The pristine snow of the glacial shore was defiled by a scene of slaughter. Standing amidst the mist like a phantom silhouette was the sole perpetrator of this devastation—a young woman. Her hair was the white of ice, flowing in a wind that carried the metallic scent of death. In her hands rested a massive claymore, held not with the burden of its weight but with the lethal grace of a master holding their favorite quill.
She moved. Not a flinch, but a calculated micro-adjustment. The air before her wavered and tore; a void that bent light and space—a dimensional volume—was revealed. From its depths, she retrieved an ancient, leather-bound map. As her alabaster fingers traced faded lines, the snowflakes alighting on her skin seemed to form a personal blizzard. Her molten gold eyes narrowed with ruthless precision and locked onto a point in the northeast.
A sound shattered the silence—the thunder of wings beating against the freezing air. From the leaden sky descended a shape of nightmare and shadow, aimed directly at the white-haired girl. It was a raven, but magnified to a terrifying scale, its wingspan casting a ten-meter shroud of darkness. Its eyes were like obsidian needles, as cold and lifeless as a glacier's heart.
The girl did not startle. She merely tightened her grip on the claymore's worn hilt. The blade, scarred and notched from countless battles, seemed to groan as if readying itself. She settled into a stance perfected through a lifetime of war: one hand on the hilt, the other poised in the air—a deadly, professional tableau of balance.
A figure dismounted from the colossal creature. Tall and gaunt, a skeletal human form. A pronounced hunch distorted his posture, and his skin, stretched taut over a prematurely aged and deeply lined face, was the color of long-dead ashes.
Liesta's voice pierced the wind, cold and flat, devoid of any emotion beyond intent. "Citizen of the Shattered Lands, what is your purpose in revealing yourself so openly?"
The man let out a laugh that was little more than a dry crackle, swallowed by the vast emptiness. "Can we ever truly escape ourselves, my lady? Forgive me. I am too... fragile to offer you a proper fight."
Liesta's only response was the slight, elegant arch of a single eyebrow. She let the silence hang, a threat heavier than any shout. When she spoke again, her words were razor blades sharpened with every syllable, capable of drawing blood. "Who dares challenge me? Who believes they can stand in my path? Who is foolish enough to defy me?"
Then her voice changed. It deepened, filled with an iron will that seemed to make the very world tremble, demanding to be heard. "I am Liesta el Eldrath, heir to the Enchained Continent. My name is a legacy from Nivara Eldrath. My art was learned from Touya Akatsuki. My defiance was taken from the gods themselves. I have mastered the entirety of the Third Dimension, and when I first awakened my awareness, the children of the stars bestowed upon me my True Name."
She took a single, deliberate step. The air crackled. "I am the Promised Paradise. Now, I ask again... who will face me?"
The gaunt man's smirk faltered, replaced by a spark of unease. The symbols of his power—the visible manifestation of his awareness—began to shimmer and dance around his claw-like hands. "You are not yet eighteen. Merely Tier 1. And yet your words... carry weight, Lady Promised Paradise."
It was a mistake. The moment his awareness surged, Liesta moved. She was a blur of motion, a white lightning bolt against the grey. Her claymore left its resting place, a silver arc aimed at severing the man's head from his shoulders. The giant raven screamed, beating its vast wings forward to protect its master. But the man's own reaction was too slow. In a desperate move, he unleashed his magic not as an attack, but as a defense. A wave of distorted space erupted from his hands.
Liesta did not block it. There was no time. The world around her bent, fractured, and tore. The frozen, barren landscape was replaced by a nauseating whirlpool of shrieking color and void. She was flung—not through space, but across it, hurled by the man's desperate teleportation gambit into an infinite, cold unknown.
---
Consciousness returned to Touya on a wave of dull, throbbing pain. He was alive. That fact alone felt like a miracle, or perhaps a cruel joke. He lay on the cold ground, Lanert keeping watch beside him. Viera and her soldiers were gone, having left behind only the massive, still-smoking corpse of a titan as proof of their passage.
