CHAPTER 64: A DEBT IN BLOOD

The warm wind of the eastern terrain whistled through the canopies of the trees at Gorg Cemetery, carrying the scent of dried earth, dead leaves, and the desolation of mortals.

That morning, under the bright blue sky, screeching metals and footsteps rose, moving through the spaces between the triangular-shaped iron gate and the graves.

Men dressed in black outfits walked out of the cars parked at the front of the triangular gate and entered the cemetery. Their outfits shimmered whenever the early morning sun shone on their chests.

Grasses bent under the weight of their boots as they moved past the gate and entered the large cemetery filled with colorful graves.

Leaves of mango trees spun in the air, floating and landing freely on the freshly planted grave, and flipping on the grass as countless boots pushed forward.

Between the graves was a newly cemented seven-and-a-half-foot hole filled with flowers and cloths that glittered like gold. Under the flowers was a black casket with the name Denis written boldly on it, and a long, large sword resting softly at the center of the grave.

At the top of the grave, men and women held their hands, singing and weeping as they stared in the direction of the casket in the hole.

Children roamed about in the covered graves, their minds filled with joy as they chased after each other, laughing and moving through the men standing still like rock.

Among the men, one turned toward the children, squeezed his eyes, and frowned slightly as a kid bumped into him. After a minute of staring wildly at the boy who bumped into him, he turned his gaze to the casket and placed his hands in the pockets of his trousers, grinning.

His yellow eyes glowed whenever memories of him and the man now in the casket walking through the roads and stopping at one of the tall buildings in the city of Babel played in his mind.

Beside him were other men and women dressed in the same black stylish outfits like married couples, also folding their hands and staring at the same casket he stared at.

At the front of the hole, where the head of the casket—where the silver cross was—was, a man dressed in a pope outfit stood there flipping the pages of a book and reciting the words in them.

"Peace be unto all of us as we stand here, saying our last goodbye to our dear, lovely brother, Denis," he said, raising his head and drawing an invisible sign of the cross in the air with his right arm, then lowering his head back to the book in his left hand.

"We all know our brother was good, kind, loving, and was a man who always acted purely."

Every word he said, every sentence he read, made the woman standing there with two kids—one boy standing beside her and a girl wrapped around her chest—face saddened more. Among all those standing there, those three people cried the most. Though they wiped the tears from their eyes countless times, yet the tears kept falling like a broken pipe.

’Why leave us in seasons like this?’ she thought, tightening her jaw and staring wildly at the yellow-eyed man who stood in the opposite direction as if he was the cause of her husband’s death.

Beside the woman, a man stood there, his face showing no sign of sorrow or grief. He turned toward the woman, wrapped his arm around her shoulder, and pushed her, helping her gift the man in the casket her last love flower.

Thirty minutes after showing their last respect for the man in the casket, they started to move out of the cemetery one after another, walking toward each of the cars parked outside the cemetery and driving off.

When the woman and her children reached a black Jeep parked beside an ash Civic, a man stepped out of the Civic and opened the door of the Jeep for the woman and her children. The moment he closed the door, he swallowed hard, seeing the face of the man who wrapped his arms around the woman and moved her forward.

"Why do you feel tense, Max?" the man said, stretching his right arm on the shoulder of the man standing there, shaking.

"You don’t need to fear anything. You did your part. But now, I will do my part. Just leave the city before we visit..." the man said, smiled, then walked toward the driving side of the jeep and sat in it calmly, but watched Max as he walked to the ash Civic and drove off.

’Bastard, you’ll regret ever joining your members and watching them kill my sister’s husband,’ the man thought, tightening his grip on the steer as the ash Civic moved out of the road and vanished. Then he stepped on the accelerator, starting the engine, and drove the jeep slowly, waving at the men standing in a group of four on the road as he drove off.

...

Among the four grouped men, the one with the fifteen-round beads around his right wrist kept on slamming his left hand on the shoulder of the yellow-eyed man.

"Kang... where the hell were you when Denis was being killed?" he said in a voice that sounded both strange and dangerous, as his chest heaved while his red eyes glowed wildly.

Kang stood, eyes closed, his mind still reeling the memories over and over again, and when it reached the scene of a boy jumping and slamming himself on a man lying on the ground, he cracked his eyes open, tightened his jaw, then clenched his fist.

All three of the men standing and throwing questions at him stopped and watched Kang, their faces turning from worry to smiles.

The red-eyed man’s lips stretched the moment Kang turned, walked to one of the cars, hopped in, and drove off.

Kang’s car’s engine and tire rumbling sounds echoed and swelled leaves up as he drove mercilessly toward the direction leading to Gorg City’s wall.

"Let’s not rush our acts. If he succeeds, fine; if not, then we turn the city upside down."

The two young men standing with their hands folded on their chests nodded and grinned, then walked to the cars and drove off, following the same direction Kang had taken.

...

Birds soared high above the clouds, dived downward toward the canopies of the trees at the burnt dusty road leading to Gilgal Village.

A minute after the birds wrapped their torsos around the branches, a blue Civic slowed down and halted when it passed a lady and a child wearing dirty clothes walking by the left side of the road.

The lady in the front seat of the Civic stepped down, frowning after contemplating who to go and meet—the dirty lady by the road.

Her expression changed as she felt dissatisfied with the air entering her lungs as she neared the lady, but kept her composure and acted as if she was okay.

She cleared her throat, catching the attention of the lady before she even closed the gap between them.

"Hello... my name is Jinx," she said, forcing a smile on her face and jolting her disgusted eyes on the lady and her child.

Her heart heaved as the lady stared at her as if she were a ghost, then shook her head.

’What the fuck is wrong with her?’ she thought, frowned slightly, but forcefully smiled and touched the little girl’s cheek.

"Your daughter?" Jinx said, tilting her gaze from the child to the lady and back to the child.

"Yes," the lady said, nodding at the same time.

For the first time hearing a voice from the lady, Jinx’s face reddened as she held back the air, trying to pave its way into her nose.

Though Jinx tried to maintain her composure, she couldn’t, as the bad smell from the lady crunched her so hard it made her cough.

"Sorry, I just ate something that keeps rumbling in my tummy," Jinx said, tilting her gaze toward the young men now standing and crossing their legs and folding their arms on their chests, laughing at her.