There was a ray of light at first, but it was more of just a blurry smudge of brightness in his eyes. But it gradually grew. He blinked repeatedly, until he got the sense of his own surroundings. Until he got the sense of his own state. He was looking up at the trees above. They covered him from the perfectly-risen sun and its light, but a few beams of the full morning had still managed to get through. Tickles of heat played around his skin like yellow insects, but overall, it was a perfect shade of phosphorescent green in the daytime. His head felt hard. He felt like he was lying down in a rough and itchy asphalt road. His body wasn’t in any kind of pain, but it felt like it finally moved for the first time after a hundred thousand years. It was dizzying, and nauseating, just to sit up straight. His eyes took in even more of what was around him. Right in front of him was just enough space for him to see a majestic, solid bluff, that overlooked an illuminated skyline. He felt
Previous Chapter
Related Chapters
God Hounds Chapter 8: The Three
To Alice, everything was all about the cafes in San Pedro. Every street. Every road. Every corner. The seven-year-old city was Laguna’s beating heart for food and coffee. The kids grew up watching coffee shops and restaurants come and go while family businesses and startup companies eat each other and fluctuate against even more. Alice was never a big fan of coffee. But that never really stopped her. Jumping from one café to another remained one of her biggest hobbies, if she wasn't in one of the safehouses brutally interrogating her prisoner. Cafes just felt right, to her. It was essentially the most important human innovation in all of economic history. Maybe it was the people. Or the menu. Or the interiors. But Alice always felt at home, in the best ones. There was a novel sense of privacy that came with coffee shops. Everyone would just mind their own business. Civilized customers knew how to respect the silence. And the café enthusiasts always had thei
God Hounds Chapter 9: The Guide
“The what?” he asked Nanay Wang to repeat herself. He furrowed his brows and glanced at Nanay Wang perplexedly.“The Kadlum.” Nanay said. She walked towards him and looked back as well. “It’s a group, kid.”“What kind of group?” he asked.“The kind of group that’ll give you your memories back,” she sneered. She looked away, slowly being pulled into her thoughts, and nodded confidently. “After that,” she gazed back at him. “You’re one step closer,” she added as she gave off a tiny smile. “You want to know why this is happening and why the world’s doing this to you?” she dared. “You’ll find out in the Kadlum.”“They’re… like you.” he said.“Well…” She shrugged, and chuckled. “You’ll see…” She walked past him and headed towards the doorway. “
God Hounds Chapter 10: The Name
Villa Urrutia was a white, gilded castle of silence and memory. A beacon, fortress mansion promising both solace and invulnerability. A marble tower resting on top of a hill, overlooking the rest of the neighborhood below it. It was a family palace. An old, retreating place for Alice, her brother, and her father. As a child, Alice used to soar across the pristine halls towards the dining room. She had always reminisced about it every time she got there.It was always just Alice and her father when she was just a kid. She never saw her mother. She died giving birth to her. But she had always heard stories about her mother. The trailblazer. A perfect example and a guiding light to the community. The funniest, smartest, queenliest, and kindest, bestest person in all the land, as Alice used to summarize growing up.Following her footsteps. She had always done it. Or at least tried too. But it had always brought her down. The expectations. Expectations, from herself. To her
God Hounds Chapter 11: The God
There was a cave. In Laguna. Where only the gods could dwell. A temple. A house. A solitude. Alice. Only Alice, Miko, and Lyle knew where. It was a long drive. In Alice’s black Mazda. She drove past and across highway to highway. City to city. And village to village. She had eventually reached the isolation. In a forest. A labyrinth only those of the guided knew. Only those of the Kadlum’s batok. She had never imagined herself back into the place again. But it felt like she needed to. To rest. And think. And pray. Kadlum had not shown himself to Alice yet, ever since the dream. She felt like, maybe, maybe he was waiting. And maybe, he was just as afraid as Alice.The gods were powerful and wise. But they weren’t omnipresent.Especially……since there were only just so few of them. Especially since the ones who have been abandoned after the genocide… have barely been surviving.Kadlum. The god of ascendence. T
