Noise.
Not outside.
Inside.
The Trench was silent.
But Ryuzen's mind—
wasn't.
A scream with no sound clawed through his skull.
Endless. Layered. Overlapping.
Like something was trying to rewrite him faster than he could exist.
His vision split.
The ground beneath him—
Stone.
No—
Grid.
Two realities overlapped.
One solid. One bleeding red.
Both wrong.
His breath hitched.
Then stuttered.
Then—
stopped.
His body didn't follow commands anymore.
It lagged.
Jerked.
Twitched.
Like something else was testing it.
The System forced itself into view.
Not appearing—
glitching in.
『 WARNING: BIOMASS SYNC AT 108% 』
『 VESSEL ELASTICITY: CRITICAL FAILURE 』
『 INITIATING EMERGENCY SHUTDOWN... 』
A pause.
A fracture in the screen.
『 FAILED 』
Static.
For the first time—
The System wasn't guiding him.
It wasn't warning him.
It was locked out.
Ryuzen's body spasmed.
The bone blade pulsed violently.
Then—
split.
Thin, needle-like shards erupted backward—
driving into his own flesh.
A sharp twitch.
His shoulder jerked unnaturally.
Muscle warped.
Melted.
Reformed.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Too fast.
Too wrong.
His legs buckled.
He didn't fall.
He stuttered downward.
Like gravity had to reapply itself.
His fingers dug into the ground—
but even that felt delayed.
His own body wasn't synchronized.
Something moved.
A presence.
Heavy.
Watching.
The Trench responded.
…Thump.
Ryuzen didn't turn.
He didn't decide to.
Something else did.
A shape flickered into existence.
Massive.
Multi-limbed.
A distortion of limbs and void—
The Void-Stalker.
It moved.
Fast.
Wrong.
And for the first time—
Ryuzen didn't track it.
He didn't calculate.
Didn't interpret.
Didn't react.
His body moved first.
Everything went black.
No sound.
No motion.
No time.
Only—
static.
The world returned.
Wrong.
Like something had pressed pause—
and resumed it without him.
Ryuzen stood still.
Breathing.
Slow.
Heavy.
The ground beneath him—
was gone.
No.
Not gone.
Buried.
Under flesh.
Shredded.
Crushed.
Unrecognizable.
A mountain of broken matter surrounded him.
Dark.
Thick.
Gray ichor dripping slowly from torn remains.
His body—
stood at the center of it.
Still.
Silent.
His hands trembled.
No—
not hands.
Bone.
His knuckles were gone.
Split open.
Worn down.
Exposed structure where flesh had failed to keep up.
Something dripped from his mouth.
He didn't wipe it.
Didn't react.
Didn't understand it.
"…What…"
The word barely formed.
"…was I doing?"
Silence answered.
He searched for it.
The memory.
The fight.
The moment.
Nothing.
Only a void.
A black space where something should have existed.
Replaced.
Overwritten.
A flicker—
A fragment—
A voice—
Gone.
He reached for it again.
Nothing.
"…Irrelevant."
The word came slower this time.
Less certain.
Something shifted beside him.
His shadow.
It stretched across the uneven surface of the Trench wall.
But—
It didn't match.
Ryuzen stood still.
The shadow didn't.
It tilted.
Slowly.
Like it was observing him.
More limbs than his body had.
Too long.
Too wrong.
Watching.
Waiting.
Ryuzen didn't move.
Didn't react.
Didn't question.
Only observed.
Like it didn't matter.
The System flickered once more.
Weak.
Dying.
『 VESSEL STATE: [UNKNOWN] 』
『 SUBJECT IDENTITY: [CORRUPTED] 』
The screen shattered.
Gone.
No return.
Silence.
Ryuzen opened his mouth.
Tried to speak.
A name.
His name.
"…Ryu—"
The sound broke.
Collapsed into something else.
A low, grinding noise.
Like metal tearing against itself.
His throat tightened.
Rejected the word.
Rejected the meaning.
Rejected the identity.
"…Who…"
The word barely existed.
A pause.
"…am I hunting for?"
No answer came.
Only the slow, distant pulse of the Trench.
…Thump.
And for the first time—
It didn't feel foreign.
It felt…
familiar.
The Abyss didn't need to change him anymore.
Something else was wearing his body…
…and it was finally learning how to breathe.
[ END OF CHAPTER 9 ]