It had an hour pass as the elder manolon shambled, leading Armen to the supposed hideout. The bloodhound dare not speak, save for his own innocence in the ordeal. "Please, I assure you, if I had known they intended to do such things, I would've aimed to warn you. Truly I've only ever been accepting of them simply robbing. No one hurt, none killed, no innocence robbed. I never imagined th-"

  "Silence. Thou test my ire as it stands now, even afore your fellows had abducted a woman of the cloth. Thou only serve to damn yourself if more is uttered..." Armen cuts him off curtly, his patience exhausted with the hound, straining his willpower to hide his rage. He cared little of their transgressions before, now it were a personal grievance of which Armen would intend to make an example of.

  After a few minutes of walking in silence, the bloodhound slows his pace, pointing at a large derelict building. It was a long and wide decrepit structure with a secondary door lodged into the side of the foundation, angled against the side, bridging the earth to the wall. The elder bloodhound points a shaky finger at the side door, "There. Beyond that door is where they often hide. Private, cooler, nigh impenetrable. Easy to stay quiet there since they're underground. If they are anywhere, they'll be there."

  Armen nods at the elder and shoves him aside as he treads in front of the entryway. Nearing himself to it, he could discern sounds of clubbing and whimpers and curses from within. He pulls his sword from his sheath and as he moves to open the door, he hears the bell within the campanile in the town chime across the land. Using the chiming as cover, he pulls the door and steps inside the cellar, beholden to a flight of stone steps leading to a glowing aura of light that flickered across the final stoop. He carefully descends, keeping mind to not alert the dwellers, let alone misstep and tumble.

  Within the cellar were an enraging sight. Armen looked around, taking note of the three fellows that stood in the left corner, parallel the entry, watching the scene of Mariette's abuse before them. Among them he saw that young manolon from the market before. The same one that had chastised his younger. The feline happened to glance over and notice Armen's menace at the final step. His eyes widen with fear, his body frozen in shock. The boy makes no movement to alert the others.

  Armen redirects his attention into the center of the room, his face whitens and for a moment, he feels nothing. Just barren within his own body, his soul unwilling to comprehend the visage before him. Before him was the doberman known as Crallen, beating Mariette into the floor, spitting upon her in between slugging the nun. Armen feels his chest wrench into itself, his hands shaking with emotions of which were beyond himself. Not in any capacity to describe the seething fire of his now swarming rage, Armen clenches his grip around his sword, tight enough that the leather-bound handle whined in agony within his iron grasp. He feels himself burning, his heart thumping enough to deafen him, his teeth gnashing together so harsh that anyone else might fear them to crack. Armen steps forth, no longer intent on deft surprise. Crallen, paying no mind to the livid omen behind him, chortles as he strikes Mariette again, and again. Armen glides behind the doberman as Crallen gets on his knees behind Mariette, grabbing her hips and pulling her up, he gropes her haunches, kneading her flesh as he sneers and begins to lift her habit. Mariette barely whimpers, hardly conscious as she soak her face within a pool of blood.

  As Armen looms over Crallen, his wrath nearly permeating through his own body, he finally garnered the notice of the other compatriots in the corner, of which one of them announces, "Uhhh....Boss?"

  Crallen rolls his eyes and begins to impatiently acknowledge his subordinate, "Christ, WHAT COUL-" then he feels it... the unmistakable edge of a blade pressed against the back of his skull. Right behind his pointed ears, the edge bit into his skin, drawing a drip of blood that trickled over his fur. Then, a familiar voice he heard from behind.

  "Thou had chance to let us alone. Yet here you are: sinning further. Hath thou truly thought of thine action thus far, or did ye pay no heart unto it?" The voice were cold, cruel, and still one could tell that it held rage so vile that a devil would blush.

  "Hey..hey- listen... I.. I'm sorry... I had a lapse in judgment... Truly, I re-"

  "THOU REGRET ONLY BEING CAUGHT! Not thine abuse of another. Tell me... Honest: Had I not arrived, would thou hath ceased?"

  "Y-yes!" But his plea of innocence was cut off as he felt a light shove against the back of his neck. In the corner of his eye he saw a glinting blade, with a crimson edge to it. Crallen quickly touches the back of his skull, feeling the deep gash.

  Armen fights the urge to smirk as he slashes a cut into the upper backside of Crallen's skull. Marking down to the bone. A satisfying itch runs along his spine as he stamps his left foot near Crallen's left side and drops his sword. Using his right hand on the back of Crallen's neck and the left digging fingers into the gaping wound upon his skull, Armen shudders in satisfaction while he hears Crallen howl in panic as he is forced down against the floor.

