It had been three months since her heart stopped.
Three months since the sky turned red and the oceans trembled. Since time itself felt like it paused in disbelief. Her world had been saved. Her people lived. But Lara didn't.
And he had to live with that.
The battlefield was long buried now. The screams had faded. Cities rebuilt. Flags replaced. They sang songs in her name, chanted tales of the war, even etched her story into broken walls like scripture.
But none of that mattered.
Because they buried her like she was just another casualty.
And now—Dark stood in front of the only truth that mattered.
The grave sat beneath a lonely tree at the edge of a quiet field. No temple. No statues. No golden words. Just a black stone, plain and heavy, swallowed slightly by the soil as if the earth itself was trying to pull her deeper.
At its center, one name was carved. Roughly. Without flourish. Without ceremony.
Lara.
No titles. No birth date. No poetry.
Just Lara.
The breeze moved gently, brushing past the leaves with a hush, like the world was holding its breath around him. The grass barely stirred beneath his boots. Even the sun seemed to dim.
Dark: (thinking) You'd hate this place. Too quiet. Too clean. No fire. No fight.
He stepped forward and dropped to one knee. No hesitation. No fear. Just a slow, deliberate motion like gravity had taken control.
He pressed his hand against the dirt.
Not to feel her.
But to feel the distance.
The unbearable, suffocating six feet of silence between them.
His fingers curled slightly. Not enough to claw, not enough to crush. Just enough to remind himself he was still breathing.
Dark: (thinking) I promised to protect you.
Dark: (thinking) I kept the world alive... but not you.
His jaw tensed. Muscles shifting beneath skin. His throat tightened like something was trying to crawl up it—but never reached the surface.
No tears came.
Not anymore.
He had cried enough. Screamed enough. Died enough.
Now there was only stillness.
His hand slid further into the soil, staining his gloves with earth. He didn't care. His knuckles pressed into the ground like he wanted to feel the pressure of death. Maybe if he pushed hard enough, the world would push back.
But it didn't.
Nothing did.
And still, he stayed there. Head low. Shoulders hunched. Breathing slow. The cloak on his back shifting slightly with the breeze, as if it too didn't know how to sit still anymore.
Time passed.
He didn't count it.
At some point, a crow landed on the fence behind him. It didn't caw. It just watched. Like it understood. Like it had seen this too many times before.
He looked up once—just once.
And for a brief second, he could almost see her.
A flicker.
Lara. Standing in the wind, smiling, hands on her hips, saying something stupid and stubborn like:
Lara: You're not allowed to mope like this, idiot.
But the wind passed, and the illusion vanished.
Dark: (thinking) Maybe I'm the one that died.
He rose slowly, every movement heavy. Not from exhaustion—but from gravity. From guilt.
He stared at the grave one last time.
Then he took off his coat and laid it over the tombstone. The same black coat he had worn through a hundred battles. Burned, torn, soaked in enemy blood. He let it fall over the grave like a banner of mourning. Like armor she never got to wear.
Dark: (softly) Rest.
He turned.
But his shadow didn't.
It lingered a moment longer, stretched across the grave like it didn't want to leave. Like it wanted to stay there forever. With her.
Then the wind picked up.
And they both moved on.
The sky above him remained still, layered in thick grey clouds that refused to break. He walked with no destination, his boots cutting through the tall grass like blades, his gaze hollow, shoulders draped in silence.
Every footstep felt like it echoed across a world that no longer wanted to speak. Even the birds that once followed him had long stopped singing. He wasn't a king here. Not a god. Not a savior.
Just a man who lost something too big to carry.
And as he moved deeper into the forest, the landscape around him began to change.
Trees grew denser, older, gnarled like twisted fingers clawing upward toward a sky that didn't answer. Moss painted the trunks, soft and cold. The air thickened with something unfamiliar—not danger, but something just as heavy.
A presence.
Something was here.
Not loud. Not violent. Just watching.
Dark paused.
