"That... is not human."

The Relic's whisper made Surya's entire body tense.

The man in the black coat still stood about twenty meters away. His face looked ordinary—almost too ordinary. Yet the smile etched across his lips felt unnatural, as though someone were attempting to mimic a human expression without truly understanding it.

Silence blanketed the stone street. Not a single person dared to move.

"Wh-who are you?" Dimas asked, his voice shaking.

The man didn't answer. He merely tilted his head slowly.

Crack...

The sound of grinding bones echoed clearly. His head kept tilting. Forty-five degrees. Ninety degrees. Until it was nearly upside down.

Rina clamped a hand over her mouth to keep from screaming. "That's not human..." she whispered.

The Relic spoke again. "Do not look into his eyes."

Surya immediately lowered his gaze slightly. "Is he a monster?"

"No."

That brief answer only made Surya more alert. "Not a monster?"

"Something far older."

Before Surya could ask anything further—

The man in the black coat stepped forward. A single step. And then...

His body suddenly shattered into a cloud of black shadows that fluttered away like smoke. In an instant, the figure vanished into thin air.

Silence.

"He... left?" Mr. Yusuf muttered.

Surya shook his head. "I don't think so."

For some reason, he felt that the entity had intentionally let them live. As if they weren't yet worthy of being killed.

The surviving group wasted no time leaving the Stone City behind. No one wanted to spend a single second longer in that cursed place.

The path they now walked opened up into a barren wasteland. No trees. No buildings. Only cracked gray earth stretching as far as the eye could see. The sky remained perpetually overcast. The sun never once rose. Time felt as though it had ground to a halt.

Throughout the journey, no one spoke much. They were still haunted by Rio. Still haunted by the stone people. And now... by the mysterious man in the black coat.

Surya took the lead at the front. Every so often, he felt a faint pulse radiating from the Soul Sigil on his palm. The Relic had also grown much quieter, as though closely monitoring something.

A few hours later...

They arrived at an expansive valley. Everyone instinctively stopped in their tracks.

Standing before them was a colossal stone gate. It stood well over fifty meters tall, supported by two massive pillars flanking a black arch carved with bizarre reliefs. The carvings depicted weeping humans, kneeling monsters, and a cloaked figure wielding a pair of scales.

In the center of the gateway... there was no door. Only a wall of gray light rippling softly like the surface of water.

"This is..." Dimas swallowed hard. "A gate?"

Surya nodded slowly. Yet what sent a chill down his spine wasn't the sheer scale of the portal. It was the ancient script etched across its lintel. The characters slowly shifted and re-formed into a language they could comprehend:

THE GATE OF SACRIFICE

Moments later...

The ancient voice that had once welcomed them to the Ash Forest echoed once more. It didn't come from a single direction. Instead, it slipped straight into the mind of every living person present.

"Every step toward power..."

"...always carries a price."

"To cross the gate..."

"...sacrifice that which is most precious to you."

Silence swallowed the valley whole. Mr. Yusuf furrowed his brow. "Most precious?"

"Does it mean... an object?"

Before anyone could answer, a stone altar slowly rose from the earth directly in front of the gate. Atop its surface rested ten hand-shaped depressions—precisely matching the number of survivors left.

The Relic whispered softly. "Place your hand."

Surya took a deep breath. "No choice, huh?"

"None."

He stepped forward. The others exchanged glances before finally following suit. One by one, they pressed their palms against the stone altar.

The moment Surya’s skin made contact with the rock—

The Soul Sigil on his hand flared to life. Black light poured downward into the altar. And then... the mysterious voice sounded again.

《Sacrifice Commencing.》

The next second... every survivor shrieked in unison.

"AAAHHH!"

Each of them clutched their heads, their faces contorting in agony. Surya experienced the exact same torment. But the pain wasn't physical. It struck deep within his mind. Something... was being ripped away.

He saw flashes of his past. A young boy running across a backyard lawn. A man laughing as he hoisted him high into the air. A woman calling out to him from the kitchen.

"Surya!"

"Come eat!"

Surya smiled unconsciously. "That..."

Memories. The fragments he had left.

Yet suddenly... a shroud of black fog consumed it all. The man's figure vanished first. Then the woman. The house. The yard. Everything slowly dissolved into nothingness.

"No..." Surya tried to chase after them. But the faster he ran, the farther those memories retreated. Until finally... they vanished. Empty. Utterly empty.

Surya snapped his eyes open, gasping heavily. Tears streamed down his cheeks. "Why..."

He tried to recall. His father's name. Blank. His mother's name. Blank. His family...

Silence. Nothing at all.

All he knew was his name—Surya. Only Surya. He no longer knew what family he came from, where his hometown was, or what lineage he belonged to. As though he had simply blinked into existence out of nowhere.

"My name..." Surya frowned. "Why... do I only remember Surya?"

The Relic answered calmly. "The Gate takes that which is most precious."

rato: "Your family identity."

Surya lowered his head. His chest felt hollow. It was bizarre. He knew he should feel sorrow, yet he couldn't even remember what it was he had lost. That realization hurt infinitely more.

On the opposite side of the altar, the other survivors met a harsher fate.

Mr. Yusuf lost his wedding ring. But it wasn't the physical band that vanished—it was every single memory of his wife. He gripped his head, weeping openly. "I... I know I was married... but... my wife's face... why can't I remember?"

Rina collapsed to her knees, having lost the sound of her younger brother's voice.

Dimas remained silent, still recalling everyone he knew, yet stripped of the reason why he had ever aspired to become a teacher.

Everyone lost something different. Something they cherished above all else. The Gate didn't steal physical items; it carved away pieces of their souls.

Slowly... the wall of light in the center of the gate began to tremble. The ripples smoothed out, and the portal slowly parted.

"The gate..."

"It's open."

The Relic vibrated. "Enter."

Surya took the lead, stepping forward through the barrier of light. Instantly, his vision turned stark white. His body felt weightless, as though plunging into an endless abyss.

A few seconds later... his boots touched solid ground once more. Surya opened his eyes. And... for the first time since arriving in the Shadow World, he was completely lost for words.

Before him stretched an impossible world.

The sky... was no longer empty space. Overhead... stretched a boundless, vast expanse of blue. Water hung suspended in the heavens like a colossal ocean blanketing the entire horizon. Fish the size of warships drifted lazily through the depths. A giant whale glided silently among the clouds.

The water never fell. Gravity seemed to have forgotten how to function.

Dimas stared upward, his jaw slack. "Good god..."

Rina forgot to breathe entirely.

Mr. Yusuf dropped to his knees in a daze.

Surya gripped the Ancient Ash Sword, his eyes unblinking as he drank in the impossible scenery.

The Relic whispered softly, its tone laced with a rare, profound caution.

"Welcome..."

"...to the Inverted Ocean."