Chapter 3 – Ambush
The car rolled to a stop on the edge of the industrial zone, where the city gave way to silence. Rusted fences surrounded an abandoned warehouse, the kind no one walked near unless they had a death wish… or were already dead.
Adam stared at the building from the driver's seat, one hand resting casually on the wheel, the other tracing the line of his glove absently.
Zafrielle leaned forward, eyes narrowed.
"This is the place? Doesn't look like much."
"Because it's not," Adam replied, unbuckling his seatbelt. "It's bait."
She blinked.
"Wait… You knew this was a trap?"
He smirked as he pushed the door open.
"They think they're clever. They always do."
Zafrielle stepped out quickly, wings twitching under her long coat.
"You weren't going to tell me?"
"Would you have come if I did?"
"…Maybe."
"Then you're learning."
They crossed the gravel lot, boots crunching against broken glass and scattered bones of forgotten animals. The warehouse loomed ahead—tall, silent, rotting like a carcass in the sun. A single, rusted door groaned open at the slightest push.
Inside, the air was thick. Not just with dust—but with something older.
Rot. Sulfur. Blood. Malice.
Zafrielle froze the moment they entered.
"There's several here. Maybe dozens. All hiding."
"Good."
Adam's voice dropped low as his fingers closed around the handle of his scythe—materializing with a cold hiss like steam off the grave.
"I was hoping they'd come in numbers."
Suddenly, like a curtain falling on a stage, the ambush was triggered.
From the shadows, behind broken crates, inside cracked walls and high beams—they came.
Dozens.
No—hundreds.
Demons. Twisted, snarling, in all shapes. Fallen angels with wings burned black, eyes glowing crimson, weapons forged from hate. They dropped from the ceiling, crawled from trap doors, slithered along the floor.
A voice cackled above the crowd.
"The Grim Reaper himself… walking right into our hands!"
Adam didn't flinch.
"You boys still talk too much."
And then he moved.
In an instant, he became a storm.
His scythe carved through the dark like a god's pen across the final page of a soul's story.
Each swing echoed like a death knell.
Each strike—a soul reclaimed.
Slaaasshh—THUD—HISS—CRACK!
A fallen angel lunged from behind—but Zafrielle caught him mid-air, hurling him into a metal pillar with a sickening crunch.
"Stay focused!" she shouted, back to back with Adam.
"I am."
"You enjoy this too much!"
"I've had practice."
More demons surged.
Adam spun, eyes glowing gold and red, death pouring from him like wildfire. The warehouse trembled. His scythe pulsed with ancient light. One demon tried to run—Adam pointed—and a chain of bone erupted from the floor, dragging it back into the rift beneath their feet.
Zafrielle moved like a shadow behind him—her broken wings flaring, eyes glowing like burning coals as she struck down creature after creature with light-laced strikes, divine energy corrupted but still potent.
"There's too many!" she called out, breathing heavy.
Adam's grin was grim.
"Then we're in the right place."
Suddenly, silence.
They stood surrounded by bodies—some smoldering, some twitching, most already gone.
But something… still lingered.
Above them, the shadows thickened. A deeper voice—one that echoed with age—rumbled through the walls.
"So the Reaper still dances… but how long before he bleeds?"
Adam raised his eyes toward the rafters.
"Longer than you can afford to find out."
The voice in the rafters had barely faded when Adam's body shifted—like the tension of a storm about to break.
His eyes flared gold and red, burning with the weight of eons.
He raised his free hand, palm out, the scythe spinning in his other hand like a blade that remembered every life it had ever taken.
Zafrielle felt it—the sudden shift in the air. The pressure. The way time itself seemed to hold its breath.
Adam began to speak.
Not in English.
Not in anything human.
But in the Ancient Tongue—the original language.
The one used before Heaven ever cast judgment.
The one that souls recognized in the marrow of their bones.
"Ra'ah el sheol, petach ha'nephesh.
Shuv el afar, yoredim—ki gam atem tishkachu!"
(Behold the grave, gate of the soul.
Return to the dust, O fallen—for even you shall be forgotten!)
The ground beneath them split open like cracked glass.
Lightless. Endless. Cold as creation's first silence.
The Rift had opened.
Zafrielle instinctively moved closer, wings pulled in tight.
"What is that?" she whispered.
"Home," Adam said. "For them."
He glanced at her.
"Stay close. Hold tight."
Then the wind screamed.
Spirits shrieked.
The Rift began to consume.
Demons dug claws into concrete, trying to resist the pull.
Fallen angels flew, desperate to escape the suck of oblivion.
One screamed Adam's name—not in fear, but in recognition.
"IT'S HIM—HE'S OPENED IT AGAIN!"
Adam didn't hesitate.
He lunged into the fray, scythe flashing like lightning. Every swing cleaved through shadow and shrieking spirit. He kicked one straight into the vortex, then spun and threw another in by its throat.
Zafrielle, empowered by his command, surged forward beside him—striking with raw holy force. A corrupted fallen tried to grab her wings—she slammed her foot into his face and hurled him into the void.
One by one, they fell—kicked, sliced, consumed.
Each soul that passed the Rift's edge wailed… and then disappeared into absolute nothingness.
Minutes passed.
The storm began to still.
Dust settled.
The last cry faded into the pit.
Then—silence.
Adam stood, scythe heavy in his grip, chest rising slow and steady. His coat tattered. His glove burned. Eyes still glowing faintly.
Zafrielle lowered her hands, blood streaked along her jaw, her wings trembling.
They looked at each other.
And—despite the chaos, despite the weight of it all—they smiled.
A grim, exhausted, shared smile.
"Good job," Adam said.
"You too," she replied breathlessly. "You weren't so bad yourself."
He chuckled.
"I've had worse mornings."
Behind them, the Rift began to close… but not without leaving behind a whisper. One Zafrielle could hear faintly in her bones:
"You cannot erase us all, Riftwalker… we are many…"
She glanced back.
Adam didn't.
"Let them whisper," he said. "That's all they've got left."