Crossing the threshold of the mill was not like walking through a door, but like being swallowed by something that breathed with ancient patience, a will that had no need to hurry because it knew that, sooner or later, everything would end up inside it. The undead surrounding the structure did not react immediately to my presence, as if they were part of a greater mechanism that did not respond to impulse, but to an inner rhythm I still did not understand. Their bodies moved clumsily, but not weakly, and every one of their steps seemed synchronized with the deep heartbeat coming from within the mill. I did not face them with fury, nor urgency, but with an economy of movement that came not from strategy, but from the exhaustion carved into every muscle. Every strike I made found its place with precision, every shield bash opening a small gap in a tide that never truly broke. I pushed forward through them, feeling them close in around me, their hands finding the edges of my armor, their fingers searching for gaps, seams, the places where flesh was still exposed. There was no hatred in them. No intention. Only blind obedience to something that had emptied them of everything else. And in that absence, I found something worse than violence: inevitability.
When I finally crossed the entrance, the change was immediate and absolute. The sound of the outside vanished as if someone had shut an entire world behind me, and the interior of the mill unfolded into an architecture that obeyed no logic. Beams stretched at impossible angles, the walls seemed to shift whenever I looked away, and the central axis, the great mechanism that should have ground grain, turned slowly, oozing a dark substance that was not flour, nor dust, nor blood, yet carried something of all three. The sensation was the same as in Valebrun. The air was thick with whispers that never fully became words, laments that seemed to be trapped within the wood before they could ever escape. With every step, I felt watched, measured, as if the mill registered my presence and reshaped itself around my movement. The stairs did not lead to the same place twice, the corridors narrowed and widened without warning, and more than once I felt I was walking in circles, only to realize the space had shifted just enough to betray my memory. It was not a place. It was a process. And we were part of it. I found them when the sound of battle managed to break through the constant murmur of the mill. It did not happen all at once.
First came the echoes: steel clashing, magic bursting, the strained cry of someone who no longer had breath to sustain it. Then, at last, the scene revealed itself. Aldric held the line as if his body were the last wall between life and something that did not deserve a name. Every movement he made carried a weight that was no longer just physical, but emotional, as if he were fighting something within as much as without. Serah moved behind him, summoning roots that burst from the very wood of the mill, twisting as if the place itself rejected her magic, as if nature had become sick within those walls. Maelor barely remained standing, his hands trembling as he channeled a magic that was clearly consuming him. And Eldran stood a few steps behind, wrapped in an energy that could not be fully defined, something caught between doing good and taking pleasure in it. When I took the final step toward them, something in the scene tightened. Eldran saw me first, and his face twisted into anger. There was frustration there, bitterness, a tension that had nowhere to go. Maelor reacted differently. His eyes widened with a mix of shame and relief, as if my presence were both salvation and accusation. Aldric said nothing. He could not. Serah barely turned her head, just enough to confirm it was me, and she smiled. I stepped closer, planting my shield into the ground for a moment to steady the weight of my body.
—It's fine —I said quietly—. You did what you had to do. Maelor lowered his gaze.
—Captain… I… I don't know what happened…
—You don't need to explain —I said, shaking my head.
And it was true. I did not need it. Because I had already seen it. Because I already understood. Because the valley did not need reasons to twist a man's choices. Eldran clenched his jaw so tightly I could see the muscles strain beneath his skin. He said nothing. He did not apologize. He only held my gaze with an intensity that bordered on hostility. His choice had revealed something he was only beginning to grasp. The mill groaned, pulling me back into the moment. It was a warning of what was about to happen. There was no direct strike, only a presence at my back that had not been there a heartbeat before. Something slipped through my armor beneath the plate, finding the exact space between metal and flesh. The pain did not come at once. It spread slowly, a deep pressure radiating outward, followed by a cold that did not belong to any natural wound. I looked down. The black tip barely emerged beneath my chest, and a laugh reached my ears. Not the open cackle from before, but something quieter. Intimate.
—So understanding… Captain…
The voice of one of the witches slid into me as she slowly pulled the weapon free, savoring it, letting the damage settle, letting the poison find its path.
—Let's see how long that lasts… once you start rotting from the inside…
The world did not stop, but inside me, the rhythm of my blood began to reverse. The moment felt old. Familiar. Like a memory. The mill had just opened a door. I was not fighting to survive. I had not come to save the children, nor to protect my companions. I was exactly where I was supposed to be. That was why the witch struck me so easily. That was why I had passed through the undead. That was why Lyria had arrived at the perfect moment. Just when I thought I was becoming the hero who would save them all, when I believed I was defying fate, a poisoned blade revealed the truth. I was a faithful servant of Agramor.