1.9 Reflection Of The Void

(Raith's POV)

Raith stirred awake to an absence of sound.

This wasn't a silence that accompanied serene solitude or the soft stillness of dawn. No. This was a silence so complete, so all-encompassing, that it consumed everything in its vicinity. There were no natural sounds, no faint echoes of life, and not even the delicate whisper of the breeze. It was the kind of silence that felt unsettling, as if the world itself had paused—and forgotten to breathe out.

The atmosphere was dense, heavy with an unbearable pressure that weighed down on him from all sides. He sensed the force, yet there was no feeling of air surrounding him. His lungs felt tight, his chest was constricted, but there was no movement. No gust of wind, no sign of life. A creeping dread curled through his veins, freezing his very thoughts.

His eyes flew open, and instantly, a sharp ache erupted behind his skull, drawing a gasp from his mouth. The kind of ache that clawed at his consciousness, as if his very being was being ripped apart and reassembled without consideration for his comfort. It spread swiftly, like a cruel blaze, racing through his veins, coursing through his limbs, and deep into his core.

His entire body quivered under its burden, yet there was no explanation for it. No injury. No wound. No evident reason.

Raith became still, his breaths shallow and quick. He attempted to move, to lift himself upright, but the sensation of pain and confusion kept him anchored in place. There was something about this location… something amiss.

He drew a sharp breath. Or—at least, he made an attempt. There was no air available to inhale. No recognizable scent of earth, wood, or sweat. Not even the faint metallic hint of blood. His body shifted, but it felt foreign, disconnected, as if he were caught in a dreamless void where the natural laws ceased to exist. His heartbeat raced wildly in his chest, like a panicked creature, but there was no throb in his veins, no warmth beneath his skin.

Raith's stomach twisted. Something felt off.

He compelled himself to sit up, the endeavor tiring him more than it ought to have. His hands pressed against the ground, yet there was no ground beneath him. No stone. No earth. No familiar grip of dirt or wood. There existed only… nothingness. An infinite, empty expanse of white stretched out in front of him, as far as the eye could perceive.

It wasn't a void, precisely. It wasn't darkness. It was worse. It was a blank slate—empty, cold, and lacking in meaning. Yet, there was a suffocating weight to it, as if the very air was pressing down on him, smothering him with its emptiness.

Raith felt his breathing accelerate, anxiety swelling in his chest as he surveyed the vacant space. There were no barriers. No boundaries. No skyline. Nothing to ground him in reality. Just… infinite white. And still, he sensed the weight of the surrounding space, as if the void itself was tangible.

Vera. Liora. Keal. Soren.

His thoughts flickered through names, faces, recollections, seeking anything familiar to grasp. But there was nothing. No resonation of their voices. No sign of their existence. They were absent. All of them. Like particles blown away by the wind, obliterated from being.

A shiver climbed his spine, icier than the atmosphere enveloping him. Something felt off. No. This wasn't merely off. It was wrong in a manner he couldn't grasp. A disjointed, unnatural feeling that gnawed at his insides, compelling him to awaken, to flee, to break free. But where could he go? To what?

His thoughts raced. The last thing he recalled… the labyrinth. The azure energy that had surged around him. The excruciating agony that ensued. And then—nothing.

Raith's head felt heavy as he attempted to reconstruct the shards of his memory. His fingers twitched, his hands forming fists against the vacant space. Had he perished? Was this what followed? Was this the afterlife?

A faint noise interrupted the stillness. It was a sound so subtle that for a moment, Raith doubted if he had truly heard it. A breath. A slow, deliberate intake of air.

But it was not his breath.

Raith's heart missed a beat.

He halted, his body tensing as he whirled around, scanning the vacant expanse. His eyes raced over the void, searching for the origin of the sound. But nothing shifted. The silence enveloped everything again, dense and overpowering. Nothing moved.

Then, at the periphery of his vision, something changed.

A figure.

Standing silent in the distance.

