(Ryuta POV)
I feel like I'm suffocating. Something's stabbing into me—again and again. My body won't move. I'm stiff, like a corpse carved into stone.
I felt both wrists were shackled, my arms strung up so I could barely kneel, my knees hovering just above the ground. The room was dark, and a light flickered in an unnatural wash of colors—red, then blue, then yellow—cycling endlessly like a sick strobe meant to confuse.
I couldn't lift my head. Not until someone yanked it up by the hair.
A middle-aged woman crouched in front of me, breath hot and sour against my lips. Then—her mouth crashed into mine.
It wasn't a kiss. She forced a bitter liquid down my throat, transferring it straight from her own mouth. I gagged, but my body wouldn't twitch in protest. Couldn't.
When it was done, she spat to the side, sneering. "Blergh. Why the hell am I the one feeding this corpse?"
"Shut it, old hag!" barked a gruff male voice from somewhere in the dark. "Ain't no way us men are doin' that shit. That's a woman's job."
Laughter and jeers followed. A few insults thrown at me, most of which I didn't catch—or didn't care to. What did I even do to deserve this?
I hung there, limp in the chains, the bitter taste coating my tongue. Was it food? Sedative? Poison? Maybe all three. Maybe none. Whatever it was, they weren't trying to kill me. Not yet.
But survival didn't mean living.
How did I end up here?
'You were dragged here.'
Right. I remember…
I was intercepting the King Dragon troupes, trying to stop them from crossing into Asura territory—a smaller force than I expected. After just a few traps and large-scale spells, I understood why.
North God Style practitioners. And not just fodder, they were high-ranked combatants.
There was the short disco-ball knight, a pair of blabbering rabbit-eared twins, a ninja-looking freak with a bowl cut and a peacock tattoo, and—lastly—the young man with black hair and Gravity Magic longsword.
He was the strongest of the bunch. He adapted to my attacks faster than I could dish them out. His gravity-forged sword turned every clash into a challenge of who could land the most near-hits. And if I analyzed his moves right, then he was the only one of the bunch who used the original North God Style.
Thanks to Sumizome, I brought down the shining mini knight and the rabbit duo. Then his Fenris Wolf form gave me an opening to behead the ninja.
But I got careless after that. Left myself open to the last one.
The black-haired swordsman struck. Sumizome tried to shield me—took a critical blow in the process. Before the final hit knocked me out, I shouted for him to warn Orsted.
That's the last I remember.
So… why am I still alive? And how long has it been?
'Two weeks.'
That long? Orsted and Nanahoshi… maybe they're searching for me. Honestly, I'm surprised I'm alive to begin with.
'Aren't you more worried that this is almost exactly like last time?'
…Huh?
Am I insane, or has there always been a voice whispering directly in my head?
'Wow. That blast really scrambled your brain. Or maybe it's tetanus from those spikes drilled into your spine. Hard to say since you aren't getting any medical care because of your resilient body.'
…
'Or maybe,' the voice drawled, 'you've just gone quiet enough to hear me finally.'
…
'Say something. Think something. Anything.'
…Alright. Fine. Who—or what—the hell are you? Parasite hitching a ride? Or just me losing my mind?
'I'm the least of your problems, kid. What you should be worried about is the necromancy ritual you're strapped into.'
Necromancy? Reviving the dead? That would explain the corpse I can sense through the mana circle—
'Hold up, lemme tilt you a bit… there.'
My head jerked upward like a puppet on strings.
That's when I saw it.
A carcass sprawled across the glowing runes: a dragon-shaped horror stitched from scraps. A mockery of Cerberus with three mismatched heads, each one sealed with metallic sutures. Purple ichor dripped between its scales. The central head was split vertically down the middle, a grotesque face barely held together. Beneath it all, an enormous Magic Circle, interconnected to places out of my sight.
A Frankenstein's dragon.
'So that's his plan. Typical trash, sewing together someone else's leftovers.'
Are they… trying to bring that thing to life? Is that what the Magic Circle is for?
'Judging by the runes, yep.'
I have to stop this—
'Hate to break it to ya, but you're not stopping anything. Not with the anti-magic shackles on you, hooks in your spine, and your mana being drained like wine at a tavern. Yikes. Glad I'm not you right now.'
Do you at least know where we are? Or at least how I can get out of this?
'Working on it. I'm more curious how they hauled that corpse out of the roots in the first place…'
You're no help.
***
Hours passed. Sometimes they stabbed syringes into me, injecting some venom that made my body even more numb than it already is.
All I could do was just hang here, and not in the chilling kind of way.
The old hag came one more time, and it was the same thing as earlier, when I first awoke—feeding me mouth-to-mouth and yanking my hair.
Eventually, the air changed.
"Get everything ready!" someone barked. "It's about to begin!"
'Uh-oh. That's never a good sign.'
Oh, really!? You think!?
Footsteps echoed. Most left the chamber. Only a handful remained—four near me, two by the exit.
"Let's begin," said one of them.
Something latched to my back thrummed.
And then—agony.
My mana ripped free, dragged out through the hooks like marrow sucked from bone. It wasn't blood. It wasn't breath. It was me—the core of myself—unspooling into the circle.
I tried to scream. Nothing came out—just a jaw clattering like broken glass.
The flow didn't stop.
Another wrench. My nerves lit up.Another tear. My bones felt hollow.Another pull. My vision fractured, black spots chewing at the edges.
And still, the circle drank from my manapool.
When the last thread of mana bled from me, I sagged forward, breath rasping out of me like a torn bellows. My body dangled in the shackles, barely responsive, my head lolling against my chest. I wasn't unconscious, but I wasn't awake either. Halfway gone, drifting in a limbo.
