2025-11-19 18:42:26The city below hissed under the rain, neon signs flickering like dying stars. Matteo crouched atop a derelict rooftop, surveying the streets and alleyways. The Syndicate’s operatives had regrouped after his ambush in the tunnels, and the Wraiths were learning. Every encounter sharpened their instincts, making them more unpredictable.
Matteo ran a hand along the hilt of his blade, feeling the faint pulse of the cross-shaped engraving. Not just a weapon—it was a tether, a warning, a subtle whisper from the relic somewhere deep in Father Malachi’s hands. It hummed faintly, guiding him toward action. He dropped silently to a fire escape, landing in the shadows. From here, he could see the first Syndicate patrol: three operatives, armed and enhanced, moving in precise patterns through a rain-slick alley. Beyond them, a flicker of black mist twisted unnaturally in the neon reflection—the Wraiths had come too, converging for the strike. Matteo’s plan formed quickly. He wasn’t going to run. Not this time. He would turn the city itself into his weapon. First, he triggered a cascade of loose scaffolding above the alley. Metal rods clanged and twisted, crashing into the patrol and scattering the Wraiths temporarily. Sparks flew, water hissed, and the neon reflections shimmered like fractured glass. Matteo rolled, blade flashing, taking down the first operative with a clean strike. The remaining Syndicate operatives fired, bullets ricocheting off metal, but he ducked and vaulted onto a higher ledge. The Wraith lunged from the shadows, tendrils striking the wet concrete. Matteo slashed, the faint glow of the cross engraving flaring as the creature recoiled, melting into black mist. From a nearby rooftop, Matteo launched his second strike—a series of improvised explosive charges he had pre-set along the fire escape and scaffolding. The explosion rocked the alley, sending debris raining down. The remaining operatives were knocked off balance, and the Wraiths staggered from the shockwave. Matteo landed in the chaos, running through the wreckage with the precision of a predator. One operative tried to flank him, but Matteo pivoted, slashing in a fluid arc. The Wraiths surged closer, drawn by the violence, whispers growing louder, names and memories echoing in Matteo’s mind. He felt it again—the relic’s pulse. Stronger now, insistent, almost alive. A subtle warmth spread from his hand to his arm, a guiding presence, a reminder of the weight of sin he carried and the power he could wield. The Wraiths recoiled as if recognizing the relic’s influence, giving him the advantage he needed. Matteo vaulted across a narrow alley, landing behind a third operative. The man’s cybernetic enhancements whirred, claws extended, but Matteo’s blade met his with a metallic screech. Sparks erupted, black mist curling around the edges. The Wraiths hissed and twisted, caught between the physical and spectral assaults. From above, a shadow detached itself from the rooftop across the alley. Massive, deliberate, silent. Matteo paused, heart tightening. Not Wraith. Not human. Something else. The hunt had escalated beyond the Syndicate, beyond the city, and perhaps even beyond his understanding. He didn’t hesitate. Action had always been his language. Matteo ran, weaving between debris and shadows, striking, dodging, slicing through the chaos. Every movement precise, every strike calculated, every heartbeat tethered to the relic’s subtle pulse. By the time he reached the roof of a crumbling apartment block, the alley below was littered with broken Syndicate operatives and dissipated Wraiths. Matteo crouched, chest heaving, blade dripping with black mist and rainwater. He looked across the city and felt the weight of what he carried—the sins, the shadows, the Syndicate, and now… something watching him from above, unseen but unmistakable. The city hummed around him. Neon flickered, rain glimmered, and the whispers of Wraiths faded for now. Matteo knew the battle was far from over. The Syndicate would strike again, the Wraiths would return, and whatever had just watched him from the rooftop was still out there, waiting. He clenched his blade, feeling the faint warmth of the relic’s influence coursing through him. He wasn’t just surviving anymore. He was preparing to strike back. A single, elongated shadow stretched across the city, detaching itself from the tallest Syndicate spire. It moved with precision, eyes glowing faintly in the rain-soaked night. And in the distance, the faint pulse of the relic flared—urgent, insistent, almost like a warning: "The sins you carry are awakening… and so is the hunter."
