When he concluded that he couldn’t trust his own senses, an old man’s gruff voice dropped from above his head.
“Why are you making so much noise?”
Blayden tilted his head back and looked up.
A black bird, with the head of an owl and the body of an eagle, sat on a silver branch.
Arigl, the guardian of the Shadow Lands.
Its icy white eyes were piercing, and its chest was densely covered with crescent-shaped golden feathers.
“Who dares to awaken my deep slumber?”
Arigl spoke through his feathers, his beak closed.
“I am Blayden Metheus Leharto, warrior of Kiavek. I wish to see the leader of the Shadow Spirits.”
Each time his words boomed, the feathers sparkled.
Blayden did not avoid the dazzling light and straightened his shoulders.
“Ask your riddle.”
Black wings flapped, the wind swirled, and the leaves made a metallic sound.
“I am cold. I am hot. I give life. I take life. I am within you. What am I?”
Blayden answered without hesitation. “Water.”
The wind stopped. In the suddenly silent forest, even the leaves ceased to rustle and froze.
Arigl’s question alone thundered in the space, as if life had drained away.
“What is the longest thing in the world?”
“The king’s hand…”
Blayden answered just as quickly.
“Why?”
“Because it kills people without touching them.”
Um-ha-ha-ha.
An eerie laugh shook the heavens and the earth.
“Oh, arrogant human, the third riddle will be your death.”
Arigl’s eyes turned red, and the sky rumbled.
“Tell me. How many feathers do I have in total?”
Blayden looked directly into its eyes, which glowed like fire.
“Ninety-nine thousand nine hundred ninety.”
“Wrong.”
“It’s correct. Count them.”
As he retorted calmly, Arigl’s eyes hissed and shed white tears.
Coo-coo-coo-coo.
Coo-coo-coo-coo.
Arigl, letting out a bizarre cry, bowed its head and began to peck at its feathers with its beak.
“One. Two. Three.”
Blayden smiled knowingly and walked past the tree.
The answer isn’t about getting it right.
It’s about insisting.
A grayscale landscape continued.
Blayden, walking on fallen leaves that emitted a rotten smell, heard a voice.
“Ignorant human, where are you headed?”
A gray-white tree made of bones spoke, waving its branches like arms.
A large eye hung from a branch.
Its pupil, the fulcrum of a balance scale, changed color moment by moment, reflecting the sunlight.
A rusty bronze beam extended long from the pupil, to either side.
At the end of the beam was a silver dish.
The scale was perfectly level, with a red flower on the left dish and a dagger on the right.
“I wish to see the Lord Charik, the Lord of Darkness and Guardian of Light.”
Blayden looked straight up into the eye and replied.
The pupil blinked and then transformed into dark blue lips.
“If you walk straight along this path, you will reach the River of Regret. If you safely cross that river, you will be able to have an audience with the Chief.”
He didn’t want to think about what would happen if he couldn’t cross safely.
Blayden bowed his head slightly to the tree in thanks and turned.
The balance beam swayed, creaking.
“What enters is the body, and what leaves is the mind.”
The trees that had been bending over him as if looking down now straightened, and sunlight poured down.
Shadows in the shape of swords and spears stretched along both sides of the path.
Blayden walked, avoiding their sharp tips.
The flow of time dulled again.
As he moved forward with the breeze, the sun’s rays grew hot.
The wind was warm, but his body felt a chill.
His face had a slight fever, but his feet felt cold, as if walking barefoot on ice.
At the end of the narrow, winding path, which seemed to mix summer and winter, a river finally appeared.
Mist hung heavily around the milk-white water.
It’s like the path to the underworld.
As Blayden took a deep breath, a small wooden boat, bobbing on the rippling water, floated towards him.
The boat, barely large enough to hold one person, was pitch black, and a small oar lay in a corner.
Blayden got into the boat and began to row.
The boat glided across the water.
It was then, as he held his breath at the excessively serene scenery, that the boat creaked and tilted.
Blayden staggered and then gasped in terror.
The oar flapped in his grasp.
It thrashed like a living fish, then flew into the air and coiled.
The wood, which had been hard just moments ago, changed shape from moment to moment.
It was a snake emitting an alluring light, then transformed into a thick mass of hair.
The tightly braided clump of red hair whipped him a few times like a lash, then wrapped around his neck.
The more he tried to pull it off, the more the hair tightened around his neck like a noose.
Blayden, choking and falling while fighting the monstrous thing, was horrified by a squishy sensation.
The boat he was in had transformed into a spider.
A giant black spider squirmed its thick legs on the water with him on its back.
He tilted his head back, blinded, and a hot sensation pooled above his head.
His hair, caught in the blazing sunlight, shimmered as if about to ignite.
The heat flowing through his hair pecked at his skin, while the mass of hair crushed his windpipe.
Blayden gasped, choking.
The air grew thin, and the scenery before him blurred and faded.
Gasp, gasp, submerged in his own ragged breaths, Blayden lost consciousness.
Before everything went dark, he thought he heard a voice calling him.
“Sir Rehart!”
Leni.
Blayden blinked, his mind hazy.
The clear sky came into view.
Warm sunlight caressed his face, and a gentle breeze ruffled his hair.
He was lying on a riverbank covered in wildflowers.
