Unchain of Madness

Loss in panicking crowd.

The world around him trembled.

Screams echoed. Sirens wailed. Footsteps pounded across cracked tile.

Ron stood in the middle of the chaos, unmoving.

Smoke curled from broken walls. Desks lay overturned, papers fluttering like dying birds. The school's main hall, once pristine, now looked like a warzone.

And at the center of it all—

The Rampaging Nent roared inside the cage Ron had forced it into. A swirling mass of nightmare given form, its monstrous body slammed against the glowing iron bars Ron had conjured.

Cracks spiderwebbed across the cage.

It wouldn't hold much longer.

"…shut up…" Ron whispered, clutching his head.

The creature roared again, louder this time, the sound vibrating through his bones.

"…shut up… shut up… shut UP!"

He felt it. The pressure inside his skull. Like claws scratching at the inside of his mind, tearing at the walls of his sanity.

He stumbled backward. Fell to his knees.

"RON!"

A voice.

He looked up.

Through the smoke, he saw his classmate—a girl standing with her own summoned Nent, a glowing beast shaped like a giant hound, snarling protectively.

"Stay with me! You need to hold it back!"

Hold it back?

He laughed.

A hollow, broken sound.

"I can't…"

The cracks in the cage widened.

The Rampaging Nent pressed its claws through the bars.

"…I can't… hold it anymore…"

Something inside him snapped.

A rush of black shadows erupted from his chest, coiling outward like living smoke. They writhed, spiraling around him, clinging to his skin, crawling up his face.

His eyes burned.

Then—turned white. Scribbled, flickering, as if drawn by an unsteady hand on paper.

The shadows spread.

Covering him.

Consuming him.

"RON!" the girl shouted again. "Stop! You're—"

But he couldn't hear her anymore.

The chains inside his mind shattered.

And something ancient, something monstrous, unfurled within him.

"…free…" he whispered.

The shadows surged.

With a scream that wasn't entirely human, Ron lunged forward.

The cage exploded into shards of black light.

The Rampaging Nent roared triumphantly—

—but Ron's fist collided with its face before it could escape.

The impact sent shockwaves rippling outward, flattening nearby walls.

The Nent reeled backward, its monstrous body stumbling, snarling in confusion.

Ron stood there, breathing heavily, his body wreathed in those pulsing shadows. His eyes glowed like jagged white scribbles in the void.

"…mine…" he growled.

The Rampaging Nent lunged at him.

Ron caught its jaws in his hands.

Muscles strained.

Shadows coiled tighter around his arms, forming jagged black chains that lashed outward, anchoring into the ground.

The Nent roared, struggling, but Ron held it fast.

"I SAID…"

He slammed the creature's head into the floor. Cracks spidered across the tiles.

"…STAY… DOWN!"

Another slam.

And another.

Blood-black mist sprayed from the Nent's fractured skull.

But it wasn't enough.

The creature surged back, claws raking across Ron's chest, tearing fabric and flesh alike.

Ron barely flinched.

"…not enough…"

The shadows thickened.

Forming into a shape behind him.

A towering, skeletal figure wreathed in endless chains, its face hidden behind a jagged iron mask. Its arms stretched impossibly long, chains coiling from its fingertips like puppeteer strings.

The figure raised its hand.

And the chains wrapped tighter around the Rampaging Nent.

"…mine…" Ron whispered again, his voice layered, echoing with something deeper.

The chains constricted.

The Nent howled.

Its monstrous limbs snapped under the pressure. Bones cracked. Flesh tore.

The skeletal figure behind Ron loomed closer, tilting its masked head, hollow eyes burning with white light.

"…control…" it intoned.

Ron's lips curled into a crooked smile.

"Yeah…"

The chains twisted—then tore the Nent apart.

Shards of nightmare scattered into the air, dissolving into dust and shadow.

Silence fell.

The skeletal figure slowly faded, chains retracting into Ron's body like veins retreating beneath skin.

Only Ron remained, kneeling amidst the wreckage, his chest heaving.

The shadows around him flickered.

And slowly… receded.

His eyes dimmed, returning to their usual dark brown, though exhaustion clouded them.

"…it's over…" he muttered.

He looked at his hands.

Blood. Cuts. Burn marks.

The faint imprint of chains curling around his wrists.

"Ron…"

He turned.

The girl approached cautiously, her Nent still summoned at her side. Fear danced in her eyes.

"…are you okay…?"

Ron's gaze drifted past her—toward the shattered remains of the cage, the scattered dust of the Rampaging Nent.

"…I don't know."

Behind him, in the deepest corners of his mind, the chains rattled quietly.

Waiting.

Waiting for the next nightmare.

Waiting for the next fight.

Waiting for the next break.

---

Waits to be freedom of my choices

As Ron said it