Chapter 189: End of Trial
Trial Three was nothing like the others.
If the first had tested survival, and the second had tested will, then the third trial—this final gauntlet—tested soul.
The moment Verena and Isolde stepped through the threshold, everything changed. Gone were the glowing halls and labyrinthine corridors. Gone were the physical traps, elemental puzzles, and celestial beasts. Instead, they stood beneath an endless obsidian sky. The stars above blinked sluggishly, as if watching, waiting.
Below their feet: glass. Or what looked like glass. It reflected nothing but darkness, and yet every step echoed like a heartbeat.
Then came the pressure.
An overwhelming weight, like guilt condensed into atmosphere. Isolde straightened, fists clenching as though resisting something. Verena stumbled slightly before regaining her balance, her throat tightening around a sudden surge of emotion.
"Where... even are we?" Verena whispered.
"The Endscape," Isolde muttered grimly. "This is where the Zodiac Weave untangles you from the inside out."
As if summoned, images began to surface around them—floating fragments, like mirrors dipped in starlight. Scenes from their past. Choices. Moments they thought buried.
Verena watched, frozen, as a scene flickered beside her. It was her—back in the real world—before everything. Alone at her desk. Head in her hands. Crying. Not because of heartbreak, or magic, or destinies. Just life. Loneliness.
The pressure grew.
From another angle, Isolde’s fragment hovered into view. It was her as a child, kneeling in a courtyard, covered in bruises and gripping her practice blade like it was the only thing keeping her alive.