Younes: "A… are you insane?"
Nawa: "I must prepare the summoning rituals, and I won't kill you immediately because I'll need bait to lure the hounds away. So, rest in your final moments here…"
Honestly, the worst betrayal for anyone is betrayal by someone you trusted. The only person I considered my friend had just stepped over me while passing. I don't know why I remember this now, but surely I'm foolish for participating in something I wasn't comfortable with. My trust in him was blind, so this was my only weakness. I could hear the hounds heading toward me. The mansion was silent for some reason, and I could hear everything. I wished this silence would last forever… My hand suddenly became warm. I couldn't fully open my eyes, so all I saw was a soft face and warm hand holding me. "Younes… Younes, wake up!" Whose voice was that? I couldn't distinguish the voices clearly now. My mother's voice was still in my ears; I remembered that on the night before she left, she had instructed me to avoid the basement, and only go there if my life was at risk. I didn't care then, thinking she just wanted me away from the stuff when I was a child. I don't know why I hadn't checked it until now… As I recalled the tape of my life, I opened my eyes after a blow from Mira that almost killed me! She had bandaged my wounds and tried to wake me the whole time.
Mira (tears in her eyes): "You fool, how could you allow yourself to die here!"
Younes: "You speak as if I had a choice. And why are you crying? Haha, are you crying for me?"
Mira: "Of course not. Something entered my eyes while fleeing the hounds…"
Younes: "Speaking of the hounds, where is Youssef?"
Mira: "He went to search for the others in case one survived."
Younes: (jumping up) "We must stop him! Nawa will kill him if he knows I survived."
Mira: "Slow down… that won't happen. You can barely move with your injuries. Let me handle finding him and take you to a safe hiding place."
We headed to the library to go down to the basement. As we entered, Mira shouted: "Amazing! How can you have a fortified place like this and not hide in it? Not even a high-ranking demon could enter!" Honestly, I didn't know that, nor was I surprised, as everything that happened today was new to me. That explained why Nawa couldn't enter earlier—the demons that he had bound had accompanied him.
Mira: "I won't worry about you anymore, so I'll go out to search for Youssef."
And in that moment of joy, Youssef's head rolled in front of the door, extinguishing the glimmer of hope we had just felt.
I couldn't see Nawa's shadow at the door, so I realized he had freed his counterpart. Mira rushed at him recklessly, thinking he was surrounded only by lower demons. All I thought was to follow her to prevent her death. As she approached the door, I pushed her inside, leaving part of my body outside the door for a split second. At that exact moment, my blood flew into the air. I couldn't comprehend what had happened until I saw my eyes bleeding—then I realized I had lost my eyes. I couldn't stop myself from screaming in pain as blood poured everywhere. Mira froze even more when she saw On step in front of the door. How could he enter? And what was that blood covering him? Was it mine?
I thought of nothing but escaping, so I grabbed Mira and headed to the basement. Pursuing us was difficult, undoubtedly due to the library spells. As I ran, my wound opened, and I fell as soon as I reached the basement. It was completely empty—no symbols, no spells—except for a coffin-like box standing in the center. On descended to the basement, but his fear was obvious to everyone. It seemed Nawa had left, the test was over, and the high-ranking demon was gone as well. Am I really dying in this empty basement? What is the value of my life if it ends this way? Then Mira shouted at the top of her lungs: "Don't act like a little girl and be brave, you fool! Don't let fear control you just because you reached a dead end…" On stabbed her before she could finish her words. For the first time, a surge of anger and hatred overtook me. I grabbed my dagger and tried to decapitate him, cutting his suit instead. He threw me from his mouth, and I crashed into the wall. My back was stabbed and broken, one eye lost, a hand severed. These were my injuries, but I cared more about Mira's safety. For the first time in my life, I changed my opinion about other humans. In this oppressive class society, someone was born with light and goodness in their heart, and I fell in love with him in half a night! I tried to kneel to her, and he placed his foot on her stomach and laughed. I tried to scream with all my strength until I spat blood. Is this what helplessness is? My second eye went dark gradually as I heard a voice in my head: "How does it feel to lose everything? How can you live with the hell your weakness created?" Was I going mad in my final moments? I opened my eyes to find On and Mira frozen. I could stand easily, so I realized what was happening was in my mind, and I might actually be dead… I saw the box's lock removed, so I tried to open it and found someone sleeping inside. He was a young man of remarkable beauty, but his skin seemed long dead. For some reason, I felt I had seen him before. I tried to approach and touch him, only to confirm he was truly dead. But what was a corpse doing in my basement all this time, and how had it not decomposed? I opened my eyes slightly to realize I had been dreaming, still lying on the ground. But why was On standing frozen in place? I couldn't understand what was really happening. All I could sense were the blood covering me and the hallucinations of my dying delirium. Then On spoke:
On: "How are you here!? What evil has been unleashed on this world?"
His head split in half in an instant, and he collapsed to the ground.
In a single second, I felt the earth shake—a massive earthquake engulfed the entire world, as if it could not contain what had been released upon it. Silence fell over the mansion; every whisper of the demons vanished, as if they had fled from something approaching, or perhaps they were all destroyed in that instant. I couldn't know what happened, but I realized one thing: whatever had emerged from that box… no longer mattered. I was already dead.
— The Death Game Has Ended —
— And Something Worse Has Begun —