  Armen clenches his left hand, eliciting a scream from Crallen while his friends behold violence they were clearly shocked and unaccustomed to. With a deliberate slowness, Armen pulls up, every second is marked by a greater and greater shriek of agony as Armen peels the flesh of Crallen's face from his own skull. The sound like a tearing fabric, fraying at the rip. The interior flesh slick and wet with blood and cruor. The veins and vessels behind the skin rolling around underneath Armen's viced fingers. Blood washes out and paints the lower jaw, unbound flesh slinging drops of crimson with every new snapping separation from bone. When he pulled upon the connection of his cheeks between his upper and lower maw, Armen had to tug and yank repeatedly and with astounding force to separate the flesh. The sound akin to wet strips of leather slapping against cobbles. Armen relished in the agonized shrieks, grinning as he slowed even further to extend its duration as long as he could. His entire wrath warping into a macabre gaiety while he flays his charge. After a few, excruciating moments of incessant howling, Armen plucks the flesh from the skull with a squelching tug. Crallen, with now lidless eyes, tried desperately to blink. He kneels up and feels his face, or lack thereof, only beholden to the hard and bony skull. The blood that rivers through his teeth only added a coppery and bitter taste along with the panicked bile that lumped in his throat. He swallows the gulp of life and gasps, using his tongue to lick his chops clean from the blood, only finding that now his lips felt so much like tooth and bone.

  His breath quivers as he begins to realize his predicament, looking up to this knight, whom stands there, holding what appeared as a sopped bloody rag, dripping wine. He looks with eyes drying against the air, unable to blink in surprise, still unable to acknowledge that he stared at the limp flesh of his face, dangling within the grasp of the man that looks upon him with an odd mix of disgust and gratification only hidden by his helmet. Like his actions were sport to him, trophy hunting for things reviled by himself.

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  Crallen, clawing at his own skull; still unwise to the finality of this macabre scene, howls once more, implicitly beckoning of his fellows to seize his assailant. The friends in the corner all exchange worried looks amongst each other, one of them stepping forth tentatively to Armen. Crallen, curled upon the floor and clutching at his barren face, rolls over and falls to his shoulder, unconscious.

  The one manolon that took a motion forth, apparent as a pitbull, with stocky shoulders and flattened face, now angered at realizing his friend's horrid state, shouts and charges forth, arms set for grapple upon Armen. The lone human, with a calm yet vigorous motion, hocks the dismembered face at the rushing cretin. The flayed skin slapping against his brow with a poignant splat that recoils his advance as blood delves into his eyes. He grunts in disgust and horror as he swipes the skin from his face and it pats onto the floor. Upon his charge again he accidentally steps onto the slick mass and slips, tumbling down onto the floor with a thud.

  Armen, seizing the opportunity, stomps into the back of his skull, the crunch of his neck audible throughout the room. The pitbull convulses on the floor, whispering out a low breath as his final wind is robbed of him. Another sinner, a fox, now shaking his eyes free from the daunting sight, finds courage to take his task of charging into the fray. Yipping as he raises an old chair leg that he had stolen from the floor in the corner. Armen swoops his entire torso down as he lurches to the side and swipes his sword from the ground. The fox swings wildly at Armen, in a desperate hope that he might at least daze the knight enough to gather a better vantage, yet Armen, having known combat for the length of his life, had only stepped aside, clearing the wide swing.

  Juking to the side of the fox, and using the pommel of his sword, Armen crunches it into his cheek, fracturing it. The fox falls to the floor in a disorient, groaning at his broken face. Armen reaches down and grips the scruff of his neck, hissing into his ear, "I have slain beasts far greater than you could hope to be..." then he crushes his face against the stone. Now unconscious, the fox wheezes on the floor. Armen, yet, is still intent on retribution, and he kneels onto the fox's back, wedging his knee betwixt the shoulders, directly onto the spine. Tossing his blade aside yet again, it clatters on the stone floor and chimes in reverence of Armen's new vindication. His gloved hands, balled into fists, trembled giddily with the promise of detriment by their own being. Armen takes a second, relishing in the promised brutality against this animal underneath his knees. Then he begins hammering down onto the skull of the manolon. Each new blow erupts blood and teeth from his victim. The eyes would bulge out with nearly every subsequent pounding, further and further they protruded from his sockets, threatening to launch from his skull like a slung stone. Now, a pulped amalgamation of cruor and rusty fur, Armen rises, and with a stamp of finality, pulverizes the shattered remains of the skull and gray matter into the cobblestones.

  Armen turns, facing the final member of the party of cretins, his menace facing the young manolon with an air begat of Azrael. Slowly, deliberately, he retrieved his sword from the floor and approaches the terrified boy, whom cowered in the corner, arms scrabbling against the stone walls, begging for purchase in the hopes that he might escape somehow. Armen glowers over he, looking down upon the miserable wretch, disdain emanating from his form and overwhelming the panic of the coward.

  The boy beseeches, "P-Please! Spare me! I only become of them through desperation. I have done no such sins as they! Please, be merciful unto me! I have a kid brother whom relies on me, my mother needs help, that is why I sought employment in them! Truly!" he clasps his hands together pleadingly. Shaking them at Armen for mercy.

