CHAPTER TWO: THE ROOM WITHOUT MIRRORS
The door hissed shut behind him with a sound like a blade sliding into a sheath, cutting away the noise outside.
In an instant, the thunder of Eden's endless celebration was gone, sealed behind walls of black stone and mirrored circuitry. The cheering crowds, the chanting choirs, the fireworks bursting in violet and gold — all of it vanished as if it had never been real.
Here, in the quiet of his quarters, the world was mute.
No applause. No hymns. No screams.
Only silence, broken by the faint hum of artificial light and the deep, steady vibration beneath the floor... the heartbeat of the Sanctum itself, a buried monolith older than Eden, pulsing like something alive under the city's highest spire.
Luther stood just inside the doorway, his hand still resting on the panel, as if unwilling to let go. He could still feel the warmth of the boy's small fingers on his own, still hear the child's timid smile in his mind. Not with you here, sir…
The boy's words burned worse than any wound.
Slowly, he let the door seal completely, and the lights adjusted to his presence... a soft white glow that felt like moonlight but wasn't.
He slipped off his robe in silence.
The garment fell heavy to the floor, catching the light like molten gold. Even discarded, it shimmered with divine scripture stitched into its seams... fragments of prayer, bits of burnt blood mixed with the thread, the runes etched into the fabric faintly glowing where angel bone had been ground to dust and woven in.
Holy garb, made for war.
He didn't bother hanging it. He let it lie crumpled, a dead skin he no longer needed to wear.
Underneath, his body was a tapestry of scars.
Some of them were deliberate.. sigils etched into his flesh by Church blades, left to fester and harden into permanent reminders. Others were deeper, messier. Wounds that hadn't healed because they weren't allowed to. Every inch of him bore the marks of their faith.
His hand drifted automatically to his spine. His fingers traced the faint lattice embedded beneath the skin, each of the twelve nodules arranged perfectly along his vertebrae.
The divine interface.
Invisible to anyone else. Visible to the one who had put it there.
His quarters were large, spacious even, but empty. The walls were bare black stone, broken only by lines of faint silver script that flickered faintly with light — wards, sanctification runes, maybe both. There were no windows. No paintings. No mirrors.
Only a single bed.
A circle of ash inlaid in the center of the floor.
And his spear, Lux Caedis, leaning in the corner like an executioner taking a rest between killings.
Luther sat heavily on the edge of the bed and let his head fall into his hands.
He didn't cry. He didn't make a sound. He just sat there, still, his massive frame shuddering slightly with each breath as he tried to quiet the pressure building in his skull.
It wasn't rage. It wasn't sorrow.
It was something else.
Something that felt alive.
Something that felt like it was watching him from inside his own skin.
He lay back on the mattress and shut his eyes, willing himself to sleep, even though he knew better.
That was when the flashes began.
Not dreams. Not memories.
Fragments.
A sterile white room.
The sharp, copper tang of blood in the air.
A scream, thin and strange, shaped like a prayer.
And over it all, a voice — soft, low, familiar.
You were made to end him.
He shot upright in bed, gasping. His breath fogged the air, though the room was warm.
The lights above him flickered once. Then again.
Across the room, the meditation circle of ash shimmered faintly — just enough for him to notice.
The ash began to stir, even though there was no wind.
Luther rose slowly to his feet. His bare soles pressed into the cold stone as he crossed the room toward the circle.
The ash shifted in subtle spirals, rising just above the floor, and then began to form something. A figure.
A woman.
She stood in the center of the circle as though she had always been there, waiting.
Naomi.
Her white hair was tied back neatly, just as he remembered it, and her robes were stained with blood that had long since darkened to black. But she looked whole. Unscarred. Beautiful in her solemnity.
Her eyes met his without fear.
"You left the mirror broken," she said quietly.
Luther froze.
"…You're not real," he whispered.
"Neither are you."
Her answer cut through him sharper than Lux Caedis ever could.
His breath caught.
Naomi stepped forward, out of the circle, and the ash scattered like dust beneath her feet, though she left no prints on the floor.
She walked the room slowly, her eyes sweeping over the walls, the bare bed, the spear resting against the corner. When she smiled, it was soft, almost pitying.
"No paintings. No windows. No reflections," she murmured.
"Why would there be?" His voice was hoarse.
"Because gods aren't supposed to doubt themselves," she replied, turning her gaze back to him.
Her words struck like ice.
He reached out to touch her, hand trembling ... but his fingers passed through her as though through smoke.
"You died," he said. "Mr. P told me..."
"Paku tells everyone a story," Naomi said simply. "Even himself."
"Then what am I seeing?"
She tilted her head faintly.
"The truth for starters," she said. "Or the beginning of it if there is a beginning."
Luther backed away a step.
"Did he... did he kill you?" he asked.
Naomi's smile faded.
Instead of answering, she asked, "Do you remember the day he first awakened you?"
Another flash tore through him... unbidden, violent.
A sterile room. Bright white light.
A man in a lab coat and sunglasses, laughing like a lunatic with a cigarette in his mouth.
The crack of a blade driving into bone.
A baby's cry — not from pain but confusion.
A woman screaming a name.
Elian.
Luther clutched his head, fingers digging into his skull.
"Naomi.... please."
Naomi stepped closer.
"Do you remember why you were created?" she pressed.
"No," he snarled.
"Do you remember who you were meant to kill?"
"Stop..."
His back struck the wall. Sparks flared where his shoulder hit.
"Stop!"
The stone behind him cracked from the force of his hand as he slammed his fist into it. The sound echoed through the empty room.
Naomi's figure wavered, flickering like ash caught on the wind.
"Hmmm... you'll find him soon," she whispered. "He's waiting. And when you see him… you'll understand why your hands were made to kill gods."
Her shape disintegrated into drifting black dust.
And she was gone.
Luther stood alone.
Chest heaving. Knuckles bloody.
The lights overhead buzzed faintly, then steadied.
Long shadows stretched across the floor, stretching into something almost like wings.
But not angelic. Not divine.
Something else.
Something darker.
Far above him, in the control room of the Observer Tower, Zero watched the feed play out across his console. The grainy image of Luther standing alone, shaking, his shadow stretched like black wings behind him.
Zero's pale eyes narrowed.
"Mmmm... are you watching Paku," he murmured.
And far below, buried in the chaos of his own lab, Mr. P was laughing so hard he nearly choked on his coffee.
"Ohhh," he wheezed, wiping tears from the corners of his eyes. "You're finally dreaming…"
He leaned back in his chair, turning his gaze to the stasis pod in the corner.. the backup Luther shell.
Still empty. Still humming faintly.
He reached into his bathrobe pocket and drew out an old photograph.
A child, white and black haired and smiling shyly. A woman beside him, her arm around his shoulders, her smile softer but just as bright.
Mr. P stared at it for a long moment, then struck a match and lit a cigarette.
"Ohh... Don't worry, Akane," he murmured to the photo. "Don't... you.. worry."
Outside, far beyond the spires of Eden, the sky cracked .. faintly, but enough to send a vein of gold lightning lacing across the horizon.
And the heartbeat of the buried monolith deep below Eden thudded once, louder than before.
Luther sat back on the edge of his bed, staring at the cracked wall, and felt the ash of Naomi's words still clinging to the air.
Waiting.
Watching.
END OF CHAPTER TWO