The factory was silent
The atmosphere pulsed with painful expectation.
SHOUTNA began speaking in a calm,
broken voice:
"During the days I was held captive,
I had nothing but my memories for company.
Memories that haunt me like an unforgiving ghost.
I wondered:
Is this our fate?
Is this the end of our long journey?"
He exhaled deeply,
as if summoning the courage to face his past demons.
"If there was a beginning…
It was in that place I can never forget.
The White Room…"
As the words left his lips,
the hall shifted instantly.
Some of them had their faces freeze
while others pressed their lips together in a heavy silence
as if the shadow of fear had passed between them.
Even AXE and BOW exchanged a knowing look.
The name alone was enough to resurrect memories that bound them all—
despite their different histories.
"It's pure white that hid the red of blood.
Its suffocating silence choked the screams of our pain."
SHOUTNA's voice cracked as he dove deeper into memory.
"We were nothing but numbers in their records…
animals for experimentation wearing human faces."
His hands trembled as the old wounds reopened.
"Days repeated like an endless loop:
from the cold of the cells
to the deadly white of that room,
where injections and experiments never ended.
They burned us,
electrocuted us,
and cut parts of our bodies to see how much we could endure.
If you collapsed from exhaustion…
They beat you until you stood.
If you didn't stand…
You disappeared forever."
ODEL looked at MOHITO with wide,
shocked eyes.
"I watched faces vanish one by one.
Numbers changed,
names forgotten.
In the end,
We felt nothing.
We were machines made of flesh…
with no emotions,
no memories…
no future."
SHOUTNA slowly stood,
each step heavy with the weight of his past,
and walked toward the window.
His back held the entirety of the unspoken tragedy.
"Then came that day…
The day everything changed.
A man in a formal suit told me:
'You're ready.'
I was nothing more than a number
whose usefulness as a test subject had ended…
and whose usefulness as a weapon was beginning."
He turned toward them,
His eyes glimmered with painful recollection:
"When I stepped outside for the first time…
I saw the sky…
I felt the warmth of the sun on my skin
for the first time in years.
In that moment… the loop broke.
Time started moving again."
He returned to his chair,
then looked at MIZYANI, ADEL, and ZARIOUH—
standing close together—
pain and solidarity etched into their faces.
"That's when I met those three…
We became a team.
They took our blood to forge OUR weapons,
took our humanity to forge their soldiers.
And I convinced myself I had no choice but to play by their rules."
His voice rose slightly,
charged with accumulated pain:
"But every mission,
every assassination…
killed a part of my soul.
I told myself,
'We either win or die.'
But over time,
I realised there was a loss greater than death…
The loss of one's soul."
He paused as though confronting a ghost,
then continued:
"Then came the most important mission:
hunting down a group that defected from the organisation.
The 'HOUNDS…
led by… BORBAKI."
At the name,
heavy looks filled the room—
Its weight is unmistakable.
"In that dark forest, they surrounded us.
I expected death.
But instead… BORBAKI extended his hand and said:
'You're not our enemies.
Your victims like us.'"
SHOUTNA closed his eyes,
revisiting that pivotal moment:
"I still remember all your faces then…
Faces worn by battle,
Yet still clear in vision.
In your eyes,
I saw myself for the first time…"
"SOLIMAN watching from the tree's shadow like a wary hawk,
MOHITO perched above on a branch,
His gaze flickered between us with silent curiosity.
CLAY, ZACK, NABEEL, BELL… and then… BORBAKI."
SHOUTNA's voice nearly broke:
"In that moment… the SHADOWS were born.
From the ashes of betrayal and despair,
A new will emerged.
We began attacking their laboratories,
destroying their centres, saving whoever we could."
He looked around at the faces before him,
counting the souls he carried:
"Eventually… this group formed.
Our group."
Then he sighed,
bitter with hard-earned lessons:
"But arrogance was our fatal sin…
When we heard of a meeting between the organisation's leaders,
We thought victory was close.
We didn't know we were walking into a perfect trap."
His eyes filled with deep sorrow.
"The Elite Unit…
The Twelve Demons…
Led by THE DEVIL VALACK
That was the first time we truly tasted despair.
We were on the brink of extinction."
He whispered, as though reliving it:
"BORBAKI ordered me to take the survivors and flee.
He said: 'Someone must live to continue the mission.'
We carried the wounded and dying and ran.
Behind us,
We heard the explosion…"
He paused, then continued, voice broken:
"We found his final message.
He told us to come to this kingdom,
to his friend, the king.
He said: 'There, you will start again.'"
SHOUTNA looked around the room,
face by face.
No one spoke.
No one moved.
Even the air seemed to listen.
"And now… here we are.
From a white room
to a world colored by blood and hope.
From numbers to humans.
From victims to fighters."
He turned his back on them.
"That's all I have…
Now you decide what to do with this truth."
He cast MOHITO a deep, knowing look,
then walked away toward the rooftop,
leaving behind a room full of ghosts.
The truth was not liberation—
It was a maze built of fog.
Every path led to a past they couldn't defeat
and a future they couldn't escape.
And in that moment,
They all realised
they were no longer searching for freedom—
They had become the very cages that trapped it.