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Chapter 62: Hannya, the Cannibal
🕑 Added 2025-06-07 04:01:01 +0000 UTCThe temperature in the pavilion dropped like a corpse sinking into a lake.
Hannya’s smile vanished. She rose slowly, as if pulled upward by invisible wires. Her form shimmered, subtly at first, then began to flicker in and out of focus. The air distorted around her.
“You actually tried it.” she spoke. Her voice no longer held its earlier charm or performative elegance.
It was hollow.
Distorted.
Damning.
The petals spun as her lips parted slightly. Mist flowing out with every word.
“You dare use the bell on me?”
Hannya’s head twitched.
Not from the hypnosis breaking. From her neck snapping unnaturally to the side.
“You’re far too audacious, lowborn.”
Suziana took a step back.
“Wait-”
CRACK
A fist collided with the noble's gut. Her body folded in half, blood flying from her lips.
THUD
A second blow, across the jaw, spun Suziana into the pavilion wall. Her head bounced off the carved driftwood beam, a cut splintering across her cheek.
“You know what’s funny?” Hannya asked, stalking forward, voice lilting. “I was genuinely going to let you go. Really! Kikiki, After I took your precious little wishes. One scream, a little groveling, and off you’d go.”
She punched again.
CRUNCH
A nose shattered.
“But you had to go and touch a taboo.”
She slammed Suziana’s head into the floor once, twice, mist binding the girl’s limbs like ropes.
Suziana screamed.
“Oh, hush,” Hannya hissed, pinning her down with one pale foot. “What was it Grandpapa gave you? A family heirloom? A gift from your house?”
Her eyes widened, trembling in mock sympathy.
“A shame it fell flat. But rejoice, I learned another valuable lesson. You’ve earned a spot in my heart, Kikiki!”
Hannya crouched down, gazing at the ant before her.
“I planned to let all of you walk free. Three noble houses humiliated, their wishes sapped. A perfect warning for the rest.”
“I could’ve let you go.”
A low mist began to flow from her pores.
“I would’ve let you go.”
The mist coiled like snakes, threading between columns and floorboards, seeping up the legs of furniture and into the very air. It shimmered with impossible hues, part shadow, part moonlight, part nightmare.
“But now?” Hannya said softly.
She rose, a hand firmly grasped in the mane of the young miss challenging her. Her steps were slow, impending. And the mist followed like a robe with every stride.
“I’ll just take your wish… the old-fashioned way.”
She tossed the woman to the center of the room.
“Side story 346, Gula's Ascension! Kikiki!”
Suziana’s concussed mind squeezed out a groan. “Gula’s… What are you-”
“Gula has a physique that was quite a bother when she was young.” Hannya interrupted. “It forced her to make wishes in order to stay alive.”
The mist began to grow denser, wrapping around the noble tighter.
“But she found a way to survive and retain her wishes to boot.” A black blade appeared in her hand, cold and final.
Hannya grinned.
She raised her blade.
“But monologuing is for villains, and a girl has her secrets, right? Kikiki!”
Suziana opened her mouth to scream, cast, or beg, but the mist flooded her lungs before she could choose. Her limbs stiffened. Face freezing before vanishing beneath a cloud of black curtains.
Showeuff was the first to try and flee. He was weakened, and the swift beating Suziana received only showed the disparity in power. She was not just a caster. Among the three, Suziana was the strongest in combat.
But the pavilion had no doors anymore.
Only mist.
Dozeuff reached for his scythe, hoping to find a way to break through, but the handle turned to sand in his hands.
Their vision blurred.
The confusion started first.
Then came the illusions.
To Showeuff, the mist twisted into an opening at the center. In front of him, Suziana still stood, and Hannya was kneeling, coughing blood, clearly wounded from the bell. Suziana raised her broken blade.
“We finish this now,” she said in a heroic tone.
Showeuff grinned. “About damn time.”
Dozeuff saw something else entirely, Hannya writhing on the ground, her bones cracking, her mist dissipating. He charged her, roaring, the scene vivid with vengeance. He would take this chance to get his prize.
