My breath hitched. My game knowledge, my author's imagination, none of it had prepared me for this.

It was a dragon.

But it wasn't a creature of flesh, scales, or bone. It was sculpted from pure, solidified starlight. Its scales were like a thousand interlocking diamonds, refracting the light into a rainbow of colors. Its wings, folded at its back, looked as if they were woven from the aurora borealis.

Its eyes... its eyes were twin, miniature suns, radiating an ancient, primordial power that was neither hot nor cold, but simply absolute.

It was beautiful. And it was the most terrifying thing I had ever seen.

[Guardian Dragon: Luminos, the First Spark]

[Rank: ?????]

[Status: Divine Guardian, Vessel of Light]

Lysandra bowed, her forehead touching the ground. "Great One. I have brought them."

Elara fell to her knees, trembling, tears streaming down her face, her hands pressed together in a gesture of pure, ancestral reverence. "Divine Guardian... Luminos... I am Elara of the Moonshade line. I... I am honored..."

The dragon's head, larger than a carriage, lowered slowly. Its voice was not a sound, but a wave of telepathic energy that resonated in my chest like a thousand harmonious church bells.

[Child of the Moonshade. You carry the blood of my first pact-bearer. It is good to see your line endures. Your spirit is strong, and the wind favors you. Rise, Elara. You are welcome here.]

Elara rose, her face glowing with a divine blessing.

Then, the dragon's head turned. The twin suns of its eyes pivoted, bypassing Lysandra, bypassing Elara, and locking directly onto me.

The temperature in the cavern plummeted. The warm, life-giving light turned sterile, cold, and sharp as a surgeon's blade.

The air pressure increased a thousandfold, slamming into me, forcing the breath from my lungs.

My [Mindbreaker] title, my Aura, my E+ stats—they were nothing.

It was like a single skin of paper trying to stop a tidal wave. I was pinned, exposed, my very soul laid bare.

...VOID...

...SHADOW...

...ABYSS...

The dragon's telepathic voice was no longer a beautiful chime. It was a cold, arctic roar of pure, undiluted hatred.

[Lysandra!] The Guardian's voice thundered, shaking the very foundations of the Sanctuary. Elara cried out and stumbled back, her new stag spirit vanishing in terror.

[You have done the unthinkable! You brought THIS into my holy Sanctum?!]

Lysandra's face was white.

"Great One, I do not understand! He is just a student, an anomaly—"

[ANOMALY?!] Luminos roared, rearing up from its crystal island.

Its starlight scales flared, and the light in the cavern intensified, burning my skin.

[He is blight! He is taint! I see the shadow of the Great Destroyer clinging to his soul! He REEKS of the Enemy!]

I staggered, my hand flying to my chest, to the dimensional pocket where Nox was now shrieking in pure, mindless terror.

But it wasn't Nox the dragon sensed. It was Draken. It was the lingering, abyssal stain of Drakerlor, my Divine Weapon, the Dragon of Doom and Destruction. The two divine forces, Light and Void, were now face to face.

The Dragon of Light uncoiled, its massive, diamond-hard form rising to its full, terrifying height. Its eyes, now burning with holy fire, fixed on me, a creature of shadow in its sacred light.

[Speak, shadow-wielder!] its voice thundered, a judgment that shook my very bones.

[Why have you come to this holy place, carrying the unholy stench of HIM?]

I was trapped. Pinned by the light of a god-tier dragon, my darkest, most dangerous secret—the existence of Draken—exposed to the one being in the world most capable of destroying it, and me, on sight.

The pressure in the cavern was no longer a gentle, holy warmth; it was an avalanche.

The moment the Guardian Dragon, Luminos, fixed its star-like eyes on me, the very air in the Sanctuary turned to crushing, solid light.

The ambient Life and Light mana, which had felt like breathing honey, now felt like inhaling glass shards. Every particle of this holy place was trying to reject, purge, and annihilate the shadows it sensed within me.

I was on one knee before I even realized I was falling.

"Ghhk—!"

The divine pressure slammed into my [Mindbreaker] title, and the passive resistance was overwhelmed in an instant. It felt like a thousand needles of pure light were piercing my mind, my mana core, my very soul. My vision whited out, and the only sound in the universe was the thunderous, telepathic roar of the dragon.

[...STENCH OF HIM!]

"Great One, wait!" Lysandra's voice was a thin, terrified thread in the storm. She had risen from her bow, her hands outstretched. "He is the one I spoke of! The one who purged the demonic corruption from the Labyrinth AI! He is a student, not a—"

[SILENCE, LYKAI'S HEIR!] Luminos boomed, its radiant head snapping toward her. The force of its voice alone sent a shockwave that made Lysandra stagger back, her face pale as her robes. [YOU HAVE DONE THE UNTHINKABLE! YOU BROUGHT THIS INTO MY HOLY SANCTUM?!]

