The screaming started in the upper tiers.

Not the roar of a thrilled crowd or the gasp of shock — but the kind of screaming that comes from the throat when the mind breaks. High-pitched. Primal. The sound prey makes when it realizes the predator has already won.

Thousands surged toward the exits at once.

Students, future participants still in their combat gear, professors who'd been observing — all distinctions of rank and skill obliterated by pure terror. A tidal wave of bodies crushing against stone archways, trampling over fallen spectators, shoving others aside, clawing over seats. Academy robes tore. The coliseum, moments ago a palace of spectacle, became a slaughterhouse.

"Move! MOVE!"

A fourth-year student shoved past a younger girl. He didn't look back when she fell. Didn't hear her scream as boots crushed over her arm with a wet crack.

He ran.

The archway loomed ahead — salvation carved in stone.

He reached it.

And bounced backward.

The impact wasn't soft. It was like striking a wall of frozen air, solid and unyielding. His nose shattered against nothing. Blood poured down his lips as he staggered, gasping, clawing at empty space.

His fingers found it.

Smooth. Cold. Invisible.

A barrier.

"No... no, no, NO—"

Behind him, hundreds more slammed into the same wall. Bodies piled against the barrier like insects against glass. Fists pounded. Nails scratched. A participant pulled his tournament sword and struck the invisible surface again and again until the blade snapped.

Nothing.

"The communication bracelets!" someone shouted. "Call for help! Call the Capital Guard!"

A professor tore at the silver bracelet on her wrist. The sapphire gem at its center had always glowed softly — a constant connection to the outside world, to safety, to rescue.

She pressed it.

Whispered the activation word.

The gem flickered.

Once.

Twice.

Then went dark.

She pressed harder. "Work. Work. WORK—"

Dead.

Around her, a dozen others clutched their own bracelets — rubies, emeralds, opals set in gold and platinum. Communication artifacts worth fortunes. Every single one dark. Lifeless. As if the world beyond the barrier had simply ceased to exist.

"We're cut off," an older professor whispered, staring at his own blackened bracelet. His voice shook. "We're completely cut off."

That's when the shadows moved.

Not metaphorically.

The darkness pooled beneath the archways, thick and oily, dripping upward against gravity. The temperature plummeted. Breath fogged. Sweat froze on skin.

Something crawled out of the dark.

The first one emerged slowly, limbs bending at wrong angles.

It stood on two legs.

Almost human.

Almost.

Its torso was a patchwork — strips of pale flesh stitched together with black thread, the seams weeping dark fluid. One arm ended in a hand with too many fingers. The other arm was just bone, wrapped in something that might have once been muscle.

Its face...

Its face wore a dozen expressions at once.

Patches of different faces. Different people. Eyes that didn't match. A mouth sewn from three different mouths, opening too wide, revealing teeth filed to points.

It chittered.

A wet, clicking sound.

Then it lunged.

The student didn't even have time to scream before it was on him. Claws — or were they fingers? — plunged into his chest with a sound like tearing fabric. Hot blood sprayed across marble steps.

The creature pulled.

Something red and glistening came out.

Panic became madness.

More of them poured from every shadow. A dozen. Two dozen. Fifty. Shambling, crawling, dragging themselves forward on limbs that shouldn't function. Some had weapons — rusted blades fused directly into their arms. Others just had teeth.

And they were fast.

A third-year stumbled backward, hand raised. "Please— please, I'm—"

One leaped.

Tackled him down.

His screams cut off wet and thick.

A professor threw a blast of flame. The creature caught fire — and kept coming, burning flesh dripping off its frame as it crashed into a fleeing group. They went down in a tangle of fire and screaming.

The professor with the dead bracelet ran.

She made it five steps before something grabbed her ankle.

She crashed down hard, chin cracking against stone. Dazed, she looked back.

A creature with mismatched limbs dragged her backward. Its face — a patchwork of three different expressions stitched together — never changed, frozen in a grotesque mockery of human emotion, even as it opened its mouth and—

Her screams joined the chorus.

The coliseum had become a cage.

The exits were sealed.

The communication was dead.

And the monsters were inside with them.

High above, in the stands, a senior student pressed herself against the barrier. Her hands shook as she stared at the invisible wall, at the creatures, at the bodies already littering the steps.

"We're trapped," she whispered.

A participant beside her, weapon still drawn but trembling, stared at the carnage below.

"What do we do?"

She had no answer.

Only the screaming.

Down on the arena floor, Avin's fingers clawed through sand.

His swords.

He needed his swords.

The golden blade lay three feet to his left, half-buried, its light flickering weakly. The crimson blade rested just beyond his reach, red lightning sputtering along its edge like a dying heartbeat.

He lunged forward—

A boot slammed down onto his back.

The impact drove him flat into the sand, ribs screaming, breath exploding from his lungs. The weight pressed down harder, grinding him into the earth like an insect beneath a heel.

"We meet again..."

The voice was casual. Almost pleasant.

"...Chrono."

Avin's blood went cold.

