I stepped toward the door.
It was ancient, yet… unaged. Smooth black stone intertwined with silver veins, glowing faintly with a dull violet hue. Runes danced across its surface like veins pulsing beneath skin. The air grew colder as I reached it, but there was a strange warmth in my chest, like a heartbeat pressing against my ribs. As if something on the other side was calling to me.
I placed my hand on the center of the door.
It responded—not with resistance, but with silence. A moment of stillness, and then…
> CREEEEEAAAAK—
The door slowly opened.
Immediately, purple mist poured out like living smoke. It hissed as it touched the floor, creeping outward like fingers stretching for light after centuries of darkness. It coiled around my legs, heavy and cold. With cautious steps, I moved inside, crossing the threshold into a chamber outside the rules of time.
And there, at the center of it all… I saw her.
A girl—no more than ten, suspended above a crumbling altar, bound by six glowing chains etched in ancient runes. The magic that sealed her was not human, not elven, not demon. It was older than any bloodline I'd ever studied. Her small body hovered above the cracked stone, as if caught between falling and floating. Her arms drooped forward, her legs limp.
Her hair was long and pitch black, but the ends shimmered a deep green, glowing softly in the dim light. Her bangs hung across her face—but one eye peeked through.
> A single, glowing green eye—
With a beast-like slit pupil, glaring directly at me.
I stopped in my tracks.
Her gaze was not weak. Not scared. It was the look of someone who had waited.
Not for freedom.
Not for salvation.
> For someone to judge.
Someone to weigh her fate.
And I was the fool who stepped into her prison.
"…Who are you?" I asked, my voice low, uncertain.
No reply. Not right away.
I took another step forward.
And she moved.
Not violently. Not aggressively.
She slowly, gently, lowered her feet to the ground—the chains allowing only enough slack for her toes to touch the cracked stone. Her head tilted. She opened her other eye, but it was veiled by a strange green glow—covered not by hair, but by a magic seal directly over her iris.
Then, wordlessly, she began to circle me.
Like a predator. Like a child trying to understand a new toy. She said nothing—yet her eye never blinked.
She studied my face, my posture, my burned cloak, my gauntlets stained with golem ash. Her small feet barely made a sound, but the chains above rattled slightly with each movement. I didn't move. I let her observe. I… let her exist.
> Something about her presence—
It made me feel like I was the one being judged.
As she passed behind me, I turned slightly, trying not to break the silence.
A sudden pulse of emotion hit me—guilt.
For what? I didn't know. Perhaps because I didn't know who she was, yet here she stood, bound like a creature, like a monster hidden from the world. I turned my eyes upward to the ceiling, where the last of the purple mist swirled like storm clouds. The altar was cracked. There were sigils on the floor I didn't understand. I reached for the divine mark on my chest.
> "Goddess," I whispered in thought, "who is this girl?"
No answer.
Not even static in my mind.
That alone unsettled me.
> She always answered before. Even with riddles.
This time… she was silent.
The girl finally stopped. She stood only a few steps away from me now.
Then she spoke, her voice childlike… but not childish.
> "Why do you have her scent?"
"You burn like her…"
"…but your eyes look sad."
I stared at her, confused.
"Her?" I asked. "Who are you talking about?"
She smiled faintly, and it didn't reach her eye.
> "The one who chained me. The one who said my soul was too dangerous to bloom."
I looked around at the runes, the chains, the altar.
"…The goddess?" I said slowly.
She didn't answer. Instead, she turned toward the edge of the chamber, where old carvings lined the wall—depictions of a sealed beast, a war between winged beings, and a young girl whose hair turned green in flames.
> A forgotten prophecy.
> Or a mistake erased from history.
I stepped closer to her again. This time, she didn't circle me. She just watched. Waiting.
"Why are you here?" I asked. "Why sealed like this? What did you do?"
Her voice was a whisper now, like wind trapped in a bottle.
> "I… was born wrong."
> "I cried lightning."
"I laughed fire."
"I dreamed of the end of things."
> "And when they couldn't kill me…"
"…they buried me instead."
My heart sank.
A girl who did not ask for power. A child punished not for crime—but for existence.
