When he glanced at the mirror, his breath caught.
It wasn't his face staring back at him.
The reflection showed someone else entirely. A figure with hair split cleanly down the middle. The left side was pure white, soft and flowing like silk, while the right was jet-black, as dark as ink. The two colors clashed so sharply they looked unnatural, almost painted on.
The strands moved faintly, swaying as if caught in a breeze, but the air around him was still.
For a long moment, he just stood there, staring at the unfamiliar figure in the glass.
Then he turned to the man who was supposed to be his brother. The stranger gave him an awkward smile.
As a detective, one of Le Wei's unspoken rules had always been not to dwell too deeply on beliefs. Beliefs were supposed to change. If you held onto one too tightly, you risked being left behind by the world. The world itself was built on change.
Once, cannons were the deadliest weapons known to man; now, there are nuclear bombs.
Change in belief, belief in change. The two worked hand in hand, as long as you followed the right procedure.
When he had first woken in that lonely room, his instinct as Le Wei was to believe he had been kidnapped. Even when faced with things he couldn't explain, he clung to the idea that this wasn't transmigration. That his death was just… a mistake.
But now? He couldn't deny it anymore. He had died in his past life. He had transmigrated into another world... into the body of someone called Zeph.
"This is… Zeph?" he muttered, testing the name.
The handsome man standing before him tilted his head, his lips curling into a faint smile.
"Isn't he cute?"
'He? Oh… right. They think I lost my memory because of this thing called Miasma.'
Speaking of which...
"Er… elder brother..." Zeph began carefully. "What exactly… is Miasma?"
The man placed a hand on his forehead and sighed, shaking his head like he'd been through this a hundred times already.
Zeph frowned, irritation prickling in his chest. "You don't have to be so cocky about it. I just asked a question."
The man didn't answer right away. Riven, who had been standing nearby, remained silent as well, shifting awkwardly as though she didn't belong in this conversation at all. Wait! Where had she even gotten a headset from?
Finally, his so-called brother spoke again. His tone was weary, resigned.
"No… that's not it. This is your fifth time losing your memory, which also makes it my fifth time explaining this to you."
Zeph blinked. His stomach sank.
"…Fifth time?"
****
A while later, the two brothers were chatting and discussing like lovers. Riven just sat in a chair nearby and occasionally glanced at Zephyros.
Every so often, Zephyros would catch her staring at him, and she would immediately shift her gaze.
"Pervert," Zeph hissed, noticing her again.
His time with his elder brother, whose name was Darius Milnar, had taught him pivotal things about this world.
Yes, Le Wei had accepted his fate and was now living a new life as Zephyros Milnar, but after hearing about this world from Darius, he immediately started missing his old life.
The Miasma... it started 80 years ago, binding the Mortal Realm—where Earth was, the one Le Wei transmigrated to, of course—with the Hollow Realm. Portals opened across all continents, making way for monsters to enter Earth and cause chaos.
Humanity wasn't left hopeless, though. A set of elites known as the Ordained emerged. They were chosen by the Miasma to battle the deadly portals and protect humanity.
They're blessed with supernatural abilities and all sorts of things that can be used to battle the monsters.
The part that left Zephyros in awe was how people were chosen as Ordained. It was nothing short of terrifying and inhuman to him.
It happens through a Miasma Veil. It's a force field that builds around a large area, trapping humans inside with monsters. No one can get out, but there is a possible way to get in.
Darius had said that someone of a higher rank.. in other words, someone very strong, can create a way to enter the veil, and they try their best to help and protect the humans within it.
The part that made Zephyros almost cry was that experiencing life in a Miasma Veil does not guarantee you will be Ordained. In fact, the Ordaining process was far too complex for the people of this world to grasp.
The Miasma selects who it wants. It does what it wants. What a jerk.
From what Darius had pointed out, Zephyros had made up his mind to never come across a Miasma Veil, but who was he to make that choice?
The Miasma chooses who it wants, and no one knows what the future holds. A Miasma Veil could appear anywhere and at any time. It's not something you can easily evade.
But then, Zephyros decided to always stay close to his new elder brother no matter what.
Apparently, this building wasn't a police station at all. It was a Crimson Sector... one of many. A place where some Ordained are asked to work as unassuming police officers, maintaining and keeping check on Miasma portals. There are also other sectors like it, but each is controlled by a different conclave.
Conclaves are like a mixture of a clan, a guild, and a political party, with the higher members being some of the strongest Ordained, if not the strongest. Those who ruled the Conclaves, according to Darius, could be compared to a monster that can destroy a continent.
This means, to stop these humans if they ever turned their backs on humanity... No, no... it was almost impossible. If they're comparable to a monster of such rank, that means they're capable of destroying at least two continents with ease.
Zephyros swallowed hard. He didn't want to ever get on their bad side. Who knows what kind of abilities each of them possessed. All in all, the abilities would surely be something deadly, honed to perfection.
