Shadows began to spill from the sword, not like smoke, but like liquid night pouring into the air.
Then the light died.
Pitch blackness spread outward from Bane, rolling across the hall in a silent wave. Walls vanished. The floor disappeared. Even the Loom Mother's massive shape was swallowed whole.
It wasn't darkness as absence.
It was darkness as presence.
Vera's vision went completely blank. No red threads. No construct. No sense of distance. Her senses dulled, as if wrapped in thick cloth.
Alexandria froze. Her breath caught in her chest. The darkness pressed against her skin like a heavy weight.
"Wh–what is this…?" she whispered.
The thought of stepping into it further filled her with dread. The darkness and the curse energy that sustained it felt suffocating, almost maddening, as if it would swallow her whole and leave nothing behind.
Within the Veil, sight did not exist, and the other senses were dulled so deeply that perception itself was nearly impossible.
However...
Kai smiled faintly.
"God, I love this sword."
His blood-red eyes saw through the darkness with eerie clarity.
That should not have been possible.
But Kai was a dark forger.
The dark did not oppose him.
It recognized him.
It welcomed him.
Existence required acknowledgment.
To be seen, to be sensed, to leave some trace of oneself in the world.
Within the Veil, sight did not exist, and the other senses were dulled to a such a degree where perception was almost impossible
Kai could not be observed.
And so, to anyone else, he did not exist
"You said you wanted to save me earlier," Kai said. "That got me thinking about a few things… but the one thing I'd like to know is..."
He walked toward her slowly. He knew his words might not reach her, but he spoke anyway.
He passed the frozen Loom Mother without a glance. The construct was never meant to act on its own. It depended entirely on Vera's perception, and without it, the Loom was nothing more than an empty shell.
Kai stopped.
"who is going to save you from me?"
Vera staggered back.
"This is bad, i can't even his curse energy," she thought
She still couldn't see him. Couldn't feel where he was. But instinct screamed that he was close... too close.
Her jaw clenched.
"If I can't sense him..." She thought
Her fingers twitched.
Red threads burst outward, not toward Kai, but away—shooting into the walls, the pillars, the ceiling. They spread fast, digging deep, anchoring themselves into stone and steel.
Cracks spidered across the ceiling as the threads pulled tight. The structure strained, dust raining down in thick sheets.
Vera drew in a sharp breath, curse energy spiking as she pulled harder.
"Then we all die here".
"Too late for that."
His voice was right beside her.
The cut was instant.
Clean.
Her thoughts were scattered, her senses were dulled to the point she could barely feel the blade as it went through her
The threads went slack all at once. They lost tension, crumbling into lifeless strands that fell away from the walls and ceiling. The hall shuddered violently but held.
Vera's body went limp
Kai caught her before she hit the ground
He looked down at her.
"Thanks for the fight, I'm a stronger person because of it" he said softly.
But Her eyes were already empty.
He turned and carried her toward the pile of bodies.
The darkness slowly started returning to where it came, The pressure faded, leaving the air heavy but bearable.
Alexandria inhaled sharply.
Her sight had returned, and the first thing she saw was Kai carefully laid Vera on top of the pile of corpses, making sure she wouldn't slide off. Only after that did he step back.
Alexandria continued to stare at him
Seeing this, Kai got a sense of deja vu
"Are you gonna scold me again?" He asked
But nothing came.
None of this makes sense, she thought.
During the fight, the amount of curse energy kai was outputting was low, extremely low
She simply came to the conclusion that the curse energy needed to summon and sustain his weapon was very minimal.
The low output also aligned with her knowledge that his soul core was damaged. Using large amounts of curse energy should have been dangerous for him.
But all of those assumptions collapsed the moment he used Veil.
The surge of curse energy had been overwhelming, more than some could accumulate in a lifetime.
And to make matters even worse, she wasn't even sure it was his...
Alexandria had always been acutely sensitive to curse energy. She could detect the subtlest details: the fluctuations, the nuances. They revealed so much about the person wielding them.
Kai's curse energy was warm. Stubborn. Vibrant. In a strange way, even beautiful.
The energy that came from the sword was none of that.
It was old.
Cold.
And deeply terrifying.
Most people would never notice the difference.
She did.
