Moments before John attacked Veer, in a different area, Sythris looked at the figure in front of her. All around them, the headless knights were no longer there. The silence left behind felt unnatural.
She was bleeding. The fight with Caria had been quite burdensome. She took heavy breaths. Sweat and blood mirrored the state of her body and mind. But more than that, her mind was in turmoil. The shock of her memories placed a crushing weight upon her mind and soul.
She was also stunned as she finally noticed the castle top. It was burning somehow, black smoke rising into the night.
"When did that happen?" she thought.
Meanwhile, Canthia was not even a bit flustered. No emotion seemed visible on her face. Her eyes were covered by a blindfold. Her dress looked beautiful even amidst the carnage.
She looked at Sythris and whispered, "You have seen it."
Sythris raised her eyes and pointed her sword at Canthia.
"What are you talking about?"
Canthia sighed, but suddenly her body convulsed as she vomited. Violent tremors spread across her body before she collapsed to the ground.
Sythris froze. "What happened?" she asked, still pointing her sword.
Then Sythris noticed something as her pupils dilated. The skin around Canthia's eyes was tearing apart as she screamed. Blood seeped through her eye patches.
"Forbidden knowledge..." Sythris muttered in a shaken voice.
"It's because of you," shouted Canthia in an agonized voice.
"I should not have seen it..." she screamed.
Canthia cried out again, "Go... Sythris, or... it will be too late to save him..."
"He... in the vision..."
"Ah..." Canthia couldn't continue, and Sythris realized that. Still, Sythris paused and looked behind her toward Caria's unconscious body.
"About Caria..." muttered Sythris.
"She... she will be okay... Just go..."
Sythris nodded and began running, her body trembling.
As she ran, faint voices echoed through the corridors.
"He... how could he possibly have survived all that..."
....
Back at the castle premises, the flames continued to spread across the top of the castle, devouring it slowly.
Just before Veer arrived and John started acting mad, the atmosphere itself had turned cold. A faint strip of pale light could be seen far to the east, hinting that the endless night was finally nearing its end. But one question still lingered.
How many would survive this battle?
At the foothills of the castle was a scene of utter chaos. At the center near the gates, the giant cross still stood with the huge human embedded within it. The survivors gathered around it still could not believe that hundreds had suddenly died and that so many golden knights had burnt to ashes.The winds blew gently blowing the ashes of the burnt golden knights.
The blue mages were healing whoever remained alive and injured. They cast powerful spells all around while the few who could still move slowly staggered toward the health center to the south.
A black knight was also being carried in that direction by a lady of Breavan. She was Sethsi. The knight in her arms was Symon, the same man pierced by John.
On the extreme left, another brutal battle continued to rage. The fight between Noelle and the knights.
Noelle had transformed from a witty, talkative noble lady into something less than human and more like a monster with numerous hands. The only thing that seemed common was striking red hair.
Nyelle, the black knight known for her fists, fought her while weeping as she muttered, "Have you sacrificed your humanity, sister?"
She struck forward as black voids briefly formed around her fists, colliding against Noelle's dreamy silky hands. Those hands appeared ethereal, sometimes shifting like puppet joints as though adjusting themselves to every incoming attack.
Noelle stepped back slightly while deflecting everything with her dreamlike hands. She spoke in a disturbing eerie voice, "What does that matter to you? Now you can kill this monster without any guilt, sister."
"Isn't that better?"
Rhaelle suddenly lunged forward with his whip as a strike landed on Noelle.
Noelle abruptly stopped moving. Her eyes slowly drifted toward the far west. A man was approaching from there. It was none other than Veer. There was also a woman resting on his shoulder.
Noelle screamed, "You perverted man! Taking another woman while your mistress is here!" Veer couldn't even hear her from that far away. Nyelle was even more agonized hearing that and stopped briefly.
It was at that exact moment John broke free from the flower bloomed by Lythria. Sebastian broke Lythria's lotus with his stick sword strike. It broke like glass revealing John from there.
Suddenly Noelle turned toward Rhaelle. The battle paused for a brief moment. She touched her cheek.
