CHAPTER 47: EYE THAT SEES THROUGH

The ground beneath Fade’s boots rippled—not from motion, but instability.His vision stuttered. The golem hadn’t even landed a second blow, but reality itself was starting to fold. Lines blurred. Angles twisted. The silence was too sharp, like a blade drawn across thought.

Then—

A pulse. Not heard. Felt. Like something inside his bones had been struck.

Fade staggered sideways, his palm pressed to the ground—but even the texture of the stone felt wrong. It was smooth and cracked and wet and hot all at once. His breathing grew shallow.

[Chemosense Triggered – Emergency Protocol Engaged]

[Cognitive Distortion Detected – Analyzing Environmental Data]

The world vibrated behind his eyes. Smells returned first—charred protein, wet copper, the sour tang of discharged ether residue.

Then came emotion.

Not his.

[Emotive Echoes Detected – Despair. Confusion. Dismemberment.]

Chemosense was trying to stabilize him, anchoring his perception through layered signals. But it was like gripping sand in a storm.

The Dicyanin Golem hadn’t moved again. It didn’t need to. Just existing was enough.

Fade clenched his teeth and launched into motion—not an attack, just survival.

Phantom Leap—instinct, not strategy.

[Skill Activated – Phantom Leap]

[Kinetic Surge: +8m directional displacement]

In an instant, he blurred across the chamber—body flickering like a misfired hologram. He landed near the far wall, breath ragged, head pounding. One knee touched the floor. It wasn’t enough.

The mirrored shards orbiting the golem rotated, angling toward him again. But they didn’t reflect reality anymore.

They reflected him—dying. In dozens of ways.

His jaw shattered in one.

His spine cracked in another.

His skin melted in a third.

He looked away. He had to.

Fade rolled forward as a shard flashed—just as a beam of pure distortion sliced through where his torso had been a heartbeat earlier.

[Refraction Pulse Avoided – Phantom Leap Residual Acceleration Used]

[Warning: Neural Overlap Detected – Short-Term Hallucination Risk Increased]

The golem still hadn’t chased him.

Because it didn’t have to.

Fade could feel his brain trying to unwrite itself, sensory data unraveling in real time. There were no stat screens, no enemy readouts. The system had gone quiet.

That terrified him more than the golem.

And still...

He stood.

Shadow Chain in hand. Body trembling. Chemosense fighting to hold his mind together. Phantom Leap on cooldown. Every breath felt like it was being filtered through a broken mirror.

This was not a normal fight.

This was a test of what remained after self fell apart.

And he was already cracking.

The weight in Fade’s skull didn’t vanish——but something inside him clicked.

His breath steadied. Not from peace, but programming.Neuromotive Override surged online, silent and efficient.

[Neuromotive Override Active – Threat Reflex Window Enhanced]

[Reaction Time: +10%]

[Adaptation Level: Synchronizing...]

The distorted world didn’t stop writhing, but he began to read it.Every twitch of the Golem’s mirrored shards, every faint vibration in the floor—it was no longer chaos. It was a pattern, jagged and alien, but now visible.

Fade rolled left as a shard lashed out like a whip—its reflection showed his throat split open. But the real cut never landed.

Instead, Fade spun with the motion—sliding along the chamber’s wall—and vanished into shadow.

[Skill Activated – Phantom Rend]

His body dematerialized in a smear of motion, like ink dissolving in water. The Golem’s head-plate turned—too slow.

Fade emerged behind it.

Then struck—twice.

One blow from the left, another from the right—angled through shifting blind spots between the shards. His shadow-wrapped blade sliced through a crystalline joint behind its left shoulder.

[Critical Hit Registered – Damage Output ×1.7]

[Golem Integrity Breach: Peripheral Node Compromised]

[Chain-Link Effect: Surge Window Enabled]

He didn’t pause.

His form blurred again—reappearing under its side, chaining into a rising slash toward the Golem’s underarm vent. Glasslike fibers cracked, sending a ripple through its torso. One of the orbiting mirrors sputtered, its light warping into static.

Then the backlash came.

A pulsewave of photonic pressure blasted from the Golem’s body.

Fade flew backward—striking the curved wall hard enough to crack it. Dust fell in arcs. The echo of his own heartbeat rang like a warning bell in his skull.

[Warning: Light Distortion Pulse – Internal Balance Disrupted]

[Iron Nerve Discipline Active – Cognitive Stability Retained]

He coughed blood—but remained focused.

No panic.No collapse.Only grit.

"It’s learning," he muttered. "Adjusting the field."

The mirrored shards realigned. This time they didn’t show death—they showed hesitation.One shard displayed a version of him frozen mid-step. Another—falling. Another—running.

The Golem wasn’t just reacting to attacks. It was reflecting decision points.

Fade planted his feet and reactivated the Chain. The weapon slithered like a shadow-spine around his wrist.

No time for fear.Only pattern.Only pressure.

And the pressure was rising.

