CRYMSON X DAWN

Adriana's world went dark, and when she opened her eyes, she found herself standing in the midst of a dazzling labyrinth. Towering above her were colossal mirror shards of different shapes, their surfaces reflecting every possible angle of the surrounding crystaline landscape. The mirrors seemed to stretch on forever, forming a maze of silvered glass that threatened to consume her.

‎As she gazed around in wonder, Adriana realized that the labyrinth was contained within a magnificent Glass Castle. The castle's walls undulated like a liquid, shifting and flowing like the lens of a kaleidoscope. The glass seemed to be alive, its surface etched with intricate patterns that shimmered and danced in the soft, ethereal light. Beyond the labyrinth stood a large gate that seemed to give of an eerie silver glow.

‎Every step Adriana took echoed through the labyrinth, as if the mirrors were amplifying her movements. She felt like she was walking through a dream, where every reflection revealed a different aspect of herself. The mirrors seemed to be showing her the deepest, most hidden corners of her own soul.

‎She looked at the three large mirrors Infront of her. She noticed that the mirrors were not just reflecting her physical appearance. They were also revealing her deepest fears, desires, and memories. She saw glimpses of her childhood, her relationships, and her most private moments. The mirrors were laying bare her very essence, and Adriana felt both fascinated and terrified by the revelations.

‎The labyrinth seemed to be shifting and reforming around her, as if it were responding to her innermost thoughts. Adriana stumbled upon a mirror that reflected a memory she had long forgotten – a summer afternoon spent by the lake with her family when she was a child. The reflection was so vivid that she could almost smell the water and feel the warmth of the sun on her skin.

‎ Suddenly, the mirror shattered, and Adriana felt a pang of loss. But as she turned to leave, she saw that the shards of glass had reformed into a new reflection – one that showed her a possible future, a future where she married the love of her life. But it shifted and showed an image of the bodies of her friends and loved ones ,their mangled corpses scattered around the ground of the burning streets of the city.

‎She instinctively smashed the mirror with a bolt of lightning.

‎Looking down at the broken shards, she realized that the labyrinth was a metaphysical one.

‎" A manifested world." She muttered.

‎" Is this your doing? " She spoke raising her head to face her reflection in the mirror to the left. The reflection smiled wickedly the stepped through into another mirror changing back into Antoine Winfred ,the Apostle of Dread.

‎" Oh so you noticed."said Antoine, his voice dripping with amusement. Adriana took in his transformed appearance. His skin shone like bright silver.His translucent hair cascaded down his back like silk, and his physique seemed more chiseled than before.

"Where am I?" Adriana demanded, trying to keep her voice steady.

"You're inside my domain, _Porta e Argjendtë e Kalasë së Xhamit_," Antoine replied,

"The Silver Gate To The Glass Palace."his eyes glinting with malevolence.

"This realm reflects the pain of my targets, their negative emotions, their regrets... everything will stare back at them just like they peer into a mirror"

"Let me out of here!" Adriana demanded.

Antoine chuckled, his voice echoing off the mirrors. "I'm afraid that's not possible. You see, I wanted to swallow up the entire city, but something is stopping me. I don't know what you did but it sure is effective.I pulled to your mind inside instead. I'll deal with whatever that was once I'm done with you."

Adriana made a water whip and lashed at the mirror. It broke but Antoine simply stepped into another mirror.

Adriana's eyes widened in horror as he transformed into her father.

"Your father, always so disappointed in you," Antoine sneered, his voice taking on her father's tone. "He always wondered why you could only use water magic instead of the lightning magic that set the Listowells apart from the other nobles . Your brother had more promise. He was ore successful, more talented, more loved."

"I'm ashamed to be your brother, " he said, transforming into Rey.

" I always hated how you used to lecture me. Do you really expect me to listen to someone like you? I surpassed you in every way and even attained a Supreme Enchantment." He said, his voice dripping with malice.

"Something you could only dream of achieving. You've always been in the shadow, Adriana. Always the inferior sibling."

Adriana's anger began to boil over and she destroyed that mirror too but Antoine wasn't finished yet.

