He studied it carefully, fingers tracing invisible lines in the air as he spoke aloud to the silent room.

“There are fourteen guards,” he explained, “but I can bypass them. Teleportation magic should get me past most. And the fog — my fog — it’s not just mist. It’s the Remembrance of Forgotten.”

He paused, eyes narrowing.

“The fog doesn’t just obscure vision. It makes people forget. They lose sight, memory... their very presence fades from minds. That’s the power my technique holds.”

Merlin’s gaze shifted to a nearby sentinel standing stoically at attention. “Are these guards powerful beings?” he asked.

The guard’s voice was low, steady. “They are, but not like the others you’ve faced.”

“Good,” Merlin replied, a slight smile curling his lips. “Now, where’s the entrance door?”

“There’s a red coat hanging by the window,” the guard answered calmly. “Open the window, and you’ll find the way in.”

Merlin raised an eyebrow. “And your name?”

“Horamashkitov,” the guard said without hesitation.

Merlin’s curiosity piqued. “What language is that?”

“The Great God Language,” Horamashkitov answered solemnly, “also known as the Legion language.”

The name lingered in the air like a weighty secret, hinting at powers and histories beyond mortal reckoning. Merlin considered it carefully — every piece, every word, another step closer to the mysteries he sought to unravel.

Merlin glanced down at his hands, the faint glow of the tattoos pulsing beneath his skin — especially the broken crown of the fool, a symbol heavy with irony and truth.

He asked quietly, almost reluctantly, “Do you have any weapons I can use?”

The guard nodded and produced a sleek glove, black with faint runes etched along the fingers. “This glove channels energy from your hands, releasing powerful shocks,” he explained. “But it consumes your energy quickly. You’ll have to manage your reserves carefully.”

Merlin’s eyes widened slightly, a flicker of surprise passing through his expression, but he said nothing. The guard’s offer was accepted silently.

As Merlin studied his hands again, the weight of the moment pressed on him. “If things go wrong,” he murmured, “tell the people to evacuate. But… I think everything will be fine.”

He laughed softly, a bitter, self-aware sound. “I’m smart, but not the smartest. I am the fool, to be exact. The unaddressed. I don’t want others involved. I don’t want to be their hero or savior.”

His voice grew quieter, almost a confession. “I do this selfishly — for myself, and for those I care about. Nothing more.”

The commander stepped closer, his voice steady but thoughtful. “People care for others, even when they don’t realize it. But none of us are perfect — only a god might be.”

Merlin met his eyes and asked softly, “But does God truly have no questions? Can a god make mistakes… or accidents?”

The silence that followed held the weight of ages. Even gods, it seemed, might wrestle with doubt and imperfection.

Merlin nodded firmly. “I go,” he said, his voice steady but resolute.

The guard raised a hand calmly. “Don’t worry. I’ve got this,” he replied, eyes narrowing with focus. “It’s a teleportation spell, but there’s one thing — I can’t come with you.”

Merlin met his gaze, understanding the unspoken risks. “That’s a fair deal,” he said quietly. “Just let me get in there.”

The guard nodded, stepping forward. He raised both hands, fingers weaving intricate patterns in the air. Sparks of lightning crackled at his fingertips, arcing wildly before converging into a brilliant orb of cosmic light.

The orb pulsed, sending ripples across the sky. The world darkened — the stars winked out, swallowed by a creeping blackness that blanketed the heavens.

Then, with a sudden burst, the sky shattered back into light, the cosmic shimmer fading as the guard was enveloped by the teleportation portal.

Moments later, the castle stood silent and still beneath the returning stars, the air heavy with anticipation.

The portal tore open — a swirling rift of lightning and cosmic shimmer, its edges pulsing with unstable energy. Merlin stepped through.

With a sound like a breath being drawn in reverse, he was gone.

In an instant, he arrived — standing quietly before the red-coated window just as the guard had described. The sky above was hazy, tinged with that eerie, pale-gold glow of pre-dawn. The wind whispered faintly, as if the world was holding its breath.

He reached out.

His gloved hand touched the cold glass. It wasn't locked.

Click.

The window opened not like a modern pane, but like a hidden door from an ancient world. Slowly, with a creak that felt older than sound itself.

He stepped inside.

And then he saw it.

Books — stacked, towering, leaning precariously. Some bound in leather, others wrapped in chain. Ancient scrolls rolled beside tomes that hummed softly with enchantments. Paper rustled faintly, even without wind, as if the knowledge itself was breathing.

The scent of dust, ink, and old magic filled the air.

This wasn’t just a room. It was a vault of forgotten thought. A cathedral of intellect. A labyrinth of minds that once reached too far.

Merlin whispered to himself, “This... this is not just his library. This is his mind.”

And somewhere, hidden beyond these walls of paper and parchment… was the being he came for.

People were hanging—

not by chains,

but like ribbons of flesh twisted into string,

suspended in the stillness of a place untouched by mercy.

They didn’t scream.

They couldn't.

Merlin stepped deeper into the room.

His voice was hollow now, quiet with dread.

“His mind,” he said.

“This place is his mind.”

Books wept ink.

Some pages turned themselves as if still being read.

The scent changed—old parchment replaced by the bitter sting of blood soaked into paper.

On the walls, etched symbols spiraled and danced like they were alive.

“There is no world without question,” he murmured.

“And the fool these people are…

is more than the fool in me.”

He looked up at a figure pinned to the ceiling by words—

literal letters stabbed through skin like spears.

The man’s face was frozen in shock, or awe, or both.

Merlin clenched his fist.

The tattoo of the Broken Crown on his forearm pulsed, glowing faintly.

“I thought I was the fool.

But they were wise enough to believe.

I... I was only ever clever enough to doubt.”

He walked forward, the floor creaking beneath his boots—

not from age, but from the burden of memory.

In this place, the enemy wasn't strength.

It was thought sharpened into cruelty.

It was logic bent into madness.

And Merlin knew:

This wasn’t just a fight.

It was a descent into the deepest chamber of intellect gone rotten—

where every answer was a knife

and every question was a god.

As Zallard steps forward, the dim corridor widens into a chamber veiled in murky haze. From within the gloom, the silhouette of the throne's top comes into view — jagged, obsidian, and glimmering faintly with red reflections, as if it were forged from the blood of memory itself.

There he is.

Slouched. Waiting. The Hooked King.

Crown of thorns. One eye open. One eye gone.

Zallard steadies his breath.

But just as he tries to shift, something shifts behind him.

SHINGK!

The sound slices the air—

a blade, fast, precise, aimed for his stomach.

He twists on instinct.

—CLANG!—

Steel grazes cloth. A shallow cut.

A Knight of the Crownless Order, expressionless beneath black iron, lunges again.

Zallard responds in a blink—

One swift kick to the knight’s stomach.

A second—sharper, deeper—to the ribs.

"You weren't part of this," Zallard mutters. "Now you're in the way."

But it's not over.

He knows blades. Knows ambushes.

He reaches into his cloak, activates the fog.

Not just any fog—Remembrance of Forgotten.

A vapor that bites the brain, unhooks memory, erases perception for seconds.

The knight reels, momentarily lost in his own thoughts—

his frontal lobe clouded, his awareness gone fog-deep.

Zallard doesn’t waste it.

He steps in and spins, driving a crushing palm strike to the knight’s helmet.