This name struck her like a jolt.
Crimson Vale Institution.
Her mind flashed back to that letter she had once received, the mysterious application stamped with their seal. An elite academy whispered about in the settlement, like things of legend… and they were standing in her home.
Her fear wavered, easing into a fragile calm. She lowered the knife just slightly, though her grip still trembled.
"You're… from Crimson Vale?" she asked, her voice small.
"Yes," the man answered without hesitation. "We were sent specifically for you."
That should have reassured her, but instead it left her chest tight with unease. Why her?
Ashley shook her head, clutching the satchel closer to her chest. "No, I can't leave. Not without Lior. He's coming back. We're supposed to go together!"
The man in black regarded her for a heartbeat, his face unreadable beneath the hood. Then his tone softened, though there was a finality in it, "I'm sorry, Miss Ashley… but this place is too dangerous to stay."
Before she could even scream or strike, his arm moved with startling speed. In a single motion he scooped her off her feet, the world spinning as the satchel slipped from her grasp.
"Wait, no! Put me down! My brother!"
But her cries were swallowed by the chaos outside as the man dashed through the door, his steps impossibly swift, carrying her away from the little home she had been waiting in. And for the first time since the alarms began to ring, Ashley felt true terror not from the monsters tearing the gates apart, but from the fact that she might not see her brother again.
The man carried her through the smoke-choked streets, ignoring her desperate kicks and shouts
for Lior. Finally, he slipped into an abandoned storehouse on the edge of the district.
Inside, five other black-cloaked figures waited. Each of them stood beside a dazed youth, boys and girls no older than Ashley, their eyes wide with fear and confusion. The man set Ashley down, keeping a firm grip on her shoulder.
"Target secured," he said curtly. Another figure, taller and clearly the leader, turned his head toward him. "Good. That makes all of them."
Ashley froze. All of them?
The leader's voice was calm, but there was something in it that chilled her spine. "We were meant to move next week… but with this wave disrupting the settlements, plans are accelerating. We move immediately to the Twenty-Third Floor."
The others nodded as if it were already decided. With quick precision, they formed a tight circle around the gathered youths, cloaks swaying like a curtain of shadow.
The leader raised a hand, and another figure stepped forward, pulling a small, jagged shard from beneath his cloak. It shimmered faintly, releasing a pulse that made the air hum.
Ashley's eyes widened. She had seen enough adventurer manuals to recognize it.
"That's… a teleportation crystal…?!"
Her mind reeled. It wasn't possible. Crystals of that kind only existed from the Shrines downward, deep beyond Floor Twenty. No one in the upper settlements was supposed to even touch such a thing.
The leader pressed the shard into the ground. Instantly, black veins of energy spread across the floorboards, weaving into a glowing circle of arcane symbols. The entire room shook, a heavy vibration settling in Ashley's chest.
One by one, the children were forced closer to the circle. Some screamed, others whimpered but none could break free of the cloaked men iron grips.
Ashley tried to pull away. "Wait, I can't! My brother,he is still…."
The man at her shoulder tightened his grip. "I'm sorry, Miss Ashley.
Then the crystal flared, blinding her. The last thing Ashley saw before the light swallowed her was the faint outline of her home in the distance, small, fragile, and already drowning in smoke.
Before she disappear she muttered under her breath "Lior I will be back so please stay alive till then.", then
SWOOSH!
She disappeared.
….
Just as Lior ran, his knuckles turned pale around the hilt of the knife, his grip so tight it felt like the blade might snap in his hand. His lungs burned as he pushed forward, weaving through the panic-filled streets, but his mind was not in the present but in the past, exactly one year ago….
The house had been quiet that night, too quiet. The kind of silence that comes after screams have already been swallowed. The news of their parents being dead just arrived to them.
Ashley had cried herself hoarse, trembling in his arms as if she would vanish if she let go of him. And Lior, still just a teen himself, had nothing to offer but words. Words that became his resolved, A oath he said to himself.
"I'll protect you, Ashley. No matter what. Even if I have nothing… I'll protect you."
That promise hadn't left him. Not for a single day. Now, as he ran with his body that would soon give out, the vow dug into his chest like a blade.
He said to himself, "Three blocks. That was all. Just three blocks between him and his sister."
He pressed the knife tighter against his palm, whispering under his breath.
"Ashley… I promised. I won't break my oath. Not now."
As he darted through a narrow alley, lungs heaving, the knife flashing dully in his hand. The cries of the Settlement rose and fell around him, people screaming, monsters snarling, steel clashing, but he forced himself not to look back. Every second wasted could mean losing Ashley.
He cut through broken streets, skirting past beasts too large to fight, slipping between shattered carts and bloodied stones. His legs screamed to stop, his breath becoming haggard already, but he refused to stop and he ran like a man that as been possessed.
