The ink was still wet on the front page.
A boy's face stared back—young, hollow-eyed, bruised but eerily calm. Even the grainy black-and-white couldn't blur the void in his gaze. Beneath it, the headline screamed:
"PRODIGY OR PSYCHOPATH? SON OF PHILANTHROPIST ADOLF VOSS BUTCHERS FAMILY, SENTENCED TO 10 YEARS."
In the prison intake ward, the newspaper passed from hand to hand like scripture. Some inmates laughed. Others squinted with suspicion. A few simply looked away.
"He's just a kid," one muttered, thumbing a rosary made of chipped plastic. "What kind of kid does that?"
But kids don't paint dining rooms with jugular spray.Kids don't stare down a courtroom like they've already lived a hundred lifetimes.And kids sure as hell don't walk into a maximum-security facility like they belong there.
When Vale stepped into Cell B-17, he didn't flinch.Didn't blink.Didn't ask what came next.
He just stood there, bare feet cold against the concrete, shoulders relaxed, eyes scanning the shadows.
The cell was small. Four walls and a slot for food. No light except the dim buzz of a dying bulb overhead. The air smelled of rust, mold, and something older—like sweat soaked into stone.
But the shadows in that room weren't empty.They were waiting for him.
And they didn't wait long.
That night, the wolves came.
No words. No warnings.Just the sound of skin on skin, the grunt of boots against the floor, and the cold press of a knee against his spine.
Two men pinned him down. A third straddled his chest, grinning with rotted teeth. In his hand, a plastic spoon—its tip melted and jagged.
"Devil," the man whispered, breath hot against Vale's ear. "We're just writing your name."
Then came the first cut.
The spoon wasn't sharp, not really. It had to dig.Tear.Scrape.It took time.
Blood oozed in thin lines, pooling along the boy's ribs as the man carved something unseen into his flesh.
Vale didn't scream.
He counted the strokes.
The rhythm became a lullaby, a grotesque imitation of childhood.One. Two. Three. Pause.Four. Five—deeper this time.
"Still so calm," the man laughed, dragging the spoon deeper. "You must like it. You must like pain, huh?"
Vale's heart skipped a beat, his fingers digging into the cold concrete beneath him. He didn't like it. But if he screamed, they won. If he bled, they won. If he begged… they won.
So Vale stayed still, silent, not even flinching. The blood dripped, splattering like a twisted metronome.
When they were done, they left him curled on the floor. Broken. Bleeding. Breathing.
He stared at the wall, his face pale, his lips parted as though he might cry.
But he didn't.
Instead, the voice came.
Soft. Patient. Familiar.
"They want you broken," it whispered inside his head. "Let them build you instead."
The voice was not new.It had whispered to him during the trial.It had hummed through the silence of the courtroom.It had laughed when the gavel fell.
Dante.
That was its name. Or maybe just the name Vale had given it.
That night, with his back stuck to the floor by dried blood, Vale pressed his forehead to the concrete. Pain throbbed from his chest like a second heartbeat, but it grounded him.
It reminded him he was still alive.
His breath shook. His nails dug into his palms.And he remembered.
His mother's scream—sharp, ragged, unfinished.His father's body crumpling like paper.The warmth of blood that wasn't his.And the silence after. The kind of silence that echoes forever.
They'd buried the truth.
The courts. The lawyers. The media.Every lie was polished, rehearsed, expensive.And they worked.
The world forgot the truth.
But he didn't.
Vale curled tighter, jaw clenched, breath shallow.
"I swear…" he whispered, voice hoarse.
The rats paused, ears twitching. Even the flickering light stilled.
"Every hand that touched my family…"
"Every lie that buried me…"
"Every guard who laughed while I bled…"
The darkness pressed closer.
"I'll find you."
"I'll break you."
"And when I'm done…"
He opened his eyes. They didn't blink.They didn't waver.They just stared forward, calm and endless.
"Even the devil will beg for mercy."
From somewhere deeper than the cell, deeper than the prison itself, came the faintest echo of laughter.
"You're a child of rage, Vale. But rage won't save you. It will only bleed you dry."
Vale didn't respond.He didn't need to.
But the weight of it settled over him, heavy and suffocating. The mocking voice wasn't just Dante anymore. It was the prison, the world, the lies, and the power that crushed him. They wanted him broken, yes. But in this place, broken things are rebuilt. Turned into tools.
And Vale was going to be the sharpest tool of them all.
He let out a breath, low and even. There was a faint tremor in his chest, but he stilled it. His body was a battlefield, each injury a step closer to his metamorphosis.
They had hurt him. But they would regret it.
And in this darkness, he was learning how to make the night his.