I patted the girl's head, her soft hair parted ways and my fingers sank until her scalp, she squirmed a little under my hand but didn't dare say anything. “You've done well,” I said smiling, “you are one of us now.” I could feel her shake, an absolutely normal reaction after what she went through; when we accept Var'Kharzot as lord he steals a little piece of our soul, that is how he can always read our minds and punish those who disobey.

The process in itself is painless, however, the feeling of something icy being coiled around your heart is hard to get used to. Not vomiting on the ground is already a great achievement.

Calming down, the frightened girl extended both of her hands towards the statue. I stared in astonishment as on her hands appeared a ball of pure black surrounded by a bright white halo, her cupped hands closed on it and when she opened them again a card had substituted the sphere.

I stared at the card, it depicted a kneeling knight in full armour turned porcupine by dozens of arrows, below him stood a mountain of corpses and two words: “The sacrifice.” By memory, I knew what this was, whenever the lord felt particularly satisfied with a servant he would reward them with one of these cards, each of them contained immense power and once absorbed would accompany one until his death.

If I didn't know what power was contained inside this card I would have stolen it right now and absorbed it myself, however, I finally understood what the Lord's plan was and that my gift wasn't the card, it was the girl! She looked at me with a pitiful expression, like a starved slave finding some bread on the ground and asking permission from his master to eat it. “Go ahead, the Lord gave it to you.”

As the card approached her chest, where it would fuse with her, a hand stopped her. The shrine maiden had leapt forward to stop the little girl, her eyes fixed on the card. “She doesn't deserve it!” she screamed at me. “I served the Lord for fifteen years and received nothing. Where is my reward!” I could see the little girl terrified by her mentor looking away and trying to pull the card to her chest, however, the woman was stronger than her and little by little gaining advantage.

I sighed, why do I always have to deal with this bullshit. Taking a dagger from my belt I gripped it in reverse and plunged it straight to the woman's unprotected neck, she was so focused on the card she didn't notice the approaching steel until a jet of blood escaped her body. She clutched the spot where the cold metal had bit her, however, a lacerated carotid was an inescapable fate, she had only a few seconds left.

Fear pushed away the previous madness as she fell to the ground, she extended her hands towards the statue, however for the first time in many years the statue didn't look back at her. “Trying to steal that card you betrayed our Lord, don't expect him to help you.” And like this, she died.

I looked back at the little girl, she didn't even spare a glance at her mentor and finally pushed the card in her chest, maybe afraid someone else would try stealing it. Like a hot blade in butter, the card easily entered her body disappearing without leaving even a reddened spot on her clavicle.

She sighed in relief, however, the peace didn't last much, maybe smelling the blood, the wolves upstairs howled in sorrow and were rushing downstairs. “Quick drink this!” I threw her a small crystal bottle, luckily her reflexes and obedience were good enough, she snatched the bottle out of the air and downed it in one go. She tried taking a defensive stance, however, the potion she gulped took effect quickly and she slumped on the ground.

“Sorry, I had to give you a sleeping mixture, it's not yet time for you to show the world your power.” she fell asleep hearing my words.

Now for the doggies, I pored some man-eating bacteria first on my clothes and then on my dagger, the little colony of parasites immediately consumed the leftover blood of the shrine-maiden, “Hope you enjoyed the appetizer, here comes the main dish.” the first wolf entered the room and leaped forward, trying to bite me, I jumped aside and slashed at his front leg.

The slash successfully cut through his fur, as the parasites entered the flesh and spread he would be dead meat in five minutes. Unfortunately, my grip on the dagger wasn't steady enough and I lost it in the confrontation before I could try to take it back the second and third wolves entered the room and tried to bite me, one came from my left and the other from the right.

I gave a kick to the right one hitting him on the snout and then turning my body like a tornado delivered a hook kick to the left one. Before I could leap forward and try to deliver one more hit, the injured wolf attacked me from the back pushing me to the ground.

I felt his claws dig into my back. Withstanding the pain I felt hundreds of time when the lord personally disciplined me I used my elbow to hit his maw as he tried to bite my neck from behind. My intuition of what he was gonna do proved to be right and my elbow knocked him off my back and with a quick turn I avoided the teeth of the fourth wolf, I supposed, that came for my face straight after getting in the room.

I managed to jump on my feet and found myself surrounded by four wolves and with a superficial injury in my back. Hot blood trickled down my back mixing with sweat, my head hurt and I felt like throwing up. “I love fighting.” people who never experienced such near-death encounters could never understand what it meant.

I personally believed that life and death were just two slates of white and black linked by a slate of various shades of grey, and ourselves just paper dolls placed on the slate of life. As we approached the death slate we would finally start to see our contours, defined by the stark contrast of white on black, the more we approached the more we would understand ourselves.

The stall lasted a few more seconds until with a growl one wolf initiated the attack, being ready I sidestepped the wolf and grabbed his head, before the others could intervene I poked out his eyes, the jelly-like organs easily got squashed after my nails penetrated them.

Howling in pain he blindly ran forward smashing unto the wall and collapsing with a low yelp of pain. One of the others, the one I had cut in the beginning tried to leap towards me, however, his leg couldn't support the effort and like rotten wood, it broke off with a disgusting wet sound. One wolf had fainted and another one was yelping in pain as worm-like parasites devoured him from the inside, even if I died now it would still be a good result.

The last two circled me like sharks, waiting for a chance to attack, I calmly walked towards the middle of the room where I had spotted my fallen dagger, as I crouched to take it, the wolves thought it was an opportunity and attacked at the same time. Immediately turning and using the centrifugal force I trusted the dagger to the hilt in the skull of the closer wolf, before I could take it out the second one had closed his mouth on my left arm, pain assaulted me as he turned his head trying to rip my arm off.

I let go of the dagger stuck in the wolf's skull and used my free hand to try pry open the wolf's bite, however he was way stronger than me, with a semi wrestling-like move I threw both of us to the ground and coiled my legs around his head trying to stop him from moving too much, my plan half-worked, as his head got stuck he tried to use his claws to break free.

Like a trapped beast he fought with all he had, his claws ripped a few fresh cuts on my face and chest, finally after a dozen seconds of dogfight on the ground, his jaw went soft, the bacteria I had spread over my clothes ate away his jaw-muscles and tongue. Taking advantage of the moment, I freed my arm and ripped away the lower jaw.

The last wolf finally fell. The lower half of his jaw was gone revealing his rotten tongue dangling down powerlessly.