Crow's Cage

Within one of the various districts in the Uceris kingdom, two women could be seen sitting near a balcony enjoying a cup of tea in the middle of the day.

These two women were of course Skyler and Mia, who had helped to apprehend the supposedly 'berserk' omen that had appeared in front of one of the kingdom's gates. That matter had now passed, and it had already been several hours since then. However, Skyler seemed to still be recalling those events.

"-yler!

"-kyler!

"Skyler!"

"Hm?"

Skyler looked up to see Mia scowling at her.

"What is it Mia," Skyler spoke in an inattentive tone.

Mia continued to scowl as she pointed her tea spoon at the cup in front of her sister.

"You haven't even touched your tea yet."

Skyler nonchalantly looked down to the tea in front of her.

"Oh."

"Oh? Is that all you have to say?"

Skyler exhaled a breath as she stood to try and walk away, yet Mia did not allow her to do so as she grabbed her sleeve.

Skyler turned to look at Mia who stared into her eyes with a resolute expression.

"Please Skyler, talk to me," Mia spoke with a surprising amount of emotion.

Skyler stared at her sister for awhile and realized she wasn't going to be able to get out of this.

"Fine."

Since they'd returned back home, Mia had been trying to get Skyler's attention to no avail. Now though, the woman had finally relented to her sister's urging and sat down to face her.

"I know you're still thinking about that... omen from the gate."

To those words, Skyler didn't move a muscle or make a sound, but Mia knew her well enough to know she was correct.

"You haven't said anything to me for the past couple hours since we returned. You didn't even drink the tea in front of you, and you love tea."

Skyler looked down to the tea in front of her and back to Mia's worried expression.

At that moment, she sighed and decided to try and let go of the conflicting emotions in her heart.

Skyler looked towards Mia and a small yet warm smile appeared on her face.

"I'm sorry for making you worry. It's just-"

"It's okay... You don't have to speak about it with me if you don't want to.

"I just don't want to see you sad.

"I'd much rather have that old annoying and troublesome Skyler than than the broody and quiet one."

Skyler's eyes widened in surprise for a brief moment before she closed them and smiled.

A melodious and serene laughter graced the area around the two women as Skyler laughed at her sister's remark, and a mischievous smile graced her lips.

"Okay, but are you sure that's what you want little sister of mine," Skyler spoke teasingly.

Mia immediately started to regret what she'd said when she saw the grin on her sister's face , but she still preferred this to the cold and quiet woman she'd seen earlier.

She knew Skyler had a past trauma involving a case of a berserk omen and maybe only aside from Skyler herself, she was the sole person who knew just how much it affected her big sister.

Mia knew that Skyler didn't hate all omens for what happened, contrary to Marcus's thoughts, but that didn't mean she'd ignore a berserk one if it crossed her line of sight, and that's exactly what happened when Skyler saw Marcus.

Because of that, Mia had been trying her best to get the little monster out of her sister's thoughts. She didn't particularly care about omens, but she definitely wasn't fond of Marcus now after making her sister feel this way.

'Hopefully he won't show himself in front of us again,' Mia hoped thoughtfully.

Mia knew Skyler hadn't completely forgotten about the earlier situation, so she'd just continue to make her focus on other things like arguing with each other, so that Skyler would hopefully forget about those troublesome events and emotions plaguing her mind.

These were Mia's final thoughts on the matter as she started to go back to bickering with her vexatious older sister.

If only she knew that the omen she was trying so hard to avoid had no intentions of being locked up forever, she might have taken it into her own hands to handle him then and there.

Unfortunately for her, she wouldn't get the chance to do so, at least not yet.

***

In another location, in complete contrast to the previous one, was a cold room completely devoid of any life or light. In fact, the room was engulfed by so much darkness that the only way the room could be recognized as such was due to the approaching torch that seeped beneath its door frame.

The individual possessing the torch was a guard who seemed to be escorting a prisoner. In fact, this guard was the exact same guard who'd apprehended Marcus previously, and because this was the case, the prisoner being escorted was of course Marcus.

