At that instant—
the world stopped.
Not slowed.
Stopped completely.
Scattered gray flames froze in midair,
the moment the ground split was locked in place.
Wei felt something sinking, slow and inevitable.
No.
Something was wrong.
Very wrong.
The next second, a deeper darkness surged out from the assassin's body.
It no longer tore or bit.
It was like a smile rising from the abyss.
Greed, mockery, hatred, cowardice—
all the ugliest emotions spread wide at once,
baring their fangs at a "young life."
The darkness closed in from every direction.
It wasn't an encirclement.
It felt more like being swallowed from the inside.
The dark pressed close—
soft, damp,
carrying a vague, sickening stench.
It wasn't hard,
but it writhed slowly,
like living flesh.
Wei felt space tightening.
Not a sudden crush,
but a slow, patient squeeze—
again and again,
like the sticky contractions of intestines pushing prey forward.
The darkness around him heaved.
Its surface was uneven,
bulging, collapsing,
rubbing again and again against his light.
It didn't feel like hitting a wall.
It felt like being stuffed into a warm body,
forced along its inner walls.
With each writhing motion,
the space shrank a little.
Not enough to see,
but enough to know—
There was no way back.
The white light was pressed thin.
Its brightness spread out,
smeared across the rippling dark surfaces,
like grease rubbed into skin.
It could still shine,
but it had lost its "thickness."
The darkness made no sound.
Only that nauseating,
unceasing sense of contraction.
As if something were confirming—
that the prey inside
had been fully sealed.
Countless filthy claws seized Chun's red fire, and Wei's white light with it.
Something vast stirred awake below.
Dragging that faint glow along,
it pulled the frail boy and girl
toward a depth without day.
The fall accelerated.
All the gray flames grew restless at once.
Not to counterattack,
but to return.
Within dense, web-like dark passages,
gray fire was forcibly drawn back,
rushing in reverse,
as if an unseen abyss swallowed it in one breath.
The white light was pressed down.
Wei understood something, very quickly.
This darkness
was not "eating" them.
If it were devouring them,
it would already be over.
There would be no struggle,
no shape left at all.
But this wasn't that.
The darkness was too close.
So close it couldn't be ignored.
It didn't bite.
It didn't tear.
It only kept tightening,
patiently,
as if waiting for something.
Wei's white light was trapped.
Not seized,
but forced to change shape.
It was pushed to one side,
bent,
pressed against the rising and falling dark surfaces.
With every squeeze,
the light lost a bit of its original outline.
The darkness was in no hurry.
It followed a cold, indifferent order—
First flatten.
Then spread.
Finally, make the light no longer resemble light.
As long as its shape remained,
it wouldn't vanish.
As long as it could still be itself,
the darkness wouldn't let go.
So it didn't swallow.
It squeezed.
Squeezed until the white light
could no longer contract,
no longer rebound,
no longer answer any call.
Squeezed until
only brightness remained,
but no longer any meaning of "being."
Wei suddenly understood.
This wasn't killing.
It was taking something alive
and, little by little,
turning it into something not worth noticing.
The light collapsed rapidly—
bent, twisted,
letting out a sharp, brief vibration,
like a white vine being snapped.
Wei's chest tightened violently.
It wasn't physical pain.
It was something deeper being clenched,
ground down slowly and without mercy.
Each time the white light dimmed,
his breath grew shorter.
It no longer moved forward.
It no longer responded.
When the last thread of light was dragged into the dark,
Wei realized—
He was being taken with it.
Not his body.
But his shape.
His very existence.
Wei opened his mouth.
No sound came out.
The white light suddenly pulled tight,
wrapping itself around the last remnant of red.
Like a white snake caught by the tail in a beast's jaws,
thrashing wildly,
lunging left and right,
never breaking free.
The darkness churned.
Silent.
As if watching.
And at the center of the dark—
Chun's heart-fire
shrank again.
Smaller.
Dimmer.
Curled in on itself,
no longer trembling.
Cold.
The world did not continue to fall.
It simply—
stopped here.
Despair,
at last, settled in.
—
A chill stabbed through Wei's chest.
It felt like an icy hand pressing down on his heart.
Was this it?
Had he lost?
Was he going to die?
At that moment—
Deep within the darkness,
a point of red light appeared.
So faint it almost didn't exist,
like a candle wick in a storm,
thin as a needle's tip.
It didn't flee.
It didn't shrink.
It collapsed inward for a split second.
Then—
It exploded.
The red fire swelled in an instant,
like a heart forced past its limit,
carrying its final will and resolve,
bursting silently within the dark.
There was no loud sound.
Only a narrow tear ripped open in the darkness.
Tiny—
but enough.
The white light was hurled outward by the recoil.
And that red fire—
shattered the instant it burst,
breaking into countless fine sparks.
Soundless.
Formless.
Gone completely.
Countless tiny red fragments
faded rapidly in the dark,
vanishing
like leftover warmth carried off by the wind—
leaving behind
not even the last trace of heat.