Standing inside the palace with its shattered dome, Sakiko looked around.
Four enormous black monoliths towered at the cardinal points of the hall—like grave markers ripped straight out of an abyss of despair, radiating a chilling pressure that made the skin crawl.
They weren't stone.
They looked as if they'd been carved from congealed shadow itself, swallowing what little moonlight remained.
Directly ahead stood the largest of them.
On its face were two characters:
Hierarchy.
Every stroke looked like a cold iron bar welded into place, exuding an austere, freezing authority.
Just letting her eyes land on it made the body want to bow—an instinctive urge to submit.
To the left, another stele bore the word:
Betrayal.
The warped strokes seemed to twitch faintly, like living tissue.
Like a freshly torn wound that hadn't even begun to scab over—still oozing scarlet blood.
To the right, the third was the complete opposite:
Loneliness.
The carving was faint, shallow—yet it carried a dead, hollow stillness, the aura of something that had fallen entirely into nothingness.
To stare at it was to feel the soul itself threatened with freezing silence.
Sakiko turned slightly, looking behind her.
The final monolith showed the road she had taken to arrive here:
Failure.
Toyokawa Kiyoteru's layered, double-voiced resonance echoed through the ruined hall.
"The loss—16.8 billion yen—happened because the Toyokawa branch family set a trap and framed me."
"That is Hierarchy… and Failure."
"I was abandoned by my father-in-law—another man like me, a live-in son-in-law—forced to shoulder all responsibility, and thrown out of the Toyokawa family like trash."
"That is Betrayal… and Loneliness."
Sakiko listened in silence.
There was no surprise on her face—only calm.
In Kiyoteru's right eye, within the gentleness, a trace of approval flickered.
"As expected of you, Sakiko…"
"It seems you've reached the darkness of the Toyokawa family… by your own strength."
His gaze swept across the four silent monoliths.
"These four rules are the iron laws that bind me—and bind anyone who steps into this place. I saw your struggle and your memories on the Stairway of Failures."
Then the gentleness was crushed instantly beneath the hatred on the left half of his face.
His voice rose—cold and cruel.
"You, Toyokawa Sakiko, still carry the Toyokawa surname!"
"Your blood. Your origin. They decide that you can never truly escape this rigid hierarchy."
"That is the Hierarchy you bear."
"You've failed again and again!"
"Even if you crossed the past and stand here now, you still cannot erase the brand of being a failure!"
"That is your Failure."
"You formed a band twice—Crychic, Ave Mujica—what happened in the end?"
"Abandoned twice. Trust shattered twice."
"That is the Betrayal you suffered."
"And look at yourself now."
"Who is still at your side?"
"You let Mutsumi's concern go unanswered, rejected Hatsune's approach, severed your ties with Tomori and the others."
"The one standing here is only Toyokawa Sakiko—alone."
"That… is your Loneliness."
As his words fell, Toyokawa Kiyoteru slowly lifted both hands—like a conductor raising the baton for a symphony of destruction.
The four monoliths roared.
Countless phantom chains—made of pure shadow—shot outward, piercing through space itself and slamming into Sakiko's limbs, her bones, her very soul.
Pain detonated through her. A stifled sound escaped her throat—
And even Icarus was forcibly sealed by the shackles, impossible to summon.
On that split face, the kindness on the right side vanished completely.
Only the twisted hatred on the left dominated now, stretching into a near-savage grin.
"Each rule you match…"
"The damage I deal to you will double."
"And the damage you deal to me will be halved."
"In other words, Sakiko—"
"You're carrying all four shackles right now."
"Every attack you make… will only be worth one-sixteenth of its effect."
"And any tiny amount of damage I impose on you…"
His right arm flicked casually toward the floor beneath her.
"…will be amplified sixteenfold."
Crack—!
With that motion, the solid palace floor beneath Sakiko shattered like fragile glass.
A bottomless black abyss yawned open at her feet, and an irresistible suction seized her body.
She only managed a short, startled cry before she lost all control—dragged violently downward, plunging into the darkness that devoured everything.
Her long hair whipped wildly. The skirt of her stage costume snapped in the wind.
All she could hear was the screaming rush of air and the pounding drumbeat of her own heart.
From the jagged edge above—rapidly receding—Toyokawa Kiyoteru's voice carried down.
"Leave."
"Come back with your father to the Toyokawa family."
"That is where you belong."
"Or…"
The voice paused.
For the briefest instant, the will of the right half of his face—pressed down to the absolute limit—seemed to struggle up to the surface.
His voice softened, carrying a father's hope and blessing for his daughter.
"When you truly break the shackles of Hierarchy…"
"When you erase the brand of Failure…"
"When you cross the trial of Betrayal…"
"When you walk out of the abyss of Loneliness…"
"Then come to me again."
Toyokawa Sakiko—like a bird with shattered wings—fell into the bottomless dark.
Only beneath the mask, those golden eyes burning with unyielding fire remained—
Two stars that refused to go out, locked on the warped palace above as it grew farther and farther away.
She didn't know how long she fell.
It was like passing through a thick, sticky membrane of water—space twisted violently.
Then the sensation of falling stopped all at once.
A familiar texture pressed up against her feet.
Sakiko gasped—like someone hauled out of drowning—dragging in air in great, ragged breaths.
In the dim light, she was standing on the cold floor of her father's bedroom.
The gorgeous Ave Mujica costume was gone, replaced again by her plain school uniform.
The Willpower Glasses she had crushed, of course, did not exist—almost as if everything she'd just endured had been nothing more than an overly vivid hallucination.
But deep in her soul, the fullness left behind by Icarus told her the truth:
It had all been real.
She stood on the cold floor in silence for a few seconds.
Then, composed, she took out her phone.
The screen lit up.
The "Otherworld Navigation" app was there—exactly as before.
She tapped it.
A simple prompt appeared:
[A palace has been detected nearby. Palace Ruler: Toyokawa Kiyoteru.]
[Enter?]
[Yes / No]
Her finger hovered over Yes for a long time—
Then moved away, and pressed the side button to lock the screen.
The display went dark, reflecting her slightly pale face… and her light-golden eyes.
She didn't try again.
Not yet.
Not until she found a way to resolve the four rules:
Hierarchy. Failure. Betrayal. Loneliness.
And to break the shackle of Hierarchy, the first step was clear:
Under no circumstances could she follow her grandfather back into that prison called the Toyokawa family.
Her gaze shifted slowly to the corner of the room.
On the messy bed, her father—Toyokawa Kiyoteru—was still curled beneath the blanket like a lifeless statue.
Sakiko looked at him for a few seconds. Her lips moved slightly, as if she wanted to say something—
But no sound came out.
Only a silent sigh, deep inside her chest.
A desire twisted enough to form a Palace outside the cognitive world…
Could not be corrected by ordinary words in reality.
This had left the realm of common sense.
It was completely supernatural.
She withdrew her gaze.
No lingering attachment. No expectations.
She turned and left the bedroom, going downstairs to negotiate with her grandfather—
And the process was somewhat smoother than she had expected.
After Sakiko clearly described Toyokawa Sadaharu's position within the family, their situation, and the darkness of the Toyokawa household, her grandfather only fell silent for a moment—
And stopped insisting she return to the Toyokawa family immediately.
When she returned upstairs to the cramped room—
The bed was empty.
At some point, her father had gotten up.
He stood hunched at the window with his back to her, unmoving, staring outside.
Even when he heard her enter, he didn't react.
Sakiko—having long since stopped expecting anything from the "real" him—quietly looked away again, without calling to him, without asking anything.
Join here to read ahead.
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