He did not die.
Not yet.
Kai lay motionless before that ancient gate, and time whatever distorted form time took in this realm flowed through him like slow poison. His breath was shallow. His pulse was a fragile beat. His limbs were numb from exhaustion, and his skin radiated with the dull throb of hundreds of small wounds that the flesh sea had gifted him.
But eventually…
Strength returned.
Not fully, not triumphantly, but like the quiet tremor of life returning to a corpse.
His fingers twitched first.
Then his arm.
Then slowly, painfully, he rolled onto his knees.
His vision was dim, unfocused, drained completely of its crimson clarity. But he could feel the elemental essence flowing again thin, weak, but there. It wasn't the essence of his world. It wasn't familiar. It wasn't comforting.
But he absorbed it anyway.
He didn't have a choice.
Minutes or hours passed. He couldn't tell. The air here was still, dead, unmoving, yet humming with a silent, unseen pressure. He forced his lungs to fill, his core to pulse, his veins to circulate the energy that trickled into him like grains of dust.
Finally, he sat upright.
His breathing steadied.
He looked up and froze.
Above him, the mirror sky trembled.
The flesh sea, pressing against it, was cracking the surface. The reflection barrier that had separated the palace below from the grotesque ocean above was failing fracturing in spiderweb patterns.
A giant shadow swam beyond the mirror cracks.
The shape of a colossal flesh-fish, its massive form twisting against the reflective barrier, eager, desperate, furious. It pressed harder, its mass deforming the cracked mirror, trying to break through.
Kai exhaled a tired sigh.
He turned away from the incoming doom.
He stared at the ancient palace gates instead.
Symbols were carved across the gate etched into the stone like veins of knowledge. They pulsed faintly, like they held breath or meaning beyond language. He tried to activate his Crimson Eyes.
Nothing.
No glow.
No subtle shift.
No power.
His core was too drained to fuel them.
So he tried the only thing left.
He placed his hand upon the gate…
…and pushed his essence into it.
A pulse erupted quiet and deep, as though the gate itself recognized something ancient within him.
The gate opened.
Not with grace.
With weight.
The stone moved like it had not opened in millennia, releasing dust and forgotten air. Kai winced, bracing himself as the force of that movement felt heavy enough to crush him.
He stepped inside.
It was the same.
And yet not the same.
The interior resembled the reflected palace above the mirror sky, but every detail here carried depth and permanence. There were no illusions. No perfect reflections. No false substances masquerading as reality.
This was authentic.
The walls were carved stone but polished to a mirror sheen, and across them were frescoes paintings done with mirror-like pigment, each one capturing scenes, figures, structures, and runes he could not decipher.
He walked down that grand hall, each step echoing hollowly.
He passed mural after mural, every one unreadable to him. He reached the forked hall where, in the reflection palace, there had been only emptiness.
Here.
There was a blueish-gold door, inlaid with the same ancient symbols. But unlike the mirrored version, this door vibrated with tension. It had gravity. Age. Presence.
Kai placed his hand upon it.
He sent his essence in.
The door opened.
And the wind that burst from the chamber was cold enough to sting. Not the cold of weather. The cold of silence the chill of a place that had been sealed away from existence for so long that time had forgotten it.
He stepped inside the chamber.
His eyes widened.
In the center stood a glowing sphere floating, pulsing, humming faintly like a living heartbeat. It cast blue ripples across the hall, illuminating the murals and carvings on the surrounding walls.
Yet Kai's attention was drawn not to the sphere, but to one specific mural.
A mural made of mirror but solid real depicting something not seen in the reflection palace.
Beside the sphere, resting against the painting, was a long black bone.
It radiated coldness the way stars radiate heat.
Kai stepped closer, as though compelled.
His blood responded.
It beat faster, deeper, like a resonance.
Not panic.
Not fear.
Recognition.
He examined the mural.
Symbols beneath it spelled words he could somehow read, even though written in an ancient form:
"THE ABYSSAL OF THE ENDLESS BEING."
Kai stared.
Endless Beings.
He'd heard legends, rumors, whispers nothing concrete. Nothing understood. Something older than gods, older than recorded history.
His heart pounded.
He reached out.
His hand passed through the mirror-like mural,
and grasped the bone.
Darkness surged into him.
Not visually.
Internally.
His eyes widened.
Then his body lurched.
The pain hit him like a supernova exploding inside his veins. His limbs convulsed, his teeth grit so hard they felt like they would shatter. His bones vibrated, rattled, cracked, realigned, merged.
Sweat drenched him, pouring down his skin like rain of liquid ice.
He had endured fire.
He had endured corruption.
He had endured teeth gnawing through his flesh.
This pain was worse.
This pain felt like his soul was breaking.
He gasped.
He groaned.
He tried to breathe but air refused him.
Then,
It stopped.
He slumped, panting, trembling, shaking but alive.
The black bone shrank collapsing, condensing, compressing and coiled into itself like molten metal freezing.
Then.
It wrapped around his other wrist.
A second dark band, matching the first, chains coiling around like serpents binding their chosen bearer.
For the first time in a long while, Kai felt cold clarity in his veins.
Not power.
Not energy.
Identity.
Before he could even form a thought.
A crack exploded like shattering glass.
The mirror ground above him broke.
The flesh sea roared down.
And the colossal flesh fish burst through the fractured reflection and plunged toward the ancient palace.
Kai lifted his head weakly.
"…you've got to be kidding me."
The monster was coming.
And he was still kneeling.