He twisted his head back, neck straining, sand scraping against his cheek.

The figure standing on him wore a dark cloak, hood thrown back now. His face was lean, sharp-featured, with eyes that gleamed with dark amusement. A face Avin had seen before — half-hidden behind a bush, watching them with unsettling interest.

Recognition hit like a punch.

"Cloak guy?" Avin muttered.

The man's expression darkened immediately. His pleasant smile twisted into a frown.

"'Cloak guy?'"

He repeated the words slowly, as if tasting something bitter.

"My name is Robert."

His hands moved with deliberate slowness, reaching behind his back. Two daggers slid free from hidden sheaths — curved, wickedly sharp, their edges gleaming with a sickly green sheen.

Poison.

Robert's smile returned, colder now.

"And I'm going to enjoy—"

"It is sad for you," a new voice cut through the chaos like a blade through silk.

Robert's head snapped up.

Avin's eyes shifted past him, toward the source.

The skull-masked figure stood atop the monstrous centipede's head, arms spread wide as if addressing a congregation. The golden stitches that had once bound his mouth hung loose now, swaying like grotesque ornaments.

"It is sad for you that no significant and powerful people chose to come to this part of the event."

The entire arena seemed to quiet.

Even the screaming in the stands dulled to a distant murmur.

"Even your future professors don't give a shit about you."

He let the words hang in the violet-tinged air.

"And now you will all die... due to your lack of strength and skill."

His head snapped to the side.

Fast.

Impossibly fast.

His hand shot upward, fingers closing around something invisible in the air above him.

Water exploded outward.

A figure materialized — blue hair, elegant robes, ice forming beneath his feet even as he dangled in the skull man's grip. The God-folk gasped, legs kicking uselessly, both hands clawing at the iron fingers wrapped around his throat.

"Pathetic," the skull man hissed.

The God-folk's eyes bulged. His face turned red, then purple. Water pooled beneath him, dripping from his robes, but the grip didn't loosen.

His gaze shifted.

Through the pain, through the suffocation, his eyes locked onto something in the distance.

Onto Avin.

Avin stared back, Robert's boot still pressing into his spine.

And his eyes ignited.

Crimson light flooded his vision — not metaphorical, not emotional. Real light, blazing from his irises like twin flames.

The world sharpened.

Colors deepened.

Movement slowed to a crawl.

And then he saw it.

A silhouette.

Transparent. Flickering. Like an afterimage burned into reality itself.

The silhouette of the God-folk — moving, attacking from the skull man's left side, ice daggers forming in both hands, lunging with desperate speed.

A clone, Avin realized. The one he's holding is a decoy.

The future unfolded before him like a map.

Avin moved.

He spun violently, his entire body twisting beneath Robert's boot. The sudden rotation threw Robert off balance — his foot slipped, his weight shifted wrong, and he staggered sideways with a curse.

Avin's hands closed around both sword hilts.

Golden light erupted.

Crimson lightning crackled.

He didn't look back.

He sprinted.

Sand exploded beneath each step as he launched himself toward the skull-masked figure. The world blurred around him — violet sky, shattered earth, scattered fighters — all of it reduced to background noise.

Only the target mattered.

The transparent silhouette in his vision flickered, then vanished as the present caught up to the future.

The real God-folk attacked.

Ice daggers materialized in his hands as he lunged from the skull man's blind spot, twin blades aimed for the throat—

The skull man's hand tightened.

The God-folk in his grip — the water clone — dissolved instantly. Its neck crushed like wet paper, the entire body collapsing into a rushing torrent that splashed across the centipede's chitinous head.

The skull man's other hand snapped sideways.

Caught the real God-folk by the throat mid-lunge.

"Really?" The skull man's voice dripped with contempt. "A descendant of the great Poseidon doing so medio—"

Avin arrived.

The skull man's eyes widened.

He released the God-folk's throat, both arms snapping up in a cross-block just as Avin's blades came down.

Golden light met flesh.

Crimson lightning exploded against bone.

The impact rang like a cathedral bell.

The skull man's boots scraped across chitin as he slid backward — one meter, two, three — his arms trembling from the force of the blow. Smoke rose from where the blades had struck, blackened marks seared into his forearms.

He looked down at the damage.

Then at Avin.

Then smiled.

Avin ignored him.

He turned, extending one hand toward the God-folk, who was still crouched on the monster's back, gasping for air and rubbing his bruised throat.

"Good thinking," Avin said, his crimson eyes still blazing. "Figuring out my ability."

The God-folk looked up.

For a moment, their eyes met — former enemies, now something else entirely.

The God-folk's lips curved into a tired smile. He took Avin's hand, let himself be pulled to his feet, and exhaled slowly.

"Pretty smart," he replied, voice hoarse but steady, "figuring out the plan."

They stood side by side.

Two warriors who'd been trying to kill each other moments ago.

Now facing something far worse.

The skull man tilted his head, studying them with renewed interest.

"How touching," he murmured.

Then he raised both arms.

And the six other cloaked figures stepped forward.

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