As Ibaan peeked into the secrets of the Iron Knuckles, he uncovered valuable information—and a faint smirk crept across his face, as if the Iron Knuckles were already wiped out.
The strongest among them—the leader of the Knuckles and his spouse—were currently asleep together, doing the kind of things only couples did. He tried his hardest not to think about that part, but still, it gave him an advantage. If he could control both of them, he could lure all the Upper Knuckles into a trap without any battle or commotion. That would be a truly smart move.
He had a plan, but again, there was a price to pay—he had to endure the emotions of the other party, no matter how unbearable. There was no escape from it.
Even so, the information he obtained was both secretive and disturbing.
The Iron Knuckles were taking doses of something called Evil Worshiping every day and preparing for a sacrificial ritual. They were planning to sacrifice humans—to an evil being.
An evil being?
That was what he thought at first.
Who could that be? It might not be the unknown entity he once imagined… yet it could also be. Perhaps it was one of the divine beings known and worshiped by humanity—the deities accepted across cultures, beings that did exist back in his real world.
But how could such a thing exist in a novel world completely isolated from the real one?
That thought confused him deeply. It made him question everything.
And the ritual—it was to take place tomorrow in the underground, perhaps that's why they did such cruel things on the second floor instead of some hidden place. As for the being itself, not even the Lower Knuckles knew its true nature. They only knew its epithet, which gave him the idea that it might be an Angel—or perhaps the Supreme Angel, the so-called King of Angels and even a Deity.
And not only that—the information that truly shocked and unsettled him was that the leader of the Iron Knuckles was an outsider, just like him.
Yeah, it made sense in a way. This world was a living book, after all. Anyone who possessed it could enter it, so that part wasn't strange. But what made his heart skip a beat was that the sacrificial ritual for the evil being had been ongoing since the very beginning—since the birth of the Iron Knuckles itself.
The group had existed for ages, and the same leader had been ruling them since then—without dying and it had been almost one and half century since then. So the outsider was in this world since then cause' mere humans if this world know or believe in no one but God, the creator of all things.
That fact reminded him of the Mythic Age, when people lived for around five hundred years. But now, the average lifespan barely reached a hundred.
The epithet name of the being, however, still remained blurred… for reasons he couldn't understand.
He walked down the narrow hallway of the mansion, heading toward the chamber of the Iron Knuckles' leader. The two Lower Knuckles were of no further use to him; he didn't think they would ever be. So, without hesitation, he granted them a peaceful rest.
The mansion's interior was unexpectedly modern and luxurious, completely opposite to its eerie exterior. From the outside, it looked like a haunted house—one no one would dare to approach, let alone enter.
Anyway, when Ibaan finally reached the leader's room, he knocked three times.
Then he opened the door.
A man with bird-like eyes and messy hair stood before him in sleeping clothes who was frozen, lifeless, like a statue. Beside him stood a woman, also in nightwear, unmoving, her gaze locked on Ibaan. It was as if some higher being had ordered them not to move, or else they would vanish from existence.
Ibaan stood there, bewildered.
Still, he knew this was the perfect moment. He didn't even need to fight or struggle. All he had to do was use his True Gaze—and they would become his puppets, tools to bring down the Iron Knuckles once and for all.
He slowly raised his hand toward them. A strange mark of energy pulsed from his chest to his palm, and in an instant, a crimson-red eye appeared on his hand.
The moment it opened, the leader and his spouse's eyes twitched—and locked on the glowing eye.
Then, all at once, a storm of particular memories flooded into Ibaan's mind. No Greed. No Lust. Just Madness. Things that couldn't even be described by words. His heart felt as if it were being crushed under unbearable weight; his chest burned, his head throbbed as if it might burst open.
The pain was beyond anything he had ever felt.
And amid it all, the epithet name of the being—blurred, powerful, and divine—echoed faintly in his mind, putting a crushing strain on his thoughts.
He dropped to his knees. Then, without thinking, he put his finger in his mouth and bit down so hard that it split open.
Blood pooled at the tip. Trembling, his body moved on its own as he bent down and began to write on the floor in a strange, divine language—one mixed with something darker.
The Sovereign of Endless Entropy,
The Embodiment of Disorder,
The Monarch of Shattered Realities,
The Origin of Discord, the End of Harmony.
The moment the final line was written, his vision blurred. Before he could understand what was happening, his consciousness vanished.
Then, his body began to twist. His limbs detached and reattached with cracking sounds; small horns broke through his head; from his back, a strange, tail-like appendage emerged—something far from normal. Mark energy surged wildly inside him, flooding through every vein. Beneath his mask, both his eyes turned pure red—no iris, no pupil—only a crimson void.
A heavy wave of energy burst from him, sweeping through the entire room and erasing the four lines he had written on the floor.
Moments later, his body steadied.
Ibaan got back to his senses —he was conscious, his vision was pure, enhanced although his eyes weren't his.
However he had control over this new, unknown form. But to a certain extent, he didn't have full control but fortunately he was conscious and control the form.
Slowly, he lifted his gaze toward the two figures before him. The leader and his spouse were trembling now, their fingers twitching slightly as if gripped by terror. They could see what he had become, yet they couldn't move, couldn't scream.
This was their punishment by the nature. For the cruelty they had spread, for the countless innocent lives they had taken—this was the price they would pay.
Ibaan could feel their emotions—and there were none. They were empty shells now, puppets bound to his will. There was no trace of power in them even though the puppet he made never lose them, no memory of who they once were—only faint, broken flashes of the evil existence.
That alone made him pause. Something was wrong.
Had someone altered their memories?
Yes—there was no doubt. Someone had come before him. Someone had erased their past, stripped away everything except the fragments tied to that evil being perhaps because they couldn't do so.
But there was another possibility—a smaller one. What if the evil existence itself had done it? Though unlikely, the thought still sent a chill down his spine.
Even so, it didn't add up. How could the strongest of the Iron Knuckles be this weak, this hollow, unable to even remember their own names, let alone fight back?
But that didn't change what they had done in past.
It all made sense—and yet none of it did.
And as Ibaan took a step forward, one memory echoed in his mind—his Master's words, :
"Choices have consequences."
Now, it was time for the Iron Knuckles to face theirs.