Kane woke up. The sickening plunge into the void, the crushing rage, Linia's final, desperate sacrifice—it all hit him like a physical blow. He remembered the excruciating pain that followed the monster's collapse, a searing agony that felt alien, not the familiar psychic bleed of his Aspect.
He was no longer in the contracting cavity of the cathedral. He was lying on soft moss, surrounded by a lush, primeval forest.
"Where the hell am I?" he rasped, his voice raw.
He looked down. He was now wearing some kind of functional, black armor with a heavy sword strapped to his waist—clothing he hadn't possessed moments ago.
He rose and started to walk, scrutinizing each tree. A sickening familiarity settled over him. The dense canopy, the scent of damp earth, the precise angle of the ancient sunlight—it was all too real.
Then, the understanding hit him, a cold spike of dread. "So, one of my previous life memories, huh?" His voice was strained. "Do I really have a chance of escaping?"
He was trapped in the Aspect Legacy again, forced to relive the existence of an earlier, more powerful iteration of his soul. His Aspect Legacy [Essence of the Past] was supposed to be a boon, granting him the strength of past lives, but it had become a curse—a terrifying process that constantly threatened to erase his current Identity.
"I need to escape this memory," he vowed, the mission urgent.
He began searching for the exit point of the memory, the seam in the illusion. Suddenly, he became aware of movement. Animals rounding him up. These were not Nightmare Creatures, but strange, beautiful fauna—some animals he recognized only as extinct, others entirely unknown, and a herd of majestic, otherworldly deer-like creatures.
All at once, the movement ceased. All the animals were caught in a trap. The mechanisms were complex and creative, unlike any he had seen in this modern world.
As Kane approached the trapped animals, he heard a female voice, ringing with lethal intent. "So, let's fight to train you."
Kane immediately spun around. Standing there was a woman. Her features were indistinct, lost in the psychic fog of the memory, but her stance was aggressive. She was armed with a sword and lunged at him with expert speed, a lethal figure rising from the depths of his own forgotten history.
The memory snapped like a stretched wire.
Kane immediately woke up, gasping, the phantom chill of the forest replaced by the dry air of the physical world.
He was in a small, cramped room. Missy and Linia were slouching against the wall, their shoulders leaning together in exhausted repose. He felt a deep, immediate familiarity with the architecture, recognizing the terrible, warped patterns of the cathedral.
He looked around, then at Linia. "Are we back to the Forgotten Shore?"
Linia, who had been resting lightly, nodded, her eyes opening slowly. "Yeah, it seems. The cathedral's final gateway led us here."
Missy, ever the dutiful narrator, separated herself from Linia. "Well, you need to know about Clarice."
Missy then explained the terrifying final moments: Clarice's confession that she was a Husk like being—a victim sustained by her attribute.
After listening, Kane's eyes widened. "So, Clarice is also one of them, huh?" he murmured, remembering her fierce loyalty and her agonizing death. "Still..." He couldn't articulate the horror that had become of her, the way the cathedral consumed and puppeted its victims. He vowed he didn't want to face that monstrosity again.
He looked at Linia, her face pale, and asked the question that had burned in his mind since the attack. "Why did you stop the blade by throwing your life away?"
Linia looked at him somberly, her expression a mix of ancient knowledge and fresh, human vulnerability. "Because you are one of the things I care about." She saw his confusing look and continued. "Before I gained Humanity, I usually didn't care about anything but my divine duty. But after I gained my Humanity, I missed something. You know what it is?"
Kane thought for a moment. "Your family?"
"Well, my brother to be specific," Linia corrected softly. "I never felt true belonging in this new world, even though I'm freer here. But there were a few people who made me feel something common, something familiar. One of them is you."
Kane felt a pang of gratitude that cut through his fatigue. "Thanks for including me. Now, what should we do? We came out of it in one piece."
"I don't know the immediate step," Linia admitted, "but I am willing to help you find justice and information about your parents."
"Then I will help you find Antigonus, your brother," Kane countered, a pact sealed in blood and shared trauma.
Linia nodded, a relieved smile touching her lips. Then, she suddenly slumped, her body convulsing. Kane and Missy instantly caught her.
