Crazy Awakening: My luck can copy Talents.

"Nikolás."

"What?"

"Kitchen. Now. It doesn’t matter what you hear on the other side of that door. Don’t come out until I tell you. Understood?"

"Adrián—"

"Understood?"

Nikolás nodded.

He gathered the boxes and the notebook, went into the kitchen, and closed the door behind him with a soft click.

Adrián stood in the middle of the living room.

On the other side of the apartment door, the presence waited.

Cold.

Patient.

That vibration that wasn’t a voice, but still carried a message.

"Open the door, Bearer. And let’s talk."

Adrián breathed in.

Closed his eyes.

He thought about the training room in the basement.

He thought about the mask floating above his head.

He thought about the black gloves growing over his hands as though they had never really been gone.

He thought about the pulse of Void disintegrating Ishtar’s top.

"Appear."

Nothing.

"Appear."

Nothing.

"Appear, please. I need you to appear. Now."

And this time, with enough force to nearly knock him off balance, the Thief’s Mask materialized above his head in a burst of black light streaked with silver.

The gloves spread over his hands, fitting around his fingers with the firmness of something custom-made.

The air around him dropped by two degrees.

Adrián felt the extra strength rush through his body.

He felt his senses expand to a level he hadn’t experienced before.

He could hear Nikolás’s heartbeat in the kitchen—fast, terrified.

He could smell the wood beneath his feet.

Three years of dust embedded in Marina’s boxes.

The old sweat trapped in the armchair.

And the cold something on the other side of the door that didn’t smell like anything specific, but somehow smelled unmistakably unnatural.

He looked at the door.

Raised one hand.

"I don’t know how to fight."

"I’ve never been in a real fight in my life unless two shoving matches at school count."

"But I’m a demon now. And I have a mask. And a card. And weird senses. And I’m probably going to die, but if I’m going to die for the second time in twenty-four hours, I might as well do it trying."

He clenched his hand into a fist.

Took three steps toward the door.

And with every bit of determination he had left, with all the adrenaline of a life that hadn’t even lasted two days yet, he grabbed the doorknob, ripped the door open—

and threw a full-force punch into the chest of whatever was standing on the other side.

There was a huge man standing there.

Blond.

Vertical scar.

Black shirt.

Gold earrings.

Kael Vandragh.

Who didn’t even blink.

Adrián’s punch—backed by the full strength of the Thief’s Mask, all his new demonic energy, and the momentum of a body that shouldn’t have been capable of hitting that hard—

slammed into Kael’s chest.

And bounced off like he had punched a marble wall.

Kael lowered his eyes to the spot where Adrián’s fist had landed.

Then slowly looked back up at him.

With the exact expression of an adult watching a three-year-old try to kick him in the shin.

"..."

Adrián stood there with his fist still extended.

The Mask floating over his head.

The black glove pressed against Kael’s chest.

His breath caught in his throat.

Very slowly, he lowered his fist.

"...Kael."

"Vega."

"It was you."

"Yes."

"..."

"Was that supposed to be a punch?"

"Yes."

"You’ve never fought in your life, have you?"

"Uh. No."

"It showed."

Kael crossed his arms.

His electric-blue eyes moved from Adrián’s face to the floating Mask above his head.

Then back to his face.

Adrián noticed that Kael’s gaze lingered on the Mask for one second too long.

He also noticed the tiny change in his expression.

Barely anything.

A small tightening of the jaw.

A subtle reassessment.

But Kael didn’t comment on it.

"Vega," he said in that deep, drawn-out voice of his. "Put that thing away."

"...The Mask?"

"Yes."

"I don’t know how."

"Think about shutting it off. Push it inward. Rhea should’ve told you that."

Adrián thought about it.

Pushed.

The Mask flickered twice.

Resisted for half a second.

Then vanished.

The gloves dissolved in a flash of silver.

Exhaustion immediately hit Adrián’s knees, and he grabbed the doorframe to keep himself from stumbling.

Kael looked at him.

"Pathetic."

"Kael."

"What."

"It was you. The voice. The weird presence. All of it. You were scaring me on purpose."

Kael laughed once.

Short.

Dry.

Completely humorless.

"Vega. I don’t have time to scare someone as weak as you. If I wanted to humiliate you today, I would’ve done it during the meeting with witnesses instead of playing with voices in empty hallways."

"But..."

"There was someone here."

Adrián stopped.

"Someone real."

Kael’s expression remained flat.

"They reached the second floor while you were talking to the human. I detected them from outside the building and started coming up."

Adrián stared at him.

"The moment they sensed me, they ran. Went out through a second-floor hallway window four minutes ago. They’re already several blocks away."

Adrián went completely still.

"...Someone real."

"Someone real."

"A Fallen?"

"Most likely."

Kael glanced down the hallway.

"I couldn’t identify the full signature. They moved fast the moment they felt me coming."

His eyes narrowed slightly.

"Professional coward. Mid-ranking Fallen know when running is the smart choice. And that tells me it was mid-ranking, not low-ranking. A low-ranking one wouldn’t have sensed me early enough."

"..."

"So now you know."

Kael looked directly at him.

"Someone was watching you."

A pause.

"Someone knows you’re here."

Another.

"And someone knows what contract you’re executing."

Something cold crawled up Adrián’s chest.

"Kael."

"Vega."

"Why are you telling me this? You could’ve just let me scare myself to death."

Kael stared at him for several seconds.

"Because technically, I’m assigned as your backup tonight."

He uncrossed his arms.

"And Mistress gave me an order."

His expression didn’t change.

"I follow orders. Whether I like them or not."

"...Oh."

"Are you done with the human?"

"Yes. Contract’s sealed. I’m going to keep the boxes for a few days so I can go through everything more carefully."

"Good."

Kael turned to leave.

"I’m going. I have an important contract to execute."

He took a step.

"My contract."

Another.

"A real one. Not a reincarnate’s trial run."

He started walking down the hallway.

Then stopped.

Without turning around:

"Vega."

"Yeah?"

"Be careful."

Adrián raised an eyebrow.

"I don’t personally care whether you live or die. But if you get yourself killed because you were careless, Mistress will be in a bad mood for months."

A pause.

"And that would ruin my entire quarter."

Then he kept walking.

His heavy footsteps echoed through the empty hallway until they faded away.

Adrián remained standing in the doorway.

He stared down the hall Kael had disappeared into.

Then he closed Nikolás’s apartment door.

Locked both deadbolts.

Walked over to the kitchen.

And knocked.

"Nikolás. It’s over. You can come out."

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