[The Ash of the Capital: A Kingdom Devouring Itself] Draka was no longer a city of dragons and ancestral pride; it had devolved into a sprawling slaughterhouse managed by the cold hand of fear. As we ghosted through the narrow, twisting alleys to return to the headquarters, the scenes we witnessed were enough to make the very stones weep. The royal soldiers, their minds fracturing after hearing the reports of the massacres in the western strongholds, had begun to act like cornered beasts—lashing out at anything that moved.
From the safety of a shattered corner, I watched a squadron storm a humble residence. The screams of children pierced the leaden silence of the night, followed by the wet thud of crossbow bolts burying themselves in flesh. "They wear dark clothing! They are among the traitors!" the platoon leader roared, settting fire to the corpse of an old man who hadn't even the strength to raise his eyes in defiance.
Paranoia had become the supreme law. Neighbors informed on one another to avoid the blade, and soldiers slaughtered entire families simply because they "seemed suspicious." The kingdom was committing a slow, agonizing suicide, and Baron watched his city burn from his high balcony, indifferent to everything but the stability of his own throne.
I looked at Ryo. His face was as pallid as the dead, his tears frozen in his eyes. He watched his dreams of a "Just King" char and blacken with every burning house we passed. Dan, however, walked with Jan's dried black ichor still coating his clothes, staring at the destruction with a terrifying detachment, as if he were merely an observer at a particularly engaging theatrical performance.
By the time we reached the secret gate of the Ryumin headquarters, exhaustion had settled into our marrow. Dan's shoulder wound was still seeping blood, Ryo was reeling from psychological shock, and I… I felt a persistent "ringing" in my head, as if the memory of the face of the woman I had killed in the illusion were trying to bore a hole through my very soul.
The heavy doors groaned open. The headquarters was entombed in the dim, flickering light of a thousand candles. As soon as we crossed the threshold, medics swarmed Ryo and Dan. Ryo collapsed to his knees—not from a physical strike, but from the unbearable weight of what he had witnessed in the streets.
Skyro stood at the far end of the hall, hands clasped behind his back, his analytical gaze scanning our broken forms. I approached him with heavy, rhythmic steps.
"The Ghost has returned," Skyro whispered, a hint of suppressed relief in his tone. "Where is Jan?"
"Dead," I said, the word emerging dry and hollow. "Dan tore him apart. There is no longer a Western stronghold for Baron."
A profound silence filled the room, but I did not stop. "But... we encountered Cyril. The Second Seat is not like the others. His blood is white, and his ability to counterfeit reality is terrifying. He made us slaughter our memories and each other without ever drawing his sword. If he attacks this headquarters... blades will not save us."
Skyro narrowed his eyes, his lips moving in a silent murmur about "purity of lineage" and the "primordial strength of the blood." He knew then that the coming battle would not be against an army of flesh and bone, but against an enemy that resides within one's own nightmares.
As the doctors tended to Dan's wounds, I noticed Gina in the far corner of the hall. She did not move, nor did she draw her sword as she had before. She stood with a wounded dignity, her eyes fixed on Dan with a hatred that seemed to vibrate through the very air. She looked at him as one would look at a virus that had invaded her body. She wasn't afraid of him; she loathed his presence beside us. Dan, for his part, turned to her with a face devoid of emotion, then offered that twisted, serpentine smile that said: "I am here... and I am not leaving."
Gina did not speak, but the white-knuckled grip she held on her hilt told a different story. She was waiting for the moment Dan faltered to drive her blade through his heart, waiting for a single mistake to finish him. It was a night charged with silent, unquenchable malice.
[The Sage's Retreat: Scent of Paper and Blood] I could not sleep. The hum of exhaustion in my brain refused to subside, and the image of the white drop of blood Cyril had spilled was etched onto my retinas like a tattoo of sickly light. I headed to Skyro's private library in the basement of the headquarters. The space reeked of ancient parchment and the smoldering herbs he used to calm his nerves.