Through the haze, I felt it—the floor beneath me thrumming like a heartbeat.
All that remained were faint vibrations against the floor, distant voices muffled through the haze. I couldn't make out the words—just tones—sharp, commanding, low, whispering. My body registered them like aftershocks rumbling through a corpse.
Eventually, the rattling of chains broke the monotony.
Hands gripped me, rough and impatient. The shackles were undone with a snap, and my body dropped like a sack of meat. I hit the floor, unable to catch myself. Cold stone bit into my skin.
"Still breathing," a voice muttered. "Barely."
Boots scraped, and then—hands under my arms again. I was dragged, my heels scraping the floor, down corridors where the air grew colder, damper. My vision blurred, darkness swallowing the shifting lights I'd grown sick of.
Finally, they threw me in.
I hit the ground hard, rolling once before coming to a stop. The space was small, walls slick with condensation, the air heavy with mildew and rust. A cell. A pit.
The door slammed shut. Metal rattled. The sound echoed like a death knell.
I lay there, motionless, half-awake but trapped in my own useless body. The silence in my head was louder than the voices outside had ever been.
The silence didn't last forever.
A dry chuckle crawled back into my skull.
'Déjà vu, huh? Hung up, stripped, spat on… doesn't this remind you of the good ol' days? Your real downfall? The day when you began becoming the trash you are?'
No. I didn't want to hear it. The past should stay the past.
'Oh, don't lie. Remember? That day? Naked, strung up at school, not a shred of dignity left. Everyone laughing, pointing their phones, recording every twitch, every whimper.'
Faces flickered across my vision, sharper than the cell's darkness. Faces of boys and girls I once knew. Eyes gleaming with cruelty, mouths twisted in laughter. Hands shoving, snapping pictures with their phones.
My breath hitched. It was the same. Exactly the same.
Back then, I wasn't a person to those people. I was an object—something to be displayed, broken, tossed aside, and laughed at.
Just like now. Shackled, drained, shoved in a cell like meat left to rot. Not human. Not to them.
'See? You get it. This isn't about survival anymore. You think they're going to stop with you? Nah. You're the tool. The joke. The thing. Just like back then.'
My chest tightened. I could almost feel the same helplessness from back then, the sense that made me think that the only safe place was my room.
But here? I do not feel safe. Not at all.
'But here's the difference. Back then, you were locked in your own mind. You let them carve the ending for you. But now? This is just steel. Shackles. Rust. Things you can break. So tell me—are you really gonna let this slip again? Gonna let them laugh and walk away, Scot-free? Or… are you finally going to stand the hell up on your own?'
Heat stirred inside me. A faint ember in the hollow where my mana had been. It grew, coiling, boiling, searing my veins raw.
I cursed under my breath. My fists clenched. My body trembled.
"No… no more…"
The promise I made to myself, that I would not fall back to my former self, caging myself into that tiny room... I was not about to make a repeat of that pathetic version of me.
Forcing myself to my feet, legs shaking, vision blurring, I staggered toward the bars and pressed my hands against the cold metal.
The iron shrieked like a dying animal, bending, twisting, snapping in my grip until the bars tore free. They clattered onto the stone.
Shouts and running feet reached my ears. Three guards rushed in, steel flashing as they unsheathed their swords. One opened his mouth to bark a warning—
Then I raised my left hand at them. Didn't even look at them with my eyes.
The first guard shrieked as the flame split him down the middle, ribs glowing white before his armor sagged into molten slag. His body crumpled into a steaming heap.
The second barely had time to scream before the fire swallowed him too.
The third guard froze at the sight. Then he turned and ran, boots slapping against the stone until the sound vanished into the dark.
Meanwhile, as I tried to walk down the hall, I stumbled forward, my skin prickling from the cold, yet inside I burned. Rage hotter than fire, a furnace that kept my body moving when nothing else would.
I didn't know where I was, nor did I even care if this was a prison after all.
My pocket dimension opened like a wound in the world. From its depths, the grey robe slipped into my grasp. Behind it, something heavy crashed onto the stone.
The black sword the masked man left me had a jagged edge on one side and a linear one on the other, both sides covered in purple crystals.
I pulled the robe over me, buckles scraping against my raw wrists. Then I bent, fingers curling around the hilt.
It was heavy. Too heavy. The tip dragged against the ground, sparks kissing the stone as I dragged it behind me. But I lifted it anyway.
The air felt like it was being absorbed by my skin, as if my body was slowly increasing my mana absorption. What once felt like just sipping water was now gulping it down.
Two more guards came and charged me.
Lightening the sword via Gravity Magic, one swing cut them down — armor, flesh, bone, all at once. There was barely any resistance from the impact, so I'm assumjiong that this was the sword's special type of Magic, Toxic Magic or whatever.
After that, I don't remember the details. Only the spray against the walls and the silence that followed.
Something slipped out of me. At first, a chuckle. Then a snicker. Then laughter—raw, jagged, tearing its way out of my throat until it echoed down the hall.
It wasn't joy. It wasn't relief. It was something feral, too sharp to be mine.
Even as it spilled from me, I felt my chest tighten—like the sound belonged to someone else and I was only the vessel.
But I didn't stop. Couldn't. Because I hadn't broken. Because I had stood up. Because I hadn't given them the freedom to give me an ending.
And those who stay in my way... shall meet their end by my own two hands.
With every step, the structure trembled. Dust fell. Stones groaned. Power bled from me—not borrowed, not drained, but overflowing.
I wasn't empty anymore. I was alive. And my past would repeat itself unless I have a say in it.
///