The spaceship touched down with a quiet thrum, its landing gears sinking slightly into the strange obsidian soil of the dark side of the planet. A mist curled through the air—slow, creeping, almost alive—hiding the towering, jagged rock formations that loomed over the surface like petrified titans. The place felt ancient. Stilled. Not dead… but waiting.
Kiyomi's instincts screamed for her to stay on alert. Violet, in his usual flair, attempted to make a joke but it quickly died in his throat. Something about this place refused levity.
That's when Atama clapped both of them on the back with exaggerated cheer.
"Hey, Kiyom-es and Violet-dude-san!" he grinned with cartoonish mischief. "I need a few hands to help me look for Neotherite stones—very shiny, very rare, very important! Go that way, yup, over those sketchy cliffs and beneath that mildly cursed archway. Make sure they're nice and good! Bye!"
Before they could protest, he was already pushing them along with exaggerated gestures and half-spoken riddles. Eventually, they wandered off, slightly confused but obedient.
Atama turned.
Seko stood still, his shadow long beneath the lightless sky, as if the planet itself bent around him. His eyes had not lifted since they landed.
"You knew I wanted to talk," Seko said, voice low.
"I didn't know," Atama replied, stepping closer, his usual playfulness fading. "I felt."
There was a long pause. Then Seko told him everything. About Nirvana. The dungeon. The goblins. The blood. The smirk. The man who was not a man. The terror that didn't belong in that moment, but had chosen to be there. A figure beyond reason or species—something he had buried beneath willpower and silence for all these years.
When the words were done, they hung in the air like ash.
Atama didn't speak for a while. He plopped himself onto a jagged rock, arms folded over his knees, staring ahead into the mist.
Then, finally, he said, "So you've encountered one of the Absolute Beyonds... huh."
Seko looked at him. "What the hell is that?"
Atama's expression was unreadable, his golden eyes gleaming dimly in the dark.
"Entities outside all laws. Beyond time, beyond death, beyond anything our current reality frameworks can interpret. Not gods. Not demons. Something else. They don't follow fate… they rewrite it. They don't have limits. They are limits. You say he looked human?" Atama tilted his head. "Yeah… that tracks. Some of them find it amusing."
Seko felt a cold dread settle in his stomach. "Why her?"
Atama didn't answer right away. Instead, he picked up a small black stone from the ground, holding it up to the faint reflection of the stars above.
"Maybe he was bored. Maybe he saw something in her. Maybe it was random. Or maybe..." He looked at Seko. "He wanted you to remember."
Silence stretched again.
Then Atama added softly, "This one... the one you're describing. I've only felt echoes of it before. Like scars on the edge of existence. A being of bloodlust. If he's awakened again... well..." He grinned without joy. "Let's just say your life was never going to stay simple."
Seko closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, they were fierce, focused.
"Then I'm going to find him. And when I do—"
"You won't win." Atama interrupted, flatly. "Not yet. You're thinking in terms of revenge. Humans think like that. Even vampires. But this? This is going to take more than pain."
He stood up, brushing dust from his pants. "It's going to take understanding what you're fighting. And becoming something more than just what they made you."
Seko didn't respond. But something in his stance changed.
The night sky split open with a thunderous burst of crimson and violet. For a brief second, it painted the entire dark side of the planet in a surreal hue, like some divine omen tearing across the void.
Seko's head snapped upward. Firecrackers?
No—flowers. Giant, glowing fauna-shaped fireworks spiraling into the sky. There was only one person flamboyant and weird enough to make a distress signal this dramatic.
"Violet," Atama muttered, eyes narrowing, lips still dusted with snack crumbs. "That's an SOS. Let's go."
Without another word, the two darted toward the origin point—gliding over broken terrain, ducking beneath jagged ridges, the wind howling in unnatural tones behind them. When they arrived, a disturbing silence had replaced the earlier burst of light.
Kiyomi and Violet were standing in a clearing surrounded by stone pillars etched with ancient inscriptions. The air was thick with a magnetic tension, like something spiritual was watching them from behind the rocks.
Seko's eyes landed first on the wall carvings.
It depicted a man, sitting cross-legged in a Choza pose, arms limp, his back against a jagged throne of bones and roots. Blood spilled from his body like rivers, and yet… all around him, creatures were bowing—monsters, mortals, even figures resembling gods. Some carved figures had their eyes darkened, mindlessly tearing at one another. Others wept and prayed. The wall was filled with violence, madness, and reverence all spiraling into this one central figure.
Kiyomi turned to them, disturbed. "This isn't a warning. It's a devotion. This entire place was built around him."
Violet stepped closer to the carvings, gently brushing the dust away to reveal ancient symbols lining the base of the wall—words written in a dead tongue. He'd managed to decipher a few of them, mumbling softly, "...Chosen One... Devourer of Sanity... the Crimson Echo..."
Kiyomi tilted her head. "This figure—he's the same man we saw in Seko's vision, isn't he?"
Seko didn't reply, but the cold certainty in his eyes said everything.
Then Atama strolled forward, chewing on something crunchy, utterly unfazed. "You guys know this language?"
Everyone looked at him.
"No?" He leaned forward dramatically. "Okay, then let me examine it... hmm... yup. I've learnt it now, thank you."
He smiled smugly and dusted off his hands.
Kiyomi blinked. "You what—?"
"I said I learnt it. Instant fluency." He stepped toward the stone and tapped a line of script. "It says: When all minds fall, when the soul breaks upon itself, He shall sit among the corpses of sanity. He does not conquer. He does not save. He simply... watches."
The air went cold.
Violet's usual goofy energy was gone. He looked shaken. "I felt something while reading it. Like something was pushing into my thoughts. Like it knew I was reading about it."
Seko's hand unconsciously went to the hilt of his weapon.
Kiyomi muttered, "What... what kind of thing is he?"
Atama exhaled deeply, for once letting the weight of the mystery settle in without humor.
"He's not a god. Not a demon. Not even a being that belongs to any category we know. What we're looking at is one of the 'Absolute Beyonds.' And not just any—this one is referred to as The Witness. A being that thrives not by acting... but by being seen. By being remembered. By being feared."
Seko clenched his fists. This wasn't just connected to Nirvana. It was the thing that took her.