I found him seated at a massive wooden table, flipping through frayed, leathery scrolls. He didn't turn to look at me, but spoke in a dry, rasping tone: "You've returned from hell, Ray... but I see questions in your eyes deeper than your wounds. What occupies that dark mind of yours?"
I sat across from him with a cold finality, resting the blade of "Sin" on the table. "Cyril... his blood wasn't red. It was white, like a radiant light. Tell me, Skyro... how is the blood of these monsters divided? And what makes them possess a power that transcends logic?"
Skyro ceased his reading and looked at me with sunken, tired eyes. "The Dragon Blood in Baron's family is not a mere biological fluid; it consists of ancient 'Gifts' distributed unequally among the scions. It is divided into three distinct grades, Ray."
He raised his first finger. "The First Gift... is the Gift of Illusion. It is the weakest on the scale of raw physical power, but the most terrifying in execution. Those who possess it, like Cyril, have blood that is white, leaning toward silver. These individuals do not need armies; a Master of Illusion can collapse an entire kingdom with a single drop of blood. They make soldiers slaughter their own families while smiling, and they make heroes commit suicide out of fear of their own shadows."
Skyro paused for a heartbeat before continuing: "The next gift is the Gift of Transformation. This is raw, primordial power—the great gift of the ancestors. Only one in every generation is usually born with the complete genetic code for it. They possess the ability to transform into a 'True Dragon.' Their skin is not human flesh, but hardened steel scales that protect them from any weapon or sorcery. No blade can pierce them; no fire can burn them."
Skyro sighed with a profound bitterness. "You may have seen people in the slums of Draka with scales on their hands or faces... we call them the Hybrids. Children of commoner families whose blood was tainted ages ago by royal lineages, but the power in their bodies is incomplete. They are the distorted, the outcasts—they possess the shell but not the essence. But Muriel... Muriel possesses the Gift in its entirety. He is the hurricane that will soon explode in our faces."
Skyro's features darkened as he spoke of the final grade. "As for the strongest... it is the Gift of Kings. The Gift of Reflection. In the long, blood-soaked history of Draka, no King has ever died by treachery, and no ruler has ever fallen on the battlefield by a sword strike. Why? Because every King inherits 'Reflection.' Any blow you direct at Baron will return to you with double the force. Any blade that attempts to pierce his heart will pierce the heart of its wielder."
"And for this reason," Skyro whispered, "our Kings die only of disease, hunger, or old age. It is impossible for a human to kill them. Baron is the 'Absolute Fortress,' and he realizes there is nothing in this world that can break his gift."
[The Primordial Myth: The Golden Sovereign] A suffocating silence filled the room. I felt the insignificance of everything we had achieved before this terrifying hierarchy of power. But Skyro leaned toward me, his eyes gleaming with a mysterious brilliance.
"However... there is a forbidden legend, Ray. It is said that ten thousand years ago, there was the True King. He did not possess one gift; he possessed all three simultaneously: Illusion, Transformation, and Reflection. His blood was so pure that it glowed with the color of gold."
Skyro stopped for a moment, as if the words were too heavy for his tongue. "He was a god walking the earth, but he vanished... vanished without a trace, and for no known reason. He left the bloodlines to turn stagnant and distribute themselves among the weak, squabbling sons you see today."
[Dark Portents] I stepped out of Skyro's library, and the world in my eyes looked fundamentally different. I walked through the dark corridors, and on my way, I saw Ryo sleeping in a side hall, bandages covering his frame.
I remembered Skyro's words about "Pure Blood" and the "True King." I looked at Ryo... the youth who possesses in his veins the purest blood of the current lineage. Could the disappearance of that ancient King be linked to what Ryo carries?
I stopped before a window and looked at the moon. I felt a coldness in my Red Eye... a chill that told me the "Eyes of Sin" did not care for "Reflection" or "Golden Blood." They wanted something else... something that lay far beyond this ladder of existence.