The chosen one's awakening

“Good work, Marcel. Now, take the sacrifice to the altar. We have to wait till the full moon for the next sacrificial ritual to be made.”

The voice of the Demon Lord boomed through the throne room, his words reverberating off vaulted ceilings that disappeared into shadow. The vast chamber was a hollow cathedral of dark grandeur. Pillars of jagged black stone rose like skeletal fingers toward the gloom, their surfaces carved with grotesque demons and writhing spirits locked forever in marble torment.

Beneath the Demon Lords seven monstrous thrones, torches of green fire flickered endlessly in iron sconces, casting warped, shifting shapes across the slick obsidian floor. Blood-red veins ran like rivers through the walls, pulsing faintly like a heart. Even the air felt weighted, close, metallic, and tinged with the taste of burnt iron.

Marcel, blank-eyed and obedient, hauled Hanz to his feet.

“Yes, Your Highness.”

But as Marcel turned to leave, the Demon Lord raised a clawed hand.

A glyph appeared before his palm — spiraling lines of glowing red kantar, humming with a predatory power that raised the hairs on Hanz's neck.

The mark leapt to Marcel's back. Instantly, Marcel's body locked up, spine arching as his face twisted in pain. Red light seared across him, bright as a branding iron, then vanished into his skin.

And when the light faded, Marcel’s face was utterly empty once more — no trace of thought behind his glassy gaze.

A slow, monstrous grin unfurled across the Demon Lord's face. Fangs glistened in the gloom as his eyes smoldered like embers.

“You can go now,” he rumbled, voice like the growl of distant thunder. “Just needed to recalibrate your Valthorne mark.”

“Yes, Your Highness,” Marcel replied in a monotone and continued dragging Hanz away.

The corridor outside was a tight, oppressive thing. Its black stone walls were slick with damp and etched with countless sigils that glowed faintly blue in the dim torchlight. Shadows slid along the ceiling like living things, and every so often, distant screams echoed like ghosts trapped forever in the walls.

Hanz’s breath came in short bursts as his heels scraped across the cracked floor.

“So you’re my twin,” he muttered. “You definitely do look like me.”

No answer.

That vacant stare gave him chills.

“No man can just remain like a machine after being kicked in the…”

With a savage grin, Hanz jerked his knee upward into Marcel’s groin — expecting a grunt or even a flash of rage.

Nothing.

Marcel didn’t flinch.

Hanz froze mid-breath.

“ARE YOU EVEN HUMAN ANYMORE?!” he shouted in disbelief.

But Marcel simply kept walking until they reached a looming steel door covered in writhing crimson sigils that glowed like embers. With a harsh shove, he hurled Hanz inside.

The door clanged shut, lock turning with an ominous metallic scrape that echoed into silence.

Hanz lay sprawled across the cell floor, rubbing his head with a groan.

“Sheesh… couldn’t you have dropped me any gentler?”

He glanced around, eyes adjusting to the near-darkness.

And then he noticed — his hands and feet were completely free.

“These idiots didn’t even bother to bind me,” he muttered, a slow grin spreading across his face. “That makes things a whole lot easier.”

He summoned his kantar into his fist, feeling its familiar warmth and strength… and drove a powerful punch into the door.

Bone crunched.

Pain shot up his arm like fire.

“WHAT THE HELL?! My kantar… why didn’t it work?!”

He cradled his shattered arm, chest heaving.

And then the world around him wavered like a heat mirage — shadows swirling up the walls as the cell dissolved into his inner Kantar Realm.

A vast expanse unfurled beneath an endless black sky, jagged rocks floating weightless over rivers of glowing red mist. Thunder rumbled across the desolate landscape as a cold wind whispered through the empty space.

And there, leaning on its enormous blade, was his demon. Its eyes glinted as it watched him with tired disdain.

“You just got kidnapped,” it drawled. “And you’re acting like an idiot.”

Hanz blinked, rubbing his neck.

“Oh… I’m here again. When did that happen?”

He spun slowly, taking in the eerie landscape.

“Anyway,” he continued, flexing his injured arm, “since I’m here, why the hell didn’t my Kantar work?”

The demon sighed — long and theatrical — and folded itself down onto a cracked boulder.

“You dumbass,” it growled. “That cell is built to suppress kantar. That’s why they didn’t chain you. You really thought they were stupid?”

A scowl pulled at its mouth as it dug its sword into the rocky ground.

“And your ‘twin’… something’s wrong with him. His kantar’s warped — like someone else is pulling the strings.”

Hanz crossed his arms, brow furrowing.

“Wow, what an intelligent guess, Einstein. I already figured that much,” he replied dryly. “I just didn’t know it messed with his brain, too. Poor guy’s like a lifeless puppet.”

The demon gritted its teeth at its own oversight.

“Tch. Should’ve noticed that sooner,” it muttered.

And then its eyes gleamed.

“We can’t break that door without Kantar,” it said, voice low and serious. “So what’s the plan?”

Hanz smirked.

“We wait,” he said, hands flexing into fists. “Hannah and her son will come for us. Besides — apart from this talk, she's saw everything tat just happened in the throne room and she can currently see where we are Remember?”

