Silence befell the room.
Adrian kept his head lowered, avoiding everyone's gaze. He wanted to give them time—time to truly digest what he had just revealed.
Being connected to the witches was one thing. They were labeled betrayers, figures who always stood apart, accused of harboring Darkness during the war.
But this… this was different.
Everyone in this world—including Adrian—had grown up believing Darkness to be an absolute threat, a plague that should never have existed.
It was the evil that shattered every moral law, every emotional bond, during the era of degradation.
Millions of families had been torn apart. Brothers slaughtered brothers. Lovers turned ravenous for each other's flesh. Mothers—meant to be a sanctuary for their children—became predators that devoured their innocence.
Darkness stripped people of reason and rationality, plunging the world into its most depraved, nightmarish state.
