THE EMAIL WAS MARKED as urgent and had arrived two hours earlier, punctuating the night like a dark premonition. The message was brief, as sharp as a blade, and cut through his mind with the cold precision of a military command:
"I hope you appreciated the relic and have practiced handling it. I must remind you that the task must be carried out with a single strike. An English requirement."
Concise words, devoid of ornament, yet carrying the weight of ancient customs and deadly protocols. He reread the lines, sensing between them the discipline and patience of someone who tolerated no mistakes. There was also an unfinished sentence, as though the sender had smiled behind the keyboard:
"I intended to keep your focus entirely on that, but something unexpected came up. The goddess will arrive tomorrow and will hold a press conference at the hotel. Be there. Good luck..."
A postscript—P.S.N.—closed the message with the same courtesy as a death notice. The irony was merciless: the arrival of a goddess, a public ceremony, and at the same time, the order to carry out an act that could only be accomplished in the shadows, in silence, with surgical precision.
— I need to cut off the head of that damned traitor, the Ipsissimus vented, his voice sharp inside his own mind, as though pronouncing a sentence that had already been signed and sealed.
The words sounded almost like both a confession and a promise, blending fury with exhaustion. He wondered what the hell he had gotten himself into this time, replaying in an instant the hidden betrayals, the three-in-the-morning meetings, the whispers in dark corners where alliances had been forged and broken over interests he now understood far too well. His need for revenge was no longer merely personal; it had become an obligation branded into his very flesh.
At least I'll finally get revenge on that bastard who slipped through my fingers like water... he muttered inwardly, once again seeing the traitor sliding away from incompetent hands, escaping while he had stood there powerless.
His resentment took shape in vivid images: the traitor's face, the muffled laughter, the cowardice disguised as intelligence—all of it fueling a methodical hatred, almost ritualistic in nature.
IT WAS NEARLY FOUR O'CLOCK in the morning. The city slept beyond the windows, yet inside the apartment the night felt denser, as though the air itself had been compressed by chains of memory and foreboding.
He walked to the table where he had left the relic—the open case, the wrinkled velvet lining, the gleaming metal that promised as much power as guilt—and gripped the hilt with both hands, locking his wrists as though anchoring himself to his own destiny.
Raising the blade above his head was a heavy, ceremonial gesture, summoning images of ancient rites, of executioners from centuries past lifting their swords before delivering judgment. It felt heavier than before—not merely in weight, but in the burden of past decisions, of names written on lists, of promises left unfulfilled.
He imagined a man kneeling before him, head bowed, neck exposed like a human altar awaiting the final blow. He could almost see the taut skin, the restrained breathing, the pleading eyes—and, at the same time, justice itself. Everything revolved inside his mind with the precision of a clockwork mechanism.
— One single strike... he murmured as he slowly brought the weapon downward. ...and your head will roll.
Repeating the mantra served to calm and discipline his thoughts, preventing doubt from creeping in. Each word marked the rhythm of the movement: slow, controlled, irreversible.
A tingling sensation spread through his arms. It began in his forearms and climbed upward like an electric current, robbing him of his grip. His strength suddenly failed, and the weapon slipped from his hands with a deafening crash—a dry metallic sound that echoed throughout the room.
The blade buried itself in the wooden floorboards, the impact driving it deep into the timber. The hilt remained tilted at a forty-five-degree angle, its point embedded like an accusation.
The blow awakened another memory: failures, nervous mannerisms, the traitor who had escaped, the trembling hands when the opportunity had finally come.
He tried to pull out the instrument of Charles I's martyrdom as though wrenching a secret from a tangled skein of wool, but the floor resisted, as if the house itself refused to cooperate with something his conscience had yet to permit.
— Damn it! he muttered through clenched teeth.
He pulled again, strained, tried to wrench it free, but his muscles responded with poisonous sluggishness. The blade remained firmly lodged in place, his body betraying his will with a fatigue that had given no warning.
He could not stop himself from collapsing.
The world tilted. His vision blurred. Every sound became muffled, as though someone had thrown a heavy blanket over reality itself.
Then he lost consciousness.
It was not only his body that surrendered to the sheets of darkness; his mind drifted away as well, carrying with it the unfinished plan, the promise of blood, and leaving behind the room where the relic still gleamed, indifferent... waiting.