A deep shadow stretched long above him, then spoke. “It’s been a long time, Sir Rehart.”
The voice sounded like an eternally aged elder and a newborn child all at once.
Blayden rose and faced the shadow.
“It’s good to see you again.”
A rounded, featureless face, with a body’s shadow draped in an ash-grey cloak.
Charik, the ruler of the Shadow Lands, made a bizarre sound, as if mixing laughter and tears.
“It’s been three years already.”
Has it been that long?
“Yes. We met in Ruhachen.”
It was about three years ago, around the time Equillium was subjugating the minor kingdoms.
Blayden, while fighting in the rugged northern mountains, was surrounded by a pack of wolves controlled by Shadow Spirits.
For some reason, the shadows had intervened in a human conflict.
Blayden, who had evacuated his unit and engaged in single combat, was severely wounded by wolf bites.
“To think someone survived an attack from my elite soldiers. Living for three thousand years, there’s not much left to surprise me, but that was quite an interesting situation.”
At the time, Charik had prophesied to a bloodied Blayden that he would likely die, but if he survived, he would gain a special ability.
Blayden, rescued by the Kinolf unit, lay unconscious for three days, teetering between life and death.
When he regained consciousness, he realized he had gained the ability to discern objects in darkness.
They said Shadow Spirits played mischievous tricks when the sun set; perhaps he would put that ability to good use today.
To come seeking help from the Shadow Chief, with whom he had once been an enemy—indeed, one could never know what the future held.
“Sir Rehart, what is the reason you seek me?”
Charik omitted any grandiose rhetoric.
Blayden also didn’t beat around the bush.
“King Tigrinus of Equillium is gravely ill. He has been diagnosed with a sickness of the mind. I request that you give me the Shadow Flower to heal the King.”
Charik took a step closer.
“It’s not difficult to give it to you.”
This time, Blayden tensed at the whisper, delivered in a soft female voice.
It could be a trap.
He shouldn’t act rashly.
As he hesitated, Charik asked, “You must choose. If you fail to obtain the Shadow Flower, one person will die. If you obtain it, two people will die. Will you still take it?”
It was a bizarre prophecy.
Was this an extension of the riddles?
“I only follow orders.”
“The warrior who once commanded battlefields is overly humble.”
Another step closer.
Blayden saw himself reflected in Charik’s face, now so close he could vividly feel the coldness.
The flat, ash-gray mass, without features, mirrored him like a looking glass.
The wind blew, scattering his hair.
Blayden stared directly at his own rough, scarred image.
Within the shadow, his lips moved and made a sound.
“I will give you the flower, valuing the courage that brought you this far. If you pay an appropriate price.”
“What price do you want?”
“Your life.”
Charik raised an arm.
A sword-shaped shadow, extending long from his fingertips, pointed at Blayden’s throat.
The wind howled mournfully.
From the sword’s hilt, an eagle with the sun in its mouth flew up and scattered into blood-red smoke.
The shadow was in the shape of the sword Blayden had received from Tigrinus when the conquest war began.
“Gasp, gasp!”
***
Sharino collapsed on the riverbank, completely drenched.
“Phew, I thought I was going to die.”
When the bridge collapsed, all the unit members fell into the Shamut River, and the fierce current swallowed them like hungry beasts.
Below the surface, it was absolute darkness, with not a speck of light.
After struggling for a long time, pulled into the cold, sticky water, they barely managed to get out.
No, it would be more accurate to say the river, bored with its mischief, spat them out.
They had been flung out of the water just when they had given up all hope, thinking this was the end.
“Are you alright?”
Sharino turned to Lentz.
Lentz’s face was pale as he coughed, breathing heavily.
“It’s a strange river. My whole body went stiff like stone; I couldn’t swim.”
“What? I felt like I was stuck in a swamp.”
William, who had crawled over to Lentz, blew water out of his mouth with a “Phoo.”
“My whole body felt hot, like I had fallen into a pit of fire.”
What was this now?
As Sharino’s gaze turned to the black river water, Gabriel’s delicate voice spoke.
“Fire? It was a thorn bush, though. It hurt like thousands of needles were piercing my body.”
It was bizarre.
They had all fallen into the same water, yet experienced different sensations.
“Gustav.”
She was about to ask what kind of trick this was, but Gustav was nowhere to be seen.
Splash, splash!
Silver hair repeatedly surfaced and submerged on the black water.
“Gustav!”
Lentz approached the water and extended a hand to Gustav.
Even after being pulled ashore by Lentz, Gustav kept flailing his arms.
He thrashed his limbs for a long time as if still in the water, then slumped onto the grass on his back.
After a moment, he blinked at the sky, then abruptly stood up and looked around.
“What happened?”
“Are you alright, Sir Gustav?”
Gabriel approached, checked Gustav’s pupils, and felt his pulse.
Gustav’s blue lips trembled as he stared blankly at Gabriel.
“Where… where is this?”
“The entrance to the Shadow Lands.”
“Ah.”
Lentz held Gustav’s arm; he seemed dazed.
“We need to get away from the river for now.”
“Yes. The river seems to be casting spells.”
William stood up and offered Sharino a hand.
All of them helped each other, beginning to climb the hillside with staggering steps.