Ten minutes. That's how long it had taken. Ten minutes of weaving through the chaos, his heartbeats that bumped as loud as the roars at night
And then, he saw it…..
His home. Or what was left of it.
His heart pounded as he shoved the splintered door wide open, the hinges screaming in protest. He staggered two steps into the ruined room, then froze.
There, sprawled across the floor where their dining table had once been, lay the corpse of a beast. Its twisted body oozed black ichor, the claws still sharp, the fangs still bared in death. The sight punched the air out of his lungs.
His knife slipped slightly in his grip.
No. No, no, no.
If a monster had made it this far in, if it had broken into their home, then…
The thought slammed into him like a hammer, and his knees nearly gave out. It felt as if the world itself had crumbled, every wall in his mind collapsing at once. His vision swam, and for a moment, he couldn't breathe—like his chest was caught in a vice.
"Ashley…" The whisper scraped from his throat, broken.
He staggered forward, past the carcass, eyes scanning wildly—the broken chairs, the shards of glass, the overturned dishes. Everything was wrong. Everything screamed of struggle. And yet… no Ashley. Only silence.
Lior legs gave out beneath him, and he dropped to his knees in the ruins of his home. His knife clattered against the floor, forgotten. Ashley was gone.
The promise he had sworn, the one thing that had kept him moving, kept him alive through all the pain, shattered in an instant. His chest felt hollow, a void swallowing everything. He pressed his hands into the blood-stained floor, trembling. His lips moved, but no words came.
"What's the point anymore…?" His voice finally cracked, raw, empty. "There's nothing left…nothing.
He slumped forward, shoulders sagging, the weight of despair pressing him down. For a long moment, he didn't even notice the low growl behind him.
The air shifted. A shadow fell over him. He lifted his head just in time to see another beast slip through the broken doorway, its eyes burning with hunger. Drool dripped from its maw as it crouched low, muscles coiled to strike.
The knife lay only inches from his hand. Yet, staring at the monster, he didn't bothered to move. He just sat there, hollow, broken. The thought echoed again, what did it matter? What meaning did his life hold anymore?The beast roared and lunged.
The beast's roar filled the room as it lunged. Lior closed his eyes. He didn't even reach for the knife. He didn't move at all. Let it all end here…
But instead of tearing flesh, the sound that followed was the crash of claws meeting something sharp and clang y. His eyes snapped open.
He recognized the figure, it was the shadow that was following him when he was walking in the alley this evening. It had appeared between him and the monster, intercepting the strike. The creature's talons scraped against its crystalline body, sending sparks into the darkened room.
For the first time, Lior truly saw it, no longer a blur on the edge of his vision, but a figure both alien and strangely familiar.
Small, sleek, almost like a cat made of living glass, shards of light pulsing faintly beneath its skin. The beast snarled and swiped again. The shadow darted aside, fast but not unscathed, cracks splintered across its crystalline form as claws raked against it. They clashed again and again, the
room shaking with each impact. Shards chipped from the shadow's body, tinkling against the ruined floor.
Finally, with a piercing cry, the crystalline creature leapt onto the beast's head. Light flared from its body as if something within it ignited. The monster shrieked, thrashing around trying to get the shadow off its head, until the shadow drove a crystalline claw into its skull.
Then the beast collapsed in a heap, twitching once before going still. Silence.
The shadow stumbled, its glowing core flickering weakly. Cracks laced all over its body, its movements strained.
Lior sat frozen, staring at the creature. His chest heaved, but not from fear, for he had no idea what he was looking at. The thing stood there on four sharp limbs, body crystalline, almost feline in shape… and yet it wasn't a cat. It wasn't anything he knew or read about.
His lips parted. "…What… are you?"
The shadow lifted its head, those strange crystalline eyes meeting his. For a heartbeat, he thought he saw something inside them, an intelligence, or maybe just a reflection of his broken self. It took a faltering step toward him before collapsing onto the floor with a dull crack.
The crystalline shadow staggered toward him, its body cracking with each step. Lior didn't move. He could only watch, wide-eyed, as the strange creature closed the distance. Then, just before it reached him, its legs buckled.
With a faint sound, half like glass breaking, half like a sigh, the creature collapsed at his feet.
Lior jerked forward instinctively, hand outstretched. But instead of shattered fragments, the thing's body shimmered… and shrank. Its form folded in on itself, its light drawing inward, until all that was left was a faintly glowing orb, no larger than his fist. The orb rolled once across the ruined floor, stopping beside his boot. Its glow pulsed softly, like a slow heartbeat.
Lior stared at it, unable to breathe. He didn't know whether to pick it up or run away. His hand trembled as he reached down. The orb was warm, unnaturally warm, as though it was alive.
"What… is this…?" he whispered to himself. The house around him was silent, except for the distant echoes of destruction outside.