The air inside Sector Theta was thick, heavy with a pulse that wasn't quite sound and not quite thought. Every step Ren took echoed twice—once in the warehouse, once inside his mind. The shadows beneath him throbbed like liquid crystal, stretching and fracturing to meet the walls as if the building itself were alive.
Luna hung suspended in the center, a lattice of glowing veins tracing her body like a star-map. Hybrid echoes spun around her, writhing like captured constellations, their silent screams forming a harmony only the Yuno Organ could hear. The twin heartbeats had grown louder, now resonating in every molecule of the warehouse.
Kaito's voice cracked the heavy silence. "It's a Cardiac Resonance Mirror. It doesn't just protect the ritual—it reflects your inner state. Fear, doubt, hesitation—it weaponizes them."
Rain stepped forward, twin pistols raised. "Then we make sure it doesn't get the chance."
Ren's shadow expanded, splintering into jagged shards that rattled across the floor, forming a bridge toward Luna. But the instant his foot touched the lattice of glowing veins, the Mirror awoke.
The first reflection wasn't a threat—it was him. Or rather, what he could have been. A version of Ren stripped of humanity, eyes golden but empty, teeth bared in a predatory grin. It moved in perfect mimicry of Ren, shadow mirroring shadow.
"Every variable is counted," the reflection whispered in a voice that was his, yet not. "Your heart is no longer your own. You've given it away."
Ren's hollow ache flared. The piece of his Phantom Genome Rai had sampled clawed at him from the inside, trying to align him with the ritual. He shook it off. His shadow surged upward, jagged facets clashing with the mirrored darkness. "No. My heart is mine. Always mine!"
Aoi's spores darted forward like streaks of phosphorescent light, cutting through the Mirror's reflection. Each contact with the spores caused the reflection to flinch, but it reformed instantly, feeding on Ren's lingering doubts.
Genrou muttered, blade slicing through another echo of hybrid memory. "It's feeding on what you fear you are. Stop thinking and act!"
Ren realized the truth in the old man's words. Every hesitation made the Mirror stronger. Every lingering thought of loss, of hollow ache, of stolen memory, gave it form.
He clenched his jaw, eyes narrowing. I am not a key. I am the lockbreaker.
He thrust his shadow forward, jagged shards piercing the mirrored figure. The reflection screamed—not in sound, but in a violent shudder of energy that rattled the lattice holding Luna.
Luna stirred, and for the first time, her eyes opened. Blue, luminous, clear—like the calm eye of a storm. Her voice, soft but commanding, cut through the resonance.
"Ren… you are the variable."
The reflection faltered, splitting into fragments that flew back toward the Mirror's core. Aoi's spores pulsed, expanding outward, and the warehouse itself seemed to breathe in time with Ren's heartbeat, not the ritual's.
Rain fired into the space around Luna, each shot disintegrating echoes that tried to anchor themselves to her. "Keep her safe! I don't care if you have to burn yourself!"
Ren advanced, shadow spreading like a black tide, each step draining the Mirror's strength. He could feel Rai probing, trying to anticipate him, but every move he made now was unpredictable. Every flicker of thought, every surge of emotion, was his own. Not stolen. Not mirrored. Variable.
The final fragment of the reflection coalesced into a perfect copy of Rai's visage, towering, eyes like molten gold. "You are insignificant, Ren. A footnote in the archive of my ascension."
Ren's shadow shattered into a storm of black diamonds, spinning upward in a cyclone of intent. "Then watch me rewrite the footnote."
The shards collided with the golden mirror-Rai, fracturing it into a thousand reflections. The lattice around Luna flared, not with pain, but with recognition. The hybrid echoes froze, then dissipated like mist in sunlight.
For a heartbeat, silence.
Then Luna floated down, landing lightly, eyes meeting Ren's. "You can enter now," she said. "The core waits. But… it isn't just me inside. Rai will be."
Ren's shadow rippled, crystal edges sharpening. "Good. I've been waiting."
Kaito checked the mapping. "We're at the threshold. What happens next… defines everything."
Genrou exhaled. "Then let's make it count."
Ren stepped forward, shadow and resolve coiled like a living weapon. Sector Theta had become a battlefield of heartbeats and memory—but he wasn't just entering a ritual. He was entering a war inside the soul of the Sovereign.
And he was not alone.