Right about now, Marcus's appearance seemed to match that of when he was enslaved. He had on a pair of rugged brown pants and a shirt that were in stark contrast to the exquisitely designed purple cuffs he now had on his wrists.

Eventually, the guard made it to the cell after fumbling to find the keys and briefly let go of the chain that had been placed on Marcus's cuffs. Though, Marcus could have possibly strangled the foolish guard in this exact moment, he held himself back and only waited for the idiot to finish finding the keys.

Once the skinny guard finally accomplished doing so, he barked at Marcus to walk in and once the omen made it to the entrance of the cell, he was greeted by a smell so horrendous and vile it couldn't be put into any other words.

And just as Marcus was entering the cell, an armored boot kicked him in the back and forced him to fall face first into something soft and wet. Though it was a good thing he connected with something soft instead of the stone-cold floor, Marcus couldn't say he felt grateful about the turn of events as he felt several things crawling around his face.

"Urrgh!"

Marcus stood up and shook his face fiercely to make whatever the things were that crawled across his face fall to the ground and into the light of the torch.

When Marcus saw what they were, he didn't show any reaction on his face, but the disgust he felt was evident as he crushed the giant roaches with his foot.

To this, the guard let out an uproarious laughter.

When Marcus finished killing what he hoped was the last of the cretins, he looked over to see what it was he'd landed in.

What he saw was some kind of green and white loaf of...

'meat?'

Marcus was unsure of what he saw because he could see small specks of red signifying it was indeed some kind of meat; however, the splotches of green and white, from what Marcus could only assume was mold, betrayed that fact.

'How long has this been here,' Marcus thought as his face visibly contorted to disgust now.

As if to answer his thoughts, the guard spoke to Marcus after he'd finished laughing.

"That my friend will be your dinner," the guard spoke in a mocking tone.

"Originally, we left it for another one of you're little friends but it refused to eat."

Marcus was slightly surprised at hearing the mention of another omen but the guard's next words turned his surprise to a mild fury.

"Soo since the little shit didn't appreciate our hospitality, we starved the little mongrel for a month before executing it.

"You shoulda' seen it. The little monster started crying like a little girl.

"Within just three days it was beggin' for death," the guard spoke in a joyous tone of voice.

Marcus was finding it harder and harder to control the anger he'd been holding in as the guard continued to laugh. He didn't care much for the other omen who'd previously died here, but it still angered him to know others found joy in mutilating and humiliating omens like him.

When Marcus thought about it, he realized that omen could have very well been him.

Due to this, every word the guard spoke was felt like a punch to the gut.

Every laugh felt like a sword being pierced into him.

And at some point, the darkness within the room became so eerie and foreboding the guard was forced to stop laughing.

He looked at the omen, no the monster in front of him and trembled slightly, and before he knew it, he'd shut the gate.

Marcus walked up to him, and with each step he took, the guard took two back. Once the omen reached the cell door where only his blindfold could be seen, the guard flinched.

He didn't know why he felt such fear from the chained omen in front of him, but he did.

His heart was pounding out of his chest and he was shivering so much his teeth were chattering. For some reason the darkness felt cold and foreign to him.

It was as if he was being swallowed into the jaws of a monster, and just before he was going to turn to run, the omen called out to him in a voice dripping with malice.

"Open the door."

The guard stood there for a moment, startled at Marcus's ridiculous demand.

Then he muttered something in a weak voice contrary to his earlier demeaning and arrogant behavior.

"W-why should I?"

"The cuffs you idiot. You left the cuffs on," Marcus spat.

The guard jumped at Marcus's tone and backed away when he saw his hands come through a hole in the middle of the door.

The skinny guard moved to slowly and awkwardly remove Marcus's cuffs, and as soon as he finished, he ran without even bothering to shut the compartment where Marcus's hands had been in fear of being pulled inside.

Now, Marcus was the only soul within the pitch black dungeon with only the sound of scuttling roaches and the occasional drip of water from a pipe to keep him company.

"Hah... finally silence."