Two eyeballs floated in the pitch-black sky. There was no better way to describe them.

It wasn’t a ferryboat—they simply hovered in midair. The ferryman hadn’t even invited him aboard and instead stood there, gazing silently at him. Enkrid felt a presence in the darkness that completely overwhelmed him.

The ferryman’s eye above his head had grown as large as a moon. It stared down and spoke through telepathy.

“Eternal pain. To writhe in that pain—that is the day you have chosen. Even if you’re freed after hundreds of years bound to this place, could you say that the ‘you’ then is the same as the ‘you’ now? By then, you’ll have become like ‘me.’ Even without giving up, without despairing, without falling—so it shall be.”

As the ferryman spoke, his eye crumbled like old wooden siding or flaking dust, scattering like gray hailstones.

Unlike usual, the words carried a wave that shook Enkrid’s entire being. They were not just a prophecy—they were a fixed future.

So, was it his turn to tremble like a frightened child? 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦

Or should he refuse to let it end like this and demand an answer?

Pain. Terror. Dread.

All of it combined into a single spear that pierced Enkrid’s heart. The formless blade tore through his pulsing cardiac muscle before being ripped out. Blood clung to its path in a long string, as if the spear and Enkrid were bound by the same blood.

The gray hail never reached his head. It scattered and vanished in the air.

‘No, maybe it’s more like snow than hail.’

The hallucination ended. The dream broke.

Heavy air, lingering pain, and the now-familiar sense of brutal reality—all of it rushed in at once.

Enkrid, newly awakened in the real world, slowly raised his hand. At first, it hovered near his heart, as if to touch the place. Then it moved up and swept through his hair. He spoke, the words slipping out with ease.

“Good.”

He understood that he had reached his third "today," and he completely ignored the ferryman’s words.

The speech had been thrown like a brand onto his soul, but Enkrid passed over it with ease. Only he could do that. His heart was beyond steely—it had swollen so large it could shove aside his other organs.

And rightly so. If his will had been weak enough to break, it would’ve shattered long ago.

“Crazy bastard.”

The ferryman’s apparition murmured from beyond the fading illusion. It lacked the weight of his earlier tone, but Enkrid didn’t care.

He was already busy thinking about what to do next—how to move.

“A guest has arrived?”

Then it was time to begin today’s task. The moment he heard the words, Enkrid’s entire body reacted. He erased the echoes of his former "today" with his current motion.

Feigning a collapse, Enkrid hurled the Horn-Trumpet Dagger. His right hand brushed past his chest with unprecedented speed.

With a sudden burst, his cloak fluttered violently, and the dagger cried out as it flew.

Pwoo-oo!

A throwing weapon Jaxon loathed flew straight at the enemy’s forehead. The enemy flinched and dodged in a panic, but the dagger’s thrower had already leapt forward.

He ran low, feet hugging the ground. It was a silent dash mixed with Jaxon’s style. Enkrid sprinted, drawing his sword mid-charge.

Swiing!

By the time the blade scraped free of its sheath, the tip was already at the enemy’s throat.

The opponent drew a sword from his left sleeve to block the Horn-Trumpet Dagger and half-pulled a shortsword from his waist with his right.

Enkrid gave him no time to counter.

The shortsword tried to rise in an arc to intercept Dawn Tempering’s path—but failed. The blade pierced clean through his throat.

Ting ting ting, thunk.

The late-drawn shortsword clashed with Dawn Tempering and sparked. Teeth chipped off the blade, which clattered uselessly to the floor.

Spk!

Enkrid yanked the sword from the neck, leaving behind a black hole as dark fog gushed forth. With that, he dispatched the first enemy and pressed forward again.

Ching, ting.

Sliding Dawn Tempering back into its sheath, Enkrid cracked his neck to both sides and stared ahead.

The darkness in the corridor revealed oddities as one passed through. There were torches, yet their light only illuminated fixed zones. It was as if the darkness had personal boundaries even light couldn’t cross.

Observation was second nature to him—a habit learned from Jaxon and perfected through Lua Gharne.

