The girl who looked like Aoi stood motionless, her hollow eyes fixed on Yuki, the cold, empty smile a grotesque mask. The imps closed in, their chittering rising to a fever pitch, their green eyes glowing like malevolent fireflies in the dim light. They surrounded the clearing, a skittering wall of shadow and malice, cutting off any hope of escape.
Yuki's mind raced. Trap. Lure. The architect had used his connection to Aoi, twisted it, and sent this… this thing wearing her face to draw him in. The horror was paralyzing. Not just the imps, but the violation. The corruption of something pure.
Destroy the puppet, Kage's voice hissed, cold and urgent. Break the connection. Sever the anchor before it drags you down.
But it wasn't Aoi. Not really. It was a shell. A tool. Destroying it felt… wrong. A final, unforgivable defilement. Yet, leaving it intact meant the imps would tear him apart.
One imp, bolder than the rest, scuttled forward, its too-many legs clicking on the frozen ground. It raised a clawed hand, dripping with a viscous, green ichor.
Instinct took over. Yuki thrust out his hands. Burn!
Crimson energy erupted, lashing out like a whip. It struck the lead imp, not with fire, but with concussive force. The creature exploded in a shower of black ichor and chitinous fragments.
The effect was instantaneous.
The remaining imps shrieked – a high-pitched, chittering sound of rage and pain. They surged forward, a wave of shadow and claws.
The girl who looked like Aoi flinched. Not from the explosion, but from the surge of Yuki's power. Her hollow eyes widened slightly, the cold smile faltering for a fraction of a second. A flicker of something – confusion? Pain? – crossed her porcelain features.
It was a crack in the facade.
Yuki saw it. He focused not on the imps, but on her. On the connection. On the architect's hold. He poured his will, his rage, his grief at seeing Aoi's face so defiled, not into destructive energy, but into a single, focused command:
Let her go!
He didn't shout it. He projected it, a psychic hammer blow aimed at the hollow shell.
The girl who looked like Aoi gasped. Her whole body convulsed. The cold smile vanished, replaced by a rictus of agony. Her hands flew to her temples. The faint bluish tint of her skin deepened, spreading like a stain. The imps around her hesitated, their chittering turning confused.
NO!
The voice wasn't Yuki's. It wasn't Kage's. It was vast, ancient, and filled with echoing fury. It seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once, shaking the very air, causing the ancient trees to groan.
The girl who looked like Aoi screamed. It was a sound of pure, undiluted agony, a sound that tore at Yuki's soul. It was Aoi's voice, but twisted, corrupted, filled with unimaginable pain.
As she screamed, the world around her seemed to tear.
Not physically. But visually. Reality itself ripped open behind her like a curtain.
Beyond the tear wasn't the mountain forest.
It was a landscape of nightmare.
A sky the color of a deep bruise, choked with swirling, toxic clouds that rained acid. The ground was a plain of jagged, obsidian glass, cracked and steaming. Towering, misshapen spires of black crystal pierced the poisonous sky, pulsating with sickly green and purple light. Rivers of thick, bubbling tar snaked through the valleys, and things moved within them – vast, writhing shapes too large and too alien to comprehend.
And the sound… even over the girl's scream, Yuki could hear it. A constant, soul-crushing cacophony – the screams of countless tormented souls, the grinding of colossal stone, the wet tearing sounds of impossible feasting, all layered into a symphony of eternal despair.
It was a glimpse of Hell. The architect's realm. The source of the blight.
The girl who looked like Aoi was being pulled backwards, towards the tear. Her feet left the ground. Her body arched in agony. Her eyes, no longer hollow, were wide with pure terror, the familiar warmth of Aoi's consciousness flickering back for a fleeting, heartbreaking second before being swallowed by the pain.
"YUKI!" she screamed, the sound raw, real, and utterly terrified.
"Aoi!" Yuki roared, lunging forward.
The imps, forgotten in the face of this greater horror, scattered, chittering in fear, melting back into the shadows of the forest.
Yuki reached out, his hand stretching towards Aoi. Their fingertips brushed.
For an instant, he felt her warmth. Her fear. Her desperate need.
Then, the architect's power surged. An invisible, irresistible force yanked Aoi backwards. She flew through the tear in reality, her scream cut off abruptly as the opening snapped shut behind her with a sound like thunder.
The glimpse of Hell vanished. The mountain forest returned.
Silence.
Yuki stood alone in the clearing, his hand still outstretched, the ghost of Aoi's touch tingling on his fingertips. The air still crackled with residual energy. The scent of ozone and brimstone hung heavy.
She was gone. Taken. Pulled into the architect's hellish realm.
Not by accident. Not randomly.
Because of him.
Because of his power. His corruption. His connection to her.
He had led the architect to her. He had delivered the anchor into the heart of darkness.
The realization was a physical blow, stealing his breath, buckling his knees. He sank to the frozen ground, the cold seeping through his clothes, a meaningless chill compared to the icy void that opened up inside him.
He had glimpsed Hell. And he had sent Aoi there.