Chapter 11: Inevitable Clash (Part III)

Previously:

One child stepped forward—little more than shadow and bone.
Her hand lifted, then froze just short of his. Her gaze climbed to his eyes.

“…monster?” she whispered, voice trembling.

My eyes burned. My mother’s whisper haunted him: “Live. If I die, you live.”

I breathed the vow, low and fierce: “I’ll carry it. Even if they fear me — I’ll carry it.”

For the first time since the ceremonial chamber, there was no roar, no clash, no command. Just me, blood-soaked, breathing in a room of freed children too frightened to call me a  savior.

The ground quivered. A heavy, rhythmic thud echoed through the tunnels. Chains rattled. 

The air thickened with a pressure that bent even the flames of the torches.

The children whimpered, retreating back into the cages they had just escaped.

My head snapped up, Beast snarling inside my chest. I knew that presence.

From the far end of the laboratory, shadows thickened into a silhouette broad as a mountain. Raul’s voice unfurled through the room— measured, commanding, silk drawn tight over steel.

“Perfect timing. My little mistake… come to witness perfection.”

Behind him, four cages rattled, iron screaming under the strain. Low, guttural growls seeped through the bars—wet, uneven, as though their throats had been carved wrong.

Shapes pressed against the iron. Not human. Not a beast. Things half-born and overmade.

One lifted its head into the torchlight: a face stretched too wide, jaw hinged with jagged fangs where no mouth should be.

Another dragged itself forward on arms sewn from mismatched muscle, a patchwork of veins pulsing beneath gray, blistered skin.

Spines jutted from backs where shoulders should have been, splitting flesh that wept black fluid. Eyes glowed red from sockets too deep, too many.

The stench of rot and alchemy rolled out, choking the air.

Raul’s smirk gleamed like polished steel.

“Behold what true bloodcraft can achieve.”

The chimeras stirred, cages buckling as claws and bone-splinters scraped for freedom.

The chains rattled louder now, each tremor sending vibrations through the stone floor. Raul stepped fully into the laboratory, shadows clinging to him like armor. His cloak dragged through blood as though it belonged there, his stride slow, deliberate.

And four iron cages groaned on heavy wheels, dragged by lesser servants with trembling arms. Inside them, shapes shifted, growling low like thunder waiting to break.

The children pressed into corners, eyes wide, clutching each other. I positioned myself between them and Raul, claws itching to return, my Beast howling against my ribs.

Raul lifted one hand, and the servants fell back. His smile cut like glass.

“You claw at cages to free those vermin. I shape cages into legacies.”

Raul snapped his fingers. Lightbulb flared brighter, spilling their light into the cages.

The first chimera slammed itself into the bars, making them screech. A grotesque fusion of wolf and man, its spine arched too far, bones breaking skin. Its face was torn between snout and jaw, teeth spilling from both. Eyes, bloodshot and yellow, locked on me with a feral hunger.

The second crouched low, its limbs spider-like, elongated arms bent at wrong angles. Human skin stretched thin over joints too sharp, nails grown into curved talons. A tongue too long lashed against the bars, tasting the air, its breath rattling like a broken bellows.

The third remained unnervingly still. Human in outline, but its skin was translucent, veins glowing faintly with red light. Beneath the surface, organs shifted, pulsing in rhythms not its own. Its gaze was hollow, yet when it turned its head toward the children, every cage in the room shook as though from an invisible force.

The fourth was the most grotesque — a child’s body grotesquely fused with a beast’s skull. Its limbs were mismatched, one arm scaled, the other feathered with bone-like quills. It keened in a high, warbling cry, like a child begging for release, though its eyes held no innocence, only endless hunger.

The laboratory seemed to shrink, the air dense with their presence. The children wailed, some curling into balls, others covering their ears.

Raul spread his arms wide, as if unveiling a masterpiece.

“Behold, Havir. Blood refined, perfected. While you weep for orphans, I forge gods. My offspring remade, stripped of weakness, bound only to me. This is the future our clan deserves.”

My throat tightened, rage boiling to the surface. My claws sprang free, teeth flashing.

I snarled. “Monsters. Just like you.”

Raul’s smirk deepened, almost tender in its cruelty.

“And yet they are your kin. My children. Your siblings. Shall I let them call you big brother before they tear you apart?”

The cages rattled violently, one chimera’s claws bursting through the bars, scraping sparks against the floor. Another shrieked, an inhuman sound that made the torches flicker.

The Clan Elder’s warning echoed in Havir’s skull: “Touch him, Raul, and you war against blood itself.”

But here, in the laboratory, I felt that war was already upon me.

The cages clanged open with a metallic scream. Raul’s gesture was casual, as though losing hounds for sport.

The wolf-thing leapt first, a blur of fur and bone, jaws splitting too wide, saliva sizzling where it struck the stone. 

I barely evaded it, claws raking down its flank — skin tore, but beneath, muscle twitched and stitched itself back together in grotesque knots. 

The creature shrieked, half-wolf howl, half-human scream.

From the left came the spider-limbed abomination, skittering across the walls, dagger-long nails sparking as they scraped stone. It pounced, limbs folding and unfolding like a puppet cut loose. 

Its weight slammed into a table, glass shattering, scalpels raining like needles around them. One blade wound into my forearm; another lodged in my thigh.

I roared my voice, shoving upward, ripping a leg from its socket with a wet crack. Black ichor sprayed, sizzling where it landed. The creature shrieked, but the limb wriggled, twitching like it wanted to crawl back into place.

