The corridors of the inn were quiet, save for the faint creak of wood in the cold night air. Sunny closed the door to his room, leaning back against it as though to keep the weight of the world from following him inside.
The poet's voice still lingered in his ears.
The sorrow.
The fury.
The quiet madness.
"Starborn Silence… could he be one of them?"
Sunny ran a hand down his face, shaking his head.
"No. The odds are too low. And yet…"
The memory came unbidden — the strange dreamscape, Gehrman's words like a whisper in the void:
"Adam is coming."
Now the poet had said the same thing. The exact same words.
Sunny dropped onto the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees, staring at the floor.
"If this Adam is that dangerous… why are they telling me? Why not someone stronger? Someone ready?"
For the first time in a long while, a sliver of unease coiled in his gut.
"What if… they already know? What if they've decided… it has to be me?"
He barked out a laugh, humorless and sharp, trying to chase away the thought.
"A prince, maybe. Or a king. Yeah, sure, Sunny… keep dreaming. If I'm that special, shouldn't they be treating me better?
The joke rang hollow in the empty room.
---
Across the hall, the poet stood by an open window, the night air tugging at his blue cloak. His glass — always empty — hung loosely in his hand as he stared up at the sky.
The stars were endless tonight, a thousand points of cold light scattered across black velvet.
"The prophecy I heard in that formation…" his voice was a whisper, carried away by the wind.
"Could it be true?"
His grip tightened on the glass until his knuckles turned white.
"No," he muttered, almost to himself. "It can't be."
Then he tilted his head back, eyes locking on the moon. In its pale glow, his white hair shone like frost, and for just a moment, his gaze softened — as though he could see someone there, someone only he knew.
---
In another room, Shen sat cross-legged on his bed, sharpening his blade with slow, deliberate strokes.
"That poet's clever," he muttered. "Too clever. Tomorrow, we move for the inheritance. And now, after telling us that little story… he'll have us all dancing to his tune."
The whetstone scraped again.
"I don't trust him. Not for a second."
---
Sunny leaned back on the bed, staring at the cracked ceiling. His mind drifted to the forbidden technique he'd read about in fragments and whispers — a power that could anchor a soul and let it slip into another vessel.
Bodies were just containers.
The soul was the true key.
"If I could get my hands on that…" his heart beat faster, reckless and desperate all at once.
"Maybe then… maybe then, I could finally be more than this."
The thought was dangerous. Addicting.
And once it lodged itself in his mind, there was no shaking it loose.