The Refuge of the Damned

Dante moved stealthily down the vast hallway, barely making a sound. His senses were on high alert, searching for a way out... or maybe an answer.

Calling out for Rafael, Luis, or Mateo had been a mistake, one he wouldn't repeat. None of them were here. This place wasn't just lonely it was hostile.

The library again. He'd been here before. The books, covered in a fine layer of dust, seemed untouched by time. Something about that stillness felt deeply unnatural, as though time itself had stopped within this room.

He paused in front of a bookshelf, his fingers brushing the spine of a worn book almost unconsciously. How did I get here Transmigration, reincarnation ideas he once dismissed as absurd.

But now, any explanation seemed possible. He knew he wasn't in his own body. The tense muscles, the foreign hands, the cold that coursed through him it all reminded him constantly that something fundamental had changed.

"Ironic," he thought with a tight smile on his lips. "The games Mateo recommended now seem useful." But this wasn't a game. Here, there were no resets, no extra lives.

Fear pounded in his chest with an intensity he had never felt in front of a screen.

As he moved through the shelves, his eyes slid over titles in languages he couldn't recognize. They weren't English, French, or Spanish... not even Arabic.

The letters twisted, as if the language itself were a living entity, impossible to decipher. Yet, a persistent whisper in his mind drew him toward a particular volume, one that stood out from the rest.

His breathing quickened as the whisper grew louder. "What is this?" His mind tried to resist, but the whisper wasn't a command, more like an invitation.

Fear climbed his throat, but his hands were already moving on their own, reaching for the book. As he touched it, he felt the air around him compress, as if something unseen was watching intently.

The whisper intensified, though still incomprehensible. "Is it guiding me or manipulating me?" He wondered, but stopping now was impossible. He opened the book. The whisper fell silent.

Inside, he found a text he could understand. The Path of Lost Souls, an ancient technique that allowed a soul to inhabit another body. According to the book, an "Anchor" was necessary to stabilize the connection between the soul and the body.

But Dante hadn't followed any ritual. He hadn't sought this fate. Something else had brought him here, something beyond his control.

As his eyes scanned the pages, a knot tightened in his stomach. And then, the final blow.

The body he inhabited wasn't alive. It was a failed creation. He stopped, trying to process what he'd just read. It couldn't be true.

The place he was in wasn't just a castle; it was Madam's fortress, a witch known for her forbidden dark arts. Her most heinous creation: the Hero Makers.

The bodies she created weren't simple vessels; they were an amalgamation of hundreds of souls fallen warriors, ruthless villains, and innocent victims. They weren't heroes, but abominations, creatures stitched together to carry out missions no human could bear.

The words in the book became darker, more sinister, as if the text itself oozed the evil of its content:

"In a world ravaged by Chaos, the divine creations "the blessed" plunged humanity into an era of blood and disorder.

Conventional methods no longer sufficed. No living being on this planet could withstand the weight of those children touched by the divine. Bowing to them was an option, but what value was life in servitude? For many, death was a more merciful escape."

Dante shuddered as he read on.

"Faced with unimaginable massacres and atrocities, we were dragged into the abyss of torture, kidnapping, and violation. Our weakness was clear until coherence shattered, and we gave way to the madness within. If we were to survive, we had to create our own heroes."

The next pages described the horrific experiments that followed: with children, fetuses, and the elderly. Limbs were torn off, bodies dismembered. But even that wasn't enough.

The air in the library grew thick. Dante felt a suffocating pressure on his chest, but he couldn't stop reading.

"We fused souls of all kinds: men, women, unborn children. It was an unbearable task, but necessary. The pleas and screams of the sacrificed haunted us... but finally, we succeeded in creating the heroes."

Suddenly, the book came to life. Claws sprang from its pages and sank into Dante's hands. "Aaagh!" He tried to pull away, but the book held him fast. The souls trapped within its pages stared at him, their faces twisted in agony.

Dante staggered back, trembling. "I'm not a hero," he thought in terror. "I'm an abomination."

The book continued: "The banished gods gave us the staff of Daríon, an artifact capable of controlling souls. Yet, it wasn't enough.

Then the gods offered a more radical solution: sacrifice. To achieve our dream, we had to spill the blood of every person on the planet, save for the bearer of the staff. Only by killing ourselves could we destroy the blessed."

Dante could hardly breathe. "In the end, I offered the souls of everyone: men, women, children, the elderly. And so, we created five heroes. They weren't fully human, but they were our champions."

After a long battle, the heroes defeated the divine creations. Yet, the narrator expressed bitter despair. "All the sacrifices felt hollow. It wasn't our victory, only mine. Then, one of the heroes offered to let me speak to the souls bound within their body, those that hadn't fully merged. I agreed... but all I saw was hatred."

The text described the torment and emptiness of the souls trapped within the heroes. They didn't want freedom; they wanted revenge for their enslavement.

Dante collapsed to his knees, unable to bear the truth. "I'm not me," he murmured. "I don't exist as I thought." He was a vessel, a prison for tormented souls, forged for a war he never wanted to fight.

The book released its bloody grip on his hands and fell to the floor with a thud. When he looked toward a nearby display case, his reflection wasn't his own. He saw distorted faces beneath his skin, souls trying to emerge.

The Path of Lost Souls wasn't just a forbidden technique it was a fate worse than death. The souls didn't rest; they were trapped, and he was their jailer.

Shaking, he struggled to stand. Madam's castle wasn't a refuge it was his prison. The whispers of the fallen filled every corner, accusing him of his existence.

Desperate, he backed toward the door. There was no Rafael, Luis, or Mateo. He was alone, trapped in a body he never chose, in a life that was never his.

The whisper returned, stronger, more insistent. And then, the Cloak of the Sinful Silence wrapped around him softly, providing a warmth that soothed his mind. For a moment, he could breathe.