The wolf-thing struck again. Teeth closed on my shoulder, fangs sinking deep. Bone ground under the pressure. My cry filled the laboratory, torn between pain and rage. I drove his claws into its skull, gouging out one burning eye.

The Beast didn’t relent.

Children screamed from their cages, their cries echoing through the clash of steel, claw, and bone.Raul’s laughter slithered through the chaos.

“Yes… yes! Look at you, my boy. Blood singing, beast unleashed. You fight like one of them already. Can you not feel it? You were born to this perfection.” Raul’s mocking voice.

I snarled at him, blood pouring from my wounds. I tore free from the wolf-thing’s bite, spinning to hurl the spider-limbed chimera against a wall. Bones cracked, but it scrambled upright, head lolling at an impossible angle, tongue dragging the floor.

The wolf-thing lunged again. I met it mid-air, claws ripping through its throat. Hot blood sprayed across my face, bitter and acidic, burning my skin where it touched. I ignored the sting, slammed the creature down, and stomped its skull until bone gave way with a sickening crunch.

Silence—then the spider-limbed one screamed and charged again, blades of bone clicking. I was slower now, my thigh bleeding where the scalpel still jutted out. It caught me, talons tearing across my ribs.

I howled, but used the momentum — grabbing its other arm, snapping it back until bones shredded through skin. The chimera shrieked, thrashing. I dragged it down, claws plunging into its chest, ripping through cartilage, tearing out the organ that pulsed like no human heart.

The creature convulsed once, then stilled.

I staggered back, panting, covered in gore. 

My claws dripped. My fangs gleamed. 

The Beast in me revealed, howling triumph in my skull.

Raul clapped slowly, mock applause that echoed like a sentence.

“Magnificent. You see it now, don’t you? You are not a savior. You are a specimen. If this is what you can do unshaped, imagine what I could craft from your bones. You would be my crowning work, my perfect chimera. My Havir!”

The remaining two cages rattled. The translucent one pressed its hands against the bars, veins glowing like molten rivers. The child-thing whimpered in its cage, voice warping into a keening scream.

The children in the room wailed louder, terror blending with my own dread.

I lifted my bloodied claws, chest heaving, my voice shaking with fury.

“You’ll never have me. I am no one’s creation! And I am not your son!”

Raul’s grin widened, eyes glittering with hunger.

“You already are. My Boy”

I staggered, blood dripping from my claws, the mangled carcasses of Raul’s creations at his feet. My breath came in ragged gasps, chest burning, every wound screaming. Still, I raised my head, ready to face the remaining cages.

Then I saw her.

Not Raul. Not another beast.

Her—

My dead wife—

A flicker at the far corridor — slender form, hair like dark silk catching in the torchlight, the curve of her face unmistakable even in shadow. She turned once, her profile clear, her eyes wide with fear. Then she fled, her shadow stretching long across the stones as she vanished into the dark.

The world stilled.

The sound of chains, the hiss of Raul’s laughter, the whimper of children—all vanished beneath the single, searing word tearing from my throat.

My voice broke into a whisper, the name trembling off my lips: “…Levithia…?”

My legs trembled. My claws lowered. Beast inside me, howling moments ago for slaughter, now recoiled into silence. My heart thundered, choking me. 

My wife— my love— died in my arms a hundred years ago, now fleeing before my eyes.

Behind me, Raul’s laughter slithered back into the silence, echoing through the laboratory like the scrape of a blade.

Mockery curled through Raul’s tone, his figure melting into darkness until only his voice lingered:

“Yes… chase that ghosts, my son. Let her lead you deeper. Every step that binds you tighter to me.”

The remaining chimeras shrieked in their cages, but Raul did not loose them. Instead, he drew back into the darkness, his voice lingering like smoke.

Raul’s words pressed like iron, each sentence cutting space between them. 

“You’ve proven your worth. You are no warrior. No savior. You are my masterpiece-in-waiting, My Havir! The day will come when I carve you into perfection… and you will thank me. My son!”

His footsteps receded, swallowed by the corridors.

I stood frozen, torn between the children’s cries behind me and the phantom of Levithia before me. My claws shook as I pressed them to the wall, whispering her name again, as though saying it aloud would anchor her to the world.

My voice shook, the name slipping out on a trembling breath, barely more than a whisper: “Levithia…”

Silence fell. Heavy as stone. It pressed against the walls, seeped into the cracks, and weighed on my chest until even my own heartbeat seemed too loud, too fragile.

Yet in that silence… something moved. A shift so slight it could have been imagined—air stirring where no breath should linger, shadows thickening as if they leaned closer.

Then it came. A whisper, ragged and broken, tearing through the stillness like a wound: “Levithia…”

The sound faltered, swallowed before the name was complete. 

My breath caught, my body rigid, listening for more.

— End of Part Three —

Author's Note:

Whew! Writing Chap 11 (part III) absolutely sucked the energy—and maybe a little blood—right out of me! (^o^")/ Havir went through so many hurdles and so do I! Now I think I need to restore my creativity or my brains need a reboot, system crash, ctrl+alt+dlte still wont work, hehehe. Let's take a break now or else those monsters will hunt us (joke!).  I'm taking a short, well-deserved editing vacation to restore my creative power. Me and Havir need to recharge too our promise to return with a full tank of creative energy, ready to dive into the next chapter. Until then, stay safe, and we will be back soon!

To be continued….