“What do you mean! What do you mean!”

‘Sashal?’ I thought, still hazy.

“Please Sahsal, calm down, we’re trying our best, but we’re not seeing any improvement, he’s stable but not waking up.” I heard Quinn’s voice.

I was in eternal darkness, trapped within myself, hearing everything, but couldn’t do anything. I heard footsteps, and a hand clenched my right arm. It was warm, and my body reacted, as I could feel the side begin to freeze. It was only then when hot water drop hit me when I responded, my eyes opening.

I quickly stood up, panting, looking around, scanning my surroundings. It was a white room, filled with six single beds, each spanned three metres length away from each other, and white curtains were blocking them halfway, looking to my left side, I saw a red tube which connected to a red bag, which was injecting the liquid into me.

But the other thing I noticed was Sashal on my bedside, beginning to cry and she tried to hug me. I did the same job but stopped; it was a stabbing pain almost everywhere, so I just put the pillows I was on, placed them on the wall, and got comfortable.

I realized that the pain was inside of me, my grey muscles, and my grey body. I almost turned into lightning many times during the battle, and that final attack with Feuer, that was the worst. My memories flooded back into me, and I gasped, and looked down, before having a little chuckle.

“Tell me... if Geoferry dead?” I asked Sashal, looking up to her, seeing a single tear trickling down her left cheek.

“...Yes, everyone was surprised, and people did see him leave when you turned to your nightmare side,” She explained.

“I see,” I took a deep breath in and out, “So, tell me, how long was I out?”

Sashal looked at her watch on her right wrist, “Almost Seven Hours, everyone surprised that you even survived your injuries,”

“I should’ve asked this before, but have any of the two have resurrected?”

“No, and Ace and Geoferry’s project has already begun to be pulled down, Jododams project, the artificial demons, is still up,”

“I’m glad-” I closed my eyes and drifted back for a moment. When I awoke, I saw Sashal running out of the room, her right hand covering her mouth. Focusing on the footsteps, they stopped, and I heard a chunky liquid hit the floor, most likely vomit.

Jododam then entered, every step he took I focused on. He looked down on me, about a metre away and asked me a question, which I didn’t want Sahsal to hear the answer through.

“Your eyes, can you see?” He asked

“Of course I can see, but my left eye, I close my right, and you become only black and white,”

“You know about your arm, but your eye, how does it affect you looking towards someone’s soul? Source, something that no one else can do,”

“It’s fine, I only just lost and arm which I see as a positive,” I summoned the chains on my right stump which was once my right arm and grabbed a glass across the room and pulled it towards me. I created a spiral of lightning at the bottom and created small pieces of ice which melted on impact.

After the glass was full, I took a drink of the water and placed the glass back. I pulled my chain again, and it disappeared.

“You could say I’m colour blind in one eye, it’s hard to focus, could I have some, you know, eyepatch?”

“Aye aye matey,” Jododam moved his right arm like a pirate, imitating a hook.

“It’s unlike you to joke around Jododam,” Slightly turning my head.

“I thought it would be better to do that before showing you this.” He pulled out a folder from his jacket and handed it to me. I placed my hand onto the envelope and used my chain to flip through the pages.

The first page had large black letters that read; MISSION: WHITE DOME, which had intrigued me, so I flipped to the next. There I saw a piece of paper which I scanned through, seeing that it was talking about the project I was a part of to get this body.

I flicked towards the next page and saw even more information about the classifications and their numbers. During the reading, Jododam had put an eyepatch over my wounded eye, making it far easier to read as it was all in colour.

“Class one: Number of failures: 327, Number of success: 1… This information, three hundred and twenty-seven people died so that one could survive?”

“Indeed, it was hard, but when we cracked the code, it was perfect, the subjects’ families have still gotten income from this project, I’m not that horrible Dyestral.”

I kept reading.

‘Class Two: Number of Failures: 5, Number of Success: 28’

‘Class Three: Number of Failures 1, Number of Success: 2’

“Sashal and Adlif were class three’s, and if the final one survived, it would’ve replaced me as your chosen? Isn’t that right?”

“The truth can hurt, can’t it?”

“I’m not harmed in any way shape or form.”

‘Class Zero: Amount: 2’

“Sashal and I,” There was no need for class threes, as there was only one left, so our numbers changed.

I read through the rest of the information and saw that there were profiles of all the victims, before and after, their sources and measurements, their backgrounds, most of them were just random people from villages around Onsice.

It didn’t surprise me, but what was next did. The final page had a large red stamp pressed on it, leaving the words in a red box; TERMINATE. I closed the folder and looked down, beginning to chuckle, the duel between Feuer and I wasn’t only for Antral, but Antrite as well.

Jododam seeing this handed me another folder and told me to read it, this one was called; MISSION BLACK DOME. I began to read through this as well, this time, at the end there was a picture of the king of Onsice: Nicholas the Great, with a giant red word in a red box saying; TERMINATE.

I looked towards Jododam in disbelief, but I just began to scroll through the pages again. After completing it, I looked over it back, this time faster, then again and again. I counted, one, three, ten, twenty-five, eighty, one hundred and thirty, all those numbers I had surpassed by countlessly reading it.

By the nine hundredth time, I closed it panting, a single iced tear trickling down my face, going underneath my eyepatch. I looked towards Jododam and asked him if it was true.

“... I’m afraid it is, Black Dome has already gone ahead and will commence in a week,” He got up and walked away.

“...One thing,” Jododam turned around, waiting for me to continue. “The class two subject known as Rowan Baki, I want you to try and save him when this happens,”

“Any reason why?”

“We’re not the best of friends, but I don’t want him to die, try and increase his chances, put him next to me… Is that clear?” I looked towards Jododam with eyes of wanting and needing, something he had not seen for a while.

“I’ll see what I can do, but now I’ll be leaving you to rest, that blood bag attached to you is such a good treat, even I’m jealous.” Jododam walked out of the room, leaving me alone, as I stared out the outside window.

“One more thing, Dyestral!” Jododam poked his head back into the room, throwing me a book onto my lap, “You missed it, but… happy birthday.” Jododam smiled and disappeared from my view again.

No one had an exact date of my birth, all except I was born on the coldest winter night sixteen years ago in Diashin. It was halfway through winter at that point, and I was rare, the townsfolk called my parents mad nine months before to try and have a child in the middle of winter, but they didn’t care.

I was born, and I survived, having white hair since birth, and a demonic soul even I didn’t know existed. I was sixteen now, and the fall of a kingdom lasting ninety-two reigns was just a week away.