Lord Of Beasts

Ethan stepped out of the elevator and looked toward the corridor ahead of him, his cigarette still resting casually between his fingers.

He took a slow breath before walking forward.

The elevator had brought him directly to the top floor of the building, and Ethan quickly realised that this wasn’t simply an office. It was a massive private suite occupying the entire floor of one of the tallest buildings in the city.

Almost every exterior wall was made of floor-to-ceiling glass, giving a panoramic view of the city below. From this height, the streets looked almost miniature, with countless vehicles moving between towering buildings like streams of light.

The entire floor was open and spacious, with expensive furniture, polished floors, and several private areas branching off from the main office. Yet despite how luxurious everything was, Ethan barely paid attention to any of it.

The elevator had led him directly into what was clearly the main office, and sitting behind the enormous desk at the far end was Victor Crowe.

Ethan’s possible father was a relatively ordinary-looking man.

The man wasn’t particularly large or particularly small, and there was nothing immediately intimidating about his appearance. He had black hair streaked with grey and wore a perfectly tailored suit that looked like it had been made specifically for him.

He was also wearing sunglasses indoors.

But strangely enough, that wasn’t what bothered Ethan.

It was how completely unremarkable the man seemed, and somehow, that was the most unnerving thing about him.

’Something’s off about this guy.’

Ethan’s eyes moved around the room, noticing that there wasn’t a single guard on the entire floor.

For someone who had enough wealth and influence to own an entire skyscraper, and who had specifically called a B Rank Titled to his private office, Ethan would have expected at least some form of security.

Instead, there was nothing.

’Either this guy has some secret invisible weapons that even I can’t sense, or he’s completely confident in himself.’

Neither possibility was particularly reassuring.

What made the situation even stranger was that Ethan couldn’t sense anything from the man. Normally, his senses were sharp enough to pick up the presence of mana, and his instincts could detect danger.

Yet Victor seemed completely ordinary.

There wasn’t even the slightest trace of mana coming from him.

That only made him more of an enigma.

Despite that, Ethan casually approached the desk while taking another drag from his cigarette. He stopped a few steps away from the man and looked him directly in the eye, or at least tried to.

"Sunglasses indoors, what a douchebag."

Victor completely ignored the comment and instead stood from behind his desk and extended a hand toward Ethan.

Ethan didn’t exactly feel like being respectful.

Rather than accepting the handshake, he stepped past the offered hand and dropped himself into the chair opposite Victor’s desk. He then casually leaned forward and tapped the ash from his cigarette directly onto the man’s desk.

Victor’s hand slowly lowered, not seeming to care.

"So, what do you want?" Ethan asked bluntly.

Victor cleared his throat.

For the first time, there was a slight crack in his otherwise composed expression. Their first interaction had clearly not gone the way he had expected.

"Ethan, I am your father."

Ethan stared at him.

"Okay, and? Do you want a-"

Before Ethan could finish his sarcastic question, Victor suddenly reached up and removed his sunglasses.

Ethan’s words died in his throat.

A single blue eye stared back at him, but it wasn’t the colour that shocked him. He didn’t even have time to process the fact that Victor had only one eye.

The world suddenly seemed to shift.

Ethan’s body remained sitting in the chair, but his consciousness was suddenly dragged somewhere else. Unlike when the demon had forcibly pulled his consciousness from his body, this didn’t feel like his mind was being ripped away.

It was more like he was being forced to watch something.

His vision blurred, his awareness slipping into a strange, hypnotic state as reality disappeared around him.

’Not this shit again.’

Ethan wasn’t exactly pleased.

’And if Beast Resistance couldn’t resist this or the demon’s thing, then what’s the point of the skill?’

The thought barely finished before Ethan found himself somewhere else entirely.

Yet perhaps, deep down, he didn’t really want to resist.

Because whatever Victor was about to show him might finally answer some of the questions that had followed Ethan for most of his life...

-

Ethan opened his eyes.

He wasn’t standing or sitting, but floating in the air like some kind of ghost. Below him was a scene unfolding in front of him, but Ethan wasn’t seeing it through his own eyes.

It was from a third-person perspective.

’What is this bullshit?’

Ethan looked around, trying to make sense of what was happening.

Then he noticed the boy; a young child was standing inside a small, miserable house. He was the centre of whatever this was, and there was something strangely familiar about him.

The shape of his face, his dark hair, and even the way he stood.

The boy looked eerily similar to Ethan himself.

Ethan watched as the scene continued.

He saw the boy grow up in an abusive household.

Years passed in the blink of an eye.

The boy remained trapped with an alcoholic and abusive father who seemed to take pleasure in making everyone around him miserable. His mother was timid and frightened, constantly trying to avoid provoking her husband, while the boy learned from an early age that there was nowhere he could run.

Then, one night, everything went too far.

The father returned home drunk, an argument broke out, and the boy watched helplessly as his father attacked his mother.

Then the man killed her.

Ethan’s expression darkened.

But that wasn’t where the story ended.

Something inside the twelve-year-old boy snapped.

He attacked his father from behind, striking him on the back of the head.

The man collapsed.

But the boy didn’t stop.

He kept hitting him over and over again.

The child’s fear turned into rage as he repeatedly smashed his father’s head against the floor until the man stopped moving.

Ethan stared at the scene.

’Someone’s got anger problems.’

He tried to make the joke casually, but even Ethan struggled to watch what he was seeing.

There was something deeply disturbing about it.

This wasn’t a monster killing someone.

It was a child.

A child who had finally reached the point where fear had become rage.

The vision continued.

After his parents died, the boy was sent through several foster homes following psychiatric evaluations. None of them lasted, and eventually, he found himself back on the streets.

Alone.

With no family left and nobody willing to protect him, he learned quickly that the world respected power more than weakness.

So he did whatever he could to make money.

And more importantly, he did whatever he could to feel powerful.

As the years passed, he surrounded himself with vulnerable women and used them to make money. Ethan watched the scenes unfold, slowly beginning to understand where the man’s life had taken him.

’So basically, he’s a traumatised pimp.’

Even Ethan’s usual humour couldn’t completely hide the discomfort beginning to settle in his chest.

Especially when he saw one of the women.

Ethan’s expression changed.

She looked almost identical to his mother.

Not the woman Ethan remembered from the final years of her life, worn down by addiction, hardship, and poverty, but a younger and healthier version of her.

Ethan stared at her.

’Of all the fucked-up origin stories I could’ve had...’

Ethan watched the vision continue, his expression becoming increasingly complicated as the pieces of Victor Crowe’s past began falling into place.