He circled the Golem slowly. Not running—decoding.Each shard that spun around the creature was a riddle in motion. They didn’t reflect the world as it was.They reflected what could happen.

Neuromotive Override filtered as much as it could, parsing threats, anchoring reflex—but the volume of variables was spiking beyond threshold.

[Neuromotive Sync Stability: 87% → 74% → 61%]

[Warning: Overload Approaching – Predictive Models Incoherent]

Fade launched the chain again.

This time, aiming not at the Golem—but at the space between its reflections.

The mirrored plates spun in reaction—projecting fake versions of himself mid-attack. He nearly hesitated, but Iron Nerve Discipline clamped down like steel.

[Iron Nerve Discipline Active – Panic State Suppressed]

He drove through.

The chain caught one of the rotating shards—crackled, sparked—shattered it.A scream echoed in the chamber.

But it wasn’t from the Golem.

It was his.

From one of the reflections.

Fade gasped. The pain didn’t hit his body—but somewhere deeper.His memory. His spine.Like a glitch in his own sense of self.

[Cognitive Desync Detected – Illusory Feedback Imminent]

[Warning: Perception Drift Rising]

The ground buckled.Only it hadn’t.

He looked down—his legs were intact. No wounds. No burns.

But in the reflection behind the Golem, he saw himself crawling. Bleeding. One eye swollen shut.Begging.

That version of him reached a hand out, eyes wide. "Don’t leave me behind," it mouthed.

Fade froze.

The Golem’s chest pulsed again—another wave burst forth. This one wasn’t physical.

It tore through intent.

[Chemosense Overstimulated – Psycho-Organic Feedback Loop Detected]

[WARNING: Multiple Realities Overlapping]

[Mental Integrity: 58% and falling]

His hand shook.

He tightened it into a fist.

"No."

The next step wasn’t a dodge—it was desperation.

He activated Phantom Rend again—but this time his exit point glitched. He rematerialized too far left.He clipped a shard. Blood arced into the air as a gash split across his shoulder.

[Health: -19 HP]

[Bleed Status: Mild]

Still moving, still attacking—he swung the chain upward into the Golem’s side and landed another crack. The monster shuddered.

Another shard fell—another reflection gone.

But now, the Golem changed tactics.

Instead of reflecting Fade...

It started showing others.

Kaela—screaming.Zeyna—burning.Arven—motionless.Darin—turning away.

Each shard began to flash with scenarios that never happened—but could.

"NO."

He struck the wall behind him.

His vision split—two, four, then six directions. Like prisms spinning inside his mind.

[Neuromotive Override: 41% Efficiency – Emergency Stabilization Failed]

[Iron Nerve Discipline: Adaptive Suppression Limit Reached]

He dropped to one knee.Chest heaving. Blood dripping.The chamber trembled, or maybe it was just him.

"I’m... unraveling again."

But this time, it wasn’t just hallucination.The Golem had seen through him.

It didn’t need to strike anymore.It just needed to keep showing him himself.

He knew what came next.

Collapse.

Unless...

He couldn’t hear anymore.

Not sound. Not sense. Just silence, warped and ragged—like static in the bones.

Fade knelt in the center of the chamber, body twisted, hands pressed to cracked stone. Blood smeared across his palm, his lips, the floor.

[Phantom Rend: Cooldown – 42s]

[Neuromotive Override: Offline]

[Iron Nerve Discipline: Critical Stability Failure]

[Chemosense: Nonresponsive]

The system wasn’t silent. It was broken.

The shards surrounded him now—not orbiting the golem, but him.Reflecting pieces of himself like a shattered mind made manifest.

One showed a younger Fade—clean, confused, begging for peace.

Another showed him grinning—covered in blood not his own.

A third...Empty.

The Golem hadn’t moved in a full minute. It didn’t need to.

Fade had become his own battlefield.

His hand twitched.

"I’m not done."

But it was a whisper, not a vow.

One of the shards pulsed—echoing the words, but reversed.

"Done... not... I’m."

He shut his eyes.

Then opened them.

But they were no longer his.

The shadow at his back thickened.

Not just longer—alive.

A low vibration spread beneath the floor, subtle as breath.

And then—

[System Override Detected – Classification Tier: Undefined]

[Legendary Skill Activation: DARK FORM]

A sound like thunder caught underwater tore through the vault.

Fade’s body arched back—fingers curled as if holding lightning.The chain wrapped around his forearm snapped free—not from strain, but submission.It bowed to what rose within.

His skin dimmed—not black, but lightless.His veins glowed with dull crimson, like dying stars trapped under flesh.

A horn—not quite real—began to emerge just above his temple.Not physical. Not visible. But the space around it bent.

[DARK FORM – Status: Active]

[All Attributes Temporarily Increased by +50%]

[Spectral Integration: Shadows Obey]

[Reflection Immunity: True]

[Duration: 3 Turns – Cannot Be Reused]

Fade stood.

But not as he was.

His breath no longer steamed. It didn’t need to.The air moved around him now. Like it was nervous.

