As Caius and Elliot’s battle against the Nightmare Flower reached its peak on this side, the others’ nightmares were also reaching a new point.
With every cycle, the despair and fear they felt increased, condensing further within them, along with something else.
Something that could devour sorrow and fear and everything else, burning brighter and brighter until it finally exploded.
...
Elsewhere, inside a small room.
A foul, nauseating stench rose, as if a corpse was in the process of rotting there.
Which was exactly the case.
On the worn-out floor lay a small lifeless body.
Just a girl of ten or eleven years old...
Her small body was already half-decomposed, while tiny white worms moved within her hands where flesh and tissue were supposed to be.
As for where her foot should have been, all that remained were clean white bones and a mass of worms struggling there over what little was left.
Her face, which had once been beautiful, was deformed, half of it already gone, and the hollow where her eye had been was now home to larvae.
As for the other half, it had lost all human color, taking on a pale bluish-white shade.
Amid all this stood a tall young man, staring at that girl with an unreadable expression.
The place was silent, and there was no one around, yet a few words slipped into his ears.
Words both cold and warm at the same time, comforting and terrifying.
"Why did you abandon me, brother?"
The voice belonged to a little girl... to Mia.
"Brother, why did you abandon me?"
Mia’s familiar voice echoed in the quiet room, slipping into Kyle’s ears like the whisper of death, as he stared at the corpse lying on the ground, his eyes turning hazy.
Pain surged within him as it transformed into something else.
"You left me... you left me here alone to die and rot."
His face twisted with each word, but this time it wasn’t sorrow—something else had taken its place.
"You said you would protect me... you said you would do anything to heal me."
Without realizing it, the sorrow inside him began to change.
He clenched his teeth so hard that the sound of cracking nearly echoed in the quiet room, and with every word that reached his ears, veins bulged around his neck.
"Liar... I hate you... I hate you."
Kyle clenched his fist, his knuckles turning white, as rage grew wildly within him.
He stepped forward, the worn floor creaking under his weight, while his unrestrained voice echoed in the room.
It held no calmness, no rationality, not even sorrow... only rage.
"Shut up... shut that damned mouth of yours, you son of a bitch."
His furious shout echoed through the silence, while Mia’s voice returned, cold.
"You abandoned—"
"I said shut up." Kyle cut her off before she could even continue, approaching the corpse on the ground with bloodshot eyes.
"I don’t know what this is, but it’s not my sister, and whatever this nonsense is, it isn’t real."
Mia’s voice returned, but this time it asked. "Why?"
Kyle let out an annoyed snort. "Because I won’t let this happen unless I die first."
In the next moment, his voice turned cold and indifferent.
"And because the dead don’t speak."
At that moment, before Kyle could do anything, blue flowers grew around him, blooming in a single instant.
And in a single instant, the heavenly blue light flooded the world around him.
...
Amid rising smoke and the smell of ash and blood, Ellen stood, staring at the barren lands around her.
Lands that had once been fertile, that had held cities and fields... and people.
But now all that remained was ash and smoke.
And the ruins of what had once existed there.
This place wasn’t the only one in such a state.
But across all four empires.
And before her stood the cause of the war itself, and the reason for all this destruction.
The embodiment of absolute desire for power... and her older brother.
Zen stared at her calmly, tilting his head slightly with a small smile on his lips, his pleasant voice slipping into her ears, calm yet provoking.
"You see, sister, just as I told you that day, this was only the beginning... and now everything is mine."
"Everyone will serve me and live for me... or die."
He extended his hand toward her.
"Even you."
Unlike the previous cycles, Ellen stared directly into her brother’s eyes, her fear turning into anger—pure anger rising within her.
She felt the heat, her blood boiling, and for the first time, she stepped toward her brother, her foot crushing the ash beneath it.
Rage burned in her eyes, reflecting her brother’s smiling face.
At her command, the metal scattered across the ground moved and floated around her.
She opened her mouth, her voice echoing through the place.
"I refuse."
With that, shards of metal shot toward Zen, carrying their owner’s desire to tear him apart.
But he did nothing, remaining still in that state, because in that moment, blue flowers sprouted and rose through the ash, their light devouring the world in an instant.
...
In the empty palace, little Izel walked through the wide corridor between large windows overlooking the outside.
Where the world was drowned in the darkness of night, a night with no stars and no moon.
Through that silence, distorted screams echoed, slipping into the girl’s mind.
With every step, she heard the crying of the small child more and more... while the voices of her parents grew clearer.
But no matter how much she tried to follow the source and find them, she never succeeded.
She tried and tried... but found nothing.
So she did something else.
With a small flame in her hand, Izel walked along the windows, where the curtains hung and swayed.
As she moved forward, her flame touched the curtains, and fire spread across the fine fabric, reaching the ceiling within moments.
Behind her, the orange light of the rising flames pushed away the darkness outside, burning the place and turning it into ash.
"You abandoned me... so I will abandon you... forever."
She muttered, her orange eyes burning like the flames themselves as she reached the exit of the palace.
She stepped into the garden she was once familiar with before turning to look at the palace behind her.
Her beautiful home... and also the embodiment of her nightmare.
In her eyes reflected the flames devouring the walls, the ceilings, and everything.
At that moment, blue flowers lit up in the garden, and the world faded into their light.
...
It was true that they didn’t remember what happened in previous cycles, but those lingering emotions accumulated time and time again, condensing within them.
Until they turned into anger... pure, uncontrollable anger, to the point that it resisted the nightmare itself.
Whether it was Kyle, Izel, or Ellen, all of them had reached that stage.
But what did that mean?
Would they do something amazing and break the influence of the Nightmare Flower?
Would they realize they were inside a dream and carve a path out of it?
No... none of that.
Their accumulated anger didn’t mean anything.
If it did, those stronger than them wouldn’t have gone mad under the influence of the Nightmare Flower.
If anger alone could change the course of things and overturn the balance, then nothing in this world would have any meaning.
It was true that the three managed to distort the nightmare and negate its effect.
But that was only once.
Only once, and the Nightmare Flower would rebuild everything again.
And begin another cycle of despair, erasing all that anger... as it always had.
So as the blue light devoured the three dreams, it rebuilt and twisted them more than ever before.
In the end, those small nightmares were only the beginning... and their anger was the key that overturned everything.
But even for the Nightmare Flower, things did not go as it wanted.
Before the new nightmare could be completed and the cycle of suffering could begin again, it lost its life.
The ethereal blue light faded, and the flowers within the dreams withered one after another, while the consciousness of the three began to return to their bodies at the same time, memories of what happened slipping into their awareness.
At the same time, in the middle of the city and within the massive pit, dozens—perhaps even hundreds—of tendrils collapsed, their weight crushing the tunnels and causing chunks of concrete to fall along with the rainwater.
At the center, fragments of the beautiful blue petals scattered everywhere, losing their color... just as it lost its life.
The blue liquid flowed from the torn body of the Nightmare Flower, mixing with the storm’s torrents below.
Beneath the black, cloud-covered sky, and within that dark pit, the blue blood shimmered amid the streams of rain, forming its bright and beautiful paths among those forgotten ruins.