To His Hell and Back-Chapter 515: A God’s Territory-II

Cassius had always known Morpheus was strange. Not simply arrogant, not merely powerful but strange. There was something beneath the man’s skin, something humming and coiled and unnatural, and it never sat right with him. Morpheus walked as if the world itself bent around him. As if destiny was nothing more than a script that he, personally, had written. As if every path, every life form, every breath of existence would obediently fall into place for him because he wanted it so.

And Cassius had seen that kind of delusion before.

He had grown up around kings and monsters, tyrants who thought themselves divine, vampires who believed their blood made them chosen by fate. But Morpheus’s confidence wasn’t simple ego. It was... evident by his bloodline, backed by something Cassius had never imagined would be real.

Half of his blood belonged to the King of Hell.

A hidden son. Born of a mortal woman. A creature with both human frailty and demonic supremacy fused in his marrow.

And yet... was that enough? Enough to tear the world open? Enough to command Hell? Enough to reach Heaven?

Cassius doubted it and yet he also couldn’t deny the way Esme’s eyes gleamed when she spoke of him. As if Morpheus wasn’t just a sorcerer but God.

Now that would finally explain this woman’s blind loyalty towards him. It would also explain the cult like following that had gathered behind Morpheus all this time, and why they would not even minded if they died.

Because all of them had been promised Heaven.

And who would deny Heaven?

"You seem to have no qualms telling me all of this," he said at last, letting Cassandra’s quivering meekness slip through his voice. "Aren’t you afraid I might expose the truth? I could speak to Lady Arabella and—"

"—Did you truly think," Esme cut in, her voice suddenly dipped in frost, "that the moment you leave this hallway you would still remain alive?"

They reached the dungeon’s entrance, a narrow corridor that seemed to inhale coldness and exhale dread.

The iron door at the end wasn’t simply old; it looked cursed, its metal veins glowing faintly as though something inside it was breathing. The walls around them shivered with icy drafts. Those who had walked down these dungeon always whispered that the chill came not from the stone... but from the souls trapped beneath it.

Cassius felt every hair on his neck rise.

"I told you everything," Esme continued, her tone drifting into the casual cruelty of someone discussing weather, "because you are nothing more than a pawn. You exist to be moved, used, sacrificed."

She held his chin, angling his face toward hers as her smile sharpened.

"All you have to do is agree to follow me and spit out whatever little secret Arabella has been hiding. Do so, and you may cling to life a while longer. If not..." She tapped his cheek lightly. "You’ll keep my secret all the way to your grave. Well.. that is if you really do have a grave to begin with."

And omniously, the door behind her creaked open.

A surge of cold wind burst outward like a roar, slamming into his body, stealing the warmth from his bones. Cassius closed his eyes instinctively, his lashes frosting at the edges.

Esme shoved him forward.

And only then did he see what waited inside.

There was no floor.

No stone steps, no floorings, no bottom... nothing.

Just an endless cavern of blackness stretching beneath the earth, wide and deep and hungry like an abyss. A hollow that swallowed light. A space that one couldn’t ever imagine its depth, as if it stretched all the way to Hell.

If he fell, he wouldn’t survive, there would be no body to retrieve. Not even any bones to bury nor a sign that he ever existed.

Esme pressed her hand against his back, ready to tip him over the threshold.

"Tick tock," she lilted, her voice turning bright and girlish in a way that made the moment even more horrifying. "Time to choose, little Cassandra."

Her nails dug into his shoulder.

"Tell me what that pesky little girl plans to do... or meet your maker in the dark and keep your secret forever."

Cassius exhaled slowly, his gaze lingering on the vast, bottomless darkness yawning beneath him before drifting back to Esme’s expectant face. The wind from the abyss tugged at his hair and clothing like invisible fingers, cold and hungry and patient. If he leaned forward even an inch... the void would swallow him whole.