The shards hesitated.

The Golem shifted. Its mirrored halo fragmented—one, two, four pieces simply disintegrated mid-air, unable to hold form.

And Fade...

Walked.

Not fast.

But final.

One step.

Then another.

Then he vanished.

Not as a shadow.But as the void the shadow fears.

He reappeared within the Golem’s core—inside the fractal glow beneath its ribcage.

The chain struck first.

Then his fist.Then nothing.

Because when the blow landed...

Time bent.

The Golem fractured not with sound—but absence.

The silence wasn’t peace.

It was aftermath.

The Dicyanin Golem collapsed—not like a machine, but like a body. Its glasslike limbs trembled as they struck the floor, thin fractures spiraling through its translucent shell. The mirrored shards that once spun around it clattered lifelessly to the ground, no longer reflecting futures—just jagged distortions of the present.

Fade stood still.

His breath was heavy, shoulders rising and falling in slow rhythm. Blood trickled down his nose, drying against his skin.

He didn’t rush forward.

He watched.

The golem’s corpse lay sprawled across the center of the vault. From this angle, it looked less like a creature and more like a shattered sculpture—its veins of light fading into dull crystal, the once-rotating halo of glass now resting like debris around its misshapen head.

There were no eyes to stare back.

But Fade could still feel something lingering.

A pull. Faint... and growing stronger.

Wisps of translucent matter began to rise from the corpse, drifting toward him—light and memory, laced with something deeper. The Dybbuk within him stirred in recognition.

He didn’t resist.

[Devour Triggered – Compatible Entity Identified][Dybbuk Lineage Accepts: High-Level Entity Fragment Detected][Synthesis Beginning...]

As the fragments of essence touched his skin, Fade felt... nothing like power.

Instead, he felt his sight split.

His body remained in the ruins—but something behind his eyes cracked open.

And then the system returned.

[ENEMY CLASS: Dicyanin Golem]

Type: Psycho-Reflective Construct

Level: ???

Core Composition: Photonic Vein-Glass

Capabilities: Multi-Reality Projection / Distortion Field / Mirror Consciousness

Origin: Unrecorded

Status: TERMINATED

[FADE – LEVEL UP]

Level 10 → Level 11

[Stat Points +5]

[Skill Points +2]

Health Restored: +30%

Passive Recovery: Activated

[STAT WINDOW – UPDATED]

Name: Fade

Type: Dybbuk / Vantablade

Level: 11

Experience: 0 / 4200

Health: 150

Power: 30

Agility: 35

Intelligence: 13

Endurance: 10

Defense: 8

Mental Resilience: 12

Spirit Power: 15

Stat Points: 5

Skill Points: 12

[PASSIVE ABILITIES]– Sword Mastery II– Unreflectable Move II– Echo of the Soul– Silent Zone– Shadowheart Pulse– Shadow Reflection– Neuromotive Override (Synthesis)– Iron Nerve Discipline (Synthesis)

[ACTIVE SKILLS]

– Phantom Leap– Shadow Contract– Soulfall– Shadow Chain– Phantom Rend (Synthesis)– Dicyanin Eye (NEW)

[UNIQUE TRAITS]– Devour – Adaptive Absorption (Dybbuk Lineage)– Synthesis – Blood Echo Binding (Dybbuk Exclusive)

[TITLES]– Shadow Slayer– Chosen of the Path of Death– Devourer (Infamous – feared and shunned)

[New Ability Acquired – Dicyanin Eye]

Type: Hybrid (Active/Passive)Duration: 25 secondsCooldown: 5 minutesTier: Soulbound – Dybbuk Signature

Effects:– Pierces illusions, cloaking fields, hidden entrances, and temporal echoes– Reveals emotional residue from traumatic past events– Tracks Eidolon traces and psychic imprints left by entities

Side Effects:– Distorted vision, mental strain, potential addiction to echo-images– Violet-blue glow, fractured iris, non-static pupil– Extended use causes visible blood-vessel stress and intense migraines

Fade’s hand rose instinctively to his left eye.

It wasn’t burning—but it wasn’t still either.

The iris shimmered, glowing faintly in the dim vault light. It pulsed—alive in a way that eyes should not be. Cracked patterns shimmered across its surface, and the pupil no longer stayed centered... it spun.

He blinked.

And saw the world unravel.

The vault was no longer just stone and silence. He could see... traces.Blood that had been cleaned.Screams that had never echoed.Flickers of shadowed motion that had long since died.

[Passive Effect: Eidolon Trace Detected – 3 Echoes Present in Vicinity]

[Emotional Debris – Residual Trauma: Sacrifice, Abandonment, Collapse]

[Warning: Prolonged Exposure May Induce Neural Saturation]

He shut the eye.

Hard.

The echoes faded, but the memory of them didn’t.

Fade remained still, hand over his face, breath steadying slowly. The victory was his... but it had left something behind.

A gift.

And a cost.

And from now on...

He would see things no one else could.

Whether he wanted to or not.