Enkrid registered everything he saw, heard, and sensed. Whether or not it held meaning was uncertain. This place was inherently hostile to him. That it was foreign and built by the enemy only reinforced it.

So would knowing a little more help? Maybe.

Like Jaxon, Enkrid had already realized this place resembled a demon realm.

No matter what it was, the fact remained—he had to fight again and again. And so, Enkrid did what he had to. He passed through the corridor and met his next opponent.

“Hello, Donapha.”

This time, he pronounced the name correctly.

“You know me?”

For the current Enkrid, facing an unguarded enemy was too easy.

Hearing his name, the opponent flinched—and in that gap, Enkrid closed in and swung his blade. Dawn Tempering traced a chilling arc of sky-blue light—a diagonal slash, long and straight.

This time, he blended in techniques from both Vortex and Oara’s swordplay.

Skkkrrrk!

Steam burst from the soles of his specially made boots. He had slammed his feet down mid-charge, dragging them for traction.

Tunk!

The strike connected from chest, to throat, to the horse-head-shaped helm, and the side of the head—all in one slash. The opponent tried to counter with a large axe but failed.

Of course. This was an enemy Enkrid had defeated easily before—even without repeating the day. This was the third time. He could now see his opponent’s weakness—and he mercilessly exploited it.

‘No gaps. Make a trajectory too fast to block.’

Whether it was the first foe or Donapha transformed into a Dullahan, the strategy was the same. Enkrid added speed modulation using Will, something he had learned from the Zaun family.

‘Line Explosion.’

In the end, Dawn Tempering never even touched the axe. The opponent didn’t even try to parry. Realizing he couldn’t stop it, he didn’t aim for the sword—he targeted the wielder.

Whoosh.

Just before death, the massive axe came crashing down vertically where Enkrid had just been.

Boom!

It was a swing that missed because he had already passed by. The axe, hewn in a downward arc as if slipping halfway off the phantom horse, split the earth beneath it with a loud crack.

‘If I had blocked that head-on, it would’ve been seriously heavy.’

Even though it was mid-swing and struck while receiving a blow, the force packed into that axe swing wasn’t trivial. And that wasn’t even a full-power strike.

Either way, it was the third time facing this opponent. Enkrid walked beyond the darkness toward the torchlight. The passage was a straight path. At its end—stood Balrog.

So was this a path that led to death?

“Yes,”

The ferryman’s apparition agreed. Just an illusion, of course. He could not speak in the physical realm.

Eventually, when Enkrid faced the opponent with the single-edged sword, the man tilted his head and cocked it sideways.

“What now?”

Without further words, the enemy lunged. The fight ended quickly. Same tactics as before. Give no openings. Use every advantage he had. His skill and strategy were superior.

“You cheap bastard.”

Enkrid, praised by someone whose upper and lower halves were now separated, soon encountered Oara again.

“Ah, right, you’re here.”

Even as Oara spoke, Enkrid’s mind was busy sketching dozens of lines, forming circles, all calculations in motion.

‘Can I suppress him through calculation?’

After two previous battles, he felt he had discovered something Balrog lacked. He intended to try it.

“It’s been a while—I thought we could chat a bit, maybe.”

Oara said a few things, and he responded.

“Ah, yes.”

Enkrid was indifferent. Already lost in his thoughts, calculations tumbling about in his head.

“Hey, just... be careful, alright?”

It wasn’t that Enkrid hadn’t said anything. He told her everything he knew—including about Roman. He just hadn’t laughed along while she reminisced.

“Yeah. Let’s kill Balrog first.”

No matter what he said, his resolve remained high. Once more, Oara’s shadow shifted—and Balrog manifested.

Flames coiled from his eyes in long tails, spinning. He looked at Enkrid with a faint note of curiosity.

—Have we met before?

What now? Was he sensing the dissonance in today’s repetition?

No. It wasn’t that.

It was a truth Enkrid would only realize after five more “todays.” Balrog had spoken after seeing the look in Enkrid’s eyes.

