Everyone was shocked.
Not because of Seraphine's betrayal…
Not because of her sudden attack.
But because of the name she had spoken.
Shadow Slave's real name.
The reason he had protected us.
The reason he had never killed us.
Could it really be him…?
Or was it just someone with the same name?
Silence filled the battlefield.
Then Shadow Slave spoke calmly.
"How can you say with certainty that I am the person you claim?" he asked.
Seraphine stared at him coldly.
"I have seen your memories."
A faint pause followed.
Shadow Slave replied quietly,
"Then you made a mistake. That person you saw is currently inside Aeldir."
Seraphine's eyes narrowed.
"Then prove it."
Her voice became colder.
"Prove that you are not Ryn."
"Prove that you are nothing more than a dragon."
"Prove it… so I can kill you without hesitation."
Shadow Slave remained still.
"And you?" he replied.
"You cannot prove it either."
The moment his words ended—
Seraphine vanished.
In a flash she appeared behind him.
Shadow Slave turned instantly to counter, but her blade had already moved.
The strike landed.
His body was thrown backward and slammed violently against the stone throne.
Her attack had aimed directly for his head.
The battlefield fell silent.
Not because of Seraphine's power—
But because the lie had shattered.
Shadow Slave slowly rose from the broken throne.
As he stood, the stone mask covering his face slipped loose.
It fell to the ground and shattered.
Beneath it… was a face none of us expected.
A charming face with devil-like eyes.
Golden hair fell across his forehead.
His skin carried a glow that rivaled royal bloodlines.
But what stood out the most… was the expression on his face.
It carried a strange innocence.
The kind that felt like it had been forced to endure too much suffering.
For the first time, he seemed uncomfortable.
As if he wanted to hide his own face.
Behind us, three voices shouted at the same time.
"Brother!"
Eron.
Mira.
And Aeldir.
Their voices were filled with shock and confusion.
But blood was already running down from Ryn's forehead.
Seraphine stepped forward.
"Now tell me," she said coldly.
"How can you still deny the truth?"
Ryn pushed himself upright using his sword.
His wounds were already beginning to regenerate.
Seraphine slowly circled him.
"I never thought humans could fall so low," she said.
"If it benefits them… they would even raise their sword against their own siblings."
Ryn's voice remained calm.
"The memory you saw," he replied,
"belongs to a soul I consumed for power."
Seraphine's expression hardened.
"You are nothing but a liar."
At that moment, I suddenly felt something strange.
Mana began to flow beneath the ground and around the pillars.
It felt like a small ripple through water.
Then—
The next moment something strange happened.
There was no flash, no movement, no pulling sensation like teleportation.
Instead, it felt as if the world around us had simply changed places.
The mana in the air shifted instantly. The energy surrounding our bodies was no longer the same as before. It now carried the exact same flow and pressure as the mana near the northern gate of the arena.
It was as if someone with terrifying control over the surrounding mana had exchanged our position with another point in the arena, moving us away from the center of the battlefield.
We were far enough to avoid the shockwaves of the battle.
But still close enough to see everything clearly.
One of the elves spoke calmly.
"The commander ordered that none of us interfere."
"This battle is not something you can handle."
Back in the center of the arena—
Ryn slowly raised his sword.
Seraphine looked at him.
"So you still want to fight me?"
Her weapon suddenly shifted.
Dark energy flooded the blade.
In the next moment the sword transformed.
The weapon extended into a massive scythe.
A skull rested at the top of the shaft.
Below it stretched a long bar of solid black steel.
From that bar curved a massive blade—dark as night and sharp enough to rival the legendary weapons of ancient reapers.
Without warning—
She moved.
"Hundred Wounds of the Fallen Star."
Her body became a flash of light.
The first strike came from the north.
Then the south.
Then left.
Then right.
She dashed west—
Then east.
Her movements continued repeating the pattern until the battlefield itself seemed to form a star-shaped trail of attacks.
Each strike left another wound across Ryn's body.
Blood splashed across the arena floor.
Yet he remained standing.
Dark energy spread from his body.
A domain of regeneration began repairing his wounds.
Despite the relentless storm of attacks raining down on him, Ryn refused to fall.
Blood covered his body and countless wounds tore across his armor, yet he continued standing.
It quickly became clear why.
Almost none of his power was being used to fight back.
Instead, the majority of his mana was being pushed into regeneration and heightened senses, forcing his body to repair itself while he tried to read Seraphine's movements.
Every strike she landed injured him.
But every moment that passed, his body fought desperately to recover.
Seraphine looked at him coldly.
"You are not at my level."
Ryn didn't smile.
He didn't rage.
His face became completely emotionless.
He was thinking.
Trying to figure something out.
Then voices shouted from behind us.
"Seraphine!"
Eron.
Mira.
Aeldir.
Their voices trembled with anger.
"Why are you torturing him like this?!" they shouted.
Their cries sounded like those of people watching someone they loved slowly die.
Seraphine did not respond.
Ryn suddenly attacked.
For a brief moment she stood directly in front of him.
But when his blade reached her—
She vanished.
A second later her strike landed across his back.
Ryn staggered and looked up toward the sky.
Almost as if he was searching for something.
Then—
Hope appeared in his eyes.
Seraphine attacked again.
Then he disappear .
After appearing in front of us for a brief moment, Ryn tore a small strip of cloth from the armor of a fallen elf.
Without hesitation, he wrapped it tightly over his eyes.
It didn't feel like the action of someone who had lost hope.
If anything, it felt like the opposite.
As if he was trying to remove a distraction.
With his vision blocked, he forced himself to focus only on the things that truly mattered—
the sound of movement, the shift of air, and the flow of mana surrounding the battlefield.
Now he depended entirely on hearing and mana sensing to detect the real attacks hidden among the illusions.
Then he disappeared again.
Returning to the center of the arena.
Seraphine laughed mockingly.
"So this is all you are?"
"A loser who happened to obtain dragon lineage."
Ryn smiled faintly.
"At least… my brothers are still alive."
The moment those words left his mouth—
Seraphine's expression turned furious.
She launched the star technique again.
The first strike landed.
Then the second.
Then the third.
By the time the fifty-fifth attack struck, we felt something strange.
A pulse spread from Ryn's body.
The energy moved through the arena like a wave of detection.
And suddenly—
He began countering her strikes.
One after another.
But the attacks were too many.
Out of the hundred strikes—
He managed to block only forty.
Blood once again poured from his wounds.
Two elves rushed forward from the sidelines, casting healing magic from a distance.
But before the spells could finish—
Seraphine appeared beside them.
Her scythe flashed.
Both elves were instantly beheaded.
Their bodies collapsed.
Back in the center of the arena—
Ryn stood alone.
Blindfolded.
Bleeding.
Motionless.
Yet it felt like he was searching for something.
Trying to understand something.
Then he shouted suddenly.
"System."
"Set output to thirty-three percent."
His aura exploded outward.
Mana flooded the entire arena.
Within that aura drifted countless particles of dark corruption.
Seraphine looked at him calmly.
"Then let us end this."
She dashed forward.
Her scythe cutting through the air.
Aimed directly at his neck.