When I stepped outside the simple tent that had hosted our discussion, I realized the sky had already gone dark.

Night had fallen.

After eight straight days of battle, the number of soldiers following me had dwindled drastically. 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

From the thousand I’d started with, barely a bit over a hundred remained.

This was no longer an army .. just a small battalion that had lost its way in enemy territory.

The rest had either run away... or died in past battles.

Their lives and deaths ..my decisions had clearly played a role in them. I was the one who dragged them here.

Maybe their souls would come to rest on my conscience.

Maybe that was why I felt this growing burden on my shoulders—this strange weight and pressure.

As I wandered through the few tents that remained in our crude camp...

A bitter smile crossed my face.

"What difference does it make now? I’ve borne far heavier burdens than this."

This was the price that had to be paid.

Unlike the past, the number of souls tied to me had grown immensely.

This time, I wasn’t just haunted by the faces of my father, Clana, or Danzo...

The faces that appeared before me now were of people I never even got the chance to know.

"Darker than black itself."

So lost in my solitude, I’d forgotten I wasn’t alone.

Having walked far enough from camp, I was now out of sight ..far enough for her to emerge.

"You’ve been so quiet lately, I almost forgot you were even here."

Those words were for the demoness who stepped out from the shadows.

"I felt this was the right time to appear again," said Sansa, with a gentle smile.

Her words brought me back to something she’d said before.

"Darker than black... What exactly did you mean by that?"

I asked, as we strolled together through the barren wastelands of the Ultras’ lands.

The sky above us was the only living thing in this dead place.

With her hands clasped behind her back, Sansa took the lead. I followed without hesitation.

She took her time answering.

"Do you remember what I told you a long time ago? When I defeated you and the others in our friendly spar?"

She answered my question with another question.

To be honest, I couldn’t recall it clearly.

But after thinking it through... I realized she was talking about that match I’d lost alongside Snow and Demon.

"That’s quite an old memory you’ve dug up. If I’m not mistaken... your hair was still blonde back then."

She was still the human princess whose connection to me I couldn’t quite define.

And I was still trying to find some meaning in my life after winning the Victoriad.

I remembered that much.

But the exact words she said back then escaped me.

"Your darkness is lukewarm and weak. Those were my words to you."

Sansa didn’t give me time to respond. She said it herself.

"But now... it’s darker than black. The abyss inside you has grown so vast... I fear it might consume you one day."

That much... I already knew.

"I don’t know exactly what your demonic eyes see, but nothing has changed. Not now, not in the past... and not in the future either."

That abyss would only grow... until its shadow stretched far and wide.

"Are you even capable of carrying that weight?" she asked.

"What I know is that I will carry it .. whether I have the strength or not. Come on, it’s not like I’m going to collapse or something."

I chuckled, pointing at her.

"You’re here, after all."

Hearing that, she nodded.

"That’s exactly why I chose to appear now."

As I drew closer to her, I began to realize just how important it was to have Sansa by my side.

I wasn’t sure what exactly I felt toward her.

But whatever it was... she felt like a sedative.

A potent drug that threw me far from reality, even if only for a moment ..

Something that made me forget all the burdens crushing my shoulders.

It might sound cruel of me to say this, and perhaps unfair to Sansa, who was willing to do so much for me.

But that’s simply what I felt toward her right now.

I couldn’t call it love. Like I said before...

She was more like a sweet-tasting narcotic .. One that helped me hold myself together just a little longer.

That’s how I viewed her.

And from the looks of it... she already knew that.

And accepted it.

Maybe, alongside her own feelings, she too had developed the same twisted perspective about me.

Perhaps I was her drug ..

Her own escape from the shadows of life.

She understood her role.

That’s why she showed up before me in this moment.

Sansa... my gentle sedative.

---

---

---

—ULTRAS CONTINENT—

At the very heart of the continent, on the main side that housed the strongest forces of the Empire’s enemies, stood the central base of the Higher Blood.

A city swallowed by wastelands like many others... but it was still in far better shape than the rest.

With towering walls and dazzling lights that made it glow amidst the desert—

This city had become the beacon of the war effort for the Ultras.

It was known as Nitheos.

Most of the Higher’s forces were present.

It was always alive.

Its flame never dimmed, neither day nor night.

As soldiers marched back and forth throughout the streets ..

Two men watched everything from atop one of the taller buildings in the area.

They stood side by side, gazing down at the very men who had chosen to follow them blindly.

The first was an old drunk, dressed in tattered rags. Nothing about him stood out—except the cursed sword on his back.

The second was his opposite.

A composed and elegant man, whose only similarity with the old drunk was the fact that he too carried a blazing weapon.

Silence loomed between them for a long while...

Until it was finally broken by Mergo, whose eyes never left the faces of the soldiers below.

"New faces come every day... and the old ones leave.

Funny how quickly I forget them."

Hearing this, Gavid Lindman responded flatly, not even looking at him.

"That’s normal.

They leave to fight.

And besides, I doubt a senile old man like you even remembers faces to begin with."

Mergo had never seemed particularly sane to anyone.

The drunk smiled slowly.

"War, huh?

Do you really think that’s what we’re fighting?"

"You think we’re playing games then?" Gavid grumbled, clearly annoyed ..

This was how every conversation with the old man went.

"Maybe we are, Lindman...

Because to me, it all feels like a grand show ..

Not a war."

That made Gavid turn to face him.

"A play to some,

A war to others.

It all depends on how you look at it."

A war tangled in clashing currents ..

Or a theater with no one truly knowing the script.

To Mergo, there wasn’t much difference between the two.

But there was one thing he was certain of.

"We’re dying, Lindman...

Dying slowly."

His words carried many meanings.

Most notably, the recent deaths of so many of their people on the battlefield.

"We made a deal with the devil," the drunk murmured.

Gavid nodded.

"We did... with more than one."

They both knew ..

There was no turning back now.

Not since the day they created that gate that allowed those demons to come through.

"I keep wondering...

Did we make the right decision?"

"I don’t know," Gavid said.

"But I know this much ..

At the very least, if I die this time...

I’ll die because of my choices.

Not someone else’s."

Even if it all ended in ruin and death .

At least this time...

They were the masters of their own fate.

Gavid Lindman, the man who had once broken his demonic contract and turned on beings like Astaroth...

He had always fought for what he called freedom.

And to achieve his twisted goals, he’d made deal after deal ..

Deals that turned this war into a dark stage play.

Despite knowing far more than most, both he and Mergo were still utterly clueless about how it would all end.

Whether it was a pact with a vile demon, a strange prince, or an unnameable entity...

There was no going back now.

At the very least,

they had earned the right to choose the place they would die.

Or at least...

That’s what they chose to believe.