To gain those abilities, what had they gone through? The Miasma Veil... those who were Ordained and still living are really tough.
What kind of monsters lurked in the veils?
According to Darius, sixteen veils have opened since the beginning of this curse eighty years ago, and only six have been conquered by humans.
By "conquered," it means those who achieved the feat of defeating the strongest, or rather, the leader of the monsters in a certain veil.
At first, that seemed like a huge feat to Zephyros, until Darius told him the threat of veils varied.
In the sense that, a veil might possess monsters with the strength to take on only ten normal humans at once, while there are certain veils that...
Zephyros shrugged. He did not want to think about it anymore.
...And since the six veils conquered were weak, it didn't seem like much of a feat to Zephyros, who hadn't seen what a monster in this world looked like. It seemed more like luck.
"So, what do Sectors do apart from clearing portals, and how many sectors are there?" Zephyros questioned.
Every so often, he let his detective instincts get the better of him, making him ask questions that could lead to suspicion.
He couldn't let Darius know his younger brother was gone and that only his body remained, which he, Le Wei, was now using as a living vessel.
Darius was totally oblivious to any of it and answered every question with ease. Zephyros could feel the love Darius had for the real Zeph. It was a really tight brotherly love.
'Did Zephyros love him the same way?'
"Ah... a conclave can have more than one sector, so there are plenty of sectors... I stopped counting at thirty-two. And yes, apart from portals, we... umm... you noticed the prisoners when you were heading here with Riven?"
Prisoners? Yes... how could he forget such an important mystery?
'A detective I am...'
"Yes... That's where I was heading," he lied.
"...If you're dealing with only portals, then why do you have prisoners and so many... erm... Ordained cops?"
"Yes... the fun fact is they're not prisoners, and most of the officials aren't Ordained. The Ordained ones are few but are still a strong cohort in each sector. We only have lots of workers so as to reduce unemployment. Portals cause more harm than just sending monsters. Every day people lose their jobs for one reason or another, all tied to the portals. So we put up limitless vacancies in every sector the Crimson Conclave owns."
Hmm... makes sense.
"...And those supposed prisoners are just people who were negatively affected by the miasma. Like you. You tend to lose your memories due to the miasma. And even that negativity works for us. We turn it into a weapon, an ability, and we reform people before they're sent to the academy."
"Academy?"
"Yes... A school for those who were recently Ordained or affected by the miasma."
"That's nice... So how many people are officially Ordained in this conclave?"
"Oh... we're, umm... wait. Ten sectors... two Ordained... yes. We have twenty-one Ordained."
"That's extremely low, given the number of people I saw in this building."
"The smaller the team, the deadlier," Darius grinned.
Zephyros turned to Riven and asked Darius, "Is she an Ordained?"
"Uhh... Riven? Of course she is."
That explains her immense speed and strength in the hallway earlier. She must be deadly.
Zephyros gulped. He really didn't want to get on her bad side. Just the little he saw today in the hallway had made him develop a slight fear of her.
Now, learning she was an Ordained made his fear for her rise at an inhuman rate.
Darius, noticing the fear on his face, said, "Ah... Riven cares little about humans. In fact, I barely hear her voice. So just be nice to her, and whatever you do, don't go into her room at night."
"What's that supposed to mean?!"
Darius chuckled.
"Ah, don't you think it's time to head home?"
"Oh... we have a house?"
Zephyros smiled darkly. He was getting what he had lost, or rather, what he couldn't get in his previous life.
This is the life.
But just before the discussion ended, Zephyros asked his final questions.
"So, who's the leader of the Crimson Conclave? The one you... um... we belong to?"
Darius tilted his head, then smiled.
"I tend to always forget about your amnesia. Well, doesn't that question have an obvious answer?"
Zephyros was silent for a while, then said, "Riven is the leader? Our parents?"
Yes, parents. That was possibly the correct answer. Having parents with immense power was so cool, and Zeph was already daydreaming of his new, "flawless" life.
The life of a rich, spoiled brat.
My biggest dream.
But then Darius shook his head, which broke Zephyros's heart into a thousand pieces.
"Then who?"
Darius grinned and then finally answered the question.
"I'm the leader of the Crimson Conclave."
Zephyros couldn't explain how he felt. He was surprised and not surprised simultaneously.
If Darius was the leader of the Crimson Conclave, this meant he was the strongest in this conclave.
But what kind of power could such a lighthearted person possess? Zephyros couldn't believe it. Such a warm-hearted... Forget about that. He was only about two years older than Zephyros.
Did he conquer a veil? Was his ability tied to aging? Zephyros didn't know. But according to Darius himself, if the same hypothesis worked on every leader of the conclave, that means Darius had the ability to destroy a continent?!
'All these information in a day?!'
What he knew was that he was automatically safe from monsters and other conclaves.
He was the younger brother of the strongest member of the Crimson Conclave, the leader of the conclave itself.
He was the younger brother to one of the strongest people in humanity, Darius Milnar.