The moon watched me again.
Hung above the broken world, its gaze indifferent yet familiar — like an old enemy who once loved me.
Its light wasn't silver. It was the color of memory.
I walked alone through the acid-cracked ruins of the beast-infested sector, Koro's body behind me, the silence in my heart louder than any storm.
He was gone.
The traitor.
The dying star.
Koro Dan.
The one who once argued about consciousness and chaos under moonlight now rested beneath it, breathless.
Victory, they say, is the sweet fruit of struggle.
But this one tasted like rust.
The wind howled. A few mutated beasts wandered near but gave me space, sensing something had changed. Perhaps it was the smell of death on me. Perhaps it was something deeper.
And as I staggered forward, a memory found me.
It was soft at first. Like breath on glass.
But then it spread—consuming my mind, dragging me into the past.
It was the rainy season.
I was nine. My shoes were muddy. My homework ruined. I had just fought a kid three years older than me because he said something about my father. I don't even remember what. But I do remember this: I had lost.
I came home with a bleeding nose, soaked to the bone. I kicked the door open, defiant, angry, trying to look tougher than I was. But as soon as I saw her—my mother—sitting beside the stove, humming an old lullaby, the defiance cracked.
"Lost the war, General?" she asked, not looking up.
I sniffled. "He said Dad was a coward."
She didn't speak. Just stirred the pot quietly.
"And he said you're poor because you're weak."
Still nothing.
I flinched, afraid of her silence more than any slap. "Say something!"
She finally looked up. Her eyes… gods, I still remember. Brown, but layered with a kind of fatigue that made them look grey.
"You think I'm weak?"
I didn't answer.
She came to me, knelt, wiped my nose with her sari. "You want to be strong, Zaman?"
I nodded, biting my lip. "I want to be so strong that they never say that again."
She smiled, not proud—just tired. "Then remember this."
She held my face in her palms, soft and scarred.
"Strength isn't about never falling. It's about choosing what you rise for. One day, I won't be there to tell you this. So listen well.
If you ever find yourself lost, humiliated, or defeated…
Don't ask life to be fair.
Don't ask the world for mercy.
Just ask yourself: 'Will I rise again? Even if it hurts?'
Because that's all that matters.
Rise for the ones who can't. Rise for your sister. She's not as clever as you, and she trips too much, but her heart is made of something rarer than gold.
And Zaman…
If the day comes when I'm not beside you, just know—
I'm still watching. No matter how far I am. I'm still watching my angel."
That was the last time I cried in front of her.
"Promise me," I had whispered, terrified. "Don't die, Ma."
She pulled me close, and whispered into my hair:
"Even if I do… that won't stop me from loving you."
Back in the present, I stood still. Eyes stinging.
I hadn't cried for years. Not even when I watched the base burn. Not even when I buried the others.
But those words still lived in me. Not like a memory—
Like a compass.
I took one step forward. Then another.
It was time to return.
The moment I reached the shattered metal hallway leading to the research center, I stumbled. A wire snapped. A click echoed.
My eyes widened.
A trap.
My body pitched forward—weightless for a moment. And then—
The world vanished beneath me.
A scream clawed up from a dying throat — a recording from a long-dead man, part of the trap. I didn't even register it.
I landed hard, darkness curling around me like smoke. When the light returned, I was no longer outside.
I was inside it.
The Temple of One Hundred Veils
A dome loomed above me, crafted from metal and bone. Torches flickered, but no flames danced. Light came from nothing. It simply… existed.
This was it.
The temple he had whispered about. The one from his prophecy.
"You will arrive in a human-built temple.
Beneath beds where fear sleeps… and towers where arrogance rests…
Truth waits buried in rusted iron.
Find the chest. That is your task."
The words echoed as if the temple itself remembered them.
I rose to my feet, brushing off dirt. Around me were rows and rows of massive sleeping chambers, warped bedframes twisted like tortured limbs. Above, spirals of machinery, like shrines to forgotten intellect.
Left or right?
According to probability, the treasure chest was buried beneath one of the structures. The left path held 50 rooms. The right—50. I had a 50% chance if I guessed right.
I trusted my instinct.
I went left.
Room after room.
Room 12.
Room 21.
Room 33.
Nothing.
By room 50, my hands were blistered, my clothes soaked in sweat.
Nothing.
Failure.
My breath hitched.
"Is this what fate is?" I murmured, voice hoarse. "A cosmic joke on those who try?"
And then—
Her voice came again.
"Just ask yourself: Will I rise again, even if it hurts?"
I laughed.
It wasn't joy. It was madness.
"I get it now."
Fate decides the stage.
But I decide whether I stand on it.
I turned to the right wing. Began again.
Room 53.
Room 58.
Room 64.
Blood on my hands. But I didn't stop.
Room 68.
Room 70.
And then—
Room 74.
There it was.
Buried beneath an iron plate, rusted and half-eaten by time.
I clawed it open.
Inside—
Not gold.
Not weapons.
But something older.
A box.
A whispering box.
One that didn't speak words—but truths.
I stared at it, trembling.
Ambition does not ask for sacrifice.
It is the sacrifice.
I understood it all.
The fire was never meant to warm me.
It was always meant to unmake me.
And I would let it.
Because I wasn't a man anymore.
I was becoming a necessity.
And the temple held its breath. For the first time in decades, someone had arrived who didn't fear the veils. He pulled them aside—one by one—until even the truth had nowhere left to hide.