His eyes narrowed as he scanned the overgrowth ahead. No birds. No insects. No movement. Just the sound of his own breathing and the soft, slow flutter of his cloak behind him.
Then he saw it.
Half-sunken into the earth, partially hidden behind the twisted roots of a collapsed tree—an old stone door.
No wall. No frame. Just a solitary, ancient slab, leaning like it had been placed there long before the world had names. There were carvings across its surface—worn, cracked, almost erased by time itself.
But one of them glowed faintly.
A single symbol.
One Dark had seen before... but only in forgotten records. Back when he had studied the Empires buried beneath the current age. Before the Celestials. Before the Summoning Veil. Before even Sojo's influence had reached the timelines.
A symbol of a throne that never existed.
A False Throne.
Dark: (thinking) This isn't one of mine.
He stepped closer.
And the air changed.
Not in temperature.
In pressure.
Like reality itself was trying to hold its breath.
The second his hand hovered above the stone, the symbol pulsed. Not bright. Not loud. Just once.
And then the roots behind him started shifting.
Like something had just woken up.
Dark: (quietly) So that's what this is...
His voice trailed off, caught in the silence that followed.
He didn't draw a weapon.
He didn't summon his shadows.
He just stared at the door, not with fear, but with understanding.
Something was coming.
Something that didn't care who he had been.
Or what he had lost.
Only that he had arrived.
Dark stepped through the stone doorway.
And when he opened his eyes again, he wasn't in a forest.
He was in snow.
A blinding white wasteland stretched in every direction, flurries slicing sideways through the air like the land itself was trying to erase him. The wind was merciless. Screaming. The sky above was a swirling dome of gray. And buried within the storm, far ahead—sharp black towers pierced through the white like daggers jutting from a corpse.
The remnants of the Assassin Empire.
He didn't flinch.
Didn't cover his face.
This cold had already touched him before.
Dark: (thinking) Still standing, huh?
He began walking, each step crunching through the snow with a sound swallowed immediately by the wind. Ice clung to his boots. The temperature stabbed into his bones like tiny knives. But he didn't slow.
The last time he came here, it was war.
Half the towers were burning. The other half crumbled.
He remembered the screams.
He remembered the duel between Retsyu—their emperor—and Sukojo. A duel that cracked the skies. A duel that tore through the empire's pride like wet paper. He didn't interfere. He didn't need to.
By the time it was over, Dark had shattered their elite corps, burned their archives, and left the survivors gasping in the snow.
But even now, months—maybe years—later... something still breathed in this place.
He felt it.
Not power.
Not hatred.
Something deeper.
Obsession.
He reached the outer gate. Once a colossal obsidian structure lined with sigils and anti-tracking wards. Now it was broken in half, leaning to the side like a wounded animal. The snow had reclaimed most of it, layering the ground with thick, untouched silence.
He stepped through.
And the ghosts greeted him.
Not real ones.
But the kind that come from memory.
He saw flashes of the first time he breached this place—his cloak whipping behind him, the alarms blaring in five different dialects, the way the assassins leapt from the rooftops like falling knives.
He killed them all.
Not because they were weak.
But because they underestimated what it meant to fight someone who no longer cared.
The wind calmed as he reached the heart of the ruin.
A courtyard—flat, wide, buried in snow. With a cracked throne of black steel frozen in place. Retsyu once sat there. The Assassin Emperor. Silent, brutal, ancient. His blood was still stained on the ground somewhere beneath the ice.
Dark stood still.
Then he turned to the right.
And stared at the staircase descending into the mountain.
He remembered that staircase.
He didn't go down last time.
He didn't need to.
But now... something was calling from below. Not with words. Not with threat. Just presence.
Dark: (thinking) What the hell did you bury under here, Retsyu?
He started walking again, toward the stairs.
The snow seemed to get quieter with every step.
The deeper he went, the heavier the silence became.
Until finally—
Stone walls.
Torchlight.
And the smell of cold steel.
The true heart of the Assassin Empire.
