Trash to trillions

DEADLY TRANSFORMATION

Caelum staggered back in horror, and the environment seemed to spin before him. The thugs immediately rushed to attack him, taking advantage of his brief moment of disorientation.

The snap of the log against Caelum's back was enough to wake him up. He growled like a wounded lion and turned to the culprit, smashing a huge fist against his eye. He grabbed the log from the groaning thug and used it to scatter his head, shouting profanities.

The other thugs were startled. The Caelum they knew was a weakling, a pushover. Where did he get all that strength from?

Truly, Caelum wasn't the confrontational type. He leaned more towards mental strength than physical fights, making him somewhat weak compared to men his age. But even a dog would bite when forced to a corner. And they just touched his bottom line, giving rise to anger which fuelled his body like a mad terrier.

“Let's go together!” One of the thugs shouted, rushing towards Caelum.

Caelum snickered and wiped the blood off his lips. He looked at the approaching men with eyes filled with hatred and anger, slowly raising the blood stained stick.

“Sure, come together, you bastard sons of bitches. It will save me the stress of going for you all individually.”

The thugs gave a loud cry and launched themselves at him. Multiple attacks landed on him simultaneously, while he only managed to land a few hits on them. At this rate, he would end up dead without saving his siblings.

Blood from his face dropped on the jade pendant he always wore, and the pendant let out a soft golden glow which covered his body. Instantly, he felt supernatural strength coursing through his body and his eyes changed from their sea green color to a deep russet, frightening the hell out of the one standing before him.

The thug's knees turned to jelly and he collapsed to the ground before Caelum, his eyes wide like one who saw Lucifer in the flesh.

Caelum let out an animalistic growl, like one possessed by strange powers, and grabbed the four men holding him, flinging them away like rag dolls. With a sweep of his legs, he knocked down the remaining six, leaving them twitching unconsciously on the ground.

His russet eyes were terrifying, but he didn't stop to think where his sudden supernatural powers came from. He took a phone from one of the unconscious thugs and unlocked it with the thug's fingerprints.

He looked at Stacy's number written on his palm and dialed the number.

“Is this Stacy Melbourne?”

“This is Miss Melbourne's secretary. She's currently in a meeting.”

“Tell her it's Caelum Wexler, and it's urgent.”

There was a brief pause, and he heard some murmurings in the background, then Stacy’s polite voice.

“Hello, Mr Wexler.”

“You said earlier that I can call you whenever I need help, does your offer still stand?”

“Of course, sir. Always.”

“My siblings have been kidn*pped, and the culprit seems to have already sold them. I need help to find them.”

“What?” The whisper of horror in the background mirrored the tremor going through Wexler's mind.

Stacy was even more shocked. Who the hell had the guts to kidnap Caelum Wexler’s people? They must have desired to die without burial.

“Where are you, sir?”

“Number 24 St. Louis Street, Sang-po dong. The man's name is Howard Mason, I'm on my way to find out who he sold them to.”

“Five minutes, we will be there.”

Caelum cut the call and made his way into the house. More guards tried to stop him, but they all met the same fate as their predecessors, all flung away like rag dolls, with most breaking arms, legs and even their spines the moment they hit the ground.

“Sir, Mr. Mason isn't receiving guests.”

He gave the maid a halting glare which sent shivers of terror down her spine.

“I said step aside!”

The maid scooted away like a frightened rabbit, shivering in terror. His eyes were monstrous, showing a hint of the barely leashed demon beneath.

Caelum met the man enjoying a feast with his wife, looking so happy as if he was having the time of his life.

“Mr Mason, where are my kids?”

The startled man looked at him, then hissed dismissively. “Which i***t let you in?”

At this point, they hadn't gotten a good look at Caelum who looked murderous. His wife chuckled and reached for a chicken drumstick, washing it down with wine, without sparing him who she considered an ant another glance.

“I brought the rent, where are they?” He growled and grabbed the landlord from behind, pulling him out of the sofa.

“Who knows? They're not here.” The fat man drawled lazily.

