The flickering campfire still burns in my memory, though it hasn't been lit for years. I can still hear their laughter—Cyrus, Aiden, Kade—slapping each other on the back as if nothing could touch us. We were legends back then, names whispered in fear, spoken in reverence. We thought we were invincible.
I can still see the smirks on their faces as we set out that day, weapons gleaming under the sun, hearts full of misplaced pride. It was the day we went to kill him. We were so confident, so full of ourselves.
And all it took was one man. Just one. He didn't just defeat us—he annihilated us.
I remember falling. The world spun as I hit the ground, my body screaming in pain, but my mind stuck on the sights and sounds around me. The cries of my comrades—first in anger, then in agony. Blood sprayed in crimson arcs, their lifeblood soaking into the earth as if the world itself wanted to erase us. Cyrus fell first, his eyes wide with disbelief. Aiden followed, his roar of defiance silenced in an instant. Kade, always the last to go down, fought harder than the rest of us combined, but even he succumbed.
I can still see their faces, their lifeless eyes staring back at me. The weight of failure pressed down, heavier than any blade.
And yet, I survived.
Now, here I am. Sitting in a cold stone chair, a sentinel in a cave I don't even care about. Guarding something meaningless to me, wasting away in the darkness. The world moved on, forgot us, forgot me. But I don't care about any of it anymore.
If not for her...
Maki's face comes to mind, unbidden yet welcome. That girl. The only reason I'm still clinging to this pathetic excuse for existence. I don't care about what happened that day, about the blood, the betrayal, the loss. At the very least, I'll protect her. That much, I can still do. If I had one final wish, I'd ask to die before she does.
My eyes snap open, the memory fading. I glance down at the figure lying on the cold stone floor in front of me. Someone dragged him here, though I can't fathom why. He's nothing—a worthless sack of flesh. He emits no Nyu, no aura, no presence at all. He's a blank slate, as if life itself forgot to fill him in.
The thing clutched in his hand—it might be his rune, but it's a pitiful excuse for one. What a joke. I can't even bring myself to consider him a threat to Maki. Not even remotely.
And those fools who brought him here... useless, spineless idiots. They can't even gather a couple hundred Nyu between them. Why I haven't gutted them yet is a mystery even to me.
I rise from my chair, the sound of stone scraping against stone echoing through the cave. My muscles ache, stiff from sitting too long, but the movement is enough to shake the memories loose. The shadows on the walls shift and dance with the dim light of the rune fires, as if mocking me.
The sun outside must be a little past noon. I can feel its faint warmth seeping through the cracks in the cave's entrance, a distant reminder of a world I no longer belong to.
Perhaps I'll step outside for a while. Stretch my legs. Clear my mind. Because if I linger here too long, the memories will come back, sharper and crueler than before.
The view outside was no different. A wasteland of dead trees clawing at the gray sky, their brittle branches rattling in the dry wind. The air reeked of ash and decay, so thick I could taste it. My stomach churned, and for a moment, I thought I might vomit.
"Pathetic," I muttered under my breath, shaking the thought away.
With a sigh, I tapped into my essence. The energy coursed through me, igniting a familiar rush as I propelled myself forward, speeding across the jagged mountains in an instant. The desolation blurred around me until, suddenly, it was gone.
I stopped in a place I'd been to many times before—a forest so vibrant, so untouched, it almost felt out of place in this dying world. The trees here were alive, their lush green canopies swaying gently in the breeze. In the heart of the forest, a massive waterfall cascaded down into a crystalline pool below, its roar echoing like distant thunder.
Here, there was no sign of humanity. No footprints, no smoke trails, no whispers of intrusion. Only the sounds of nature and the occasional rustle of wild beasts in the undergrowth.
Here, I was king.
I looked around, surveying the land with a faint smirk tugging at the corner of my lips. In this level, I could crush anything—or anyone—without effort. The creatures that roamed this forest wouldn't dare challenge me. And as for the so-called organizations or the self-proclaimed top ten of this level? They were nothing. Worthless parasites clinging to scraps of power.
The thought lingered, heavy and tantalizing. Why didn't I just tear them apart? It would be so easy to gather the nyu I needed, to advance to the next level with Maki at my side. I could obliterate anyone in my way, carve a path straight to the top.
