Chapter 22 — The Aetherial Crest, 7
The footsteps echoed like hammer blows, heavy and unrelenting, but when Sylan turned, the corridor was already gone. Stone dissolved into mist, and the cold air of the estate became a suffocating fog that pressed into his lungs.
Virelle's gasp caught his ear. "My lord?" Her voice quavered, her brown eyes darting around the distortion as though reality itself had frayed. She clutched at his sleeve, fingers trembling.
'Hold steady,' Sylan thought, jaw tightening. He had walked battlefields where the air itself shimmered with heat and death, and this—this was just another front.
The fog thickened, then bled into shapes. A woman stepped forward, her smile soft, pleading. For an instant, it was her—Ji-eun, the one who had betrayed Jin in another life, the wound deeper than any blade. But as she spoke, her face flickered, stuttered, and Amanda Von Noctis's cold, aristocratic poise took its place.
"Forgive me… you must forgive me… I was wrong," she whispered. Her lips moved, but halfway through, the words broke, replayed, then resumed as if the Game's narrative had torn. "I love you. I— I— I—" The sentence froze, cut, restarted.
Virelle flinched. "Her face—it's… it's wrong…"
Sylan's crimson eyes narrowed. 'Not her. Not Amanda. Not Ji-eun. Just the Crest.'
The figure reached for him, eyes wet with tears that gleamed like molten glass. "Trust me again," she begged, voice slipping between Amanda's cool timbre and Ji-eun's broken sobs. The fusion was obscene, a scene rehearsed by the Game and rewritten until it bled.
Sylan stepped forward, his shadow long in the fractured light. "You are neither of them." His voice was steady, his soldier's tone carved sharp. "And you will not break me."
The illusion shattered.
The fog bled into darkness, and from it rose another phantom—broad-shouldered, stern-eyed. His father, Darius Von Noctis. But when he spoke, the words belonged to Jin's old commander.
"Coward. You disobey orders, you waste your unit, you're nothing but—" The voice glitched, distorted, replayed. "—a failure. A disgrace. A son unworthy of the name."
Each line struck like a hammer, echoing from walls that weren't there.
'Darius would never speak like that,' Sylan thought. 'And my commander—he's dead.'
Still, the illusion pressed, stepping closer, eyes like empty sockets. "Kneel. Submit. Die forgotten."
The system flared in his mind:
[Directive conflict. Submission grants salvation.][Warning. Submission leads to annihilation.]
Virelle clutched his sleeve harder, her voice breaking. "My lord—it's lying to you—don't listen—"
He glanced at her, her brown eyes wide, reflecting both terror and loyalty. That was real. That was his anchor.
Sylan bared his teeth, soldier's resolve blazing. "I am no coward. I am no failure. I am a soldier. And I decide how this war ends."
The phantom dissolved into shards of light and shadow.
But the ordeal wasn't finished. The chamber bent into something grotesque. Elias Vaughn appeared—or almost. His silhouette formed from threads of light, his face handsome but wrong. His mouth moved with words meant for another, the heroine's lines twisted into his voice. "Choose me, and your suffering will end. Choose me, and you will be erased."
The heroine herself appeared beside him, her glowing smile cracking at the edges, teeth multiplying, eyes hollow. Her words looped, "I love you, I love you, I love you—" until the sound broke into static.
Virelle stumbled back, horrified. "This isn't… this isn't real…"
'No. It's worse,' Sylan thought. 'It's the Game bleeding through its seams.'
The Crest was not just testing him. It was showing him the corruption rotting inside this world—the recycled lines, the broken roles, the falseness behind the glittering surface.
Sylan inhaled once, steady. Then he roared, voice cutting through the illusions like steel. "I am not your pawn. I will not kneel. I will not submit to your lies. I am Jin Soowhi. I am Sylan Von Noctis. And I take what I need to survive!"
The world shattered.
The phantoms screamed soundlessly and bled into motes of light. The chamber reformed around him—the archives' stone walls snapping back into place, the fog thinning into nothing. Virelle gasped, clinging to reality as the visions collapsed.
At the center of the chamber, untouched by dust or time, hovered the Aetherial Crest.
It was shifting—always shifting. A crown of light one moment, a jagged blade of shadow the next, wings unfurling, then horns curling. Divinity and damnation woven into one endless cycle.
The air hummed with its presence. Hymns and growls overlapped, whispers brushing the edges of thought.
Virelle dropped to her knees, her brown eyes wet with awe and dread. "It's… it's alive…"
Sylan stepped forward, steady. His crimson eyes reflected both its glow and its shadow.
'Not alive. Not dead. A weapon.'
The system pulsed, steady now:
[Candidate acknowledged.][The Aetherial Crest: Status—Unclaimed.][Proceed to claim.]
The Crest pulsed as if waiting for him.
Sylan raised his hand, scarred and steady, and reached through the shifting light and shadow. It burned and froze, cut and healed, divine and demonic all at once.
His fingers closed around it.
The chamber erupted in light and darkness, twin storms coiling into his body, his soul. Virelle cried out, shielding her eyes, but Sylan stood firm, soldier's resolve unshaken.
The Crest sank into him.
[System Update: The Aetherial Crest has been claimed.][Attributes increased. Skill unlocked.]
The storm stilled. The chamber fell silent.
Sylan lowered his hand, his breath steady, crimson eyes gleaming with a new, dangerous light.