Chapter 213: The Tunnel of the Future I
Back in Gods’ Prison...
Kai crossed another tunnel, stumbling toward yet another grim end. The tunnels of the future bent like an endless maze, each passage closing with a portal that shimmered like liquid dark glass. At every dead end, he faced a choice: surrender to the future it offered, or resist and keep searching for the one that led him home.
Before stepping through the next portal, he glanced at his gashed arms, wounds that healed slowly, unnaturally, as if the prison wanted to keep him whole for more torment. He leaned against the dark stone wall, trying to summon a tender memory of Reneira. But even those precious moments were slipping away like smoke, fading. He knew that once he crossed this threshold, more of his past would vanish. Only when a forgotten fragment sparked within him did the next portal take shape, and once he passed through, there was no going back, and he would return to the tunnels.
He had long lost track of time. Minutes, hours, or centuries, it was all swallowed by this eternal place. He closed his eyes and whispered hoarsely, "Wait for me, wife."
Then, gathering the last of his strength, he stepped forward and the world shifted.
He found himself in the heart of a battlefield. His sword was buried in a human chest. With a rough pull, he tore it free and looked up into a gray, angry sky. He stood atop a mound of corpses. Behind him, Shadow roared, his beast bound to his fury.
He had slain so many, men who came to plunder Thegara, to steal its mines, to trample its people’s rights under foreign feet. To make them human’s slaves.
He closed his eyes, breathing. But the air stench of blood. Rain fell in slow, heavy drops, washing the blood from his face, but not the guilt behind his eyes.
Thunder cracked across the sky. Kai turned his head away from the sound, his gaze falling on the bloodied forms of his men.
"The golden dragon is dead!" Gamma Axe called out.
The King of Thegara descended the slope of bodies, his steps heavy, relentless. His eyes locked onto the dragon’s massive corpse, and beside it, the lifeless bodies of Queen Gloria and her lover Rail, lying close as if death had been their final truce.