Prisoner
Chapter - 29
There was no answer.
They remained on guard, their gazes locked in a suffocating silence.
Zavi glanced toward the road on his right. He stood with his back to the door, his thoughts racing. Was this Moreira’s doing, or did someone truly intend to kill him?
He held his breath, forcing himself to stay calm. His right hand slowly moved behind him, brushing against the grip of the revolver hidden beneath his clothes.
“Now…”
He suddenly turned and ran to the left, darting into the narrow alley beside the house. His goal was simple. Escape this district, no matter how.
One of the two immediately gave chase. The other turned back toward the house, yanking the dagger from the wall before following after.
Zavi ran while opening the revolver’s cylinder, loading bullets one by one. His hands trembled, but his movements were quick. The cylinder snapped shut. Fully loaded.
As he burst onto the main road, his steps abruptly stopped. A crowd filled his vision, people moving back and forth.
From behind, without warning—
Bang! Bang!
Zavi’s eyes widened. He had not even turned around when something cut through the air, hot and lethal.
The bullet should have pierced his head. Yet at the very last second, its trajectory twisted, as if deflected by something unseen, and struck a woman across the street instead.
A scream erupted instantly.
“There’s a shooting!”
“Is she still alive?”
“Find the shooter!”
Chaos exploded in an instant.
Zavi stood frozen. His eyes were fixed on the woman. Her body twitched in pain for a brief moment, then went still. Dead.
His jaw tightened.
Slowly, he slipped the silver revolver back into his clothes. If he was seen holding a gun, everyone would assume he was the culprit.
“This can’t be…”
From behind a narrow gap between buildings, the shooter, Nawai, froze.
His hands trembled. He knew exactly where he had aimed.
“I don’t believe it…” he muttered.
A chill crawled up his spine. The brown pistol in his left hand slipped free and fell to the ground.
“That bullet… it really bent.”
A few seconds later, Calvert hurried over from behind him, confusion immediately flooding his mind.
“Hey, what actually happened?” he asked, trying to confirm.
Silence. No answer.
Nawai slowly turned his head, staring at his partner with wide eyes and trembling lips.
“Answer me! What really happened?” Calvert shook Nawai’s shoulders, trying to snap him out of it.
“Um… Calvert. Am I going crazy? Am I about to die?” Tears began to spill from his eyes.
Calvert frowned, unable to understand why Nawai had suddenly become like this after being left alone for only a moment.
“I don’t get it,” he said, confused. “How did he end up like this? This is strange. Could it be because of that man? Where is he now?”
He quickly stepped out of the narrow gap and moved toward the intersection and the crowd ahead. However, the target, Zavi, was gone from where he had been standing earlier.
“Wasn’t he just standing here? I saw blood seeping through the back of his coat. There’s no way he could walk with a wound like that.”
He nearly turned away. He took one step, then his shoe touched something wet that had appeared behind him.
Calvert stopped instantly. He bent down and brushed the stone pavement with his fingertips.
Blood. Warm and fresh.
“So it’s true…” he murmured softly. “But… where is he now?”
He stood up and looked back toward the gap between the buildings. Nawai was still there, sitting against the wall, his body stiff, barely moving.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
“Hey. Nawai.” Calvert stood at the mouth of the alley, staring at him with a furrowed brow. “That guy escaped. Get up. We’ll chase him, then we’ll go home.”
There was no proper response.
Nawai’s movements were slow. His head lifted slightly, his lips moved, but his voice was barely audible.
“Where are you now, Calvert…?”
His voice broke.
“I’m… I’m scared being alone.”
Calvert froze.
Nawai was staring straight ahead. Not at him. Not at anything. His eyes were open, yet empty.
“No way…” Calvert’s breath caught. “You… you can’t see?”
There was no reaction.
Nawai’s hearing had vanished, swallowed by something unknown, along with his vision. His words spilled out aimlessly, without control, as if cast into a boundless prison.
Calvert stepped back half a pace.
He had seen death in many forms. He had killed, toyed with it, and laughed at human screams.
But this—
This was not an injury. Not death. This was punishment.
Nawai’s knees finally gave out. His body collapsed, and his crying burst forth, raw and desperate, like a lost child searching for a parent in a silent, pitch black space.
Calvert did not move. For the first time, he felt fear. Not of death, but of something that still allowed them to live.
“Is this punishment for a hunter? But why him? Shouldn’t it be me instead?”
