Chapter 20: The Name That Was Sealed

Silence followed the Reclaimer's fall.

Not peace—

Just the kind of silence that waits for something worse.

Jin stood alone in the ruins of the battlefield, smoke rising from his hands, the sixth chain broken and flickering across his chest like a dying star. The fragment of the Reclaimer—the obedient half of his soul—dissolved into mist and memory.

But what remained… was not relief.

Noctis landed beside him, expression unreadable.

"That was the last failsafe," he said. "The system has no more locks for you."

Jin looked up.

"Then what happens now?"

Noctis closed his eyes.

"We find the seventh."

Back in Kaizen, chaos rippled through the spirit towers.

The ranking monoliths—each tied to a student—began to fade. Names blurred. Letters unraveled.

The Spirit System was crumbling, glitching at its core.

The High Exorcist stood before the final altar, hands clenched.

"The Seventh Chain… we swore it would never be touched."

A voice behind him answered:

"Then you should've destroyed him when you had the chance."

The Exorcist turned.

A man stepped out of the dark.

Wearing a black crown.

Marked with no spirit symbol.

The Original Sovereign.

In the battlefield realm, a black wind blew.

Jin staggered. Something deeper than pain hit him—

A memory not his, but carried inside him for years.

He saw—

A city burning.

A child chained to a throne.

A crown forced onto a screaming head.

And seven voices, whispering his name in a forgotten tongue.

Then a phrase echoed, as if from the bones of the world:

"He Who Was Sealed Shall Break Us All."

Noctis caught Jin as he collapsed.

"What did you see?"

Jin's eyes glowed briefly—black and gold. His voice was hoarse.

"My name."

Noctis froze. "Your real name?"

Jin nodded slowly.

And whispered it:

"Aedryn."

The name struck the realm like lightning.

Skies split.

Spirits wailed.

The Seventh Chain pulsed—still whole, but bleeding light.

The battlefield tried to hold…

But it was too late.

The realm cracked open.

Not from attack.

But from recognition.

The Spirit World remembered Aedryn—the first sovereign, the one who tried to destroy the ranking system before it ever began.

Jin wasn't his heir.

He was him.

Reborn.

Sealed.

And now awakened.

Back in the Grand Assembly Hall, the Original Sovereign smiled as chaos unfolded across the kingdom.

"So," he whispered, "the King of Chains remembers his throne."

The Seventh Chain trembled.

And the war began again.