"When chaos sleeps, patience is the blade that wakes it."
The sea of blood was silent again, its surface as smooth as glass.Crystal sat cross-legged where she had been, eyes half-closed, trying to steady the strange rhythm that pulsed beneath her. She had stopped asking what this place was. The questions only echoed back.
Then the stillness broke.
A low tremor rolled through the red water, spreading outward in perfect rings. From both sides of where she sat, the surface began to swell. At first it looked like rising waves—but the waves did not fall back. They stretched upward, twisting, hardening, and from them two enormous forms began to climb out of the blood-sea.
Statues.
They kept growing, the ripples widening until she could no longer see the edges. One stood far in front of her, the other behind, both lifting from the ocean like ancient towers that had slept too long beneath its surface. The motion stopped as suddenly as it had started.
Crystal rose slowly, eyes darting between them. "There was nothing here before," she whispered. "Now there are two of you."
The statues said nothing.
Each was still, shaped from dark crimson stone that gleamed under the blood moon. The air hummed faintly with energy, like the world itself was holding its breath.
Crystal glanced down, half-expecting to see through the red water again, but there was nothing below—no depth, no shadow. Only the same endless liquid void.
For a while she simply stared, trying to decide which way to go. Her instincts told her forward, toward the first statue.
She started walking.
The sound of her steps was strange—soft, almost hollow. Each one sent small ripples across the surface, but the statue ahead didn't seem to grow any closer.
She frowned and kept moving. Ten more steps. Twenty. A hundred.
Still the same distance.
Crystal stopped, blinking hard. The statue was exactly where it had been, unmoved, impossibly far yet clearly visible.
She tried again, this time walking faster. Then running.
The blood ocean splashed under her feet, but the horizon didn't change. The statue remained just out of reach, as though space itself had decided to mock her.
"What—" She gritted her teeth and sprinted harder. The surface hissed beneath her boots, throwing up crimson droplets that vanished before falling back down. She kept running until her chest ached even though she had no breath left to lose.
The distance never changed.
It was like running in a dream. The harder she pushed, the less the world moved.
Frustration bubbled in her chest. She slowed, turning around to see if the other statue was any closer. It wasn't. Both stood exactly where they had been, silent, unbothered.
Her fists clenched. "Fine," she muttered. "You win."
She shut her eyes and took a long, steady breath. The anger didn't help. She knew that.
Her mind flashed back—an old memory, soft but clear.Her master's voice, calm as always: "When the path refuses to open, stop forcing it. Flow with it. Water cuts stone not through strength, but through patience."
She let the words settle in her chest.
After a few moments, she lowered herself onto the blood-water again, crossing her legs just as she had before. The surface rippled once, then stilled.
"Don't force what is not meant to move," she whispered. "Flow together with it."
Silence.
The red moon above flickered faintly, its light bending across the surface like liquid glass.
Crystal waited. She didn't count the seconds this time; she simply breathed. The tension in her shoulders eased, the frustration dulled, and her heartbeat slowed into the same rhythm as the faint tremor under her.
Then, without thinking, she stood.
She didn't look at the statue again. She just walked. Not fast, not slow—simply forward, letting her feet follow the strange pull that guided her.
The world changed.
The endless distance began to fold. The blood ocean shimmered, and the statue that had stayed far away now seemed to draw nearer with every step.
Soon she could see its shape clearly.
It was a man—tall, silent, carved from stone darker than night. He wore a broad metal straw hat that shadowed the top half of his face. A mask covered the rest, smooth and stylized into the shape of a demon's snarl. In one hand he held a katana unlike any Crystal had seen, its edge carved in black stone so deep it seemed to swallow the moonlight around it.
Behind the statue, a halo hovered—a ring of cracked stone that glowed faintly, threads of lightning crawling across its surface and disappearing into the air.
The presence that radiated from it was overwhelming, alive. Impossible.
Crystal's breath caught. "You're… made of stone," she murmured, "but you feel alive."
She stepped closer. Each pace brought a heavier pressure in the air, as if the statue's silent gaze weighed on her.
When she finally stood before it, she hesitated. Then slowly, she reached out her hand and touched the cold stone of its arm.
For a heartbeat, nothing happened.
Then the world moved.
A pulse ran through the statue like a breath of thunder. The mask's eyes flared blue for an instant, lightning dancing inside the empty sockets. The halo crackled, casting long streaks of light across the water.
Crystal gasped, the sensation burning through her fingertips—a connection, brief but unmistakable, like touching the edge of a storm.
But it vanished as quickly as it came.
The statue returned to stillness, the glow fading until nothing remained but the stone.
Crystal stared, stunned. "What was that…?"
She touched it again. No reaction. The surface was lifeless now, cold and unyielding.
She pressed her palm harder, searching for the feeling, the spark—nothing.
Her hand fell to her side. "It's gone."
The silence returned, heavier than before.
She stood there for a while, looking up at the figure. Even motionless, it felt as though it were watching her, waiting. For what, she couldn't guess.
Finally she turned away. "If you won't answer, maybe the other one will."
The second statue stood somewhere behind her, still distant but no longer unreachable.
She began walking.
This time, the world didn't resist. The blood water rippled gently under her feet as she moved, each step taking her closer without effort. The distance folded easily now, and within moments the second statue loomed ahead.
Crystal stopped. Her eyes widened.
What she saw left her speechless.
"Patience opens what strength cannot; chaos listens only to those who are still."