The world vanished.
For Kafka, sinking into his own shadow was like stepping into a cold bath. Sound, light, and sensation were all instantly submerged. He found himself in a place he instinctively knew was the "Threshold"—a thin, membrane-like space between the physical world and the true Domain of Shadows. It was a monochrome echo of reality, a silent, grey city made of shifting mist and insubstantial forms. He could see the "real" world as a vibrant, colorful, but muted film playing out just beyond a thin veil of water. He could see Hoshina and Kikoru, bright and real, but untouchable.
He was a ghost.
And he was not alone in this grey space.
He saw it now. The "phasing" Kaiju. It was a creature not of flesh, but of raw, unstable energy, its form a constant, flickering distortion. It looked like a serpent made of television static and broken light, weaving its way through the ethereal grey forms of the playground's swing sets. Its phasing wasn't a skill; it was its natural state of being. It existed partially in both dimensions at once, which was why it was so difficult to pin down.
It sensed him the moment he entered its realm. The serpent of static hissed, a sound that was not a sound but a wave of pure, psychic disturbance, and turned its featureless head towards him.
A contest of ghosts in an unreal city.
[A dimensional aberration,] the Monarch's voice, a cold and distant guide, noted in his mind. [A creature not native to this world or the Architect's. A byproduct of a dimensional tear. Primitive, but its nature makes it impervious to physical assault. You, however, are no longer purely physical.]
The serpent charged, its body passing harmlessly through a grey, spectral park bench. It was a blur of distorted energy.
Kafka stood his ground. He didn't summon the full power of Kaiju No. 8. It was useless here. That was a weapon for a physical war. This was a battle of concepts.
Instead, he did as he'd been trained to in the most esoteric of the Monarch's lessons. He drew on the intelligent, sentient shadow-essence of Blackwing. He wasn't forming armor or a blade. He was shaping his own ghostly presence.
The static serpent opened a maw of screeching digital noise and lunged, trying to devour his spiritual form.
At the last second, Kafka's shadow-form destabilized, becoming a swarm of black, fluttering bats made of pure darkness that scattered, letting the serpent pass through the empty space.
He reformed behind it, a silent, black figure in the grey mists.
This was a new kind of combat. Not about strength, but about will. About who had greater mastery over their own unnatural form.
From the outside world, Hoshina and Kikoru saw nothing. The playground was quiet and empty.
"What is he doing?" Kikoru whispered, her nerves on a razor's edge. "I can't feel anything. I can't see anything. Is he winning?"
"Patience," Hoshina replied, his eyes scanning every shadow, every flicker of light. "The prey and the predator are in a different jungle now. We're just the tourists, waiting to see who walks out alive."
Back in the Threshold, Kafka was learning. The serpent was fast, its attacks disorienting, but it was a creature of pure instinct. It was predictable. Kafka, on the other hand, was now a being of disciplined, trained intelligence.
The serpent shot a beam of distorting energy at him. He didn't try to block it. He simply let a hole form in his own ethereal body, allowing the beam to pass through harmlessly before sealing himself back up.
[Do not simply defend,] Jin-Woo's voice commanded, a coach growing impatient. [Your shadow is not merely a shield. It is a fang. Strike back.]
Kafka reached out. Not with a hand, but with a thought. The grey, misty ground of the Threshold beneath the serpent rippled. It was his shadow that formed the floor of this unreal space now. He controlled this piece of the battlefield.
Thick, black, ethereal chains erupted from the ground, wrapping around the static-serpent's body. The creature shrieked in psychic agony, struggling, its energy form flickering wildly as the chains of pure shadow began to sap its own energy, grounding it. It was like trying to put chains on a lightning bolt, but the Monarch's magic was absolute.
"I can see it!" Kikoru suddenly yelled. In the real world, as Kafka's power exerted its influence, a faint, shimmering distortion, the vague shape of a thrashing serpent, was becoming visible in the air above the playground.
"It's being pulled into our dimension!" Hoshina realized. "He's forcing it to become real!"
Back in the Grey, Kafka walked calmly towards the now-fettered and weakening creature. It was a dimensional parasite, a being that thrived on being untouchable. Now it was bound, held fast by a power far older and more profound than its own.
He placed a hand, made of solid, cold shadow, on its flickering head.
He didn't need to punch it. He didn't need to cut it. He just… squeezed.
He wasn't crushing flesh. He was crushing its very concept. He forced its unstable dimensional energy to collapse in on itself.
In the real world, the shimmering distortion flickered violently one last time, let out a sound like a thousand dying modems, and then vanished with a faint pop. The battle was over.
Kafka felt a wave of dizziness as the adrenaline left him. Holding his form in the Threshold and manifesting the shadow chains had been a massive drain on his mental energy.
He pulled himself out of the shadow, his form rematerializing in the center of the playground, stumbling for a moment before catching his balance. The world of color and sound rushed back in, almost overwhelming him.
He was breathing heavily, his entire body feeling cold and numb, a side effect of existing outside of reality.
Hoshina and Kikoru rushed to his side.
"Hibino! Are you alright? What happened?" Hoshina asked, his hand on Kafka's shoulder to steady him.
"It's gone," Kafka panted, looking around. "I… I destroyed it."
Kikoru stared at him, her eyes wide with a new kind of awe that had nothing to do with Kaiju-like strength. "You fought a ghost," she whispered. "And you won."
Kafka just nodded, too tired to speak.
In the back of his mind, a final, cold pronouncement from his master echoed, the only praise he would ever receive.
[The aberration has been purged. An acceptable outcome. Your utility continues to increase.]
He had won. He had saved the day. He had done it without losing control, without causing a single bit of collateral damage. He had acted as a perfect, silent, spectral blade for the Defense Force.
But as he looked at the relieved faces of his comrades, a cold reality settled in his heart. The things he could now do—step between worlds, fight concepts, command shadows—were abilities that no human, no Kaiju, not even a Numbers Weapon could possess.
He was becoming more efficient. More powerful. More… useful.
And with every victory like this, with every step he took into the realm of the Monarch, he was leaving the world of Kafka Hibino further and further behind. He wasn't just a man who could turn into a monster anymore. He was slowly, terrifyingly, becoming a different kind of monster altogether.