Chapter 9 – Inheritance of Regret

The temple burned behind him—its lies turned to ash, its false legacy erased. But Yoru didn’t look back. His eyes were fixed on the shadows ahead, where no path existed… only whispers.

As he stepped beyond the ruins, the landscape twisted.

The air thinned.

And reality... broke.

This place was not part of any map.

A realm between realms. A pocket of unformed memory—a prison for rejected truths.

Yoru’s boots sank into soil that pulsed like veins. The sky bled with static, stitched together by lightning shaped like words he couldn’t read. Here, magic itself was raw, wild, feral.

“You shouldn’t have come,” said a voice. Not from behind him—but from within.

Yoru turned, and saw… himself.

But not as he was now.

A version of him still pure. Still full of belief. The child who thought being a hero meant something. The boy who died.

This apparition stared at him with sorrow. Not hatred. Not fear. Just… grief.

“You left me here.”

“No,” Yoru replied, voice low. “They did.”

A pulse of violet erupted from his chest. The boy vanished like mist. In his place: a black stone altar, floating mid-air, wrapped in chain sigils.

Tsuyoi Ritual: “Inheritance of the Hollow”.

Yoru placed his hand upon it.

Pain surged. Not in the body, but in the soul.

A scream—his own—ripped through the air. Visions returned. Of betrayal. Of the spear through his back. Of the one who killed him smiling as crowds cheered.

The altar shattered, and from it, he drew a blade forged from memory. Not steel—but condensed regret. It didn’t shine. It devoured light.

“This world killed me once,” he whispered.

“It won’t get a second chance.”