Butter causally walked through a quite suburban street. A confident intimidating aura that made even the air fear her.

  

  

  Most people misunderstand Scytherians the first time they see one.

  Worse, they never bother correcting that misunderstanding afterward.

  They think Scytherians are defined by their scythes.

  It's an easy mistake.

  The scythe is visible.

  It's large.

  And more often than not, it's the last thing someone sees before a situation turns very, very bad.

  So people look at a Scytherian and think:

  That is a person with a very serious weapon.

  Butter summoned her echo scythe

  

  

  But the scythe isn't what defines them.

  Several Parasites swarmed Butter.

  

  

  

  

  Butter removed her blazer.

  It's only the most visible expression of a deeper principle.

  A Scytherian is someone who has restructured their entire relationship with the world around a single instinct, the instinct of the predator. Not in the crude sense. Not cruelty. Not hunger.

  Awareness.

  

  

  The parasites lunged, claws first.

  Butter heard every shift in air, every scrape of limb, every twitch before movement.

  She moved with effortless grace, slipping between their attacks as if she had already seen them coming.

  Her sound Abi formed around her echo scythe with a low, humming pulse.

  Then she went to work, carving through them one by one with calm, surgical precision.

  

  

  The Scytherians are perhaps the most misunderstood of the Trinity.

  Outsiders define them by the scythe.

  That is the first mistake.

  The scythe, often called a Hunger Tool, is not merely a weapon. It is a living extension of its wielder. An adaptive organism. A companion that feeds, grows, and evolves in tandem with the Scytherian who carries it.

  Each scythe possesses a unique appetite. Some consume organic matter. Others devour energy, minerals, light, sound, even abstract forces. As the scythe feeds, the Scytherian evolves alongside it, their body and Abi adapting biologically rather than through discipline alone.

  In raw Abi output, Scytherians are the strongest of the three orders.

  Their power often manifests through feline archetypes, lions, tigers, panthers, predatory forms that mirror the instinctual architecture of their nature.

  And that nature is not gentle.

  Scytherians do not trust easily.

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  Especially men.

  SLICE! CUT! SPLIT!

  

  

  Parasite limbs fell one after the other.

  Trust, to them, is not a social courtesy. It is a calculated risk assessment. A negotiation of proximity. They are biologically wired to evaluate threat, dominance, and intent in every interaction. Where others see conversation, a Scytherian sees posture, breath control, micro-tension in muscle.

  This is why their bonds are rare, and why they are so intense.

  A Scytherian does not casually attach.

  When they choose someone, they anchor to them.

  That anchor can feel like possessiveness to outsiders. Territorial. Protective to a fault. Their bond, to weapon, to kin, to lover, can become dangerously consuming if left unchecked. Obsession. Emotional volatility. A refusal to yield.

  It is not cruelty.

  It is instinct.

  An ancient survival code written into their biology, the same code that makes them apex predators on the battlefield and fiercely selective in the heart.

  The parasites moving through Shogun that afternoon were not the same cluster Toshi had cleared earlier.

  

  

  These were new.

  Two them.

  They slipped through the back alleys near the market, overturning vendor carts, sending civilians scrambling, filling the narrow streets with the sour scent of displacement and panic.

  Mora found them first.

  "Finally," she muttered, with the quiet satisfaction of someone who'd been waiting for this all day.

  

  

  She dropped into X Black Tiger before the nearest parasite even finished turning toward her.

  

  

  Mora "In this form I can use my scytherian gold claws capable of slicing through a 10 story building with ease.

  Her golden claws moved in smooth, controlled arcs, the motion of an experienced predator who had done this so many times it no longer required her full attention.

  

  

  Mora "I can still use my grave chains."

  Chains of compressed earth erupted from her free hand, wrapping the nearest parasite's limbs and locking it in place mid-stride.

  The creature thrashed.

  The chains didn't.

  "You're not strong enough to break those," Mora informed it calmly.

  "I don't know how many times I have to say that."

  It tried anyway. More silenced it once and for all.

  Butter watched from the mouth of the alley.

  

  

  She leaned against the wall with her arms loosely crossed, chewing gum at an unhurried pace that suggested she was neither bored nor particularly impressed.

  She watched Mora, but her awareness stretched far beyond the alley. Every vibration, every shifting current of sound within a hundred-mile radius brushed against her senses, feeding into the quiet map she carried in her mind. Nothing moved without her knowing.

  She was the sound scytherian, she could hear the way sound moved through space. The displacement of air. Footfalls. Breathing. Micro-vibrations sliding across brick and pavement. She felt it all the way other people felt temperature or light.

  Butter leaped from roof top to roof top.

  Butter's echo scythe extended with a soft metallic whisper, and she let it do what it was built to do:

  Devour sound.

  The scrape of claws against stone.

  The wet rasp of breathing.

  The low-frequency hum parasites produced when preparing to strike.

  She took it all.

  Sound Pressure built inside her reserves, quiet, invisible, patient. Then she released it through the blade in two clean, compressed bursts.

  No flash.

  No noise.

  Just precision.

  A parasite clung to the wall of a building. It lept in the air and began to glide.

  Butter "That's new."

  She brought her scythe down and released the sound she'd been compressing.

  It surged outward in a focused, invisible blast, ripping through the open air below.

  

  

  The moment it struck the parasite in the street, the pressure tore through it, vibration splitting sinew, cracking armor plates, unraveling its massive body into fragments that scattered across the pavement far beneath her.

  

  

  It detonated outward in a focused surge towards the para creature.

  The instant it touched the parasite, the pressure tore through it, vibration splitting sinew, cracking plates, unraveling it into fragments that scattered across the alley floor.

  Then it was over.

  Butter stood on the building rooftop

  "Mm." Butter blew a small bubble and let it pop.

  LATER

  Butter walked beside Mora, the two holding hands,

  Mora "I can't believe they made their way all the way into Shogun" Mora asked.

  Butter "They're like bedbugs they keep multiplying."

  Mora "Come on let's go home, Toshi's making dinner."

  The district stretched out ahead of them, alive again with ordinary sound.