naturally have strong psychic abilities that can affect alphas, but he never believed that someone raised in such an environment could easily crack his psychic defenses and invade his mind. Not even after being tortured for several days and feeling incredibly weak.
It was just that the tactics of these guys in the military supply department were too low. He had seen what an alpha looked like after they had been tortured to the point of mental breakdown. That was a guy who was originally as tough as steel. First, they would torture the body, wearing down the will. They would beat someone until they were at their weakest, then crush their spirit in the most shameful way.
By some twist of fate, they'd chosen her. If there was any beta from the Tower he was worried about, it was the young girl he'd crossed paths with several years ago.
That very girl had a potent psychic force that had surprised even him back then. And it was her, the one he had deeply wronged years ago while on duty.
Ren forced a bitter smile, tasting the hint of blood from his cracked lips. He suddenly felt an overwhelming thirst. Those people had strung him up here, denying him even a sip of water for five days. His throat felt as dry as if it were on fire.
"Am I going to fail? Can't even get past the first step of the plan?" Ren thought. The sun above seemed too bright, making his mind start to fuzz.
"So many people have died, so much blood has been spilled. Yet, the gods of luck still won't even give a small break. I should've known, luck only smiles at those at the top of the Tower. If only I could have a sip of water..." He knew he shouldn't be dreaming about such unrealistic things right now. But his deep thirst was shouting, the more he tried to silence his thoughts, the more they refused to quiet down.
"If I could just have a sip of water," he thought. "If I could just have a sip of water now, maybe I could make it."
The sergeant in charge of the questioning was thrilled at Kestrel's arrival. With a beta around, the task he had been struggling with now had a chance of success. He eagerly served Kestrel coffee and water, brought a comfy lounge chair, picked the thickest whip from the table full of torture tools, and held it with enthusiasm.
"You take a break first. I'll give him another round of punishment. It'll make your job easier."
Kestrel accepted his coffee, took a casual sip, but her pale little hand blocked his view, waving him off.
"No need, you can step back." Her tone wasn't exactly polite.
The questioning sergeant was a lower rank and needed her assistance. Despite his annoyance, he didn't dare argue. Swallowing his pride, he stepped back, thinking, "Such an arrogant young girl, this is a tough case, I want to see if you can handle it."
Up in the office on the second floor, several officers and Roy brought chairs to the window to watch the show.
"Kestrel is so young, and her academy scores are quite high. She seems really impressive," Officer Hoo said, flipping through Kestrel's file with a pleased look.
Roy thought to himself, "You don't know, she's only scored exceptionally high in one subject, she's basically failed all the others. She's an oddball, but then again, how many who sign up for the Special Research Division aren't?" Of course, he didn't share this with the officers next to him.
Roy stretched his neck to peek out the window. Everyone was holding their breath, waiting to see what techniques the new beta would use to crack the stubborn alpha. They wanted to see if the man, who'd stayed defiant under intense torture, would mentally break under the beta's gentle touch and confess.
As Kestrel lifted her hand, her neat and delicate fingers gripped the chin of the alpha on the gallow, making him lift his face. Then, she grabbed a cup of water from the table with her other hand and offered it to the alpha. All of this happened under everyone's watchful gaze, as if it was a normal and flawless process.
"What, what is she doing?" Officer Hoo nearly leaped up in shock, pointing to the scene below and asking Roy.
Roy, sitting next to her, propped up his feet casually, giving her an annoyed look as if she was being silly, and as if this was the usual way things went, and only these unseasoned rookies in their office would make a big fuss out of it.
Officer Hoo didn't enjoy being embarrassed in front of Roy, who was her equal in rank. She bit her tongue, adjusted her shoulders, and forced herself to sit still.
"It's no big deal, I'll just watch a bit more," she said to herself, "Maybe this is some unique method. After all, the people who get into the Special Research Division are all strange. The department is disorganized, there's no decent leader, and they only nurture oddballs. Ah, I still can't figure it out."
She sneakily glanced at Roy, who was nonchalantly propping up his leg, acting like he couldn't be bothered to explain. But she didn't know that Roy was actually totally confused, not understanding what Kestrel was up to.
He didn't know, but he didn't care. Kestrel was one of his people. And whether these nobodies from the Military Administration could do their job properly or not, he didn't care.
Kestrel held the man's chin and poured the entire cup of water into his mouth. She watched him swallow the last drop from the cup, his cracked lips opened, and he took a few breaths.
The man drank the water in her hand and shook his head to release himself from her hold, looking up at her. His face was covered in blood, his dirty hair hanging in front of his eyes. He looked as pitiful as could be. But when he lifted his eyelids, the gaze that peeked out from behind his dirty hair was the same as the young boy on the snow field years ago. Cold and proud, fierce and unyielding, like a blade reflecting the cold snow.
Kestrel wiped her fingers, cleaning the blood off her pale fingertips. Then she opened her hand, covered the man's eyes, and pressed it against his forehead.
...
Kestrel found herself above a vast sea. The seawater was endless, clear blue in the distance, and emerald green close up. She didn't hesitate and dove into the sea. The waves roared around her, sunlight trickled through the surface, painting every wave golden. Diving into the sea felt like being in a gigantic and pure emerald, stunning like a dream. That limitless beauty was both mesmerizing and daunting.
So this was Ren's psychic barrier. It was like an ocean. Each alpha had their own psychic landscape, kind of like a secret room that held their feelings and hidden memories. They built strong walls around this secret room to keep it safe.
This psychic barrier was like a protective shield every alpha used to keep their psychic landscape safe. Kestrel had seen many of these barriers. Usually, they looked like something hard and strong, like a metal wall, a huge stone castle, or sharp thorns. But this was the first time she saw someone's barrier that looked like a never-ending sea.
