The sanctuary had gone quiet.
Not peaceful. Quiet in the way a battlefield became quiet after the last scream had already been swallowed.
Zekai remained on one knee, one hand pressed against the stone as blood slipped from the corner of his mouth. His breathing was shallow, and his body ached beneath the remnants of the damage inflicted by the Witnesses.
Then a familiar cold spread beneath his skin. Pale frost traced across the wounds. Torn flesh closed.Bruised muscle recovered. The pain in his ribs faded.
Zekai watched the process without moving. For all the punishment he'd endured, one thing still remained.
Frost Heal.
He slowly flexed his fingers. The wound across his palm disappeared beneath a thin veil of frost.
"...Still working." A quiet breath escaped him. It wasn't relief.
It was the exhausted certainty of someone who had finally found one thing in this place that still obeyed him.
Across the sanctuary, Lucien remained seated upon the throne, one leg crossed over the other, his cheek resting against one hand. His attention never left Zekai.
Zekai slowly raised his head. Their eyes met across the ruined courtyard.
"...What?"
Lucien's gaze drifted briefly toward the frost disappearing from Zekai's wounds. Then back to his eyes. "Nothing."
Zekai frowned. "Then why are you staring?"
"Are you seriously still trying to figure out how to kill me with your dogs?"
A faint smile touched Lucien's lips. "I'm curious."
"What exactly are you expecting from me?"
"About what?"
Lucien's eyes moved once more toward the fading frost.
"How many times you can stand back up."
Zekai's eyes narrowed. He glanced at the wounds that had already disappeared.
"As many times as I need to."
Lucien's smile remained faint. "We'll see."
Zekai's eyes narrowed. "What does that mean?"
"Nothing."
Lucien's gaze drifted briefly toward the frost still clinging to Zekai's wounds.
"I'm simply curious how long that certainty will last."
Zekai looked down. His hands were shaking. He hated that. He forced them still.
This place had slowly stripped away his confidence and certainty, leaving him with one thing he could no longer trust: his ability to predict what would happen next.
A faint distortion flickered beside Zekai's shoulder. He looked toward it.
For less than a second, the sanctuary duplicated itself. Two thrones occupied the same space. Two Luciens watched him from opposite ends of the platform. Even the six Witnesses seemed to multiply before the image collapsed back into one.
Zekai blinked. "...What?"
Another distortion appeared.
Then the ground beneath his hand rippled like water before hardening into stone again.
His breathing slowed.
The edge of Null Drakular seemed to exist several inches away from its true position.
His vision stabilized. Zekai's expression became confused. "What is happening?"
Something was happening inside his perception.
Every time he imagined moving, he caught glimpses of different outcomes—left, right, forward, backward. Holding the sword. Losing it. Standing. Falling.
None lasted long enough to become real.
They appeared only long enough to remind him that they could have existed.
Zekai grabbed his head. "Stop!"
The images vanished. Silence returned. He remained hunched over, breathing hard.
Lucien's attention remained on Zekai.For a moment, his expression became impossible to read.
Then his gaze returned to the distortions around Zekai.
"You keep treating what you possess as separate weapons."
Zekai frowned. "What are you talking about?"
"The sword. The Authority. The cards." Lucien's golden eyes remained calm.
"You use each one as though they were tools you picked up along the way."
Zekai didn't answer.
"That's why you keep losing control of them."
"Then what am I supposed to do?"
Lucien smiled.
"Learn what it means to be their bearer."
"That is something you will have to discover before they finish you."
He raised one hand. The six Witnesses immediately understood.
Lucien's voice remained calm. "Enough."
The Witnesses stopped.
Hella's chains loosened slightly. Vespercoil lowered his weapon.
Jerom stepped back. The Beast remained motionless. Nihil closed his grimoire. Astrael said nothing.
Zekai stared at them.
'Why stop now?'
He had expected another attack. Another execution. Another death.
Instead, Lucien had ordered them to wait. That was somehow worse.
"You don't want them to kill me."
Lucien smiled. "Not yet."
Zekai's stomach tightened. "What do you want?"
Lucien didn't answer immediately. His gaze shifted toward Null Drakular lying several meters away.
The sword remained motionless.
Its black-and-red surface reflected the dim light of the sanctuary.
Lucien's eyes remained on it. "I want to understand why that sword chose you."
Zekai followed his gaze. Null Drakular. The sword had survived everything.
Hella couldn't break it. Nihil couldn't erase it. Even after everything that had happened, it remained there.
Waiting.
Zekai's fingers tightened. "Forget it."
Lucien's eyebrow lifted. "Excuse me?"
"You heard me." Zekai slowly forced himself upright. His legs shook. He nearly fell. But he caught himself.
"I don't know why it chose me." He wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth. "But it's mine."
The Witnesses stared. Jerom gave a faint laugh.
"Still talking like a king."
Hella's lips curved. "He can barely stand."
Zekai looked toward them. "Then come closer."
The laughter stopped. His voice was weak. But his eyes weren't.
"I'm still standing."
The Beast's expression changed slightly. Astrael watched him without speaking.
Lucien smiled again. "You really are strange."
Zekai's gaze hardened. "No." He looked at the blood on his hand. "I'm just not finished."
For a moment, nobody spoke.
The word finish stayed with Zekai. For a moment, he saw something else.
His parents.
Not their graves. Not their deaths. Just the memory of them standing together before everything had been taken from him.
Then Marcus beneath the circus lights.
Then Aron behind the convenience-store counter, smiling as he pushed the bag across the register.
Don't waste my money.
Zekai's throat tightened. He lowered his eyes.
Four faces. Three wounds that had never truly closed.
And now six beings stood in front of him, waiting to see whether another body could be broken.
His fingers tightened around the empty air.
"...Not yet."
Zekai shut his eyes. "Enough." His breathing became uneven.
He remembered the bodies. Every time he had failed. Every time someone else had suffered because he wasn't strong enough.
Every time he had believed that surviving meant he had won.
But Frost Heal had never made him stronger. It had only given him another chance to keep moving. And somehow, even after everything the Witnesses had done to him, that chance remained.
Zekai looked down at his hand. A thin layer of frost still covered his skin before fading away.
He closed his fingers.
'Then I still have a chance.'
The thought didn't make him confident. It simply gave him enough reason to stand.
For the first time since the torture began, Zekai had something he could rely on without questioning whether his body would survive the next attack.
Zekai looked down at his hand. The frost had already disappeared. His wounds were gone.
The memories weren't. His body could recover from what they did to him. His mind couldn't simply pretend it had never happened.
Zekai's breathing shook. "Why..."
The word escaped before he could stop it. His head lowered.
"Why does everyone I try to protect end up disappearing?" No one answered.
The question hung in the sanctuary.
Zekai laughed once. A faint, bitter laugh escaped him. "Maybe I really am a fool."
He lowered his head. Then slowly raised it again.
"But I don't think that means I have to be a smart one."
His eyes sharpened. "I'll figure it out my way."
A crimson flicker passed through the air.
Possibility.
For the briefest instant, Zekai saw something.
Null Drakular in his hand.
The image disappeared. He blinked. Nothing.
He looked toward the sword. Still there. Still unreachable. Then—
Astrael spoke. "Rejected."
Zekai's eyes snapped toward him.
✦ End of Chapter 69 — The Thing That Returns ✦