Still, I didn't let emotion cloud my thoughts. I raised my hand slowly, flame circling my palm.
"If I break those chains," I said, "what happens next?"
She smiled then.
But that smile carried no joy—only something hollow. Something ancient.
> "Maybe I burn the sky."
"Maybe I just want a name again."
"Maybe I just want to walk with the wind one more time."
The seal on her second eye glowed, reacting to my presence.
The altar rumbled.
And deep in the stone, a voice—distant and faint—whispered:
> "Choose carefully, Flame-Bearer."
"For not all cages hold monsters. Some… hold memories best forgotten."
I stood frozen—between mercy and madness.
Between hope and ruin.
So this was the girl.
Not just some hidden character locked behind layers of puzzles in the game. Not an optional encounter. Not a "secret ending." She wasn't useless. She wasn't meaningless.
She was too late.
I knelt beside her limp form, still warm in the soft glow of the fading magic seals. Her body trembled, bones far too thin, skin pale like ash, but her pulse—faint—still beat with life.
Carefully, I reached under her small frame and lifted her into my arms. She barely weighed anything. A child, no older than ten, but something about her presence… felt ancient.
Her long hair, tangled and soaked in dried miasma, brushed against my chest. Her fingers suddenly clutched tightly around my neck as I stood up. I flinched in surprise—but there was no malice. Only desperation.
I kept walking, cradling her like something fragile. "Why are you here?" I asked softly, careful not to spook her. "How did it end up like this?"
Her voice came out slowly. Dry. Hollow. Like it hadn't been used in a hundred years.
"I… I was born here."
A pause.
"Mama and Papa loved me. They fed me every day. Held me when I cried. I remember their warmth. But… it wasn't enough."
I frowned. "What do you mean?"
She hesitated. Then her voice cracked.
"I was always… hungry. Not like other kids. No matter what I ate, it was never enough. It felt like something inside me was… hollow. Always gnawing."
Her grip tightened, and I could feel her starting to tremble in my arms.
"One day… I couldn't take it anymore. I was so hungry. I felt the world itself bleeding into me. I didn't even try to stop it—I just absorbed everything. The magic around me. The miasma in the land. I felt full… finally full. But…"
She stopped. Her breathing hitched.
"The village saw. They said I was cursed. A monster. A sin. They didn't punish me—they threw Mama and Papa into the Dark Abyss. They let monsters devour them. Right in front of me."
I stood there silently, the weight of her memory heavier than her body.
"I lost control. I don't remember what happened. Just screams. Fire. Blood. And then… darkness."
My heartbeat echoed in my ears. This wasn't in the game. None of this was.
"I don't know how long I was like that… But one day… Mama found me. She… she was barely alive. Her body broken. But she still smiled at me. She said she still loved me, even like this. And then…"
The tears fell freely now, soaking into my clothes.
"She carried me into this cave. Used her last strength to seal me here. She said… she was sorry. That she couldn't stay with me until the end. That one day… someone would come. Someone who wouldn't be afraid."
Her voice cracked again. "…That someone would hold me."
I didn't realize it, but my hands were shaking. I looked down at her again—this cursed girl buried by time and myth.
Her eyes slowly opened, glowing faintly like dying embers. There was no hatred. No desire to kill. Just emptiness.
And in that moment… everything clicked.
The goddess's story—the first civilization that vanished. The "calamity born of hunger." The ancient being that absorbed the magic of the world and brought it to ruin. A mistake so powerful the gods themselves rewrote the cycle of fate and created the Hero System to contain her existence.
It wasn't just a myth.
It wasn't a warning.
It was her.
This girl—the one in my arms—she was the one who devoured the world.
My eyes widened. My chest tightened.
But I didn't say it aloud. Not to her. Not now.
I held the truth back. I clenched my teeth and looked up toward the crack of moonlight peeking through the cave.
"…I'll ask the goddess about this later," I whispered under my breath.
For now…
I held her a little tighter.
Because no matter what she once was…
Right now, she was just a starving girl who had been left behind.
And I would not abandon her.
Not like the others did.
Chapter 25 end.