The sea was the softest, but also the wildest and strongest.
Kestrel felt that if she wasn't herself, maybe no other beta would dare to dive into this deep sea like she did without any fear. She kept going deeper into the sea. The sunlight became dimmer and dimmer, like golden strings falling on her body. The seawater around her seemed so calm and gentle. It didn't react to Kestrel being there. It felt like a real ocean.
But Kestrel knew that this was Ren's spiritual world. Big waves and whirlpools could pop up in the sea at any moment to fiercely attack anyone who invaded. She didn't feel scared; she was calmly waiting for the fight to start.
She swam deeper into the sea. Her dress floated behind her as she went down, moving around in the sea like it had always lived there. Unclear and hidden big shadows stretched out from under her floating dress, happily spreading in all directions.
Kestrel felt good, even though what she was doing was dangerous, she felt happy. She hadn't felt so many emotions for a long time. Right then, she remembered Tarian always telling her that she didn't show her feelings like a normal beta.
Actually, she had been trying really hard for many years, trying to act like a normal person, trying to look like a normal beta. She tried to live the life everyone thought a normal person should live. But all her tries didn't work.
The bottom of the sea was very quiet, so quiet that it made her feel comfortable. From the deep parts, faraway and dreamy sounds echoed, like the calls of some sort of whale, some kind of fish, or some old sea creature. They were calling her to swim towards them.
Kestrel saw the sea floor and also saw the hidden garden deep under the sea. There were soft seaweed and beautiful coral, like a giant underwater forest, moving and swaying with the sea waves. Little fish darted between them, with cute sea snails and shells in the sand.
The big coral reefs, of different heights, sparkled with colorful lights on their surface. They were piled up and deep, looking so far away that she couldn't see the end at a single glance.
Kestrel almost couldn't believe this was actually an alpha's spiritual world. So diverse, mysterious, gentle, and alluring. Her tendrils seemed to want it more than Kestrel herself, each of them eager to reach into that sea floor, mess something up there, then swim and explore those coral reefs.
Kestrel held back that terrible urge. A beta should be gentle and calm, filled with love and respect for beautiful things. Not like her.
Kestrel heard a clear whale song, coming from the depths of the giant algae. From the dark seagrass forest, a huge whale appeared. The whale's back was dark, the belly pure white, with a large and powerful tail, a high, spear-shaped dorsal fin on its back, and a white eye patch under each eye.
It was an orca, a beast of the deep sea. Strong, powerful, huge in size, the top predator in the ocean. This was Ren's psychic incarnation, a form of alpha's psychic power, a kind of alter ego.
Kestrel hadn't expected that this alpha, without any resistance along the way, letting her march straight in, was actually planning to fight her at the edge of his mental world.
"He's a madman," Kestrel thought to herself. A tough guy who wasn't afraid to risk it all.
She suddenly felt a bit excited. She started wanting to bite on her fingers. In the depth of her heart, the thick shell of many years of self-control suddenly cracked open a bit, and something started to peek out, which was quickly pushed down by Kestrel's hands.
"Betas shouldn't be like this. Betas should be gentle. Betas shouldn't get excited by fights," she told herself.
The battle started in a flash. Terrifying and thick tendrils suddenly burst through the sea floor and wrapped around the orca's tail in an instant. The suckers on the tendrils tightly latched onto the orca's smooth skin, pulling the massive creature deeper into the sea trench.
Another tendril quickly coiled up, winding up the long tail fin, slipping past the sleek belly and dorsal fin, and heading upward.
Suddenly, that tendril was grabbed by a strong arm. It was a human male arm, with a purple bruise on the wrist, but it held the smooth tendril like a metal clamp. Then, a sharp blade was pushed against the tentacle's skin.
In the disrupted seaweed forest, the murky seawater slowly cleared up, revealing everything. The orca's black tail fin was tangled by a massive tendril, but the upper half had turned into the shape of a human male, showing Ren's face. He reached out with a powerful arm, grabbed the tendril, and pushed a sharp blade against it.
The water swirled all around, the seaweed and corals that the tendrils destroyed in the fight turned into bubbles of memories, floating upwards. In these floating fragments of memory, Kestrel could see glimpses of Ren's young face. Sometimes laughing, sometimes toasting with friends, sometimes fighting on a battlefield.
This was a world built from his memories. Any heavy destruction would shake the alpha's core spirit, causing him pain. But right now, the half-human, half-whale alpha was floating amidst the scattered bubbles, calmly facing Kestrel without saying a word.
One hand gripping tight, the other held a sharp dagger, his arm muscles were firm with strength. No one would doubt his ability to cut the whole tendril with one slice.
"It will hurt," his eyes were fixed on Kestrel, "Getting hurt in a psychic landscape hurts more than in real life."
This was his psychic sea. As long as he believed he had a knife, he would have a knife. As long as he believed that the blade could harm, then that knife could cut Kestrel's psychic tendrils.
The sharp feeling of the blade pressed against the skin clearly sent a message to Kestrel's brain. It brought a slight hint of pain.
The scene seemed to blend with that snowy night years ago.
Dangerous and deadly, it stirred up a warmth in the bottom of Kestrel's heart.
"A normal beta shouldn't be like this, a beta should..."
"Forget should."
"Forget being gentle and calm," Kestrel said to herself, "I clearly like it, I clearly have this desire in my heart."
"I don't like to wait gently and calmly. I like to attack, I like to take control and destroy, I like to have everything under my control."
"I like doing things without any restrictions that a 'beta shouldn't do'."
"I am a beta of no ordinary!"