“You didn't really sell them off, did you?” The light in Caelum’s eyes dimmed, and his grip became shaky.

The landlord freed himself from Caelum's clutches and turned to face him.

“What if I did? What can you do?”

“Excuse me?”

Mr. Mason scoffed. “You're a damn church rat without connections, and you currently have a criminal record. Do you dare to go make a police report? Even if you do, the police are on my payroll, will they offend me for the sake of a nobody like you?”

“What?” Caelum's heart sank. Indeed, in this world, people without money aren't treated like humans. He took a deep shuddering breath and licked his lips, trying to hold back his emotions.

“Fine, I will pay you five times the original rent, tell the person who bought them to return them.”

The landlord chuckled wickedly, his eyes bearing a sardonic glint.

“Stinky boy, so you had the rent but refused to pay? It's already too late though. The business has been sealed, by now, they should be dead, or close to it.”

The words landed like a sledgehammer on Caelum's heart, and he gripped the man's throat filled with folds of fat.

“Dead? Who exactly gave you the permission to sell people? They're not animals! How dare you?”

“Then what are they? Humans?” The man laughed, his shoulders shaking as if he heard the most ridiculous thing.

“Do people that live like that deserve to live at all? They're better off sacrificing for people whose lives matter. I'm doing you a favor here by getting rid of the dead weights pulling you down. Now, get out of my house before I make you regret it.”

Caelum's nose flared and he tightened his grip on the man's neck, his eyes burning with hatred and fury.

“Your life ain't important either, you stupid fatso. If you can't provide my siblings right this instant, I will set off a bloodbath here, and your head will be the first offering I make.”

Fear finally crept into the landlord’s eyes. The Caelum before him didn't look like the timid pushover who collected trash and ran errands for a living. He currently looked like a deranged beast, a monster on the loose.

“You bastard, let go of my husband immediately!” Mrs Mason roared from behind him and smashed a champagne bottle on his head.

But he didn't even flinch. He grabbed her arm without turning around, and flung her at the wall, ignoring her pathetic heart wrenching cries.

“Where are they? Or should I snap off your head?” He slapped the landlord multiple times, but the man refused to speak.

“Jack! Sl…” The rest of the man's desperate shout dissolved into a grunt of pain as Caelum slapped the words back into his throat.

“You might as well save your energy. All your men are either dead or knocked out cold, and you will join them soon if you don't give me a satisfactory answer.”

The man began to shake, finally feeling afraid, truly afraid.

“I sold them to people from JS group. They needed organ donors with O- blood to save their kid, and I figured out I could make some fast cash.”

Caelum chuckled sarcastically, and flung him away, his eyes filled with indescribable pain and sorrow.

“Make some fast cash, with someone else's child, huh? Why didn't you call back your children from the States and use them instead?”

“Don't you dare compare my kids to your lowly family! They're just a waste of space and resources, whose existence can only be for others. I only helped them achieve their purpose in life, so you can finally focus on yourself. This is all people like you can ever amount to, worthless slaves meant to pave the way for others. What's wrong with it? That's how the world works. It's their honor to save people that matter.”

The man's demeaning words that made it obvious he never saw them as anything other than disposable trash—less than fleas—made his heart run cold. And he didn't even seem apologetic about it, like everything he said and did was a matter of course. The rest of his words overlapped in Caelum's mind, a mere noisy echo which didn't register as words and he staggered back, the first drop of tears finally gathered in his eyes.

His chest felt tight, and each attempt to breathe was a struggle. He let out an animalistic roar, his face red with veins visibly popping on his forehead and temples.

At that moment, something seemed to have died in him. There was no more warmth, no more conscience, nor humanity. His eyes had gone cold, and he seemed to transform into a different person entirely.

From the moment Mrs. Marlowe died, his eyes had been dimming bit by bit, but there was still a little bit of sanity in them, that part of him that clinged desperately to humanity.

But at this point, that tiny thread holding him together snapped, and the kind Caelum whom everyone could step on gave way to the eyes of a dead man, a beast out for blood and vengeance.