Chapter 96: Illusions.

Everything happened with such startling speed that, within an hour, the burial was over.

Vincent, Bryce, and Dave sat on chairs a few feet from the gate, watching everyone who passed through it.

Their purpose was simple.

No one who left the compound would retain any memory of the family whose funeral they had attended, nor of the residence or the property itself.

Those who lingered around the compound were compelled to leave by the voices Vincent and Bryce had planted inside their minds, each person eventually making their way through the gate despite whatever reason had kept them there.

Once the last of the visitors had gone, Vincent and Bryce turned their attention to the bodyguards stationed throughout the residence.

One by one, they erased every memory connecting those men to the house, making them forget that they had ever worked there in the first place.

When it was over, only four heartbeats could be heard within the residence.

"There are only four hearts beating around here. I think everyone else is gone." Bryce turned toward Vincent. "Can you tell if there’s someone else?"

"No," Vincent answered. "Just the four."

"Let’s go, then. I feel like I can’t breathe with them still here."

Dave’s face was calm, but the energy surrounding him was saturated with anger.

"I’ll go get the papers. I left them in the car."

He started toward the gate, but Bryce stopped him.

"Let me get them."

One moment, Bryce was standing beside them. The next, he had moved, retrieved the property papers they had prepared for the four people inside to sign, and returned.

He placed the documents in Dave’s hands.

Together, they approached the house.

They had not even reached the entrance when voices carried through the door, the argument inside loud enough for them to hear every word.

"I cannot believe for even a second that the two of you stood there and spoke such nonsense! Now we’re stuck with that grave here! Does this look like a fucking cemetery to you?"

"We already told you, Mom. We don’t know what happened. We came back to our senses once everything was done," one of the twins replied.

"I’m not about to see that thing every day."

Angela’s voice followed, sharp with anger.

"I don’t know what you’re going to do, but it has to be moved from there!"

"Yes, it’s going to have to be removed," Victoria agreed. "And you two are going to find people to remove it tonight and take it to the cemetery where we bought the plot."

Vincent, Dave and Bryce exchanged disbelieving looks.

They could hardly believe that these people were willing to go that far.

Dave pushed the door open without warning. Vincent and Bryce entered alongside him.

The four instantly turned toward the entrance.

The moment they saw Dave, their expressions changed simultaneously, anger sweeping across their faces.

"There goes the creature I can’t stand any longer. You have the audacity to step in here?" Victoria said, resentment thick in her voice. "Do you have a death wish? Do you want to follow your father to the cemetery tonight?"

Jack and Jake laughed at the same time.

"You think getting yourself two useless bodyguards is going to save you this time?" Jack cut in. "I really don’t see any reason to keep him around just to have him suffer. Let’s send him to hell, where his beloved father is already."

Before he could finish, Jake drew the gun from his waist.

He aimed it at Dave and pulled the trigger.

Bryce’s power surged before the shot could be fired. He seized the weapon with his mind, wrenching it from Jake’s hand and drawing it directly into his own.

The four people stared at him in stunned silence.

"What the fuck is that?!" Angela screamed.

"Guards!" Victoria shouted, but no guard came.

Vincent removed his glasses.

Whatever patience he had possessed for the four people standing before them was rapidly evaporating, and it showed plainly in his expression.

"Vincent?!" Jake called, disbelief overtaking his voice as fear followed close behind.

"Didn’t I make myself clear yesterday?" Vincent asked.

His voice carried a dangerous edge that made the atmosphere around them seem to turn cold despite having nothing to do with the weather.

"You... you did. We didn’t ambush you again, nor were we planning to. I..." Jake stammered as he backed away.

"If I made myself clear, and you’re fully aware of what I told you not to do again, then why did you just try to shoot him?" Vincent asked. "The warning was not simply about ambushes. I told you not to touch him. Wasn’t that what I said?"

"It... it is..."

Jake barely finished speaking before his hand rose to his own face.

He slapped himself.

The blow landed hard against his cheek.

"What kind of madness is this? Are these demonic powers or what?" Victoria muttered, staring at her son in horror.

