"WHO THE..." His heart was beating fast.
The darkness behind those hands wasn't normal darkness. It tore open the Reality inside him, just to show him the truth.
Images rushed through his mind one after another, so fast that he couldn't understand them. Pieces of truths that had been waiting for him from the very beginning.
The pain made Zekai's head tighten. He tried to scream, but no sound came out of his throat.
Inside the darkness, the figure raised its head. The First Door started to open with a creaking sound.
Something was standing on the other side.
Then everything went black.
But none of them felt like watching a scene. It felt more like remembering something that had never happened to him before.
A skyscraper appeared inside the crack in Reality. It was tall. A man was standing at the edge of its roof.
Every time Zekai tried to look closely at the face, it changed. It was as if Reality itself had already decided that he should not recognize that face.
Below the tower was a huge pit. Dozens of bodies were scattered across the empty concrete floor.
Then the smell hit Zekai, making his stomach turn.
Everything below was soaked in death. Zekai's chest tightened.
The man standing on the roof smiled. It wasn't a proud, victorious smile. It was the look of someone watching a dream finally come to an end. All he had was the relief that it was over.
'Why is he looking like that?'
Screams rose from below. Even from that far away, they sounded raw and brutal.
The Fool card was in that man's hand.
"How did it get into his hand?"
Zekai tried to move. His body refused. Every muscle in him felt like it had stopped working from the inside.
'Why can't I move?' Something struck his mind. It was beyond fear and pain. It forced its way through him, as if his body was never made to hold it.
The man's face suddenly became clear. Only his eyes stayed the same. But those eyes stayed fixed on Zekai, looking straight at him. There was something personal in that look.
The man raised his hand without hesitation. He pointed straight at Zekai. He marked him. "You're next."
"...Who are you?" Zekai whispered.
For a second, something passed across the man's face. Pity. The kind of pity saved only for someone who could no longer be saved.
Suddenly, he threw The Fool card upward. The card crossed the gap in an instant. It flew straight into Zekai's chest and sank inside.
The mysterious man's voice came with a warning. "Soon... you—"
"—!"
A deadly pain exploded through the center of Zekai's body. His heart stumbled and stopped. Then it started beating again.
It felt like Reality had forced something strange directly into his soul. His blood rushed in two directions at once.
He looked toward his heart with desperate eyes. "Ah—!!"
"No. No..." He grabbed his chest. Now he could feel it. The Fool card was settling inside him. "Get out of me!!!"
Without any hesitation, he pushed his fingers into his heart, driven by the pain. The pain tore through his whole body at once. It was so sharp that his whole vision turned white. But he didn't stop. His fingers grabbed the card. It was still there. Still glowing with a faint, sinister light.
He pulled.
"—!!"
It resisted. It had already decided that its place was inside him. His whole body shook. But through the terrible pain, he forced the card out of his heart.
His breathing was uneven. Very shallow breaths. 'What did I do to deserve something like this?'
Doubt slowly crept into his mind. 'No... am I supposed to die here because of this Fool card?'
'Or... is all of this just in my head?'
But the heat in his blood, the shaking in his hands, and the pressure crushing his ribs all felt real.
'But I'm still alive.'
The Fool pulsed once in his palm, as if it had gotten what it needed. That one bitter truth gave him something close to relief. A weak kind of relief.
"...Why." His voice came out rough. "No. Wrong question."
He stared at the card. "How did I already become a part of this?" Before he could finish the question, an answer rose inside him. "When did I agree to this?"
The ground beneath his feet disappeared. Something pulled him down. His vision tore apart. The whole world folded inward toward a single point.
-------------------------
Outside, in Greyhaven, a signal called "Minutes" had marked off a 500-meter area as a restricted zone. Barricade tape with "CAUTION" signs was placed all around it.
A few officials in black coats were gathered around the area, as if some incident had happened. Other than them, there were no civilians around.
An officer with a badge spotted a man approaching from a distance. He raised his hand and called out.
"Captain Orlan. Come take a look at this!"
Orlan came with three others. One of them was a 15-year-old boy wearing a collar device around his neck, along with two other young people.
When Orlan came closer, he looked at the road crossing the signal. Various things were scattered across the ground—chocolates, fruits, jasmine flowers, and all kinds of other items.
Orlan looked at the scattered things. "How many people are missing in total?"
The officer looked at the tablet screen in his hand.
"Based on the CCTV cameras around here and reports from the families of the missing people, a total of forty-five people are missing!?"
"The Everlight Unit is included in this. An eleven-person squad under Helmith's command is part of it.
"Other than our people, do any of the remaining thirty-four have Grave Energy?"
"We checked them. None of the civilians had even a trace of Grave energy!"
The boy who came with Orlan was checking something on the smartwatch on his wrist. Green, yellow, orange, blue, red, and black lights lit up one after another, changing colors each time. Then suddenly his watch completely stopped working.
"Captain Orlan. Could this be a Reality Fracture we've never seen before?"
The boy started to sweat a little. "Captain Orlan, I've read through the BSA case histories, but I've never seen anything like this before! What does this mean?"
Orlan thought about all the Reality Fractures he had seen in his life. Nothing like this had ever happened before.
"Then this is a disaster!"
The boy said in shock, "Captain Helmith will need our help."
Another person spoke. "Whatever it is, we'll know once we open the Reality Scar and take a look. That's my job, after all."
Max tapped the other person's shoulder. "What are you talking about, Karter?"
Karter, the young man who couldn't speak, gave a thumbs-up with his finger to say 'OK.'
Orlan said with a confused look, "Max, open it now. Everyone else, get ready."
Everyone except the officer who gave the report lifted the caution tape by hand and went inside.
Then, in the middle of the signal, Max raised both his hands. He focused his Grave Energy and gathered it inside himself. A black energy came out from his hands. The air in front of the signal cracked open, forming a fracture in the Reality Layer.
But as soon as it opened, it suddenly pulled itself shut again. It didn't even stay open for a few seconds. And not only that, an indescribable shockwave suddenly came out of it and knocked them all back, completely catching them off guard.
They were all thrown back. Only Orlan managed to stay on his feet, though he stumbled. He quickly reached out and caught the boy who had been caught in the shockwave, holding him up as the force threw him toward Orlan.
Max and Karter were thrown back and fell some distance away.
Max laughed through the pain. "Captain, this pain feels new too. I think something much bigger is waiting for us."
✦ End of Chapter 6 — The Unreachable Layer ✦