The shards in the ground showed scenes of Sharone ,Kojo and the others.

"Sharone, your dear friend, always so much more confident than you," Antoine said, his voice taking on Sharone's tone.

"And Kojo saw how weak you were, how fragile. He knew you'd never be able to keep up with him, never be able to match his strength." She turned to face away.

"You're just a weak little girl, Adriana," Kojo's reflection in a nearby mirror sneered at her,his voice echoing off the mirrors. "You'll never be strong enough, never be good enough."

Antoine appeared and touched her shoulders.

" Give up." He whispered into her ear.

Adriana summoned a water vortex around herself, shattering the glass mirrors. In a fit of emotion he charged at Antoine, sending forth streams of water that cut through the mirrors he was hiding in.

Antoine laughed as he moved through the shards.

"You're just proving my point.You're a weak human who can only lash out when your weaknesses are exposed."

As he spoke, he attacked her from the mirrors, his reflections pulling her into memories of her loved ones and warping them into twisted, nightmarish versions where her people died horribly or where she was betrayed and stabbed by the people she cared for, their laughter and taunted echoing through our the Glass Palace. Adriana stumbled back, her mind reeling from the onslaught of painful memories.

Antoine's voice echoed through the labyrinth, his words dripping with malice. "You'll never escape this place. Give up."

He took advantage of the opening and blasted her several meteres away with a powerful energy beam.

Adriana tried to stand but her mind consumed by the agony of Antoine's words. He has attacked her with a psychic energy wave that amplified all the negativity within a person causing those emotions to gnaw ath their very beating and ultimately consume them from the inside out. She fell to her knees trying to resist. A sharp headache brought her to tears. Antoine's laughter echoed through the labyrinth, a cold, mirthless sound that seemed to come from all directions at once. He snapped his fingers and images of her lover ones.

Kojo, Sharone, Koniko ,Lin,Kakra,Billiam,The King and Queen the other leaders of Moonshadow the entire populace of Ekron

All of them with sinister grins on their faces as they accused her.

" Burn the witch." Antoine yelled from within the crowd began chanting it. The landscape changed as Antoine's reflections closed in around her, their twisted, mocking faces leering at her from every angle. She was trapped in a living nightmare, with no escape from the torment that Antoine had created for her.

******

Kojo's eyes narrowed as he sensed two worlds being attempted to be manifested one from within the city and one from Faust. He has to act fast or the story would end. He knew he couldn't get to Faust quick enough and even if he could,he wouldn't be able to do anything to stop the other one from manifesting. In that split second,his instincts took over, and he swiftly stabbed Caliburn into the ground. The blade cut the manifested world away from reality. The world's connection to the physical realm was severed.

Kojo had used the skill Split Psyche so whlie he dealt with Faust,he at the same time activated Resonance Amplification vibrating all the surrounding area and pushing the city into another dimension. This temporary shift disrupted Antoines manifested world causinng him to make the decision to activate the realm within his mind and pull Adriana's consciousness into it.

Kojo came back to his senses. A second had barely passed through all these events yet he panted like he'd been running for hours.

" Wait. I usedResonance Amplification. I thought you said I couldnt use it?"

( No. You stupidly made copies of your skills and gave them to him hoping to stimulate and heal The damaged magic circuits in his body, idiot.) Sysia said annoyed.

"Why didn't you say anything?" Kojo asked.

Sysia's response was laced with sarcasm. (Oh, I don't know, maybe because you're not as clever as you think you are. You should have figured it out yourself.)

" Well I -"

( This just proves how lost you'd be without me)

Kojo recovered and straightened. Looking around,he found himself standing in the midst of a desolate, eerie landscape,the only light coming from an eclipsed sun that have off a neon orange glow. The air was filled with an otherworldly melody, a haunting lullaby that seemed to reverberate through every cell in his body. In the distance was the statue of a naked woman with her hands clapped together as if in prayer while cloth spiralled loosly around her body. She had a bandage around the upper part of her face and two Halo's a smaller one inside the bigger one and a four pointed star at the center of the small halo.

