Mr. Valen opened his eyes to a juicy steak right beside him, its scent as overwhelming as the hunger that plagued his being.

Left with no choice, Mr. Valen bit into the steak in an attempt to quell this hunger, his teeth digging into the succulent flesh. 'Hmm, it's undercooked,' he couldn't help but think, upon discovering that it was taking more effort to bite into than he had expected.

"Ahhhhhh! Fuck! Rape! Rape!"

A loud voice broke him from his trance so jarringly that Mr. Valen woke to find himself biting Lofi's inner thigh, his jaws dangerously close to the young man's member.

"Hmm," Mr. Valen grunted and pulled away, freeing the terrified-looking man from his clutches.

Lofi quickly pushed himself away from him, and back up against the wall, his chest heaving as he gazed at Mr. Valen as though he were some cornered animal.

"Bang!"

"Bang!"

"Bang!"

"Is everything okay in there?" The sound of heavy knocking, followed by a concerned voice from a passerby, came from the door.

There was a brief moment of stillness at those words:

Lofi: -_-

Valen: -_-

Lofi: "Hel-" (Lofi drew a breath to speak)

"Everything's alright, just kidding around," Mr. Valen dove towards Lofi, using his superior speed and strength to forcefully cover his mouth.

"Humff!" Lofi struggled to no avail, and the voice, having heard that everything was okay seemed to have left.

Taking a breath at this development, Mr. Valen looked towards Lofi, his voice calm as he spoke, "If I let you go, will you calm down and let me explain?"

Lofi: -_- (Lofi said nothing, his eyes wide)

"I'll take that as a yes," Mr. Valen nodded and slowly let Lofi's mouth go, his own breath hitching as he prepared to explain.

"Rap-" Mr. Valen quickly covered the stubborn youth's mouth, his eyes flaring in faint annoyance as he spoke, "I hadn't slept for two days, man I was sleepwalking, I'm straight-"

"Hghmm mmm," Lofi muffled through his palm, obviously not believing him.

It took several minutes of constant persuasion before Lofi calmed down enough to allow Mr. Valen to get up and stretch.

Lofi, on the other hand, went on to find some pants, obviously not feeling comfortable in his underwear, anywhere near Mr. Valen.

Looking to the side, he spotted the shadowy humanoid wiggling three fingers at him, an unnerving smile on its face as it disappeared in a puff of black smoke.

The dim rays of the sun slipped through the window, and when Mr. Valen looked up at the sky, he did not see the sun; he had never seen the sun. Only a sky that was barely a sky and more of sea of corrupted black clouds and in its depths (he hoped) was the sun, for if there was no sun how was there light?

'Let there be light,' he thought and looked down below, his eyes narrowing as he observed something... strange to say the least.

There seemed to be a crowd of people moving in unison towards a singular direction, 'a strange deviation from their usual pattern of movement,' Mr. Valen noted.

The students of RD usually moved in a chaotic but orderly fashion, almost never deviating from the pathways, but now, with pathways occupied, people walked on open grass.

Curious at the sight before him, Mr. Valen rushed into the bathroom and took a cold shower; intent on discovering what could move so many students at once.

The bathroom, though small, was equipped with a simple shower space and one toilet.

Taking off his clothes and tossing them into an empty basket at the side, Mr. Valen stepped into the shower, indifferent to the details of the bathroom.

The water felt cold against his skin, and as he scrubbed his form with the scented soap, he couldn't help but think to Amethyst, 'A massive problem, I don't know what she wants, who she is, or even if I'm strong enough to kill her, by Carla's words I need to experience an evolution to get stronger, but can I even experience evolutions?'

Mr. Valen was aware of the fact that his powers possessed vastly different properties from those of others.

For starters, he killed the demon that turned him with his eyes, an ability he had even before Amethyst summoned a demon on him.

But the fact remained that he gained his superior strength after the demon injected him with mucus.

'So the question remains, was I a hellspawn before all this, and did I just go through an evolution then, or was I not a hellspawn and did I get turned by the demon, or rather, am I something else?' Mr. Valen found himself thinking deeply.

Looking through the glass, he saw the shadowy humanoid standing outside and noted how no one else seemed aware of it (not even Amethyst).

'I also have the ability to gain strength by devouring others though it seems selective,' Mr. Valen shook his head, deciding to put the thinking behind him.

When he came out, he noticed Lofi smiling broadly at something on his laptop. This act caught his attention, but he knew the man loved his privacy.

"What are you looking at?" He asked, without expecting an honest answer, his hands on his head drying his hair with a towel.

"Bam!" Lofi jammed his laptop shut his paranoia managing to subvert even Mr. Valen's expectations.

Giving him an estranged look, Mr. Valen then spoke, his tone playful. "Damn, man, what are you hiding?"

"None of your business," Lofi shot back, yet the moment he spoke, his eyes widened like he had made a mistake, a nervous chuckle escaping him as he added, "Did you hear? Apparently, some killer struck at the girls' dorm last night, the one near the fountain, third time this year, it's on the news."