The gun had been torn from his hand and transported into someone else’s grasp without being thrown or physically handed over, and now Jake was striking himself as though an unseen force controlled every movement.

Before she could recover from what she had witnessed, her own hand rose.

She slapped herself.

Angela followed.

Then Jack.

The sound of repeated blows filled the room as all four struggled against something they could neither see nor resist.

Each strike landed squarely against their cheeks again and again until their faces turned red.

Vincent turned toward Dave.

"Is there something you need to do it say?"

Dave did not answer immediately, and when he finally spoke, his voice remained calm and rough as he removed his glasses, exposing eyes still swollen.

"I don’t know... I’ve imagined this moment so vividly. I’ve imagined punching all their teeth out, crippling them, I don’t know... A lot of terrible things have crossed my mind.

But now that I’m actually here, though, I don’t even feel like wasting my energy on them. Just... make them sign this, unwillingly but still doing it anyway."

He paused, his attention shifting to the papers in his hands.

"Then, if it’s possible, create illusions in their minds that will drive them away, sending them fleeing from creatures that don’t exist until they’re so far away that I’ll never have to see them again."

Vincent turned to Bryce. "Can you do that?"

"Do what?!" Angela yelled.

She stumbled backward as though she intended to run, but Bryce fixed his eyes on her before she could get any farther.

Her legs gave way beneath her, sending her to the floor, only for her body to drag itself forward against her will. A moment later, she forced herself upright, completely under Bryce’s control.

"Mom..." she cried, turning toward Victoria, who was shaking silently.

Her gaze shifted to Dave.

"Brother..."

Dave turned away without saying anything.

"Dave, you don’t have to take things this far. Let’s get our family back together. Your father was the one who instilled hatred between us, and he’s gone now. I’ve always seen you as my child. I..." Victoria said urgently, but before she could finish, Dave turned toward Bryce, cutting across her words.

"Bryce, can you do that?"

"Yeah," Bryce answered.

He stepped toward them with a pen and the papers while Vincent moved to his side, positioning himself as though he would be there immediately if anything happened.

Bryce handed each of them a set of papers.

"Read, then sign."

Bryce knew that forcing them to read exactly what they were surrendering before making them sign it would sting harder.

They lowered their gazes despite themselves and read the documents. When they reached the signatures, their hands began to tremble with resistance, but the motion continued against their will until each of them had signed.

Bryce collected the papers from them as though they were examination scripts being gathered at the end of a test.

He wanted to finish this as quickly as possible so they could disappear from his sight. He was not certain the illusion would truly take root in their minds, but after everything else he had managed to accomplish with the strange powers inside him, he told himself this would have to work too.

"I can transform half human and wolf so that..." Vincent began in a low voice, but Bryce interrupted him.

"Or I could create some other image in their minds with the illusion instead of using our own images."

Vincent nodded.

Bryce closed his eyes for a moment before opening them again and turning toward Dave.

"Anything else you would like to say before we..." His voice faltered intentionally.

"No," Dave answered shortly.

Bryce turned to Vincent and asked him to erase their memories.

The effect took hold almost immediately. The four people looked around in confusion, their expressions empty of any understanding of where they were and what had just happened.

Bryce did not give them even a moment to breathe.

He closed his eyes again and summoned an image of an unimaginable creature, forcing the illusion into their minds. He struggled to establish a connection with all four at once, but when that proved impossible, he changed his approach and worked on them one after another.

He commanded the illusion to chase each of them, driving them to run as far as they could before the illusion would finally leave them alone.

He saw no reason to make the illusion follow them forever. As long as they were far enough away, left homeless, and kept from ever remembering this place or Dave, that was enough.

And it worked.

One after another, they fled, running out of the house and disappearing from sight until only the three of them were left in the room. They watched their figures vanish into the distance.

Dave swallowed hard, quickly wiping a tear from the corner of his eye as though he could not allow either of them to see it.

Bryce moved toward him and wrapped his arms around him.

Dave held him tightly in return, as though the sheer force of the embrace could somehow ease the emotions overwhelming him.