The training grounds were silent.
Kelvin Nox moved alone under the pale glow of moonlight. Each step precise. His katana shimmered with a dark, pulsating aura. The air was heavy, and a thin mist curled along the floor like silent watchers.
He turned swiftly, slicing the air. Black seals ignited along his arm.
— "Hidden Shadow: Silent Fall."
The strike hit the earth with a dull crack, sending shadows rippling outward.
Kelvin's breath was steady… until he looked up.
In a cracked mirror leaning near the edge of the hall, his reflection had changed.
It wasn't him.
It was a taller, more monstrous version. Clad in warped armor, with burning red eyes that pierced into him like daggers.
Tyrus.
Kelvin froze. The reflection grinned back.
— "You carry my burden… or are you simply my continuation?"
Whispers crept into his thoughts like smoke:
— "Legacy…"— "Ruin…"— "You hear it, don't you? The call of what you truly are."
Kelvin stumbled back, trembling. The shadows surrounding him pulsed in sync with the voices.
At the top of the stairs, Lorien Valtier stepped into view, bathed in soft, radiant light. His expression was tight with concern.
— "Has this happened before?" Lorien asked, descending.
Kelvin hesitated. Then nodded.
Lorien stood in front of him, hand firm on Kelvin's shoulder.
— "Fighting yourself won't silence the darkness," he said calmly, then summoned a glowing blade of pure light. "Show me what's clawing at you. Let's train."
Their duel was swift. Brutal.
Kelvin moved with refined form, but his strikes were… chaotic. Unstable.
In a flash of motion, Lorien disarmed him, halting a finishing blow at the last second.
Then, looking him dead in the eyes, he muttered:
— "This isn't just shadow magic… it's a corrupted inheritance."
Kelvin's gaze dropped to the floor.
Lorien took a step back, his voice lower now.
— "Do you feel it? Like part of you… doesn't belong to you at all?"
Kelvin slowly lifted his eyes, silent.
— "Your link to Tyrus…" Lorien said gravely, "...may not just be energy. It might be blood. Or something far older."
A chilling thought: what if Tyrus… was his father?
Elsewhere, within the Phoenix Guild base, Diana stood before Inavy, Rose, and Darius.
— "Your first S-Rank mission," she announced. "Destination: the Elkaris Region. Ancient forest, long dead... now corrupted."
Their journey was long. The air grew colder the deeper they went. Trees turned to petrified husks, rivers had dried to cracked veins of stone. A strange purple mist coiled around them.
Then it emerged.
The Voidspawn.
A creature twisted from living shadows and bone. Eyes void of light. Its mere presence drained the earth beneath it.
Diana reacted instantly, raising a water barrier and casting a healing pulse across the group.
— "Spread out!"
Inavy attacked, but the beast absorbed his chaotic energy. Rose bound it with boiling water whips, and Darius altered gravity to slow its movements.
It thrashed, breaking Diana's defense. She barely escaped its claws.
Inavy dropped to one knee. The Chaos inside him surged, responding violently to the corrupted aura. And then… something inside him whispered.
— "Do not destroy. Observe. Its weakness lies in what it pretends to be."
Nion.
Fueled by clarity, Inavy focused his power into a single pinpoint strike—straight into the creature's hidden core.
The monster screamed and collapsed.
But the corruption didn't fade.
It retreated, as if part of something far greater.
Later that night, Kelvin woke up in a cold sweat.
He was dreaming again.
A vast field. Endless darkness. Tyrus stood before him—face unreadable—then extended his hand.
— "Don't fight what's inevitable… We are one."
Kelvin sat up, staring at his trembling hands.
Meanwhile, in the Hall of the Guild of a Thousand Lights, Lorien reviewed the energy data Diana had sent from the battlefield.
A crystal pulsed unnaturally in his palm.
He closed his eyes and whispered to the silence:
— "This isn't a common threat…"— "This is a war against the origin of ruin."
Lorien stared into the pulsing distortion within the crystal, his eyes narrowed.
The energy… it was familiar.
Ancient. Corrupted. The same force that felt when he was young decade ago.
Suddenly, a crack shimmered across the inner wall of the central sanctuary — not physical, but spiritual.
The Primordial Aura... was crying.
And in the silence, a single whisper echoed across the minds of the world's most sensitive heroes:
"The Ruin has awakened."