History had been changed. And reunions, in the end, were always something worth celebrating.
"Kag... Saruman..."
Lina looked at her two companions, both of whom seemed close to tears of joy. Her own emotions surged, and tears blurred her vision once again.
She opened her mouth, wanting to tell them everything that had happened inside the dream, the battle as the Giant of Light, the darkness being stripped from her, the strange new power Ian had given her. But there was too much to say.
In the end, all those words became a single trembling sentence from someone who had barely escaped death: "I... I feel much better now. I'm sorry I made you worry."
Lina didn't know what else to say. Her gaze quietly drifted toward Ian. She still had no idea who he really was, but judging by how he stood with Saruman and Kag, perhaps he was someone they had brought along to save her?
That thought immediately reminded her of what Ian had done inside the dream. He had made her a Seer of the Raven. Saruman had studied the history of the Raven for years, perhaps he knew a priest or some powerful figure connected to it? Still, she hadn't expected him to know someone 'this' terrifyingly powerful. Absurd as Ian could be, there was no denying his strength, leaving her feelings toward him hopelessly complicated.
"Thank goodness... Thank goodness!"
Kag finally couldn't hold back any longer. He stepped forward and gently embraced Lina, moving so carefully it was as though she might shatter if he used even a little too much force. Then the warrior turned toward Ian, his face filled with sincere gratitude and awe.
"Lord Prince! I could never repay what you've done for us. From this day forward, my life is yours! If you ever need me to walk through fire or face death itself, I won't hesitate!"
Saruman also gave Ian a deep, solemn bow, his voice slightly hoarse. "Thank you, My Lord. For saving her life... and rebuilding what had been broken. We will never forget this kindness."
Both men meant every word.
Ian simply nodded, accepting their gratitude without ceremony. His gaze swept over Lina one more time. Her condition was essentially stable; her soul had integrated well with the mark of the Raven Seer, and Cthulhu's corruption wouldn't be able to invade her again anytime soon.
"Not bad," he muttered, the comment coming completely out of nowhere.
Then Ian turned his attention toward the silver-gray portal behind them. It was slowly shrinking and becoming unstable, still connected to the collapsing dream battlefield they had just escaped. The place might have been a dream world, a realm of consciousness, but it had clearly developed the ability to influence reality.
That was hardly surprising. Creatures like Cthulhu were never bound by ordinary rules.
"That place... still exists." Lina followed his gaze. Seeing the portal fluctuate and contract as though it might vanish at any moment, she suddenly felt uneasy. "Lord Prince..." She hesitated before finally asking, "Aren't you coming with us? Aren't you leaving this awful place too?"
Ian turned around. He looked at Lina, then at Saruman and Kag, who wore the same confused, worried expressions.
Then, unexpectedly, he smiled.
It was faint and disappeared almost immediately, but unlike his usual cold or calm demeanor, this smile carried something else: a trace of excitement. The kind of fighting spirit one might show after discovering an interesting new toy.
"Leave with you?" Ian repeated, shaking his head. "Not yet."
His tone was calm, but left no room for argument. He raised a hand and pointed toward the shrinking portal, and, by extension, toward the deep, chaotic dream abyss beyond it where remnants of that maddened will still lingered.
"That big guy in there and I..." Ian paused, considering how best to phrase it. "We're not finished yet."
Cthulhu was the type to hold grudges, and Ian had no intention of leaving behind future trouble.
"Hm?" Saruman's pupils contracted sharply.
Not finished? His Lordship had already cleansed Lina's corruption and even destroyed the Dream Incarnation that had pursued them. So what exactly was left?
Kag and Lina both paled as well. Neither of them knew the exact details of what had happened inside the dream, but they could imagine how dangerous it had been. If someone as overwhelmingly powerful as Ian was saying the battle wasn't over, what kind of horror was still waiting beyond that portal?
"All right. You three leave first." Ian offered no further explanation. He raised a hand, tracing a casual motion through the air, and opened another gateway leading back toward the outside world, stabilizing it at a size large enough for one person to pass through.
"You go first," Ian told Saruman. "Get them away from this area. As far as possible. You can't maintain your current state much longer either."