Mr. Valen raised a brow at those words, less worried about the killings than about Lofi's reaction. 'He reacted as though afraid, as if the secret he hides is so monumental he has difficulty controlling his emotions. Or it could be that the personality I have engineered clashes strongly with his. Am I a bully now?' he thought.

"Ahem, Valen?" Lofi spoke, his face already turned toward the television, which he turned on with a remote.

After fiddling with the channels a little, he finally switched it to a news channel which true to his words was talking about RD

"Turn that up," Mr. Valen said when he saw something that caught his eye.

[RD has prevented any media outlet from entering the establishment. The image we are about to show you is graphic; viewer discretion is strictly advised. A reporter spoke as the image switched to the scene of a reporter standing in front of a familiar club. [Could this murder at RD be a response to The Artist's message, or just The Artist herself toying with us, a few days ago, the air here in this neighborhood ran colder when The Artist struck club one time fight scene, this time using the limbs and body parts of her victims to form a grim message, 'hello 42 let's play a game, find the killer at RD.']

The image then switched to a large cage above the club, seemingly on a different date and when Mr. Valen saw what had happened, he felt...

'She's leading the police to me? No, calm down, there's nothing to tie you to anything, there's another, more pressing issue to tackle. I knew she was strong, but I did not know that she was that strong,' he thought, remembering how he felt surrounded with nowhere to go. 'Could I have managed to kill all those armed men if I tried? No, unlikely, additionally there were two hellspawns there as well.'

Before the reporter could finish speaking, Mr. Valen was already stepping toward the closet, looking for a fresh hoodie and jeans.

"You said the dorm near the water fountain?" He asked, his voice grim, curious to witness the nature of this murder.

"Yeah, the fountain with the creepy Cupid," Lofi expanded, promoting Mr. Valen to walk out of the room closing the door with a bang.

Lofi gazed at that door for a moment too long, an inexplicable gleam flashing through his eyes.

Meanwhile, Mr. Valen took the crowded elevator down, the white light above buzzing slightly as he listened to their discussions.

"Is it really that graphic?" One of the young men asked, one with a shorter build, his tone tremulous, carrying with it a hint of formality that could only be born by nobility and rich people.

"You can't tell you're afraid man, there's a reason the killer only goes after girls," another guy added.

"Yeah, I'd totally whoop his ass if he comes after me," one more chimed in.

'So the killer only goes after girls and has three victims this one being the third, I can't believe I was completely unaware of this,' Mr. Valen thought to himself, resolving to catch up with the news every morning.

"Hey man, what do you think?" another young man spoke, prompting Mr. Valen to listen in, but then he realized that everyone was quiet, prompting him to discover that they were speaking to him.

'Am I acquainted with these people?' Mr. Valen thought in confusion before answering with a slow, nonchalant tone. "I think I'd hit the killer with a bat if the freak showed up around me, to hell with being scared I even turned off the TV this morning so I could see the scene up front."

"That's what I'm talking about, you hear that twerp?" one of the large men spoke, his whole body throwing his hands over the short one's shoulders.

'Oppression?' Mr. Valen first thought, curious about their dynamic, but when he noticed the shorter youth look of genuine excitement, he took a step back in his mind and shook his head.

The elevator ride was short, but the walk to their destination seemed to take forever. The campus was lively as Mr. Valen walked amidst the group from his dorm.

"That's messed up, man," the larger man of the group, whom everyone called Barney, chuckled at Mr. Valen's joke.

The shorter one was named Thomas, a man whom Mr. Valen found to be the very definition of 'looks can be deceiving.

"I would fuck that bitch," Thomas said with his overly academic tone, promoting another roar of laughter from Barney.

"What you have no idea what bitches would do for money," Thomas doubled down.

'Speaking of money, I'm dangerously low on cash,' Mr. Valen thought, thinking about how he'd survive his stay on campus.

He had assured his father that he had money saved when the topic arose, though in fact he had none. His reason was that he did not want to give the man any grounds to prevent his admission to RD.

'It's not like I need anything though,' Mr. Valen thought to himself, his eyes widening at the realization that he hadn't eaten in days, and yet he felt fine; he was hungry, but not for food.

Soon they had walked for about ten minutes and the closer they got to their destination, the thicker the crowd of students walking around them became until they had to limit their steps so as to not trample on anyone.

"Shit!" Thomas suddenly cursed his voice drawing Mr. Valen's attention, and when he saw that the young man was looking at something in the far distance, he followed his line of sight.

Mr. Valen felt his eyes narrow at the sight before him, his gaze zooming past the crowd of people around them, and even last the police parimiter to a Cupid's statue.

The statue itself was uninteresting, but that changed when one took into account the dismembered head impaled on the arrow tip.

Atop that head was a dead rat, one which struck a chord of supposed memory in Mr. Valen's mind.

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