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Chapter 22- the hollow place
There was no darkness.That surprised Matteo more than fear ever had.He expected blackness, suffocation, pain—some crushing pressure that would pulverize him into nothing. Instead, there was space. Endless and pale, stretching in all directions without horizon or edge. The ground beneath his feet was smooth and colorless, like stone worn down by centuries of prayer. When he moved, no sound followed. No echo. No confirmation that he still belonged to anything physical.He checked himself instinctively.His wounds were gone.The torn muscle in his leg, the gash in his ribs, the burning fatigue that had lived in his bones only moments before—silenced. Not healed. Absent. As if they’d never existed.Matteo clenched his fists.No blade.The Confessor’s Blade was gone.That realization struck harder than any injury. He turned slowly, scanning the empty expanse, heart pounding louder than it ever had during battle.“Don’t do this,” he muttered. “I didn’t come here to be alone.”The place an
Chapter 21- The Measure of What Remains
The storm should have drowned everything.Instead, it bent.Rain fell sideways around the second colossus, bending and scattering as if afraid to touch it for too long. The thing stood half-buried in the city, its legs embedded deep into broken streets and collapsed transit tunnels. It was not stitched together like the earlier titan. This one was deliberate. Shaped. Formed with intention.Matteo had the strangest thought that it had chosen its appearance carefully.The Confessor’s Blade pulled at his arm as if resisting gravity, its weight pressing deeper into his bones. His vision blurred—not from injury, but from pressure. The closer the colossus leaned toward the city, the heavier everything inside him became.The mysterious figure landed behind him without sound, boots touching water but barely disturbing the surface. Their staff flickered faintly, struggling to remain lit.“This is not an executioner,” they said. “It’s an adjudicator.”Matteo exhaled slowly. “So it decides who l
Chapter 20 - Overrun
Rain hammered the broken street as Matteo shoved himself upright, ribs aching where the titan had slammed him into the ground. Mist churned ahead, thickening before forming into the Wraith commander. Its jagged grin stretched too wide.“You’re still standing? I expected you to stay down with the rest of the weak.”Matteo spat blood into the puddles. “Then you don’t know me.”“I know you perfectly,” the Wraith hissed. “A killer pretending to be righteous. A butcher hoping for forgiveness.”Matteo tightened his grip on the Confessor’s Blade. “Keep talking. It won’t save you.”“I don’t need saving—you do.”A tendril slammed into the street, sending cracks spiderwebbing outward. Matteo dodged, rolling through rainwater and broken glass. He surged back to his feet, blade slicing through a smaller tendril. It dissolved with a sizzling hiss.Above them, the titan roared again—louder, angrier—shaking windows from surrounding buildings.A faint glow flickered on a balcony high above. The myste
Chapter 19 — Reflections in the Storm
The storm broke over the city with a violence that felt personal.Rain hammered the rooftops in relentless sheets, turning the neon-lit skyline into a distorted watercolor of collapsing lights. Matteo crouched atop the rusted billboard frame, coat whipping in the wind, raindrops stinging his face like cold needles. Below him, the streets convulsed with chaos—shattered vehicles, flickering street-lamps, panicked civilians running through rivers of oily water.And amidst it all moved the colossal shadow.Fifty feet tall, vaguely humanoid, its surface churned like smoke infused with lightning. Tendrils whipped from its back, smashing cars and ripping through the pavement. Each step it took made the ground tremble. Wraiths clustered around its feet, exhaling mist that warped the air.Matteo exhaled slowly, gripping the hilt of the Confessor’s Blade. The relic pulsed faintly under his fingers, as if sensing the magnitude of what stood before them."Found you," he whispered.A presence swir
Chapter 18 — Colossus in the Shadows
The streets of the lower district were a storm of chaos. Neon reflections shimmered on wet asphalt, punctuated by the screams of Wraiths and the mechanical screech of Syndicate reinforcements. Matteo sprinted across crumbling rooftops, blade in hand, eyes fixed on the towering silhouette emerging from the haze.It was massive—black and gold shadow limbs, eyes glowing molten, tendrils writhing like serpents. Each movement caused the street below to quake. Civilians scattered, screaming, as Syndicate operatives scrambled to contain the creature."This… this isn’t natural," one operative shouted, raising a rifle."No," Matteo muttered, blade spinning, slicing a Wraith mid-air. "But it can be fought."From above, the mysterious figure hovered on a rooftop, staff glowing faintly. "It tests you, Confessor. Not just strength, but judgment. Strike where it falters.""Judgment… right," Matteo replied, leaping down into the chaos.The colossal shadow lunged, tendrils smashing into a parked car,
Chapter 17 — The Hunt Spreads
The city was a labyrinth of shadows, neon, and rain. From the rooftops, Matteo watched the streets churn with Syndicate operatives and lurking Wraiths, all converging toward the chaos he had already unleashed. The apex spire loomed behind him, its broken windows reflecting streaks of lightning."You cannot hope to control them all," the mysterious figure called from a nearby rooftop, staff glowing faintly. "The Syndicate spreads like a virus, and the Wraiths are its immune system. Pick your battles.""I don’t need to control them," Matteo replied, voice low but firm. "I just need to survive—and make sure they pay for what they’ve done."A hail of plasma fire erupted from the street below. Matteo rolled behind a broken neon sign, sparks flying as bullets ricocheted off exposed metal. Two Wraiths emerged from the alley, tendrils snapping."We can’t let him reach the lower districts!" one Syndicate operative shouted."Watch him!" hissed the Wraith commander, reforming partially, mist cur
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