[The Headquarters: An Unknown Pulse] Skyro stood before the illuminated tactical map, his voice cutting through the electric tension with a clinical, technical coldness. "The Royal Purge has begun to encircle the surrounding forests entirely. Baron is no longer merely hunting rebels; he is combing the earth inch by inch. They believe we are there... and they are prepared to burn the world to find us."
In that heartbeat, Dan's aura underwent a seismic shift. He had been sitting in the darkest corner of the hall, nearly invisible, but his eyes suddenly ignited with a savage, predatory brilliance I hadn't seen since the slaughter of Jan. He stood up with an abrupt, monolithic force, and the black blade in his scabbard vibrated with a rhythmic, hungry rattle.
Skyro adjusted his glasses, his eyes narrowing. "Where are you going, Dan? Stepping outside now is not a mission—it is a public suicide."
Dan's voice emerged as a low, gravelly snarl. "I will not let them put their filthy, aristocratic hands on the Heart. It is mine... mine alone."
I moved before he could take his first step, blocking his path with a shadow's grace. "I am going with you," I said, my tone flat and non-negotiable. "Cyril is out there. If you face his illusions in your current state, you won't just die—you'll become a puppet in his theater."
Dan turned toward me, his blade sliding a fraction of a millimeter from its sheath, the sound of steel on steel a sharp threat. "I have never needed a protector, and I certainly do not need a 'Ghost' to hold my hand today."
I offered no verbal rebuttal. Instead, I simply walked past him, heading toward the reinforced exit. "I am not protecting you, Dan. I am protecting the Objective."
The forest was suffocating. The trees intertwined above us like the skeletal fingers of a dead giant, choking out the moonlight. We walked for hours—tree after tree, cave after cave—descending into a territory that had not felt the weight of a human footfall in centuries. Finally, we reached a massive, monolithic rock face encrusted with thick, black moss that seemed to pulse with a life of its own.
Dan stopped, turning to me with eyes overflowing with a lethal promise. "Ray... if I see you even glance at it, or if you so much as think about touching it, I will separate your head from your shoulders."
I did not flinch. I stepped back two paces as he shoved the rock aside with a raw, barbaric strength that transcended human limits. From behind the stone, the stagnant scent of ancient blood and royal rot wafted out. And there, in the deepest corner of the dark cavern, sat a black, wooden chest.
The moment Dan's hand touched the wood, the cave groaned. A gargantuan pulse—Dub-dub... Dub-dub—hammered against the stone walls and my own ribs. Dan opened the lid, and a deep, visceral red glow washed over his features. It was the Dragon's Heart. A living fragment of hell, still pumping, still radiating a power that made the mountains themselves feel fragile.
I looked at the Heart, then at Dan's exposed back. A singular thought crossed my mind like a cold flash of lightning: If I kill him now... if I drive "Sin" into his neck and take this Heart for Ryo... would the nightmare end? Dan moved as if he had sensed my murderous intent; he slammed the chest shut and tucked it under his arm. "Move, Ray. Before the ceiling collapses. The Heart is awake... and it has begun to call the hunters."
[The Illusion: The Whiteness of Annihilation] We emerged from the cave into the pale, sickly light of the moon, but the forest was not as we had left it. A profound, absolute silence had fallen. Even the sound of the wind had been erased. Suddenly, a terrifying laugh echoed from the canopy—a voice as soft as silk and as jagged as a razor. We looked up. Cyril was perched upon a high branch, casually playing with a singular drop of white blood in his palm.
"Thank you for the gift," Cyril purred, his voice melodic and mocking. "You've saved me the tedious effort of digging through graves."
Before we could draw our steel, the world around us erupted. The forest vanished, replaced by an infinite, featureless white plaza. It was an absolute void that swallowed both sight and sound. I screamed with everything I had—"DAN!"—but my voice returned to me dead, muffled by the oppressive whiteness. I was alone in Cyril's cursed abyss.
I walked through the void, the blade of "Sin" vibrating frantically in my grip. Suddenly, a woman emerged from the nothingness. Her face was blurred, as if a hand had smeared her features before the ink could dry, but she was weeping with a sound that tore at the very fabric of the soul. I felt nothing. I stepped toward her and, with a singular, horizontal sweep, took her head. She vanished like a mirage. Then a man appeared, his features also absent, reaching out to embrace me. I drove my blade into his chest without blinking.
"Cheap illusions, Cyril..." I whispered with a cold, focused hatred.
But then, the ground trembled, and Lina appeared. I froze. Lina... the only name the Eyes of Sin had not been able to fully erase from my blackened memory. She was kneeling on the white floor, her tears falling like lead, and she looked at me with eyes I knew—eyes I felt in my dreams.
"Ray... please... don't kill me... I am Lina... have you truly forgotten? Have you killed everything inside you?"
I raised the blade of "Sin." My hand felt like it was made of lead, and my heart—the heart I believed had died in the White Doors—began to shake. I looked into her eyes and saw the reflection of my own monstrous face. "I will not fall for the trap again!" I roared, my voice choked, and brought the sword down. Lina's head hit the floor, and her body dissolved into a white mist.
[The Confrontation: The Bitter Truth] In that heartbeat, He appeared. A man in his thirties, radiating an aura that transcended the limits of this world. He stood with a terrifying solemnity, his gaze piercing through my soul. It was Jin.
"So..." Jin said, his voice as calm and inevitable as fate. "Are you still unconscious?"
The blood froze in my veins. His words were not Cyril's illusion; they were a reality that slapped me across the face. I realized suddenly that I had drowned in the shifting sands of Draka. I had forgotten that Baron, Muriel, and Cyril were nothing more than trivial obstacles on the path of the Nine Worlds. I had forgotten who was waiting for me behind this darkness. I had forgotten my original world... and I had forgotten the vows I made before the Eyes of Sin devoured my memory.