He approached his friend, who now looked like an empty cocoon, something that might vanish in the future. Unable to speak to him, knowing Nawai could not hear, Calvert could only hold him tightly, refusing to let it happen, searching for any reason why this had occurred.
Suddenly, Nawai returned the embrace, forcing a smile as he whispered, “Mother… is that really you?”
Calvert stiffened. Not because of the words themselves, but because of a single word.
“Mother.”
It had been far too long, perhaps more than sixteen years, since he last heard that word leave Nawai’s mouth. Neither of them even knew what their biological mother looked like. They had longed to meet their parents and searched for them until now.
His exhausted face formed a thin, strained smile.
“Even if you can’t see or hear me, can you at least see your mother’s face in your dreams?” he muttered half jokingly. “If so, I want to meet mine too, damn it.”
…
At that moment, Zavi exited Kurs Street and headed toward Number One Buca Street, his head spinning. Guilt weighed heavily in his chest over the woman’s death. He had been thinking about it constantly, wondering where the bullet came from. One thing was certain. It came from the two mysterious men he had encountered earlier.
But one thing shocked him.
By coincidence, at the previous intersection, he chose to turn right, and just a few steps from where he stood, he encountered Moreira.
Earlier, Moreira had asked why he did not wait at the location he had provided.
Zavi answered casually, “I just wanted some fresh air.” Hearing that, Moreira simply nodded and followed him.
And now, the two of them were walking side by side.
However, something bothered Zavi, enough that he did not hesitate to ask.
“Aren’t you supposed to be alone? Who’s the person watching from over there?” His index finger pointed to the right, toward a café and the muddy road beside it, the Hava district market.
Moreira’s body stiffened. He did not turn around, but occasionally glanced at Zavi, who was staring back at him.
“Hm. Why isn’t that guy hiding?” he thought.
“You’re smarter than I expected,” he praised, not anticipating that his opponent would be this perceptive.
“…”
Zavi suddenly turned and ran away, pulling the revolver from his coat pocket and preparing to fire.
“Where are you hiding that person? How can you look exactly like him? Are you working together with those two?” he asked nervously, finger ready on the trigger if there was no answer.
“Does he have the Magician ability? What level does he control?” Zavi thought, his face unable to hide his shock.
From the opposite direction, a man wearing a bowler hat approached. The brim cast a shadow over his face, leaving darkness where his eyes should have been.
His steps were calm. Too calm.
Something about the way he walked made the air around them feel wrong. Even without a weapon, anyone could sense that he was dangerous.
“Stop right there!” Zavi growled, raising his revolver. “One more step and I’ll shoot!”
But the man in the bowler hat seemed to hear nothing. He kept walking forward, passing by his companion, then his body slammed hard into the building wall.
Thud.
“What?” they muttered in unison.
He did not turn. He did not curse. He showed no sign of pain. He simply stood there, head lowered, as if he was not even aware of the wall’s existence.
Zavi and the fake Moreira exchanged glances.
“What… did we just see?” they whispered at the same time, confused as to why he had deliberately crashed into the wall.
Then, the man disguised as Moreira, a Hollow who wielded the Magician ability at level one, immediately approached his partner, whose behavior had suddenly become strange.
The man changed. His face shifted, like a mask being forcibly torn away. Straight black hair fell loose, and his brown eyes were now filled with undisguised panic.
He did not understand what had just happened.
The plan was supposed to go smoothly. He had disguised himself as Moreira, kidnapped him beforehand, taken a part of his body as the condition to perfectly mimic him. Zavi should have been fooled. He should have let his guard down.
He should have died.
But everything went wrong. His partner had become strange. Now the man in the bowler hat moved like a blind man, groping at empty air, his face blank with fear.
For the first time, a chill spread through his chest.
This was not a simple failure. Something was wrong, and he was no longer sure who he was facing.
“Hey, what is actually happening?”
His attempt failed. His partner did not answer. Not because he refused to answer, but because three vital senses, sight, hearing, and smell, no longer functioned as they had minutes ago.
A few seconds later, the man who had disguised himself as Moreira realized something. The one standing behind him was someone capable of threatening the existence of his other comrades, including himself.
He immediately turned, understanding that the target was not an ordinary man. Completely different from the information provided by his captain.
Yes. He was part of the same hunting group as Calvert and Nawai.
He bowed deeply, begging for mercy, knowing he could not win against an opponent whose power was far too dangerous and entirely beyond his current level.
