Three hundred years ago…
Far across the eastern seas of Arcanis, hidden in uncharted waters, there lay an island without a name. No map marked it, and sailors who glimpsed its jagged shores swore they felt death pressing from its jungles.
On that forsaken ground, a war unlike any other burned its scars into history.
The World Noblesse—known simply as W.N.—summoned their twenty strongest warriors: the S-Rank Noblesse. Elite beyond comprehension, each could topple an entire continent's army within minutes. They were humanity's ultimate line of defense.
And yet… they perished.
None returned. No bodies. No survivors. No victor.
The truth was buried so deep that even whispers were forbidden. Only the officials of the W.N. and their counterparts in the Global Protection Force (G.P.F.) knew what had transpired. The rest of the world lived in ignorance, never realizing that the balance of all life had nearly been shattered.
For if twenty S-Rank Noblesse could fall, fighting side by side—what kind of enemy had stood against them?
The answer was unspeakable. So the island was erased from every chart, declared the Most Dangerous Prohibited Zone, and given a single, dreaded name:
Death Island.
The Present — 300 Years Later
Night lay thick over the jungle of Death Island. Vines coiled down from ancient trees, roots sinking into black soil that seemed never to have known the warmth of the sun.
And yet, at its heart, shadows were torn by light.
Flood lamps blazed across a clearing, their beams stabbing into the gloom. The stillness trembled with the clang of shovels and the rasp of human breath.
A pit stretched wide—thirteen feet deep and growing. Men toiled inside, their faces slick with sweat, their hands blistered raw. No machines had been brought into this cursed place; the work was left to human backs, human flesh.
A row of canvas tents flapped in the night breeze.
From one of those tents, two men emerged. Both wore tailored suits that seemed absurd against the mud and heat.
One of them—thin, restless, his tie loosened—peered into the pit with unease. His name was Rocky. He leaned closer to the man beside him and spoke low, as if the jungle itself might be listening.
"Mr. Jack… do you think we'll succeed this time? What if this is the wrong spot again?"
The man at his side was taller, broad-shouldered, carrying himself with the quiet authority of someone long accustomed to command. His eyes were sharp, unblinking. This was Mr. Jack, a B-Rank Noblesse, though his calm mask hid the unease gnawing in his chest.
He didn't answer immediately. Instead, he scanned the pit, the workers bent over their shovels, the flickering light catching the edges of their strained faces.
Finally, he spoke—flat, measured.
"Keep digging. We're close."
Rocky's throat bobbed. He wanted to believe.
Whispers in the Pit
Below, the laborers worked with nervous urgency, each strike of the shovel carrying both fear and desperation. Their voices rose in murmurs when they thought no one listened.
"Another night in this cursed place," one muttered, his hands trembling as he dug. "I can feel it watching us. The air is… wrong."
"Shut your mouth," another hissed, glancing nervously at the guards. "You want them to hear? You'll get us killed."
But a third worker—older, gaunt from years of hardship—leaned on his shovel, eyes hollow.
"I heard stories… from my grandfather. Men came here once, long ago. Strong men, not like us. They never came back. Do you know what the island is called by the few who remember? The Island of Betrayal."
The younger ones froze, exchanging fearful glances.
"Betrayal? What do you mean?"
The old man's voice dropped, barely a whisper.
"They say… a god once walked among men. Stronger than all. But men turned on him, bound him, buried him here. Since then, the ground itself thirsts for blood."
One worker spat nervously, trying to laugh. "Old ghost tales. Nothing more."
But no one laughed with him. Silence pressed in. Even the shovels seemed to falter for a breath before resuming their scrape against the earth.
Above, Rocky shifted uncomfortably. "Jack… did you hear that?"
Mr. Jack's lips curved—not in amusement, but in something colder.
"Superstitions. Let them talk. Fear makes men dig faster."
And so the work went on, deeper into the night.
But no one—not Rocky, not Jack, not the laborers with their haunted eyes—understood that every strike of the shovel was bringing them closer to a truth that had slept for three centuries.
A truth sealed in chains.
A truth buried not to be found, but to be forgotten…
To be continue..