February, 1888. An open-air, rotting prison in the forgotten backwoods of Sortelha, Portugal. The most brutal cynomancy recorded by the industry just concluded accidentally. Five days of wanton murder, hate, vermin, and rain. All Dogs went rabid, only five survived. The cynomancy may be over, but the grief isn’t. Ables, Dog of the Frontier, struggles to cope with the consequential memory loss, anxiety, and hallucinations, as well as the harrowing obligation to coexist with Goethals; the man-jackal that tried to humiliate, mutilate, and murder him. While he climbs up the rank in the industry, carrying the burdening prestige of being a surviving Dog from the nightmarish cynomancy, he becomes acutely aware that his most despised rival is buckling under the same mental strain. Deciding to leverage the younger man’s weakened bodily and cerebral fortitude, Ables takes his revenge against Goethals through years of subtle psychological, emotional, and physical torture while also securing his own dignified Godhood among the industry. Easy enough for one like him, but his goals and ethos grow murky as his righteous revenge bleeds into perverse fixation.

Similar Works and Inspirations: Fatal Attraction, The Picture of Dorian Gray, The Treatment (De behandeling)