She woke to silence.
No breath.
No wind.
No world.
Only darkness stretched around her—a boundless sea of red that shimmered faintly, neither solid nor water, as if the earth itself had been drowned in blood.
Crystal's eyes fluttered open, heavy and uncertain. Her first thought was pain, her second emptiness.
The last thing she remembered was Noah's blade, and the weight of betrayal pressing through her chest. Now, she stood barefoot on a surface that rippled softly beneath her feet. It felt neither cold nor warm, neither alive nor dead.
The air was thick, heavy with a scent she knew too well. Blood.
Above her hung a single moon. It was red—not crimson like battlefields, but deep, endless, sorrowful red. Its glow painted the dark in haunting shades, making the silence breathe.
No stars.
No horizon.
No sound.
Just her, the moon, and the sea of blood that stretched beyond sight.
Crystal turned slowly, trying to make sense of the place. Every direction was the same—the same rippling surface, the same reflection of that lonely red moon. Her reflection followed her wherever she turned, a faint outline of herself in the liquid mirror below.
She blinked once.
The reflection blinked too—but a moment too late.
Her breath caught. The figure in the red water stared back at her, but it wasn't her.
Its skin glowed faintly green, transparent and shifting, its eyes serpentine—sharp and cold. When she moved, it moved. When she stilled, it smiled.
Crystal stumbled back a step, but there was nowhere to go—only the endless red. Her heart raced in her chest, a rhythm far too loud in the silence.
"Am I dead…?" she whispered. Her voice was thin, small, fragile against the vastness.
No answer came. Only the rippling water moved, spreading circles that vanished too quickly to be real.
She closed her eyes and tried to breathe. The air burned in her throat.
Was this hell? It had to be. A fitting end for the woman who had painted so many lands in blood. The general of death. The Queen of Elarion.
Every battle, every scream, every blade she had drawn in Noah's name—they came back now, like echoes carried by the red tide. Faces she couldn't remember clearly. Voices that called her name not with fear, but with sorrow.
She sank to her knees. The red water rippled softly beneath her, yet it did not stain her armor or skin. It simply shimmered, almost as if welcoming her.
Tears welled in her eyes—real tears, pure and human.
She had not cried in years. Not when she lost her sister. Not when her grandfather's blood sealed Noah's throne. Not even when she realized the man she had loved had used her.
But now, in this place where nothing lived, she wept.
Her sobs echoed, swallowed by the dark. There was no one to hear them—and yet, for the first time, she didn't care.
Her hands trembled as she stared into the water again. The green reflection still watched her, its smile now faint, almost sympathetic.
"You… are me," she whispered. The figure tilted its head, eyes glowing softly beneath the moonlight. Her own reflection did not answer. Only the ripples shifted again, spreading outward in circles that glowed faintly with pale green light.
She tried to take a step forward, but the surface refused to move beneath her. It felt endless, like walking on sorrow itself.
Time passed—or maybe it didn't. Here, there was no sense of it. No day, no night, no heartbeat but her own.
Crystal walked.
Left.
Right.
Forward.
It made no difference.
The same moon watched her from above, the same reflection waited below.
Her thoughts blurred into one quiet, painful truth.
Maybe this was her punishment. A world made from the blood of those she had slain. A prison where she could never stop seeing what she had done.
At last, she stopped moving. There was no point. She couldn't tell if she had taken one step or a thousand. The red water didn't change. The sky didn't move. Even her reflection seemed tired now.
Crystal let out a shaky breath and knelt again, her hand brushing the surface of the water.
It felt soft, almost like touching smoke. And yet it rippled—alive, responding to her presence.
"This is it, then," she whispered." This is where I stay."
Her voice trembled. The thought of eternity in this place made her chest tighten. She lowered her head, staring at the faint green shimmer of her reflection.
"Is this what I deserve?" she asked quietly. The reflection blinked once, and for the briefest moment, its lips seemed to move.
But no sound came.
She waited. Nothing answered.
A long silence stretched, broken only by the slow, constant sound of her own breathing.
She closed her eyes and thought of Elarion. Its towers gleaming white under sun and frost. The sound of banners flapping above the royal walls. The scent of snow mixed with steel.
She remembered the cheers of her soldiers, the way Noah's hand had felt in hers, the way she had believed his smile.
And then she remembered the sword, the poison, the look in his eyes as he whispered his final words.
Crystal's fingers curled tightly, nails digging into her palm. She felt nothing.
"Why couldn't I see it?" she murmured. "All those years… I thought I was fighting for love. "Her laugh was soft, hollow. "In truth, I was just a blade waiting to be broken."
The reflection tilted its head again, its faint green hue brightening under the red moon.
She looked up. Her tears had stopped. What replaced them was quiet exhaustion—a weariness that reached deeper than her body.
Maybe she had cried enough for a lifetime.
After a while, she exhaled, long and slow, letting the silence take her again. Her heart had begun to steady. There was no escape from this place, but there was no pain anymore either.
Perhaps that was mercy.
She stayed like that for a long time, the red glow bathing her armor, the moon unmoving in the sky.
Then—she moved.
Without knowing why, Crystal lowered herself slowly and sat upon the red surface. It should have been impossible. It should have swallowed her whole.
But it didn't.
The surface held her weight, rippling softly like breath beneath skin.
She stared at it, startled. And then—
something happened.