Saruman could already feel the borrowed power within him draining away at an alarming speed, making the barrier he maintained increasingly unstable. He knew Ian was right: if they stayed, they would only be liabilities.
Saruman glanced at Ian's calm, resolute profile, then at Lina, alive but still weak, and Kag, who had nearly exhausted himself. Finally, he nodded heavily.
"My Lord... please be careful." His voice carried genuine respect and concern.
Ian waved them off, signaling for them to go, and Saruman hesitated no longer. He immediately contracted the barrier, focusing most of its protection around Lina and Kag. Drawing on the last of his remaining strength, he began guiding them toward a region farther from the core where space was relatively more stable. He needed to give Ian a battlefield free from interference, and give the three of them a chance to survive.
"This way." Kag supported Lina as they moved. Before stepping through, he looked back one final time at the lone figure standing before the portal, the boy's black robes fluttering gently in the chaotic currents of energy.
Lina bit her lip, her eyes filled with gratitude, worry, and the instinctive concern a newly awakened Raven Seer felt toward the one who had guided her onto this path.
Soon, all three disappeared through the portal Ian had opened, vanishing into the shadows of distant structures and the turbulent currents beyond.
"Now then..." Ian stood alone before the remaining portal. "This is between you and me."
He waited until his senses confirmed that Saruman and the others had traveled a considerable distance. The oppressive pressure Cthulhu's will had been exerting on the outside world also seemed to weaken slightly after Lina's departure and the complete removal of her corruption.
Only then did Ian slowly turn around to face the silver-gray portal head-on.
What lay beyond was no longer the ruined dreamscape from before. There was only darkness: deep, absolute, and pure. But it was not empty. It was a darkness formed from concentrated madness, chaos, and an immense sense of self so overwhelming that merely perceiving it felt suffocating. It was as though the portal no longer connected to any location at all, but opened directly onto the edge of some indescribable, slumbering horror's consciousness, the outer surface of its dream.
"Quit throwing a tantrum and come fight me."
Ian could clearly sense it: the will whose incarnation he had destroyed earlier had never disappeared. It had simply retreated into something deeper, something more fundamental. And after Ian's provocation, and his theft of its power, it was now far more focused on him. And far angrier.
It was waiting for him. Or rather, it had no intention of letting this insect, this thing that had disturbed its slumber, stolen its prey, and run rampant through its Domain, leave so easily.
Ian wasn't intimidated in the slightest. He stepped through the portal again, this time entering Cthulhu's dream with his physical body.
The hostility waiting for him was impossible to miss.
"Heh. Knew you wouldn't be that easy to get rid of," Ian muttered under his breath.
There was no fear in his eyes; if anything, the anticipation only grew stronger. He took a deep breath, then slowly raised both hands. This time, he wasn't going to call on the Raven's power or use any complicated techniques. Instead, he would use the power he had just absorbed to pay this sleeping neighbor a proper visit in the most direct, fitting way possible.
"Darkness - gather."
At his low command, the dark energy he had extracted from Lina's corruption, already partially converted and suppressed inside him, stirred like a waking beast and erupted from deep within his body.
Thick, ink-like darkness surged outward in waves, possessing a depth that seemed to contain the death of stars. Even the silver-gray glow of the portal around him was instantly stained with an ominous shadow as faint sizzling sounds filled the air.
The dark patterns from earlier emerged across his body once more, clearer and more vicious than before. His face grew even paler, almost translucent, but his eyes were frighteningly bright, like two stars burning with black flames.
Wrapped in surging darkness, Ian's body began to expand. He grew taller, larger, the outline of his muscles becoming more pronounced beneath his black robes, radiating explosive physical strength while retaining an eerie, fluid elegance. His silver hair rose without wind, the strands darkening from the tips until they turned a deep metallic gray.
Then, as the darkness reached its peak...
"ROOOAR...!!"
A deep roar filled with primal savagery and overwhelming pressure erupted from the heart of the darkness. All the surrounding dark energy suddenly collapsed inward, then exploded outward.
A Giant now stood before the portal.
