We will meet soon.
— By your Number 1 fan.
A heavy, suffocating wave of dread washed over Kai's body. He stared at the crisp white paper, his mind racing through a list of enemies he hadn't even fully met yet.
Beside him, Nyra broke the silence with a sudden, teasing giggle. "Wow. The great hero already has a fan club."
Her smile lingered. Just a fraction of a second too long.
"But remember," she added softly, her voice dropping to a register that didn't entirely sound like her own.
"I will always be your first."
Goosebumps violently erupted across Kai's arms.
What was that? he thought, his eyes darting toward her. The tone of her voice had shifted just a hair too far into genuine obsession.
Before he could process the anomaly, Nyra relaxed, her normal, fiery demeanor sliding back into place like a well-oiled mask.
"Anyway, there were other people who visited you while you were unconscious."
Kai's eyes widened.
"Who?"
Thud. Thud.
A soft, rhythmic knock interrupted them. "Come in," Nyra called out.
The heavy door pushed open, and a nurse stepped inside. Her movements were unnervingly stiff, almost overly deliberate.
She approached Kai's bed and began checking his temperature and heart rate with cold, mechanical efficiency.
"How are you feeling, sir?" she asked, her voice entirely devoid of inflection.
Kai twisted his torso, stretching his stiff muscles. "Everything is alright physically. It just feels like someone is hammering a rock inside my skull."
He waited for a sympathetic smile, or a polite, practiced chuckle. The nurse remained completely still.
She just stared at him, her eyes unblinking, like a malfunctioning NPC waiting for a dialogue prompt.
Not a fan of humor, Kai thought.
But then, the ambient temperature in the room seemed to plummet. A violent shiver crawled up Kai's spine—a sudden, primal instinct screaming that something in this room was deeply wrong.
The nurse's face remained deadly serious. She blinked once. Slowly. As if remembering how the biological function worked.
"Okay. And anything else, sir?"
Kai swallowed hard, shifting his gaze away from her piercing, empty stare. He looked toward the adjacent bed.
It was neatly made, the sheets tucked with military precision. Completely empty.
"Where is the patient from that bed? The old woman?"
The nurse looked down at her blank notepad.
"I don't know. Many female patients have gone missing from the hospital recently."
Kai and Nyra froze in absolute shock.
"What?" Nyra demanded, stepping forward. "What are the cops doing about it?"
"They are doing their jobs fine," the nurse replied, her voice remaining unnervingly calm, entirely detached from the words she was speaking.
"But there are no clues. The Doctor says you can be discharged this evening."
She finished writing an invisible note on her pad and turned toward the door, walking out without another word.
Kai's face brightened slightly at the prospect of leaving this nightmare hospital.
"No!" Nyra blurted out.
Kai shifted his eyes toward her, raising a skeptical eyebrow.
Nyra sighed, looking genuinely frustrated.
"I have a meeting scheduled with Alfred, the mad scientist, this evening. I can't be here to help you check out."
Seeing her sudden guilt, Kai smirked, the tension breaking slightly. "Do I look like a kindergartener waiting for his mother to pick him up?"
Nyra scoffed, crossing her arms defensively.
"You're a little child in a grown body."
Kai opened his mouth to retort, but he was left completely speechless as Nyra's phone began to ring. She threw up her hands in defeat.
After a few quick, hushed words into the receiver, she grabbed her purse and hurried out the door to take the call, leaving him entirely alone.
An hour later, the silence of the room had become unbearable. Boredom and a lingering sense of profound paranoia took hold of Kai. He needed to move. He needed a fresh breath of air.
He unhooked his remaining monitors and stepped out into the hallway. The simple act of walking felt like a necessary reboot for his stagnant system. His legs ached, but his mind began to clear.
As he wandered the corridors, he peered into the open doors of the wards. So many beds were unoccupied.
A sense of deep sympathy washed over him, but it was quickly replaced by a terrifying, logical realization.
If there is a serial kidnapper taking women from this hospital... why is it so quiet? There were no police officers interviewing staff.
There were no weeping family members demanding answers at the front desk. There was no panic.
It was as if the missing women had simply been deleted from reality, and the System had wiped the code of anyone who would have cared.
The nurse station was empty.
Phones rang somewhere in the distance. No one answered.
Kai kept moving, his heart pounding a little faster now, the Violet Shard in his chest humming with low anxiety.
The claustrophobic hallway finally opened up into a large, sunlit atrium.
In the absolute center of the room stood a massive, beautifully carved stone statue of a kneeling woman.
Kai suddenly felt a heavy, crushing presence.
"She is called the Spirit of Sacrifice."
Kai whipped his head toward the source of the voice.
Standing a few feet away, gazing up at the pale marble figure, was a man.
He wore dark sunglasses, clearly acting as a shield between his fractured soul and the outside world.
Yet, the shield was failing.
Through a jagged crack in the left lens, Kai saw his eye. His iris did not look human.
It looked like a dying star trapped inside blue glass, pulsating with a dangerous mix of ancient grief and fresh vengeance through the fractured shards.
A massive spike of déjà vu hit Kai's chest. He felt like he had seen this man somewhere before, in a memory that felt just out of reach, buried beneath static.
The stranger didn't turn around. He just kept staring up at the cold stone statue.
"She is called the Spirit of Sacrifice," he repeated softly.