My hands began to tremble with a violence I had never known. The blade of "Sin" began to emit a sharp, high-pitched wail, as if it were rejecting the reality I was living. I looked at Jin and saw everything I had lost. I felt a sense of oppression tearing at my vitals. How did I let myself forget? How did I become a "Ghost" in a world that is not mine?
I raised "Sin" with every ounce of strength I had left. I wasn't aiming at Cyril; I was aiming at my own chains. With a broken heart and a soul screaming for vengeance, I hurled the sword with all my might at Jin's face... at the Truth that was hounding me.
"I am close, Jin..." I whispered. "I am close... and I will burn every world to reach you."
[The Awakening: The Fury of the Crimson Blood] My scream was not merely a sound; it was the eruption of mana suppressed for millennia. Cyril's white void began to crack under the immense pressure. My eyes were flooded with a deep, abyssal red, then exploded into a frenzied, dark crimson.
I felt a heat incinerating the veins in my skull. I no longer saw whiteness; I saw the world through a film of blood. The illusion shattered, and I found myself back in the forest. Dan was directly in front of me, frozen in place, clutching the wooden chest with enough force to make his fingers bleed, but his eyes were vacant... he was still trapped in his own internal prison.
I ran toward him, screaming his name to wake him. "DAN! WAKE UP!" I seized his shoulder to shake him, but in that moment... the blood in my veins turned to ice.
Dan screamed in my face—a sound that was not human. Suddenly, his skin began to tear from the center, from his chest up to his jaw. And from between Dan's tattered remains, Cyril's head emerged with its provocatively soft features, laughing as he pulled his entire body out of Dan's mouth. "Do you truly think you can save him so easily?" Cyril mocked, lunging with his white blade toward my throat.
The Red Fury ignited in my mind. I began to fight Cyril with a visceral savagery, "Sin" striking the air and colliding with Cyril's white steel. I struck with everything I had, aiming to shred this monstrosity that had emerged from Dan's frame.
Suddenly... a distant laugh echoed. A real laugh this time. I looked up, and high atop a towering tree sat the real Cyril, legs crossed, watching me with amusement. "Yes... just like that... fight... tear each other apart!"
I snapped my gaze back to the one I was fighting. It wasn't Cyril. It was Dan. Dan was standing before me, his eyes overflowing with a protective madness, his black blade delivering lethal strikes toward me. He thought I was Cyril! He was fighting me with everything he had to protect the Heart from the "Illusion" he saw before him.
I took a step back, my mind clouding. What is this terrifying power? Cyril wasn't just manipulating the environment; he was manipulating our identities. We were now two monsters shredding each other in the same cage.
Dan lunged again with a roar that shook the forest. "You won't take it, you bastard!" I was forced to parry. The strength in his hand was suicidal. In a lightning-fast movement, I struck Dan with the flat of "Sin's" blade—a crushing blow to his head and chest.
Dan slammed into the earth with violent force, and as he fell, the wooden chest slipped from his grasp.
[The Pulse: The Cry of Kings] Dub-dub... Dub-dub. A gargantuan pulse erupted from the chest—visible golden waves that wiped away the magic of the area as if erasing a mistake from a canvas. Everything stopped. Cyril, who had been watching from above, descended slowly, his features masked in a blend of fascination and disgust. He stood before us, staring at the Heart vibrating inside the chest.
I gathered what remained of my strength and stood as a shield between him and Dan. Cyril was looking at me, but his mind was elsewhere.
[The Poisoned Dialogue: The Hunter's Logic] "If I were to kill you both here..." Cyril began, speaking with a terrifying calm, as if weighing his options on a golden scale. "I would take the Heart, and things would return to their proper order under my father's rule... but..." He paused, his eyes gleaming with a sickly light. "The person for whom this Heart beats... is still alive. And you, undoubtedly, know where this rat is hiding. So why shouldn't I make you bring him to me?"
Dan laughed bitterly, wiping blood from his mouth, and spoke in a tone of wounded pride: "There is no person this Heart beats for but me! I am the one who recovered it, and I am its master!"
Cyril looked at him with a biting, sardonic irony, his voice dropping into a deep resonance that shook the forest: "You are delusional, Dan. The Heart beats only for one of Pure Royal Blood. If there is no noble in this world whose blood is pure and ancestral, the Heart will never beat; it will simply die and turn to stone... and you? You are merely a filthy commoner. This Heart would not beat for you even if you worshipped it for an eternity."
[The Departure: End of the Show] Dan's face turned ashen, as if Cyril's words were a wound deeper than the blade of "Sin." Cyril continued as he turned his back to us, a euphoric smile on his face: "My performance for today is over... I shall see you next time, and then... I want to see the 'Royal Dog' you are hiding. Do not be late; my patience is evaporating rapidly."
Suddenly, his features dissolved like white smoke, and he vanished from the forest as if he had never existed, leaving behind the scent of blood and an endless whispering in the mind.
[The Escape: Whispers of the Return] I carried the psychologically and physically broken Dan, who clutched the chest with trembling hands. We set off for the headquarters, but the path was not a journey home; it was a prison of doubt. "Is this truly the way?" Dan whispered. "Are we in the headquarters? Or are we still beneath Cyril's tree?"
Every tree looked like Cyril's face, and every heartbeat reminded Dan of his reality as a "commoner." We reached the gates of the headquarters and stood before the entrance with swords in hand, fearing that we would open the door only to find Baron waiting for us.
"Ray..." Dan said, looking at the chest with terror. "Is this real?"
I did not answer. The redness in my eyes told me that the Truth had become more expensive than blood in this world.