It was so motionless, so disturbingly quiet, that Raith couldn't even determine when it had emerged. Had it been there all along? Was it part of the void? His instincts screamed for him to flee, to escape, but his body wouldn't comply. He couldn't divert his gaze.

The figure was human-like, tall, with a faint silhouette of a face—though it was too far away to discern any details. Raith's heart raced. His hands tightened at his sides, his fingers longing for a weapon that was absent. Every fiber of his existence screamed that something was amiss. Every instinct advised him to keep his distance, to stay away.

But it remained still. Didn't blink. Didn't breathe. It just… stood there.

Observing him.

A gradual, unsettling realization settled in his mind. He knew this figure.

No. He recognized it.

It was him.

Raith's breath caught, and for a brief moment, his thoughts went empty. His sight became hazy, his stomach sinking beneath him. This wasn't real. It couldn't be true.

The figure positioned in front of him reflected every detail perfectly. His height. His face. His scar. It seemed as if it was shaped from the same mold, his image—only… incorrect. There was something amiss, something unsettling about the way it stood. Its posture appeared overly rigid, too unnatural. Its limbs were too motionless, as if they had lost the ability to move.

Then, it smiled.

Raith felt his stomach churn, his heart racing as terror seized him. His body urged him to flee, to escape, but his limbs would not obey. He was ensnared. Immobilized.

The figure took a measured step forward, its grin expanding. The movement was purposeful, calculated—like it possessed knowledge Raith lacked. Knowledge he wasn't prepared to grasp.

Raith's mind raced, panicking. This couldn't be real. He had to be imagining things. It simply could not be happening.

"Who are you? " he croaked, his voice sounding strange to his own ears. Raspy. Feeble.

The figure remained silent.

However, its voice—Raith's voice—reached him, not from its mouth, but from within his own consciousness. A deep, unsettling whisper that sent shivers racing up his spine.

"You shouldn't be here," it said, its tone icy and derisive. "I was the one meant to wake up. "

Raith's chest constricted, his heart pounding against his ribs. "What are you saying? " he gasped, his voice strained, desperate for clarity.

The figure inclined its head, its smile persistent, its eyes shining with an unsettling awareness.

"You were not meant to return. "

Raith clenched his hands into fists, his thoughts a maelstrom of confusion and fear. "Return? I don't comprehend—"

The reflection raised a hand, pointing downward with careful, unhurried movement.

Raith's gaze followed the indication. He didn't want to see. His instincts churned with terror, but his eyes betrayed him. They looked.

And what they beheld nearly shattered his sanity.

Beneath him, in the reflection, his own face glared back. But it wasn't solely his face.

Shadows writhed beneath the surface, stretching like dark tendrils, curling in on themselves. And in the midst of the gloom—countless eyes. Eyes that regarded him with cold, unblinking intensity.

Raith's chest constricted, his breath halted in his throat.

Empty. Cold. Watching.

The voice resounded in his mind once more, louder this time. "You were supposed to stay buried. "

Raith's body stiffened. His legs felt unsteady, his knees threatening to give way beneath him. The reflection shifted again, its figure advancing, its presence overpowering.

The shadow—its shadow—contorted unnaturally, moving in the opposite direction of the figure's body.

Raith's heartbeat ceased. He struggled to breathe.

This couldn't be real. Shadows didn't behave this way. They followed the light. They obeyed the rules of nature. But this shadow—it was wrong.

It was closing in on him.

With horrifying speed.

Before he could respond, the shadow surged forward. A blur of motion. Too quick. Too overwhelming.

And then—

Suffering.

Intense, overwhelming suffering.

It surged through his head, tearing through his mind like a myriad of daggers. The voices… they surged in, screaming in his ears, tearing at his thoughts, unraveling them until they ceased to be his own.

His sight dimmed at the peripheries, the illumination surrounding him flickering and distorting. The final image he perceived was the reflection's smile—

As the abyss consumed him entirely.

—END OF CHAPTER.