So why was I holding back?
I sank deeper into my thoughts as I wandered toward the waterfall. The answer scratched at the edges of my mind, reluctant to show itself. Was it fear?
Fear of losing her?
Fear of reaching higher levels where monsters far greater than me awaited?
I clenched my fists, the questions gnawing at my pride. Here, I was a monster, a force that could command this forest like a god. But up there? Beyond Level 2? Not even a thousand of me could survive Level 3 as I was now.
I pushed the thought aside and climbed to a stone ledge just above the waterfall. The rock was smooth and cool, a perfect perch to overlook the forest below. I stretched out on my back, the surface cold against my skin, grounding me.
The constant roar of the waterfall filled my ears, drowning out the rest of the world. I closed my eyes, letting the sound wash over me. For the first time in what felt like days, my body relaxed.
Before I realized it, sleep claimed me.
Even the strongest aren't immune to the call of rest, I thought fleetingly, just before darkness enveloped me.
Another memory forced its way into my mind. I was lying in a forest, my body broken and battered. My hands were shredded, my rune nearly destroyed, and every last drop of essence drained. I couldn't move. I couldn't heal. The stars above me blurred as my vision wavered, the cold grass beneath me soaking up the blood that poured from my wounds.
I had decided then to let it end. To let my life bleed out and dissolve into the earth.
In the distance, I could hear them—my friends, my comrades—screaming as they fought desperately to land even a single hit on him. The sounds of clashing weapons and guttural cries filled the air, each more hopeless than the last.
Our leader's voice still echoed in my ears, shouting encouragement, trying to keep the party's spirit alive. But his words faltered, cut short. I'll never forget the moment his head was severed from his body. His lifeless eyes stared back at us as the sheer horror set in. What followed was chaos. Desperate cries for help, the unrelenting sounds of slaughter, and then silence.
I stared up at the stars, ready to close my eyes for the final time.
But then, I heard a voice.
"Aren't the stars beautiful?"
My eyes fluttered open. Standing above me was a girl about my age, her silhouette outlined against the night sky. She blocked my view of the stars, but for some reason, I didn't mind.
I didn't answer. I couldn't.
"What? Did I disturb your sleep? Oops, my bad."
Her tone was light, almost playful, but something about her felt... off. Her voice sounded too young for the way she spoke. Or maybe I had just spent far too many years in this cursed game.
As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I noticed her rune dangling from her neck, glowing faintly in the starlight. It was a soft, pure green, shaped like a musical note. Her face was obscured, hidden by the shadows of the trees and the dark.
"Oh, what's that? You're missing a leg?" she said casually, as if commenting on the weather.
I didn't know why, but her presence didn't irritate me. If anything, after months of lying here in silence, waiting to die, I felt... something close to happiness.
I tilted my head slightly and closed my eyes. It was strange, but for the first time in ages, I felt warm.
Then, suddenly, warmth turned into sensation. My body stirred. The numbness faded, replaced by the unmistakable feeling of touch. My hands tingled, alive again. My legs... I felt them too.
My leg.
My eyes shot open.
The girl was kneeling beside me, her rune glowing brilliantly as she performed a spell. The light surrounded us, brighter and purer than anything I'd seen in years. My leg—the one I had lost in that fight—was fully regenerated. Even my rune, once shattered and lifeless, now glowed faintly, half-restored.
I gasped, disbelief overtaking me. How was this possible? Healing someone else's limbs—regenerating them—was unheard of, even at Level 3.
But before I could process it, I felt her collapse against me.
She fell into my lap, her small frame cold and limp. My hand instinctively reached out to steady her. That's when I noticed the blood. Patches of it covered her face and clothes—not hers, but someone else's.
I stared down at her, my chest tightening. What kind of hell had she been through to reach me?
I didn't know how to feel. Gratitude? Guilt? Anger? Her actions had saved me, but at what cost? I gently rested a hand on her head. Her hair was soft despite the grime and blood.
A loose, bittersweet smile broke across my face.
"Sleep well," I whispered.
And as I sat there, cradling her fragile form, I stared back up at the stars. They looked different now. Less distant. Less cold.