Suziana, still locked in mist, could only twitch, her body limp in Hannya’s grasp, her mouth barely able to croak a curse.
None of them noticed the real pavilion anymore.
They fought in a dream.
A dream carefully woven by the mist.
And in the real world…
Hannya began to eat.
Not like a beast.
Not like a monster.
But like a noblewoman at a banquet.
DING
[
The [Platform of Chaos] looks to your direction in fury. It pauses. It recognizes your face. It scolds you halfheartedly and turns away, feigning ignorance.
No punishment was given.
]
She carved through Suziana’s shoulder with her elegant sword, lifting a sliver of flesh and chewing slowly. Not with joy. Not with rage. Just precision. Her mist pulled blood and flesh from Suziana like wine from a bottle.
The noblewoman gurgled. Her eyes rolled.
Hannya glanced at the struggling devil. The spirals in her eyes deepening. She scoffed. “Don’t whine. You’ll get used to it.”
She continued leisurely.
“I never cared for the taste of inferior mana,” Hannya muttered as she tore another piece free. “All silver. All tradition. All that pride. Yet no meat. no flavor.”
…
…
Showeuff and Dozeuff's eyes regained focus as the mist faded. Their weapons were still raised and their hearts racing. For them, a mere second had passed. Stuck in a timeless world that showed their destination, but none of the progress.
And in the center of the pavilion…
Hannya was sitting over something.
Or someone.
Ragged pieces of Suziana's velvet robes lay around her like peeled petals. Blood soaked into the floor. Flesh torn clean from bone.
Hannya looked up, her mouth red and eyes swirling.
“Did you enjoy your illusions?” she asked sweetly.
Dozeuff fell to his knees.
“She was…she was-”
“Was. That’s correct.”
He stumbled back, gripping his mouth, bile rising as he saw the scene.
Hannya didn’t bother with them.
She tore Suziana’s rib free with a single pull, then cracked it in her jaw.
“You two can go now,” she said, still chewing.
“You served your purpose.”
The two just sat there, trembling. What kind of monster eats another devil?
“You two can go now,” Hannya said again, more gently this time, as if repeating a bedtime reminder. “Your part is now finished here.”
Dozeuff staggered back, scythe half-raised, lips trembling. “You… ate her,” he whispered.
“Piece by piece,” Showeuff added, pale. “Like a beastkin from the old cycles…”
Hannya finally turned to face them. Her lower jaw was smeared crimson, blood glistening like gloss.
She stood.
The motion alone froze them.
She took a slow step forward, bare feet pressing blood into the wooden floor. “This isn’t about Suziana anymore. It’s about what happens to everyone who treats me like prey.”
Behind her, the mist stirred, forming shapes, beautiful, grotesque illusions.
“You were never here to win,” Hannya said, circling them like a wolf. “You were here so the rest of Hellnia would learn: the old ways are ending.”
Dozeuff’s pride cracked first. He dropped to one knee, grinding his teeth. “You’re no princess. You’re a monster.”
Hannya crouched beside him and tilted his chin up with one red-tipped finger. “Yes,” she whispered. “And still, better than any of you.”
“You nobles think we’re all like that little council. That we all kneel to old sigils and Houses. That we exist in neat little roles. Mistresses. Courtesans. Summoned pets.”
She gestured toward Suziana’s remains.
“She begged me with the same mouth she used to curse me. All of you... I wanted to humiliate you. That was the message. Originally, at least.”
The mist drifted outward again.
“But now the message is much more simple.” Hannya smiled.
Dozeuff fell to his knees. “She was the daughter of-”
“Of nobody that matters,” Hannya snapped. Her voice cracked like a whip. “You still think your names shield you here?”
A whisper of silk. Her feet glided across the blood-wet floor.
Baku's voice spoke faintly through the open dome of the pavilion.
"She told me she had plans," he muttered, perched atop a distant rampart as he watched through the mist. "Guess this counts."
Showeuff dropped his sword. “We’ll go. We’ll leave. You have your message. We'll tell the Houses. We’ll-”
Hannya looked at him, halting his words.
