Sunamy's apartment was plunged in the typical twilight of early evening. The only illumination came from the television, which continued playing news about Ultran attacks in an infinite loop that had become the soundtrack of modern life. Nélia was sprawled on the couch, absently scrolling through her phone while part of her mind remained tuned to the news.
Forty minutes.
That's how much time had passed since Sunamy left to "buy popcorn." A trip to the corner store that should take, at most, fifteen minutes considering traffic and possible checkout line.
"Why is he taking so long?" she murmured to the empty apartment, irritation beginning to color her voice. "What is that idiot doing?"
She paused her phone scrolling and looked around the space she knew as well as her own apartment. Sunamy's organized chaos—stacks of books about historical battles, DVDs of documentaries about supernatural phenomena, newspaper clippings pinned to a corkboard covering half the living room wall. It was the sanctuary of someone obsessed, but it had never seemed sinister before.
Why was she feeling so uneasy?
"And why am I worrying so much?" she asked herself, covering her face with her phone as if she could hide the growing anxiety even from herself.
The truth was she knew Sunamy better than he imagined. Three years of close coexistence had taught her to read his expressions, recognize when he lied, identify when something made him more agitated than normal. And the way he had left today—that poorly disguised rush, the way he had avoided her gaze—had nothing to do with a simple trip to the store.
On the TV screen, a reporter commented on reinforced security measures in the city center following rumors of Ultran activity in the region. Nélia felt a chill in her stomach. City center. Exactly the opposite direction from the corner store.
Meanwhile, three hundred kilometers away, in an underground fortress that existed long before the first city was built over it, the heroes' tribunal seethed with an energy that oscillated between expectation and horror.
Sunamy was at the center of that polished stone amphitheater, the silver shackles weighing on his wrists and ankles like lead anchors. Around him, hundreds of heroes—veterans whose names were whispered in legends, young prodigies who had proven their worth in battle, specialists in different aspects of the war against the Ultran—watched him with a mixture of morbid fascination and genuine revulsion.
"Let me go!" he shouted, his voice echoing through the stone walls with a reverberation that transformed his words into something almost inhuman. "Let me go right now!"
The panic in his voice was real, visceral. This wasn't the provocative young man who had faced an Ultran with sarcastic smiles. This was someone completely terrified, struggling against shackles that seemed to drain his strength with every movement.
The judge's gavel came down on the pedestal with enough force to crack the stone.
"Silence."
The word carried absolute authority, the kind of command that had been obeyed for millennia. The judge was an imposing figure even seated—hair and beard white as fresh snow, eyes that had seen empires rise and fall, ceremonial robes that seemed woven from solidified sunlight.
"You are an aberration," the judge continued, each word falling like a death sentence. "You not only devoured an Ultran, but also tried to harm already wounded heroes. How—and who are you—to speak here?"
Sunamy's eyes widened in absolute horror. "Lies! Lies! It's all lies!"
His voice broke on the last word, coming out as a desperate scream from someone watching their reality being destroyed around them. Because deep in his mind, part of him knew it wasn't a lie. Part of him remembered flavors he shouldn't know, a hunger that wasn't human.
The whispers began again, a growing chorus of hundreds of voices echoing through the chamber like the buzzing of enraged bees.
"Monster."
"Should be executed."
"Not human."
"Aberration."
The judge raised his hand, and silence fell instantly. When he spoke again, his voice carried the weight of a decision already made.
"Silence, everyone. Show the video to the condemned."
One of the crystalline screens embedded in the tribunal walls lit up, projecting a cold blue light that made shadows dance across the spectators' faces. The ambient lights gradually dimmed, leaving only the ghostly glow of the screen to illuminate the chamber.
Sunamy fixed his eyes on the screen, his heart beating so hard he was sure everyone in the room could hear it.
The video began.
The train station appeared on the screen, but the perspective was different from the amateur recordings he was used to seeing. This was high definition, captured by military security cameras strategically positioned around the area. Every detail was sharp, every movement perfectly visible.
There was the Ultran, standing amid the wreckage, staring at something off-screen with an expression of absolute shock. The two heroes lay among the rubble, clearly defeated, barely able to move.
And then the camera moved, and Sunamy saw himself.
Blood dripped from his mouth in a red torrent that stained the concrete floor. His eyes were closed, his body falling toward the ground like a puppet with cut strings. For a moment, it seemed the battle was over—that the insolent young human had finally succumbed to the Ultran's devastating blow.
But then something happened that made even the chained Sunamy in the tribunal hold his breath.
Without opening his eyes, his body on the screen extended his left arm, planting his palm on the ground. With a fluid movement that defied the laws of physics, he propelled himself back to vertical position. There was no hesitation, no imbalance. It was as if someone had simply rewound a film.
The Ultran on the screen stepped back, its eyes widening in genuine terror.
"No," the real Sunamy whispered, tears beginning to stream down his cheeks. "No, no, no..."
On the screen, his other self disappeared.
He didn't run. Didn't jump. Simply ceased to exist in one location and began to exist in another, reappearing directly behind the Ultran with speed that turned the movement into a blur even for high-speed cameras.