I felt like I'd slept far too long. The weight of it clung to me, heavy and oppressive. I tried to open my eyes, forcing them the way I usually did when exhaustion pinned them shut. But this time, it was different.
This time, I couldn't.
Instead, the world shifted around me.
I found myself standing in a black void, endless and consuming. There was nothing—no stars, no ground, no horizon. Just darkness. I turned in every direction, desperate to find some anchor, something real. But there was nothing.
I looked down, expecting to see at least my own reflection, but the ground didn't exist. There was no texture, no sensation beneath my feet. I reached for my rune instinctively, calling on its power to break free.
It was gone.
A chill ran down my spine. This place... it was only me. Stripped bare of everything, of essence, of presence. Just me.
I stood, shaking off the initial wave of panic. I hadn't felt like this in years. Vulnerable. Alone. Was this a spell? An attack?
But who? Who in this level could challenge me? There was no one left.
I spun around, frantically searching for an answer, for anything to explain this. But it was futile. The more I searched, the deeper the void seemed to stretch, as though it were mocking me.
I thought of Maki. The one constant in my existence. My mind clung to her image like a lifeline.
And then, I felt it.
A light.
It appeared behind me, faint at first but growing stronger with each passing moment. I turned slowly, cautiously, and there it was.
A single eye.
Suspended in the void, vast and overwhelming, it stared directly at me. Its flawless violet iris shimmered like liquid light, cascading iridescent hues that rippled outward and illuminated the blackness. The brilliance of it fell upon me, making me feel exposed, as though it could see into the very core of my being.
For a single moment, I stood frozen, utterly captivated.
Then, everything shattered.
I jolted awake, gasping for breath. My heart raced as my senses returned, and I was greeted by the cool night air. The darkness around me was familiar this time—the starry sky above, the pale moonlight casting gentle shadows.
This wasn't the void.
But relief was short-lived.
Something was wrong. Terribly wrong.
I reached out instinctively, searching for the presence of The Harmonis. The aura, the essence that was always there, tethering me to this level, was gone.
"Maki."
Her name escaped my lips, sharp and urgent.
Without hesitation, I raised my hand, summoning my essence. In a single, swift motion, I slashed downward, releasing a torrent of power. The entire forest and the mountains around me split apart, carved into two clean halves. A clear path now stretched before me, leading straight to where I needed to go.
I didn't waste a moment.
I leapt down the waterfall, the rush of water roaring past me as I plunged into the open path below. My face was set in stone, my mind singularly focused.
With a burst of speed, I surged forward, leaving the forest and devastation behind. My essence propelled me faster than ever, every thought consumed by one thing: reaching the cave.
Reaching her.
The mountain stood before me, its jagged peaks now cleaved in two from my earlier attack. The cave, once concealed within its depths, lay exposed, its secrets laid bare. Without a second thought, I rushed in.
The air inside was still, unnaturally quiet. Shadows flickered against the stone walls as my essence faintly illuminated the cavern.
Empty.
I searched every corner, every crevice, but found no one. No Maki. No sign of her infuriating friends. Not even the useless brat I had left behind.
My chest tightened. I extended my senses, desperately searching for even a flicker of aura—anything that could lead me to her or her party. My mind strained, combing through every fragment of energy in the cave.
Nothing.
The realization hit me like a blow. They were gone. Completely.
But I refused to believe it. Not yet.
I accessed the leaderboard, my fingers trembling as I opened the mental taps I had kept shut for so many years. A flood of notifications poured in—updates, messages, meaningless noise—but I ignored it all. My focus was singular.
I searched the party leaderboard.
Her name.
I needed to see it. Just her name. A single confirmation that she was alive, somewhere. That she hadn't been erased from existence.
But there was nothing.
Her name wasn't there.
My vision blurred as the weight of it bore down on me. The truth I had tried so desperately to deny was now undeniable.
I let go.
The grip I held on my rune, on my emotions, on everything—gone.
Essence surged through me, an uncontrollable torrent brimming in my chest. The walls of the cave quaked under the pressure, cracks spreading like veins through the stone. I stumbled back into the open air, my body trembling, my mind fractured.
Then it happened.