“The dream core price goes up. Tenfold. You will beg to be allowed to trade here.”
She turned away.
"Get out while you're still breathing."
The pavilion doors reappeared.
The doubled illusion fading.
Reality settled.
Dozeuff dragged Showeuff away. Neither looked back.
Suziana’s corpse, or what was left, twitched once. Then dissolved into ash and rose into the sky.
The moment they passed the threshold, the pressure vanished.
The two remaining nobles fled into the night, hearts racing, minds shattered.
Far above them, dream beasts swarmed and howled on the mountaintop, still caught in the bait's frenzy, their minds melting in the moonlight. Baku had not even bothered to kill them all; he had simply waited, his manifestation guarding the walls. One by one, they began to spiral down into dormancy, their hunger fading.
Within the pavilion, Hannya sat back down.
She poured herself a new cup of tea.
She sipped.
Smiled.
“Much better,” she murmured. Feeling whole once more.
A bell lay beside her.
Silent now.
Cracked.
“I doubt that was healthy for you.” A voice soon echoed through the room.
Standing at the door, his arms crossed and face a little strange, was Baku.
“Oh? Did you not want any?” she said, rolling her eyes.
*Snort* “I’m a sentientarian.”
*Snort* “You just made that up.”
Hannya exhaled through her nose. As her mind began to settle once more, she flopped backward into a lounging position on the red couch she sat on. “Well,” she said, letting one leg hang lazily over the armrest, “I suppose that makes us officially difficult to ignore.”
“You’ve forced a realignment,” Baku said, his voice neutral. “They’ll scream to the higher council. Probably accuse you of cannibalism.”
“They’re not wrong.” She grinned, then let it fade. “But we needed this. The moment I let them do as they please in my own garden, the whole tower would’ve cracked.”
“You handled it… extravagantly.”
She waved him off. “They would’ve preferred me quiet, apologetic, maybe in a collar. If we’re going to lead, Baku, it can’t be by consensus. It has to be by dominance.”
Baku folded his arms. “And yet you let two go.”
“Of course. Someone needs to drag the news across Hellnia.” She leaned forward. “Imagine the stories they’ll tell. How a girl in a pavilion stripped them of their dignity. How the dream world itself bent to her will. I want that fear. I need it.”
Baku regarded her silently for a few beats. Then spoke. “What’s next?”
Hannya’s gaze turned thoughtful. “We make allies. The Dream Fissure’s getting noisy, and now everyone will start sniffing around. Nobles, cults, maybe even some of the Forsaken Clans.”
She stood and moved to the edge of the balcony, gazing out at the endless mountain range beyond. “We give them a reason to come to us. Power. Opportunity. Sanctuary, if they need it. But not for free. Never for free.”
“Terms?”
“Pledges of loyalty. And recognition of our authority.” She glanced back, eyes gleaming. “If we gather enough weight behind our name, even the High Council won’t be able to touch us. We won’t need to beg. They’ll come kneeling.”
Baku moved beside her. “And if they don’t?”
She smiled faintly. “Then we show them what happened to Suziana.”
For a moment, the two stood together in silence, the wind carrying the faint echoes of distant howls from the fissure mouth.
“Let’s make preparations,” Hannya said. “We’ll send invitations, host a feast.”
“Who’s on the guest list?”
“Everyone who still thinks I’m playing dress-up.”
Three days later, the mountain hummed with the restless murmurs of arriving guests.
Comments
Butch Perterson
😳🏃♂️➡️
Get In The Batvan
Butcher writing a character who commits cannibalism…Hmmmmmmmmmmm
Butch Perterson
lol I wish I could use the color text here! 😭 if I can I haven’t figured it out! But the current meta for her influenced behaviour will be italics for now
Butch Perterson
lol yes, but this simple little method will be a bit more complicated than Hannya thinks but she won’t figure that out that until later
Prent
I wonder at what point Hannya regained control from the Mark of Madness
Cosmoros Subs
So she cqn get wish by eating a devil?
