"Teach me!"

These words were harder to say than the steps it took to reach the basement. Through a door in the storage room to a spiral staircase that stretched well beneath the earth, and then across the long hallway filled with coffins. Each step he took was greeted with sounds of ethereal sobbing and the agonizing sawing of bones...Asher was familiar with that sound.

He was also familiar with the sobbing as it was fear whose cries were competing with the bone sawing which was getting louder the closer he got.

On legal paper, this place functioned as a licensed apothecary. The clinic run by Clara was a front to hide whatever Stephan was doing here all day long. He slept, ate, and worked here with the dead bodies watching over him. The thought made Asher's stomach turn.

He was having many such thoughts. It helped keeping him focused on the objective. It was hard not listening to well himself...or fear and regret and common sense.

He had promised himself not to delve back into the intoxicating embrace of the power he had experienced before. Once was all it took to know how wrong yet so right it felt. The consequences of that single time haunted him to this day.

Irked by his hesitation he quickened his pace past the coffins and through the barely lit corridor till he reached the doors that led to the lab where he'd previously fought the beast.

Asher thought he'd hoped he'd never have to step in here again but today was one to break many such hopes. Once the door cracked open orchestral music slowly made its way out.

Curiosity fueling him, he swiftly widened the gap, revealing the lab which had returned to its original form, hanging bodies and all with the addition of a record player tucked in the corner.

The record was a hollowed blue crystal and the player was a circling apparatus of brass and wood, equipped with glyphs to absorb energy. The energy would coalesce into light which passed through the crystal grooves, producing the dramatic melody.

His eyes focused and he stared at the man standing in the spotlight of the operating table. He was wielding a bone saw and a wide disgusting smile. Multiple blades and scalpels hovered with a cyan sheen above the corpse.

He was akin to one of house Neibla's maestros. His grace reminded Asher of the plays he visited as a child. Stephan conducted his symphony with hands ablaze in cyan flames. With precision, they guided the blades to dissect the naked corpse of a lady as if they were marionettes.

The innards would soon float from the operating table and launch towards some of the cages leaving what Stephan deemed as the important bits.

He said the words again.

"Teach me!" Stephan ignored him twice now. So, Asher mustered his courage and walked further in only to be held by the scruff of his neck.

It was the cyan hand again. It materialized above him and dragged him faster towards the operating table. A wooden chair followed him. The hand would then seat him with surprising gentleness.

As he was about to speak up again, a scalpel bloodied with grime and rot flew straight at him. It gently rubbed his face with blood. It drew a wide smile across his lips and then flew back to join the dissection.

While all this happened, Stephan's eyes never left the corpse. He wanted Asher to watch the orchestra and watch he did. It was only an hour later when the mad scientist finished studying the corpse.

The corpse would fly above the ground lighting multiple layers of magic formula drawn with chalk and blood.

Energies of myriad colors seeped into the body which began to glow from the inside. It only lasted for a few seconds before the energy convulsed upon itself and the body disintegrated into dust.

Asher summarized that this was another failure, but Stephan's stoic smile didn't give him any insight into the purpose of the experiments.

Just as Asher was about to sigh with frustration the music abruptly ceased, and the blades that had danced through the lab crashed to the ground, their clatter filling the void left behind.

Amidst this cacophony, Stephan fixed his gaze on Asher, who squirmed in his chair. Closing the distance between them, Stephan scrutinized the boy from every angle before tossing him one of the scalpels.

"Stab me." Stephan ordered so nonchalantly that it almost sounded sane.

"W-What?" Asher watched as the madman opened his arms wide, offering his body to the blade twisting in the boy's sweaty palms

"Stab me." He ordered again kicking the chair from beneath Asher who fell to the ground.

"What would that even teach me?"

"Stab me." He said it a third time but when the boy hesitated again, a scalpel flew from the ground, nicking him across the arm.

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"Trinity have me…FINE!" Asher took a deep breath. He tightened his grip and straightened his posture. Feeling ready, he ran towards the madman. The person who kidnapped him and forced him to fight a beast for an experiment. The man who made him face the fate he had dreaded and the man he…stabbed?

Asher's knife cut straight through Stephan's abdomen. Asher thought he'd dodge or swat him away…he never considered the possibility that he'd manage to do it. Swallowing the vomit stuck in his throat, he hurried to ask.

"Thunders…Why the hell didn't you dodge!" Asher backed away, leaving the knife hanging from Stephan's abdomen. He fell back to the ground as he watched Stephan, simply slide the blade out. Blood barely gushed out before both wound and cloth returned to their original form.

"But-But how?"

"First time's a whore…always is…what were you thinking before you did it?" Stephan laughed as he watched the confused boy who scowled. He felt stupid worrying about this monster.

"How are you more aggrieved than the person who got stabbed? Focus puppy. What were you thinking about." He squatted near the boy and stared at him at an uncomfortably close distance till Asher admitted.

"Hatred...Anger...Retribution...Good reasons to stab someone if there were any…But you won't always have them. What will you do then little puppy?" The boy stammered for an answer but remained silent in the end.

