Dust drifted hazily around the room. With nowhere else to exit, it could only float around.

Ryn groaned as some of it entered his nose.

He jerked awake, coughing as it went down his windpipe. As the dust finally went back out, his vision started to snap back to focus.

The chamber looked different.

Stone chunks had been dragged into a rough semicircle around him, stacked just high enough to block the cold. A faint orange glow pulsed from a heat-stone near his feet, warmth fighting against the lingering frost.

Jay sat opposite him, leaning against a slab of rubble, arms crossed and eyes ringed with exhaustion.

"…Jay?" Ryn croaked.

"Hey," Jay said, relief flashing across his face. "Welcome back. You owe me about twelve years off my lifespan."

Ryn tried to sit up.

Pain flared.

He hissed and immediately regretted the decision.

His memories were in disarray. The last thing Ryn remembered was going down due to MP Exhaustion, and Jay charging at the golem like a madman.

Ryn stared up at the cracked ceiling. His arm tingled unpleasantly, caught halfway between numb and burning pins and needles.

"…Did we win?"

"Barely," Jay snorted. Then he jerked his thumb toward the far side of the chamber.

"But yeah. New door opened. The stairs sealed behind us. Same deal as before."

Ryn closed his eyes for a moment.

Good. At least the dungeon agreed.

As if confirming Ryn's memories, a system message appeared.

[Technique Acquired: Essence Burst]

He stared at the panel in shock. Usually, the technique could only be acquired when somebody reached the Mid-Knight Stage.

Ryn was two levels below, yet he still managed to learn it.

Nevertheless, he decided not to dwell on it.

He let out a slow breath and pushed himself up to his feet. The motion sent a dull ache through his body, but it was bearable now.

"How long was I out?" he asked.

Jay shrugged. "Not sure, but if I were to guess…around 2 hours? Also long enough for the dungeon to…change."

Ryn frowned faintly. "Change how?"

Jay stood and walked toward the newly opened passage, gesturing for Ryn to look.

"Come see. It's strange, believe me."

As soon as they stepped through the doorway, the temperature dropped immediately.

Not the biting, violent cold that Ryn was used to, but the kind that settled into the lungs with every breath.

The passage opened into a vast cavern.

At its center lay a lake.

Ryn slowed, then stopped entirely.

The water was impossibly clear…so clear it felt less like water and more like glass. For a heartbeat, Ryn thought he was staring into a perfect mirror.

Then he realized he was looking through it.

There was no visible bottom.

Just an endless abyss beneath the surface, darkness stretching downward as if the lake had no depth at all.

Cold light pulsed faintly from within, illuminating the stone at the edges while leaving the depths untouched.

Ryn's breath caught.

It was Cold Energy, exactly what he needed.

This is awfully convenient…

Ryn frowned faintly.

It wasn't unheard of for Royal families to hoard natural Essence sources tied to their lineage and Affinities. Fire springs beneath citadels, storm clouds bound and hidden in mountain peaks—a privilege given to their heirs to advance power.

This could've been one of those.

A cold lake, hidden beneath a fallen kingdom. Preserved, forgotten, left behind when no one remained to claim it.

If that was the case…

Ryn exhaled quietly.

He thanked the gods—because by sheer coincidence, it aligned with his affinity.

Ryn straightened and took a slow step back from the edge.

"Jay."

Jay looked up from where he'd been checking his pack. "Yeah?"

"If I start… shriveling," Ryn said after a beat, choosing the word carefully, "pull me out."

Jay stared at him. "...What? Don't tell me you're—?"

"Serious," Ryn finished.

Jay's mouth opened, then closed. He glanced from Ryn to the lake, then back again, as if hoping the water would suddenly explain itself.

"…Shriveling," he repeated slowly.

"You'll know it when you see it," Ryn said.

"That's worse," Jay muttered.

Ryn didn't respond. He was already pulling his cloak free, letting it drop onto the stone beside him. Then his outer coat, boots kicked aside without ceremony. The cold air brushed against his skin, but his body barely reacted.