He was roughly the same size as Tiga had been earlier, but his presence was completely different. Ian's new body was primarily black and dark gray, streaked with blood-red markings, its lines sharper, harsher, and far more aggressive. The energy core on his chest was no longer blue; it glowed a dark crimson like coagulated blood, pulsing faintly with every beat. Two sharper, almost demonic horns rose from his head, and where Tiga's eyes had once been milky-white, there were now two dark red eyes burning with a cold, merciless light like openings into the Abyss.
Even with his physical body present, imagination combined with the darkness he had stolen still allowed Ian to turn his will into a force capable of distorting reality.
At that moment, Dark Tiga descended.
"Your Dream Domain is actually helping my imagination," Ian remarked, moving his new body slightly to test it. "I couldn't pull this off in reality."
Pure, powerful darkness surged through him, bringing with it instinctive urges: destroy, devour, conquer. Ian forcibly suppressed every one of those impulses, keeping his mind completely clear.
Then Dark Tiga's crimson eyes turned toward the darkness beyond the portal. "Using your own power against you seems pretty appropriate, doesn't it?"
As though answering his transformation and provocation, Cthulhu's will began to churn violently. This was no longer a scattered torrent of thought, nor was it another simple incarnation. Something larger, older, and far more complete began to emerge.
A colossal outline slowly rose from the darkness, unstoppable. Even the vague edge of its silhouette was enough to make the portal tremble violently, as if the gateway itself could barely withstand the pressure of its mere existence.
"Cthulhu."
Ian could make out the suggestion of a gigantic, distorted humanoid head covered in writhing tentacles, and a body rising and falling like mountain ranges, coated in scales and slime. And beyond all of that, a gaze. Even through the portal, it seemed capable of freezing the soul: a gaze filled with endless madness and an ancient silence that had existed since before human memory.
Cthulhu's will, or rather, a far clearer projection of its immense Dream Domain and power, much closer to its true origin, finally stopped hiding.
Across the portal, it faced Ian Prince in his Dark Tiga form. No words were exchanged; none were needed. The sheer pressure of their confrontation alone would have shattered the minds of ordinary beings.
The real battle was only just beginning.
Meanwhile, Saruman was leading Kag and Lina through the shadows of R'lyeh's twisted architecture and the chaotic energy currents that filled the city. They moved with great difficulty, putting as much distance as possible between themselves and the battlefield.
The dark-silver barrier surrounding them had become as thin as a cicada's wing, its glow almost gone. At this point, it could barely shield them from direct spatial pressure and the lingering psychic whispers. Ian's teleportation gate had only brought them into R'lyeh itself; if they wanted to escape the city completely, they still had to find their own way out.
Fortunately, there was at least one piece of good news: because Ian had drawn Cthulhu's full attention, the ancient being no longer had any focus to spare for them. As a result, R'lyeh was actually far safer than when they had first entered.
Dangers still remained, of course, but they were no longer beyond Saruman's ability to handle. The real problem was the corruption permeating the entire city. With every step, the borrowed power inside him drained away like sand through an hourglass. Agonizing pain tore through the depths of his soul, accompanied by an ever-growing weakness.
But he didn't dare stop, and he couldn't.
"This way!"
He had to get Lina and Kag somewhere relatively safe. At the very least, they needed to get far enough from the core battlefield that they wouldn't be caught in the aftermath of whatever terrifying clash came next.
"That's it. I'm never going into another ruin again," Kag muttered as he supported Lina. "These places are cursed."
Lina was still weak, but at least she could walk on her own now. The two followed closely behind Saruman, neither speaking much after that. Relief at surviving was written across their faces, but so was deep concern for whatever was unfolding behind them.
They could feel it: the darkness in the distance was growing heavier, more terrifying. The mad pulse coming from that direction strengthened by the second, as though two ancient beasts were awakening and preparing to tear into each other.
"Saruman..." Kag finally couldn't hold back any longer, his voice low and uneasy. "That lord... is he really going to be all right by himself?"
Kag might have been a warrior rather than a mage, but his sensitivity to danger was sharp. The presence rising behind them made even a veteran like him tremble from the depths of his soul.
Saruman did not answer immediately. He continued forcing the barrier forward while navigating their path, rapidly turning the same question over in his mind.
Could Ian truly win?
Because if Ian lost, everything they had accomplished here would vanish like a reflection on water.
(End of Chapter)
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