The chamber's air grew heavier—dense, almost metallic—as Reiji stepped beyond the shattered remains of the mirrored hall. Dust drifted like ash on unseen drafts, and the torchlights flickered as though recoiling from his presence. Behind him, the fragments of Silas's illusions still twitched with phantom movement, as if refusing to accept death.
Reiji didn't look back.
There was nothing behind him worth remembering.
Ahead, a narrow corridor gaped open, carved from obsidian stone with veins that pulsed faintly like a heartbeat. The air smelled ancient—older than the Citadel, older than the families that once ruled the continent. A breath of something forgotten brushed against his skin.
"This place…" Reiji murmured.
It felt like a tomb built for kings no one dared acknowledge.
He stepped inside.
Each footfall echoed unnaturally, splitting into several overlapping reverberations—as if multiple versions of him walked the corridor together, slightly out of sync. His vision briefly doubled, showing two paths of movement, two gestures of his hand.
The absence of Silas's illusions made the distortion worse, not better.
The Citadel was showing its original face.
A memory surfaced: The Archivist once mentioned that the Citadel's foundation was built upon the remains of a forgotten dynasty—one erased from every history book. A lineage known only as the Kings Beneath the Veil.
Reiji kept walking.
As he reached the corridor's end, the temperature dropped sharply. Frost crept along the walls in branching veins. He stepped into a cavernous hall illuminated by cold blue fire suspended in midair.
And he stopped.
Stone statues lined both sides of the hall—towering, robed figures gripping chains carved from the same stone. Each chain wrapped around the base of an enormous central throne.
The throne itself was cracked down the middle, as though split by an ancient blow.
Reiji slowly circled it, eyes narrowing.
The chains weren't decorative.
They were restraints.
For something massive that once sat here.
He bent down, touching the cold stone. His fingertips felt grooves—deep claw marks gouged into the floor, circling the throne like a cage someone had desperately tried to escape.
Not something. Someone.
A presence stirred.
Reiji rose instantly, hand going to his weapon.
From behind one of the statues, something shifted—a faint scrape of stone against stone, followed by a whisper of breath. A shadow peeled itself from the pillar and stepped forward.
The figure wore armor older than any Reiji had ever seen, its metal etched with sigils that pulsed faintly. A helmet entirely devoid of facial slit covered its head, shaped like a smooth, cold mask.
But when it spoke, the voice echoed like it came from a throat bound by centuries.
"Another heir of the surface."
Reiji tensed. "Who are you?"
The armored figure tilted its head.
"A guardian of a king long forgotten. A remnant bound to oath and ruin."
It stepped closer, each movement deliberate, like someone unfamiliar with the weight of its own body. Chains wrapped around its limbs rattled—real metal, not stone.
Reiji's eyes narrowed.
Those chains weren't ornamental either.
They were binding restraints.
"If you're a guardian, then why are you moving freely?" Reiji asked.
The masked knight stopped three paces away.
"Because the king I swore to protect is gone."
A hollow pause.
"And yet, the oath survives."
Reiji knew that tone.
The tone of someone trapped in a duty that no longer had meaning.
The knight's head lifted slightly, as if sensing his thoughts.
"You carry chains of your own, Surface-Born."
Reiji's grip tightened. "I didn't come here to share burdens."
"And yet you drag them louder than your footsteps."
The flame suspended above them dimmed, murmuring like a breath being drawn by the room itself.
Then the knight raised its chained arm.
"I must test you."
Reiji reacted instantly.
Steel met shackles with a deafening clash. Sparks exploded as Reiji struck aside the knight's chained blade. The force behind it was monstrous—far greater than its slow movements suggested. Reiji's feet skidded across the stone floor, leaving scratches.
The knight advanced without pause.
Another blow. Reiji ducked. A chain snapped toward his torso like a serpent, and he barely twisted in time. The floor cracked beneath his heel as he redirected the force.
Fast. Heavy. Precise.
The knight wasn't fighting to kill.
It was fighting to measure him.
Reiji snarled, his muscles straining. "If you want to test me, then fight me seriously!"