God Hounds Chapter 12: The Mistake
Aden had come a long way. This was the path, he thought. The road to memory. Somehow, some way, Aden knew how to drive. Abel let him borrow his old pickup truck that could barely even brake. He had remembered, when the white dog gazed at his eyes during the family’s ritual. There was a flash in it. Some kind of map. The next step. That was all he had to go on as he left the family and the yellow house. As he left the forest. He was now in Laguna, as the signs read. And he knew nothing but the map in his head. Just a map. And a vision. A cave. Inside it, a temple. Abel had given him enough food for the travel. And clothes, too. Along with his final promise. “Continue the path,” Abel had said. “You will reach the promise.” Those were the last words. That was the end of Aden’s time in the forest. He had left the sanctuary. And now the path had led him elsewhere. Beyond. Specifically, the Kadlum. His guide was nothing but a dog. Soundless and strict. The white, r
God Hounds Chapter 13: The Witch
“Lyle,” Alice said. “That’s enough.” She strode towards Aden as Lyle and Miko backed away. She gazed down at Aden’s pathetic body and listened to him cry. “Why?” Alice asked. Kadlum had already told her, but she just wanted to ask once again. “Why kill Dante?”It was still a pressing question in her head. And the question was more personal. There was still one. One secret. That they didn’t even know the answer to.Alice’s eyes started to well up and tears began to stream down her cheeks. She sniffed and tried to push it back. But she was already sobbing. The secret. It wasn’t that the Datus were dead. It wasn’t that they were – whoever they were – going for the throne. It was something else and it dug deeply in her heart. She wheezed back any sign of pain. But it was already there. Everyone knew that the Datus were dead. And everyone knew they’d just
God Hounds Chapter 14: The Kadlum
“So,” Alice said. Her arms crossed protectively around her as she stood in the orange-kissed, over-natured room of sad quiet and ill meditation. Everyone looked at her and waited. In the messed-up silence, she was the beacon of either mercy, or death. She was lady justice if lady justice had a gun and pointed wherever she liked. “He’s really lost his frickin’ brain, huh?”“How many times do I have to tell you?” Ramu said. Her voice was like an old, crackling radio sitting dignifiedly inside the room. She was in that phase for old women where everything they said had to be carefully listened to. She grunted. Her sound of peace and thinking was an ugly and unwelcome hum in the otherwise tranquil space. “No twenty-year-old could react to poison like that,” she said. “Unless the guy’s been sleeping all his life.”Thirty minutes ago, Aden ate the fruit everyone thought would kill him. Now
God Hounds Chapter 15: The Work
Three weeks later…The bar had already died out. No one was left. It was 3AM. All the blazes had gone out. And what was left of the beating night heart of the city was just an empty casket of nothing. Except for two guys. “Hey, umm, I’m sorry,” his voice flowed across the faintly-glowing room towards one lonely table. “We’re closing, sir.” His cheap smile was naïve and breakable. A bar with no lessons. An owner without manners. It was the kind of face who wouldn’t listen to his disappointed, betrayed father. He tried to keep things warm but he couldn’t fake it. All he could do was look good and show money.Aden, holding his black suit jacket and a glass of gin, got up from the table. He faked a similar smile, and walked away from him. The sound was playful and lonely, on the gleaming, cold ground. It was a memorable floor, for just a few hours anyway. It was his first time coming in alone, at the open
Latest Chapter
- God Hounds Epilogue
- God Hounds Chapter 68 – Blood
- God Hounds Chapter 67, Part 3 – Throne
- God Hounds Chapter 67, Part 2 – Throne
- God Hounds Chapter 67 – Throne
- God Hounds Chapter 66 - Corruption
- God Hounds Chapter 65 – Goddess
- God Hounds Chapter 64, Part 2 – The Island
- God Hounds Chapter 64, Part 1 – The Island