Then she vanished forward.
Rhaelle was a black knight, so he reacted instantly. Yet the slash still brushed past his body and struck him. He crashed backward as Noelle shouted, "You bastard... dare to spill my blood."
Marvis also intercepted one of Noelle's strikes as he landed near the Breavan princess. "Rio, do this..." he shouted. Even the Breavan captains joined the fight against her, though it looked half-hearted. In truth, other than Rio, everyone was exhausted.
Damn exhausted.
From far away, it was at that same moment Veer saw them. He was stunned seeing so many people fighting a single enemy.
Rio nodded as he raised his spear upward. Noelle moved before Rhaelle as twenty hands descended toward him simultaneously. They spun like gauntlets as though trying to devour him whole.
At the last second, Rio's spear exploded as twenty spectral spears manifested and intercepted Noelle's hands, deflecting them away. They vanished immediately afterward.
Noelle looked stunned. As though regaining clarity for a moment, she turned toward Rio and smiled.
"So the family killer is trying to redeem himself..."
Rio roared as he clashed against Noelle once more.
The battle continued, but Marvis was no longer there. He turned toward the Breavan princess and said, "I presume you can now speak."
She merely pointed into the distance.
Marvis followed her gaze. At first he overlooked the fact that John had broken free because of Sebastian.
Then he muttered in a daze, "H-he... how did he break free...? At least... it should have taken half a prahar..."
"Sebastian..." the princess uttered softly.
Marvis narrowed his eyes as he noticed Sebastian whispering something into John's ears. John kept flaring up again and again. Marvis roared, "This bastard..."
The princess suddenly grabbed Marvis' hand. The once domineering princess who had attacked her own people was now trembling like this.
Hatred crossed Marvis' face, but he couldn't move.
"Hmm.."He looked ahead.
"Isn't that Veer... Princess Eryssa's bodyguard..."
Then he witnessed something he would remember forever.
John rained punches upon Veer. Veer was like a toddler caught in a storm. He couldn't attack nor defend. It was as though his mind had gone blank.
Marvis kept staring, stunned.
"My... my suspicion..."
"So it was him..."
"It was because of him we lost brother.."
"Prince Eric too..."
"You're kidding... right?"
He witnessed John kicking Veer.
He witnessed him strike Lythria aside.
He witnessed a single punch send Veer flying into the distance like a broken doll.
The princess stared at John in the distance. She had already released Marvis. But Marvis only looked ahead in silence, as though crushed beneath the unbearable weight of those words.
"So everything started from this bastard. What is his true identity?"
.....
To the present, Moments after Veer landed far away, John shouted, "Today is the day I cleanse the Starweaver clan."
He staggered around while shouting wildly, "It was me... because of you I had to do that."
His eyes moved around as he clutched his head,"I killed everyone..."
He pulled at his hair as he spun around. "I killed Eric..."
"No no.. I had to. No it was you Veer. It was because of your motives."
"Look at Noelle..."
"Because of me she became like this. Because of you."
He pulled out a weapon and lowered himself into a stance. The blade lit up ominously. Only now did many others finally notice. The incident with John and Veer had happened so fast that only Lythria, who was nearby, had truly seen everything. She was barely moving as she uttered ,"Sorry Veer..."
"I ...I am not able to move...I need time..."
"S-so it was John that murdered the prince..." said Revel in a trembling voice from the distance.
John's figure blurred as a loud clang erupted.
A figure stood before him. She had black hair and blue armor. She was battered and bruised, yet none of that diminished the overwhelming aura of a black knight nor her impeccable beauty. Her pearl-like eyes gleamed as her lips parted in a whisper.
"It's enough, John."
"You are sick. Stop this nonsense."
John screamed and attacked with his sword. Strange fire ignited around the blade as Sythris muttered,
"It's Shura's fire."
"You bastard."
"You deceived with this flame like spell or whatever ?"
Sythris drew another sword.
And so another brutal fight began.
.....
Veer didn't know where he was.
He didn't want to find out.
Suddenly he regained consciousness, albeit only slightly.