He huffed a soft breath, almost amused at himself. "Well," he murmured, "I suppose you wouldn’t be that foolish after all. It seems I underestimated you. Looked down on you so much that it was I who made a mistake."

Esme blinked at him, momentarily thrown off, then barked out a laugh, "What is this? Are you confessing your regrets before death? A dying girl’s final dramatic words?"

Her grin widened, "So insistent on serving that girl... why? What does she offer you? She can’t give you safety. She can’t promise you victory. She can’t even promise she’ll survive the night. Why cling to her?"

Cassius let his head fall back for a moment as if contemplating, though his eyes were sharp, calculating beneath Cassandra’s false meekness. "Maybe not to you," he said softly, "but I know what is right."

Esme scoffed. "Right? Don’t make me laugh."

"You wanted my answer," Cassius continued, his voice calm, almost gentle, though his gaze hardened with steel. "So here it is: No. Over my dead body."

Esme repeated the words with mocking delight. "Over your dead body?"

A laugh slipped from her, high and cruel and echoing through the hollow dungeon chamber.

"Then," she whispered, leaning close enough that he could smell the coppery tang of the blood still smeared on her thumb, "so be it."

Her hand snapped forward, shooting as if it was an arrow released from a tightly drawn bow.

Her five fingers drove straight into his stomach.

The impact wasn’t a clean stab, it was a malicious tearing push as her nails dug through skin and muscle as if plunging into wet paper. A flashing hot jolt of pain exploded through Cassius’s abdomen, stealing his breath in a choked grunt. Warmth rushed out over Esme’s hand, the red liquid turning into a wet glove over her five fingers that hadn’t only wanted to push him down to the abyss but also made sure of his death.

The world tilted.

The wind from the abyss roared up his legs, threatening to drag him down.

Esme’s eyes gleamed with triumphant cruelty as her fingers curled deeper, twisting.

"Well..." she breathed tauntingly against his cheek, "there’s your dead body."

By the time she let go, Cassius’s body toppled backward and his weight gravitated to the ground, being pulled until no sight of his body could be seen anymore. Not even the dull sound of his body reaching the ground reached to their ears with the depth of the abyss.

"We are done here," Esme said before closing the door, turning on her heels with a gleaming smile. "I wonder what that Arabella will do now that she had lost one of her supporters. But really that maid is so foolish. If only she had agreed, she would have been able to see Heaven."

Then turning to the guard on her left, Esme eyed him with a meaningful smile, "Aren’t you two happy to know that you have managed to survive a fate like that maid?"

"We are always thankful for your protection and his Lordship," said the guard in a practiced ease and seeing this Esme’s smile turned brighter, as if she had just been celebrated.

As they left the dungeon, the same guard didn’t immediately leave the room. He briefly turned his head behind, looking at the door where Cassius had been pushed to before turning his gaze to the front again, following Esme like he was a part of her tail.

Meanwhile Arabella who was left alone in the room sighed when she sat down on the bed. Isaac immediately rushed beside her, falling to his knees on the ground as he looked at her, "Milady... Cassandra is always violent but she always speak with rhyme and reason. She didn’t go willingly with Esme to test your authority, please do know that. She must have wanted to ensure that your plan wouldn’t go awry just because Esme demanded her to be taken away from your side."

"I know."

"Yes you know but..." Isaac suddenly stopped and quirked his head to the side, "You knew?"

"I knew," she confirmed before standing up on the ground again and opening the window to peer at the sky that had rained. "My ego isn’t so fragile that I would be furious just because someone tried to stop me when I am angered. I feel quite disappointed that he chose to leave... but I knew it’s all to protect our plan. Either way, now isn’t the time. We have to go to the dungeon and check on him."

"H- Him?" Cassandra isn’t a man though??

When he saw Arabella taking out the brown cloak from the closet, Isaac followed in suit, "But how will we enter? That dungeon is..."

"There is nothing in this place that I can’t enter, Isaac," Arabella stared at the sky in determination. "Nothing."