The staircase opened into a massive stone corridor—wide enough for ten men to walk side by side, yet silent enough to carry a whisper like thunder. The walls were covered in chiseled murals, etched with scenes of pain, obedience, and precision. Assassins kneeling before severed heads. Silent children holding blades twice their size. A throne of ribs. An eye carved into every scene.
Dark walked deeper.
And that's when he saw them.
Corpses.
Dozens.
No—hundreds.
Lined across the side walls in recessed alcoves, preserved by the cold, each body wrapped in black linen stitched with red threads—the Mark of Obedience. Their arms were folded across their chests. Their masks still covered their faces. No names. No graves. No flowers.
Just silence.
Dark: (thinking) They died in formation.
Their feet were bound in discipline. No signs of fear. No signs of struggle. These weren't victims of an attack. They chose this.
They died guarding something.
He stepped over scattered blades as he reached the first chamber—round, dome-shaped, with four black pillars circling the center. Each pillar was marked in deep scar-like carvings. Along the walls, hundreds of scratched etchings. Not in blood.
In flesh.
Carved finger by finger.
Training records.
He read them.
Not because he wanted to.
But because something in him said he had to.
He brushed his hand over one, a panel that read:
"Acolyte Year 1: Blade Drill No. 17"
Below it was a list of commands. A ritual. Written entirely in the form of a mantra.
"Awaken.
Bleed.
Strike.
Fall.
Repeat."
"Awaken.
Blindfolded.
No food.
No water."
"Room: 30 meters wide.
Lighting: None.
Sound: 4 bells randomized.
Objective: Kill the three shadows in silence or die."
"Failure rate: 76%."
Dark read another.
Acolyte Year 2: Emotional Severance Trial.
"Candidates must present a corpse of someone they knew. Friend. Brother. Mother.
Body must be undamaged. No hesitation. If there are signs of mourning, trial restarts."
"The corpse is not real. But they do not know this."
"They will believe it. They will feel it.
If they do not weep... they pass."
"Failure rate: 88%."
Dark: (thinking) These weren't assassins. They were machines.
He moved on to the next chamber.
This one was darker. Torches flickered. There were blades embedded in the walls—hundreds of them, with small hooks hanging from the handles. Beneath each, journals. Training books. Old. Leather-bound. Dust-covered. Lined up perfectly on steel racks that had never rusted.
He picked one.
Its cover bore a symbol of an open hand with the fingers stitched together.
He opened it.
The script was tight. Neat. Methodical.
He read.
"To kill is not to hate."
"To kill is to obey."
"To obey is to forget."
"Lesson 12: Slicing below the rib without triggering spinal recoil."
"Lesson 19: Silencing a heartbeat before it finishes the third pulse."
"Lesson 31: Killing without aura."
"Lesson 42: Moving between dimensions of light without permission."
"Final Principle: Remove identity. Assume the Target's."
He turned to the back of the book.
More text. A personal log.
"My name was Seki.
Before they took it."
"I passed the Severance.
I slit the throat of the one who raised me.
I smiled when they told me it was fake.
But it wasn't."
"I smile better now."
Dark closed the book.
He didn't flinch.
He just looked at the next one.
And picked it up.
Another journal.
More doctrine.
He sat on a flat stone bench in the corner of the archive and began reading through all of them.
He read every page.
Every paragraph.
Every confession from every forgotten assassin who bled for this empire.
Their beliefs. Their techniques. Their madness. Their humanity, slowly erased page by page.
By the time he finished the seventh book, the torches had dimmed. The wind outside the corridor no longer howled. Even the cold had retreated, as if afraid of what lay in these pages.
Dark stood.
Dark: (thinking) They weren't made to live.
Dark: (thinking) They were made to disappear.
He stepped deeper.
Past the archives. Past the corpses.
Until he reached the last door.
It was sealed.
With chains of red.
And above it, a sentence carved in six different languages:
"Only the one who destroyed us may open this door."
Dark placed his hand on the seal.
It unlocked instantly.
The door opened.
And the stench hit him first.