The aura erupted from me in a violent burst, a shockwave that rippled through the land. When I opened my eyes again, I was no longer in control.
I had lost myself.
The cybercity was the first to fall. I descended upon it with fury, my essence burning brighter and hotter with every moment.
Buildings crumbled under my power, their twisted metal frames collapsing like paper. Civilians screamed, but their cries were short-lived. I cut through them like a scythe through wheat—players, non-combatants, children—it didn't matter. None of it mattered anymore.
I unleashed my wrath indiscriminately, leveling entire districts in my rage. Fire and chaos engulfed the city, smoke rising in thick plumes that choked the sky. My blade tore through anyone in my path, and when there were no more, I struck the earth itself, leaving fissures and craters in my wake.
They had to come.
They would come.
The Sable Order.
I knew they wouldn't ignore this. My massacre would force their hand. They would descend from their gilded towers, their enforcers finally stepping into my presence.
Until then, I would destroy everything.
The descent was swift, and the cybercity sprawled before me—a glittering labyrinth of steel and neon, teeming with life. For years, I had avoided this place, its artificial hum a reminder of everything I despised. But now, it would serve as the canvas for my wrath.
The first strike came without thought. My blade tore through the tallest spire, its glowing advertisements flickering and fading as the structure groaned. Shards of glass and metal rained down like a cruel hailstorm, crashing onto the streets below.
The screams began.
I landed in the heart of the chaos, the force of my impact shattering the ground beneath me. The shockwave rippled outward, sending cars tumbling and bodies flying. I stood amidst the debris, my essence swirling like a tempest, the very air vibrating with its intensity.
Panic spread like wildfire. Civilians scattered in all directions, their cries of terror mingling with the blaring alarms. Players armed with minor runes rushed to confront me, their auras trembling in my presence.
They didn't last.
With a single swipe, I cleaved through the nearest group, their weapons shattering like brittle twigs. Blood spattered the pavement, pooling beneath the fallen.
"Cowards," I growled, my voice reverberating through the crumbling streets. "Is this the best you can muster?"
I moved forward, relentless. My essence burned brighter, consuming everything in its path. Buildings crumbled under the weight of my power, their reinforced walls caving as though made of sand. The ground splintered, massive fissures swallowing anything in their way—vehicles, bodies, even entire blocks.
A child's cry reached my ears, faint amidst the carnage. I turned, spotting a young boy clutching his mother's hand as they tried to flee. For a brief moment, I hesitated.
But only for a moment.
The energy surged from me, a pulse of raw destruction. The street erupted in a blaze of light and fire, and when it cleared, nothing remained.
I pushed onward, my path cutting straight through the cybercity like a blade through flesh. Those who tried to fight were struck down without mercy, their runes and weapons useless against my fury. Those who ran were caught in the wake of my destruction, their lives extinguished in an instant.
Above me, the artificial sky flickered. The once-vibrant neon lights dimmed as the city's power grid faltered, unable to withstand the devastation. Darkness crept over the skyline, punctuated only by the fires raging in the ruins.
I roared, the sound echoing across the desolation. "Come out!"
My voice shattered windows and silenced the remaining cries of terror. "Sable Order! Face me!"
But there was no response.
The city lay in ruins around me, its lifeblood snuffed out. And still, I burned. My essence crackled and hissed, desperate for more, demanding release.
I raised my hand, and the sky above the city turned crimson. A swirling vortex of energy gathered in my palm, growing larger and brighter until it threatened to consume everything in its path.
"Until you come, I will reduce this level to ash," I snarled. "I will erase everything."
The power surged within me, ready to be unleashed. And I waited, the only sound the crackling fires and the whispers of a city brought to its knees.
Amidst the chaos, my eyes caught it—a flicker of movement, a shadow wavering behind the twisted corpse of a fallen player. Instinct took over, and I pounced without hesitation.
My blade struck true, cleaving through the air and stopping just shy of flesh. As I landed, a man emerged from the shadows, cloaked and masked. He bore no skull emblem, no clear insignia of his allegiance, but I didn't need confirmation. The way he carried himself, the faint aura that clung to him like smoke—it was enough.
Sable Order.
