William exited the cabin with the massive sword wrapped in its cloth again tied to his back as well as a couple of vials of Valerie's blood as she told him to take it whenever he felt overly tired or like he was going to collapse. She was pretty upset about the revelation about Sam's father. Still, she agreed to allow William to handle it first as a show of good faith to him. While the crest would prevent him from ever directly hurting her, it was in her best interest to maintain an amicable relationship with him.

This is turning out to be quite the day. Too bad this thing can't be left at the cabin; it's going to be hard to hide It in the orphanage or on my person.

Valerie was true to her word, and William had tried to test it. Whenever he got a certain distance away from the sword, it would begin to drag itself with its tendrils until it could latch back on to him. He could place it down somewhere, but only if he maintained the correct distance to it.

"You're kind of a pain, you know, I can look past the whole draining my life away thing if Valerie can help me, but you're also ridiculously heavy!" He patted the sword on his back, expecting an answer in his mind as before but only got silence. "Whatever." William mumbled. He continued to make his way through the forest in the dark until he reached the east gate.

"There are eight people on the other side of this gate with animosity directed towards you." The voice had spoken in his head again.

"Oh, so now you want to talk? Wait, eight people? That's quite an amount to all be mad at me? David's group only had four others besides him." William scratched his chin as he thought it over. "Maybe we can talk this out." He said.

"I doubt it. Drink one of Miss Valerie's blood vials before you enter, just in case. If you do that, you should be able to wield me for a couple of minutes." The blade replied.

"Fine, fine, I'll drink one. I'm not using you to kill anyone, though! There most likely just dumb kids hoping to get even over the beating I gave them last time." William said sternly. The blade did not reply back this time.

William opened the gate, and sure enough, there was David's gang plus three others he recognized as Raymond's older brothers.

Raymond must have told them about what happened, and now they want revenge too. Great.

The three other brothers were bigger and larger than Raymond; all of the brothers had been given the woodcutting vocation as their father before them. Shawn was the oldest at 23, followed by Gabe at 20, Nicholas at 19, and then Raymond at 18. Their sizes seemed to correlate with how old they were, with Shawn being one of the biggest men William had ever seen.

"You kept us waiting, William!" David shouted. The boys around him had brought various weaponry with them this time too. The woodcutters had brought their axes, and some of the other boys held wooden clubs. David himself had brought a butcher's cleaver instead of the small dagger as last time. David was wearing a bandage over his forehead to hide the mark William had carved into it.

"How's the head, David? Already looking to get some more letters added to it?" William replied coldly.

"Shut up, you imbecile! Things are going to go much differently this time. Especially if you don't want anything to happen to Sammy over here. Though I'm afraid, we already had to get pretty rough with him as he wouldn't tell us when you were going to be back!" David laugh.

"What have you done with Sam" William shouted as he could feel his anger starting to boil over. Divinity Eater's black tendrils had begun rustling around underneath its wrap, moving around his back.

I need to stay calm; otherwise, this sword is going to kill everyone here.

"Bring him over here, boys!" David snapped his fingers as Cameron and Jake walked into the alley and came out dragging Sam, who was unconscious. His shirt had been ripped off and his pale body shown in the moonlight, highlighting the bruises and cuts that had been spread throughout his body. His braid had also been undone, letting his hair fall freely behind him. The only part of his body that wasn't hurt was his face, while some cuts on his legs still had blood coming from them.

"You're not going to get away with this. The Omnituen guardsman will be here any minute for their nightly rounds!" William shouted. The tendrils had begun to creep from outside the cloth and onto his body slowly.

"Oh, I don't think so. Daddy is in charge of the guard, and after I showed him what you had done to my face and told him about my plan, he assured me that none of the guardsmen will be patrolling this way tonight" David wore a wicked smile.

The sword was rattling on his back now, feeding off William's rising anger. Some of the closer boys had noticed the wrapped object shaking on him and kept their eyes on it out of caution.

William took a deep breath. "I'm going to ask you to leave Sam out of this. He isn't the one who hurt you guys, so let him go, and I'll take whatever beating you want to dish out on me. Just let Sam go, please." He spoke as calmly as he could.

"Oh, I don't think it will be that easy, Willy. If you really mean what you are saying, I want to get on your knees and grovel for it!" David spoke with venom in his words.

This is for Sam; if I don't do it, then they'll keep hurting him. I need to cast my pride aside for now.

William complied and got onto his knees and bowed his head out of submission. The woodcutting brothers proceeded to walk over at David's signal and beat William with their axes' handle end. William started coughing out blood as pain filled his body. Still sore from his battle against the monster. They continued to beat on him.

All I can do is endure this and hope they don't do any serious damage to me. If I try to fight them, Divinity Eater will take it as the okay to kill them.

They continued to take turns wailing on William. After the brothers had finished, Joshua, Cameron, and Jake had begun beating him with wooden clubs. The entire time William maintained his position of submission, enduring all the pain. Every time he felt like he would lose consciousness, a new surge of strength would flow into him.

"That's enough. Make sure he's still conscious of this!" David shouted. They all walked away except Shawn who stayed and pulled up on William's hair to force his head to look at David. William could already feel his wounds start to heal themselves throughout his body.

"I thought real hard about how I should punish you for what you did to my beautiful face! I considered taking one of your hands, but that would cause people to ask too many questions. I could keep having you beaten repeatedly, but your tough, and you would heal eventually. I needed to come up with something with permanence." David spoke coldly as he walked over to Sam.

"Thankfully, your dear friend Sam here was the perfect opportunity for something like that! Everyone knows about Sam's hobby of wearing female clothing even though the Head Father Cragore tries to keep it silent throughout the village. I thought if he wants to be a girl so badly, we'll treat him like one. What would be better than you being forced helplessly to watch as we take turns defiling him? As much as it disgusts me to touch this filth, the scar it would leave on both of you would be more than worth the price" David was laughing as he moved over to Sam's body on the ground and had stroked his face. The other boys were all grinning evilly as they turn their eyes to watch David.

William's mind was racing as he couldn't believe what they were capable of doing. The beatings and harassment he had underestimated to just be teenage antics. This was crossing a line that would leave scars that couldn't be repaired easily.

What do I do? I can't let them hurt. Sam. But I'm afraid of what will happen if I fight back.

"Leave it to me if you don't want to stain your hands with their blood." Divinity Eater spoke to him.

William's screamed in pain as he felt the same searing pain as when he had first picked up Divinity Eater flow throughout his body again. This had brought the boys' attention back to him. David had stopped removing Sam's remaining clothing as he looked over to see Shawn, who had backed away as William writhed in pain. A black fog had started emitting from his body as it began to cover the area, trapping the boys and William inside.

Please don't.

"You lack the resolve to do what is necessary to protect the other human you treasure," Divinity Eater replied to him. "You'll thank me eventually."

I don't want to be a murderer.

Divinity Eater's amber eye opened.