Zeka opened his eyes. It wasn't out of fear—it was simply the quiet act of waking up.
He was suspended in a heavy, pitch-black void. He tried to move, to reach out, but nothing responded. His arms and legs refused to respond, as if his physical body had simply ceased to exist. In the absolute silence, he couldn't see or hear a thing, yet a strange, lingering chill clung to him—the faint sensation of someone, somewhere, calling out for help.
Then came the pull.
An abrupt, violent force yanked him backward. The world snapped back into place, and his eyes flew open to reality.
Before his mind could process his surroundings, his heart seized in an agonizing spasm. Phantom agony flooded his chest—the horrific, icy sensation of a wide blade tearing through his flesh.
Panic flared. Zeka clawed at his chest, his fingers scrambling desperately to grip the cold iron tip he was certain was protruding from his sternum.
There was nothing.
His eyes widened as he stared down at his torso. No blood. No gaping wound. No torn fabric. But the phantom pain completely overwhelmed his senses. His legs buckled, slamming him onto the cold floor as his stomach heaved, spewing bile and acid onto the ground beneath him.
He lay there trembling, his chest heaving as he gasped for air.
W-What is going on... he thought, his vision swimming in terror. Am I dying... or am I still alive?
A sudden, violent heart attack seized his chest, driving a bitter chill straight through his ribs.
I-I'm scared... I d-don't want to... die... yet...
He forced himself up, but a surge of immense pressure spiked inside his skull, setting off a blinding headache. Desperate to keep his balance, he grabbed a nearby chair for support.
Before he could steady his footing, a brutal shockwave tore through the lab, throwing him off his feet and slamming him back onto the cold floor.
BOOM.
The impact left Zeka dazed, but the deafening roar and sudden heat felt disturbingly familiar. An eerie wave of deja vu washed over him—he knew this explosion was coming. Scrambling to his hands and knees, his eyes widened in sheer horror as he realized history was repeating itself right in front of him.
Ignoring his screaming muscles and the agonizing ache in his head, Zeka pushed himself up. Through the swirling smoke, he spotted Genseki launched mid-air by the blast. Sprinting forward, Zeka caught him before he hit the hard floor of the lab and carried him outside into the snow. Setting him down, Zeka felt a rush of quiet relief—Genseki's facial features were still intact, his body undamaged.
Movement caught his eye. Hayato and Hayaru stood nearby in the snow, trembling in terror as they stared at the wreckage of what they had done.
Then Zeka noticed the orange glow creeping up Hayaru's clothes. Acting on pure instinct, Zeka lunged forward, tackling Hayaru straight into the snow to smother the rising flames.
Hayato immediately turned around, reaching out for his brother to check if he was okay.
Zeka stood up and scanned the chaos, only to realize Genseki was gone. He looked around frantically, but before he could act, a massive tree collapsed onto the laboratory, crushing the structure. Horror struck Zeka—he was late. He was supposed to save Liora next, but Genseki had vanished, and he hadn't reached Akari yet.
Refusing to give up hope, Zeka sprinted toward Liora's location, his legs pumping so hard he nearly lost his balance in the slick snow. He scrambled over the charred, fallen tree trunk—and instantly froze.
He was too late.
The shadowy figure was already standing over Liora, holding her pinned by the back of her shirt with its massive scythe raised. Reality itself began to fracture. The ground trembled violently under Zeka's feet, accompanied by a sickening, metallic screech as space distorted and tore wide open, revealing a rift of absolute darkness.
With an effortless motion, the figure hurled Liora straight toward the void.
"Liora!" Zeka screamed.
He lunged forward, taking a frantic step toward the rift. His hand reached out, fingers stretching desperately through the freezing air as if he could somehow pull her back before the darkness swallowed her whole.
Then the figure turned.
It didn't attack. It simply raised the scythe, making a single, slow gesture in Zeka's direction.
Zeka halted mid-stride. A wave of pure, paralyzing horror washed over him, freezing the blood in his veins. His heart slammed against his ribs like a trapped animal as the phantom agony of the scythe blade flared back to life in his chest. Every instinct in his body shrieked that if he took one more step, he would die—violently, permanently, right here in the snow.
His outstretched hand began to tremble. His feet felt rooted to the frozen earth, weighed down by an overwhelming, cowardice-inducing dread.
He stared at the closing rift. He could see her. He was close enough to try. If he threw himself forward right now, he might reach her. But the shadowy figure hovered right between them, silent, waiting, a living promise of death.
Move... please, just move... Zeka begged his own body, tears blinding his vision. I don't want to die...
The rift narrowed to a sliver. Seconds felt like agonizing hours as Zeka stood paralyzed in the snow, his heart hammering in his throat, trapped between his desperate urge to save her and his sickening fear of dying.
The dimension snapped shut. She was gone.
A sharp gasp broke from Zeka's throat. The realization of what he had just done—what he had failed to do—crushed him. Terror completely broke his spirit. He stumbled backward, his knees giving out as he scrambled blindly away in the snow.
"I-I'm sorry..." he sobbed into the freezing air, his voice cracking. "I'm sorry..."
He turned his back and ran. He didn't look behind him—not once. He kept sprinting aimlessly through the snow, blinded by tears, desperately trying to make the nightmare disappear, to flee from the horror left in his wake.
His lungs burned and his vision blurred, but terror pushed his legs far past their limit. Suddenly, his foot caught on a thick, hidden log buried beneath the drift.
Zeka pitched forward, crashing hard into the freeze. Darkness swam at the edges of his sight as exhaustion and shock finally claimed him. As consciousness slipped away, he lay motionless in the cold snow—still far too close to the danger creeping behind him.