**The cell door exploded inward.**
Three figures stood silhouetted in the torchlight, clad in black robes embroidered with silver serpents. Their faces were hidden behind featureless masks of polished bone.
"World-walker," the center figure intoned. The voice was genderless, echoing strangely as if spoken through water. "You are summoned."
Min-jun's fingers tightened around the obsidian shard Liao had given him. The brand on his chest burned suddenly, viciously—a white-hot brand searing down to bone. He gritted his teeth against the scream rising in his throat.
The lead hunter tilted its head. "The mark responds. Good."
Liao moved faster than his ragged appearance suggested. A rusted eating knife appeared in his hand as he lunged—
—only to freeze midair, suspended by invisible forces.
The hunter on the right made a casual flicking motion. Liao's body slammed into the stone wall with a wet crunch.
"NO!" Min-jun surged forward.
The center hunter raised a single finger.
Agony.
Min-jun collapsed as the brand ignited like a star beneath his skin. His vision whited out. Distantly, he felt iron manacles clamp around his wrists, smelled the ozone-stink of charged air.
When the pain receded enough to see, he was being dragged down a corridor he'd never seen before—smooth black stone veined with pulsating crimson. The walls whispered as they passed.
Liao's words echoed in his mind: *Every cage has a key.*
The obsidian shard still bit into his palm.
---
**The chamber stank of blood and burnt copper.**
Min-jun was chained to a circular dais engraved with runes that squirmed when stared at too long. Above him floated seven black candles that burned with green flame.
A new figure emerged from the shadows—taller than the hunters, wearing a mask of beaten gold.
"Subject 117," the golden mask said. "You will answer."
The brand on Min-jun's chest throbbed in time with the candles' flames.
"Go to hell," he spat.
The figure made a gesture.
Fire erupted in Min-jun's nervous system. Every nerve ending lit up like a live wire. Somewhere far away, he heard himself screaming.
When it stopped, he was on his knees, drooling onto the dais.
"Better," said the golden mask. "Now. Tell us of the gate that brought you here."
Min-jun's vision swam. The obsidian shard was still there, wedged between his palm and the manacle. He could feel its edge biting flesh.
"I don't... remember..."
Another gesture. More pain.
This time, when it faded, the golden mask was kneeling before him. "You will remember. Or we will carve the memory from your flesh." A blade appeared in its hand—jagged, like a shark's tooth.
As the blade descended toward his eye, Min-jun *twisted*.
The obsidian shard scraped against the manacle's locking mechanism.
A click.
His right hand came free.
---
**What happened next** blurred into a frenzy of motion.
Min-jun's freed hand found the golden mask's throat. His left manacle shattered against the figure's temple. The hunters moved as one—but the brand on Min-jun's chest flared brighter than ever, and suddenly he could *feel* something inside him responding.
The first hunter died with its own jagged blade in its heart.
The second collapsed screaming, hands clutching at the brand-shaped burn now seared across *its* chest.
The golden mask was retreating, shouting in a language that made the candle flames dance wildly.
Min-jun didn't give it the chance to finish.
The obsidian shard found its home in the golden mask's left eye.
---
**Silence.**
Panting, bleeding, Min-jun staggered toward the chamber's only exit. Behind him, the black candles guttered out one by one.
As the last flame died, the brand on his chest cooled—but not completely.
Something had awakened.
Something hungry.
And now it knew his name.
**TO BE CONTINUED...**