His gaze swept slowly across the n and won on the ship.
"Did any of you carry a cursed artifact? Or suspect you did? I understand if you were greedy. I can also understand if you were under so kind of ntal hex."
His voice remained calm.
"I promise there will be no punishnt if it was you. Just co clean."
The crew glanced at each other nervously, quiet murmurs spreading across the deck.
No one stepped forward.
Damon’s eyes darkened slightly.
"I already know who it is."
His voice beca colder.
"If I have to point you out... I will kill you."
He waved his hand dismissively, though he doubted anyone would step forward.
After all, how could anyone be sure he actually knew?
It could easily be nothing more than a bluff.
And no one wanted to gamble their life on that.
Damon sighed slowly.
"So that’s how you want to play it... fine then."
He straightened and turned his gaze toward the gathered knights and sailors. His eyes moved across their faces one by one, studying them in silence.
Then he stopped in front of one person.
Before the man could react, Damon stepped forward. His shadow stretched unnaturally across the deck like a living thing.
Damon reached down and touched the man’s shadow.
Then he pulled his hand back.
"Ahrggg—"
The man didn’t even have ti to scream properly before his legs buckled and he collapsed to his knees. His shadow peeled itself off the deck like black liquid and slid into Damon’s palm.
Damon stood there holding it.
His expression was cold and unreadable.
The man clutched his chest as if sothing vital had been ripped from him. His breathing turned ragged. Sweat poured down his face.
It felt as if Damon was holding his soul in his hand.
"Your shadow is mine," Damon whispered.
This was the Shadow Seizer skill.
Normally Damon would never use sothing like this in front of so many witnesses. It looked far too demonic.
But right now he didn’t care.
He was already a mber of the temple. In a sense he was the highest religious authority present on this ship.
If anyone had the right to judge corruption, it was him.
"It was you, wasn’t it," Damon said coldly.
The man hunched forward, clutching his chest. He didn’t even understand where the pain was coming from.
"You are one of the people I haven’t interrogated yet," Damon continued calmly. "And honestly I don’t even need to anymore."
His eyes remained cold.
"Your body is already enough proof."
Damon had found his culprit.
The man slowly raised his head, his face pale and trembling.
"I... I haven’t done anything," he rasped weakly.
Seras frowned from where she stood nearby. Even she didn’t fully understand what Damon was doing.
"Yes... maybe you believe that," Damon replied calmly. "I can see you aren’t telling lies."
He crouched down until his face was level with the man’s.
"Then explain why you are slowly getting corrupted."
Damon grabbed the man’s gauntlet and tore it off.
Beneath the tal glove, the man’s skin had begun to change.
It was turning grey.
Thin, sharp hair-like spikes were sprouting through cracked flesh that looked dry and brittle.
The corruption was spreading slowly across his arm.
Damon stared at it for a mont.
"I know the stench of rot."
The man’s eyes trembled violently.
"What did you take?"
The man’s hands trembled violently.
Damon’s question echoed in his head.
What did you take?
Set stared at his own arm as if it belonged to soone else. The grey corruption crawling beneath his skin filled him with a kind of quiet terror he had never known on any battlefield.
He thought it would pass.
He thought it was temporary.
Now he was afraid.
"I... I... what’s happening to ?" he asked, his voice shaking. At that mont his own condition mattered more to him than anything else in the world.
Damon glared down at him, his eyes cold and rciless.
"You’re being corrupted," he said flatly. "You touched sothing you shouldn’t have. Your soul has been tainted."
He tightened his grip around the writhing shadow in his palm.
"Nothing can save you now."
Set’s eyes widened in horror. His lips trembled before he lowered his head in silence.
Nearby, Lana lowered her gaze, watching one of their own descend into sothing monstrous.
"Why, Set," she whispered softly.
Set gritted his teeth. Sha twisted his face as the weight of his failure as a knight pressed down on him.
"I... it was a mont of weakness," he said hoarsely. "I saw sothing on the beach. It was lying in the sand... shining."
He swallowed hard.
"I reached for it... but I swear I didn’t take it. I resisted."
Slowly he reached into the bag hanging at his side and pulled sothing out.
A round golden artifact rested in his palm.
It glead faintly even under the bloodstained sky.
A single red gem sat at its center like a watching eye, surrounded by ancient runes etched into the tal.
Damon’s gaze hardened.
"Then how do you still have it," he asked coldly.
After all, this man was one of the knights assigned to guard him.
Set stared at the object in his hand with a haunted expression.
"I don’t know," he whispered. "When we boarded the ship... I found it in my bag."
His voice dropped lower.
"I didn’t throw it away because... I thought it was fate."
Damon’s expression didn’t change.
"Until you realized it started corrupting you," he said quietly.
Set’s shoulders stiffened.
"And by then," Damon continued, "you couldn’t tell anyone. So you kept your mouth shut and let everyone else deal with the consequences."
His voice turned colder.
"You let people die."
Set closed his eyes.
The corruption had spread further now. Grey veins crawled across his arm like cracks in stone, thin black spikes beginning to push through the skin.
"Dispose of it," Damon ordered.
"Throw it overboard."
Set nodded slowly.
He lifted the artifact slightly as if preparing to toss it into the sea.
Then he stopped.
His movent froze halfway.
Slowly... very slowly... he lowered the object back down.
When he looked up again, his face had changed.
The fear was gone.
Sothing else stared out through his eyes now.
His expression hardened unnaturally as he whispered in a quiet voice.
"You’re after my precious."
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