The demon inclined its head.

“Right,” it growled. “Guess we wait, then.”

Hanz’s grin grew sharper as he settled into a stance.

“Till then,” he said. “i wanna test something, let's fight maybe we'll be able to unlock hidden memories like the last time.”

The demon answered with a wolfish grin of its own.

“My pleasure.”

And as they rushed one another, sparks of energy flashed across the jagged stones, their clash lighting up the black sky like bursts of scarlet lightning.

Meanwhile, on a windswept peak blanketed in snow, Shu and Hannah stood before a colossal temple. Its marble walls glowed faintly under the full moon, and intricate carvings of dragon forms coiled across every surface. The massive double doors were etched with swirling patterns that glimmered silver in the cold light, and flanking them were two dragon statues — their eyes set with glowing rubies that glared into the dark.

Snowflakes swirled in the frigid wind, catching the moonlight as they fell, and the thin mountain air smelled of pine and distant storms.

Hannah narrowed her gaze at the structure.

“What exactly are we doing here again?”

Shu kept his hands tucked into his sleeves, eyes on the door.

“During my time in the celestial realm,” he said calmly, breath misting in the cold, “I spent some time watching you guys, just checking up to see if you were all okay. During those times, I saw  Tobi searching for sacred places to control  Dracula inside him. This was the last temple he visited — and its barrier was so strong, I couldn’t see what happened inside.”

He glanced at her as he says, "I thought I told you this before?" he then continued, saying seriously  

“I don’t know what version of Tobi we’ll find in there.”

Hannah nodded slowly.

“My bad,” she replied, brow creasing. “I was too focused on Hanz before to listen properly. Looks like we’ve got until the next full moon to save him.”

A smile tugged at Shu’s mouth.

“That’s four days. Longer than I thought.”

He reached for the door —

And in a blink, a monstrous shape burst outward, shattering marble and air alike as it hurtled toward him.

Wings like torn leather sails stretched from its back. Red eyes glowed like coals set into a skull, and jagged claws glinted in the moonlight as it roared.

Shu moved like a whipcrack — fist glowing with red kantar as he drove it into the monster's chest.

A shockwave burst outward with the impact, hurling the beast skyward. Shu followed without hesitation, catching its leg mid-flight and slamming it into the ground with an ear-splitting crack.

Before it could rise, he let a surge of red flame roar from his hands — but the beast dodged with monstrous speed, tearing into him with a swipe that sent him tumbling across the marble.

Snarling, Shu rolled to his feet and shaped a spear of kantar in his palm.

With a sharp cry, he hurled it like a bolt of lightning, pinning the monster to the temple wall, spreading glowing rods across its body like a cage.

But a moment later, black Kantar surged through its form and shattered Shu's construct into glowing dust. The monster moving with tremendous speed was about to attack Shu in a vital spot before he could react, but before he could do that,

Hannah was there.

Blue light pulsed around her hands as she appeared in a flash, a gleaming spear of kantar stabbing cleanly through the monster’s skull.

Before it could recover, she activated her Kantar technique.

The monster screamed as its body dissolved into countless blue sparks swirling upward like embers on a summer night.

And as the light faded 

A dragon-shaped mask clattered onto the marble at Hannah’s feet.

Her brow furrowed.

“That’s a dragon mask,” she breathed.

And in that heartbeat, the mask glowed — black light leaking from its empty eyeholes — as the monster re-formed faster, larger, and fiercer.

Its claws flashed like knives.

Before Hannah could react, it rammed a spiked hand straight through her torso.

“HANNAH!” Shu roared, fury flooding him like fire.

He charged, fist wreathed in scarlet light, and his punch hit like a meteor, hurling the beast away across the marble with a crash that split the ground.

Kneeling at Hannah’s side, Shu’s hands glowed red as he forced his energy into her wound.

“Heal yourself,” he urged fiercely, eyes never leaving the beast as it rose.

Her hands glowed blue as she pushed him back gently.

“That mask,” she gasped, wincing as light sealed her wound, “is cursed. Cults use it as a last-ditch weapon — it turns humans into monsters that grow stronger the longer they fight. And the stronger the person, the faster it adapts.”

Shu’s gaze narrowed into a predator’s glare.

“How do we kill it?”

“Destroy the body like I did,” Hannah replied quickly as she got to her feet, eyes glowing. “And the instant the mask appears, crush it. That’s the only way to stop it.”

The monster was already back, claws grinding into the marble as it roared again and surged toward them.

And this time, Shu stepped forward — his breath like a growl, his voice like a rumble of thunder.

Scarlet light blazed around him as he focused his kantar into a single point.

“Kantar Manifestation,” he intoned, the mountain trembling underfoot as power burst upward like a wildfire.

And in the storm of glowing red energy, his form shifted, becoming something greater, something brighter — a shimmering figure wreathed in light.

A voice deeper and more powerful than before cracked the night air:

“The Honoured One’s Rebirth.”

And as the monster charged —

Shu’s burning gaze met its glowing eyes as he said with a voice that shook the entire mountain 

“GAME… OVER, YOU OVER GROWN BAT"