75. A Deal(2)

Her pale hands danced, and her puppets lunged forward—a tide of rusted armor and ancient bones. The corpses of Hollow Mountain's beasts moved with an inhuman stiffness, their hollow eye sockets glowing like dying embers. Chains of congealed blood lashed out, wrapping around Nenavist's limbs.

"Bind him," Ki Song murmured, voice soft but cutting.

Nenavist's shadows tore through the first wave of corpses, slicing armor, bone, and chitin into ribbons. But Ki Song's Dormant Ability took hold—the tiny scratches on Nenavist's arms, the shallow cuts he had ignored, began bleeding faster, worsening with each passing second, as if time itself deepened the wounds.

Nenavist hissed, blood dripping onto the broken ground.

"Get out of my way, Ki Song!"

Her lips didn't move, but inside, her mind screamed:

'I don't want to do this. But if I hesitate, they'll kill me too.'

And then came Asterion.

His crimson cloak flared as if caught in an unseen wind, his very name pulsing through the stones. "Asterion… Asterion…" whispered the Hollow Mountains, as if the mountain itself sought to remember him.

His smile was venomous.

"Nenavist…" Asterion said, his tone like silk stretched over broken glass. "Don't you even know what you've received?" His voice was soft, mocking, each syllable carrying the weight of someone who knew the answer and relished withholding it. "And don't you also know its price? What you're trying to do—dragging her back—" He tilted his head slightly, the souls swirling behind him groaning like distant windchimes. "Are you trying to bring her back on the corpse of the universe itself? Quite a selfish one, aren't you?"

Nenavist's shadows convulsed, coiling tighter around his body like serpents ready to strike. His silver eyes flared with fury, his Aspect of perception expanding outward like threads of burning light, dissecting Asterion's every gesture, every subtle twitch of muscle. He saw the intention behind each word, saw the malice draped beneath that velvet tone.

But the truth was worse.

Somewhere deep in his heart, a whisper told him that Asterion might be right. That the "Smile of Heaven" he sought to bring back from the Category 5 gate might be gone, truly gone. That his desperate clawing at shadows was nothing but madness.

The thought poisoned him.

"SHUT UP!"

Nenavist spun, his blade sweeping in an arc, shadows spiraling outward into a dozen black crescents. The attack shredded through stone pillars, sending chunks of rock crashing like meteors. Asterion responded instantly—hundreds of hands rose, damaging the very soul of Broken Sword through the shadow crescents.

The clash produced little more than a whisper of force—less than the collision of insects—but the damage was anything but trivial. Nenavist felt as if his very soul had been struck hundreds of times, each impact echoing through his essence.

Asterion grew stronger with every passing minute—his Domain fed on recognition, expanding and deepening each time his name was spoken or remembered.

Using this opportunity, Ki Song's puppets dove forward, their rusted spears piercing the ground around Nenavist like a cage. His shadows responded, flowing like black ink to impale the corpses—but every time he struck, her Dormant Ability worsened his wounds. Blood dripped from his fingers, staining the cracks in the stone.

"It's not her name I need to say," Asterion whispered, his voice like silk soaked in poison. "It's your failure I want you to remember. You left her, Nenavist. Left your daughter crying in the dark while you chased a phantom. And for what? Do you even remember her name?"

Nenavist froze. His perception, usually flawless, fractured. For a brief second, his mind was filled not with combat calculations, but with an image—a small hand clutching his, a child's tear-streaked face.

That second was all it took.

"NOW!" Anvil roared.

The storm of swords descended all at once, hundreds of blades converging like a silver comet. Nenavist raised his cracked blade, shadows spiraling desperately to form a barrier around him.

For one brief moment, black shadow met silver steel. The clash generated a blinding light and an explosion so violent it tore through the mountain. Entire sections of the cavern collapsed, sending massive boulders crashing into the abyss below. The shockwave carved a crater beneath their feet.

But Nenavist's strength faltered. His shadows cracked, splintering like glass under the weight of Anvil's storm.

CRASH!

The barrier shattered. Blades pierced through his shoulder, thigh, and ribs, pinning him to the ground. Blood sprayed across the broken stones.

"Smile… I… almost…" Nenavist whispered. His black blade fell from his grip, splintering into fragments that dissolved into mist.

Ki Song looked at him, her chest tightening. She wanted to stop this. She wanted to scream. But she didn't. She couldn't.

Asterion crouched, his shadow stretching over Nenavist's broken form like a predator's maw. He smiled—a cruel, quiet smile.

"Don't worry, Nenavist," he whispered, voice like poison. "I'll take care of your daughter. She is a such a fine specimen. Last descendent of Immortal Flame clan. Daughter of Broken Sword, Humanity's hero and Smile of Heaven, only being to receive their True Name in First Nightmare. Also the last descendent of Sun God's Lineage. A born of hollow mother. Indeed, a fine specimen.

I'll make sure she grows up remembering that her father was a hero…

A hero who died for nothing."

Nenavist's silver eyes widened with helpless fury, but his strength was gone. His shadows flickered out, the battlefield silent but for the slow drip of blood.

Blood pooled beneath Nenavist, thick and dark, soaking into the shattered stone. His vision blurred, silver eyes clouding as the world narrowed to the metallic taste of blood in his mouth and the cold weight of defeat pressing into his chest. Asterion's voice lingered like venom, his smile etched into Nenavist's mind like a scar.

"Died for nothing…"

The words burned worse than the wounds.