I pointed my blade at his throat, the sharp edge glinting faintly in the dying light. He didn't flinch, didn't react. The chaos behind me raged on—screams, explosions, the crackle of fire consuming the cybercity—but he remained still, a statue of calm amidst the carnage.
The corpse beneath him told the story. Its stomach was pierced, grotesquely impaled by its own knee, twisted by some cruel force.
"Where is the girl with the Rune Harmonis?" I demanded, my voice like a blade itself, cutting through the din around us.
Silence.
He said nothing, his expression hidden behind the mask. My patience frayed. Without a second thought, I grabbed the front of his cloak, hauling him into the air like he weighed nothing.
"You will answer," I growled, my essence flaring dangerously.
Still, he refused to speak.
With him in my grasp, I turned back to the city. If his silence was his answer, then the city would pay the price. My rampage continued, carving through the streets like a storm. I swung my blade through fleeing crowds, reducing entire buildings to rubble with every motion. The innocents fell before me, their cries merging with the roar of destruction.
I held the man aloft, forcing him to watch as the chaos unfolded. His silence began to crack, his aura trembling under the weight of my wrath. Finally, he spoke, his voice a wavering whisper.
"They went to the northeastern province."
That was all I needed.
With a snarl, I slammed him into the street below, the impact creating a crater that swallowed the pavement. The surrounding buildings groaned under the force, and I brought my hands together, crushing both structures on either side into him. The dust and debris swallowed his form, leaving only destruction in my wake.
There was no pause, no hesitation. The moment the words left his mouth, my focus shifted. I turned, my essence propelling me forward like a comet. The northeastern province.
Maki.
The thought of her consumed me, driving me faster, harder. The air around me crackled as I surged across the broken land, leaving the ruined city behind, a wasteland in my wake.
It took mere minutes to reach the northern province. The world blurred around me, particles of air bending and warping as I sped through the terrain. In the blink of an eye, I found myself standing at the edge of a gathering.
Before me, a sea of people had gathered in the heart of the province. Their faces, a mixture of the young and old, men and women, children and elderly, were all locked in a shared gaze toward something in the center. The air hung heavy, as if the crowd itself held its breath, waiting for something, or perhaps dreading what was to come. In this mass, there were players, each adorned with their runes, the unspoken power in their eyes making the air vibrate with a quiet tension. The rich and the poor, the common and the privileged, all huddled together, their lives seemingly suspended in the gravity of the moment.
I saw shadows moving within the crowd—figures cloaked in black, their presence imposing. Six of them wore the unmistakable skull emblem, a symbol that chilled the spine. With them, the top of the level stood, their dazzling runes pulsing like beacons in the dark. Their power radiated like a storm contained, waiting to be unleashed.
It was then I realized they weren't simply observing—they were spectators at some twisted, gruesome spectacle, as if this were no different from a festival or a performance. A sickening calm enveloped the crowd. I felt my breath catch in my throat.
Tears welled in my eyes as I slowly approached the center, where the horrific sight lay exposed. Three bodies, sprawled out in the open for all to see. Two women, and one man. The man's body was grotesque, his head missing, severed as if it were nothing but a discarded piece of flesh. The two women, their faces pale, their limbs contorted in the unnatural positions of the dead, still retained the cruel traces of life that had once inhabited them. But it was their absence of life that struck with cold finality.
One of them—the girl I had fought so hard to protect, the one whose name still burned in my chest—was Maki. Her body lay limp and lifeless, her beauty marred by the brutality of her death. A gasp escaped my lips as I fell to my knees, the weight of the world crushing me all at once. The rage, the sorrow, the disbelief—all of it converged in a single moment. I was too late.
I hovered there, frozen, my body still as if controlled by the rune of the wind itself, my eyes fixated on her still form. The noise of the crowd blurred into a distant hum, their lives irrelevant in this instant. Nothing mattered now. Only the body of the girl I once knew, now reduced to a lifeless shell, burned into my mind like a cruel tattoo.
The moment I landed, the crowd took notice. Some instinctively took defensive stances, preparing to fight, while others shouted for everyone to flee, their voices scrambling in the chaos. Some simply muttered, too terrified to speak clearly, and others screamed in panic. But none of it reached me. The noise was muffled, distant—like the world around me had been reduced to a hollow shell. My ears rang with the pressure of my own fury.