Kojo saw chains had been wrapped around the statue. His eyes followed the chains and he realized that they diverged and bound thousands of body that were suspended in the space above them.

(This is a world made manifest.

'The Maiden's Lullaby from Namless Fortress,' a 5-dimensional space that operates within the boundaries of eternity yet remains totally separate from it. It appears to be a perfected version of an earlier manifested world.)

Kojo's eyes scanned the horizon, taking in the surreal scenery. The landscape was a twisted, and the eerie voice that sung the lullaby made his blood curl. It was like the feeling you get when chalk scrapes on a chalkboard.

Or fingers.

The lullaby growing louder and more intenseand the void seemed to be watching him.

(Be careful, Kojo. This is unlike anything we've seen before. It's as if the creator has taken every nightmare, every fear, and every doubt, and woven them into a tapestry of pure madness.)

Kojo took a step forward but instinctively threw himself to the side, avoiding a blast that left nothingness the ground he was standing on mere seconds ago.

As he landed, he gazed around, he saw Faust appeared from behind the massive statue, his eyes fixed on the stone figure. He reached out a trembling hand and touched the statue, his voice barely above a whisper.

"Beatrice... you're just as beautiful as the day I met you."

Kojo's eyes narrowed. " Ok that's...weird."

Faust turned to face him, a hint of madness in his eyes.

"Welcome Kojo Atari tothe space I created over several decades, a sanctuary to resurrect my beloved Beatrice. The previous incarnation was lacking so I used it as the foundation for this perfected one."

" I have no idea what you're talking about." Kojo responded.

"A twisted smile appeared on his lips adding to his madness.

"I did all this to gain a better understanding of people. You see, Kojo, I can alter anything I have an understanding of. And making contacts with those I do not all as a means to get closer to my goal."

"You've been harvesting souls." Kojo realized.

Faust's expression turned cold.

The air erupted with a series of blasts, and Kojo leapt into the air , his Dragonfang flashing as he blocked a beam of energy.

A second blast came from his right and tore off his arm. He made a swing firing an arc of ice at Faust.

"I expected to kill you on the second strike." He said as the ice evaporated before reaching him.

Faust was about to say something but suddenly doubled over, coughing up blood. The locket around his neck seemed to be wearing out, its surface cracking and fading.

"It's draining my life force, just to maintain this fortress," Faust gasped.

"I'd hoped to use it, and the souls I've gathered, to finally resurrect my lovely Beatrice. But you've forced my hand, Kojo."

Kojo's expression was grim. "I don't know what your beef is, but going this far just to resurrect someone is a bit creepy. You need to accept that death is final. Once you're gone, it's over."

(Like you're one to talk.)

"Shut up." Kojo whispered.

Faust's eyes darkened, his expression twisted in anger.

"You're just like them. All those who laughed at me, who made a mockery of my work. Only Beatrice saw me for who I truly was. And the world took her from me."

The air seemed to grow colder, the shadows deepening into twisted, nightmarish forms. The bodies suspended in the air dropped to the ground, morphing into monstrous creatures . They swelled and burst, their forms twisting and contorting.

Faust's voice rose above the chaos. "Beatrice's resurrection will have to wait. Once I've dealt with you, the heathen, I'll redefine you and use youre essence to bring her back."

Kojo dodged beam from his blindspot the attack. The landscape itself seemed to turn against him, the ground erupting with chains that sought to bind him.

As he fought, Kojo shouted at Faust, "Do you truly think you can pull this off? Bring back the dead?"

Faust's response was confident. "Yes, I can. And I will."

Kojo's eyes locked onto Faust's.

"But will it be the same Beatrice you knew and loved, or just an empty shell that looks like her?"

Faust's expression twisted in rage, and he fired a blast of energy at Kojo. The attack took the form of a massive cross with two horizontal bars, its surface etched with twisted, nightmarish symbols.

Kojo dodged the attack, but was caught by the chains. Faust stepped forward and pulled out the cross, making his way toward Kojo.

" Die!" He yelled charging at him