Anvil exhaled slowly, lowering his hands. The swords behind him rotated in a lazy circle, their work seemingly complete.

"It's over," Anvil said coldly, his voice like iron scraping stone.

Ki Song's puppets still clung to Nenavist's limbs, the chains of coagulated blood pinning him like an insect beneath a needle. She stared at his unmoving form, chest tight, fingers trembling.

'Is this… really the end?'

A strange heaviness tugged at her heart, but she forced it down.

Asterion crouched beside Nenavist's broken form, his shadow spilling over the man like a predatory shroud. His crimson cloak stirred though there was no wind, and the ghostly faces swirling behind him moaned faintly.

"See?" Asterion whispered mockingly, tilting his head as if studying a curious insect. "Even your obsession wasn't enough. Caelirisu… she's gone. And now so are you."

Nenavist's breath hitched, his silver eyes dull but burning with a final flicker of defiance. "Smile… I will… find you…"

Asterion smirked, leaning closer to hear the words of a dying man. But the next instant, the cavern darkened.

The shadows beneath Nenavist surged—not with strength, but with desperate cunning. The ground cracked like glass, blackness spilling outward in a sudden wave. A dozen shadow-clones burst forth, each shaped like a distorted fragment of Nenavist's form, rushing at Anvil and Ki Song with suicidal ferocity.

"What—?!" Anvil snarled, his swords immediately lashing out to shred the false shadows. They burst like smoke, but more kept coming, forcing him to defend from all directions.

Ki Song staggered back, commanding her puppets to intercept, but every time one fell, the shadows dragged it into the black fissures opening in the ground. Her heart skipped a beat.

'This isn't just an attack—it's a diversion!'

Asterion's grin faltered as he felt the pull of Nenavist's Domain. The wounded Supreme was vanishing into his own shadow, sinking into the earth like water draining into a crack.

"STOP HIM!" Asterion roared, his voice echoing through the cavern. His name pulsed like a curse, strengthening his reach, spectral hands clawing at Nenavist's retreating form.

He poured everything into a single strike, one that pierced directly into Nenavist's soul—wounding it so gravely that not even a Sacred, let alone a Supreme, could possibly survive it.

But Nenavist was already gone. His shadows closed around him like a coffin, dragging him into the deep fractures of the mountain. The last thing they saw was his blood-soaked hand vanishing into the dark.

The cavern shook. A moment later, a deafening boom erupted from deep below. The ground collapsed into a jagged abyss, a torrent of shattered rock and dust exploding upward like a volcano.

Anvil and Ki Song leapt back, shielding themselves. When the dust settled, all that remained was a chasm stretching into nothingness. No trace of Nenavist—no shadows, no body.

Far below, cloaked in his own shadows, Nenavist bled and crawled through the fractures of the mountain. His perception, frayed and weak, mapped every inch of the darkness, seeking a path.

'Not yet… I can't die yet. Smile… wait for me.'

As what remained of Nenavist began to sink into the void beneath the Hollow Mountain, his vision blurred. Shadows flickered. His body was shredded, his soul fractured. He should have died.

But then he heard it—a voice.

Childish. Cheerful.

And yet, buried within that voice was something deeper—older. A patience that could only be called ancient.

"Oh my. My. Broken Sword, it's such an honor to meet you," the voice cooed.

Nenavist's head twisted weakly. He tried to open his eyes, but he was already beyond the reach of light. This was not darkness—it was True Darkness, a place where even souls dissolved.

"Who… are you?" he rasped.

A giggle echoed in the dark.

"Well, who I am doesn't really matter, now does it?" the voice replied with a singsong lilt.

"What matters is that I can help. I can heal you—restore you to your peak. And even better... I can give you the strength to end the ones who did this to you."

Nenavist's blood boiled, but his voice remained hoarse. "What do you want?"

A pause. Then the voice spoke again, softer, with the tone of a child asking for candy.

"Me? Oh, just two little things. One—your loyalty. I do so hate being betrayed."

"And two…"

The darkness curled tighter. The pressure increased. Nenavist could feel the stranger smiling at him from somewhere just behind the veil of sanity.

"I want what you took from the Hollow Mountains," the voice whispered.

Nenavist froze. His eyes widened, but he couldn't move.

"You can't mean—"

"Oh, I absolutely mean it. That teeny-tiny sliver of Weaver's Forbidden Lineage, nestled in your soul. Give it to me, and I'll give you the power to rewrite the tale they tried to end today."

Anvil, Ki Song, and Asterion sprinted down the broken passes of the Hollow Mountain, their expressions grim. The battle had stirred something ancient—something that should have stayed slumbering.

The air grew thick with unbreathable dust. Monstrous shapes writhed in the distance. Mouths with too many teeth. Eyes that wept fire. Things even Supremes dared not name.

"Faster!" Anvil growled, swinging his swords to sever a pursuing tentacle-like mass.

"I am running!" Ki Song snapped, guiding her puppets as decoys to delay the horrors.

Asterion said nothing, merely gliding with inhuman calm, red cloak trailing behind him like spilled blood. Yet his eyes were alert. Calculating.

The trio crossed the final bridge of silver bones connecting the Hollow Mountains to the Chained Isles. Behind them, the mountain trembled—as if furious it had been denied its meal.

Only when they stepped onto the cracked marble of the isles did they allow themselves to breathe.

And then—A sound. A tone that rang inside Asterion's head like a temple bell. The Spell's Voice.

[You have slain a Supreme Human: Broken Sword.]