The colossal, skin-stitched sword had speared through Linia, its point emerging in a spray of thick, vital blood. She slumped, a shield of borrowed humanity, her dying breath a whispered, sacred commandment: "Just... Don't... die. You... are... precious... to... me."
Kane looked at her, lying down on the floor, bleeding, the image searing itself into his consciousness. The sight was a grotesque mirror—a traumatic rerun of his deepest, most agonizing memory: his father and mother dying in front of him. The psychic wound was reopened, and a towering, monstrous wave of enormous rage rose to eclipse all fear, all pain, all sanity.
Not again. Never again.
He roared, a sound that was no longer human but a guttural tear of despair. The fragile connection points of the surrounding husk swords that pinned him were instantly shattered by the sheer psychic force of his fury. He violently ripped the remaining pieces of leathery armor from his flesh and leaned over her body.
The monster, its intelligence panicked by the sacrifice, began to regroup, its scattered husks sliding towards the center. In the precious seconds before it could fully reassemble, Kane leaned close to Linia. She was still breathing, shallow and rattling.
"I will transfer you [Band of Heaven]," he hissed, his eyes manic and focused. " It will heal you. Just don't die."
He touched her hand and transferred the Memory.Linia's heart wound thrummed with a sudden, soothing feeling, succumbed to unconscious but stabilized.
Kane stood, his body a map of fresh, crimson gashes, and walked forward, ignoring the throbbing pain. He faced the monster, which was now fully re-assembling back into its hideous humanoid form.
His madness was complete. The [Sleeper Killer] resummoned as a sword, Kane dashed toward the creature. He swung the sword, and the monster, adapting its defense, split into multiple husk swords again. One came at him directly, aiming for his head.
Kane caught it—with his mouth.
He bit down, the foul, dry leather of the sword-husk scraping against his teeth. The monster momentarily stopped, stunned by the raw, animal aggression. Kane smiled—a terrible, maniacal smile, blood mixing with spittle, madness reeking in his eyes.
He broke the sword with his mouth, spitting the pieces out.
Slowly, deliberately, he advanced. He shattered the surrounding husk swords, some with his weapon, some with his bare, bloody hands. Nothing could stop him. He reached the main body and began a relentless, visceral attack, not just striking, but severing the physical and psychic links between the husks.
The creature rearranged itself desperately, trying to flow and reform to avoid his strikes, but Kane was a blur of frenzied motion, slowly but surely bringing down its numbers.
Then, the monster slipped its shape entirely. It split its husk pieces into like pieces of clothing, which began to wrap tightly around Kane's body, suffocating him, rendering him immobilized in a cocoon of dead skin.
The monster felt a small, sharp pain and recoiled. It looked down to find Kane biting off pieces of the creature's flesh where it touched his shoulder, ripping and chewing it out with furious, guttural growls. The beast wrapped its disgusting hold tighter, crushing his ribs, but Kane never faltered. He ripped husk after husk with his mouth, a savage tug-of-war continuing until the monster, in a final act of bewildered revulsion, left him and re-assembled back, this time significantly smaller and uneven—it had lost most of its material thanks to Kane's primal assault.
Kane stood, soaked in his own blood and the rotten essence of the husks. He looked at the diminished form of the monster and shouted, a raw, psychotic sound. "What's wrong, bastard? Lost some weight?"
The monster reacted with predictable rage. They clashed, and in the final, desperate move, the monster dissolved and reformed one last time into multiple swords that surged toward Kane, intending to root him into the floor and drive into his heart simultaneously.
The swords rooted him, penetrating his skin and driving inward. But as the agony spiked, Kane shaped the [Sleeper Killer] in his hand into a small, perfect knife. With methodical, cold efficiency, he began to use the knife to remove the sword pieces from his body, one by one.
After removing the last penetrating piece, a chilling, disembodied voice—the ethereal resonance of the cathedral's internal logic—echoed around the chamber. It was the Nightmare spell's notification:
[You have killed a Fallen Beast, Thousand Faces.]
[You have received a Memory...]
Kane stood victorious, blood streaming from dozens of punctures, a maniacal smile plastered on his face. He began to laugh like a lunatic, a mix of relief, exhaustion, and pure madness.
Suddenly, his body convulsed. This was not the familiar burn of his Aspect; this was a sharp, alien pain that seized his muscles and brain, causing his vision to white out. The bleeding, combined with this sudden, debilitating surge of foreign energy from the defeated monster, rendered him unconscious.
[Missy's POV]
Missy looked at both of them. Kane was a bleeding, collapsing statue of rage, and Linia was an unconscious victim of a spiritual disease.
She desperately wanted to help them, but her gaze was fixed on Clarice, who was constantly attacking her. Ever since Kane and Linia started their fight, Clarice had seemed to be entering and leaving a trance, her eyes glazing over before she began assaulting Missy.
Missy yelled, her muffled voice strained. "Why are you attacking us? Clarice, get a grip!"
Clarice, limping heavily on her remaining leg, started using her Aspect, forming crude rocks that she hurled with surprising speed. Missy was clearly holding back, avoiding a killing blow, struggling to defend herself while protecting the two unconscious figures.
Then, the attack suddenly stopped. Clarice's image began to flicker faintly, like a faulty projection.
Clarice, her eyes returning to a grim normalcy, looked at Missy with profound sadness. "Missy... it seems I am one of the ghosts."
Missy was shocked. "But how is that possible? You looked normal compared to others!"
"It is because of one of my attributes... a preservation mechanism," Clarice explained, her voice growing hollower, more distant. "But it doesn't matter anymore, because I am already dead because of that cathedral."
Missy's mind raced. "So that Emma... she is the one, isn't she? She is the cathedral all along."
"No. Emma is one of the victims," Clarice corrected, her voice fading. "It took Emma's persona, that's all. It uses them until they're spent." She fought a final, agonizing spasm. "Soon, a gateway will open. All three of you, just escape."
As soon as she spoke the last word, the stone wall behind Clarice ripped open. A bright, shimmering gateway formed on the barren surface, a luminous tear in the cathedral's corrupted body.
Missy, without a second thought, immediately grabbed Linia and Kane, her surprising strength allowing her to drag both unconscious, heavily wounded bodies toward the gateway.
As she was about to enter, she saw Clarice standing at the edge of the dimensional portal. Clarice offered a final, ghost-like smile. "Go. My story is over. Go and live yours."
Missy felt a sharp pang of regret. She couldn't fully fathom Clarice's pain, but she somewhat understood it. Missy simply nodded, a silent acknowledgment, and pulled the two unconscious bodies into the gateway.
As soon as she entered the blinding light, she felt a profound shift in energy, and then landed hard on damp earth. She found herself in a place she recognized instantly from one of Kane's earliest memories. It was the Forgotten Shore.
Missy looked down at Kane, still bleeding but stabilized, and Philanias, now inert but already slowly healing due to the transfer. The trial was over.
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The trial is over and Kane has returned to the forgotten shore,soon will meet the original cohort.Kindly the review and comment