Dante wanted out.

  It wasn’t a noble thought. It wasn’t brave. It wasn’t even particularly intelligent. It was raw, desperate, the frantic scrabbling of a man cornered by forces far beyond his means to resist. It was the last, dying ember of a hope he hadn’t even realized he still carried—the belief, however foolish, that he could just walk away.

  Because after everything—the debt spiraling beyond comprehension, the enforcers who had long since stopped making threats and started making examples, the Celestial Legate whose very name sent shivers through the Undermarket’s underbelly, and the infamous Ghost Clause that bound him tighter than iron chains—he had finally reached the edge.

  His contract had been stolen. His debt had been accelerated. And now, somewhere out there, something—someone—had just felt him. A presence like fingers brushing the back of his neck, like cold breath against his ear.

  That was it. Game over. No more playing by the rules. No more hoping for some impossible loophole. Time to cut his losses and disappear.

  Except.

  The contract wouldn’t let him.

  He had nearly made it.

  Dante was already threading his way through the twisted arteries of the Undermarket, past stalls hawking wares that should have never seen the light of day, past Pactmakers and debt-rats who could smell it on him. The fear. The raw, electric stink of a man trying to run from something that could not be outrun.

  He ignored them. Ignore everything. Get out. Get gone. Be normal again.

  And then—

  Pain.

  Not just pain. Not something so simple. This was a chain, unseen but felt, wrapping around his ribs and yanking—hard. It wrenched his insides like a fishhook in his soul, driving him staggering into a wall. His vision fractured, his lungs locked, and something inside his chest burned, cold and sharp.

  Then came the voice. Not sound. Not anything that could be heard in the normal way.

  A whisper, sliding like a needle through his skull.

  A cold pressure coiled around his ribs, tightening like unseen fingers, each breath coming shallower than the last. It wasn't just pain—it was a command, something woven deep into the marrow of his being. The words weren't spoken so much as etched into him, carved into the fabric of whatever was left of his soul. Every syllable carried weight, a law written in the fundamental language of reality itself, and he was on the wrong side of it.

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  The Undermarket blurred around him, colors smearing like wet paint, the world distorting under the force of something he could neither see nor resist. His knees hit the ground, hands clutching at the stones as though he could anchor himself in sheer defiance of the pull. Vendors and passersby barely spared him a glance—pain like this was the price of doing business down here, and no one was foolish enough to intervene in a Pact matter. A few watched from the edges of their stalls, eyes gleaming with the sharp interest of scavengers waiting to see if a body would be left behind.

  Something deeper than his bones, deeper than thought, cracked. A thread snapped taut, sending a pulse of agony straight to the core of him, and for one terrible moment, he could feel it—the other end of the chain. A presence, distant but aware, turning its attention toward him with the slow, deliberate certainty of a predator acknowledging a struggling meal. It wasn’t fully here yet, but the weight of its awareness alone pressed against his mind like a boot on his throat.

  "The Pact is not yet fulfilled."

  Dante choked, gasping on air that refused to fill his lungs. His legs buckled, his body folding in on itself as if some unseen hand was pressing down. His every nerve screamed in rebellion, his very being rejecting the notion of leaving.

  And then—just as suddenly—it stopped.

  Dante collapsed against the alley wall, sucking in desperate, ragged breaths. His hands shook. His chest ached like something had been carved out.

  A flicker in his vision. A telltale glow of malicious intent.

  The light seared against the dark, too bright, too sharp—less an interface and more a judgment. The glowing text bled into his vision, filling the air with the cold, clinical finality of a sentence already passed. It didn’t hum or flicker like a standard projection. No, this was something older, something deeper, woven into the fabric of the Pact itself. It carried the weight of a thousand unbreakable oaths, of debts measured not in coin but in obligation.

  Dante swallowed hard, his throat raw, his pulse hammering against the walls of his skull. The pain had stopped, but the memory of it lingered, a phantom pressure against his ribs, a warning coiled around his spine like a waiting blade. He flexed his fingers, willing the tremor to still, but his hands still felt wrong, like they no longer belonged to him entirely. Maybe they didn’t. Maybe he didn’t. The Pact had claimed its due, had reminded him—violently—that he was no longer just a man. He was a debt made flesh.

  And debts were not allowed to run.

  His System Interface flickered to life before him, radiating quiet, inevitable menace.

  [WARNING: CONTRACT VIOLATION ATTEMPT DETECTED]

  The Pact is not yet fulfilled.

  Attempts to escape will be met with appropriate measures.

  Dante stared.

  Slowly, painfully, he let his head tip back, thunking against the alley wall.

  “Of course,” he muttered hoarsely. “Of course it won’t let me leave.”

  He closed his eyes.

  And for just one, sharp moment, he let himself imagine—what would running have even meant? A normal life? A fresh start? Peace?

  No.

  That was never in the cards. It never had been. Not from the moment that dying bastard had stumbled into his bar, pressing a blood-soaked contract into his hands with the urgency of a man trying to offload his own damnation.

  This wasn’t a life he had chosen.

  But it was one he was trapped in.

  Dante exhaled, slow and shuddering. Then, with no small amount of effort, he pushed himself to his feet.

  "Fine," he muttered. "I won’t run."

  His debt was growing. His enemies were watching.

  And if he couldn’t escape this game?

  Then it was time to start playing to win.