Chapter 292: The Hunters Become the Hunted

The red wound filled the horizon now.

Not distant. Close. So close Lucifer could feel its pulse matching his own heartbeat. The ground beneath his feet had changed again—no longer sand or stone, but something organic. Veins ran through it. Dark fluid pumped beneath the surface.

They were walking on the Collector’s skin.

Damaris noticed too. His wings tightened against his back.

"We’re close."

Lucifer’s shadows stirred.

"I know."

The attack came without warning.

One moment, the horizon was empty. The next, shapes tore through the red haze—dozens of them. Twisted. Wrong. Their bodies were patchworks of things Lucifer recognized.

Angel wings, broken and burnt. Adversary limbs, too long, too jointed. Faces that flickered between Adam’s cold smirk and the blank hunger of Hollows.

The Collector’s minions.

Not original. Not creative.

Just echoes. Stolen pieces stitched together.

Lucifer moved before the first one landed.

His shadows exploded outward—not wild, but surgical. Each tendril found a target. Each strike severed a limb, crushed a skull, tore through patchwork flesh.

The minions kept coming.

Damaris raised his hands. Golden light bled from his palms—older than Adam’s, warmer. It didn’t burn. It unmade.

Where his light touched, the minions froze. Their stolen pieces began to separate—angel wings falling away, adversary limbs crumpling, faces fading like smoke.

"They’re connected," Damaris called out. "The Collector is puppeting them directly."

Lucifer tore through another minion.

"Can you cut the strings?"

Damaris’s eyes blazed.

"I can try."

He dropped to one knee and pressed his palms to the organic ground. Golden light poured into the veins beneath them, spreading like wildfire. The minions convulsed. Some collapsed. Others turned on each other, their connections severed, their stolen consciousnesses fragmenting.

Lucifer grabbed one.

It was smaller than the others—a patchwork of a child’s body and an angel’s halo, flickering between forms. Its eyes were empty, but its mouth moved.

"Kill me," it whispered.

Lucifer tightened his grip.

"Where is the Collector’s core?"

The minion’s mouth stretched into a smile that didn’t reach its eyes.

"Inside. Deep inside. Where the stolen souls scream."

Damaris stood, his light fading.

"The core. That’s his weakness. If we shatter it, the Collector dies."

The minion laughed—a wet, broken sound.

"You can’t reach it. The Collector protects it with everything he’s taken." Its empty eyes flickered. "But if someone could get inside..."

Lucifer’s jaw tightened.

"Inside the core."

The minion nodded.

"Become part of the collection. Then break it from within."

Damaris stepped forward.

"No."

Lucifer looked at him.

"It’s the only way."

"There’s always another way."

Lucifer shook his head.

"We’ve been walking for days. Through wraiths, through the Library, through the Coast. We’re here. Francisca is here." His voice dropped. "I’m not stopping now."

Damaris grabbed his shoulder.

"Then we go together."

Lucifer stared at him.

"You’re not fully healed. Your body—"

"Can handle it." Damaris’s golden eyes held his son’s gaze. "I didn’t come this far to watch you sacrifice yourself alone."

The minion laughed again.

"How touching."

Lucifer crushed its skull.

The body dissolved into memory stones.

Damaris looked at the red wound—now a massive structure in the distance. A fortress made of bone and crystal and frozen screams.

"The core will be at the center."

Lucifer nodded.

"Then let’s stop wasting time."

They walked.

The ground pulsed beneath them. The red light grew brighter. Hotter.

---

The fortress had no door.

Just a wall of compressed souls—faces pressed together, mouths open in silent screams. Lucifer placed his hand against it.

The faces turned toward him.

Hundreds of eyes. Hundreds of mouths.

"He comes," they whispered. "The Progenitor. The Hybrid. The one who hunts."

Lucifer didn’t flinch.

"Let me in."

The faces laughed.

"The Collector is waiting."

The wall split open.

Not a door—a wound. Organic. Bleeding light.

Lucifer stepped through.

Damaris followed.

---

Inside, the air was thick with stolen memories.

Fragments of lives floated past—a child’s first steps, a soldier’s last breath, a lover’s whispered confession. The Collector didn’t just take souls. It took everything that made them who they were.

Lucifer pushed through.

The memories clung to him, whispering.

You failed her.

She died because of you.

You’re too late.

He ignored them.

Damaris wasn’t as lucky.

He stopped in the middle of the corridor, his golden eyes glazing over. A memory had caught him—a woman’s face. Dark hair. Familiar eyes.

Lilith.

"Damaris."

No response.

Lucifer grabbed his father’s arm and shook him.

"Damaris!"

The old vampire blinked.

"I saw—"

"I know what you saw. It’s not real." Lucifer pulled him forward. "Stay with me."

Damaris’s jaw tightened.

"Right."

They walked deeper.

The walls around them changed—from compressed souls to crystallized screams. The memories grew sharper. More painful.

And then they saw it.

The core.

A massive sphere of stolen souls, floating in the center of a cavern. Thousands of lights—each one a person the Collector had taken. Some flickered weakly. Others blazed with stolen life.

And at the very center—

A light that burned brighter than the rest.

Francisca.

Lucifer’s breath caught.

"There."

Damaris saw it too.

"She’s alive."

"Not alive." Lucifer’s voice was raw. "Preserved."

The core pulsed.

A voice echoed through the cavern—deep, ancient, hungry.

"Visitors."

The Collector.

Not a shape. Not yet. Just presence.

"You’ve come far."

Lucifer stepped forward.

"I’ve come for the fox."

The Collector laughed.

"Everyone comes for something. No one leaves with anything."

The core pulsed again.

The stolen souls screamed.

Lucifer looked at Damaris.

"The core. We have to shatter it."

Damaris nodded.

"From inside."

Lucifer turned back to the floating sphere.

"Then let’s go."

He stepped forward.

His shadows reached out, touching the core’s surface. The souls inside reacted—some pulling away, others reaching toward him.

Damaris placed his hand on Lucifer’s shoulder.

"Together."

Lucifer nodded.

Father and son stepped into the light.

A/N

Thanks for reading this far, it has been a glorious ride, I love all your supports and contributions, and I will continue to do my best to keep you all entertained despite my tight and busy schedules.

And one day I hope this novel would be the talk of the ages.