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Dust still danced in the air. The golden sparks from Mei Nuhay floated like constellations aflame over the rubble, illuminating the tragedy with the cruelty of a starry sky in ruins.
She did not understand.
She could not.
— Akira…?
The word came out like a splinter, scratching her throat. A wounded, trembling whisper that barely sounded like her. Mei's golden eyes stared at the figure before her. The body was familiar—hair, posture, even the way he breathed. But there was something… twisted.
Something that made her stomach churn.
The aura... wasn't his.
It was ancient. Cruel. Dark as a night without a sky.
And Tekio was fallen. Bloodied. A mosaic of pain, cracked, about to come apart.
The figure—the monster with Akira's face—stood over him.
— Akira… what is happening here?! — Mei's voice rose, firmer, but desperate. — Tell me... tell me this isn't what it looks like! Tell me it was a mistake... that he attacked you... anything!
The creature turned its face slowly. Its lips curved into a crooked smile. Icy. Soulless.
— The boy? — he asked, almost bored. — He just didn't want to die. It's irritating. But... admirable, perhaps.
Mei clenched her fists. The heat of her aura snaked across her skin, as if the sun itself were whispering in her flesh. But her heart hesitated. It was Akira. The face was his. The eyes, almost...
— Stop... talking like that — she said, almost a plea. — You don't talk like that... Akira doesn't talk like that.
Silence.
Then, a low laugh. Like a cursed echo inside a crypt.
— Are you always like this, Mei? Naive?
It wasn't Akira.
— …Who are you?
The impostor's smile widened. Akira's body seemed even more assured now. The gaze—black, like boiling oil—pierced her soul.
— I am Akira. Your friend... your great friend...
Mei froze. Everything about him was the same. But everything about him was wrong.
And her heart... already knew.
Something inside her tore.
— Then tell me... WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE, AKIRA?! — she screamed, but her voice seemed to scratch the very strings of her soul.
— Ahh, nothing much. Tekio and I just had a... disagreement. Sibling rivalry, you know? — He shrugged, theatrical. — Aisha tried to break us up. But I took good care of her.
Mei did not scream. She did not cry.
But... she trembled.
Her whole body.
The fire around her flickered. Unstable. Panicked. As if the world could feel it.
She closed her eyes, extending her perception. She tried to find Aisha.
Nothing.
Not a spark.
No presence.
Terror seized her features. Her skin crawled. The golden flames hesitated, trembled with her.
And before her, the creature with Akira's face... smiled. A sickly smile. Inhuman.
Dante approached. His steps slow. Amused.
— You know, Aisha said you were going to save her — he whispered, almost tenderly. — I think those were her last words.
He smiled more.
— But... it seems you were a little late, weren't you?
A lie. Probably.
But in that moment... it felt too true for Mei to deny.
Her throat tightened. Her eyes welled up, but she did not cry.
Mei's mind was in tatters. It was Akira's body. His face. But it couldn't be. It couldn't...
"He would never do this."
"Not to Aisha."
"Not to Tekio."
But… did he?
The idea tore her apart.
She felt the weight of the world on her shoulders. As if she had failed everyone. Aisha. Tekio. Akira.
Perhaps even herself.
— Akira... you wouldn't do this... you are... my friend...
— I am — Dante replied, mocking. — I always have been. A friend to the end.
His voice was sarcastic. Full of poison. A knife being twisted in her guilt.
Mei bit her lips. Her head low. Her body trembling.
And then, in the background... a sound.
— I... will... kill you.
Tekio.
His voice was almost inaudible, but it was there. Broken. Weak.
But real.
Dante turned his head, with a look of contempt.
— Is that damn brat still breathing?
He raised his hand. A pulsing black energy began to form in his palm. A final blow.
But then —
The world exploded.
Golden flames. Ancestral fire. A deafening roar. The impact shook the ground and tore the air.
Mei struck him.
A punch to the abdomen, direct and fierce.
Dante was launched like a living missile, crashing through walls and columns like paper. The rubble shattered around him.
— WHAT DOES THIS MEAN? AKIRA! — she roared, her voice reverberating like thunder.
She ran to Tekio, her knees giving way beside the boy.
— Tekio... Tekio... — she whispered, touching his face. His eyes were still open, but... distant. As if looking through her.
— What... did they do to you? — her voice cracked.
She remembered his shy smile. His kindness.
Now, there was only rage. A crimson aura pulsing around his body, like spiritual teeth ready to devour.
— Where was I when you needed me...? — she whispered, the pain tearing her voice.
She ran her hand over his wounds. Helped as best she could. Transferred some of her energy, trying to calm the fury swirling like a storm.
But the energy inside him was too dark.
