Chapter 16 – The Puppet Hero and the Hollow Light

The banquet hall of the Ivory Citadel was silent.

Gold-lined goblets stood untouched.
Dancers waited without music.
Nobles shifted nervously beneath chandeliers that suddenly seemed... too bright.

At the center of it all stood Elias Solheart, draped in celestial robes, basking in artificial radiance.

And yet—

“Why do I feel… cold?”

He clenched his fists. His magic, once radiant, now flickered. A divine aura that once bent crowds to awe… now failed to even warm the air.

Then came the voice.

“Do you believe you earned that light?”

It didn’t come from a person.

It came from the silence itself.

Far below the citadel, in a forgotten sanctum sealed since the Second Era, Yoru dragged the blade of memory across the floor—leaving no cut, but rewriting the air with each pass.

Tsuyoi: Erosion Trigger – Mythrender.

The ritual was simple:

Undo one lie.
Crack a thousand.

A statue of Elias, enshrined in the catacombs as the "Beacon Born," began to bleed light—not sacred, but desperate.

“He was never meant to carry the burden,” Yoru whispered.
“He just picked it up after killing the one who could.”

Back above, Elias stumbled.

The guests gasped.
He fell to one knee—his halo sputtering like a dying flame.

“Wh-What’s happening to me?!”

From the crowd, a woman in crimson robes stepped forward. Her veil parted just enough to show a cruel smile.

“The gods gave you a role, boy. Not divinity.
You’re the face of their lie, nothing more.”

“Lies?” Elias rasped. “I—I am the Hero…”

But the room didn’t echo back his words.

Because the world itself wasn’t sure anymore.

Outside the citadel, in every village shrine, Yoru’s sigil began appearing—an ink-black spiral etched into old stone.

No worshipper knew what it meant.

But some of them knelt.

Out of fear.
Out of doubt.
Out of truth.

The Hollow Light was fading.

And the puppet who once basked in it?

Was starting to see the strings.