It wasn't rot. It wasn't blood. It was worse. The stench of suffering. Old sweat, burnt metal, raw meat, piss-soaked dirt, and fear. The kind that hangs in the air, sticks to the lungs, and makes the skin twitch before the eyes even see what waits ahead.
He walked through the threshold without a word.
The corridor opened into a massive, dimly lit cavern—so wide the ceiling was hidden behind fog and torch smoke. A whole subterranean city stretched across the rock. Stacked buildings carved into the stone walls. Bridges. Ropeways. Watchtowers. And beyond them, glowing red banners bearing a symbol he didn't recognize—a dagger stabbed through a bleeding crown.
But this wasn't a city.
This was a prison built by shadows.
And beneath those towers—lined in rows like cattle pens—were the people.
Slaves.
Half-naked. Bruised. Shackled to the ground by iron spikes hammered through their wrists. Dozens of them. No beds. No food bowls. Just dirt. Urine. Rags. A few tried to sleep, curled around each other for warmth under the frozen stone arches. Some didn't move at all.
Dark narrowed his eyes.
From the far-left corner of the camp, a scream rose. A woman's voice. Desperate. Sharp. Shaking.
He turned his head slowly.
Two masked assassins were dragging her across the stone—one gripping her by the hair, the other kicking her side every few steps. Her body was too thin. Ribs showed. Her ankle was broken, foot dragging behind her like dead weight. Her shirt had been torn—barely covered anything.
She was pleading. Not in words. Just broken gasps. Whimpers. Begging not to be hurt again.
Dark didn't move.
Not yet.
They threw her down into the mud outside a tent made of stitched leather and chain drapes. One of them grabbed her throat, spat on her, and said something in a language even Dark hadn't heard in years.
Another man emerged from the tent. Shirtless. Covered in tattoos and ash. His smile showed gold teeth.
He grabbed the woman by the jaw and yanked her head back.
Dark saw the fear in her eyes.
Then she screamed again.
Not from pain this time.
From memory.
And behind them, children were cleaning blood off the stone steps with torn cloths. Their hands moved mechanically. No emotion. No reaction. Just small bodies scrubbing dried crimson off the floor like it was their only reason to exist. One of them slipped and fell. Another screamed. No one helped them.
Dark's hand slowly curled into a fist.
A low rumble echoed through the stone beneath his feet.
But still... he didn't move.
Not yet.
He walked forward.
Deeper into the shadows of this city.
And what he saw only got worse.
A man crucified upside down—his legs removed at the knee, arms stretched tight, his face beaten until it was just pulp and swollen lips. Still breathing.
Women shackled together at the throat, forced to march in circles carrying baskets filled with blades. Naked except for the blood-soaked cloths wrapped between their thighs.
Men in chains fighting each other barehanded while assassins watched from the balconies, cheering. Betting. Laughing.
A world of predators.
Built on the bones of the weak.
Dark kept walking.
The deeper he moved, the worse it got. The city didn't just thrive on cruelty—it worshipped it. There were no smiles here. Only twisted grins. No joy. Only survival layered in hierarchy.
At every turn, someone was suffering.
He passed a cage where a boy—couldn't have been more than twelve—sat trembling with his knees to his chest. One eye was swollen shut. His other stared blankly forward, unmoving, like the soul behind it had already left. Next to him, a corpse. Another child, slumped over, throat cut, tongue nailed to the cage bars as a warning.
No one came to take the body away.
No one ever did.
Dark's boots moved through puddles that weren't just water. Blood, piss, bile—all collected in shallow dips in the stone. The air was thick with heat from nearby forges, where slaves hammered away at weapons they would never hold.
A woman stumbled past him, dragging a collar chain behind her. Her back was marked with lashes—raw, fresh, still bleeding. Her dress was nothing more than thin fabric torn down the middle, her feet bare and bruised. She didn't even register him as she passed. Just kept walking like her soul was on a track she couldn't step off.
And above it all—higher up in the carved terraces of the stone city—stood the assassins.
Unmasked.