My eyes were fixed, unwavering. I knelt down and gently took Maki's lifeless head into my hands. She was no longer the girl I had known—the smile that once lit up her face was gone, replaced by an expression of unrelenting stillness. Beside her, the bodies of her so-called friends lay discarded like refuse. Kael, his head severed cleanly from his body, stared into nothingness. None of them had their runes on them—those symbols of their power, their essence, stripped away as though their very identity had been stolen in death.
They were gone. They were dead.
The cold, biting truth hit me like a hammer to the chest.
A voice cut through the air, mocking, dripping with malice. "Finally showed yourself, huh? Mister 2." The tone was as insufferable as it was familiar.
I didn't even acknowledge it. I couldn't.
Another voice, one that belonged to someone who clearly didn't grasp the weight of the situation, chimed in with a laugh, "Ohhh, so these two were important to you?"
I could hear the sneers in their words, the amusement they found in my pain. But their words didn't matter, not anymore.
"What is that girl to you? Your girlfriend, perhaps? Hahaha." The laughter was hollow, empty, and it churned in my stomach like acid.
I looked up, my face a dark, indistinct mask of rage. "What did you do to her." I asked, my voice barely more than a low growl, the words dripping with fury.
One of them pretended not to hear, dragging the moment out with an exaggerated, "Ahh? I didn't hear that."
Another, emboldened by their cruel camaraderie, scoffed, "He's asking how we killed the kids."
The first voice piped up again, as if narrating some twisted show for the crowd. "Ohhhh, right. I guess the Sable Order should explain it, since we were just spectators."
I didn't move, my gaze unwavering. My body was a storm of raw, uncontained fury, but I remained still, as if waiting for the last word to break the silence.
A new voice broke through the heavy silence—a voice that was low, chilling, the kind of voice that made my skin crawl with recognition. One of the skull-emblemed figures from the Order. The words that followed came with an unsettling calmness, as if recounting a familiar tale.
"The boy's head was cut off when he tried to fight our men as the girls ran," the voice said, almost lazily. "The big girl... she got her gut pierced by one of us. And the annoying healer? She—"
"She was the main event!" Another voice interrupted, brimming with twisted glee.
The words were so casual, so mercilessly cold, that it sent a tremor down my spine. My grip on my sword, which had been firm and resolute just moments before, suddenly faltered. The weight of what they said pressed down on me like a suffocating vice.
The voice continued, more matter-of-fact now, its tone dripping with disdain. "She was incredibly annoying, healing every grave wound. Even when we tried burning the boy alive, she kept regenerating him. You know what we did? We cut her on every part of her body. We made her bleed. We let her blood drain, and each time, she healed herself. We did it again. And again. Until she just let it go. Her rune? It wasn't even close to being fully used up. She just... gave up."
I could barely hold on to the blade now. The words hung in the air like poison, the venom of their cruelty spreading through my veins. My chest tightened with the agony of what they had done. I wanted to scream, to roar, to bring this whole place down around me. But I didn't. I stayed still, as if frozen in time, my thoughts a blur of rage and heartbreak.
"Too bad you weren't there to witness all that," the voice added with a sickening finality.
I rose from my kneeling position, the sword still in my hand, but now my mind was somewhere far away, in the depths of a darkness I hadn't known existed. This was a spectacle to them. A show. The cruelty of it all—the fact that these people, these spectators, were gathered here to witness the slaughter of innocent lives, was too much to process.
I looked around, the crowd still standing there, as if in a trance. Some faces twisted into grotesque smiles, others were paralyzed by fear, some ran, and a few just... looked dead inside. Depressed. Hollow. The children—what were they doing here? Forced to watch this horror unfold before them, perhaps taught to obey, to fear, to submit.
It hit me then—the terrible, crushing weight of the situation. This wasn't just an execution; it was a message. This display, this show of violence, was meant to remind everyone. The top dogs. The Sable Order. They were sending a signal—a warning that rebellion would not be tolerated. They wanted to remind the people of the price for defying them. This wasn't about justice. It was about control.