Too furious.
She could no longer see the boy she raised, taught, protected.
— My God... — she whispered.
Seeing Tekio's state tore her apart, marks of cuts all over his body, his gaze completely lost and empty, filled with hatred.
She could see everything there, except Tekio.
Her smile trembled. Fragile. A desperate reflex of hope.
And then, she lowered her head. Her red hair hiding her eyes. Silent tears.
— Where is Mei... when everyone needs her?
In the distance, Dante was getting up.
Dragging his feet, still laughing.
— What a magnificent scene. The strongest woman in the world... on her knees. Broken. Crying over her failures.
Mei lifted her head.
Her golden eyes burned.
And this time, the fire around her... was no longer a warning. It was a sentence.
— WHO ARE YOU?! — she screamed.
The man smiled, still with Akira's face.
— I am Akira your friend... — he said, with scorn.
Mei took a step forward.
But she did not see.
She did not notice.
Tekio... was no longer resisting.
He was no longer fighting to hold on. His body... was sustained by something he himself did not understand.
Something ancient.
Something electric.
Something with eyes.
And that thing... wanted out.
The world seemed to tremble around them. Golden flames crackled in the air, the heat of anger, doubt, pain.
Mei Nuhay remained standing. Her fist clenched, her eyes fixed on the enemy ahead.
It was still Akira. The face. The voice. The body that fought by her side so many times. The warrior who smiled silently while protecting the rear. The friend who promised not to retreat.
But everything about him now was... grotesque.
That dark presence around him. Those black, oily eyes, like bottomless pits.
The black flaming aura rose like demonic serpents, wreathed in a dry, nauseating heat.
— Still trying to understand...? — Dante taunted, his voice dripping with amusement — It's fun to see you like this, Mei. So powerful... and so lost.
Mei did not respond.
The fire around her flickered, as if sharing her confusion.
She took a step forward. The ground cracked under her feet.
— You... are not Akira. — she whispered.
But her eyes still trembled. Her heart still denied it.
— Of course I am — he said, tilting his head. — Do you think you'd forget me so easily? After all we've been through?
He walked slowly, his steps echoing like hammer blows on her judgment.
— You know, sometimes I think... If you weren't so arrogant, maybe you could protect your own.
Aisha, for example. She screamed, you know?
But you... didn't hear.
Mei launched an attack.
A blast of golden flames cut through the air like a solar scythe, incinerating everything ahead.
But Dante disappeared.
Appeared behind her, smiling.
— You shouldn't attack a friend...
She spun with another strike, a kick wreathed in fiery energy. Dante defended, but was thrown back, his feet digging into the soil until he stopped.
— Stop playing with me! — Mei shouted. — Stop using that face!
— Which one? — he asked, spreading his arms. — The face of your friend... or your nightmare?
The air still trembled with the impact.
— You were always so explosive, Mei. I think that's what I liked about you.
She did not respond.
The golden fire enveloped her fists, her eyes fixed on the impostor. Her legs vibrated. Her body yearned for action. But her mind… still wavered.
"Akira wouldn't do this…"
"Not to Tekio. Not to Aisha."
She wanted to fight. But fighting him was to admit it. To confirm what her heart did not want to accept.
Dante watched her as one reads a familiar book.
— You're hesitating — he said, amused. — That's rare. You know, normally you burn first and ask questions later.
Mei stood firm. But her fingers trembled.
— You… are lying. — She gritted her teeth. — You are not him. You are not Akira. And you also… can't be who I'm thinking…
— Oh? And who would that be?
He took a step forward. A trail of dark energy dripped from his feet, like living ink.
— Dante is dead. — said Mei, as if convincing herself. — I killed him. I saw the body… felt the end.
Dante raised his hands.
Black flames appeared around him, flaming in grotesque spirals. They did not burn—they consumed. The ground beneath him dissolved into ashes where they touched.
— And yet, here I am — he said. — In the body of your friend… with your dear Aisha dead, and the boy there almost joining her.
Mei clenched her fists. The air around her trembled, her flame responded with ferocity—but her soul did not.
She launched into the attack.
One blow. Two. Three. Golden explosions swept the area, the ground splitting under her feet. Golden flames and black shadows collided in spirals of light and darkness, exploding like colliding moons.
But Dante... smiled.
He defended himself easily, dodged, as if he knew her every move before it happened.
— You're dancing. But you don't believe in your own music — he mocked. — Are you afraid to kill me?
Mei hesitated for an instant. And took a brutal kick to the abdomen, throwing her against a cracked wall.
She got up, staggering. Blood at the corner of her mouth.
Dante walked toward her slowly, rolling his shoulders as if warming up the borrowed body.