Questions crowded her mind. About the blade. About where that energy came from. About how long he'd been carrying something like that.
Fear didn't settle in her chest.
Something else did.
A quiet, growing curiosity.
And for the first time she realized...
She had no idea who the person standing in front of her truly was
But now wasn't the time for her questions
She finally broke the silence.
"I'm just glad my armor didn't get ruined by all the blood you spilled today."
Kai smiled. "Fair enough."
"It's actuall-"
"Watch out!" Alexandria yelled as Marcus tackled Kai from behind.
He'd finally regained consciousness. Mounting Kai, he unleashed a barrage of punches.
"DIE! DIE! DIE!" he bellowed with each strike.
Kai raised his guard, but the punches started breaking through. A clean hit might have been enough to finish him in his weakened state.
Marcus was utterly consumed by his assault. He failed to notice Alexandria creeping up behind him.
She shoved him off Kai with all her strength, giving Kai the breathing room he desperately needed.
"You!" Marcus snarled, pointing at her.
"Why do you insist on ruining everything?!"
"Damian would have been the team leader if it weren't for this bitch!"
"You two have done nothing but try to make a fool out of him!"
"We did nothing of the sort. If you think he's been made a fool of, then it's probably his own doing or the doing of idiots like you who can't even think for themselves."
The insults were the final straw for Marcus.
"I'm going to enjoy ripping your heart out of your body."
He slowly raised his arm, and almost immediately, his diamond-coated body began to darken, shifting to black.
The material his form was transforming into was one Kai knew all too well.. something stronger than even diamond.
"Bane..." Kai muttered.
Marcus's prior contact with the sword had been enough for him to replicate its material.
Soon, the transformation was complete.
Kai dashed forward, swinging Bane toward his head, but the attack was effortlessly blocked. The collision reverberated through every bone in Kai's body.
"There's no way I can cut through," he thought.
Marcus must have sensed it too. He threw a full-force punch, slamming into Kai's chest. It nearly caved in his ribcage, expelling all the air from his lungs and sending him flying.
Kai tried to rise, but his body rebelled, wracking him with coughs as blood sprayed from his mouth.
"Not so fun when your ass is the one getting tossed across the room, is it?!"
Marcus morphed his arms into sharp blades and came at Kai again and again
Kai blocked when he could, dodged when he had to but every exchange rattled his body.
He was significantly the better fighter, but it didn't matter if you couldn't even harm your opponent. Marcus didn't bother to dodge or block Kai's attacks; he only wanted to end him
Nothing else mattered.
Marcus continued his barrage of attacks but then he noticed something, something infuriated and surprised him all at once
Kai was smiling
"What—what's so funny?!" Marcus roared as he swung wildly.
Kai slipped past the attack. In the same motion, Bane flashed upward. Sparks burst as the blade scraped across Marcus's face. He flinched, vision blurring for a split second.
Kai grabbed Marcus by the head and drove him straight into the concrete. The impact cracked the floor.
Marcus snarled and shoved Kai away with all his strength. Kai was thrown into the air, but he twisted and landed cleanly on his feet.
Marcus pushed himself up.
Kai spoke calmly. "Do you even know what Bane is made of?"
Marcus didn't answer. His breathing had grown uneven.
A sharp pain spread through his chest, like something grinding against his bones from the inside.
Rebecca's eyes widened as she felt it too.
"Oh no," she muttered
Kai continued, his voice steady. "I don't know the full composition. But a major part of it is curse energy."
Marcus staggered.
Black lines pulsed beneath his skin. His muscles tightened, then spasmed.
Marcus clenched his fists. "Wh…what are you talking about…?"
Rebecca stepped forward. "Marcus," she said sharply. "If your ability allows you to replicate any material, then it replicates everything that makes up that material."
Marcus's body jerked violently.
For a moment, his scream caught in his throat
"you have both curse energy and essence running through your entire body."
The air around Marcus warped.
His skin cracked in thin lines as light began leaking through.
Rebecca's voice dropped. " And they're starting to resonate."
Marcus fell to one knee, clawing at his chest as agony tore through him.
"Resonance only works if the energies align," she said. "If they don't—"
Marcus screamed.
"And if they don't," Kai finished quietly, "your body goes... BOOM"