The silence that followed was not peace.It was the kind of silence that howled behind your ears, louder than any battlefield.
Aurel stood in the cracked apartment he called home. The UI window had faded, but its weight lingered. His breathing was sharp, shallow—like someone who'd just escaped drowning.
No light from the outside filtered in. It was early morning, but the city of Graysmire—his city—remained cloaked in a polluted smog that wrapped itself around buildings like the fingers of a dying god.
His hand trembled as he reached for the mirror.
The reflection that stared back… wasn't the one he remembered.
He looked the same. But he didn't feel the same.
His eyes—once dull and fatigued—were now laced with something darker. Memory. Not just of Fantaso, but of how he died. Of what he lost.
And something else lingered beneath his skin. Not power—resonance. As if this body, once sickly and frail, had become a container for something ancient.
"Is this really me?"
No answer.
But then—
[Passive Skill: Memory of the Darkest Knight has synchronized. Unsealing suppressed core… 6%]
6%.
It felt like someone unzipping his bones.
He fell to his knees, choking on his breath. His muscles tightened, a storm of agony flooding him from the inside. His memories sharpened—like blades, not visions.
He saw his son again.
Small hands. A crooked smile. Calling him "Papa."
Then the sword, cleaving the child in two.
"Stop."
He clawed at his chest.
"Please—STOP."
His scream didn't echo in the room. It echoed in both worlds.
A thousand miles away, in the depths of the Blood Seeker's Domain—the deepest cave ever charted—something stirred.
A crystal embedded in the stone, long thought inert, pulsed with blood-red light.The mana surrounding it twisted. The cave groaned like a slumbering titan.
[Synchronization Detected. Initiating Phase I: World Echo.]
Back in Graysmire, Aurel finally rose.
Sweat clung to his back. His fingers were shaking, but his eyes had steadied.
"I need answers."
Being chosen was just the beginning. The system was lying to him. The world was hiding something. And he didn't believe in coincidences anymore—not after two lifetimes.
"Someone made me forget. Someone made me start over."
And he was going to find out who.
Later that day…
He entered a government-run Chosen Registration Facility—one of the dozens scattered across the globe. It looked like a sleek hospital lobby, all glass and chrome, with holograms of triumphant Chosen ones flashing across the walls.
But Aurel's eyes caught the camera domes in the corners. The guards with guns that were too advanced. The way every other Chosen there—new or old—looked tense, pale, afraid.
He was led to a private room where a woman in a white suit greeted him with a practiced smile.
"Congratulations, Mr. Gray," she said. "You've been blessed."
"Cut the crap," he replied.
Her smile didn't falter. But her fingers paused above her tablet.
"You remember something, don't you?" he asked, stepping forward. "The system. The caves. You know it's not just some power lottery."
There was a moment of silence.
Then, without warning, the walls of the room shimmered. The woman vanished.
She was a projection.
[Cognitive Barrier Detected. Security Protocol Engaged.]
"Player Aurel Gray: Clearance Denied."
The room transformed instantly.
Gone was the fake office. In its place stood a chamber of black glass and steel. And in the center—suspended in a tank of glowing blue liquid—was a humanoid creature covered in wires, its eyes sealed shut, its spine fused with cables.
"This is… a living processor?"
Then he heard it. Not aloud—but inside his mind.
"Darkest Knight… You were not meant to wake."