— You know what's funny?
Mei prepared for the next blow, but he just stopped, before her.
— You killed me, remember?
Time seemed to stop.
That phrase… echoed.
That battle.
Yes. She remembered. Dante was beaten. Defeated. There was no way out. And then…
He smiled.
"You will be the second to die..."
Mei staggered a step back. Her golden eyes widened. Her breath failed.
— No…
Dante leaned in, whispering, black eyes piercing hers:
— Did you forget my promise?
Mei could barely breathe.
— Aisha is already gone...
He raised his arm slowly. The gesture was precise. Almost ritualistic. A dance of death.
— And as promised…
A black symbol formed under Mei's feet. A circle of shadows, ancient, grotesque, with thorns of inverted light rising from the ground.
— ...you will be the second to die.
Mei tried to run. Tried to act. Her body ignited, her eyes blazed.
But it was too late.
— Veil of the Abyss.
The words tore the world like a forbidden spell.
The darkness swallowed her.
Not as shadow. Not as absence.
It was worse.
It was the end of all light. A space where time dared not exist. Where all that is, was, and could be… disappears.
Mei screamed, but sound did not exist there.
No heat.
No fire.
No her.
Dante kept his hand raised, watching the prison of darkness spinning like a black cocoon from within.
There was no ground. No sky. No body.
Only the weight.
Mei was fallen—or floating—or just… trapped.
She wasn't sure. She couldn't feel her arms. Nor her legs. Only her own consciousness, suffocated in a sea of dense darkness, which felt like a living substance trying to crush everything inside it.
Breathing was nonexistent. But still, she gasped. As if the very effort of trying to exist within the Veil was an agony.
And then... he spoke.
— Impressive — Dante said, his voice coming from all directions, as if space itself were speaking. — You're still conscious. And you even tried to speak.
Mei felt her mouth move.
Or tried to feel it.
She forced her lips.
— A...kira...
It was like spitting glass.
Pain shot through something that wasn't even physical, but was hers.
Dante appeared in front of her, walking calmly, as if gliding over the malleable reality of the Veil.
The face was Akira's. But now it was clearly his. The posture. The gaze. The smile rotten with pleasure.
He crouched before her, as one observes a sculpture about to break.
— Fascinating... you barely have control over your muscles in here. But you managed to form words. — He laughed low. — You really are stubborn.
His hand touched her face.
And even without skin, without matter... it hurt.
— But it's a good thing you're not like Tekio.
His tone changed. Colder. Serious.
— That boy... what a bizarre thing. He distorted this place. Tore the Veil from the inside. It was like trying to hold lightning with my hands. — Dante frowned, remembering. — I was almost swallowed by my own creation. If I had waited one more second...
He stepped back, laughing, rebalancing his mocking tone.
— But you... you are perfect. The Steadfast Empress. Proud. Rational. And full of cracks inside.
Those words struck deep.
Mei tried to look away. But here, she couldn't even do that.
She was trapped within herself.
— Want to know what Akira showed me? — Dante asked, like someone sharing gossip. — Your weaknesses.
He raised a finger.
And the Veil folded.
Images appeared in the dark. Slow. Detailed.
The Nuhay Clan.
They laughed together. Mei still young, surrounded by her own.
And then — the flames.
The massacre. The voices dying. The bodies being consumed.
Dante leaned close and whispered:
— Do you still believe you can protect anyone?
He snapped his fingers.
The image changed.
Aisha.
Smiling, her arm around Mei's shoulder. Saying: "You are my beacon, always."
Then... the blood.
— You were late. — Dante said, with Aisha's voice.
Mei shuddered. The pain pierced her soul.
She tried to respond.
But only managed a hoarse, choked sound.
— And Tekio? — Dante continued. — So gentle... So small... And you turned him into a weapon. — He leaned in. — He will kill. He will lose everything. Because you trained him.
Mei ground her teeth inside. Her heart, if she still had one, pulsed in silent terror.
And then...
The final image appeared.
Akira.
The real one.
At some random moment. They were laughing. Sitting under the moonlight.
Tenklyn, Aisha, Akira, Mei, and Fenra.
He said:
"I trust you, Mei. Even if the world collapses, I know you will be there for us."
The phrase burned inside her.
And when the image faded, Dante returned.
— And you weren't.
When Akira was lost.
When Aisha died.
When Tekio was corrupted and when Tenklyn died.
He knelt, pressing his forehead against hers. His black eyes empty like abysses.
— You lost everything. And now... I will take the rest.
— He raised his right hand, wreathed in black flames.
Checkmate, Empress of Misery.
The energy concentrated.
Mei felt it.
The end.
To be continued...
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