Chapter 120: The Sovereign's Decree
The silence in the underground bunker was oppressive, heavy with the lingering tension of the day's events. It was the night after the "incident"—the moment Ren had been forced to kiss Mina Kimo to bypass the biometric security and save her life. While the act had been a tactical necessity, the weight of it hung in the air like a thick fog.
In the dimly lit room, two beds were pushed against opposite walls. Mina lay on one, her breathing deep and rhythmic as she finally succumbed to exhaustion. On the other bed, Ren Vority lay perfectly still, but his eyes were wide open, staring at the cold concrete ceiling.
Sleep was a luxury he couldn't afford. Every time he closed his eyes, he felt the thrumming vibration of the mechanical eye—the eye that had replaced his lost sapphire iris. It felt alive, a parasitic entity rooted deep within his optic nerve.
Suddenly, Ren sat up. The restlessness in his soul was too great. He stood up silently, his boots making no sound on the floor, and walked toward the small, cramped bathroom. He shut the door and splashed freezing water onto his face, trying to wash away the phantom sensations of the day.
As he looked into the cracked mirror, the red glow of his new eye flickered.
"Alright," Ren whispered, his voice cold and devoid of patience. "Tell me. What are you?"
From the depths of his own reflection, the shadows began to swirl. A pale, ethereal mist seeped out of Ren's eye socket, coalescing into a spectral form that floated in the cramped space of the bathroom. It was Thomas. His soul was translucent, flickering like a dying candle, but his face carried that same arrogant, twisted smirk that Ren had grown to hate.
"I didn't expect you to take it this well," Thomas's soul whispered, his voice sounding like wind whistling through a graveyard. "Most men would have gone insane by now, feeling a dead man's soul tethered to their brain."
Ren didn't flinch. He leaned against the sink, his gaze unyielding. "Because I already knew. I felt your presence the moment this eye was fused into my skull. Now, cut the games. Tell me what the hell is going on."
Thomas let out a hollow laugh. "Straight to the point as always. Fine. Let's start with the truth: The 'Book of Secrets' you found? It was a fake. I planted it. I orchestrated the leaks, the maps, even Mika's involvement. All of it was a play to ensure that you—the Butcher—would be the one to inherit this eye."
Ren's eyes narrowed. "I know. I figured that out the moment I saw the hidden scripts. Get to the power, Thomas. What does this eye actually do?"
Thomas's spectral form leaned closer, his eyes glowing with a faint, sickly light. "You've already tasted a fragment of it, haven't you? It is the Eye of Sovereign Command. To whoever possesses it, the world becomes a stage of puppets. When you look into the eyes of a target and issue a decree, their very soul is forced to comply. They have no choice. Your words become their reality."
He paused, a glint of malice in his eyes. "For normal humans, you don't even need eye contact. Your voice alone is enough to stop their hearts or make them dance. But for Vaners... it's a bit more complex."
Ren remained silent, absorbing the information. He thought about the Titan in the Frost-Spire, how it had simply ceased to exist at his command.
"You'll believe it when you use it more," Thomas continued. "But everything has a limit. This power is absolute, yes, but it is bound by the hierarchy of Vane energy. It will work flawlessly on anyone from Rank 10 down to Rank 5. But once you face the elites—Rank 4, 3, 2, or the 'Kings'—the resistance becomes too high. You can't simply tell a God to die and expect him to follow through. Not yet, anyway."
"So, you gave me a weapon with a safety catch," Ren remarked, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
"I gave you the keys to a kingdom!" Thomas hissed. "You should be thanking me. You can test it if you don't believe me."
Ren looked at the ghost of Thomas. A dark, predatory thought crossed his mind. He didn't like being a part of someone else's plan. He didn't like being a vessel for a soul that thought it could manipulate him from beyond the grave.
"Test it, you say?" Ren asked softly.
He locked his gaze onto Thomas's spectral eyes. The red glow in Ren's socket intensified, the black 'X' spinning with a violent velocity. Thomas's smirk vanished. For the first time, even as a soul, he felt a genuine, bone-chilling fear.
"Wait... Ren, what are you doing? I'm the one who gave you this!" Thomas stammered, his mist-like body beginning to vibrate. "Don't try it on me! I'm part of the eye! If you—"
"Die" Ren commanded.
The words didn't just vibrate in the air; they tore through the spiritual plane.
Thomas's soul let out a silent, agonizing scream. The red light from Ren's eye acted like a vacuum, lashing out with tendrils of dark energy that wrapped around the ghost. Thomas began to evaporate, his very essence being shredded into nothingness by the weight of the command.
"You... you monster..." Thomas gasped, his face dissolving into the mist. "You were meant to be my... my legacy..."
"I am nobody's legacy," Ren whispered as the last of Thomas's soul vanished into the void.
The bathroom returned to silence. The mist was gone. The presence that had been nagging at the back of Ren's mind for days was finally silenced. He had used the power of the eye to kill the very man who gave it to him, erasing his existence entirely.
Ren looked back into the mirror. The red glow faded, returning to a dull, deceptive sapphire. He felt a slight ache in his temple—the "disadvantage" Thomas was going to mention—but he didn't care. He had control now.
He walked back into the bedroom. Mina was still asleep, her face peaceful in the moonlight filtering through the bunker's ventilation shafts. Ren looked at her for a long moment. He knew that the path ahead was paved with the corpses of those he would command to die.
Thomas wanted to use me as a tool to live forever, Ren thought as he sat back down on his bed. But he forgot one thing. You don't give a butcher a knife and expect him not to use it on you.
He closed his eyes, finally feeling a sense of cold, dark peace. The mission in the Northern Frost-Spire was still ahead. The Titans were still waiting. But now, Ren wasn't just a soldier with a sword. He was a King with a voice.
And the world would soon learn to be very, very quiet when he spoke.