The Cult's Failed Summoning

Chapter 9: A New Form

After shutting the door behind him, Boros walked up to the front of his captive. He stretched his hands across the room, lifted a chair, brought it in front of her, and set it down backward before sitting.

He looked into the eyes of his captive, then lowered the gag tied around her mouth down to her neck.

“Let’s start simple. What’s your name?”

The black-haired woman refused to respond.

Boros tilted his hollow face.

“This is you.”

He stretched out his hand and morphed his fingers, shaping them into a perfect miniature female model.

“My cells are distributed all over your body. This is you.” He paused, letting her stare at the tiny figure. “If you don’t answer my questions…”

The model exploded and melted away in his palm. He reshaped his hand back to normal.

“Now do you understand?”

The female cultist sneered. “Go ahead and blow me apart.”

Boros slapped his own face. “I’m no good at interrogating women I want to bed.”

*What to do,* Boros thought. *I can’t safely read the memories of a living person yet. Even retrieving the memories of the dead is difficult. Only recent memories pop up, along with those that are important, joyous, or painful. I should be glad I could learn the language.*

“And that bastard Alistair’s memory is rejecting me, far more fragmented than I can handle.”

He said the last part out loud. When he turned back, he saw his captive staring at him.

Boros stood up from the chair and reached for the rope binding her. The moment he loosened it, the female cultist twisted her wrist—revealing that her hands had already slipped free—then drew a needle from her sleeve and aimed straight for his shoulder.

Her arm froze mid-strike. The needle slipped from her fingers and clattered helplessly to the ground.

Boros lifted her without effort, walked to the bed, and tossed her onto it. She made a soft, startled gasp as she landed.

He looked down at her. “Plaguecraft. A very useful ability with endless uses. You can’t move your body, can you?”

Boros stretched his hand, grabbed the front of her assassin skinsuit, and tore it open in one smooth rip. The tight fabric parted, revealing her full figure. He descended onto the bed, but the frame creaked loudly under his current mass. He stopped, adjusting his size and shrinking down to average male height.

Then he focused.

His form began to change. At first, his hollow body merely shifted into something more human. Then a thick black mist enveloped his entire frame. It was no longer simple shapeshifting—he was crafting a permanent form for himself using Cellular Manipulation, Flesh Mutation, Bio-Augmentation, and finally Ouroboric Transmutation.

A deep red light shone through the black mist. The cocoon turned solid crimson. Moments later, a piercing white light bloomed from within, turning the entire sphere into a glowing orb.

When the light finally dissipated, what remained was a young man with messy light-green hair, a well-toned body with sharp six-pack definition, and striking dual-layered eyes—red inner pupils ringed by an outer circle of light blue.

Boros ran a hand through his hair and smiled, looking down at the woman on the bed.

“So, what do you think?”

Meanwhile, deep within the subterranean underbelly of Gomorrah—the Lawless City—a different kind of interrogation was taking place.

The room was pitch-black, save for the single, sickly yellow beam of light hanging over a blood-stained chair in the centre of the damp stone floor. Chains clinked heavily against iron shackles.

Bound to the chair was a man with long, unkempt black wavy hair, his face bruised and swollen, blood trickling from his split lip down into his coarse stubble. Two massive, iron-armoured men stood beside him, their heavy spiked gauntlets dripping with fresh crimson.

A sharp, metal-shod boot slammed into the man's ribs. The chair rocked backwards, straining against its floor anchors.

The man gasped, his head snapping back as another brutal fist crushed into his cheekbone.

"I'll talk! I'll talk!" he screamed, his voice raw and raspy, echoing off the wet stone walls. "I'll talk! I'll talk! Give me—"

The heavy iron gauntlet froze inches from his face. The interrogators paused, panting, waiting for the capitulation.

The black-haired man coughed violently, spitting a mouthful of dark blood onto the floor. He leaned his head back, sucking in a ragged breath.

"Give me a moment to catch my breath..."

One of the interrogators narrowed his eyes, his grip tightening on his iron truncheon.

"Okay, okay," the man wheezed, looking up through swollen, heavy eyelids with a crooked, blood-stained grin. "I'll tell you. I'll tell you where Alistair keeps his finest wines."

Silence hung in the dark room for a single second.

Then the iron truncheon descended with brutal, relentless force.

The dull thud of metal on flesh and the sickening sound of breaking ribs filled the chamber again. They struck him over and over—body shots, facial blows, heavy kicks—hammering away at his frame while he grunted, absorbed the strikes, and twisted his body to avoid the worst of them.

After several minutes of continuous beating, the interrogators stepped back, panting, their knuckles painted red.

"Useless old bastard," one spat, wiping sweat from his brow. "Leave him to rot until the boss gets back."

The iron door groaned on its heavy hinges, slammed shut, and the heavy bolt slid into place, plunging the room back into near-total darkness.

Silence returned.

The man hung limp in the chair for a few long minutes, his chest rising and falling in shallow, agonising rhythms. Slowly, painfully, he lifted his chin. His black wavy hair fell back, revealing dark eyes that, despite the swelling and blood, held a strangely calm, unbothered light.

He gasped out a long, shuddering sigh.

"How long is this going to last...?" he muttered into the dark.

He shifted his weight, testing the iron chains, before shaking his head with a raspy, bitter chuckle.

"Alistair, you bastard... I hope you croak. I hope you croak on your ritual."

He closed his eyes, leaning his head back against the cold iron of the chair.

"Ahh! I miss spiced haw wine.”