Inside a dreary cell that reeked of rot and burnt flesh. Several feet below the palace grounds...

The wails of a middle-aged man rang through the space in horrific screams, interspersed intermittently with a chilling quiet that is broken after a few minutes with sharper and more anguish-filled cries.

Victor Malverin was nailed naked to a circular stone slab. Both his hands and feet were driven through by long and rusted metal shrapnel, straight through the stone slab beneath him.

Long needles were sticking into both of his eyes, with gashes of missing skin and open bleeding wounds ravaging through his entire body.

He appeared bloodied and inhumanely tortured, but he still held a rebellious and murderous rage in his stone-like expression as he observed with a vengeance-filled glare at the mastermind behind his current condition.

Before him stood a middle-aged man in simple brown fabric that was stained with fresh blood and had pieces of flesh attached to some parts.

The man had grey hair and a silver-colored extended goatee. He held in one hand a hooked knife, bloodied with patches of flesh attached to it....

And on the other hand, he had a scissor-like tool, also dripping with blood. But those were not the most striking thing about this man...

It was the fact that he was currently shedding real, genuine, sorrowful tears.....

Yet he proceeded to use the curved knife in his hand to begin a new session of torture on Victor, while he repeatedly apologised for the pain he was causing him.

"I already told you..."

"I DID NOT STEAL FROM THE TREASURY!" Victor screamed in anger as his whole body was being ravaged with pain.

It’s been several hours since he was imprisoned and bound here, deprived of all access to his abilities.

The cells were lined with mana-canceling formations that fed into a similar artifact used in the treasury....

And the stone slab he was strapped to was literally draining out all of his physical strength.

He was also stripped of all he had on him, including his jewelry and artifacts, leaving him no external means to put up a fight.

Victor wondered why none of his ministers had made any move to plead his case....

Though he understood it was a long shot, and that it was unlikely that it would lead to his release....

But they could at least reach out to their allied kingdom to initiate the plan earlier than designed....

That would have caused enough disruption to at least let him escape in the hubbub that would ensue.

But there hasn’t been a peep from anyone; he doesn’t even know the current condition of his wife and daughter.

This led Victor to believe his setup must have been quite the comprehensive ploy, and covering more angles than he had earlier presumed.

The likely suspects to his setup would most definitely be the royals, but the longer he remained locked up and tortured....

The more the image of a certain someone kept running through his mind.

And no matter how much Victor tries to brush off the fact that this person is capable of such a critical ploy when they had only been in the kingdom for just a little over two weeks....

His instincts still scream at him that they are definitely behind all this.

Victor understands that unless a miracle happens, he will for sure be executed soon.

All his ambitions to usurp the throne of the Ursula kingdom now seemed meaningless as this abomination of a torturer continues to flay him alive while crying like he is the one being tortured.

"Even if it’s the last thing I do..... I will make sure I kill you!" Victor uttered in agonizing pain at the weeping butcher.

The weeping Butcher. The kingdom’s most infamous torturer is dubbed so because he loves flaying his victims, and he also feels so bad after doing it that he weeps passionately.

"I am so sorry...But I have to get the truth." A tiny and sorrowful voice came from the weeping butcher as he continued to cry while pushing another long needle into Victor’s eye.

It was clear to Victor that this sick man was only doing this for his personal twisted enjoyment and actually didn’t care if the treasures were found or not.

’Damn it. At this rate..... I am going to die here even before my public execution.’ Victor lamented in his mind...

But as he did, he noticed something in shock, that soon blossomed into a joyful surprise....

From the corner of his eye, a figure was shifting in the shadows outside his torture cell.

The figure of a man, he most definitely recognized as they came fully into view in the dull light of the dark underground cave.

"Aeric ?!"

The weeping butcher turned around in surprise when he heard Victor’s mumble. That’s when he saw a man in leather armor pointing a strange object straight at him...

"What ?!. How did you get in here?!" the weeping butcher blurted with a tear-filled eye, slowly reaching to his side to grab a more combat-appropriate weapon....

But before he could reach, an orange projectile of pure mana pierced through his skull, and he slumped dead to the floor.

Aeric directed the same projectile to cut through the sealing mechanism of the cell as he ran straight inside for his heavily wounded lord.

He hastily undid all the contraptions before feeding Victor a healing elixir that could feed a small village for several years.

Aeric watched in amazement as the elixir took effect, with Victor’s injuries began to close up at a rapid pace.

"My lord." Aeric knelt respectfully to the side after Victor, while Victor wore some fresh new commoner clothes he had in his storage.

"How?"

"You shouldn’t be able to use mana here...."

".... And I can also feel access to my mana pool is slowly being restored," Victor remarked as he ran a diagnostic check on his condition.

"It is with the help of this, my lord," Aeric responded, stretching an hourglass-shaped object to Victor.

"... I see.’ Victor accepted it in recognition.

It is, in fact, one of his very own artifacts that should be in his private vault.

But Aeric had access, which is not surprising.

He was already putting two and two together regarding what might have happened at his mansion and his family before Aeric’s voice came once again.....

"We need to leave immediately, my lord."

Victor nodded, as he could see that the sand in the hourglass was already running out, which meant that soon all access to mana would be cut out of the area once again.

"How did you manage to break in?" Victor asked casually as they walked out of the cell. Taking steady, dignified steps like his now, former position required.

He didn’t mind much that Aeric had seen him in such a sorry state. What matters most at the moment is survival and steadily getting his revenge on all his enemies.

"Using this, my lord..." Aeric presented yet another artifact. An amethyst gem with flakes of gold dancing with it.

"...Though, it has just two remaining uses," Aeric added.

Victor nodded in understanding as he grabbed hold of the artifact; it was yet another one of the artifacts from his vault. Victor was glad that his very efficient guard was able to at least secure some of his treasures before it was all seized.

"And my wife and daughter?" Victor stopped and asked concernedly, and a bit dreading of what he might hear.

But before Aeric could answer, they both heard the clicking of a cane approaching behind them....

TAP! TAP! TAP!

What followed was the visage of a veiled figure with a walking cane appearing seemingly out of nowhere... and was now right in front of them.

"Leaving so soon ?" muttered a calm voice deepened with sage-like regal flare.

"Fuck!" Victor blurted as his heart dropped to his stomach from fear.