Unseen by him, in a separate room veiled by screens and silence, the observers sat frozen. They hadn't noticed the darkening of his eyes, the eerie stillness of his form. But the monitors did not lie.
On the largest screen, a diagnostic panel flickered, pulsing with urgent data:
[Mana Core Analysis — Status: Glowing]
[Color: Pure White]
[Rating: ★★★★★]
[Stability: Unconfirmed]
[Type: Unclassified]
[Activity: 157% of permitted level]
The room stiffened.
One doctor leaned forward, his voice dry and cracking with disbelief:
"Is… is that a five-star Core?"
Another, eyes locked to the display, responded with a whisper that felt heavier than a scream:
"No… not just five stars. Look closer."
He swallowed, then continued with wide eyes, almost reverent.
"It's unclassified. Not recorded. Not recognized. This isn't a mana core… she's alive."
When the report reached Elin, she didn't speak immediately. She just stared—silent, unmoving—as though the weight of a prophecy had finally taken shape in numbers and light.
Then, almost imperceptibly, her lips curved.
It wasn't a smile of pride. Nor of victory.
It was a quiet, uneasy expression… like a hunter realizing that the beast she trapped wasn't sleeping—it was simply watching. Waiting.
The monster had opened its eyes.
But it was not yet awake.
And because they knew that—because they feared what would happen when it truly did awaken—they moved to the second phase of the experiment.
The breaking.
Reis was returned—not gently, but with methodical force—to that cursed black room. But this time, something in the atmosphere had shifted. The darkness was thicker, not just empty but oppressive, almost intelligent. The air reeked of old blood, of rust and chemical steam rising like ghostly fingers from unseen vents.
There was no water drop this time.
No rhythm to cling to.
Instead… came the voices.
They whispered, not through walls or speakers, but within the fibers of his mind. Footsteps echoed where no feet walked. Breath brushed against his ears in cold gusts, then vanished. Gasps. Whimpers. Laughter. A thousand fragments of madness, all circling like wolves.
He didn't know if they were hallucinations, or if his illusion had finally bled into the fabric of the real.
Perhaps both.
He saw things—visions or memories, it no longer mattered. A boy dragged by the ankle, screaming silently as he was thrown into a vat of gray fluid, shivering until his body stilled. A girl, younger than him, injected with a seething, unstable Core—her face folding in on itself, warping into something inhuman before fading from existence.
Then he saw himself.
Not his body—but a reflection.
A younger version. Fragile. Desperate. Kneeling before a hand without a face, begging, voice cracking.
The voice inside him echoed with disgust:
"You were a joke."
"You thought you were chosen. You thought this power meant something."
Then the screen turned on again.
Blank. Cold. White.
And the voice returned—not cruel, not angry. Just hollow. Mechanical.
"You're a failure."
"You're just a broken experiment."
"No one is coming to save you."
And over.
Until Reis began to whisper it to himself… without knowing.
They weren't trying to torture him anymore.
They were trying to erase him, atom by atom, until only the shape they wanted remained.
Between those mental attacks, they dragged him—naked, shivering—into ice baths. The water was so cold it felt like needles stabbing his joints. His body convulsed, but he refused to scream. Refused to give them that sound.
He didn't even cry anymore.
His skin grew pale. His breath shallow. It felt like pain had become… irrelevant. Something distant. Abstract.
But inside—inside, something was collapsing.
One night, he glanced down—and the floor breathed.
He blinked, then stared again. Not metaphorically. Literally.
The mana particles, the subtle shifts of air, even the faint electric current in the walls… they moved. Pulsed. Whispered. Every wire was a snake. Every light a heartbeat. The very room was alive.
He saw what no one else could.
But that vision—it wasn't a gift.
It was a curse.
The more he saw, the more alien he became. No longer a child. Not yet a weapon. Not even a person.
He belonged nowhere.
Not to the Awakened.
Not to the humans.
And the voice inside, now no longer a whisper, declared:
"You are an illusion, Reis. just an idea, a dream that failed to form."
One night, seated in his usual corner, eyes blackened beyond recognition, he stared at the air. It danced in slow spirals.
He reached out.
"He tried to give it form — to bend the wild particles to his will, to mold them into something tangible. A sphere, a bird, a blade... anything that would respond to the shape inside his mind. But each time he reached for it, it slipped away, like smoke through trembling fingers."
But it scattered.
And that broke something.
He closed his eyes, let the weight settle. Then he said, softly—more a confession than a cry:
"I am nothing," he whispered into the void, his voice barely audible, as if even the air hesitated to carry it. "No one will help me… no one cares." The words fell like ash, lifeless and final, not a cry for help, but a quiet surrender to a truth he could no longer deny.