The three-meter creature tried to turn, tried to react, but it was too late.
The strike that followed was devastating. The Sunamy on screen moved his right arm in an arc that seemed casual, almost disinterested, but the impact sent the Ultran flying through the station like a cannonball. The creature crashed against the back wall with enough force to crack the structural concrete, leaving a crater in the shape of its body.
And through all of this, Sunamy's eyes remained firmly closed.
The Ultran rose from the rubble, clearly dazed but still alive. That's when it noticed something that made its supernatural blood freeze in its veins.
Sunamy was smiling. A wide, genuinely happy smile, like a child who had just received the toy they always wanted. But there was blood covering his teeth, dripping down his chin, and in his right hand...
"Oh my God," someone whispered in the tribunal stands.
Sunamy was holding an arm. The Ultran's right arm, torn from the shoulder like someone picking ripe fruit from a tree. And while the camera captured every detail in crystal resolution, he brought the severed limb to his mouth and bit.
He didn't hesitate. Showed no disgust or reluctance. He bit and chewed as if savoring the best dinner of his life.
The Ultran on screen looked at its right shoulder, where only an open wound dripped dark liquid. The shock on its face was almost comical—an expression of complete incomprehension in the face of the impossible.
But it didn't have time to fully process what had happened.
Sunamy charged at it again, moving with speed that defied perception. This time, the Ultran tried to dodge, but it was like trying to escape lightning. Sunamy's fist pierced its abdomen like a spear, penetrating muscles and organs as if they were made of wet paper.
And then the feast began.
Methodically, almost ritualistically, Sunamy began to consume the Ultran while it was still alive. Each bite was calculated, precise, like an experienced chef preparing a rare delicacy. The sound of chewing echoed through the station—an obscene noise that the cameras captured with painful clarity.
Worst of all was the expression of pure satisfaction on his face. Eyes still closed, but lips curved in a smile of absolute contentment.
When nothing remained of the Ultran but dark stains on the ground, Sunamy slowly turned toward the two wounded heroes.
The camera perfectly captured the expression of terror on the men's faces. They were experienced warriors, veterans of hundreds of battles against creatures that defied human sanity. But at that moment, seeing that blood-covered figure walking toward them with measured steps and eyes still closed, they were simply two people facing something that shouldn't exist.
Each step Sunamy took echoed through the station like a funeral drum beat. The heroes tried to crawl away, but their wounded bodies barely responded to the desperate commands of their brains.
Death approached with a smile on its face.
That's when the air in the station tore.
Not metaphorically—literally tore, as if someone had cut reality itself with an invisible blade. A bright rift opened in space, and from it emerged a figure that radiated authority like the sun radiates heat.
Captain Ika.
She was a woman of indefinable appearance—could be thirty or three hundred years old, with silver hair that floated around her head as if she were submerged in water. Her white armor seemed to be made of solid light, each plate reflecting not the ambient light, but some internal luminosity that made her shine like a fallen star.
Her arms moved with speed that made even Sunamy's movements seem slow. She touched his shoulders with open palms, and instantly the young man collapsed as if all the strings holding his body had been cut simultaneously.
Sunamy fell into deep sleep, the smile finally disappearing from his blood-covered face.
Captain Ika turned to the wounded heroes, her voice carrying genuine concern that contrasted dramatically with the clinical efficiency with which she had dealt with Sunamy.
"Are you alright?"
The video was abruptly cut.
The tribunal lights gradually came on, revealing hundreds of pale faces and expressions of barely contained horror. Some of the younger heroes had vomited during the screening. Even the veterans seemed shaken by having witnessed something that defied not just logic, but humanity itself.
At the center of all that charged atmosphere, Sunamy was devastated.
Tears flowed freely down his face, falling onto the silver shackles with small metallic sounds. His body trembled uncontrollably, as if he had a high fever, and his breathing came in irregular sobs.
"No," he murmured, his voice broken and almost inaudible. "It's not true. It can't be true."
But deep in his mind, flavors he shouldn't know echoed in his memory. The taste of flesh that wasn't human, nor animal, but something completely different. Rich, complex, satisfying in a way that normal food had never been.
The judge's gavel came down one last time, the sound echoing through the chamber like final thunder.
"If it weren't for Captain Ika, we don't know what would have become of our heroes," the elder declared, his voice carrying the authority of millennia of justice. "And not only that—you had the audacity to attempt to steal one of the Trias that maintains the balance between the shadow realm."
He paused, letting the weight of his words settle into the already charged atmosphere of the chamber.
"For this reason, your execution will be immediate, creature!"
The verdict echoed through the stone walls like a divine sentence. Hundreds of voices rose in approval, a chorus demanding justice, demanding that this aberration be removed from the world before it could cause more damage.
And at the center of all that bloodthirst, Sunamy continued crying, not just for the death sentence he had just received, but for the discovery that something lived inside him that wasn't human.
Something that hungered for things that even the darkest nightmares couldn't imagine.