Later that evening, after everyone had departed for their respective homes, Jihu retreated to his private study. He unfolded the paper Raven had given him. It was blank, save for a single address written in elegant, familiar script. Beneath the address, a short, urgent message was scrawled: "Come and meet me here as soon as possible."
The air in the dungeon hung heavy, thick with the scent of damp stone and something else, something acrid and unsettling, like decay barely masked by illusion. Jihu, heart thumping a nervous rhythm against his ribs, followed the address Raven had given him. Freedonia's midnight darkness pressed in, but a faint, unnatural glow emanated from the cavernous mouth before him. Just as Raven had described.
He stepped inside, the echoes of his boots swallowed by the oppressive silence. And then he saw him. Raven. Standing with his back to Jihu, a silhouette against the dim, ethereal light that seemed to cling to the dungeon walls themselves.
"Raven?" Jihu called, his voice bouncing off the unseen walls.
The figure turned, and Jihu's breath hitched. He stumbled back a step, a sudden, icy dread clutching at his throat. It was Raven, he knew it, the set of the shoulders, the familiar height. But… it wasn't. Not the Raven he'd laughed with over morning tea just hours ago.
This Raven was… skeletal. His skin was stretched taut over sharp bones, a sickly greyish-white in the dim light. Deep shadows gouged out his cheeks and temples, and his eyes, once warm and bright, were now hollow pits that seemed to absorb the faint luminescence around them. He looked like a corpse, animate but lifeless, a chilling mockery of the vibrant man Jihu knew.
"Brother… Raven?" Jihu managed, his voice a strained whisper. "What… what happened to you? You were fine this morning."
Raven sighed, a sound that rasped in the silence, like dry leaves skittering across stone. "This… this is my true form, Jihu. My reality." He gestured vaguely at his gaunt frame. "I can't… I can't go before Roxy and Faith like this. They would be terrified."
A raw ache tightened in Jihu's chest. He saw the agonizing truth in Raven's desolate eyes. "But… the Raven we saw… in town…"
"An illusion," Raven confirmed, his voice heavy with weariness. "A carefully constructed façade. Do you think I haven't yearned for years to hear Roxy call me 'Father'? To have Faith accept me? He even said I was handsome, remember? Handsome!" A bitter laugh escaped Raven's lips, a sound that held no mirth, only self-deprecation. "Perhaps he was just afraid to contradict me."
Jihu stared, comprehension dawning. "So… for three years… you've been changing your form… just to see them?"
Raven nodded, his gaze drifting downwards. "Yes. But it's become… excruciatingly difficult. Maintaining the illusion drains me. My spiritual power is dwindling. If you hadn't seen me today, I might have simply… stopped meeting them. Disappeared again." He looked up at Jihu, desperation etched onto his skeletal features. "But now that you know… I have no choice but to ask for your help."
His voice dropped, becoming a low, pleading murmur. "Call it selfishness, Jihu. The selfishness of a father desperate for a few more days with his daughter. The longing to see the love I sacrificed everything for reflected in her eyes. The desperate hope for just a little more time with Shu, my soulmate. Call it greed, the last gasp of a dying man clinging to life. I just… I need to borrow your spiritual power. Just enough to sustain my illusion for a week."
"Borrow?" Jihu repeated, a knot of unease tightening in his stomach. "But… how would that work? If I give you spiritual power for a while, how will you get it back? You're talking about healing yourself?"
Raven shook his head, a slow, mournful movement. "There's no healing for this, Jihu."
Jihu's anger flared, a protective instinct kicking in. "Then what are you saying? You'll use my power to maintain this illusion, and then what? You'll… you'll just vanish? Your whole body will… merge with the air? Brother, why are you doing this? Do you know how terrible the consequences can be? Siphoning spiritual power is dangerous!"
Raven managed a weak, self-deprecating smile. "What other option do I have, brother?" He spread his gaunt hands, as if displaying his ravaged form. "I've thought about this endlessly. This… this is the only way. I just… I need Shu to forgive me before I finally fade. I want to die with the peace of knowing she doesn't hate me."
His voice cracked, a raw vulnerability exposed. "Do you think… after all these years, I can simply appear before them like this? Like a walking corpse? Show Roxy her dying father, returning only to die in front of her eyes? Tell Shu that I'm dying, begging for forgiveness? Maybe Shu would forgive me if she saw this. But… would it be real forgiveness? Or pity?"
Silence descended, heavy and thick with unspoken grief. Jihu stared at his friend, his heart aching with a mixture of pain and understanding. Raven's words resonated with a terrible, heart-breaking logic. There were no good options. Only degrees of bad.
Finally, Jihu sighed, the sound ragged and defeated. "I'll help you."
Relief flooded Raven's face, momentarily softening the harsh lines of his decay. "Thank you, Jihu. Thank you, my friend." He stepped forward, his voice gaining a flicker of strength. "I promised Roxy I'd return in a week. I need to maintain the illusion until then. I'll need your power intermittently. Just for short bursts, when I have to be seen. The rest of the time… I can conserve what little I have left."
He paused, searching Jihu's eyes. "I knew you'd understand. That's why I called you. Even after all these years of silence… you're still my brother." He reached out, drawing Jihu into a weak, fragile embrace. Jihu hugged him back, feeling the brittle sharpness of Raven's bones beneath the thin fabric of his clothes.
Pulling away, Jihu managed a weak smile, trying to inject some levity into the devastating situation. "Alright, alright, enough with the sentimentality, you old ghost. Let's get this over with. And no more emotional hugs, okay?" He chuckled, a forced, unsteady sound. "Remember that time we almost set Fang's hair on fire trying to make that potion? Good times, right?"
Raven actually laughed then, a rusty, creaking sound that was nonetheless a welcome break from the oppressive despair. They talked for a while, reminiscing about their shared past, the easy camaraderie a small balm in the face of their current grim reality.
As Jihu turned to leave, Raven's voice stopped him. "Jihu… one more thing. Don't tell Fang about this."
Jihu frowned, turning back. "Fang? Why not?"
Raven's expression turned serious, his hollow eyes gaining a surprising intensity. "You know Fang. He's always been… emotional. We all are, in our own ways. But you and I, we know how to control it. Fang… Fang's emotions are like wildfire. Remember all the trouble he caused us as kids? Your father and mine were always scolding him, muttering about his reckless heart endangering us all." He sighed again, the sound laced with resignation. "No, don't tell Fang. Not yet. When… when it's time, I'll tell him myself. If there's still time."
He gave Jihu a faint, sad smile. "Don't worry, brother. I won't deceive you again like I have these last three years. My silence… it was a great injustice to you. But now… you'll be by my side until the end. My friend, my brother. Goodbye for now, Jihu. We'll see each other in a week."
Jihu nodded, unable to speak past the lump in his throat. He turned and walked away, the weight of Raven's secret and the fear of the future settling heavily on his shoulders. Sadness, disappointment, pain – a tangled knot of emotions twisted in his gut. He left Raven standing alone in the dimly lit dungeon, a skeletal statue haunted by the ghosts of his past and the uncertainty of his future. The dungeon door closed behind Jihu, plunging Raven into deeper shadow, leaving him to contemplate the fragile illusion he was so desperately trying to maintain, and the inevitable fading darkness that awaited him.