Touya stirred, a thousand burning questions lodged in his throat, his eyes locked onto Lanert's. But the words died before they were born. The expression on Lanert's face was a complex tapestry of grief, shame, and a deep, weary self-loathing.
"I'm sorry," Lanert whispered, the words raw. "For everything. It was my fault. The people I tried to protect... the other slaves... they're all dead. It seems... it's just you and me left."
"There were... others there?" Touya croaked, the revelation hitting him like a fresh blow.
Lanert shook his head, unable to meet his gaze fully. "I didn't make a pact with them. Not like with you. I just... pitied them. Their lives were being spent for nothing. I didn't want them to live my fate. I wanted all of them saved." His voice trembled. "And I saved no one."
Touya felt a cold knot, sharper than the winter air, tighten in his throat. "Then why? Why make a plan with me and not them?"
A faint, sorrowful smile touched Lanert's lips. "When I saw you, I just... knew. Do you believe in fate, Touya?"
"Fate?" Touya echoed, the word tasting like ash in his mouth.
Lanert leaned back, his eyes looking into the middle distance, seeing not the glacial horizon but the painful architecture of his own past. "The gods laid down rules for their wars against the Others. Laws, like fate itself, dimensional boundaries to protect their precious order. They forged fate as their shield. They all stood for this, they all desired it, and thus the system was built."
He took a shaky breath. "I was a Warden of the Cathedral—one of the god-sanctioned orders on Miara. An orphan. I had no family. On the surface, it seemed like a happy place. I found solace in the stories they told us. I tried to feel like I belonged to something, that I had a place in the grand design." His expression darkened. "But the reality was different. The Cathedral... is a place that hides unspeakable acts behind a veil of divinity, using the name of the gods to mask its rot. The cathedrals in your world may seem pure, but on Miara, with multiple gods vying for power... it leads to conflict. To corruption."
The confession seemed to physically pain him. "So I rebelled. And for my insolence, I was sent here. To be broken. As a reminder of my place as a pawn." His voice hardened, filling with a new, relentless determination. "But I came willingly. I have a sister. I know where she is. My only goal is to find her, to protect her. To give her the life I never had. I will fight for her freedom, no matter the cost."
Touya felt something stir within him—a sense of... recognition. Here was someone like him, yet not like him at all. Someone with a purpose. A reason to fight. But what was his? What was freedom? What was happiness? The questions echoed in the hollow cavity of his chest.
"I'm glad you escaped," Touya said, the words feeling inadequate. "But I... I have no reason to live. No one knows me in either world. I'm a ghost. I'm nothing. What will I do if I escape? Who will I fight for? If freedom is stepping forward fearlessly for a cause, then I am not free. If I am a child forgotten by fate, then am I not still in chains? If this is all I am, then how am I different from an animal? If I cannot even claim ownership of my own will, then what am I?"
The truth of it crashed down on him. He was a weapon without a hand to wield him, a scream thrown into an uncaring void. He was the one who would make the darkness itself afraid, who would carve a path through the unknown... but for whom? For what? He was The Fear of Darkness, feared and hidden precisely because he was, at his core, nothing. A negation. A walking absence.
He was nothing.
The injustice of it was a physical ache. He would make someone pay. He would settle the score with whoever wrote this story. This was not over.
"I'm lost," Touya breathed out, the confession tearing itself from the deepest, most broken part of him.
Lanert's smile returned, warmer this time. It was a small thing, but in the desolate cold, it felt like a sun. "Hey. Let's just walk together until we're out of this frozen hell. Maybe you'll find your purpose along the way. You have worth, Touya. Like everyone else, you are human."
Touya could no longer hold them back. The tears came, hot and silent, tracing paths through the grime on his cheeks. They were not tears of weakness, but of a deep, agonizing catharsis.
Wordlessly, Lanert took him by the arm and helped him to his feet. Together, they began to walk, two small figures against the immense, relentless white. The freezing cold was an agony they had to endure, step by painful step, a purgatory. But they were moving. And for now, that was enough.