Tears did not fall.
Blood did.
Dark crimson streamed from his eyes, not like wounds, but like truth escaping.
He wasn't sure if he was crying… or if he had finally shattered.
And at that moment—when all that was human in him faded—he realized something else.
He would have to die inside… to be reborn.
The next day, they brought him to the arena.
No warning. No transition. No chance to prepare.
Two guards dragged him down a long, echoing hallway lined with cold metal, their grip unforgiving, his bare feet scraping against the concrete. Each step reverberated like a distant drumbeat, like a countdown to something irreversible.
He didn't ask where they were taking him.
He didn't need to.
When they reached the center of the arena—an underground chamber of stone and rusted steel lit by artificial daylight—Reis blinked once against the sterile glow. The ceiling was high, and its walls were scarred with the memories of past trials. Dried blood painted faded shapes across the floor, each a silent testimony.
In the observation room above, a group of scientists stood behind reinforced glass, murmuring among themselves like spectators awaiting a performance.
Then she stepped forward.
Elin.
Clad in her sharp black uniform, cold and composed, with a tablet in one hand and authority in the other.
She didn't greet him.
She didn't ask if he was ready.
She simply said, in a voice without emotion:
"Raw power means nothing to us, Reis. What we demand… is obedience. Now answer—will you obey?"
He stood still, his breathing shallow, his face unreadable. His dark eyes, rimmed in that unnatural ash-like shadow, didn't flicker.
He didn't speak.
Elin narrowed her eyes, then gestured with a hand.
A panel in the far wall hissed open.
Behind the glass… a child.
A little girl.
She couldn't have been older than eight. Her hair was thin and blond, her skin too pale for health. Her eyes—blue and wide—trembled as she looked at him through the barrier. Fear lived in her gaze, not like a spark, but a storm. She didn't cry. She didn't scream. She just stood there… paralyzed.
Elin's voice was as flat as ice:
"This is not a test, Reis. It's judgment. One of you will not leave this room."
Before Reis could move or protest, the girl was pushed into the arena.
The door clanged shut behind her with a sound like a final verdict.
She stumbled forward, catching herself on trembling hands, then stood. She didn't speak. Didn't plead. But her mana—untrained, wild—flared around her like unstable gas. Her small frame buzzed with power that her body wasn't meant to carry.
Reis didn't react.
He watched her, watched the air around her fracture slightly as she stepped forward, one foot after the other, each one an effort, each breath a battle.
She raised her hand, her fingers glowing faintly, but her body was already failing.
Veins bulged in her neck. Her eyes shook with strain.
She was attacking… even as her body screamed for mercy.
Reis did nothing.
He looked at the air—not at her, but around her. The tremor of mana particles. The panic in their motion. The way her presence distorted the current. The fear behind her movements.
And then, he simply raised a single finger.
Just one.
Everything around him froze.
Not in a dramatic explosion. Not in violence.
But in silence.
The air thickened. Particles stopped mid-spin. Even the flickering lights above stuttered.
Time didn't break.
It compressed.
Folded inward like a breath held too long.
Then… the girl collapsed.
She made no sound, unleashed no burst of power—only sank quietly to the floor, her body folding with eerie grace, like a fallen leaf caught in still air, untouched, unconscious, and swallowed by silence.
The scientists behind the glass stared, their hands suspended mid-motion.
One of them asked, voice trembling:
"What did he do…?"
No answer came.
Reis didn't explain. Didn't look up.
He turned slowly, his movements heavy but deliberate, and when his eyes rose to meet theirs, they no longer shimmered with power—but with something far deeper, darker, and unshakable. It wasn't rage that filled them, nor the wild defiance of a cornered boy. It was conviction—cold, calm, and resolute. And though his voice came as a whisper, it carried through the room like a verdict. "I am not your tool," he said, his words deliberate, carved from the quiet. "And I will never be your obedient beast."
Then, as if the act had drained the last thread holding him up, he collapsed. His knees gave out, his hands limp beside him. The world flickered around him—but this time, he didn't fall into unconsciousness like before. He fell into clarity.
Measured him like a miracle they didn't know how to contain.
But they didn't understand.
They thought he was resisting out of fear. Out of instinct. They thought he clung to life.
They were wrong.
Reis had let go of survival.
What he sought now was no longer survival, nor strength for its own sake. It was something far more dangerous—something that burned quietly behind his hollow gaze and pulsed through every shattered thought. He sought liberation, not just from their hands, but from every chain—seen or unseen—that had ever dared to bind him.
Even if it meant burning the entire world to ash.
Even if he had to destroy himself to be free.
Even if the only thing that remained after him…
was silence.