Unashamed.
They looked down like gods over livestock. Some leaned on railings with meat in hand, eating as they watched the slaves below. Some laughed. Others gave quiet signals that sent guards moving instantly—like ordering merchandise.
Some were draped in silks and bone jewelry, lounging on cushions while chained women massaged their feet.
Others... did worse.
Dark saw one man forcing a woman to kneel while he sharpened a blade. Her face was bruised, her lips torn, and when she tried to stand, he struck her with the hilt hard enough to draw blood. She cried out once—sharp, guttural—but didn't run.
She couldn't.
Her ankle was chained to a rusted pipe.
Another figure nearby—taller, bald, covered in black robes—grabbed a pair of young slaves by the collar. He whispered something, then tossed one toward a door while the other screamed and tried to follow. The door slammed shut before the scream reached its end.
Dark: (thinking) They don't see these people as human.
He stopped.
And looked up.
Higher above the others, at the highest level carved into the cavern wall, was a black throne.
Simple. Stone. Elevated.
And on it sat a figure.
Not armored. Not scarred. Not theatrical.
Just still.
Watching.
He wore deep gray robes, sleeveless, and his arms were marked with cuts—fresh ones. Self-inflicted. Ritualistic. His face was clean, too clean, like he never stepped in blood yet smelled of it.
And he was staring directly at Dark.
The rest of the city hadn't noticed him yet.
But he had.
The throne figure raised a hand slowly.
Not in greeting.
But in acknowledgment.
Like he already knew this meeting was inevitable.
Dark stared back.
And in that moment—time didn't freeze.
But meaning did.
Dark: (thinking) That's the one.
Dark: (thinking) The leader of this hidden filth.
Dark's jaw tightened slightly.
From above, the man on the throne finally rose to his feet. Slowly. No rush. His movements were elegant—too elegant. Like a priest stepping into a sermon, not a killer preparing for war.
He raised one hand, and the entire courtyard fell silent.
Just like that.
The whips stopped. The screams faded. Even the guards dragging women by the chains came to a halt.
All eyes turned toward the throne.
And then toward Dark.
The man's voice cut through the cavern like silk dipped in poison.
Voice: So... you came back.
Dark didn't answer.
Voice: The man who burned our towers. Killed our best. Broke the old names in half.
He smiled faintly. It didn't reach his eyes.
Voice: We tell stories about you down here. The Ghost Emperor. The Final Blade. The Shadow Killer. They say you slaughtered hundreds with no hesitation... and walked away without looking back.
The man stepped closer to the edge of the platform.
Voice: I like that story.
Dark: You forgot the ending.
The man's smile grew.
Voice: Did I?
Dark: You did. Because I didn't walk away.
Dark: I spared this place.
Dark: And that was my mistake.
Murmurs echoed through the cavern. A few assassins tensed. Others leaned forward like they were watching a performance.
The man above chuckled softly.
Voice: Mistake? No, no... That was mercy. And mercy has value.
He gestured around the cavern with both arms wide.
Voice: Look what that mercy created.
Dark: A sewer. Dressed in ritual.
Voice: A kingdom. Forged in truth.
Dark: A grave.
A pause.
Cold silence returned.
The man's expression didn't break. But there was a flicker in his eyes now—just for a moment. Something he didn't control.
Voice: You see monsters here. I see purpose. I see control. I see obedience. We don't pretend to be holy. We don't pray to a sky that's never spoken. We don't ask for forgiveness. We take what others are too scared to take.
Dark: You take nothing. You steal lives.
Dark: You don't build. You harvest suffering.
Dark: You're not leaders. You're rot.
A heavy breath left the throne's figure, almost a sigh.
Voice: Then why haven't you drawn your blade yet?
Dark: Because I wanted to hear what you'd say.
Dark: And now I know.
Dark: You're not worth redemption.
The man smiled wider now.
Voice: Then you've come to judge?
Dark: No.
Dark: I've come to bury.
To Be Continued....
End Of Arc 6 Chapter 1.