"No need to look glum…Go rest up we're done for the day." Stephan laughed and turned around to tend to nearby equipment, while Asher was too stunned to speak.

"But I didn't learn anything."

"Ahhh…but I did. Little puppy has received training before…might even have stabbed someone. Lackluster training but something I can work with." Upon hearing this, the complaints circling in Asher's head settled down.

"So, before I start digging up more secrets how about you run to your room while I make up a training regimen for tomorrow."

Asher cursed under his breath as he made his way back to his room.

To anybody else, he would be just sitting in his bed, staring at the ceiling but in reality...or as to what modicum of sense he took shelter in...Asher was having a very verbal argument with Regret and Fear.

"No no..NO…we have to run…If he finds out we'll die."

"Done it again…Shown too many cards! You were better off dying of starvation."

"I can't let this opportunity go. I must get stronger. I must change." Asher fought back. He rarely spoke back to them. On the rare occasions that he did, he found that they'd become louder…clearer…more real but he had to make up an excuse for himself to stay even if it was dangerous.

Without the power, he'd remain useless. He'd die on the streets, consumed by the promise. Asher had so many brushes against death in his short 12 years of life but now that he tasted something akin to hope...the feeling of weakness and losing this tranquility terrified him.

Just like that…Asher returned the next day. This time around there was no music. Most of the corpses were cleared out and the operating table was packed into the ground by the swing of a lever. Without them, the lab was quite spacious. For some odd reason, he still heard the bone saw but choked it for fear trying to scare him.

"And the puppy returns…So my snappy student…Has thee found an answer?" With a welcoming bow, he greeted the boy to the center of the room.

Stephan himself sat on a cushioned chair. He watched with a strange glint of anticipation as Asher took his place ahead of him. Once seated Asher took a deep breath and spoke the answer he wracked his brain for the previous night.

"Kill only those who deserve it."

"So a murderer."

"A-A constable…A Blighter...not a murder." Asher rummaged for an answer. Being called a murderer left a sour taste in his mouth.

"A glorified murderer...noted." Asher scowled at the widening smile.

"What even is the purpose of all this!"

"To think my murderous puppy. Contrary to brutish belief…Thought comes before Action. You could argue that there is beauty in mindless slaughter…you wouldn't? Well, you get the point."

"Then what's the right answer?"

"Back to the topic again…ughh…learn to read between the lines. There is no right answer. In fact, trying to find justification for killing only dulls the blade."

"Only the person holding the blade at the end can delight in his work…or question the choice in your case."

"Now, with masterful finesse... Allow me to tie this back to my initial point"

"You...me...we're not any types of murderers...we're the dangerous kind...the hated kind...the kind hunted by justified murderers. We're Canites...people cursed or blessed depending on who you ask. We suffer the ability to manipulate the world."

"The only institution Sanctioned to teach Canites is Egrafelt's Academy. Which makes us unlicensed dangerous murderers. That is the result of..."

"The Infernal Mandate."

"Well informed for a street urchin," Stephan taunted, his smile widening. "Seems public schooling is finally stepping up its game." Asher's face froze. knowing the academy's name is one thing but the mandate was an old piece of history. Most people didn't know of such intricacies. He was baited by the long pause. Asher swallowed the curses at the tip of his tongue and listened in silence.

"But everybody…maybe even public schools…know that other such institutions exist. Each has its creed and justification to kill."

"The academy would make of you a soldier. The Trinity would ask of you a sacrifice. The White Flame's Blighters or The Dusk Abolishers would ask you to kill in the name of their gods. So on and so forth. Melt down all the propaganda and it comes back to one thing…Survival."

"No need for fancy words or reasons…you kill to survive…And that's what I will teach you. How to survive. You can clap now." Asher remained silent. He stared at Stephan's eyes which swirled in their own flavor of propaganda. Rotten cyan with a touch of insanity.

When Asher didn't clap multiple cyan hands materialized around them and clapped instead. Scratch a touch...full insanity.

"You could learn a bit from your classmates…Dearest puppy. Now as amusing as it is to play the fool we have a lot to do."

"Assuming public schools haven't delved into heresy to teach the rabble of sorcery…I'll explain from the beginning." Stephan winked at the boy who gritted his teeth. Asher didn't like to be ridiculed but he played along. Stephan didn't ask for the truth and Asher would not give it. That would be their relationship.

"Now see Bob over there." He pointed at a random pair of floating hands who waved back at him. "Bob…the sly thing…at his core is made of Malaize. Pure chaos."

"Malaize is everything and nothing. It's what makes us…us and the world what it is. But Bob you see is a figment of our insanity. He can't exist without us. By us, I mean Canites. We grant order to the chaos making up Bob."

"Now you could dwell on how meaningless Bob's existence is or focus on the near god-like applications!" Stephan laughed out loud in a hysterical manner then deflated like a mannequin and looked at Asher straight in the eyes. His tone turned glum and satirical. The smile deeper…almost carnal.