The pain was unbearable as blood flowed endlessly from his body.
He could no longer feel his limbs.
"Where am I..." he could barely think.
His mind laughed.
"Haha... hahaa..."
"Haha... I..."
An image surfaced amidst the pain. He could not open his eyes.
A huge palm existed within his mind. That enormous palm was formed from countless human hands. Veer himself was trapped within that palm, unable to move.
"No... no... I... I am free..."
"This can't be..."
"I am not controlled by others."
"Why? Why?"
Laughter echoed from everywhere.
John was laughing.
Eleana was laughing.
Even Eryssa and Lythria wore faint smirks.
Beyond them stood hundreds of shadowy figures pointing at him while laughing endlessly.
Veer screamed crazily.
"No... no, let me out..."
"Let me out..."
No matter how much he ran, he could not find a way out. Darkness stretched endlessly around him.
From everywhere, countless hands wrapped around his body, suffocating him.
He struggled desperately.
Then suddenly his eyes snapped open.
It was dark everywhere.
"Hah... hah..." he breathed fearfully.
He barely pushed a trunk away from his body as he looked upward. There were no stars.
Nothing.
Only darkness.
"John... so it was you..."
"That awkwardness... that friendliness... all of it was a lie, huh."
"You ...are this mad..."
"Ahhhh... it hurts..."
"What did I even do to you?"
He could not move.
"Where am I?"
"I need to move. I need to face him. Why? Just why is he doing all this?"
"Ahhhh..."
Veer was exhausted and couldn't gather any strength.
Suddenly his arms fell limp again. His expression became hollow, as though he had given up moving altogether.
"The pain is too much... I can't think..."
"Ahhh..."
"But where is John? He wanted to kill me. So where is he?"
As he barely endured the agony, the ground suddenly vibrated.
A head slowly emerged from the earth.
Its top had been cut off.
It looked grotesque.
Threads spread outward as Veer's dull eyes suddenly revealed something.
Fear...
Because the strike that had severed it... had been his own strike.
And the face was identical to Veer's.
It was the puppet.
The same puppet Veer had clashed with before.
The same puppet later captured by the puppet master.
Veer turned his head sideways. His eyes bulged as he screamed for the first time.
"I was right in the forest... Monster... go away... go away..."
Veer was already on the verge of collapse, and the appearance of the puppet seemed to shatter something deep within him.
He tried rolling away, but he could barely move. He screamed and screamed, but no voice seemed to escape this place.
Gradually the puppet crawled fully out of the ground. Veer finally looked at it properly.
But his eyes...
Those were the eyes of a man who had lost his calmness and reason.
The puppet's body was shattered. It crawled toward Veer's body. Its frame was broken beyond recognition. Strangely, it almost resembled the body of a human rather than a puppet, blood spilling endlessly from it.
Yet the unnatural joints said otherwise.
As it drew closer, it whispered in a dreamlike voice while placing a trembling hand over Veer's head, almost as though gently patting him.
"This body is breaking..."
"The seductress took everything else..."
"In moments all will be gone..."
"So take responsibility..."
"Save her... she must be waiting..."
The puppet's remaining finger touched Veer's forehead. The puppet began making strange star-like noises. Veer felt something.
Veer's mind suddenly became calm. Something inside him had quieted. He felt slightly better as he focused on the puppet. Those strange words echoed endlessly within his mind.
"You must find her. She must be lonely."
Then the puppet's body suddenly broke apart, flesh and threads spilling everywhere. It continued snapping apart as it uttered its final words. The puppet broke apart exactly like a discarded toy.
"Sister...."
Suddenly Veer remembered something. That small hand clutching him in dreams. He felt the deep anguish of himself but strangely it was not breaking him . He also remembered something else.
Back when he had first awakened without memories, Eryssa's uncle had specifically told him,
"Rest, young man... or you might snap like a puppet."
Now he was witnessing the snapping of a puppet.
And somehow... it resembled him.
He heard voices as though his forgotten self whispered in his ears.
"Starweavers never bend..."
"They weave..."