Golden woke up gasping.
Air tore into his lungs, sharp and cold, as if his body had forgotten how to breathe properly. His heart hammered violently in his chest, each beat echoing in his ears.
For a moment, he thought he was still dying.
Then he realized something was wrong.
There was no pain.
The realization came slowly, cautiously, as if his mind was afraid to acknowledge it. Golden lay still, staring up at the endless violet sky, waiting for agony to bloom in his chest.
It didn't.
His breathing steadied.
His heart slowed.
Golden frowned.
That's not right.
The last thing he remembered was pain so intense it had swallowed everything else. The weight of blood soaking his clothes. The feeling of his chest being torn open.
And before that—
The Cerberus.
The Unicorn.
The clash.
Golden's fingers twitched.
Memory sharpened.
He remembered the moment clearly now.
The way the ground had shattered with every collision. The blinding arcs of light carving through the ruins. The Cerberus roaring in fury as the Unicorn drove it back.
And himself.
Dragging his broken body forward.
Blood pooling beneath him.
I ran between them.
The thought sent a shiver through him.
Golden remembered lunging forward, teeth clenched, vision blurred, reaching blindly toward the Unicorn's flowing mane as shockwaves tore the world apart around him
He remembered his fingers closing around something warm and impossibly smooth.
Hair.
White.
Radiant.
That was it.
After that—
Nothing.
Golden sucked in a sharp breath and sat up abruptly.
His body responded instantly.
Too instantly.
He froze, eyes wide.
His chest was whole.
The torn tunic still bore the marks of violence—ripped fabric, dark stains of dried blood—but beneath it, his skin was unbroken,
Smooth,Untouched.
No wound.
No scar.
Golden pressed his palm against his chest, harder this time, as if expecting pain to manifest if he pushed enough.
His heartbeat was steady.
Strong.
Real.
"…I should be dead," he whispered.
The words sounded foreign.
He looked around.
The battlefield was gone.
No shattered light. No scorched stone. No divine beasts tearing each other apart. The ruins stood quietly beneath the violet sky, unchanged and indifferent.
The Cerberus was nowhere to be seen.
Neither was the Unicorn.
Golden slowly rose to his feet, legs trembling—not from weakness, but from shock. He scanned the area desperately, searching for any trace of what had happened.
There was nothing.
As if the world itself had erased the event.
A chill crept into his bones.
Did it heal me? he wondered.
Or—
Did something else?
Golden's thoughts felt sluggish, weighed down by an unfamiliar heaviness. His head throbbed faintly, not with pain, but with the sense that something was missing.
Like a memory forcibly cut away.
He exhaled shakily and looked down at his hands.
They were clean.
Too clean.
He turned them over slowly, half-expecting to find a strand of luminous white hair wrapped around his fingers.
There was nothing.
Golden's jaw tightened.
"I grabbed it," he muttered. "I know i did."
The certainty anchored him.
He hadn't imagined that part.
A wave of nausea rolled through him.
Golden staggered back and leaned against a cold stone wall, sliding down until he was sitting. His hands shook as he rested them on his knees.
He had been that close to death.
Closer than he had ever been to anything.
The fear hit him then.
Not the panicked terror from before—but something deeper. Heavier. A quiet realization that survival here was not guaranteed. That luck was fragile. That next time, there might be no miracle.
"I won't survive," he whispered.
The words slipped out before he could stop them.
Not like this.
Not alone.
Golden squeezed his eyes shut, breathing slowly, forcing himself not to spiral. The ruins remained silent, uncaring witnesses to his weakness.
Something brushed faintly against his left forearm.
Golden stiffened.
The sensation was subtle—like pressure rather than touch. He frowned and lifted his arm slightly, glancing down at the sleeve of his tunic.
For just a moment, he thought he saw a faint discoloration beneath the fabric.
Then it was gone.
Golden stared at his arm for a few seconds longer, heart pounding, before lowering it.
Stress, he told himself. Shock.
That explanation felt thin.
He pushed himself back to his feet.
As he did, his gaze drifted to the wall beside him—and froze.
Carved faintly into the black stone was a symbol.
It was old, weathered nearly beyond recognition, yet unmistakable. A pattern of lines and curves that stirred something uncomfortable in his chest.
Golden stared at it, breath catching.
A sense of familiarity washed over him—strong enough to make his skin prickle.
His left arm tingled faintly.
Golden tore his gaze away.
"No," he muttered. "Not now."
Whatever that symbol was, whatever had happened after he grabbed the unicorn's hair—it wasn't something he was ready to face.
He adjusted the satchel at his side and took a tentative step forward.
He was alive.
That was all that mattered.
For now.
Behind him, the ancient symbol remained etched into the stone.
And beneath the torn sleeve of his tunic, something had begun to wait.