The room was quiet, almost eerily still.
Zayn lay on the bed, chest rising slowly, eyes closed, the faintest tremor in his hands.
But somewhere deep in his mind, a voice whispered.
“Zayn… you don’t have to fight. Join me. We are of the same bloodline… the bloodline of the Dark Spirit. We are destined to rule together.”
He shivered, heart pounding. Shadows stretched across the room, twisting around him like fingers.
“All of this… the pain, the failures, the deaths… they were not your doing. But you feel the guilt. You feel it in your bones. You cannot protect them all… you never could…”
Images flashed before his eyes: May on the battlefield, soldiers falling, the Five struggling against overwhelming odds. The collapse of the villages, the faces of those he failed to save—every memory,