The dragon's gaze snapped back to me, the pressure intensifying. I felt my bones creak, my knees scraping against the crystal path.

[ANOMALY?!] Luminos roared, its voice laced with a disgust so profound it was a physical force.

[HE IS BLIGHT! HE IS TAINT! I SEE THE SHADOW OF THE GREAT DESTROYER CLINGING TO HIS SOUL LIKE A FILTHY LEECH! HE REEKS OF THE ABYSS! HE REEKS... OF DRAKERLOR!]

I gasped, my lungs refusing to draw in the hostile, holy air. It knew. It didn't just sense a darkness; it sensed the darkness. It knew its ancient, primordial rival.

Elara, still kneeling, was weeping, her hands pressed over her ears, utterly terrified. "Please... Great One... mercy..."

[MERCY?!] Luminos's light flared brighter, burning my skin. [THE VOID IS SHOWN NO MERCY! IT IS GIVEN ONLY ANNIHILATION! SPEAK, SHADOW-WIELDER!]

The command wasn't a request. It was an absolute, divine order that vibrated in my very bones, demanding an answer.

[WHY HAVE YOU COME TO THIS HOLY PLACE, CARRYING THE UNHOLY STENCH OF HIM?]

I was trapped. Pinned by the light of a god-tier dragon, my darkest secret exposed to the one being in the world most capable of destroying it, and me, on sight.

In my dimensional storage, Nox was silent, not growling, but paralyzed, playing dead in the face of an overwhelming, ancestral enemy.

But Draken… Draken was not silent.

The Divine Weapon, suppressed to the point of inertness by the holy aura, was now seething. The dragon's direct, hostile pressure was like a challenge, and the ancient, slumbering consciousness within my sword began to stir, an abyssal coldness rising to meet the holy fire.

[...INSOLENT... WHELP... OF LIGHT...] Drakerlor's voice growled in the deepest recesses of my mind, a dark, primal rage. [...LET ME... OUT... CHILD... I WILL DEVOUR THIS—]

"No!" I choked out, the word tearing from my throat, though it was only a whisper.

I was caught. Pinned between two divine, warring forces. The light of Luminos was crushing me from the outside, threatening to atomize me. The darkness of Drakerlor was raging from the inside, threatening to erupt and consume me.

This was the test. Not of spirit bonding. This was a test of will.

My mind, honed by the Labyrinth purge, sharpened by the [Mindbreaker] title, found a sliver of clarity in the center of the storm.

Lie? I'd be atomized.

Beg? I'd be "cleansed"—a fate worse than death.

Fight? I was a gnat between two suns.

That left only one path. A truth, shaped by my will.

I focused every ounce of strength I had, every particle of my consciousness, not into my affinities—they were useless here—but into my voice. I pushed the words out against the crushing weight of the dragon's aura.

"You are… right, Great One!" I gasped, my voice a raw, strained thing.

Lysandra's and Elara's heads snapped up, their expressions a mask of horror. I had just confessed.

"I… I carry it," I panted, forcing myself to look up, to meet those twin, solar eyes. The light burned, and tears of pain streamed down my face, but I did not look away. "I carry the… the shadow. The stench. I know."

Luminos's aura pulsed, the pressure lessening by a microscopic fraction. It was intrigued by the confession.

[A PARASITE ADMITTING ITS OWN FILTH? YOU CONFESS TO BEING HIS SLAVE?]

"NO!" I roared, the single word fueled by a surge of pure, defiant adrenaline. I planted my hands on the crystal floor, fighting to keep my head up.

"He is not my master!" I spat, blood mixing with my words as the pressure ruptured capillaries in my nose. "He is my prisoner."

The silence that followed was absolute.

Luminos, Lysandra, Elara… even Drakerlor in my mind… all paused.

"I... I am not his worshiper," I forced out, my body trembling violently. "I am his jailer. This… this darkness… it is a burden I carry. A curse I am trying to control."

It was the ultimate gamble. The only narrative that could save me. I wasn't an agent of the Void; I was a warden, a victim struggling to contain an ancient evil.

Luminos stared, its massive, diamond-like head tilting, processing the paradox. [A GNAT... CLAIMING TO CAGE A TITAN? A MORTAL... THE JAILER OF THE ABYSS? DO NOT MOCK ME WITH YOUR LIES!]

The aura returned, doubling, a lance of pure, agonizing light aimed at my soul, intended to shatter my will and expose the lie.

(To be continued)

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