A gaze that calmly met his own—a gaze that held a will honed like a blade.

So few mortals could look upon his presence and remain that composed. Meeting two such mortals in a short span? Rarer still.

That meant recently, even before Enkrid, he had met someone similar.

He had lived so long that counting the days no longer held meaning. In such a sea of meaningless time, encountering a mortal like that stirred a rare interest. That curiosity moved Balrog’s heart.

Like a rampaging chariot drawn by mad horses, he leapt past three challengers in a single charge. As always, after speaking with Oara—

—Behold.

The eighteenth “today.”

For Enkrid, the moment felt oddly out of place.

Fwoosh.

Balrog spread his wings and pointed to three gemstones embedded in his chest. Three mysterious, glossy-black stones shone upon his blood-red skin.

“Hmm?”

Enkrid tilted his head slightly. Balrog saw even that reaction as something unusual.

—This is my origin. Shatter all three at once, and you win.

Should he ask why he was revealing that? No—there was no time for that.

“Ah.”

So Enkrid only gave a short hum and nodded.

Balrog’s lips curled into a grin. Whether he wielded power or not, he existed in this world with arms, legs, torso, and internal organs. So he could laugh. Some demons expressed emotions differently from mortals, but not him.

—Interesting.

With genuine curiosity, he introduced Salamandra and Urtt.

A red, snake-like whip and a blade wreathed in black flames flared up in greeting.

Whoosh!

At the same time, Balrog spread his wings wide.

Was this what a god did when preparing to fly? Perhaps. It wasn’t much different from Frokk puffing up his cheeks.

Enkrid’s composure didn’t falter even at a demon’s wingbeat.

Should he return the greeting?

Before he could decide, his cloak moved on its own.

Flarararak.

The cloak he’d received from the fairies unfurled by itself, despite the air being perfectly still. It grew as wide as Balrog’s wings, fluttering behind him.

Zzzzing.

At the same time, his sheath rattled—Dawn Tempering let out a cry.

Though it looked like the cloak and sword acted first, in truth, they moved because Enkrid’s will stirred them. He grabbed the grip with his right hand. Sword and arm became one—and with it came confidence.

Just holding it made him feel like he could do anything. A sense of omnipotence surged through his body.

But he had to be careful. Succumbing to that feeling would only ensure defeat.

If he lost control of his emotions, Balrog’s black-flame blade would scorch his skull to ash. He knew that well—he had experienced it already, more than once.

Chrrrrring.

Still gripping the sword, he drew it. The sky-blue light of Dawn Tempering lit up the dark corridor as though pushing the darkness away.

Behind that gleaming blade, two blue eyes flared with fierce will—then quickly dimmed.

But the flame wasn’t extinguished.

Like embers that burn longer than a blaze, the calm blue fire between his eyes continued to shine with presence.

To Balrog’s eyes, Enkrid’s gaze looked like two blue moons that pushed aside the Red Moon.

Moons that carried fire.

Enkrid had started each day a little differently, counting the number of “todays” he’d repeated.

‘Eighteen times.’

That meant he had tried and refined the method he found on the third “today” more than ten times.

Originally, it might’ve taken hundreds of days. The old Enkrid might not have been able to pull it off even then.

No matter how many times he repeated the day—hundreds, thousands—he wouldn’t have reached this point. His body wouldn’t have kept up.

But he wasn’t the same anymore.

‘Let’s try it.’

Tap. He kicked a stone as he pushed off the ground.

He’d do whatever it took to win. That premise hadn’t changed.

He drew hundreds of lines between himself and the demon. Attack paths tangled, overlapping territories.

Countless potential near-futures tore through Enkrid’s mind. His thoughts stretched, insight pushed to its limits.

Balrog swung his blade, staying within the bounds of prediction—his motion and trajectory familiar.

The black-flame sword fell vertically in a clean drop.

The attack lacked any continuous flow—like a random, disconnected strike.

Enkrid intercepted it with a heavy swing of Dawn Tempering.

Bam!

He blocked the sword—and fought again.

And once more—

Enkrid died.