Jay stiffened. "Hey—hey, wait. You're not even going to—test it first?"

"If I hesitate," Ryn said quietly, "I won't go in."

Jay watched, jaw tight.

"Fine. I've got you," he said, voice low and steady.

"Don't do anything stupid."

He nodded, then turned to step forward. Ryn relaxed his body and let it float on the surface of the water.

It closed around his skin without bite. He was half-expecting his whole body to go numb, yet that didn't happen. Just a deep, steady cool that settled into his bones and stayed there, a comfortable familiarity.

The surface rippled gently as he displaced it. He was shivering before, yet when he stepped inside…it was calm, serene even.

Sound started to fade around him. The dungeon's distant creaks and echoes dulled into something far away, unimportant. His breathing slowed on its own, each inhale matched by a gentle rise of the water beneath him.

Cold flowed around him in slow, steady currents, not pressing inward but circling. Threading through places left hollow by overuse and strain.

It didn't feel like power filling him.

It felt like being allowed to rest.

The sensation was familiar…

The blue above him softened, stretching wide until it became a pale winter sky. White replaced stone. Snow whispered beneath his back as he floated there, arms spread without effort.

Soft laughter drifted in from somewhere close.

"You're too stiff," a voice said gently.

Ryn turned his head. A figure stood nearby, half-outlined by falling snow. He couldn't see her face clearly, only the way she moved—unhurried, as if the cold had never bothered her

She knelt beside him, snow barely shifting beneath her weight.

"Like this," she said.

Cool hands guided his arms outward. Then back in.

Ryn followed, the snow settling and smoothing beneath him as the shape took form.

A snow angel.

He lay there, breathing evenly, watching flakes drift down from the sky. The cold surrounded him completely, but it was comfortable. It didn't demand anything of him.

It simply was.

"Alright," a voice said, amused. "That one actually looks like an angel."

Ryn felt weight shift beside him. Snow crunched softly as someone sat down, close enough that their shoulder brushed his. A moment later, a hand slipped beneath his arm and helped pull him upright.

Her hands were cool.

Ryn blinked snow from his lashes and looked up at her.

His mother smiled down at him, cheeks pink from the cold, black hair loosely fell over one shoulder. Her eyes were the same as his.

Not the sharp ember gold that marked most of the Arctis line.

But a deep, dark purple.

Ryn had been told once that it was an odd color. Rare. That it didn't belong so far north.

She never seemed bothered by that.

Ryn stood as his mother brushed the last clinging frost from his sleeves. Her movements were slow, careful, as if the world might break if she rushed it.

"There," she said softly. "Good as new."

Ryn nodded, then hesitated.

She held out her hand.

Ryn took it without thinking.

Her fingers closed around his, cool and steady, and together they began walking back toward the estate. Snow crunched softly beneath their steps, each sound swallowed almost as soon as it was made.

They walked toward the estate.

At least… Ryn thought they were.

The snow beneath his boots faded first, its texture smoothing away until each step felt more imagined than real. When he looked up, the courtyard was gone.

In its place stood the halls of the Arctis estate.

The stone walls were there, tall and familiar, but drained of color. White stone. White banners. White railings lined the upper walkways. Even the torches burned with white flame.

Furniture passed by as they walked: benches, tables, pillars—each one bleached pale, as if carved from frost rather than wood or stone.

Everything was white.

Preserved. Muted. Still.

Ryn tightened his grip on his mother's hand, suddenly aware of how quiet it had become.

Only their footsteps, softened and distant.

Then he saw it.

At the end of the hall stood a door.

Dark wood. Deep brown, almost black, grain sharp and untouched by frost. The iron handle gleamed faintly, solid and real in a way nothing else was.

The only thing in the world that still had color.

Ryn slowed without realizing it.

His mother did too.

They stood there for a moment, facing the door, the white halls stretching endlessly behind them.

Her hand tightened around his.

Not in fear.

In resolve.

The door waited.

And even without understanding why, Ryn knew—

This was where the memory had been sealed.

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