The people were nothing more than pawns in their twisted game, forced to bear witness to a horrific display of power, their fear the only thing they could hold on to.
And it made me sick.
"Why?" My voice cracked as I spoke, the words barely escaping past the lump in my throat. I could feel the weight of the question suffocating me. I didn't want to hear the answer, but I had to ask. I needed to know the reason behind this—behind their sickening cruelty.
A brief silence hung in the air, and then one of them responded nonchalantly. "Uh, I don't know?" The indifference in his voice sent a wave of nausea through me. It was as if my pain, their pain, meant nothing at all. Just a simple question, a simple shrug.
Then, another voice broke in—another one of the figures with the skull emblem. "Because they had stolen the cloak of Master Seven," he said, as if the explanation were obvious.
Master Seven. The top seventh-ranked person of this level. But why would they—they go this far, dragging innocent lives into their madness over a cloak. These idiots, as stupid as they were, couldn't possibly have understood the weight of their actions. To kill for something so trivial?
"How do you know they stole it?"
The man flinched and took a step back, clearly unsettled by the fire in my gaze. "A—a guy had it... He—he told us it was given to him by that guy," he stammered, pointing shakily toward the headless body of Kael.
So that was it. That guy. The one they dragged into the mountain the day before. The one who sought refuge, without a rune, without any Nyu. The one with that insufferable, careless face—the same face that I could still picture so clearly in my mind. A useless pile of garbage, trying to survive in a world where he didn't belong. And they had done all of this because of him? Because of a worthless cloak that meant nothing?
They were so desperate for power, so determined to crush anything in their path, that they would destroy everything—everything—just to hold onto a single piece of worthless cloth. The depth of their depravity sank into me like an anchor, dragging me further into the abyss.
And as I stood there, my heart pounding, my resolve solidifying, I knew one thing for certain: I would not let them get away with this.
"What, you want to fight?" one of them sneered, his voice dripping with mockery. Laughter rippled through the crowd. Some of them took a few hesitant steps back, while others, with more confidence or arrogance, began calling their runes.
But I didn't move. I didn't flinch. Instead, I rose. Not just off the ground, but I rose higher. Higher into the heavens, where the air grew thin, and the sky stretched infinitely above. My body became a mere silhouette against the clouds as the air crackled, charged with power. And then, I let my essence surge.
The Terrastone. The power that ran through my veins. Nothing, not even the combined strength of all their runes, could compare to this.
Lightning crackled from my back, tearing through the air, the light illuminating the chaos below. Every bolt of energy that erupted from me painted the world in a jagged, ferocious glow.
With that, I descended.
The speed of my fall was unimaginable. I plummeted like a comet crashing toward earth, my rage and sorrow fueling the tempest within. As I descended, time seemed to stretch, slow, and then freeze. In that moment, as I neared the ground, I saw their faces. Some were terrified, eyes wide with the primal fear of the unknown, their bodies trembling as my aura began to suffocate them. Others grinned, anticipating the fight, eager for the thrill, but even they couldn't ignore the feeling of death hanging thick in the air.
I landed with the fury of an avalanche, the earth itself shuddering beneath my weight. I didn't need to see the aftermath—I knew what I had done. I felt the splintering of bone, the crack of metal, the screams that had already fallen silent. I felt the weight of my anger and my grief, manifest in the bodies that now littered the ground, their blood sprawling like rivers across the earth.
And before I knew it, it was over.
I stood at the top of a throne made of corpses, my eyes sweeping the battlefield, a silent witness to my own devastation. My rune, the Terrastone, was barely used. It had only required the slightest of touches to bring all of this destruction to life. But despite the ease with which it had been done, a heavy weight settled on my shoulders. The burden of my actions. Of what I had become. Of what I had lost.
My chest rose and fell with labored breaths, but even then, there was no relief. My head hung low. I was no longer sure if I was breathing out of rage or sorrow, but I felt everything—every ounce of it.
And then, after just minutes of the carnage, I heard footsteps.
A single, deliberate step after step, cutting through the stillness of the aftermath. The sound I had been waiting for. The one I had anticipated since the moment this madness began.
It was about time he came.
And it was about time I ended this.