Deep beneath the earth, strange sounds echoed through the underground chamber.
Something was struggling to emerge from within a massive cocoon of writhing, slimy tentacles. The ground around it was drenched in blood, stretching endlessly in every direction as two figures confronted one another.
One of them was faceless. A sword engulfed in dark flames rested in his hand, and a single wing extended from his back. He stared at the woman standing before him for a moment before shifting his attention toward the cocoon hanging above, covered in slimy tentacles.
The woman was strange. Her body appeared to have been stitched together, yet somehow she moved as naturally as any living person. A veil covered her head, through which her mesmerizing yet dreadful face was only barely visible. In one hand she held a painting depicting a land covered in snow. In the other—she held a human head.
If Veer had been there, he would have immediately recognized it. It belonged to the old man who had saved him several times.
The woman stared at the faceless man, her voice trembling faintly. "No… How can it be you? Weren't you pulled back into the painting?" Her eyes subtly flicked toward the canvas in her hand.
The faceless man ignored her question. His gaze moved toward the ritual surrounding the cocoon, which pulsated like a giant heart.
"Crit Puppets from the Emerald Rune Inheritors, their hands anchoring the base…" His voice was calm as he examined the array. "Does that mean all of them are dead in reality?"
A hint of melancholy softened his tone. "Did you really kill the grey knights and the princesses of this realm?"
His gaze shifted. "The trunk of a Relovar Tree… serving as the vessel for connecting to the beyond." Then he looked toward the candles. "Candles made from the Treyang Tree… used to call spirits."
He slowly swept his eyes across the blood-soaked chamber. "A massacre of at least nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine people… All of this blood just to provide enough essence to form the heart of the ritual. So all the freezing quaking has been due to this thing."
He stepped forward, gazing at the cocoon, before his attention settled on the woman's hands—specifically, the severed head. "And this is…"
Before he could finish, both the painting and the head vanished from her grasp. The woman vanished with them.
A moment later, she reappeared directly behind him. Her hands emerged from beneath her velvet-purple robes, her fingers twisting unnaturally as her nails elongated into enormous claws. She struck toward his stomach.
The faceless man reacted instantly. He twisted around and stepped backward, narrowly avoiding the blow as her claws tore through the air where his vitals had been.
During the exchange, her veil slipped. For a brief moment her beauty was breathtaking, but beneath that beauty lay something deeply unnatural. Her face had been stitched together; she looked less like a human being and more like a beautifully crafted puppet.
She glared at him. "Die."
A spark flashed.
BOOM!
Her talons collided with his spiked, dark-flamed sword. The impact shook the entire underground area.
The faceless man spread his single wing and, with a powerful flap, shot into the air.
The stitched woman stepped backward. "You think you can escape?" She curled her fingers inward as though pulling invisible strings.
The faceless man's body suddenly lurched. He tumbled through the air, losing control as momentum dragged him downward. A faint smile appeared on the woman's face, but then—he stopped.
He remained suspended in midair. The woman pulled again, causing space itself to constrict around him, but his body suddenly liquefied. His form splattered across the ground like water, the multicolored drops refusing to mix with the crimson blood around them.
The woman narrowed her eyes, preparing to strike again. From the pool of liquid, the faceless man re-formed—wing, dark sword, and empty featureless face intact.
"How did you get out?" she asked, her eyes squinting.
The man tilted his head. "From the painting…?"
A mouth suddenly split open where there had previously been only blank skin. It curled into a mocking smile. "Oh Mistress… why do you keep forgetting where I was born?"
The woman's expression darkened. "Even if you were born there, I imprisoned you in the Time-Healing Temple inside the painting. Yet you escaped."
The faceless man slowly walked toward her as she stepped back.
"Let us not be enemies here," she said, her voice trembling slightly. "I will help you after I succeed."
He stopped. "What was supposed to be my reward after I successfully helped you split Veerstrax's soul and use it to create that puppet?" His voice hardened. "You imprisoned me instead. You actually dared to imprison me in that place."
Dark flames erupted around his body. He raised his sword toward her, and ten blades of pure darkness materialized in the air, hovering at equal distances around him.
"You deserve to die."
All ten swords shot forward simultaneously.
The stitched woman spread both hands, her fingers curling as she pulled at the empty air. Faint, shining threads spread in every direction across the chamber.
The ten swords collided with the net of threads, which wrapped around each blade to bind them in place. But the dark flames immediately began burning through them.
Anxiety broke through the woman's composure. "You—! How can my strings be destroyed like this?"
BOOM!
The threads exploded, destroying the ten blades in the backlash and sending the puppet master staggering backward.
His anger swept through the underground chamber. The woman's pupils dilated as she raised her hands to block, but he was already gone.
A moment later, two sword strikes struck at once—one coming from where he had been standing, and the other from directly behind her. She managed to deflect one with a loud CLANG, but the second sliced deep into her hands.
The dark flames burned her flesh as the kinetic force sent her flying across the chamber. She crashed into the ground, struggling to rise.
The faceless man slowly approached her, his voice carrying a strange amusement. "You wanted to know how I escaped. Well, it's all because of that brat."
His mouth curved wider. "That old man from the Spellcraft Academy really was amazing. He actually managed to force that brat to conceptualize a hypothetical Starweaver state."
The woman stared up at him.
"You used that strange baby's power to imprison me," he continued, "but the spell that old man created freed the Starlight Baby. And me."
"I never noticed anything," she whispered, her eyes narrowing.
"Of course you didn't." The faceless man's body shifted. "I changed my essence to match the air itself. You know I am something of a painted man myself… as well as a painter. Then I devoured the Pontiff of a random church and took his place."
"You…"
The faceless man paused, his tone shifting. "But things are really surprising. No one could have guessed that random man had actually come from the painting itself."
"Also, there's one interesting thing about that Starlight Baby. You would never imagine who he really was."
He raised his sword to strike, but before the blade could descend, something went wrong.
The puppet master suddenly smiled.
The faceless man looked down to find his body frozen in place. Hundreds of pale hands had emerged from the ground around him, gripping his limbs from every direction. He struggled against the hold, but could not budge.
The woman calmly watched him. "It's no use. I rigidified everything around us with puppet essence while you were busy posturing."
She slowly approached him. "Do you really think I wouldn't notice how you escaped?"
His expression changed.
She leaned in close. "Welsria… does that name sound familiar?" Her smile widened as hundreds more strings manifested around his trembling frame. "Who do you think tricked that old man into going after that brat in the first place?"
The faceless man gritted his teeth. "Damn it… You devious woman. Why can't my flames destroy these? They are the blackflames of him!"
"Isn't it obvious?" she mocked. "I created an ethereal husk that stops the flame from interacting with this dimension. The barrier exists both within and without. Try breaking it now, Mr. Posturing."
Two eyes finally formed on the blank face of the man as he glared at her through gritted teeth.
She looked down at his immobile form, unable to float or liquefy, and muttered softly, "I was surprised when you manifested his blackflames… but you are not him."
A massive shockwave violently shook the chamber. The ceiling cracked above them, showering debris across the blood-soaked floor.
She looked up and said, "Be a good boy as usual. I need to hurry. The eclipse is here."