The alarm did not ring. The stone trembled. Not strongly, but with a brief hesitation.
Atsuro lifted his head immediately. His hand was on the hilt of his sword before he even realized what he had done.
"Read it again."
He said it coldly, but his eyes did not move from the symbol that appeared and then began to distort.
This time, the voice came from the crystal itself, broken, unstable:
<< Connection lost…
Three habitation points…
Inhabitants: present… unresponsive.>>
The voice fell silent. Then, after an unprogrammed hesitation, it added:
<
Atsuro clenched his jaw. This type of report is only sent when all other explanations fail.He turned around.
Lilithia was at the door. She didn't ask how he knew. She spoke directly, as if the question had already settled within her before it was spoken:
"Where?"
He extended the crystal toward her. She looked. Its color did not change. But her breathing slowed.
"This…"
She paused. Then continued in a quieter voice:
"This feeling…"
He did not answer. He pressed on the symbol. The map appeared then half of it vanished, as if something had swallowed the location from within.
Atsuro said sternly:
"This will not be an ordinary mission."
Lilithia clenched her fist.
"It never was…"
He looked at her. For a brief moment, he saw the same calm she had carried out of that corridor. A calm that did not mean peace.
He said:
"You're with me."
It was not a request. Nor was it an official order. It was an acknowledgment. She nodded. She added nothing. They turned at the same time.
And the moment they left the hall, the black stone trembled once more. Longer this time. Deeper. As if it recognized the name before it was spoken.
-
And in a distant place that no map could show...
Tsukushiro smiled.
There was no alarm. No horn, no scream, no magical sign in the sky. It was just a pause.
A woman walking along the dirt road stopped abruptly. She lifted her head. The village before her was as it had been.
The houses stood. The doors were open. Smoke still rose from some chimneys. But the sounds… had vanished.
No children. No dogs. Not even the echo of the wind.
In the square, the people were there. Standing. Sitting. Leaning against the walls, Alive. But something was not moving within them.
A man in the center was bleeding from his palm. The blood flowed… but he did not fall. He hung in the air, like a dark thread tied to nothing.
He opened his mouth to speak. No sound came out. He tried to scream. No air emerged.
Then, the symbol moved. It was not carved, not drawn.Only one person stepped back. One step. Then another.
He said in a trembling voice:
"This isn't...!"
He didn't finish.
The shadow at the edge of the square moved. It was not a person. Nor a monster. It was an absence taking the shape of a shadow.
A voice without a mouth said:
"Do not be afraid."
Bodies tensed.
"The first layer has already been opened."
The symbol trembled, drawing blood as one draws breath from a weary chest.
"You… are not the victims."
The woman felt her breaths vanish.
"You are the vessel."
At that moment, the moon rose. It was not full. It was not waning. It was in a position it should not have been.
And elsewhere, Atsuro stopped suddenly. He clenched his fist unconsciously. He said in a low voice:
"Lilithia…"
She turned to him. His face had gone pale. He did not ask if she was ready. He did not say where.They did not arrive through a gate. There were no guards. No walls. The place… as if it had revealed itself only to them.
One step, and then they were inside.The ground beneath their feet was sticky. Not mud. Not yet blood… But it knew the way to it.
Lilithia stopped first. Her breath caught. The square was open. Circular. And in its center the symbol. Bigger than she had ever seen. Deeper. Incomplete.
Blood was flowing toward it from all directions.A scream. Sharp. Broken.
"Help me !!!"
Lilithia turned immediately.
A woman.
Suspended by her arms. Chains embedded in her flesh. Blood flowed from her shoulders stretching like red threads across her trembling body.She was alive. Alive enough to feel pain.
And before her, Tsukushiro Ren. His robe was not clean this time. But stained with layers of blood as if he had worn it specifically for this place.
He held the woman's head with one hand. His fingers pressed behind her ear, where he left no room for unconsciousness.He said in a calm, almost gentle voice:
"Hold on a little longer."
The woman screamed. Her voice tore even before her body could.
Atsuro moved instantly. Just one step, the air broke. A barrier, an invisible wall. It struck his chest and pushed him half a step back.
"Another move..."
Tsukushiro said without turning,
"and I'll take the soul before the body."
Lilithia gritted her teeth.
"Let her go!"
Tsukushiro laughed. A light laugh, surprised.
"You leave me after all this without a result?"
He lifted the woman's head slightly. Her eyes were open, but they no longer saw.
"Help me…"
The word came from a mouth full of blood.
Lilithia reached out without thinking. The air around her lit up.At the same moment, the symbol pulsed. A scream, louder. Deeper. As if it had come from the very heart of the place itself.
The chains exploded. Not freeing but embedding.They sank into the flesh. Into the chest. Into the neck.
The woman's body rose then bent at an angle a living body could not bend.The blood fell
like rain. Not all at once. But… slowly, deliberately.
Lilithia screamed. Atsuro tried to advance once more, The ground rose. It intertwined. Fingers emerged from it and grabbed his feet.
Tsukushiro tilted his head.
"See?"
He pressed. The symbol ignited.
And the woman, did not die immediately. Her body trembled. Then stopped. Then emptied. The body fell. It did not reach the ground. It dissolved before that.
Tsukushiro finally looked at them. His eyes were calm. Satisfied.
"Late,"
he said without malice.
"But your presence…"
He smiled.
"Useful."
Atsuro clenched his fist until blood ran from his palm.
Lilithia was trembling. Not from fear. Anger. Nameless anger. Stronger. As if to say:
Now… you know.
—
No one knew when the change had begun.
But at that precise moment, in the Drakhaen Kingdom, as the stone settled in the red room, Kai opened his eyes.
The awakening was not violent. It was cold… deeper than fear. The darkness under his eyes became more pronounced, his eyes filled with heavy sorrow.
His breathing returned to an unusual regularity. The wounds that should have bled more began to close. The flesh healed at a speed that belonged neither to his body nor to logic.
He did not move. He did not ask for help. As if something inside him had decided that pain was no longer a priority.
Kai lowered his gaze to his hand. It trembled lightly, not from pain, but from something older.
He closed his fingers slowly, clenching his fist, until his nails dug into his skin. And when he felt the sting… he did not stop. He did not want the pain, he needed it.
And in the moment the pressure intensified, something opened in his mind— a painful memory.
It was not a sound. It was an image.
A small boy. He saw him as he always had… too young to understand danger.He was calling out to him, blood running down his face.
"Kai…"
He saw himself rushing toward him, trying to catch him, trying to scream, trying to be faster than fate. But his body… did not respond. The step never completed. The arm froze in the air.
His chest tightened. He returned to the red room. To his clenched hand. To the blood beginning to appear at his fingertips.
He finally released the pressure. He breathed deeply. But the anger was there. Present. Not an explosive anger, but a silent one, accumulating.
He said in a low voice, as if speaking to a memory with no body:
"I'm sorry… for failing."
He fell silent for a moment. Then he clenched his fist again, this time without trembling.
And he said, the coldness in his voice not diminishing the weight of the vow:
"But from today… I will not fail again."
It was not a plea. Nor a wish. It was a promise.
____________
____________
© 2026 Lobna. All rights reserved.
-To be continued...-