Kane looked at her skin. Traces of a horrifying, black mark were spreading beneath the surface. "Don't tell me..."
Linia's smile was weak, tinged with fatalism. "It seems I am still infected."
She immediately attempted to use the residual [Healing Lamp] memory to activate its Healing function, but it was not effective as it used to be. The disease was too potent, the memory's power too diluted.
Missy, analyzing the failure, spoke plainly. "This Memory is awakened, but weakened. We need a higher-rank healing power."
Kane thought rapidly. "We need to increase its memory rank, or..."
Then, a forgotten piece of information surfaced, a voice from the wall of the cathedral that had been overwritten by subsequent horror—Thrain's words.
The ancient message of the First Bright Lord flashed across Kane's mind, inscribed on the dusty wall in the beginning of the trial:
Dear Traveler,
When I first came here to the castle and fought with my cohort, facing that Spire Messenger in the throne room, I thought we would escape. But we found only a gateway at the Witched Crimson Spire.
Then, I found out that there are seven shards that can form an escape plan. The hunt for the shards began. I raised an expedition to find all the shards. They will not be destroyed.
If you are reading my message, then you must have come here to find the emergency exit, but sorry to say this, I need to use it because there is one of the shards here, and this place is hard to find due to its anti-divine nature.
This shard, the Dawn Shard, which has the ability to empower the memories, is here.
I have people to lead. If you are able to read this, then I have failed, spectacularly. I have been racking my brain for a solution to lessen the casualty. If you'd like to consider, after collecting the shards, I will fight the entire army of attacks, even if it kills me, because that's what a ruler does. A ruler's life is a life of service and not for his own good. Sorry for the incompetence. Please survive with less bloodshed.
By Thrain, First Bright Lord.
Kane looked at the suffering Linia, then at the cryptic message of a dead king. "Remember the First Bright Lord's message?"
Linia's eyes widened with comprehension. "Are you planning to search for the Dawn Shard? But do you know where it is?"
"Nope," Kane admitted, "but I can search as fast as possible."
He slumped against the wall, catching his breath, and reviewed his inner status—the constant, terrifying log of his burgeoning power. He looked at his runes:
Name: Kane
True Name: Deputy of Heaven
Rank: Dreamer
Class: Monster
Rebirth Cores: [ 2/2000]
Memories: [The Ultimate Defiance], [Levitating Cloak], [Shrink Chest]
Echo: -
Followers: [Mist Assassin]
Attributes: [Fated], [Mark of Divinity], [Adaptive], [Wood Shell], [Sleeper Killer]
Aspect: [Emperor of Rebirth]
Aspect Rank: Divine
Aspect Abilities: [Realmheart]
He was shocked by the sudden appearance of a new entry: Class: Monster. 'It must be a result of wielding a Divine Aspect,' he rationalized, though the term sent a shiver of self-loathing through him.
He quickly entered his Soul Sea. The temple had grown bigger. Inside, there were two altars, each containing a solidified soul core. "It seems I've grown another core, as I filled the previous ones." He theorized: "If 'Monster' means two cores, then I can grow up to seven cores. But is there any change in my abilities?"
He returned to the room, leaving Missy and Linia to rest and talk. He covered a short distance, then activated his transformation, using the solitude to test his hypothesis.
To his shock, he had grown another pair of hands. They were attached from his back, ethereal and powerful, shining with a golden energy. He could use them.
He immediately willed the second pair to vanish, and they did, but the potential was still there, a terrifying and beautiful addition to his growing monstrosity. "I don't want to spook others with another set of hands," he muttered, the irony heavy.
He returned to the room. Linia and Missy were sleeping, leaning on each other's shoulders, two damaged souls finding respite in shared survival.
Kane looked down at the pale, infected Linia, his gaze filled with a renewed, grim determination forged in the blood of his sacrifice.
"I will save you, Linia," he vowed, the whisper a sacred promise. "Whatever it takes."
The search for the Dawn Shard begins. Will Kane's growing power, and his terrifying new 'Monster' Class, be enough to save the life of the woman who died to save him?
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