Damien lay sprawled across the cold stone floor, his body trembling from the exertion of his latest attempt at Mind Castle. His chest heaved as if he had run through a storm, and sweat trickled down his temples, soaking his shirt until it clung uncomfortably to his skin. At last, his strength gave out, and his arms loosened from their clenched grip around his skull. He fell still, his mind and body at their limit.
His eyes slid shut, and for a moment there was only silence. But then—it began again.
A faint hiss. A whisper curling at the edge of his consciousness like smoke seeping through cracks.
Damien's eyes fluttered open—or at least, they felt like they did—and he realized with a bone-deep chill that he was no longer lying in the training room. Instead, he was standing upright, though his legs felt strangely disconnected from him. A dim, red-tinted haze swallowed everything around him, the air thick, suffocating, reeking of iron and rot.
He looked down.
Corpses.
Dozens of them. Hundreds. The ground was buried beneath twisted bodies piled atop one another, their limbs at grotesque angles, flesh torn and charred. Some had gaping wounds where their torsos had been cleaved open, entrails spilling like serpents across the blood-soaked earth. Others were crushed entirely, little more than mangled pulp with fragments of bone jutting out like broken stakes. The smell was so pungent it coated his tongue, making him gag as the metallic tang of blood mixed with the stench of rot until he swore he could taste death itself.
The whispers rose louder, swelling into a chorus of overlapping voices, neither male nor female, some shrill, some guttural, some little more than bestial growls. They clawed at his mind, telling him to give in, to sink into the carnage. But this time, something was different. His thoughts did not scatter into chaos. He knew—he knew—that this was a dream, a nightmare, yet one where he could cling to the thread of his own awareness. He could resist being swept away.
His breath shuddered as he looked around, his legs refusing to obey, rooted in place by horror. In every direction he turned, there were more corpses. Stacks of them, mountains of the dead. Blood flowed between them in rivulets, congealing into a river that wound around his ankles. Severed hands twitched as if still reaching for help. Eyes stared upward, glassy and unblinking, their sockets filled with crawling things that scattered when he noticed them.
The sound came then—a deafening clash, like thunder crashing against steel. Damien turned his head, drawn to it despite the dread rising in his chest.
And then he saw them.
Towering figures, their bodies massive, at least three meters tall. Some were grotesque and beastly, covered in scales or fur with fangs that dripped black ichor. Others were armored soldiers, faceless behind helm and plate, their weapons gleaming with a killing intent so thick it was suffocating. Each one radiated such power that even in a dream, Damien felt his knees weaken. These are monsters beyond Saints, he thought numbly. Beings so far above him that they might as well have been gods.
And yet all of them—all of them—were locked in battle with a single man.
Damien's eyes widened.
That man fought like nothing he had ever seen before. Cloaked in shadows, his form blurred by a darkness that seemed to bend reality itself, he wielded anything he touched as if it were an extension of his will. A sword torn from a corpse's hand, a broken spear, the jagged edge of shattered armor—he even lifted enemies themselves, hurling their bodies with such precision that they became weapons. There was no hesitation, no pause, no wasted movement.
Everything was a weapon. Everything was used to kill.
The man moved like a storm through the crowd, his every strike lethal, his every step calculated. And with each death, Damien's terror dulled, replaced by something else entirely. He was mesmerized.
It was not a battle. It was art.
The way the shadowed man shifted from one opponent to the next, weaving between blows, severing limbs, piercing throats, crushing skulls—it was as though Damien was watching a painter brush his canvas, each stroke perfect, deliberate, inevitable. The battlefield became a masterpiece of death, and Damien could not look away.
He stepped forward hesitantly and found, to his shock, that no one noticed him. He passed through armored legs, brushed against a monster's claw, yet none of them turned their heads. His body was like an illusion here.
That realization freed him.
He moved closer, so close he could see the whites of the eyes of men as they died, so close he could hear the gurgling choke as their throats were cut open. He studied every detail—the trajectory of each cut, the timing of each counter, the subtle shift of weight before a killing blow landed. He crouched beside a fallen soldier as the man's chest was caved in with a strike, watching the light dim in his eyes. He followed the shadowed warrior step for step, absorbing the way he fought, the way he killed.
And for the first time in his life, Damien felt joy.
It was horrifying and intoxicating all at once, a rush that drowned out fear and doubt alike. His heart thundered not from dread but from exhilaration. He felt as though he had finally glimpsed what he had been searching for—power. Not the kind given by bloodlines or bestowed by teachers, but power forged from perfect control, from turning everything, anything, into a tool for survival.
I want it, Damien thought feverishly.
But as his obsession deepened, his eyes sharpened, and he began to notice something strange. It was not that the shadowed man held a cultivation realm vastly higher than his enemies—no, that was not it. He did not tower over them in raw strength or aura. Rather, it was something subtler, more terrifying.
It was control.
Not just mastery over his strength or aura, but mastery over… something deeper. Something Damien couldn't yet name, couldn't even comprehend fully. But it was there, in every motion, every pivot, every death. Control beyond limits.
And then… the battlefield thinned. The piles of corpses grew taller, but the number of enemies dwindled. Until at last, only one remained.
Unlike the others, this final opponent had barely moved during the battle. He stood tall, imposing, his presence radiating an oppressive weight that pressed even Damien's illusory form. When at last he stepped forward, the ground trembled.
The clash between him and the shadowed man was unlike anything Damien had witnessed before. Every blow shook the air, sending shockwaves through the piles of corpses. Their strikes cut deeper, their wounds more grievous. Steel clashed against steel, claws against blades, until the two were drenched in their own blood. They were equals—masters locked in a final, brutal dance.
But in the end, the shadowed man prevailed.
Damien's breath caught as the warrior, now missing one arm and a leg torn nearly to shreds, stood victorious atop a mountain of the slain. His body trembled, his breaths ragged. And then—he turned.
His gaze locked onto Damien.
For the first time, Damien saw his eyes.
They were not human eyes. They were pools of pure blackness, a void that seemed to stretch forever, threatening to pull Damien in, to drown him in eternal nothingness. His body froze. He could not move, could not even breathe. His heart slammed against his ribs, frantic, panicked, as those void-like eyes bore into him.
And then—
The corpses stirred.
Every mangled, broken, twisted body began to rise, their limbs cracking unnaturally, their jaws unhinging wide. One by one, they turned toward Damien. And then they ran.
Thousands of them, charging, screaming, their voices a cacophony of madness. Their eyes glowed red, their mouths dripped gore as they lunged. Damien stumbled back, horrified, only to feel cold, rotting hands seize his arms. Teeth sank into his flesh, jaws tearing into his skin, ripping, biting, dragging him down. Their screams filled his ears until he could hear nothing else.
He screamed.
He screamed until his throat felt like it would tear open—
—and woke with a violent jolt.
Damien opened his eyes, drenched in sweat, his chest heaving. His hands clawed at his own skin as though the corpses still clung to him. His eyes darted wildly, desperate to escape the nightmare that still lingered in his vision.
And then he froze.
A face hovered above his own.
Evraine.
Her pale features were drawn close, her brows knit together, her eyes wide with worry as she reached out a tentative hand towards his face.
"Damien…" she whispered.