Silence.
Not the peaceful kind — the wrong kind.
The kind that comes after something massive tears through reality and leaves everyone staring at the space it used to occupy.
Dust drifted lazily through the ruined courtyard, illuminated by lingering traces of gold and violet light. Cracked stone smoldered. Runes embedded in the ground flickered, failed, and died one by one.
Baek Siheon was gone.
Seraphina stood frozen at the center of the devastation, her silver hair slowly settling around her shoulders as the wind died down. Her eyes scanned the scorched ground again and again, as if staring hard enough might bring him back.
"…Siheon?" she called, her voice barely louder than a breath.
No answer.
Lucian jogged forward, boots crunching over fractured marble. He crouched, touched the ground where Siheon had last stood, then hissed softly.
"Okay," he muttered. "That's… not good."
Ulfric remained completely still.
Unlike the others, he wasn't looking at the ground.
He was staring at the sky.
The space where the column of fused power had torn through the heavens still hadn't fully healed. The clouds above twisted unnaturally, rotating around an invisible axis, as though reality itself had been pierced and hadn't yet decided how to close the wound.
Ulfric's jaw tightened.
"…Tch."
Seraphina rounded on him instantly. "What do you mean tch?! Where is he?!"
Ulfric finally looked down at her. His usual feral amusement was gone, replaced by something grim and ancient.
"He's not dead," he said.
Lucian exhaled sharply. "That's… good. I think?"
"But," Ulfric continued, "he's also not here. And he wasn't taken by Heaven or Hell."
Seraphina's heart sank.
"Then by who?"
Ulfric didn't answer immediately. He knelt, pressing his palm flat against the ground. His aura spread outward like a slow tide, brushing against shattered runes, burned stone, and the lingering residue of Siheon's power.
His eyes widened — just a fraction.
"…Primordial."
Lucian stiffened. "You're joking."
Ulfric stood. "I don't joke about things older than gods."
The word hit Seraphina like ice water.
Primordial.
Beings that existed before celestial law. Before demonic hierarchy. Before Heaven decided it ruled the skies and Hell claimed the depths.
Entities that didn't care about balance — because balance had been created after them.
Seraphina clenched her fists. "Then he was taken against his will?"
Ulfric shook his head slowly.
"No. That's the worst part."
He looked back at the sky.
"He answered."
Elsewhere
Siheon felt no impact.
No pain.
No sense of falling or rising.
Only… separation.
When awareness returned, it came without warning. One moment there was blinding white, and the next he was conscious — suspended in a space that felt both infinite and intimate, like standing inside the breath of the universe.
He wasn't standing on anything.
Yet he didn't fall.
Beneath him stretched a vast expanse of deep violet shadow, rolling and shifting like a living sea. Above him burned a sky of radiant gold, filled with slow-moving constellations that pulsed like heartbeats.
Light and darkness.
Not colliding.
Not merging.
Coexisting.
Siheon's breath caught.
"…Where am I?"
His voice echoed strangely, not bouncing back but dissolving into the space itself.
Inside his mind, the systems stirred — cautiously.
〈Celestial Ascension System: ERROR — LOCATION UNREGISTERED.〉
〈Demonic Sovereign System: Heh. So this is where they keep the good stuff.〉
"Neither of you know?" Siheon muttered.
For once, neither system answered immediately.
That scared him more than the scenery.
He looked down at himself. His body was intact — no injuries, no burns — but faint threads of gold and shadow still clung to his skin, slowly sinking beneath the surface like embers cooling.
Then—
Something shifted ahead.
The space parted.
A presence emerged, not walking, not teleporting, but simply being there, as though it had always occupied that point and Siheon was only now permitted to notice.
The figure was tall, humanoid, yet impossible to fully define.
Its form flowed between identities — masculine, feminine, neither — draped in robes that looked woven from starlight and void. One half of its face glowed with soft, ancient gold. The other was etched in deep shadow, marked by symbols that hurt to look at for too long.
Siheon's instincts screamed.
Not fear.
Reverence.
The being regarded him with eyes that contained no pupils — only depth.
"Baek Siheon," it said.
The sound did not travel through air. It appeared directly inside his mind.
"You have crossed the threshold."
Siheon swallowed. "You… brought me here?"
The being tilted its head slightly.
"No," it replied.
"You came because you could."
The systems reacted violently.
〈Celestial Ascension System: ENTITY IDENTIFIED — ARBITER-CLASS. PRIORITY UNKNOWN.〉
〈Demonic Sovereign System: …That's not an Arbiter. That's something worse.〉
Siheon's pulse spiked.
"Who are you?"
The being extended a hand, palm open.
"I am what remains when Heaven and Hell end their arguments," it said calmly.
"I am the witness to beginnings."
It paused.
"You may call me the Veiled Arbiter."
Siheon felt the weight of the name settle into his bones.
"…Why am I here?"
The Veiled Arbiter looked past him — not at the sky of gold, not at the sea of shadow, but somewhere deeper still.
"Because," it said softly,
"the world has begun to move around you."
The space trembled.
"And I must decide," the Arbiter continued,
"whether you are an accident… or a correction."
Siheon clenched his fists.
"Decide quickly," he said, forcing steel into his voice. "My friends are waiting."
For the first time—
The Veiled Arbiter smiled.
And the trial began.