The knight hesitated, as if considering.
Then…
The chains around its arms and torso lit with blue fire.
Power surged.
The next strike shattered the stone floor into dust. Reiji was thrown back, crashing against a statue that splintered on impact. Pain shot down his spine, but he forced himself upright.
The knight approached again.
Reiji exhaled shakily.
He felt it—an emotion he rarely allowed:
Fear.
Not of dying.
But of what this meant.
If a guardian forgotten by history wielded this strength…
What kind of king had it once protected?
The knight swung its blade. Reiji rolled aside, sliding under the blow and slashing upward. His blade skidded uselessly off the knight's armor, sparks raining like broken stars.
"You wield skill."
The knight turned.
"But skill without conviction is hollow."
Reiji's teeth clenched. "Conviction enough to keep moving is all that matters."
The knight's response was a quiet, mournful hum.
"Then show me that movement."
It charged.
The hall thundered.
Reiji felt the collision before he saw it. His weapon locked against the knight's chained blade, the impact shaking the air itself. He braced, leaning forward, forcing all his strength into resisting the overwhelming pressure.
The knight pressed harder.
Stone cracked beneath Reiji's boots.
"You bear a crown you refuse to acknowledge."
Reiji spat blood. "I don't wear a crown."
"Every man who survives enough deaths eventually does."
The knight shoved him back, lifting its chained arm high. Blue fire roared along the metal—
—and Reiji dropped low, letting the blade pass above him.
He thrust upward, aiming for the knight's joint. The blow struck true. The knight staggered—not from pain, but from surprise.
Reiji didn't waste the moment.
He lunged again, this time using the knight's chains as leverage, climbing up its arm. The guardian swung wildly, but Reiji was faster. He brought his blade to the mask—
—and froze.
Just for a heartbeat.
Because behind the smooth mask, he felt it:
A human face.
Not monstrous. Not ancient.
A man burdened by a curse.
The hesitation cost him.
The knight grabbed him by the throat and slammed him into the ground. The chamber cracked like thin ice. Reiji coughed, vision blurring as cold stone kissed his skull.
The knight lifted him slightly.
"You hesitate."
Reiji's voice rasped. "You're… still human."
A beat of silence.
Then the knight lowered him gently, not violently. The chains around its limbs dimmed.
"Humanity is not freedom," the knight said quietly.
"Sometimes it is the heaviest shackle."
Reiji lay still, catching his breath.
The knight slowly knelt.
"You have passed the trial, Surface-Born. You fight not with arrogance, nor with blind fury, but with weight—your own chains, acknowledged or not."
The blue flames in the hall dimmed further.
The knight's voice softened.
"This place… the throne you see… belonged to the first of our kings. A ruler erased by those who feared his power."
Reiji listened, silent.
"He was not a tyrant. But he was too aware of the cost of truth. The world broke beneath him, and instead of bending… he shattered."
The knight's hand rested lightly on the cracked throne.
"We—the guardians—were bound here to wait. To judge. To guide. Until one appeared who could understand the burden of carrying a crown made of sacrifices."
It did not say the word king.
It didn't need to.
The knight stood and looked down at Reiji.
"You are not ready."
Reiji stiffened.
The knight raised a hand—gentle, almost paternal.
"But you will be."
The chains binding the knight began dissolving into blue dust, drifting upward. The armor's sigils flickered weakly.
Reiji's eyes narrowed. "What's happening to you?"
"My duty ends."
A faint, weary exhale.
"I have fulfilled the last command of a king who no longer breathes."
The knight's body began to fragment at the edges.
Reiji stepped forward. "Wait—"
The knight shook its head.
"Continue forward. Beyond this hall lies the chamber of echoes. The truths you seek will claw at you."
It paused.
"Do not let their voices drown your own."
Then the knight dissolved completely, scattering like ash into the cold air.
The hall fell silent.
Reiji stood alone… with the broken throne of a forgotten monarch looming behind him.
He turned toward the next corridor—the one the knight had indicated.
A long breath.
Then he stepped forward.
Not as someone chosen.
But as someone who refused to be chained by the ghosts of kings.