The silence that followed Dante's collapse was more terrifying than any battle cry. For his team, it was the sound of their world breaking. Their leader, the cold, calculating monster who had orchestrated their victory, was now just a man, bleeding and broken on the forest floor.
Panic was a venom, and it shot through their veins.
But Erica's obsession gave her an unnatural strength. Her scream of Dante's name had been a release of fear; her actions now were a display of pure, undiluted purpose. As the others stood frozen, she took command.
"Move!" she ordered, her voice cutting through their shock. "Do you want to die here? Eric, Jin—drag the bodies away from the camp. All of them. Make a pile, we can't have predators drawn to us. Talia, get in that tree," she pointed to a massive oak. "You are our eyes. Masha, help Rina. Now!"
The authority in her voice was absolute, and the team, desperate for direction, clung to it. Eric and Jin began the gruesome task of clearing the battlefield. When they reached Neil and Juno, they paused. The anger had faded, leaving only a hollow, aching grief. They carried their fallen friends with a gentleness that defied the brutality of their surroundings, laying them to rest separately.
High above, Talia became a silent shadow in the branches, her Kinetic Eye scanning the oppressive darkness.
At the center of it all, Dante lay oblivious, lost in a storm of his own making.
"It's not working," Rina said, her voice tight with frustration. She pulled her glowing hands away from his chest. "His own mana is fighting me! It's chaotic, violent—like it's trying to protect him, but it's tearing him apart in the process. The strain from that last puppet… it broke something inside him."
Erica, who had never left his side, gently wiped his brow with a damp cloth. His head was resting in her lap, a position of startling intimacy that no one dared to question. "There has to be something," she insisted, her voice low and fierce.
Masha knelt beside them, her practical mind searching for a solution. "If you can't heal him directly, can you support him? What does a body need when it's fighting itself?"
Rina's eyes lit up. "Energy. He has a fever. He needs hydration… but normal water won't be enough." She looked at the canteen Masha was holding. "Maybe… I don't have to heal him directly."
She took the canteen and placed both her hands around the metal flask. A soft, emerald light enveloped it. She wasn't pushing her power out as a wave, but carefully infusing the water within, molecule by molecule, with pure life essence. It was a delicate, draining process.
"Erica," Rina said, her voice strained. "Help me get some of this into him. Slowly."
Together, they managed to tilt his head, and Erica gently poured the life-infused water past his lips. It was a slow, arduous process, but it was hope.
The night was long and filled with ghosts, both spectral and remembered. Dante's five shadow puppets stood in a perfect circle around their small camp, their violet eyes the only source of light in the immediate darkness—a terrifying, but effective, wall of guardians.
The living took turns on watch, but Erica refused to rest. She sat with him through the long, cold hours, his head still cradled in her lap. The fire cast flickering shadows across her face, illuminating the complex emotions in her eyes. She looked down at him, her fingers gently tracing the line of his jaw.
This is a Dante no one has ever been allowed to see. The cold strategist is gone, replaced by a fragile, vulnerable boy. The memory of him in the rain, so awkward and kind, merged with the image of the ruthless commander who had slaughtered a dozen men. They were not two different people. They were two sides of the same soul, and she loved them both with a fierce, possessive intensity.
"You're so stupid," she whispered to his unconscious form, her voice thick with unshed tears. "Pushing yourself like that. Did you think we couldn't protect you?"
She held his hand, her thumb stroking his knuckles. "Neil is gone, Dante. And Juno… he saved us. He saved you."
"You can't die. You can't. You're the only one who can get us through this. I need you to get me through this." Her confession was a secret shared only with him and the silent, watching night. It was a love born from awe, obsession, and the desperate need for a protector in a world designed to kill them. His cruelty was a necessary shield. His power was beautiful. And his current weakness was a precious gift, a moment of vulnerability that belonged only to her.
As the first, pale light of dawn began to filter through the canopy, Rina's tireless efforts began to show. The violent fluctuations in his mana started to calm, and the fever finally began to recede. Erica, who had not slept a wink, felt the change instantly. The heat radiating from his skin lessened, and his breathing deepened into a more stable rhythm.
A wave of relief so profound it almost buckled her washed through her body.
She leaned down, her face just inches from his, her hair falling around him like a curtain. "Dante?" she whispered. "Can you hear me?"
His eyelids fluttered. The darkness in his mind receded, replaced by a dull, throbbing ache. He was aware of a soft warmth beneath his head, the scent of rain and woodsmoke, and a gentle pressure on his hand.
Slowly, painfully, he opened his eyes.
The first thing he saw was her. Erica. Her face, etched with worry and exhaustion, was the first thing to greet him in his return to the world. Her eyes, wide and luminous in the dawn light, were filled with an emotion so raw and powerful it stole the breath from his newly healed lungs.
It was not the look of a soldier for her commander. It was the look of a worshipper for her god.
And in that moment, vulnerable and completely at her mercy, he understood. The chains of loyalty I have forged are far more complex, and far more dangerous, than I had ever imagined.