The Sword Spirit reached for the core. A soundless pulse rippled through the white expanse as her dark, glasslike hand made contact. Palm flat against the core's membrane she stepped right through.
…
A clearing.
Blue embers drifted lazily in the air, suspended like dying fireflies. Beneath her feet, the ground had become a slow-churning black void—viscous, unstable, yet somehow walkable. Above, a single dim white light filtered down like moonlight seen from underwater.
And scattered across this dreamscape were hundreds of millions of glowing figures—human-shaped, indistinct. Souls.
Panic swelled like static.
"We're dying!" cried one soul, its voice shrill, echoing.
"What are we supposed to do?!" another shouted.
"I don't want to go to Hylia—I'm Christian!" a third wailed, clutching their head in confusion.
Chaos rippled through the crowd.
A voice rang out from somewhere deeper in the mass—furious, desperate. "What blasphemy! There is only Allah!"
"No! There is only Brahman!"
"Fools! The Light of Hylia guides us all!"
"Shut up-nerd!"
"Y'all are nuts! Jesus already came back and I missed it?!"
"Why was my Tagatha never referenced?"
"Hey who's that over there?"
The chaos stuttered. A ripple passed through the crowd as countless glowing heads turned.
The Sword Spirit stood at the edge of the soulsea—silent, sharp, utterly still. Her black-glass skin shimmered faintly in the light, red eyes glowing like coals buried in ash. She made no sound. Yet every soul present seemed to feel her gaze pierce through the weight of their doubt and clashing belief.
"She's not one of us," a voice whispered.
"I think she's in that sword that Kylia held," muttered another.
"She seems like she's looking for something," said a third.
The Sword Spirit continued forwards, ignoring the others.
"Hey! Where is she going?!!"
"If she continues forwards, she will encounter those 3.5!"
"Maybe we should try and stop her?"
"Hell no! I don't want to die! Let those 3.5 handle her!"
"Yeah! Let's do that!"
The Sword Spirit said nothing.
She moved forward, slow and deliberate, each step leaving a ripple across the viscous black ground. The sea of souls parted further, many recoiling, others blinking out like extinguished stars rather than risk proximity.
The surrounding space became narrower with each step, unnoticeable at first.
The embers above intensified, their light contrasting the thickening dark. The souls—once scattered across a wide dreamscape—now lingered only behind her. Ahead, nothing. The black void beneath her feet deepened in color, reflecting no light, no depth. Only endless pressure.
And the space around her seemed to press in, walls that weren't walls shifting subtly inward.
After what would seem like an eternity the Sword Spirit encountered four, four winged figures guarding a portal. Its core was black—not the natural absence of light, but a consuming center, a singularity that pulled thought, time, and reality toward it.
Its rim, however, was wild—a turbulent storm of blue and vibrant hues that twisted and folded across themselves in impossible ways. Hints of red, gold, violet, and green shimmered like oil on water, never still, never repeating. It crackled with soundless energy, each pulse rattling the void around it.
The Sword Spirit stopped.
A black haired man closest to the sword spirit answered. "Hello, umm…my name was Andrew, I am the leader of us four-"
"Three and a half!" Interrupted a young white haired woman.
"Shut up you suicidal maniac! I am a person!" An older white haired man retorted back.
"Hey…let's all not fight, we have a sword loli here" Interjected a blue haired woman.
"Ahem! Anyways, I would suggest that you should not continue any further, for your own safety of course." Replied Andrew, silencing the other quarreling figures.
The Sword Spirit spoke. "Step aside."
Andrew's wings flickered. His hands slowly opened and closed. "I'm warning you. What's on the other side of this portal is too dangerous."
"It is where I must go," the Sword Spirit replied, her voice low and blade-flat. "I want her body."
"Wait—what?!" said the blue-haired girl, eyebrows disappearing into her bangs.
"Oh, that is sick, man!" the younger white-haired woman grimaced, taking a full step back.
The older white-haired man raised a hand, glowing with soul energy. "Alright, that's it. I'm purging this—"
But in that moment, the Sword Spirit shot through the portal with such speed it left the four breathless.
"..."
"Well. I did try to warn her."
…
She emerged atop a grassy hill.
The blue floating embers were gone. The white light above had grown so intense she had to squint against it. Jagged cracks streaked the blue sky. Black sludge seeped through the soil, staining the grass. The air reeked of ash. On the horizon, gray flames towered like siege walls.
On the top of the grassy hill stood Kylia, her back facing the Sword Spirit. The Sword Spirit, seeing the opportunity, summoned a sword similar to the one Lord Ghirahim uses and stabbed the figure in front of her.
"Die."