  "The lamentations of the wicked are all too innocent..." Armen echoes his thoughts aloud in response to his prayer of mercy. "The vile are only ever victims of chance, yes??" His rhetoric strikes at the boy almost as a physical blow, and he cowers further into the corner as Armen brings the point of his sword up to his throat. "Tell me, 'innocent boy': What did you intend within this cellar? Would you have suddenly caught wise of your actions and neglected your loins?"

  "I should hope I would! I would not revel in the sin, I was forced into it.. Please believe me!"

  "And yet, you stood by and admired the abuse before you. No protests raised upon the villain. No aid offered to the victim. And still you claim to innocence..."

  "Turn thy cheek! I have done nothing! No hands did I lay upon her! You witness my innocence!"

  "Indeed, you have done nothing... And that is thine sin."

  The boy's eyes widen in horrid realization, his thoughts racing with any proclamation of his guiltlessness. He looks behind the imposing knight to find Mariette begin to stir, and rise. Coughing a spat of blood onto the floor as she looks upon the scene in the corner. "S-Surely if the woman should forgive me, then I am guiltless, am I not?" He points at Mariette, who was now lucid and beholden to the event.

  "Fair enough. Perhaps we should inquire." Armen agrees. He grabs the throat of the boy and drags him before Mariette, throwing him against the floor. The young manolon curls up onto his knees, bowing to her with his arms stretched across to her pleadingly, "Please, maiden. Ye know I strike not against you. I only made the mistake of being here. Surely you may proclaim my innocence, forgive me for not coming to thy aid, for I were afeared of my own life in their presence. Certainly you could understand my place in this all... Please, forgive me, for I know certainly of my sins, I repent."

  Mariette visibly turmoiled in the decision. Despite her swelling eyes, Armen could see that she couldn't genuinely condemn the young manolon. She looks up to Armen, whom stood stoic, his face indiscernible. Standing as though an impious judge more than a friend wrought with anger and sorrow. She looks back to the trembling manolon stooped before her, begging for her to discharge him of his guilt. After a moment of internal deliberation, she nods, justifying her grace, "I heard thy reservations against my abuse, and your protest against their actions. I know that you had no hand in my beating or abduction. I forgive your still-handedness against the evils, for I understand your fears." She reaches a gentle hand and covers the young manolon's trembling fingers as she bestows her blessing of forgiveness.

  The boy breathes in exhausted relief, raising his shoulders so that he sat upright upon his ankles, he bows at Mariette gratefully, "Thank you, maiden, for I shall take mine lesson henceforth and become an aid to others." The boy looks up to Armen, a sheepishly hopeful grin plastered across his face, "See? I am innocent of this ordeal. I were onl-"

  His words are cut short as Armen, in a blinding speed, delves his talons into the boy's mouth, forcing his jaw open as Armen jerks his head back. A gag of surprise erupts from him, and Mariette looks at them both in shock. Armen hears Mariette cry, "NO!" as he plunges his blade into the maw of the boy. Sinking it down his throat and through the rib cage and guts until it chinks against the ground upon exiting through his taint.

  The boy chokes on the sword, alive through only adrenaline, spitting blood and vomit as his body began convulsing and throbbing in a vain attempt to dislodge the blade from himself. After painful moments, he stills and slinks down the blade. Armen retracts the sword and the boy crumples to the floor, his body unnaturally bent against the weight of itself.

  Mariette gasps in awful horror at the sight, "WHAT HAVE YE DONE!??" she barks, "Did you not witness my forgiveness of him?! I held no ill against him any longer!"

  "And for that: thou art guiltless in his death." Armen utters to her, "I, yet, had grievance against him, and I forgave not. He only repent as I judged him. Had I not arrived, had he gone unpunished, there would be no penance for his crime. After awhile, he would forget the sin entirely, and hold himself kinder than he deserved. Thou, however, would bear the weight of his sin upon thine shoulders for life, especially knowing that no justice were wrought from him."

  Mariette looks at the crumpled boy, lying lifeless and skewered on the floor, oozing blood into a large puddle that crept nearer her own, nearly to meld into each other as a single pool of forgotten life. As she allows the happening to sink deeper into her soul, next to her, the doberman stirs, groaning painfully as he began to regain some semblance of consciousness. Armen, his ire now revived at his victim's continued persistence, delves into the thought of prolonging his suffering even further. There were still fingers and claws that needed revocation. Flesh and sinews that could use rending. So many options available to he.

  Mariette startles as the manolon stirs next to her. She whimpers slightly, not quite confident in her assured safety or Armen's steward. Her fretfulness only serves to enrage Armen further, whom frolics into the inner confines of himself, entertaining any manner in which he might satisfy his lust to wreak misery upon the thing at his feet, wriggling like a maggot.

  Armen sheaths his blade, quietly, and as a silent bearer of doom, clutches the wrist of Crallen. Armen drags him away, the manolon scraping against the stones to the stairs leading out. Ascending the steps into the violet dawn outside, he makes no motion to ease the bouncing of Crallen upon each new step up. Closer to heaven, Armen brings a demon.