Chapter 97: The Gutterborn Ate the Enforcer

With just one flashback in your mind, an old photo comes alive again.

But Kairon had no flashback to know how things came to this.

His right leg was on Zane’s chest but he wasn’t winning.

Because Zane’s mouth was on Kairon’s thigh.

The gutterborn was eating the Enforcer.

Chewing. Making sure his teeth reached the ends of the leg. Making sure he reached the bone.

Kairon struggled against the gutterborn as it was prohibited to use Skills inside the church much less the Cathedral.

Zane didn’t know that but after hearing Kairon, he became even more violent in his assault.

Kairon had asked help from the other Enforcer that was also present in the Cathedral.

The name of the other Enforcer was Varikh.

The door of the Cathedral was still open and Kairon would have looked for Varikh if not for Zane keeping him occupied.

But more than anything, Kairon wanted to know something else.

When he had left the Cathedral, everything was normal.

And now that he returned, everything was in shambles.

He jerked his head at the Emberlord on the stage, and in his loudest voice, he finally asked it.

"What exactly happened here after I left!?"

At that, the Emberlord simply sighed.

———

Just after the Emberlord ordered Kairon to bring Milo, the doors of the Cathedral opened and the Enforcer stepped outside.

And as the doors were closing, Kairon locked eyes with Zane and mouthed:

"Consider her dead."

With such words, the doors went shut.

Zane gripped the barricade in front of him.

He panted heavily.

His veins ran all the blood his heart pumped as all his pores begged for release. Release for his rage.

"I told all of you so many times that she has nothing to do with this. She is innocent. And yet, you ordered her appearance here."

His hairs hid his face as he stared at the brown floor of the stage.

The Emberlord shrugged. "I am doing everything to announce justice, Zane Atlas."

"Justice?" Zane raised his head.

He shot a glare at Coin.

"Fuck your justice. Fuck this trial. Fuck you, Emberlord."

A ripple of shocked exhales swept through the Cathedral.

Zane outright abused an Emberlord in front of his face.

Coin’s jaw tightened. He opened his mouth but...

"Don’t speak." Zane interrupted. "You have said enough. I don’t care anymore. Call me a sinner, thief, infidel, impotent. Nothing matters. That bastard had gone to touch my sister and I am going to stop him. If I fail and he comes here with my sister, I swear on the stinking soil of my slums..."

Zane grabbed the barricade in front of him and with maddening grief, ripped it right from the confession box.

"I will make him regret being born so monstrously that he will kill his parents with his own hands for making out that day!"

The gutterborn had let go of himself.

He threw the barricade and as Kairon’s face flashed in front of his eyes, his whole body felt the crawling of ants again.

He knew for sure that the Enforcer would steal the smile from Milo’s face and thinking about it... 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

"Anghhh!"

Zane clenched his hair.

He screamed in helplessness as he began slamming his chained hands on the barricade on his right.

The Emberlord Coin watched closely and placed his scythe near the podium as it remained standing with the support of the wooden podium.

He then unbuttoned the sleeves of his black shirt and rolled them.

His muscular thick forearms became visible and people weren’t amazed. The man might look old with silver hair but there was a reason he was an Emberlord.

Zane, however, went on a rampage to the barricades.

"Barricade here. Barricade there. Just lines. Borders. I am not a virus. I am not a criminal. I am a human with a little sister!"

Zane’s wrist bled by the constant hits on the barricades as Xavier’s heart winced seeing his friend raging out of helplessness.

If not for Tesla holding him back and knocking sense to him, Xavier would have joined the stage and started fighting the Emberlord without caring for his own life.

The audience watched Zane venting on the barricade and eventually, what was bound to happen, happened.

The barricade turned loose and Zane ripped it out of the confession box as well.

And without waiting, he turned around and began pounding on the barricade on his right.

It was the last barricade and it faced the Halocrats.

The Halocrats watched Zane’s bloodied face and they couldn’t recognize Zane anymore.

He stopped looking like a gutterborn. He looked like a man who was pushed to the brink of sanity and didn’t survive.

Only Zane’s cries rang out in the Cathedral as Milo’s cries rang in the Citadel.

All of them heard the sound of his wrist bones snapping as their nose wrinkled.

But that didn’t stop Zane.

He kept hitting the barricade with his dangling wrists and eventually, the barricade lost against his rage.

Zane ripped the wooden border again from the box and this time, his eyes met the Halocrat who had made him fall on the stairs.

The Halocrat also locked eyes with Zane and he would have scoffed if not for Zane’s eyes screaming murder.

Zane stared at the young man with the barricade on his hand and not wanting to become part of something worse, the Halocrat simply walked to the side.

Zane’s eyes would have followed that gilded trash but as soon as the Halocrat walked to the side, a face appeared in front of his eyes.

The face of the person standing behind that Halocrat.

As soon as Zane saw the face, his entire body screamed.

The person also watched the gutterborn and they understood the feeling.

"You snitching bitch!" Zane shouted.

The person he saw was a woman.

And someone like Zane, who respected women, was forced to address her as bitch. There must be a reason for that.

... There was.

This was the woman from the reception.

The woman who started this.

The woman who diverted the attention of Coin to Milo.

The woman who was to blame if something happened to Milo.

More than all those things, for Zane, right now, the woman would become something else.

A tool for venting his anger.

Zane raised the barricade above his head and the woman trembled.

She looked at the Emberlord who was busy looking at Zane.

The Halocrats around her shifted to the side which only left the woman alone in front of Zane.

Her knees shook as she had never seen anger from up close. She had lived a life of comfort with her husband in riches.

What was she supposed to do in front of someone who suffered because of her and wanted revenge?

"Run, Dorsi!"

A shout rang out and hearing her name, the woman snapped out of her thoughts.

"Stay right there!"

Another shout rang out and this time, the shout belonged to the one whom the woman was running away from.

Zane Atlas.

With his broken wrists, he held the barricade above his head and as he recalled the satisfied face of the woman when revealing Milo’s existence, he couldn’t hold himself.

"It’s because of you."

Zane had no other words to spare as with crazed eyes, he jumped towards the woman and...

THRAAM!

Slammed the barricade on her.

The Halocrats as well as the Commoners, all of them had stuck to the walls of the Cathedral. They weren’t afraid. They were afraid of getting hurt and doing something to the accused before his trial wasn’t concluded.

Xavier and Tesla remained as they were and the Gutterborns at the back simply stared at Zane, relating with the agony and fury the man felt at the moment.

Zane panted heavily after slamming the barricade but from the corner of his eyes, he saw something.

He jerked his head to his right and his eyes widened.

The woman was alive.

She stood far from Zane and a man stood beside the woman.

The woman thanked the man for saving her and Zane looked at the barricade and it was no more.

Only two handles were left on his hand and the empty seat that it had slammed on was broken as well.

He gritted his teeth and yanked the handles away.

He turned his head at the woman again and the woman jolted.

Her breath stuck in her throat as Zane walked towards her.

She had joined the other people standing close to the Cathedral walls as well but Zane would reach her. He would reach her. She had to pay the price for uttering Milo’s existence without Zane’s permission.

But the man who saved the receptionist from Zane’s barricade by pushing her at the last second, stood in front of her again.

He met Zane’s eyes and even if Zane ignored the man, the man didn’t ignore the gutterborn.

"She has nothing to do with this. She is a mere worker. If you really want your sister’s safety..."

The man gulped as he didn’t know if he would be punished for saying the next words. But to save his wife, he would say them.

To save his wife, he told Zane that hurting the woman would amount to nothing. If Zane really wanted to protect his sister, there was only one thing to do.

"Attack the Emberlord. If you dare."